Okay, who will say something? Who will say something? Yes, my little intention at the moment is to open my mouth. My small intention in this moment is to once open my mouth. Great, okay. In our group we exchanged ideas In our book you spoke of many types of intention which relate to Zazen, to observe your breath, Intentions. Concerning every day's life.

[01:03]

I don't want it to be right. Would you like me to thank you for so many intentions? She said it would fill me with so many intentions. And are there some different levels? Because we've been speaking about the word levels. And then the question, where does the intentionlessness remain or reside? ...lessness, with the non-intention.

[02:05]

Yes, or the non-proposal. Non-intention. Is it so that I, with these many small intentions, such as the practice of practising a sentence of wisdom, the daily practice of satsang, the attention to my breath, with these intentions, So is the intention or the idea of all these intentions you have, like that you do daily zazen, that you practice mindfulness, that you watch your breath, is that all about making some kind of experiences? And these experiences, and there was the word enlightenment.

[03:07]

I'm not speaking about myself. You're so modest. I'm so shy. Do all these... I suspect that all these intentions lead somewhere. I'm sure they do. But what do we do with this place without intention? I understand. I guess I understand. This is a very good opening. So let's see what happens next. No, it really is a great opening. Erhardt. I have a question concerning intentions and the necessity or capability of deciding.

[04:17]

So he says in himself he would say intentions exist on different levels. It's like a whole textile of intentions and clusters of intentions which are within him. So if these clusters condensate Condensate. Condense. Yeah, otherwise they would turn into water.

[05:33]

That's what I thought. Then this results in an And then you shouldn't think that it's something fixed, but it's in coexisting or something that there's a resonance with. And what I think has become clear to me in our session is the connection to decision-making. In the past, I have actually always made decisions without the aspect of being vocal. So in this small group discussion I got clear about deciding.

[06:40]

In the past I always felt a decision needs to match, be harmonious, needs to kind of, you know, feel right. And this feeling of being right or right can actually only be in connection with these many intentions, that the intentions that exist there and the decision to make is harmonious and compatible with it. So that the decision that you have to make needs to be in unison or harmony or something of that type, right, with all this cluster of the intentions that are within yourself. Okay. My question is, is that so, or are there other criteria for decision-making?

[07:42]

Is this like that or are there other criteria for decision making? In the beginning of my practice I always ask myself what kind of role does intention have within my own practice. I am sure that that is from several years. And then the result was that it is a pivotal point of practice itself. And when I got to that point it felt so banal, that kind of recognition. That's it.

[08:46]

Okay. Thank you. Yes. Were you in new groups today? Good. I guess so. I've been in the same group as Gisela. But Gisela really presented it very well. I just want to add one more question. I'm looking for the connection to the koan. From the smallest, tiniest attention to the attention reaching all the way to enlightenment. That was our discussion.

[09:48]

Then the intentionlessness and now the reference to the core. What connection to the Quran? Then I have to address that from my personal being, not from the group. That's all right. So for me, the subject of enlightenment first ever arose here in this context. And I thought it had some connection to the koan. Any koan or koans in general?

[11:00]

This koan. This koan, okay. I do not see this koan. Okay, you don't see in this present koan, number 21, any connection to enlightenment. And also not to intention. I'm sorry. No, I'd be sorry. You just looked at the Emperor's new clothes. Yes. Spontaneously I want to say something to that. In this call, I got kind of maybe stuck in the too busy.

[12:04]

Okay, and I thought maybe we've not sufficiently dealt with, discussed, thought about what this busyness entails. Mm-hmm. Daru Yunyan asks, with what intention are you sweeping? So, in other words, he's basically testing his intentionlessness or his intention. Okay. Yeah, why not? That was just one thought.

