So we should answer. I remember years ago, Sekiroshi and I gave a talk in New York at the big... Mm hmm. some kind of liberal Protestant church which has election. I can't remember the name. And somebody who later became a friend of mine, I didn't know him at the time, decided to go to the election. But he got there a week early.

[01:04]

And the doors were locked, so he thought, well, this might be the way Zen lectures are, the doors are locked. So they found a back door that was locked. They went in and they met a man. They said, are you the Zen master? He said, no, I'm the janitor. The janitor is someone who cleans the building. And it's also related to Janus and transition. Janus is the month that looks both ways. You mean after all the training we've had... I was not sure because it always is blinking.

[02:37]

Well, it's blinking if nice. It's okay. Yeah, it means I'm talking. Also, das Blinken der grünen Lampen ist in Ordnung, das bedeutet das Gespräch. Well, I don't know what it means. Who cares? You can listen. That's what she said. Okay. Starting like Walter... This morning I had a dream. Yeah, so it's quite an early morning dream. And we have a cat. I think we, I hope we have a cat named Charlie at Creston. Christian knows Charlie.

[03:46]

He's what's called an American bobtail. I say he, but actually Charlie's a she. Because she is named after him. The cat, the now dead cat at Johanneshof, who was named Charlie, who was the boy. And it was Sophia's cat. And it's quite a marvelous cat, best cat I ever had. And Marie-Louise has said a number of times it's the best thing I've ever done for Sophia was to get a cat, this cat for her.

[04:52]

Yeah, so I... Anyway, the... It's a cat, former feral cat. Feral means wild. Yeah. You mean the individual or the feral cat? It was a former feral cat. The individual cat. The individual, well, it's ancestors. Oh, that's what I was asking. Okay, I see. Diese Rasse ist ursprünglich eine wilde Katzenform gewesen Somebody liked this cat.

[05:55]

It was found in an Indian reservation junkyard. About 20 or 30 years ago or something. And they bred it into a show cat. And her brother was best of breed. But Charlie, the girl, his sister, didn't have quite the right bobtail. So, anyway, we were weak. bought this funny cat online. Because we were looking for a feral like cat that could survive at Creston because most of the cats have disappeared into the jaws of coyotes and foxes and mountain lions.

[07:13]

Well, she survived for more than three years, I guess now. And she... extremely alert and able to climb things, hide. She's really great. Outside, she's completely, totally alert. But inside, she's just this unbelievably loving cat with Sophia. So we'll go into...

[08:15]

Sophia's asleep. And sometimes when we can't find the cat and Sophia's at school, we look for the cat and she's gone into Sophia's bed, got under the covers and put her head on the pillow. And as of three or four weeks ago, she hasn't been seen. So Louise asked me on the phone, shall we tell Sophia? It probably will never see her. So, of course, we told Sophia. And Sophia just actually flew by herself with her assistant teacher from...

[09:30]

Denver to Frankfurt, landed yesterday afternoon. And she's never been separated from us before. Anyway, so, in my dream, I was shaving. I guess I was already dreaming I should get up. Yeah. And, you know, I was kind of feeling... Excuse me for being so personal, but I'm a little tough on people and life and so on. Yeah, I usually have a view, you know, you have to let things happen, let people, animals take care of themselves. Yeah, so... So in the dream I was feeling a little regret in my tough attitude.

[11:20]

And I guess in the back of my mind was the times for various reasons we just let Charlie stay out at night. But she could climb up the side of the house and she also could go in the greenhouse down at the main house. But she had other places to sleep. Still, I felt a little badly putting her out in the night. After she went to bed with Sophia. Anyway, so then in my dream I went out on a porch. And there was Charlie trying to squeeze under the screen.

[12:33]

And she didn't resist and I pulled her through and she clung to me with her arms. With her arms. So I had this intense feeling of regret and missing this sweet, intelligent cat. So my practice in general, but I'm emphasizing it these days, is to start with whatever feeling I have.

[13:48]

To start any moment, waking up with any feeling I have. Now, what is a beginning point, though? What can't be a beginning point? What's an end point? Any point is a beginning and end point. But some points we notice more as beginning and end point. So as I mentioned briefly at the end of the last seminar, one good way to start is was to start with whatever feeling you have.

[14:57]

So in this case, I would... sat immediately after getting up or shortly after getting up or now. I should start with the feeling of missing and regret for contributing to perhaps to her death. This feeling of loss, of abandonment, of grief and also possibly to have contributed to her loss.

[15:58]

Yeah, so I would start with that as the beginning point of zazen. And as I said, you're feeling lousy, you're feeling good, whatever it is, you take that as the starting point. Yeah, so I'm trying to speak about it. bringing tension into the craft and details of light. We each have a world. We are a world. We each have is a world.

