Okay, I'll start here. I would like to hear more about intentions, because intentions are closely related to awareness, how to practice with them. You spoke about valid knowledge in eastern context. Is perception and logic. And then, of course, scripture, which then you explained, was not used anymore.

[01:12]

But in the Western context, perception and logic in the scientific sense is also an instrument of validating truth. But obviously, it seems to be a completely different axis, nonetheless. Because the difference seems to be that perception, observation in the Western understanding is what can be measured, while, as you just explained, perception in this context is non-conceptual perception. The logic in the Western, un-Aristotelian sense of contradiction elimination is obviously

[02:17]

And then what would interest me is the difference in the understanding of logic, the Western logic in the Aristotelian sense, where one of the core ideas is to eliminate contradictions. So then I'd be interested to hear more about the Eastern approach to logic. When are you planning to move to Johanneshof? Oh, well, that would take at least a month. Okay, I have that in mind. Next. I was reminded how you used to speak about awareness and your definition of awareness in the past was that it's that which keeps you from peeing into your bed at night.

[03:33]

I don't remember that. Yes, it's true. Babies learn to wait after a while so they can take their diapers off. And that's a kind of awareness because you're not conscious. Was ich gestern verstanden habe, in sehr langer Zeit, war, dass ich offensichtlich die Fähigkeiten habe, es zu tun, aber ich merke es dann. Diese Form von Gewahrsein ist für mich verlosen. So what I understood yesterday after all this time now is that I obviously am able to accomplish that. I hope so, for Eric's sake. But I'm not at all conscious that I do this. So in that sense that awareness is invisible and that it's not accessible to me that there's an awareness of this.

[04:59]

And the development of my practice is also the development of awareness. And it takes different forms, but it feels like walking in the dark, which is nice to walk in the dark, but it is dark. What is the instruction for this self-awareness? One knows that one is on the right path.

[06:08]

And so when you ask, what do you want to hear, then my question is, what would be an instruction for the development of awareness, and how does one know that one is on the right path? Okay. Good question. Yeah? Harrison? Martin? Oh, no, I never have enough. I have got a whole bunch that I'm not telling you. You mentioned this morning, generally, I think, that you have not accomplished anything. You haven't invented a seed. You haven't thought about sounding it. Is this, is it important to accomplish something?

[07:22]

I'm sorry. This is . It's . Can somebody, how stop going about Well, I think I really don't want to respond to each question. What's important for me is to be in the process. Whether that process accomplishes anything or not, I don't care. But I'm all very impressed with other people and how much they do in much shorter lives than me.

[08:22]

So that's just a way of loving somebody. But I am always very impressed by other people when people achieve so much and sometimes in much shorter life spans than I have. But that's just a way of loving someone. I would like to learn more about Shispa in our field and what we can learn there. I would like to hear more about your bathing in our field, and what can we deduce for our practice from that? OK. Do you notice? Yes. I would like to experience from this immediate experience, when I notice that something mixes in, that is, this naming, comparing, how I simply fall back again early enough, or how I have to practice that I fall back faster and longer.

[09:39]

I have no problem, when you speak German, I have no problem having non-conceptual perceptions. You have a blue shirt on and blue eyes, and it's very pleasant. What she said, I don't know. So now you can tell me. I would like to hear more about when in this immediate sense of perception, or in an immediate sense of, just be immediate, and when I drop out of that through the process of naming and so forth, I would like to hear more about how can I stabilize myself

[10:45]

back in the immediate field of perceiving? What would be an instruction for practice for how to keep bringing myself back to the immediacy? I would like to get there. We'll see if it's possible between now and tomorrow. Thank you. I'm going clockwise. Yes. Yes. It is a little bit the same, but in different words. And about awareness and consciousness and the image I have is about very shy animals in the dark.

[11:52]

And as Christina was talking, a similar image, I'm walking through the darkness. And sometimes consciousness is like a group of people that are also walking through a dark forest and speak very loudly. And one reason they speak so loudly is because they don't know that these shy animals even exist. And actually they would be happy to see them. Und auf der anderen Seite reden sie so laut, weil sie auch ein wenig Angst haben, dass eines dieser scheuen Tiere sie von hinten anfangen könnte. And the other reason they speak so loudly is because they are a little scared that one of these shy animals might attack them from behind.

