So this is the description of the process of knowing. This is a kind of looking at it as a practice. And although some of you know this and we've talked about it recently, I still think it's useful to keep till it's really you know it the way you know your name. Her birth means something appears. And the word birth really emphasizes its newness. Because you've erased the blackboard, it's quite new. Then you name it. We tend to name it.

[01:02]

Yes, that's an airplane I hear. Now, I've said that the naming of the airplane, when you hear it in meditation, Is not a thought. In the sense that it's part of thinking. It can become part of thinking, but it doesn't have to. You know, you physically hear the airplane. Hear the air. Yeah. hear your own hearing, et cetera. And part of that is you may have a little blip which says, oh, it's an airplane. As I say, you may not, after a while, you may not name it.

[02:05]

That habit may be broken. But naming is a practice within Theravadan Buddhism of stopping thinking. So in the process of noticing, I get in the habit of naming instead of thinking. Und wenn ich in die Gewohnheit komme, im Prozess des Bemerkens zu benennen, anstatt zu denken. So, for a while today, I might practice some. Und eine Zeit lang, jeden Tag, übe ich das vielleicht. I've got nothing to do in the dentist's office. Ich habe nichts zu tun im Wartezimmer des Zahnarztes. So you say, a bell. Und so sage ich, eine Glocke. Glass. Ein Glas. Water. Wasser. Tisch. Table.

[03:06]

woman, man. If I just get in the habit of doing that, it tends to stop the process in its tracks. It tends to stop the process and it turns into appearance or presence. So that means that you can stop this process at naming. But naming is the first step toward discrimination. So you hear the airplane. That's an airplane. I wish the Zendo wasn't so near the airport. I need a really quiet mountain place.

[04:18]

That's discrimination. Then that shifts you to another mind, another viscosity of mind. Here we could go into that by speaking about the three minds of daily consciousness, but we're not going to try to do everything here. What we're talking about here, some of the basics I've worked out over the last ten years or more, teaching in Europe, that I think can make adept leg practice work. Okay, so as a practice something appears or is born, is named, you start discriminating about it, but you can cut that discrimination with right knowledge. But you can cut through this distinction with the right knowledge.

[05:36]

like the four marks. And with right knowledge, you return it to appearance. And to return it to appearance is the experience of suchness. Now, suchness is one of the... Dzogchen and Mahamudra and Zen Buddhism. Suchness is the direct experience of emptiness. Or the direct experience of mind. And the experience of each thing in itself. An equalness to each other thing without comparison. So we could say this is five easy steps to suchness. Five easy steps to the highest state of mind known to Buddhism. Five simple steps to the highest known state in Buddhism.

[06:51]

And maybe you see how simple Buddhism is. It's just how we actually know things already. But the process of making it your awareness is transformed. Okay. Was I supposed to stop for lunch at 12.30? Dave, I don't know what time it is. I'm sorry. Well, we'll start at 3 instead of 2.30. Was 2.30 soon enough to start yesterday?

[07:58]

Yeah, we could have waited till 3 because it was a nice day, but 2.30 was okay. I want you all to be happy. Now, let me just say that If you don't have this practice of the four marks and the five dharmas, if you don't erase the blackboard, pretty soon it's covered with chalk. covered with chalk dust. And you can't, I mean, it just seems like a permanent kind of presence. There's a permanent blackboard, permanently got marks on it, and nothing changes. So the way we establish duration and the function of consciousness, the necessary function of consciousness to establish a predictable, cognizable world

[09:03]

The predictability kind of takes over and cognizability diminishes. And pretty soon you have a blackboard which is never erased. And you think the present is permanent. You can't even read what's on the blackboard anymore. So all you can do is think about yourself. Okay. So in a way to clear... The blackboard is to free you from self-relevant self. Self-referencing self. Okay. Now, the last thing I would like to say... is the process of knowing until trying to respond indirectly, implicitly to your question.

[10:51]

The process of knowing is many-tracked. It's non-graspable feeling. It's the non-verbal motoric sense of how the world works. And it's many simultaneous perceptions. Yeah. Shiri downstairs. the baby crying, the autobus bus over there, all kinds of things. And only some of them rise from this stream of knowing

[11:52]

Which is actually many streams of knowing. Only some of them surface as consciousness. Most of them are non-conscious. But the complexity of it, and according to Damasio you can show that that's the way the neurological system works, gives us a sense of, even if only part of its conscious, it gives us a sense of depth and duration to the present. Sense of depth and duration to the present. And in that sense, consciousness or knowing or the who's doing it. is more a moderator than a decider.