[13:06]

No, no, it's a kind of Rorschach, this call. And you can find what's right there. Because we have a really simple conversation. And hardly, you know, compared to what most of us like, sweeping might be the least busy thing we ever do. But the question of intention is the question of, you know, the mind itself. Of mind itself. Yeah, so let's continue, because this is fruitful. Yes, David, you were going to say something? After the group I asked myself, because we have talked about different levels of intention, for example the fundamental intention which is always present at the root and the superficial intention, and for me the question came up now

[14:31]

And for me the question arose is what generates intentions? So to a degree I know it is intention, that is mindful attention. Attention is creating intentions. And then we have this experience that often we forget or lose our attention Is that lessened attention alone? How do we hold the attention? Okay.

[15:49]

Something like this. I've never had so many hands up at once since the seminar began. Whatever intention did, you were next. These new groups must have been refreshing. They were very refreshing, weren't they? We also talk about different intentions. Basic intentions. The intention to practice. Yes. So the most important thing is the kind of seeding of the attention. Like a seedling. An initial act of... Planting it.

[17:00]

Planting of the intention. Those deep intentions find their own way. You don't really need to worry or maintain or something. Nurture them. They go their own way but they permeate your whole life. Yeah, I'm learning a lot about intention today. A different type of intention is the not moving in sitting. That you can always kind of pull into the foreground and when it is in the foreground it really powerfully works.

[18:03]

Okay. Both share that they live or reside in the body It comes out of the body and reminds the body not to move. In addition to both what David and Michael said that the intention seems to be lost because I'm not maybe conscious of it but then suddenly it appears in a certain situation and to me that's the proof it did not really completely get lost it was only like maybe underground and I just wasn't conscious of it but somehow it

[19:24]

It works its way, in its own way, maybe. I remember it just a little. Yes, maybe she has her turn. Oh, yes, please translate. To David and to Michael, I just want to add that the experiences, the intentions, sometimes seem to be lost, because they are not aware of it, but then suddenly appear in a certain situation and are there again. Do you remember years ago you drove me somewhere? near Hamburg, in a car, and we talked about your father and stuff like that. In Hamburg. In Hamburg, yeah.

[20:27]

I don't know when that was exactly. I remember. Yeah. It must have been in 1995. Okay. Anyway, I remember riding with you in the car, and I... thought to myself, listening to you, I thought, Katrin has actually made the decision to practice the rest of her life. But I didn't think you knew it yourself. No, but I remember. What I remember is that I decided to go to practice beer. Yeah, what I remember is that I felt you made such a decision

[21:34]

And I remember thinking I hope she will decide to go to practice period because there's a good chance that it might become true if the right conditions are supported. So when you decided to go to practice period I was quite happy but I tried not to show my happiness. I had no idea where it would lead me. But I didn't want to look too happy because I didn't want to make you feel like I was trying to capture you or something.

[22:51]

Okay, in the back. Somebody. Yeah. I might repeat what Gisela said. We are in the same group. We went into the group with the question, among other things, to think about small, simple intentions and comprehensive ideas. So we went into the group with the question or thought to think about small intentions and more bigger profound intentions. I realize that I am already exhausted enough.

[23:54]

The great intentions, I think, I do not know if it is a quality or I see it more as pure joy. Okay, so it feels to me like I'm already maxed out with these little intentions, you know, and then what to do about these profound intentions. So I think it's more a succession or a kind of, you know, which one comes after which one. So when I am able to fulfill or stay with my small intentions And then will there or there will at some point be a development into more profound kind of attention.

[25:03]

And the second thing is why do I even have, do I even grasp this one concept? And am I actually, well, Why am I? The question was why am I creating an intention? And for me it's not that there's maybe a different intention underneath, there's a necessity below it. That's the basis. What would you call the necessity? Out of necessity for there to be a change or something, you formulate an intention.

[26:06]

Working with breath. Okay. How is Eddie's leg doing? We get to find him and it's, yes, the sutures are pulled out. He will, on Saturday, he will go back to Moscow with his family. Where is he now? In the Ostsee. Oh really? In Travemunde? Yes. He was operated in Hamburg. In Hamburg he's been operated. When he broke his leg? He broke his neck in Moscow.

