Well, those of you who had your hands up, I asked you not to forget, so I shouldn't forget either. Who remembered that their hands were up? Who remembered that their hands were up? I'm talking from the point of view of an elderly person, and it's much easier. Elderly? You're much younger than I am. Well, I'm 56, and when I was 35, I was searching for that very special, bright being. And at that time, I was desperate, because malignancies are not... So I didn't find it.

[01:02]

I had to find it, find it, find it. And that wasn't it. Suddenly, after meeting Christiane, something changed gradually. And if I want to locate it, from the moment that I was crying because something was beautiful, music or nature, child or bird, that search for the ground of being went backwards. And sometimes I forgot it. And I just had this... I just wanted to contribute it. How to put that, that by the moment of joy with something right now, right here.

[02:07]

A couple of times and more and more it happened that I forgot this. I'm not looking for it anymore. I don't want this. It's quite a grace to be here. Yes, thank you very much. Volker? Yes. There are many questions in between. Many questions folded themselves in, somehow, on the cushion. But you said, among other things, a strong self is needed.

[03:10]

For example, the struggle to let go of oneself, or to let go of oneself. To what? Well, you have to decide for yourself before you can let go of yourself, or let go of yourself. It needs a strong self before you can pass through the self, self-gone-ness. Okay. You said this. I did? Oh, okay. Last time I said okay. But where is the inner garden? It's difficult, I think. But where's the passage or where's the point where you're passing that or bridging that?

[04:25]

For myself it doesn't seem to be so difficult. Because I'm practicing. It's much more difficult, for example, when dealing with the children. I have small children, smaller children and big children. And some of you know that I have a big grown-up daughter who had difficulties of the soul last year. Then I sometimes try to imagine that it is now useful to go to a council or to an institution or an instruction.

[05:37]

And sometimes I try to find out should I give an advice now or should I try to guide, give guidance or a direction? Or isn't it simply the best to concentrate on my practice and just Be an example to her, to your daughter. Or also for the other children. And also the question I'm formulating now, somehow it feels a little bit artificial. Because in real life we are muddling through a lot. Yeah, well, of course, I can't answer the situation so personal and particular.

[07:14]

But in general, I think it's always better to be an example. And better not to give advice unless you're already an example. Sometimes we can give advice. The person receiving the advice has to really, in various ways, give you permission and ask for the advice. That's in my experience. Okay. Yes? Oh yes, Kisla. Yes, I don't know if I can translate this correctly.

[08:17]

So my feeling is that what we think of ourselves So my feeling, I don't know whether I can explain it, but my feeling what the self is, it's somehow put upon ourselves from the beginning like a tea house. Like a tea cozy. A tea cozy. For my feeling, it feels for me like I had to dig myself out of that. So I was raised from a Protestant background and from the beginning I was struggling against it. And now I don't want to have form ideas or images because they all would be too narrow, somehow narrowing it down.

[09:45]

Yeah. I don't need any ground because my freedom resides in this boundarylessness. Okay. And that's how I'm feeling fine. It sounds good, too. And it looks good. Hi. Who's next? Yes. to understand what we have been speaking before lunch. I was somehow looking what you meant by this ground of being. Is it the meaning or the cause?

[10:48]

Or is it somehow feeling something common in everything? Or something entirely different? Well, right now I can't reach out to speak to it as well as I would like to. But we have a saying in Zen Buddhism, not one and not two. That when you look at things, they're not one, they're actually many.

[12:08]

And you look at the many, it's not only many, there's some relationship, some similarity between things. And one of the main things from our perceptual point of view is that on each thing we feel a sameness. When that sameness is how they appear. They each have the nature of quality, of quality, but a quality of momentariness and appearance. And whatever from our point of view as human beings, there's always mind and perception as part of it. So sometimes that experience is called suchness or sameness.

[13:19]

But when we say not one, not two, not two-ness is not oneness. If you say it's one, it's wrong. And as many of us know, we can have experiences of oneness, but an experience of oneness does not mean everything is somehow reduced to one underlying reality. So on the whole, on the whole, on the whole, oneness, on the oneness whole, on the whole, oneness is a reductive idea. and it's you know we think we feel in practice that it's better to notice the plurality rather than trying to reduce it to something that isn't plural but Jung's idea of a

[14:36]

What is something, what's his idea? The collective unconscious or something. That's a rather Protestant idea of an underlying ground of being. Okay. No. Yeah, okay. Someone else? Yeah. Roshi, in the morning you talked about that there is in Buddhism big doubt. And I asked myself whether this big doubt, there is also a big doubt in enlightenment, whether there is enlightenment.