[17:11]

So if you do, let's take the starting point of doing zazen. Because last night you expressed your feeling of... that this seminar would include Zazen as we just did. And some of you, I believe, sat this morning before breakfast. And Walter even dreamed that he received instructions from sages. So I'm also, you know, I want to consider with you really how we can bring sasen into the usual lives we have.

[18:47]

And one of the emphases in all adept practice is the ability to have a continuous, uninterrupted sense of practice. And one of the elements of advanced practice is to have a continuum of practice. But nobody does zazen 24 hours a day. I mean, Jarek might, but most of us don't. So none of us have zazen 24 hours a day. I heard of a Tibetan that sat so much that he couldn't unfold his legs and they'd pick him up and put him in the other place. I don't know if it's true. And I heard of another Japanese Zen teacher who continuously wept.

[20:05]

I think we can understand that. So it helps if you sit more, but still there's always What is continuous practice? When you're sitting, what is it when you're not sitting? We can also ask the question, why continuous practice? What does that mean? But let's put aside that, you know. And just say, well, what is meant by continuous practice? in satsang or in just being alive.

[21:14]

Well, it's certainly an emphasis on intention or a craft of practice. It also means... And it implies there's no natural state or given state. But there's only intentional states. Or in that sense, even if there's no intention, no intention is a kind of intention.

[22:20]

But doesn't mean there's not relaxation or having a cup of tea. In fact, having a cup of tea in the midst of Intention is quite wonderful. And now, you know, yeah, Sabina somehow, Christian, we're now exploring The famous phrase in Zen, have a cup of tea. Why? I mean, what's implied in such... in such few words.

[23:31]

What is suggested when a phrase like that is no longer just a polite invitation, but is somehow an event in itself. Wouldn't any ordinary action, activity, become... an event. Christ's birth. no matter what the historical accuracy, date, et cetera is, is in fact an event in Western culture. There are events in each of our lives. Memories that shine in our memory.

[24:54]

Why do some memories shine in our memory? Yeah, so I'm suggesting as a practice again this sitting in which you start with whatever your feeling is. You don't feel you want to go somewhere and you're sitting, you just want to stay. You don't feel you want to go somewhere and you're sitting, you just want to stay. But you add, but you do add something. You're starting with, I'm starting with this regret and pain and probably losing our sweet adventuresome charlotte.

[26:09]

It was such a strong... It is such a strong feeling. I... It's a kind of pain, but also a kind of treasure. So what do I add to it, though, when I sit? I add the posture. And the mind of the spine is a kind of activity. Because there's a When the spine becomes more alive, there's a feeling of lifting through the spine.

[27:29]

And lifting through the spine orders the whole body in a certain way. Clearly a yoga posture. But orders your shoulders. Yeah. Torso. Neck. Head. And then sometimes these days I'm suggesting you notice how you lose the left and right in your legs. Your legs feel merged, like they're just one sort of unit, triangular unit.

[28:30]

And that happens more if you've been sitting regularly. And then you notice that feeling and bring that feeling along with lifting through your spine, you bring that feeling up through your whole body. And this merged feeling in the legs, you know, it's quite easy to reach into, come to. It's not so easy to bring it up to the whole body. Your whole body kind of loses left and right, up and down. But if you know it in the triangle of the legs, you can find it in your torso too eventually.

[29:52]

Or it will just happen. Now this is something different than just posture. And it's something different than our differentiated state of mind. Now, let's go back to when you first wake up. I think for the yogi, it's not just sasen, it's really noticing all transitions. So when you first wake up, what's happened? Staying in bed a little longer than usual, you may dream you're shaving.

[31:13]

I mean, if you're male at least. There's a lot of published stuff recently about... about transsexuals. And some of the people I practice with are feel they're transsexuals or are. And when I was young it meant somebody who wanted to have a sex change operation. But now it's someone who at least fused and English in America.

[32:22]

Refused to name someone who feels they were born with the wrong body. I've read about some little girl that two and a half her parents would say, well, she's going to do this, and she'd say, no, I'm a he, not a she. Okay. It can go either way. The opposite is the main thing.

[33:25]

This is very interesting. It's understandable once you get somewhere close to puberty, you desire one sex or the same sex, the other or the same. It's very obvious that when you enter puberty, you want to have one or the other sex. But at two and a half, to feel you're born in the wrong sexual body is quite unusual, isn't it? I'm like him. Ich bin ein Eher. Maybe we should have named Charlie Charlotte. Charlie Charlotte. Anyway, so this is quite interesting that you can bring a different sense of body to your body.