[27:34]

In Moscow, okay. In Moscow was the question. They might break the other leg. You don't know where the leg is. So Suzanne is with him? Yes. They were going to come to the seminar, but… Yes, he wanted to go. Yeah. Well, we missed them, but I'm glad his leg is getting… He had a phone call yesterday and they sent many greetings. Really? I'm glad you remember to tell us. Today I'm really glad that we had the subject about the intentions because it more and more becomes subject of my practice

[28:36]

and the first thing is that I am convinced that we will not all be here if we do not develop a deep intention to practice. And the second thing is that I remember that you said in Rastenberg I remember in Rastenberg you said, without absolute intention it doesn't work. 24 sounds being a tiny word or a kind of wisdom phrase or whatever, without that it just does not work.

[29:51]

That's what you said. And now I know what the branches said. Absolute intention is an enlightenment experience. My question is, And this also connects to David, can we generate it? How do we generate it? Intention or absolute intention? You can generate intention, the intention of intention. And I really ask myself now, is there such a thing? Can it be that absolute intention is something that you experience with birth?

[30:53]

It's just a question. It's just a question. Does the absolute intention come with birth? Or... Can you, by always going with intention into the intention into the intention, finally reach absolute intention? If the connection should first go on, it starts closing the door. In this sense or context is my question. Good. Yeah.

[32:14]

Wait a minute. Frank? Why me? Because that was my intention. I was also in the group of... I was also in that group. Gisela and... Giselaas. Giselaas, yes, Giselaas and Katharina. Katharina. Regina. Regina. Yes. And what remained for me was that... What remained was me. That I fare well, I feel comfortable with that practice where it's about intention. Because this intentionlessness is so central within it. And my feeling about such action probably only works that way.

[33:28]

Like with Dao Wu and Yun Yang. That the broom comes because there is an intention. But because it only works, because it's intentionlessness... Because you can't understand it. Because you can't understand it. And it's still so pointing or... Accurate. Accurate, yes. And it's as if there were intentions in me. It is as if the tensions were awoken within me. Which I cannot really understand.

[34:29]

Which then understand in me. And then hold me like a broom. Okay, so... It seems to me you're saying that in a sense the foreground of this koan is that Daowu and Yunyan and National Teacher Wei Jiang and all the other folks What is common to them is they all share the same intention. Okay. And that makes you feel intentions rising in you. And then those intentions rising in you talk to you.

[35:34]

And what are they saying? What kind of moon is this? I mean it's really important that there's not a kind of, you know, box and okay, now I have my intention. Okay. And you like your intentionless attention as well. You know, that could be a problem. It's a nice problem. That could even make the problem bigger. Our intentions are actually coming. and especially the intentions that are most life-changing.

[37:10]

And in our group one person noticed it, and I also believe that it is at least what one can call the greatest inner desire, so to speak, a drive, is sort of a generator or creates a tension field out of which those intentions are created or arise. Okay. and later when you've learned certain kind of tools in practice and then it's possible to consciously generate and strengthen intentions And in the end, this entire Zen practice is a conglomerate of intentions.

[38:30]

Yeah, that's true. Yes. For me the interaction is important, I cannot say that I have made a fundamental decision to practice without examining my motivation, why? Well, that is not a question, relation between intention and motive. I can't just have a decision and then I have an intention to practice all my life without asking myself what my motive is. Motivation. Motivation. And it seems to me that there is something in me that the suggestions you make

[39:32]

So then I do notice there is a resonance if you mention things and to some there is some thinking that the vitality of body and mind which resonates with that. what reduces my suffering and also the suffering of the whole situation. So for me to concentrate on what reduces my suffering and what reduces the suffering of the whole situation. I have just found out an important point today. It may also be that the situation carries the intention So I did notice also that the situation itself supports intention, some situations, and then like a situation here, that my sort of ego can kind of get less strong.

[40:47]

And then I can let myself go into that intention that the situation carries. Connection for me too. Which intention is in unison how things really exist? For me it's really more like a movement. And this dialogue between the two is also like movement. Also from host and guest. And then this all comes together in a situation. Okay. Okay. What I noticed there is a whole range of qualities of intentions.

