So of course I would like to know if you have any thoughts about the teisho this morning and about anything you want to mention from your discussion. Let me see, I thought, where's Lona? Where are you? There you are. I thought you wanted a chair. Can't we have a chair in here for you? Is it okay? Okay. Because we can have lots of chairs in here. So, anybody want to say something? Or even if you don't want to say something. Peter? Peter? For me this discussion this afternoon about the changing of the world view was very important for me.

[01:09]

It was in that context. The just now is not all that new. Well, I hope. You've been around here for a decade or two. And I repeatedly knew I started trying to practice with that. and it's so in contrast to the normal consciousness which suggests continuity so that I always thought this practice is rather artificial.

[02:19]

And now looking back on the shift, the change of my worldview over the last 10-12 years gave me confidence that that will also change. I guess to accept or to see the momentarity or the moment-to-moment changeability of things. I think one needs a lot of trust in this practice that some intellectual understanding will transform into some Or intellectual knowledge transforms into real understanding.

[03:41]

Yeah. Experience. Yeah. You said at first it seemed artificial. What seemed artificial? The practice of repeating something? Determination. to influence perception in a way that it kind of disrupts the consciousness of continuity. It's a mental intervention I have to do. That's right. That's exactly right. It's basically what the word jhana means. It is to bring a mental posture into your activity. And I, yeah. Someone else. Can you explain once more how the word origin could be understood or is understood?

[04:58]

You said it's nothing new, but I don't think you also meant it's something that's always been there to be discovered now. I don't think you meant that either. I didn't say it was nothing new. I said it was new. Really? Well, I thought I did. When it's clear. What I remember is that it's not a beginning. Okay. Yeah, I said it's not a beginning in the sense of something prior. How can it be a beginning? It's not a beginning in relationship to that there was something before, then it would be a continuation. Okay. Okay.

[06:16]

So it's not... I understood it like... The origin as in ursprung, where it started all originally. The word origin, the origin of the word origin is basically appearance. Something that becomes visible. But because you can have a worldview which emphasizes consciousness and not awareness, and I think we need to make this extremely simple. Because as Peter says, We need to be able to bring it into our activity.

[07:33]

And if it's not fairly simple, we can't bring it into our activity. The effect on our activity is not at all simple. If you put your hand in, if we... in our water supply at Crestone. If you just have, after rain, a little buildup of rock where the stream is, Our water supply goes down the road instead of goes down the stream. So if you put your hand in the stream of the mind, that can be quite simple. But what happens with everything going around the hand,

[08:36]

It can change your life. And let me just go back again. I don't want to talk much at this point. But the basic technique of advanced Buddhism is to bring wisdom into your activity. So you bring a mental formation, an insight, an understanding, You bring a mental formation, an insight into your activity until it transforms your activity or is embodied in your activity.

[09:48]

Okay, someone else. I like being in this room, it's kind of nice. Yes, Brigitte. Today you spoke of world views. So that in the koan it's not overtly about world views but it's more hiddenly included. Okay. Explicitly. And there is a part in the koan I think is very interesting.

[11:03]

And it's about the north and the south, how they see Buddha nature in different ways. The way it is described is a little bit strange. Half born, half not born. Completely unborn. Completely unborn. Completely immortal. I'm not going to stick to all the words, but I have a feeling that there is a difference in how you can see Buddha nature or what kind of figures you can have. So I don't want to stick to the words, but just to get a feel of what it feels like, or the consequences of different views of Buddha-nature.

[12:22]

And this north-south phenomenon is in several koans. Could you please say something to that? Okay. I spoke earlier, a few days ago, or not long ago, to Carolina about this very point. And it's something I think we have to go over and over. You know, I always feel I'm saying something new. But I seem to have to say it by repeating myself.

[13:26]

I have to say the same things until we really get it and then see what happens when we put them together. So if you're going back to the origins of origin, and again, as I said, without keeping it simple, If you emphasize consciousness, what consciousness needs to do is to make things predictable. That's the job of consciousness. And so if you mostly or entirely experience the world through consciousness, Origins are going to disappear into the past or appear into the past.

[14:55]

Yeah. Anyway, Buddha nature is... Dogen made a big point of, let's make it simple, denying Buddha nature. Or redefining Buddha nature. And this is an important point in the history of Chinese Buddhism. What we are studying is primarily Chinese Buddhism. And yet, we have to... But Chinese Buddhism emphasizes the idea of Buddha-nature.