[13:09]

Because much of what you're doing is coming from the situation. I'd say about 85, 90%. If you walk through a door, no one says, geez, what an interesting decision, he didn't walk through the wall. But you walk through the door because the door asked you to walk through the door. And mostly the situation is making us respond. And only part of that is conscious. And only part of that is the autobiographical sense. And only part of that autobiographical sense is the observing self. And there's an observing mind as well as observing self.

[14:19]

And You want to experientially separate the observing mind and the observing self. Through Zen practice. Okay, that's enough. So let's sit for a moment and then we'll go. We're together. You seem to follow. The stillness in the appearances of the world.

[15:52]

Know the physiological mental pause. That allows the stillness of the world to appear. To be deeply relaxed, absorbed into stillness, is at the center of our practice.

[16:59]

Good afternoon. Now I spoke last night about the concentration of Yuan Wu. His use of the word concentration seine verwendung des wortes konzentration which we um well what he means is so much a part of the i mean not even a more than oral tradition But a kind of embodied, let's say an embodied tradition, proprioceptive or embodied tradition.

[19:34]

So if you just see a phrase like, once you've got the gist of the teaching, Concentrate uninterruptedly without breaks and the womb of sagehood will develop and mature. Now, if you're not embedded in such an oral or embodied tradition, as most of us aren't, You have to feel what the word must mean in the context of the sentence.

[20:45]

Because it's a word, he uses the word concentration for something we don't have a name for. So you have to think, what can you concentrate on uninterruptedly? What she emphasizes, without breaks. And what kind of concentration could you possibly call the womb of sagehood? So I suggested that we can understand this really as concentration on the fullness of mind itself. Or even To try to make it more specific, the presence of stillness.

[22:02]

Oder um es spezifischer zu machen, die Präsenz der Stille. Or stillness or presence, rather. The present is not an entity. The present is presence. Und die Präsenz ist keine Einheit, ein Gegenwärtigsein. So the presence. Presence as stillness. A kind of grokking or absorption of stillness. And I used the example of the shape of an ocean wave The shape is determined by its return to stillness. Or to feel the stillness of the tree. in its movement and its stillness, and feel the stillness of the mind even in its activity.

[23:17]

So that's a practice I tried to give you last evening for most of the evening. And this morning I presented these practices through the four marks and the five dharmas. And this also... turns on your ability to catch or feel appearance. Perception or knowing as a pulse. Okay, so I think you can, obviously we can understand these things.

[24:22]

But even understanding them, understanding them is not practice. And I like people actually who don't understand. Some of you are happy. Because understanding interferes with practice. The person whose understanding is linked to practice They only really have an experience of understanding when they do something or practice something. This kind of pressure of understanding coming out through practice or doing leads us further in practice. So if you're the kind of person whose intelligence leads you into understanding fairly easily, you have to kind of hold that back

[25:45]

and keep moving through practice. Tsukiroshi used to say wave follows wave and wave leads wave. A traditional Zen saying. It means Understanding leads practice and practice leads understanding. And you shouldn't get two or three waves ahead. Or you leave the ocean behind. Yeah. So I ask myself, okay, I've presented this, maybe it's understandable.

[27:19]

But what's the entry? Let's say physical entry. Because it's the yogic practice, usually the physical entry is easier than the mental entry. You may get a mental picture of it, but you need a physical entry. And I think this practice of feeling in each person, in each situation, in each object, uninterruptedly, the fullness of mind or the bridge of stillness that joins the world, is best understood through developing a habit of pausing.

[28:40]

And this too, in a way you pause for appearance. So I would say that physiologically, in a way, dharma practice is rooted in a habit of pausing. You can find the pause in disappearing on your exhale. Or staying with the breath, you can find the pause as the breath turns at the top or at the bottom. Or you can just feel the pause as a stillness, a waiting for the stillness of each thing. Like you might wait for a beach stone to speak to you.