[42:30]

In the group I noticed that this term came to my mind, innermost request. In this phrase for me something really powerful rests and resides in it. and if that is born or is innate or congenital no that means that inside you when you're born yeah even like maybe Krista meant that comes with birth that this grinds by itself. and the taste of that and how much freedom this gives me.

[43:57]

Much discussion and the things I have with myself I don't need to do if I have that for myself. All this drops away. That is some freedom. The taste of such type of intention that it generates in other places intentions. Yes, and then it's for me, then I just let it be. Then I don't have to think about it any longer. It's like this now. This thinking together or this thinking for yourself It refines our own experience of intention.

[45:19]

And it's quite useful to do. Yes, Christian? The question of the intention is for me a question that reaches right into the center of the axis. and the question of intention really for me reaches to the core of practice and automatically this question of the intentionlessness arises and the relation between these two phenomena and then I experienced that there is an intention in the intentionlessness. It is a causal contribution for the attentionlessness.

[46:33]

And then for me it is completely sufficient for the reduction of the heart sutra. The reduction of the heart sutra? No, the reduction of the heart sutra. And then for me it is completely sufficient for the reduction of the heart sutra. Every dharma is free from your own being and the skandhas are free from the self. Because that represents complete freedom from intention. But it requires intention. Okay. Did I interrupt you? Oh, it's easy. This is it. Okay, Laura. Saying in the direction of Christian Anita. Okay.

[47:34]

Through life there goes sort of a pulse or rhythm or kind of spiral movement. There's this funny legend about me when I was a little kid. I was older than two years old. We lived in a war, after the war, in a little wooden house amongst all the war rubble. And my mother told me that it was the new year. And all the people came and said that the post office was too far. And the child disappeared. But her kid, which was me, had disappeared.

[48:54]

And then she was looking for me in the rubble and there she found me and she said, but Lona, what are you doing here? Supposedly, I have responded, I'm looking for the New Year. And as a teenager this was about intentions but it wasn't intent, it was about attractions. And I think I've said that before, but every day I went to work. I love what's happening, my education. And I had to pass a bridge, and every day I studied the differences of the water in this little island. So I did that especially for one year.

[50:13]

This was the attraction and then the practice came. And then it was said, watch, on purpose watch your breathing. And that was like a new pulse. And now I have the feeling we should intervene into the observation and then partly create them by ourselves. So we had another pulse in the group. It's always something full of intention and then something automatic, it's not a good word, but it comes from the body by itself. Okay.

[51:24]

Jonas, could you say something? Yes. It was mentioned before, but inside our discussion group came to one point where we spoke about the intention as a deep decision, which is not taken or made, I don't know the word that is not a decision that you take at a conscious level but it's more like something that you become aware of So my question would be what makes it come there?

[52:25]

And how does it come there? Okay, okay. It seems to go in the direction where I asked in this direction in our group because I always looked at intention as a tool because it is clear that it is a force and it gives a force and when I formulate it So it is something that has power and gives power. So if I formulate one, it changes the way I go into certain situations. So it's a kind of tool. And in the class of training we had the power of will be discussed. What is the reason for this in me?

[53:39]

And maybe it goes on with the word motivation, or with the animal's request. Motivation, the animal's request, and on what do I base this? Yes, and for me personally, I am back to the word longing. And to me, myself, it always comes back to the word longing. And I can't continue to think about it. Okay, I think if I'm going to say anything, I have to say something because we're running out of time. Maybe I don't have to say anything because you're all doing so well. I can't, of course, respond to all of the nuances of this. It's a... the center of our lives, this question.

[54:54]

But I can say that Buddhism is basically, I think it's Christian said or implied, is rooted in vows. And, you know, since I did finish the Festschrift piece for Michael, it felt quite good to get it done. Unfortunately, Jay Ogilvie, who's He has been a philosophy professor and he's putting the book together. Right. At the present time, anyway, he was able, an earlier version he was, he can't open it on his PC because I have a...