[12:57]

Und so wäre mein Wunsch, könntest du ein bisschen einerseits über die scheuen Tiere reden, aber dann auch... And so one wish I have is, could you on the one hand speak somehow about these shy animals, but also about the fear? I've seen them all the time. I can try to talk about them. but also about this element of fear about other mental states. This was a good example of thinking in images. Who's next? Yes. I feel the same way. You have these shy animals too?

[14:01]

We are sometimes very concrete. It's like this, when I come together with people and actually want to meet them, then, I'll say it a bit exaggeratedly, as soon as I open the dog, I experience resistance, verbally, with a predefined opinion, or with a movement from which I know that now it will be dangerous, now I lose my motivation, my desire to stand on a new level with this other. I feel similarly and the images I use are very concrete in a way which when I want to encounter other people and actually feel a longing to actually meet them how then as soon as I open my mouth I feel like I encounter resistance or judgment and how then I'm

[15:12]

afraid to lose my motivation to bring the conversation to some kind of new level or something. Okay. Yes. Yes. It's not so much specifically about teaching, but how you're teaching and taught, for example, this morning. And for me, what's the most informative for my practice And this really picking me up where I am.

[16:15]

When you describe a moment like you're waking up and the flower and this moment or this point of meeting. And from this moment sometimes like one or sometimes two or three practices And how you from that moment sometimes fold out, unfold a teaching like now the five dharmas and this practice of moment by moment, moment after moment, and then fold that back into this moment. So you like that? Yes, very much. Okay. I woke up this morning and I thought, this peony is so beautiful.

[17:27]

Can I possibly say something about how it's beautiful as an activity that is inseparable from my own? I thought, this is not possible. Then I sort of tried. Yes. You talked about the allness and that is a term that interests me, namely the allness in connection with simultaneity and that there is a very deep logic in it. You spoke about allness, and that's a term that I'm interested in, and allness in relationship to simultaneity, and how in that there is a profound logic.

[18:55]

And it was in Fieber and there were pictures all the time. And it went from one picture to the next. And every time I arrived, it was the same. It had a very deep logic. I had this logic that I didn't want to wake up from this dream at all. And there was something about this everything. There is always something about this everything, which is also part of my practice. I was reminded of a dream I had in which, in the dream, image after image, I felt a sense of arriving and a sense of this is exactly how it is.

[20:11]

And that feeling was so wonderful, I did not want to wake up from the dream again. And that also... And so that had something to do with allness for me. And the point of it really was that there was a feeling of it had such a profound logic to it. It was as if everything was exactly the way it is. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, Tara? I have been thinking about this for a long time. I asked Köln and Köln people, what is the core issue for you, because you have learned a lot from the past. On my way here, driving here, I was wondering if I could ask you, should ask you, could ask you this question, which you've taught so much throughout the years.

[21:28]

And the question, what is, from your point of view, the central or the core teaching or the core statement message of Zen Buddhism? I think if I were to ask you this question, it would be the author from Namara. And in some sense, with your quote by Yamada Muman Roshi, you sort of touched on that. Yes, of course, I don't know what he means by that. What comes to my mind is that one is a concept, as you say, and the other is that what I think, or what I think, should appear at the beginning. Who is my future self? And I didn't understand the first point, that everything appears in one's own spirit.

[22:33]

So my impression is that this statement itself is also a concept that I'm sort of holding onto, and also that it points to everything appearing in my own mind. And so with that, in the background, if you could say something about this question. Okay. Thank you. Everyone? A pain arose. Your beautiful description of the peony and yourself as a human being. This moment of mutual or shared bow.

[24:12]

And this sense of humility that I felt in that and that I'm familiar with. And when you spoke about this, there was an empathetic joy or, yeah, I joyfully heard that. . In your further descriptions, you spoke about how millennia of incubation led to this hand having five fingers, and that for us to meet here as these human two-legged beings,

[25:20]

Science is at a point where one sees for the first time that one species on this planet has a very large exclusion from many other species, a great exclusion in the middle of the process. And at the same time, science is showing clearly these days how this is the first time in the history of this planet or on this planet that one species is responsible for the extinction of many, many other species is currently in the process of doing that. And that's also a direction in my practice and has something to do with how things actually exist. And there is this joy, and there is this pain, and there is this possibility that no mental or emotional suffering arises from that.

[27:04]

And then my request would be to say more about the intentions for how to direct practice, the directionality of practice. It could be environmentally responsible. There is no environment. And how would you say it? I don't know. Responsibility. At the moment, I'm glad that we don't recite in German in our sangha, to save all beings, but I promise to guide you. For now, I'm happy that in our Sangha, we don't chant to save all beings, but I vow to... How do we say it in English? Be in accord with them? Well, Geleiten is different in German, but to be in accord with them.