[29:47]

Patience as a practice means to wait for things to speak to you. So instead of rushing ahead with your thinking, you wait for the world to speak to you. Yeah. You know, if you develop this habit... In the process it may, for a while, during the time you practice, it's a kind of slower, it's a kind of slower movement. But eventually it's just part of the process of knowing.

[30:55]

And I'm sure it's related to athletes, tennis players and others who get in so-called the zone where everything seems slow. There's still playing tennis very quickly, but everything feels slow. It feels like it's in a pause. So I would say that this sense of developing a habit of pause can open you to this continuous practice of the fullness of mind. Or the pause of appearance, which allows the four marks of the five dharmas to be your practice.

[32:02]

I think the pause is a kind of catalyst which actually allows something chemically and psychologically to happen. So again, we're trying to enter into how we actually exist. And thinking kind of rushes by the world. It's nice to see the world from an airplane. Yeah, but how different it is to walk. From a car you don't see much, but from walking or a bicycle, the world is much more as it actually is.

[33:07]

And thinking is sometimes like a car on an autobahn. So things like the five skandhas, the four marks, et cetera, are a way to get you to slow down, but it doesn't mean you're slower. And as Gerhard said the other day, the sense of letting things nourish you Is one entry into this changing your pace. Or discovering a pause or discovering a pace that nourishes you.

[34:11]

Now I've been in the back of my mind partly because of the my dismay with American patriotism. I've been thinking a lot about how nationhood works in us. And, you know, even though I'm snobbish and angry about ideas like patriotism. I wonder if matriotism would be better. Your college is your alma mater, but your nation is your alma pater. I don't know why. But there is a side to it that is real.

[35:24]

So it's been like in the back of my kind of sort through what we're talking about today and actually the last few seminars have been turned out to be quite related. And as we spoke this morning, I talked about a non-verbal narrative. A knowing of the world that's not languaged. A non-languaged narrative.

[36:26]

And certainly what these practices are doing are trying to open you to knowing the world in a non-languaged way. Enter you into, enter us, enter you us into how we actually exist. Looking through the suds of consciousness and the sometimes dirty dishwater of consciousness. Had the silverware of the mind. Perhaps looking, feeling into the non-language narrative of knowing, the non-languaged knowing. Okay, so if consciousness needs and creates a predictable, cognizable world, what does the non-language narrative of the world do?

[37:57]

What does this non-lingual narrative of the world do? Well, first I think it wants or it appreciates a familiar world. We feel a depth of familiarity. And so when I say to you, when I say, notice where you really feel comfortable or familiar. What kind of urban situation, what kind of countryside, And it's interesting to me that even the countryside and the forest paths in different European countries have a different feeling.

[39:07]

And you can feel actually the nationalities of the people and how they walk on the forest. Germans walk one way, the British walk another way. So what is it that makes the world familiar to us? I think it's this non-language narrative that's reinforced by the familiar. And gives us a sense of depth and a fullness of the present. Okay, then how can practice possibly work? If consciousness is determined to be predictable, and be a medium for the self, and edit out our own experience which challenges the self,

[40:20]

And excludes other modes of mind, like dreaming, obviously. Well, consciousness tries to create a predictable world in which the biographical self can swim. Und das Bewusstsein versucht, eine vorhersehbare Welt zu schaffen, in der das biografische Selbst schwimmen kann. And swim without too many obstacles. Und schwimmen ohne zu viele Hindernisse. Okay, so then we have the, we can say that's the languaged or conscious and often languaged narrative of the world. Und wir können sagen, das ist das sprachliche und languaged and and conscious and language narrative of the world.

[41:38]

I mean, consciousness certainly isn't limited to language, but language becomes the predominant influence. Bewusstsein ist natürlich nicht beschränkt auf die Sprache, aber die Sprache wird dominant. Yeah, not for us completely and not for artists and so forth, but yeah. Nicht für uns völlig, aber bestimmt nicht für Künstler, aber doch. Okay, so then, so that's hard to get, I mean, that creates an implicitly predictable and implicitly permanent world, as I said. So you can understand things in consciousness, but it's hard to make changes. Okay, so what about the non-languaged world? narrative and non-conscious narrative, which most of it doesn't surface as consciousness.