[55:55]

He can't open it because he has a PC and I don't. But somehow we will solve the problem. And after I wrote about Michael, his father was a doctor. They expected him to be a doctor, then he was in graduate school in philosophy and so forth. And he didn't find analytical philosophy, which they were teaching at Stanford those days. He had a more mystic bent. But in any case, he came across Sri Aurobindo's teaching. Which is interesting, because Sri Aurobindo's teaching, and rooted in Hinduism, but it was very influenced by the West.

[57:28]

It makes me think of... It's very similar to, for me, to the most famous in the West building in Japan is the Katsura Detached Palace. The most famous building in Japan is Katsura Villa. Generally in English it's called the Katsura detached palace. It's part of the palace but it was a separate building. But it was built by, ordered, designed by a prince of the Fujiwara family who was completely interested in Western architecture.

[58:34]

But this is a building that was commissioned by a Prince of Fujiwara who was totally interested in Western architecture. And if you look at it carefully, it's more, in many ways, more like a Western building than the other, etc. And if you look at it closely, it really is more like a Western building. Anyway, the building we're attracted to look at. And it's interesting that this is the building Anyway, Michael found that Sri Aurobindo's teaching which emphasized evolution including the evolution of spiritual teachings was the first thing that completely made sense to him.

[59:42]

And he went to, I mentioned this to Paul yesterday, he went to a lake that's near Stanford College. And he made a very conscious vow to commit his entire life to make Sri Aurobindo's teaching accessible to others. And that vow opened up into the many things he did. Yes, he wrote all these books on sports and how sports are related to spiritual things, and he created probably the term in the zone. And it led him to bring Yeltsin to the United States on his first visit.

[60:55]

Silence in Congress, but it all came out of that vow. What he did also led to the fact that Yeltsin was invited to the West for the first time. Even though it doesn't all seem to be connected, it is all based on this praise that he received. He made this vow because he cared so much about Sri Aurobindo's teaching. the teaching of Sri Aurobindo was so important to him.

[61:59]

And so his effort was something like in his entire life to reconceptualize the world through Sri Aurobindo's teaching. And that's one thing why we're such close friends is because I also made a decision to reconceptualize the world through Buddhist teaching. And it became also his way of caring, expressing his caring for others. Now, when Sophia was born, I made a conscious decision to remind her when I could unobtrusively that her most basic intention should be to stay alive.

[63:24]

So every now and then I would say in some context, you know, your first vow is to stay alive. And I want to do that in a way that wasn't fearful. I want to give her the confidence to stay alive but not to be fearful. Okay. No, that's biological. If you take a baby and you're going to drop it or something, they try to not fall. They want to stay alive. But I felt we have to make this basic vow conscious. This biological vow ought to also be conscious. Then I began adding, as she got a little older, to the Bible.

[64:49]

To the vow to stay alive, I began adding how you stay alive. For what it's worth staying alive for. My sense of this is clearly that It really makes a difference when the vows are conscious. So when we took that car ride, my feeling was, when can Katrin make her vow I felt you'd made, when could you make it conscious? That would make a difference. Now, I think what Frank pointed out was very useful and important.

[66:00]

And I think what Frank said is very useful and important. What unites this koan is that they all share the same vow. And their dialogue only makes sense if they both share the same vow. No, maybe we can come back to that. But certainly when I'm speaking with you, when I'm giving a lecture or a teshu or now, I always have two subjects. Your experience and your intention. And I'm always speaking to the experience which might support your intention.

[67:25]

And the intention which might support your experience, influence your, shape your experience. So that is always the content of my talk. Now let me change the subject and refer a little bit to this morning's tissue. We can come back to this subject of attention in various forms. I want to say that, you know, because I notice, you know, when we pour out the water, we do this little click.

[68:28]

In the Yogi. And I think you all realize that this is an expression of the Huayen philosophy. It's an interaction. It's a... enactment of, I know that's hard to translate, enactment of interdependence and interpenetration. Interpenetration. Okay, so you don't, though. You can do whatever you want, you know, of course. But you know the Buddhist police are watching.