[28:20]

Yeah, something like that. Hans-Jürgen? Besides... You say that there are no universals, like space is not a universal. We create, generate the space. We and all kinds of things. Wir und alle möglichen Dinge, ja. I can approach it by understanding space as a layer of consciousness. And if, as you say, you come in here in our space, then there's, so to speak, our space, your space, and the space of each individual.

[29:32]

And somehow then there is like a knot. And somehow then there is a knot in my trying to approach space as an activity of consciousness. Yeah, so anyways, that doesn't quite come together for me. Okay. Yeah, it does take some time. Yes? No, behind you. Awesome. Yes, please, I have a question. Simple practices like I would like some simple practice phrases that can be used from situation to situation. Like, what is this? That's good, yeah. Okay.

[30:53]

Yes? I would be interested, also in connection with the perception of the Finns as beautiful, whether the perception of beauty or whether beauty is based only on perception and whether that is actually the perception, because I don't need to remember anything. I would be interested in your perceiving the Peony as beautiful, whether the relationship between perception and beauty, whether the beauty is the perception. Also, awareness is something.

[31:56]

It's an awareness. And then I go into that. Awareness and beauty is the thing. Whether perception of beauty is the same. If it is for you, I'm very happy. But I don't think that it makes sense to try to say it is the case. For you it may be the case. But it is a relationship, but I don't always add the experience of beauty. And then the question is, what is beauty, really?

[33:09]

Your experience. Yeah. As Nagarjuna or somebody said, a fly finds a turd beside the road beautiful. She doesn't know these words. Well, I thought that's what it is, but I didn't want to go wrong on that one. Oh, beautiful. How to enter the context of these questions, statements?

[34:20]

I like hearing the feel of whatever comes out of your mouth, experience, thinking. And the topic of this seminar is the layers of consciousness and awareness, right? Did I think of that or someone else said it? I don't know. No one knows where it came from. It just appeared in print. Always. The printer? Did you talk to the printer? I'll just pay you. Oh, really? Auto-spelling, I see. Spell check creations. The pillow by itself is too small, and the pillow with the cushion, too big. And I'm discriminating. At least my legs are discriminating.

[35:51]

I always feel like a cat. Take a nap. A cat nap. Maybe we can open a door or something to maybe the ones that don't blow on people too much. Breathe in. So let's see if I focus on the sense of layers, consciousness and awareness.

[37:00]

I think one needs to be closed. And I think the image of the kind of geological image of layers as strata or something is limited, but it's okay as a starting point. And though I don't want to use scripture as an authority, I would like to use part of the case one of the Shoyoroku again, the book of serenity, as a way to bring our noticing into

[38:03]

layering which may be both simultaneous and sequential. And again, I'm suggesting how we can make use of the teaching of our Dharma ancestors. Because these koans were composed, clearly composed, for our benefit. And I want to emphasize the intensity or density with which these teachings expect you, with which you're expected to investigate these teachings.

[39:38]

Again, the assumption is that you are creating yourself. There's a bunch of genetic and cultural givens. But the dynamic is, and your lived dynamic or lived life is what you do with these givens. And from the point of view of yogic practice, what you do with these givens is 90% of what and who you are. Now, in a koan like this says on the second page,

[41:04]

I mean, very early in the koan, it's only a few paragraphs after the first page. It says, this is the essence of the Daoxiong school. This is the essence of our lineage. And it is the lifeline of the Buddhas and Buddha Dharma ancestors. Okay. Now I know that in the days when this was written, people had a few books. And so they took each book much more, and paragraph even, much more seriously. And

[42:25]

But still they expected you to read this or study or investigate this teaching. Wholeheartedly and with the wholeness of your attention. von ganzem Herzen und auch mit der Gänze eurer Aufmerksamkeit. Now, what I'm trying to say is, you know, yes, we can talk about these four criteria, four potentials or four wisdoms. But to really... Where are these four potentials located?

[44:00]

These four potentials are in the field of your activity and you're noticing and connoticing. And how do you find yourself in this field? Now, we can start with a very, in a way, very simple point. As I've been mentioning, G.E. Moore of the philosopher, British philosopher, who was a contemporary of Wittgenstein and Russell, said, and this was fairly recently, at least in my life, said, consciousness is invisible. Okay.