[15:59]

Because it seems that Chinese people really wanted, like we do too, some kind of soul or ground of being. So they turn Buddha nature into something you uncover. Something that's already there. So basically an idea of an inherent self. This leads to a lot of problems. If you have the experience of just now originating, there's no uncovering. Because it's just now constructing. Okay, now, this is...

[17:18]

This is a matter of emphasis. A matter of choice. Because we're both, whether we're Chinese Buddhists from the south or the north, or Western Buddhists, we're in the same world. I mean, more or less the same world. But we're in it with different emphases. And the different emphases make a difference. And the different emphases change us. I mentioned the other day that if you that they've done neurological studies of Chinese people in comparison to Western people, persons.

[19:02]

And we tend to, when we do basic mathematical computations, we treat numbers as words. So we think the computations as if they were, it was a kind of language. The Chinese process computations in terms of pathways that are usually used for weight and color. So they're feeling the weight of the numbers Not the language of it, not the quantification of the numbers.

[20:21]

Hence they do mathematics differently. They feel the relationship between the numbers rather than counting the numbers, something like that. I think of this guy, in Boulder This is an anecdote. Thank you. He comes to, this guy, what is his name, David? David, I think David. Oh, I know, David. So, David sits with us in the zendo, in the bread and breakfast. David... Were you there? Did you meet him when he came? He was already sent. He sits with us in the Briar House Bed and Breakfast.

[21:26]

We were there for this opening ceremony, the Zendo. We were at the opening ceremony of the Zendo. This guy and I talked in the garden afterwards. I'd never met him before. And people afterwards said, you know, he's the most popular street entertainer, street theater person in Boulder. So I, oh, okay, I didn't know. So I found out while we were sitting talking, having dessert cake and things like that after the ceremony. It was a sunny day that was supposed to rain but didn't. And it was a wonderful sunny day when it was supposed to rain.

[22:35]

And he said he had to leave because he had to go down. He had a slot in the town mall. And he said he had to go now because he had a time window on the pedestrian zone. And I said... Well, maybe we'll come and see you if you're going to do a show. Okay, so Marie-Louise and I went down. And what he does is he starts out with juggling. And he juggles various things and he talks and, you know. He tries to distract people and then he gets them to pay attention to juggling. And juggling, I think, you know, he and I talked about it later, his use of juggling. But if you juggle, if any of you have ever done it, you have to just watch the field.

[23:45]

I don't know if you've juggled, but when you juggle, you have to look at the whole field. You can't watch any particular ball or you're in trouble. So he does this and everybody gets into this kind of field mind. It's contagious. but within this field mind there also has to be the stability of the return point the posture because the ball has to come back to your hands so he does this for a while and then he says to somebody where are you from And you say, Oklahoma? You've never said Oklahoma to anyone, right? You say, Oklahoma?

[24:56]

He says, Oklahoma. No, no, that's not the way it works. You say, he says, what's your zip code? He says, And he says, that's just outside Oklahoma City. And everybody, so I said to him, can I tell you my zip code? So I gave him this zip code. And he said, he paused, and he says, that's outside Freiburg, Germany.

[25:58]

And he's famous. He can do it for anywhere in the United States and most of the world. And I said to him, and then we talked for quite a while, because after this thing, he came down to Crestone and was with us two or three days. I said, how do you remember this? How do you do this? He said, I mean, you can imagine what I'm going to say. He said, the numbers have a kind of weight and color. And once I can feel the weight and color, the location appears, the map appears.

[27:04]

So he's not thinking of the numbers in any language sense. So he's clearly processing this information in ways that we don't usually do. So my point is very simple. Difference makes a difference. If you actually begin to perceive differently Wenn ihr also wirklich anfangt, auf andere Weise wahrzunehmen, so wird es im Laufe der Zeit Dinge auf bemerkenswerte Weise verändern. Im Buddhismus möchten wir euch nicht von eurer Vergangenheit kurieren, We're trying to cure you of your present.

[28:13]

Anyway, someone else. Yes? In March I had an accident in the mountains. Something happened that I came much closer to that, that in every moment reality arises. And I guess that helped me because my body perception had changed. The left upper part was incredibly painful and the rest seemed to be normal. You had broken your shoulder in three places, I think, right? Every moment was different.

[29:31]

To create each moment, and you have just said, just now originated. So that feeling lasted, it persisted. Because my everyday life was very different than it usually is after that. I couldn't do as many things as I'm used to doing. And I noticed that I could hear better and could see better. And I assumed that this receding of concepts into the background, that this really helped.