[69:33]

Okay, so you don't just sort of do that. You take the, not necessarily the spot where you drink, but you want to take the rim where you drink and touch the rim to the... So it's a little enactment of I touch this, the food goes into my mouth, and then I take where the, and I touch it and I dump the water out, which is going somewhere else. So, this is a little example of the emphasis in Buddhism at bringing intention into the details of your life. So, you know, the Yogacara, Madhyamaka, and Huayen are the three main teachings. It's the background of Zen Buddhism.

[70:35]

And this is a little enactment of interdependence that you do, and you say, oh, interdependence. Yeah, or throwing the staff down and... Look, there's a snake. It's a little inactivance. Okay. Thank you for translating. Okay. Okay, so, and I want to say that, you know, this sense of, you know, it amuses me that, uh, I'm talking about randomly actualized mind.

[71:49]

And it sounds like random accessed memory, RAM. I don't know how to translate that. Right, but the whole word... The German word doesn't have a word for it. What do you say in German? We just call it... In English it's called... It's actually free access. Good. Choice free access or something like that. So every time I see RAM, I think... Free of this choosing access.

[72:53]

Yeah, okay, good. So I... Every time I see RAM, it's a little like the click, because I think of randomly accessed, actualized mind. Give me the word... So, I'll try to finish in a moment. So, when you get in the habit of this practice of observing the mind, the random observing mind as a random process first you observe it in sasa where consciousness is not in charge.

[73:56]

Okay, so various things appear. And you observe them. And again, as you know, I like looking at the words I'm using. Observe literally means to look over, to take care of, or keep safe. Observe. This observation means to look over, to keep something safe, to look over, to pay attention to something. It's like a little baby that is being born and you just observe him and keep him safe. Now, when you in zazen develop this modality of mind, and you let each appear separately,

[75:09]

And you don't connect the dots. Okay, as I said, it's incommensurable. You're allowed to be incommensurable. What you begin to, after a while, you just simply know and notice. But these are mental constructs. Okay. And you begin to notice, because you're not connecting the dots, you begin to notice the mind in which they appear. So you begin to have the ingredients of the mental constructs and the mind in which they appear. And then you also begin to notice, of course, that the mental constructs themselves are mind.

[76:20]

So you begin to just be in the midst of these ingredients. The mental constructs, which are mind. And the field of mind. And returning to the one who's not busy is like returning to the field of mind. But the mental constructs are also mind or the room. Okay, so you just get in the habit of this. Okay, now some mental constructs which appear There's a lot of emotion attached to it. And it's impossible not to connect the dots because the dots are charging at you.

[77:42]

Or some mental constructs keep reappearing and reappearing. Then you begin what is basically a kind of psychological process. And it's related to the idea of practice of past lives. Now you ask yourself, where does this come from? And maybe it's like Erhard said, a cluster. So you hold this, the emotion and the mental construct in your mental space.

[78:53]

And you look at whatever appears. Now there's a separate practice which enhances this. Because one of the intentions, one of the forms of the basic Buddhist vow is to know yourself and to know yourself whether you like what you see or not. So you want to create a mind that allows everything to appear. Which is very clear that the conscious mind doesn't allow everything to appear. And here we're very close to Western psychology.

[79:56]

So you try to create this randomly actualized mind as a way to notice what consciousness doesn't. And part of wanting to know yourself is this practice of reviewing your past life. That means the life you have. Your past. Of this life. Sometimes it's like you go back to your birth and then you go back to previous lives. But in Zen we don't worry about that. But you do try to go back And you just pick from now or you pick some point like your 18th birthday or I remember I started most strongly with my third grade desk.

[81:33]

I noticed that when I went back in my past there were certain bright spots. I remember that when I went back to my past, there were some brighter spots. The first time I crossed the street by myself, when I got up before my parents got up, because we were on a trip, and they were asleep in a hotel, and I went out and crossed the street by myself. So that's the first time I crossed a street by myself, and we were somewhere on a trip with my parents, and they were still sleeping in the hotel, and I went out and crossed the street for the first time. Or my third grade desk with Mrs. Marshall, who was the teacher. Okay, so I would take some bright spot like that.