[15:47]

That's a good doubt. Is this something where Buddhism is reflecting about? Or is some reflection about in Buddhism about that? Well, it depends. I mean, Buddhism depends what you mean by enlightenment. I mean, enlightenment is... First of all, it's an experience some people have. And I would say, when you understand what Buddhism means by enlightenment, I would say all of us to some extent have this experience.

[16:49]

Sometimes we don't notice it or develop it. So Buddhism notices the experience of enlightenment and also speaks about the wisdom on each moment of acting through impermanence. As a wisdom which arises from enlightenment. So there's no reason to doubt that anymore than to doubt there's trees outside. But from one's own experience. I would say that if enlightenment is anywhere, it has to be here.

[18:05]

Where else would it be? So the potentiality of enlightenment is always present. But a doubt about how we exist makes you more open to that potential. Okay. Anyone else? Yes. Yes. yesterday when I arrived this was the end of the pre-day there was talk about the background self that you can also imagine a self in the background of the ordinary self and this hasn't been followed up whether this really exists or doesn't exist and I in the way of thinking for me there is an interesting

[19:14]

similarity to this background of being, if you imagine that. And the parallel I'm seeing is somehow the permanence you're trying to establish by that. Permanence or impermanence? Permanence. Who's trying to establish permanence? If I imagine a background self or a ground of being, so this has an aspect of eternity. A god-like quality, religious and religious aspect. So in that sense.

[20:37]

Okay. Did we say background mind or background self? A prior self, a previous self. That I said, yeah. There are two different things, I think. The background self was something you know? So we don't know whether we had the background self or not. Yeah, well, any case. So I also have the experience that self is changing all the time.

[21:55]

So the question is, apart from the self that is changing all the time, is there also something like an inner core of self? Yeah, that's what we're talking about. Yeah. I mean, if I speak philosophically from the point of view of Buddhism, I have to say no. If I speak more practically, yes, maybe sort of. And if I speak more ecumenically, yes, some religious views and some people's personal experiences, something like that, and it really works for them. And of course, the basic view of Buddhism is that everything is changing.

[23:17]

Absolutely everything is changing. Change is changing. And that idea alone means, if you carry that through, that there's no ground to be. From a Buddhist point of view, Einstein's search for a unified field theory is definitively fruitless. Yes, but it certainly motivated him to make some marvelous world-transforming ideas. Okay, so the basic view of Buddhism is everything's changed.

[24:24]

The word Dharma means literally, the etymology, what holds, what doesn't change. And Turning words are basically the larger idea which turning words or Wado is rooted in is the idea of Dharanis. Dharani is how to use a teaching or a phrase or wisdom. So it enters into what holds or stays. But it doesn't mean what holds doesn't change. It just changes differently and slower. Now, I've often spoken over the years and it was one of my early experiences which I tried to notice to myself

[25:36]

was the idea of a background mind. And a background mind, I discovered from practicing meditation that I began to have a background mind. It kind of stayed in place and didn't change much. There was a kind of foreground mind caught up in circumstances and thinking and a background mind more rooted in the body and in the field of awareness. And sometimes I said it was maybe something like the way a woman might feel when she's pregnant. She does her daily life like, I presume, like she usually does. But probably most of the time she's still aware she's pregnant.

[27:15]

In the way she walks and what she decides to eat, drink and so forth. And somehow practices something like that. You become pregnant with a state of mind or mode of mind which is different than our daily mind of consciousness. It's integrating and accepting, not divisive. And it begins to pervade and transform our foreground mind. And it's the first experience of, or seeds of, what I would call awareness in contrast to consciousness.

[28:18]

And it's the first indication of, or it's the beginning of, what we call, as someone mentioned, imperturbable mind. Even in the midst of very difficult things or painful things or whatever, there's a Your fundamental mind is undisturbed. So that's as much as I can say about it right now. And some people, and in fact some Zen teachers in the past, and certainly contemporary ones, translate that experience into oneness. Or into an underlying ground. And there's no reason for me to say they're wrong.

[29:21]

I don't know what's wrong and right. But I can say I don't think it says deeper attitude with which to practice. Or an effective attitude. And sometimes it's used as an initial teaching for people because it gets them started. And then you take it away later. But I don't like to practice that way. And then some teachers forget to take it away later. And some teachers are teachers who their teacher forgot to take it away.