[30:39]

And I saw the relationship to practice to keep everything always in balance in every situation. It felt some way like a harvest. Okay. You mean you are harvesting your practice experience. Yes. So kind of... Valuing if it is a bad or a good time or something that was not like that.

[31:51]

It was a very valuable time experience. Yeah, okay. Thanks. Someone else? Yes, Carolina. I am really grateful that you told me that there is no powder lavatory. I am really grateful that you told me that there is no Buddha nature. Very happy to tell anybody. In some level I really feel relieved. Because it's 10 years I'm making exaggerating desperately trying to find the wooden fish. I never understood it. I never found it. It was like an alien body or something. And of course, I thought, everyone else knows what it is, and of course they have it.

[33:03]

But now, where it doesn't exist... But right now we're in it, doesn't exist, right? But since then it's a feeling of completeness, because I have the feeling that all the ingredients of my practice So now some kind of completeness is happening because I can feel all the ingredients of my practice are there, are existent. and I don't have them all in my mind or working with them or something like that.

[34:08]

Still, it is a feeling of completeness. and at the same time that time in itself does not matter. It's not a player. So no matter how long it will take to get certain state or if I will never get to certain state or not get all states does not really matter. So it's like I'll live a certain amount of time, and certain things are going to happen, certain won't, and then it's just over.

[35:20]

Yeah. That's the way it is. I hope I got you right. If you worry about whether you've got me right, then you're a little bit concerned with Buddha nature. Yes. In your own confidence, what you say is, from my point of view, correct. So the Diamond Sutra says, no idea of a lifespan. Yeah. So it is... Astonishing. Simple shifts in view can change your relationship to everything, including the most basic dimensions, time and space, past and future, and so forth.

[36:27]

Okay, someone else. I was at a seminar by a man who spoke about the meaning of words. And I found a lot of what he said and some of the things he said I found quite interesting. He said, if you shorten your name, you cut a part of yourself away. And he said that your name is no coincidence. And he said that your name is no coincidence. Much of what he said was rooted on the basis of creation.

[37:45]

and that's where basically our mind, our spirit separated in thought. He also said if you get married you should keep your name because it's your name and it says something about you. It's also a thing about the man's name having a manly meaning and the woman's name having a womanly meaning. It's very good to hear. Nonetheless, I thought about this and I talked to my partner and he said, I said to my husband, what's it like for you to have taken up my name?

[39:04]

And somehow I talked to the kids about it. You know, do you know that you're, I thought they should know their name. Do you know that your father's name is Knotschmann? That's also your name. And then Eve said, So I said, Mordschman is a man's name so it's good that we are called Veselva Devendra because it's a neutral name and you're a woman and then you can have that name too. I have no idea what it has to do with anything but it just came up. Well, your son sounds more Buddhist than the guy who ran the seminar.

[40:15]

Someone else? Yes? I've made a very interesting experience with the two texts, the English Kor text and the translation of Mikal. So, if I read Nicole's German text, and I'm just coming from Holland, I think and speak Dutch. Um... I don't know Dutch that very well.

[41:23]

I mean, there are words, the Dutch words, I wouldn't know as well or in the precision as they are in that text. But I know the feeling of the language, of the Dutch language. So I don't know exactly the words, maybe Dutch, but I really know a lot about the language. So then I had this idea that I should first translate it into Dutch and then into German. So she did do it. She translated it into Dutch. So maybe the words of it don't make that much sense, but... By the feeling, I have the feeling I translated it much better. Better than Nicole translated it.

[42:30]

No, for my own... Self, yeah. What it means to me... So your Dutch version was closer to your feeling of the understanding of the text than the Deutsch version. And then she re-translated it from the Dutch into the German. How close was it to Nicole's? And then she thought, that's the way, it's a good way for me to work with these texts. I did not compare the text to Nicole's text. But what she talks about, I can completely understand. That's all I can say. Because when you read the text... No, because I also live in a different language that I'm not completely mastered, but I have a very good feeling for it. So the feeling is stronger than the intellectual understanding of English I have.

[43:33]

So I said, I can understand you very well, because I also live in a language that I don't master perfectly, but I have a very good feeling for it, but intellectually... dem nicht gewachsen bin, der sprach komplett. Also verstehe ich das ganz gut, was du sagst. And there seem to be, from what Marie-Louise has told me, some problems with Nicole's text. Maybe they'll come up during the discussion. Also es gibt vielleicht ein paar Probleme mit Nicole's text, das Marie-Louise erwähnt hat. Und vielleicht kommt es auf im Verlauf der Diskussion. If there is no inherent Buddha nature, enlightenment is an illusion. No. When you see it, that isn't like that.