[45:02]

I think we can understand that. And it's worth noticing it's invisible. Wittgenstein himself said, which I've mentioned in this room every now and then during the last 30 years, something like 30 years I've been teaching here. He said giving a lecture. There's nothing in the information presented to me here that tells me I'm seeing this within my own consciousness.

[46:03]

The senses present us these particulars which we immediately conceptualize. Now, we have this subtlety in Buddhism that perception is assumed as a source of knowledge to be first of all non-conceptual. Und wir haben diese Subtilität im Buddhismus, in der es heißt, dass die Wahrnehmung zuerst mal als eine Quelle des Wissens betrachtet wird, die auch nicht konzeptuell sein kann, oder die zunächst mal nicht konzeptuell ist. So if we're going to enter the field and pass a practice, we need to create the kind of

[47:08]

Buddhist culture or conditions that allow us to make sense of the teaching. Well, it's easy to understand that perception is a source of knowledge, it's a source of something or other anyway. You know, there's the famous, simple analogy of you see a rope and you think it's a snake and so you jump back. So our senses... can fool us. Particularly if it becomes named and the name is a snake.

[48:17]

Now, I've mentioned to you often, and I'll mention it to you again, just as a way of putting us on the same cube, page, or something. I discovered... very early on in the 60s sometime, that if I changed a view, the views function prior to perception. ...that views, cultural views, world views, habits, control perception. ...that cultural views, worldviews, Okay.

[49:41]

Okay. So the example in which I discovered this, as I've told you hundreds of times, or mentioned at least if not told, that I began to experience the connectivity of everything. And that connectivity which I experienced seemed to be denied by the cultural view, the view, the truth, that space separates.

[50:42]

And so at some point I recognized that space also connects, and then I recognized that space separating is a cultural view, not a fact. And when I changed the view in front of the projecting light, The slide. My senses, which used to show me separation, began to show me connectivity. This is extremely important to know, to discover, to find out.

[51:49]

Because it means that the dynamic of our teaching is primarily dealing with our worldviews. Okay. So now, again, simple phenomenology takes what our senses show us as a given. But it's not a given. It's only a given, given particular slides in the worldview projector. So you can think of, as I said the other day, the five physical senses as a keyboard.

[52:50]

And phenomena plays on that keyboard according to your worldview. Keyboard. Keyboard. Ah, okay. All right. But what you discover is like an organ has a lot of keyboards. That if you change your register... Are you getting tired? Yes, but it's okay. No, I'm not getting tired. Are you in the night? We're supposed to eat soon.

[54:11]

Maybe you need some food. No, no, I'm fine, I'm fine. Does anyone have a Coca-Cola? Sugar water. And lunch is at what time? One o'clock. One o'clock, okay. Can you hang in there for our translator? Yes. Okay. But we need a break before lunch, so it's okay. Okay. So what one discovers is that, again, the senses are not just a source of accurate information. It depends on what keyboard the senses form.

[55:12]

Okay. When I changed to the keyboard, the slide of the worldview, that space connects. Als ich diese Veränderung vorgenommen habe, hin zu der, ich nenne es unterschiedlich, von Tastatur, Register oder Klaviatur, oder dem Bild, dem Bild auf dem dir das Raum verbindet, I in fact created a new keyboard, which then phenomena played a different tune on that keyboard. Phenomena played a different tune on that keyboard. Okay. Is perception a source of knowledge then?

[56:40]

Now, if I were to, I said this the other day, I mean I have some leftover tea, and if I were to pour it in this bell, I can only do that because my body takes gravity for granted. And if I tried to pour it in this way, you'd all say... No, don't do that. Because gravity is built into how we function. Mario Kovacat, what is that physicist's name? He says space is gravity. Mario something, a physicist, who says the...

[58:02]

And, of course, Einstein's space can be bent and blah, blah, blah. So space is something. It's an activity of some sort. And we're participants in that. And we couldn't participate without the space. All right. So I'm not trying to be a physicist here, I'm just trying to lay some common sense groundwork. Now, perception is usually imputes, perception usually implies or imputes substantialist views. assumes that things have substance. And perception carries self-referential attitudes as well.