[30:33]

Okay. Yes. Dhamma means to hold, but it doesn't mean to keep. That's good. Dhamma means to hold, but it doesn't mean to keep. Because this brings me to another thought I had before, because we always speak of the self as a theme, and since it's so closely linked with perception and mem... Mem-science. Mem-bots. Mem-bots. Mem-science. Yeah. So, And also you talked about the fields of experience.

[31:37]

So isn't self appearing with any experience and disappearing? Yeah. Self may appear with any experience, but it also disappears with any experience with which it appears. Nische Deutsche, ja. Okay. Und da die Eigenschaft, diese vier Kennzeichen vom Dharma, dieses Erscheinen, Bleiben, Verschwinden und Verschwunden sein, oder Ausgelöst sein, sind, da habe ich das auf diesen Gedanken gebracht, weil er eben gesagt hat, weil Roger gesagt hat, dass die that itself is so closely connected to perception and these times of memory. And she also mentioned again these fields of vision with which we exist, the fields of experience, and whether or not the self is not a thing that exists or does not exist or changes, but that it appears with every experience and disappears with every experience.

[32:53]

Yeah, you're right. I mean, when we say self or mind, etc., we have to remind ourselves or find a way to make clear we're not talking about entities. We're talking about maybe processes. From a Buddhist point of view, there's no self. There's a process that we're functioning that we can call self. And you know, when I usually speak about self, I speak about these three, plus one or four, functions of self. And I, yeah, it's the center of my teaching about self. And I haven't mentioned it this time. Yeah. Because you've heard it so often. And also because it's interesting for me to avoid speaking about it.

[34:23]

Means I have to find some other way to speak. Yeah, so it's process or clouds, you know what we're talking about. Functions. Yeah. Okay, anyone else? Yes. My experience concerning Dharma is that the experiences are different but they have a similar quality. And it's connected with a feeling of clarity. And also a feeling of being connected in the sense that I don't differentiate between myself and the object.

[35:42]

So this feels much bigger. So, and here I have the feeling of oneness with this object. Yeah. Of connectedness, maybe, instead of oneness. Vielleicht verbunden sein statt eins sein. I cannot make a difference. Being connected or one. But it's the same quality. Would you say oneness for that moment? Because that's the sense of a dharma. Dharma is what holds, but the only thing that holds for a moment is oneness at that moment.

[36:47]

And the thing is, we can understand that, but to get ourselves so that we can feel that just the way it is, this is practice. It'd be like a physicist perhaps who sees that this is the way the world is, but that's not the way he lives at home and thinks and acts and pursues his career. Yeah, so if a physicist says, how am I going to live what I see that how the world exists, then he'd have to start parsing Buddhism. No, I would like you before the break, I mean after the break,

[37:48]

as I usually do on Saturday afternoon, that you meet in small groups in your own language. And I find it's a little kindergarten-like, but it's always good. And you count off one, two, three, four, you know. But I want to complexify the situation a little bit first. You know, our idea of self is very connected with our western idea of self. It's very connected with what we mean by an individual. An indivisible individual. And it means that you removed yourself, at least as you mature, from a familial identity.

[39:16]

From a primarily at least familial or tribal identity. And when you have an identity that's distributed through your people, your race or your tribe, I think Plato would say you're first of all a city zen, you're defined through your city, your polis, not through some kind of interior. And it looks like Christianity supported the development of the idea of the individual. I mean, I'm not a scholar of these things, so I'm just making suggestions. But I believe from the 12th century on, 1100s on, there was a feeling that you knew God through self-knowledge.

[40:35]

And that at least from that time on about, Christianity was very much an interior religion. You opened yourself to God and the spirit of the Holy Spirit then guided you. Well, to the extent that this is the case, it is part of what we in the West call an individual, an indivisible individual, who knows him or herself through self-knowledge. And our contemporary democracy continues this idea. I mean, one person, one vote, this is basically the idea that you're an individual.

[42:04]

And you're able to make up your own mind separate from society as well as along with society. And democracy simply does not, our idea of democracy simply doesn't work in tribal society. The idea that the United States can impose democracy on the Near East is the utter stupidity. It took the West centuries to come to, you know, what we call an individual democracy. And closely related to the individual and self in the West are the idea of human rights. What are human rights? Human rights are what? No state can take from you.