[44:37]

It doesn't exist. Well, in this koan it starts out with enlightenment and something... Illusion. Illusion. So in that sense enlightenment doesn't exist. Okay. Anyone else before I say a little something about something or other? Yes. Yes. And it's an introduction into drawing. Or it's a kind of, yeah. So the connection to the koan is that if you clean rice, you can either focus on the rice or on the grit.

[45:50]

And this woman suggests not to look at the tree, but to look at the surrounding of the tree. And this way she's kind of training the perception. And she does it. So most people would look at the tree, fixate on it and then draw it and she does it differently. So with this koan I try to work that I change that which I habitually perceive or do, if it's possible to me. not only what I already have done before that I have feeling that the person in front of me I take their place or something go with into this other person?

[47:33]

I always had the feeling with all these people in the koan that one looks at a particular person or particular thing and the other one at all the other things around it and vice versa. And I do feel it was in my life, without sort of practicing it, something of this shift has happened. For instance, I feel my mother very different.

[48:46]

I don't experience her threatening anymore in my body. And it really changes everything. I understand. Let me suggest that you notice, and I'm going to have to use the word, when things first are noticed, first appear. So let me suggest that you notice when things appear for the first time.

[49:46]

So that you notice what appears. Notice if subject-object distinction appears first. I'm here and the object's there. Just notice in yourself. It's a rather subtle matter to notice it because we hardly notice how we notice because it's taken for granted. See if you can notice if what you first notice is yourself in relationship to an object. If that's the case then what you're first noticing is separation. you're noticing the separation between the subject and the object.

[51:06]

And we take it for granted. It's me, and there's the object. But if that's what you're noticing, That process of noticing, which we take for granted, yes, I'm here and that's there, that noticing reifies the subject and object. In other words, the habit of establishing a subject-object distinction turns the subject and object into things. But it's interesting, if you go back to the etymology of words in European languages, It's almost like whoever was originating the words were living in a world much closer to the Buddhist yogic view of the world.

[52:17]

Because a thing in its etymological origins essentially means a meeting point, like at the airport, a meeting point. It means where things are assembled. And you have Castaneda's words, assemblage point. And Castaneda, I used English brilliantly, I think. Okay, so if you see everything as an assemblage point, Wenn man alles als einen Montagepunkt sieht... Then the thingness goes away.

[53:37]

Dann geht die Dinghaftigkeit weg. Dingheit. But thing has come to mean a material object. Aber ding bedeutet jetzt ein Objekt. A thing is an object. What did you say? The word thing, which originally meant a meeting point, has been turned into a material object. And reify, re means to thingify it. Re means thing. So reify is to thingify it. In English. In a strange kind of English. That sounds good. Good. Okay. So I'm just asking you, notice if what appears first to you is the subject-object distinction.

[55:07]

And let's forget now about the idea of worldview. and just say fundamental view. If naturally the subject-object distinctions you're establishing a fundamental view. If naturally what first appears to you is the subject-object distinction what's appearing to you in fact is separation. Was da bei euch auftaucht, ist in der Tat Trennung. And that repetition of the initial experience of separation establishes a view. Und dieses Wiederholen, diese ersten... The repetition of the first initial... If you keep repeating the establishment of separation... Wenn ihr immer wieder dieses...

[56:16]

will establish a view that affects everything you see and know. Okay, if we can really see it that simply, like this is an acupuncture point, And you can now establish an antidote to that. Oh, a wisdom point. So, something like just now originating. Or if instead of the first thing that appears to you in every sense moment, instead of subject-object distinction, and appearance itself appears, if appearance itself appears,

[57:36]

I want to keep saying it over and over again. If appearance itself appears. Okay. all of the philosophy and psychology about subject and object almost dissolves. Or certainly our relationship to it becomes more and more different. Because what appears is appearance. Denn wenn das, was auftaucht, auftauchen ist, then what appears is appearance as a text. Denn was dann auftaucht ist dieses auftauchen als ein Text.

[58:59]

And that text of appearance, which text means to weave, und dann dieser Text, die Textur, das Gewobene, was da auftaucht, and the subject disappears into the text, And the object disappears in the text. And all you have is the text. So now what you have is not separation, but connectedness. Or let me say, contextedness. Yeah. Okay, now this, Manuela said, the artist notices the surround of the tree and not the tree. So what he or she is drawing, she, I think it was, is a

[60:00]

The context-ed-ness. It's this context-ed-ness. The zusammenhang. You can use a German word which means the hanging togetherness. Okay, that's good. Okay. Okay. So, if... I'm just trying to find language for this. If the text of the moment appears, in fact the word moment means nothing in this context, If text appears, you either read it or you don't.