[82:43]

Which usually represents some kind of shift in consciousness. It's bright because there was some kind of shift in consciousness by crossing a street. And then I would, over a period of days and weeks, I would visualize, say, the third grade desk. And then I'd go through the day and I'd go how I got to school, how I went home. And then I'd try to go two or three days before and two or three days after. And I found I could really expand this to several days on each side even more.

[83:57]

And I did this through many of these bright spots and I began to feel connective tissue. So this practice, which I related to the practice of knowing your past life, enhanced my ability to take some kind of mental formation that had a lot of emotion or pain or something associated with it and explore what were its associations, where it came from in the past. What were its associations?

[85:10]

And where it came from in the past. So I had two motives, two feelings. One is to get a feeling for where it came from, where it was cathected. and how it arose and when it arose and what were the triggers of it arising so I had to try to have a feeling for its source and then I really tried to notice what triggered it Because one of the ingredients of my experience, because of randomly actualized mind, because of this sense of randomly actualized mind, I can do it. Wonderful. the ingredients of my experience that I understood from the practice of randomly actualized mind.

[86:35]

Yes. was that it was all mental constructs. And the emotional pain itself associated was really, I mean, it was not nothing. And I respected this emotional pain. And I've never been a person who wants to heal. I've always wanted to keep the wounds open. Because I learn from them. But I don't want the wounds always in the midst of my pain. But the wounds became just one of the ingredients.

[87:51]

And the identity which was inseparable from the wounds The identity that glued these clusters together so they were painful was an ingredient that was inseparable from me. But the mind in which these mental formations appeared was also what glued these things together.

[88:52]

So they didn't just appear through my identity. They also appeared through the field of mind. And they were made from mind. So I could look at them much more easily than when I just had them in the stream of identity. So basically, the practice of randomly actualized mind, which allows you to be open to all kinds of things, And to see all of them as constructs of mind.

[90:00]

And not just in Zazen, but also in ordinary circumstances. Increased the ingredients which were my experience. So the glue of my life was also the field of mind itself, not just my identity. And it very powerfully and effectively changed how I related to my personal history. And my personal history was connected with my identity. But my Buddhist identity was connected with the field of mind. And my Buddhist identity was informed by my intention.

[91:13]

And there was a kind of moving around of the vows, the kind of vows and intentions which became my personal identity. And my now Buddhist identity rooted in different vows which were more inclusive than my personal identity vows, and my Buddhist vows were reinforced all the time by my new context of experience.

[92:23]

I decided to lead a life which reinforced my Buddhist vows. Doing Zazen. Yeah, practicing mindfulness. Having mind and attention rest in the breath. And that actually changes the vows that support identity. And changes how you work with the identity stream. Okay. Thank you.

[93:36]

Let's have a bell instead of a whistle. You know what she's whistling for? Her mother. She's very clearly letting us know she's outside and her mother's inside. And I said to her the other day, you know, she loves being in the sangha. I said, you really love being in the sangha. And she said, but they all go in one room with you and not me. I said, do you want to be head of the Zen Center? And she, well, not yet, or something. We don't need to be surprised she now whittles with two fingers for you. Because you taught her how to do it?

[94:45]

She also got me the other day. She also got me the other day to sign a piece of paper. And I said, what am I signing? Salt folded up and... Sorry, okay, I sign. And a few minutes later, she brought it back in. You have to sign in this place, too. I don't know. And I guess Anita had told her she needed my permission to get her to take her on a walk during Zazen. So she went to Anita. Yeah, so she went to Anita and said, I've got my father's permission. Oh, of the abbot, oh.

[96:02]

First it said, I don't even remember how. Because I really wanted to design it. And she wanted to persuade me to go play outside. I said to her, then you have to go. It's not easy. You need the permission of the abbot. Who the hell is the abbot? That's what Sophia said? So somehow she got your permission and they went out for a walk during that. That doesn't work. I have to sit, you know? Isn't she very convincing? We said, but you don't need to sit. That really convinced me. Oh dear. I'm going to be outwitted soon.

[97:13]

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