[42:45]

But it's what gives us a sense of familiarity, of belonging, and so forth. And I think it's important to recognize how much we need a sense of belonging and familiarity. One of the toughest practices is to take that away. Yeah. At least it was... Certainly when Sukhiroshi did it to me, it was a big challenge in my practice.

[43:54]

Here's the person I changed my world for. You know, when I was in college, I listened to Tillich and other philosophers, and I felt... their life isn't what they're saying. And I tried to stay outside our society. Even in college, people would say, There was a book that came out at that time by a man named Colin Wilson called The Outsider. And everybody would say, yeah, we can tell you're like that. A British writer. So it's actually Suzuki Roshi who shoehorned me inside. And the first person I ever met who was the kind of human being I wanted human beings to be, which is what a person I assume now to be some sort of Sufi,

[45:21]

who I met when I was working on ships in Bandar Shapur, Iran. Bandar Shapur. Yeah, on the Euphrates. And he was just a guy working in the port to make money with his son, and the family lived up in the hills somewhere. And the feeling of this man has never left me. His name was Shukra-la-Ali. And I'd never felt that again with a human being until I met Suzuki Roshi. Yeah, I feel it in the Dalai Lama, though, for instance. And what's interesting, the people I've met who are somewhat like that, they're more like each other than they're like the culture they come from.

[46:41]

So here's this ideal person for me that I changed my life for and said, okay, Whatever happens from now on, we do it together. One day he stopped looking at me. One day he stopped responding to me. He just ignored me. I thought I'd done something wrong, of course. I probably did. I was a human being. But he continued it. I mean, after a few weeks, I thought, well, this is getting to be a habit.

[47:44]

And at some point after about a few weeks of it, I decided, well, that's his problem, not mine. I'm going to practice with him no matter what he does. And I don't know. I mean, I just thought, okay. And then actually after a couple of months, I thought to myself, it's going to last a year, and it did. But he took away from me the need for Re-friendship, reassurance, and things like that. So I had established that for myself, from within myself. Okay. But going back, we have this non-languaged... narrative of the world, motoric, etc.

[49:01]

How the world is presented to us in an infinite variety. Okay, this non-languaged narrative gives us a feeling, generates a feeling of the familiar and the depths of the familiar. but it's not linked to consciousness or language. It responds to the familiar, but it's not stuck in the predictable.

[50:03]

Now, do I know what I'm talking about? Is this really the way it is? I don't know exactly. I would be surprised if it wasn't this way. But it's my way of describing my experience. So this non-language narrative, this non-language knowing is is what creates a sense of familiarity and gives a feeling of depth. But it's not only confined by consciousness, it's also not confined by language, by the limitation of words and so forth.

[51:06]

By the syntax of language. So it's basically open to the unfamiliar. Open to the unique. Yeah, the... ego structures and consciousness structures are a little afraid of the unique. We can say this non-language knowing likes the familiar but isn't afraid of the unique. And the unique is a kind of energy. And it's pervasive. In other words, when an object, a perception, an event is apprehended by the

[52:32]

non-language narrative, knowing. If it's familiar, it strengthens the familiar. When it's unfamiliar, it changes the familiar. So it's like dropping a stone in a pond. The ripples spread out very rapidly. So in my trying to find words for this, I would say that familiar penetrates, but the unfamiliar pervades. Can you say it? I'm testing our translator inadvertently.

[54:00]

Okay. Pervades means spreads out, covers everything, touches everything. Realigns the nonverbal narrative. and can be transformative of the non-verbal knowing. Okay, so the Zen practice of gate phrases are meant to get under our languaged into this non-language narrative. Now, one of the differences between Tibetan Buddhism and Zen Buddhism And Tibetan Buddhism, particularly Mahamudra and Dzogchen, are the forms of Buddhism most similar conceptually and most similar historically.

[55:24]

They developed from similar schools and in a similar period. This Tibetan Buddhism came into a culture that was agricultural and different valleys. and not an urbanized culture for sure. And Zen entered an already highly urbanized culture. literate culture in China. Buddhism entered, not Zen. So Zen had to develop techniques to work with people who their whole education wasn't going to be Buddhist. They were already poets or administrators or something.

[56:26]

So how do you find the acupuncture points in the culture? How do you find where you can inject, sometimes surreptitiously, Buddhism into the mainstream? And these gate phrases were a big part of it. Koans are a big part of it. So a gate phrase like just now is enough. Yeah, it It stops your thinking. Or some good ones to work with.