[34:27]

I've tried to, when I'm sitting zazen, see if I can shift the sense of, I can shift, switch left and right, but I sometimes see if I can shift the inside I'm facing backwards. And it's very difficult to do. Yeah, I can get it. Quite far, but not all the way. But it's good because, you know, if there was an emergency in Zendo and I'm facing backwards, I wouldn't want to jump off backwards.

[35:31]

Yeah. So this front-back orientation is extremely basic. And it's something we live with. And most of us live with. from sense of being a male or female. Probably deeper than just being brought up as a boy or girl. But if in meditation you bring a sense of no left and right, or a merged sense of the body. You brought something very powerfully transformational

[36:33]

into the ingredients of your life. So again, waking up. The first thing you do is you But you begin to put, you begin to construct consciousness. Consciousness is really a network of A tapestry of concepts. It's like the gorilla on the soccer field, on the football field. You know, I'm told you can see it on the net.

[38:07]

Have any of you seen it? People don't recognize that there is... Yeah. They tell people there's a black team and a white team and they're playing football and keep track of the score or something like that. So people watch it and after, I don't know, 2015 or 20 minutes, they say, what did you see? What was the score? Well, they tell you, did you see anything unusual? No. They show it to people two or three times and finally they point it out.

[39:23]

Even after two or three times, don't see that right in the middle of the field is a huge, larger-than-human-sized gorilla walking around. Eureka Greenway saw the film and she didn't see it the first time. The second time she saw the film, she saw the gorilla. She saw something funny here. Ulrike Grün-Grün hat diesen Film gesehen und hat erst beim zweiten Mal bemerkt, dass da irgendetwas Merkwürdiges vor sich geht. My point is, we tend not to see what isn't part of our conceptual tapestry. Mein Punkt hier ist, dass wir einfach nicht sehen, was nicht Teil unserer mentalen Kapizerie ist. Can I ask something about

[40:33]

Is there a difference between people who are interested in and know the game of soccer and people who don't know the game of soccer? I don't know. I didn't. Because if I, I mean, for instance, when I, there is no, I have no concept of cricket or of American football or of... I understand your idea. Yeah. But they've shown it to business people in Europe and America. And there was no difference. No difference. Okay. Not just showing Americans who think football is a form of cricket. Whether the point of the story is there's been extensive studies done on this. People don't see what they don't expect to see. And it's something totally unexpected. outside your conception occurs, you immediately try to make a conception.

[41:45]

You try to put it in the framework of consciousness. Okay, so the first thing we do usually is we make we put together a tapestry of conceptions. And as we're waking up, there may be only a few conceptions floating around looking for friends. Doesn't anyone else want to get up? So something you have to do later in the day floats in and they start hooking together. And before they've all hooked up with each other, if you peer between them, your dream may still be going.

[42:54]

But eventually makes the thing, you can't go back to sleep. And the next step, as I said when I've spoken about this occasion, you begin to create conceptual consciousness. framework, structure, which you can enact, which you can act in? And that transition is usually marked by the time you stretch in bed, or you flex yourself in bed, and then these concepts become something you can act within. No, as I said the other day, it's the same notation when you fall asleep.

[44:33]

You try to discover that part of mind that stays awake in a sleep. that stays awake as you fall asleep. Usually there's a little physical shudder in the body as you fall asleep. And at that point, if you're able to stay aware, your breathing becomes involuntary, the tapestry of conceptual consciousness falls apart, and things start to float in a new kind of space.

[45:36]

The concepts in the tapestry, especially the breathing and the curly hair, So that little shudder you pass through when breathing becomes involuntary. You can stay aware at that moment. You can usually then... stay aware in the midst of, during sleep and during dreaming. Now this you don't have to do zazen to do. But if you do zazen regularly, it helps to have the kind of mind that can notice things. the transitions of waking and sleeping.

[46:55]

Okay, so if you join, what are you adding to, you're starting with whatever your feeling or mind is at the beginning of zazen. So you start with it and connect with the feeling that is there in the Sase, whatever this feeling is. You add the posture. You add perhaps bringing attention to the breath. Which begins to embody the mind. You bring attention to the mind of the spine.

[48:04]

Now, if you can, in addition, bring the merged body without left and right or something, then you've done something quite Yeah, significant. Because you dismantle the inactable conceptual structure of consciousness. Now, what I'm doing is looking into the craft of practice. looking into the details of simple acts, the details of simple acts that we're usually not present enough within to notice. But it's actually how we live.

[49:24]

It's the largest quantity of how we live because most of how we live occurs outside the tapestry of conceptual consciousness. Because most of what we experience happens outside of this carpet of consciousness.

[49:54]

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