[43:31]

You have a right as a human that's not that belongs to you more than what the government says. China is struggling with this right now. I mean, the Chinese government wants Chinese people defined through being Chinese, not through multicultural identities, etc., They've probably been fairly stupid in inviting the Olympics at this time. Maybe it'll be good, but they don't want what comes along with the Olympics. Okay, so humanity is rooted in the idea of the individual.

[44:34]

I think of Herr Dr. Konze, if you know who that is, Edward Konze, who developed Buddhist Sanskrit. I mean, identified it and developed it for translating the Prajnaparamita literature. I knew him pretty well. And he was a kind of bitchy curmudgeon of a guy. He was a what? Bitchy? Bitchy Sanskrit. A curmudgeon is somebody who always finds something wrong to say or to put you down. A curmudgeon is somebody who's often old, who's often grumpy and you know. that's not good yeah you have that one too oh yeah you probably have even the people you can guess oh you do anyway he said once people have called me many things but no one's ever called me a human being yeah

[46:15]

A human being is a kind of funny idea. It's what we use these days. And what's quite interesting about the human being as an individual that developed, say, as Colin Morris says, from the 1100s on, what's interesting about the human being as an individual, that developed from about the 1100s on in Europe, Western Europe, according to Colin Morris, is that where did the monks and scholastics of the Middle Ages find their anchor as a human. It was in Latin. What united the monastics and scholars of Europe was Latin. And I'm simplifying it but I would say they would say you can't be a human being without knowing Latin.

[47:48]

And there were some similar ideas in ancient India because Sanskrit refined the mind. And without the refinement of Sanskrit, you couldn't think the thoughts that allowed you to be a Buddhist. And you see this still carried out in the English and American colleges, the humanities. Before you study medicine or science or anything, you study the humanities. And the humanities no longer mean Latin, but it means studying literature, language and so forth. It's the humanities which make us human.

[49:04]

And Western educational system is much based on this and it comes from this, what was rooted in the idea of knowing Latin. You might be interested, a little aside, that the American college system is based on the British Oxford and Cambridge College. But the American university system, which is an extremely good system actually nowadays, is based on the German university. And there was an American professor in the 1800s I think it was the 1800s. who went to Europe.

[50:13]

And he found out that Germans knew a hell of a lot more than the Americans. They really knew more Latin, they knew more Greek, they were just much more adept in philosophy. So he modeled the development of Harvard on Goethegan University. And it became the model for American universities. So thanks a lot. Okay, so Bernard of Clairvaux is one of the main people, for instance. I guess founded the Cistercians or was the outstanding Cistercian? That seems to be one of the most intelligent men of that time.

[51:16]

And he really emphasized this self-knowledge through knowing the Greeks and the Latins and the classic culture. Yeah, but not so much as a scholar, but to know oneself. Okay, so now this is quite interesting. If you're a human being, not through the vernacular of your national languages, This whole question of how you refine yourself so that you're a human being. And only through that process did you become an individual.

[52:20]

You weren't born an individual. You became an individual. Okay. So, I'm just bringing this up. Because when we use words like human rights and human being We don't really probably recognize that we're talking about a particular idea and experience of self that we embody. So self becomes a very complex thing. Now, one other thing. Oh, first let me give you a little poem of W.H. Auden, the British poet.

[53:21]

He said, wrote, some 30 inches from my nose. I don't think this is worth writing down. some 30 inches from my nose the frontier of my person goes and all the untilled air between all the untilled air untilled means unplowed which is of course a sexual image All the un-tilled air between is private unless I beckon you with bedroom eyes.

[54:27]

But it's this real sense of there's a frontier, there's a border. And unless you might be a lover, you know, stay out. Then I read a West African person advising his son. There are certain ways you have to act and behave. If the guiding spirit of our race is going to visit you. And if the guiding spirit of our race is going to visit you you must from now on spend more time in my company.

[55:31]

Now this is actually very similar to Buddhism in the lineage sense of Buddhism. In that it's an apprenticeship. that the genius or the guiding spirit of the lineage is only likely to visit you if you develop a certain way of behaving and knowing, of knowing and noticing. Now I throw that in to further complexify things. Because then is Buddhism a kind of tribal identity? Yeah, but what about the uniqueness of each moment? Time for a break. I asked Yamada Reirin Roshi, who I practiced with, along with Suzuki Roshi in San Francisco in the 60s.

[57:26]

I said to him, you know, what is reality? And then later while we were sitting He said, this is reality.

[57:51]

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