[57:28]

I'm always close to this. Not knowing is nearest. Such phrases turn away from language and sort of Bumble along on the non-language narrative, non-language knowing. And sometimes they can penetrate in. And when they do, this non-language narrative can shift and see the world, know the world in a new way. And that can erupt into consciousness. Yeah, and that's one kind of enlightenment experience.

[58:32]

Okay. Hmm. So I'm not only trying to say something about practice to you, and the way we exist, the way we exist through our senses and mental processes.

[59:33]

But I'm also sharing with you how I'm trying to look at the background of Zen teachings to understand how they, what one, how how they work and which ones work in our culture. So I would like us to take a break in a moment. And as usual on Saturday, I'd like us to break into small groups. And there's not afternoon showers yet, so we can meet in the garden or up here, etc. And I'd like you to consider three, perhaps three questions.

[60:35]

You can think of whatever you want, it's fine, but I'll suggest three questions. One is simply, what practices have worked for you? Breathing, zazen, mindfulness, whatever. And second, what gate phrases, have any gate phrases, wados, worked for you? And third, Have you had any experiences that suggest or make you realize the world isn't entirely the way the official version is? die euch irgendwie nahelegen oder euch überzeugt haben, dass die Welt nicht wirklich so ist, wie es in der offiziellen Version heißt.

[61:43]

Experiences that made you stop and say, I don't know if I want to tell anybody that. Erfahrungen, die euch irgendwie innehalten haben lassen und euch denken, ich möchte vielleicht nicht wissen, dass das alle wissen. Or experiences that make you think, I don't, that surprise you. I didn't know the world could be like this or might work like this. Okay. Now let maybe you two can... Break, let's see, how many? We've got like 40 or so people here. So, five groups of eight. Something like that. If I can still multiply. Okay, thank you. Vielen Dank. And after a little while, I'll suggest we stop, but have a break first, and then gather together after the break.

[63:03]

Much about meditation practice. Perhaps you can think of it as a vertical sunbathing. You're just relaxing upright, but inside relaxing in the sun. In this case, the sun is the mind settling down. As we feel, I think sunbathing, settling down.

[64:32]

Or it's a way to discover if you can just be relaxed in yourself sometimes. And it's a way of discovering whether you can sometimes be relaxed with yourself. Guten Morgen.

[67:52]

Of course I would like to, since I can't participate in the, yeah, I would like some reports from the five groups. But first, you know, Giulio had a question earlier about appearance. You still have the question? About disappearing. Well, I think that, you know, Conceptually, it's easy to understand. But I think for knowing you a bit, if you can't practice it or get a feel for it, you don't think you understand it.

[69:07]

And of course that's true. So I've been wondering how to. One way is to just say, well, practice this and you'll discover what it means. That's probably the best way. But I always wonder, is there a way to approach it with... feeling and language. It's always a kind of challenge for me to see if we can shape this English and with the help of Christina German so that it reflects practice.

[70:18]

So perhaps I'll try to say something about it after our discussion. Yeah, so somebody want to start off? Yes, Gerhard. In our group at first we talked about what leads us into practice. And the feeling was there is a big gap between how the world is presented to us or it seems to us. and how we can cope with it and what we feel about it.

[71:28]

Just like you also talked about in the morning. And for many of us there is also a kind of longing to sit, a longing for a kind of depth, And also a very strong longing for stillness. Sounds good. And some feel a very powerful dismay with these repetitive thinking or thoughts. That's what's good about thoughts. It drives us to practice. Compulsive monkey mind. Monkey mind is the first Buddha. And what is important in practice, for most of us it is sitting.

[72:34]

And some feel that sitting alone is not enough. Only sitting is not enough. So something has to happen between the periods you're sitting and then. I mean, something has to happen in between your sitting periods so you decide to have a life. But it had to be something which realized practice or enfolded practice somehow. And some people also like to practice qin hin on their own.

[74:00]

Or it's easier for them to meditate when they are doing jogging or running. And people also try to be more mindful during their daily activities. And some try to stay with their breath during their work. There is the experience that while walking and staying with your breath, it makes easier to get in a balanced state when you are in a kind of mixed up state or angry irritation or something.