[61:12]

So then, the idea of just now originating is the text is originating. And can you read that text or not? And practices about developing the ability to read that text. Okay. Now, what do I mean that text appears? What do I mean that text appears? Connectedness appears, not separation. Contextedness appears. And through your senses, within your senses, you know it to various degrees.

[62:13]

Also, all right, so the juggler has to notice a field. Also, der Jongleur muss ein Feld kennen. If contextedness appears. Und wenn Kontextheit auftaucht. Let's say, then what you're noticing is a field. Was sie dann also bemerkt, ist ein Feld. And what is that field based on? Und worauf beruht dann dieses Feld? That field is space. So you're noticing space. Not separation. You're noticing space. Space as a field. And what is that space? What's the basis of that space? The basis of that space is mind. So you're noticing mind.

[63:38]

So you're noticing mind and space and field. And within that mind, space and field, the particular appears, but the particular is always contextualized. And if that is re-originating at each moment, at each moment you have to read it. And read it again each moment. And that's a different kind of presence and attentional and bodily... That's a different kind of attentional body than our usual way of thinking. It's our normal reading of the world.

[64:45]

Now, that's enough. There are some things I'd like to say. But I think that's enough for now. But I think that's enough for today. What we've done here is just taken some very simple things and put them together. And we've really changed our world view. Yes. May I ask you a small question? We had a question in this moment.

[65:47]

But in this very moment there is no view anymore of myself. I mean, I don't have view anymore. There is no view anymore in that particular moment. I am in it. I does not exist anymore. That's right. Subject disappears in connectedness. This changes psychology. Yes. In our group we've been to a similar point and we've asked ourselves what degree, necessity... What degree?

[66:52]

Or necessity it is to have a physical posture or a Zen posture to be able to develop that. Tomorrow. Tomorrow and tomorrow creeps this petty pace. That's Shakespeare. Yeah, we have to start with one thing. We really have to get a feeling for it because it's kind of an anathema to us. A what thing? A taboo. Okay, so for what we have to get a feeling because it is not a taboo for us.

[67:55]

Zazen is a physical position that becomes a posture Through the mental posture of don't move. So zazen is the physical posture brought together with the mental posture, don't move. And the genesis of, or what flows from understanding don't move, is at the center of this koan.

[69:06]

Now, I'm using... There's lots of mental postures. Not all mental formations are mental postures, but some are mental postures. But the mental posture joined to the physical posture, the mental posture, don't move, joined to the physical posture, is Zaza. Now, you really need to understand that. that if at each moment the world is originating, that it's not synthesizing. We can say it's converging. That everything is diverging and converging.

[70:06]

I discovered how powerful these two words could be, you know, in practice period. You weren't there, but you were there for a few minutes. So if the world is diverging, There's no harmony. There's no oneness. There's no background of unity. Sorry. There's only diverging and converging. And you're a participant in the converging. At each moment you are a participant in the convergence we call the present.

[71:26]

This glass has no identity and no name. It's just a convergence. It doesn't indicate the way a tea bowl would indicate that it's a convergence. Es gibt keine Anzeichen darin, wie es eine Teeschale hätte, dass es eine Zusammenführung ist. A Japanese tea bowl absolutely clearly says, I'm a convergence. Eine japanische Teeschale sagt absolut eindeutig, ich bin ein Zusammengeführtes. It shows how it was made. Es zeigt an, wie sie gemacht wurde. It shows that it's an activity. And this tries to pretend it's an object.

[72:33]

Okay, but it still is a convergence. Of this silicon or whatever it is and stuff that makes glass. Silica. Silicon dioxide. Silicon and oxygen. Then, you know, I use it, I converge with it by drinking from it. With two hands, which is art. Your hands converge. Well, that's enough. Maybe we're supposed to eat in a few minutes, right?

[73:35]

Half past six. Okay, so let's have a bell for a moment of sitting. The stick will converge with the bell. And perhaps we'll converge in sitting. If each moment is a convergence, the mental posture you have is a, the word I want to use, a dramatic part of convergence. If each moment is in fact convergence,

[74:40]

Yeah, it's a repetition of difference. Then the mental posture you hold is the crucial element in that convergence. the most important element, the key element in this coming together. And crucial I use that with the sense. It means cross. Where two things cross. And crucial I use in the sense that it comes together by crossing.

[75:19]

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