[59:17]

So how do we free perception of self-awareness and free it of substantialist views? This is an entity, it's a... this is the challenge of Buddhist teaching. But that's inconsequential to say that. What's consequential is the challenge in your experience. Are you able to notice and catch yourself at entity or substantialist thinking and self-reference? Your perception gives you the chance to do that. So just as my body, or this body, or built into my activity, I know to pour water into another container with the assistance of gravity, my, this bodily mind,

[61:10]

with sufficient exposure, can know how things actually exist. As your body knowing gravity is an example of it knows how things actually exist, If you can see the space or get some space between yourself, some space in your, I'm trying to find words that make sense, the space within your perceptual field for non-substantialist views, Wenn du sowas wie einen Raum finden kannst, in dir selbst einen Raum kreieren kannst, innerhalb der Wahrnehmung für nicht-substanzierende, also Sichtweisen, die die Dinge nicht in Substanzen verwandeln.

[62:32]

And if you can find some space in your perceptual field, in the perceptual field, which is not... linked, inseparably linked to self-referencing. You know, everything has a topography. And everything has a sequence. And it's not always the same. So sometimes self-referencing is stronger and sometimes it's less strong. If the path is the study of your lived life, then you can begin to notice when self-referencing is stronger and when it's not so strong.

[63:40]

And by noticing that, you can begin to create the conditions where it's not so strong. Okay. Now, if perception is a source of knowledge, If this Vasubandhu, Dignaga, and so forth, say this is a source of knowledge, and our Western culture says it's a source of knowledge, now I've read a lot of Western And I think Yogacara Buddhism is extremely close to that.

[64:54]

But it has some dynamic differences which really make a difference. Difference makes a difference. And one of those examples I mentioned earlier, that perception when it's to be or likely to be a source of knowledge is initially non-conceptual. Now, I can't think of any phenomenologist, or anyone else, who has said that perception should be initially non-conceptual. But effective yoga, effective and affective local yogic practice depends on actualizing such small differences. And if you really want to do this, you take this on as a kind of, hey, I've got to do something, this might be fun.

[66:30]

So you experiment with that sort of cusp when perception becomes name, or perception... It's not yet named. Learn the physical feel of that. You can stay on the side of the physical feel where it's not yet quite named. And when non-conceptual perception is your habit, it creates the space for non-substantialist views. And it cuts off self-referencing before it starts.

[67:37]

So just say, end with one thing. In five parts. So if G.E. Moore started with, and Wittgenstein, that consciousness is invisible, And G.E. Christina Griesler pointed out, no, yeah, said that awareness is even more invisible. For summarizing, George Moore did not want first names, so he always insisted he be called G.E., So, if we state that as a starting point, consciousness is invisible. Wenn wir das als Ausgangspunkt nehmen, das Bewusstsein ist unsichtbar, let's really notice how that is the case.

[69:16]

Lass uns wirklich bemerken, wie das der Fall ist. And then let's take the Buddhist teaching, which says you cannot practice unless you make consciousness visible. Die besagt, du kannst nicht praktizieren, The whole practice rests on making consciousness visible. So first you need two concepts. The first is the concept that it's seeable. If you don't have the concept that it's seeable, you will never see it. So that's the first concept. Then the second concept is noticing that it's seeable, you notice that it's a construct. Das zweite ist, dass wenn du bemerkst, dass es sichtbar sein kann, dass es sichtbar ist, dann bemerkst du, dass es ein Konstrukt ist.

[70:27]

So the second concept that's part of this practice is to know that it's a construct. Das zweite Konzept, das Teil dieser Praxis ist, ist zu wissen, dass es ein Konstrukt ist. And the third aspect here is to know that it's visible. is to experience it, to experience directly consciousness, and to experience it under construction. No, as I said the other day, this is not a matter of slowing down the process of construction, which is what the job of the five skandhas is. This is a process of By attentional articulation, you begin to see the articulating process in high relief.

[71:30]

in greater detail, so when you asked me about the bathing in the field, part of the bathing in the field is feeling the field come together in greater and greater articulation. Because I feel the activity of the senses putting together the scene or the circumstances. Okay, so... You know it's seeable, you know it's a construct, and you begin to directly experience it.

[72:47]

Ah, now that you know it's a construct, you can deconstruct it. And then the process of reconstruction can start. Now you're a stream-enterer. And now we're a lunch-enterer. Thank you very much. Thanks for translating and getting your energy back together. You know, professional translators don't work for more than half an hour at the UN and stuff like that. My head is fine, but my legs aren't. That's supposed to be your big strength. Yeah, that's not the case.

[73:48]

An honest practitioner.

[73:51]

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