[75:08]

I hope. Das hoffe ich. And some also feel that the group or community and what we also experience here as a sangha, it's getting more and more important for their practice. And the second part we dealt with, as you wished, was which sentences or phrases worked for us. And there was some like. I free breath from feeling, emotions and thoughts.

[76:11]

Yeah. Of freeing thought. Right now, already here, already arrived. Already arrived, yeah. I am on the path. On a path. Everything I need is there now. All I need is already here. Ich bin genau so gut, wie ich jetzt und hier bin. I'm good the way I'm here now. I'm perfect the way I'm just now. Wo du bist, dem was du kannst, das was du kannst. Do where you are with what you have, what you can or something, exactly what you can. Or death in the midst of life.

[77:20]

And death meaning transformation. And somebody else saying the big liberation. Or there's always someone who is not busy. There's quite a lot of gate phrases there. That's our topic now. And the third topic, experiences of the world, which are not officially accepted so much. We didn't have much time to go into that.

[78:23]

Thank goodness. And people are told about near-death experiences in that respect. Okay, thank you. It's interesting how some of these wados or gate phrases are kind of homely wisdom. Things that might be a New Year's resolution. Or that might be, you know, in a book of of sayings from medieval times or something. But it's interesting that there's often wisdom in those homely phrases. But when you bring them into mindfulness and meditation practice, they can be very powerful.

[79:34]

Okay, someone else? Andreas? So he adds to this group a little thing. To the third point, I found interesting that some people, through accidents or something like that, they had experience which opened up for them another sphere of experience. But it was like the thing that opened this up for them, it was only... a trigger, but other people who had the same kind of event, they not necessarily could have opened it up like that.

[80:59]

So before that happened, many things made it possible for that to open up. Yeah. There's an expression in early Buddhism, a bee flies into an unclean hive and flies out again. And it's used to mean you can have many enlightenment experiences, but if you're not ready for them, just you don't. Yeah, you're not ready for it. In fact, I think, as you know, enlightened experiences are almost a natural part of life. But because we don't recognize them or don't react to them, they are like little bubbles floating around us.

[82:18]

And with new practitioners, I can almost see how many bubbles are floating around them. And something in their life was working, but when they start to practice, often these bubbles start to open. Okay. Someone else? One articulate group, four silent groups. You know, can I say something first? The five fears are fear of loss of livelihood. Fear of loss of reputation.

[83:38]

Fear of death. Fear of unusual states of mind. And fear of speaking before an assembly. And in ways that is the most important because it really means the courage to speak out in your society under any circumstance. But anyway, yes. In our group, there were four women and three men, and it was interesting that, to the first question, three men seemed to be directed somehow to the sitting meditation. It allowed them to be clear with themselves, experience their feelings and emotions.

[84:58]

And the women, they brought practice in their everyday life, in their picking of berries. And watching, taking care of children. And my feeling is that everything has its place and it's changing in your life, in the time of life. This is the favorite sentence she got from you because it's the hardest thing to practice for her.

[86:06]

It was hard for me, too. Took a year and about four... And three months before it actually happened. And in the middle of that period, for two or three months, I forgot to say it. So, as a question, do I understand correctly that in your daily practice you virtually said this sentence to yourself again and again? I did. Every day? Like a mantra. Like a mantra, yeah. That's what these gate phrases are.

[87:09]

You use them in a mantra-like way. But you say it, but then after a while you have a feel of it. So you... And what's useful, I found useful about that phrase... It was at a very busy time of my life. I was a full-time graduate student and a full-time employee and a young father. So I always had to go somewhere and do something. So every time I thought you know, in a Pavlovian sense, every time I thought I have to go, I'd say, no place to go.

[88:09]

And every time I had to do something, I'd say, okay, no place, nothing to do. And every time I had to do something, I'd say, okay, no place, nothing to do. And one thing I liked about the practice also was that when I forgot it for two or three months, I remember exactly where I remembered it. Ich erinnere mich genau daran, wann mir das wieder eingefallen ist. Exactly along which street in a particular park in San Francisco? Genau an einer bestimmten Straße bei einem Park in San Francisco. And I think often when you look back in your memory and there's a kind of bright area, you remember the situation, the quality of the light and so forth.

[89:09]

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