This is the last lecture I'll give in this practice period. I'm sorry. I'm unfortunate in this regard. Because, you know, I'd really like to stay here. Weil ich wirklich gerne hier bleiben würde. You're rather used to me coming and going, probably. Ihr habt euch wahrscheinlich inzwischen daran gewöhnt, dass ich komme und gehe. But I always actually like to stay. Aber ich mag es eigentlich viel lieber, wenn ich einfach bleiben kann. The problem is, when I get to Creston, then I want to stay there. Das Problem ist, wenn ich erstmal in Creston bin, dann möchte ich da bleiben. But anyway... Staying, going. I've been speaking about the need to establish a non-conscious attentional stream.

[01:12]

And there's a kind of like... if, as I've been saying and gotten across to people, I think, that Zen is a teaching about how to teach yourself. And the main reason for this emphasis is that you make the practice your own when you teach yourself. That means you do get yourself through teachings, Sashin, etc. You get yourself started on the path. But you investigate the path and create it as you're going.

[02:18]

Now I've been laying out some of that investigation. And, you know, it's okay. I'm sorry. I apologize for doing that. But just because I'm pointing out the logic of establishing a non-conscious attentional stream Aber nur weil ich auf die Logik hinweise, einen nichtbewussten Aufmerksamkeitsstrom herzustellen. That doesn't mean you shouldn't. In fact, it means you should establish it still for yourself.

[03:21]

Das bedeutet nicht, dass du das nicht für dich selbst herstellen solltest, sondern tatsächlich bedeutet es eben genau, dass du ihn sehr wohl für dich selbst herstellen solltest. Okay, so let's start with... Let's go through the pattern, the logic. So the most common initial little push is, see if you can please count your exhales to ten. And the first thing that happens, of course, is you can't get to 10. Most of you can get to one. But then there's a series of ones. Or maybe you get to three. So then the investigation starts. Why, as I've been saying to you, why is it so difficult to do something repeatedly that's so easy to do a few times.

[04:36]

So you notice that as a problem, not just, I mean, you notice it as a problem to be solved, not just a problem that causes you to give up or get discouraged or what the hell, you know. So you're looking at it as a problem to be solved. You see that what happens is your attention keeps going back to your thinking. And I think we all can notice that our ordinary thinking is not all that interesting.

[05:36]

So why are we going back to it? Because we need to establish continuity. Now, although I'm telling you these steps, you need to go through the steps and establish and see, yes, I really need to establish continuity. And then if you need to establish continuity, as we do, from one moment to the next, otherwise you don't know where the hell you are, how do you do it? You do it in your thinking. Now, sometimes Sashin forces us into, we can't do it in our thinking anymore, and you just find yourself doing it through the body or through the breath. So it really helps to make this clear to yourself that yes, I need to establish continuity and yes, there are other possibilities.

[06:57]

And the breath is one and the body is another. As vehicles, mediums, like electricity needs a wire to pass through, your attention needs the body to pass through or the breath to carry it. So then you start your own investigation again and experiment with, can I establish attention in my body? Can I establish attention in my breath? And both at once, to what degree, etc. ?

[08:12]

I mean, if you're going to do this, you have to be convinced it's possible. And you have to be convinced it makes psychological and emotional sense. So going through the logic and making it clear for yourself is really helpful and important. So, as I've suggested, the easiest way bodily path, in addition to breath, is the spine. Now a third path, in a way, a third vehicle, is actually mind itself.

[09:14]

And in the Dharma Wheel meetings and so forth, there's been some people say, well, the word flow has come up a number of times. And Joseph Campbell, who wrote The Hero with a Thousand Faces and so forth, who I'm old enough to have known. He died a pretty long time ago. He was rather famous for his phrase, a rather commonplace phrase, but anyway, he said it, go with the flow. And I've never liked that phrase very much. I'd rather go with the staying. What do I mean by that? Well, I don't know.

[10:25]

Something's like a train window. You're looking out a train window and everything's flowing past, right? But you feel more comfortable in the train than trying to jump out and go with the flow. And while everything's flowing past, the train window's staying quite still. So the train window is like the mind. It's actually staying, I mean, whatever this means, but in comparison to the flow, it's actually staying in place.

[11:31]

So Nagina, I'm trying to find language for this that allows you to metaphorically stick the language in your attentional field. Now as you probably know, one of the most basic yogic practices is to be aware that all sensorial perception is the simultaneous arising of the mind and the percept. So we could call it something like the perceptive mind. Das könnten wir so etwas wie den Wahrnehmungsgeist nennen.

[12:43]

Or maybe the double mind. In the text it's sometimes called the simultaneous mind. Meaning that when you perceive something, an object, a stick or whatever, it's your mind perceiving it. Das bedeutet, wenn du etwas wahrnimmst, ein Objekt, wie zum Beispiel diesen Stab, dann ist es dein Geist, der den wahrnimmt. This is called a nyoi. Do you see the nyoi, or do you see the mind seeing the nyoi? Und das hier heißt nyoi, und dann ist die Frage, siehst du den nyoi, oder siehst du den Geist, den nyoi sehen? If you see the mind seeing the nyoi, it's a little like the train window. The more you see the mind simultaneously with the nyohe, the mind stays in place.

[13:48]

And if I look over here at Nicole, translating, or Friedemann, the mind stays the same. Friedemann is different than Nicole. but the window the mind stays the same now you want to find a way to experience that sameness but you're not going to be able to do it till you really experience the mind's presence along with whatever you're perceiving.

[14:53]

And as I said the other day, trying to find a word from it, you need to physicalize the mind. Or physicalize your attention. As psychologists talk about, as an example I've used, it's like physicalizing your anger. Feel your anger, don't just think anger. And psychology sometimes feels to feel the anger helps you deal with the anger. As long as you don't hit someone. You want to see me physicalize my anger? Yeah, and I think if you're in love, we like to physicalize.

[16:06]

But we can also physicalize attention. That's some kind of yogic skill. And I can explain, I can say it, but you need to kind of explore feeling, feeling it, feeling what you see and hear and think. Like right now I'm speaking from feeling what I'm saying and feeling your presence. I'm using words consciousness a little bit to turn feeling into words.

[17:19]

I'm not thinking what I'm saying, I'm feeling what I'm saying and then I turn the feeling into words. So in this case the words I'm using are physicalized feelings. In this case, the words I use are physically... How do I say this? They're embodied, they're physically made feelings, sensations. They're taking form in my... My heart is here, I can feel... hara pushing the words up in a way. Okay, so now here is, I've just given you a kind of yogic stage of practice in which you begin to physicalize attention

[18:22]

And feel, experience the presence of mind on every person. So at first you sort of mechanically have two streams of mind. And one we can call the percept stream. Or the object stream. But maybe You have to feel that the object, the curtains, the lights, the room, each of you, each object, the teacups, the objects are noticed as percepts. So feeling the sensorial field, the perceptual field, as a stream.

[19:40]

You can also feel... I hope this isn't too complicated. It's really simple once you get used to it. But once you get a feel for the perceptual, the sensorial stream, Which is always changing according to what you're perceiving. While the mind stream is always staying the same. Like the window of the train. So you begin to feel them as two streams. One taking the shape of whatever you're perceiving.

[21:02]

Whatever you're perceiving. And then once you get used to these two streams being present, You can begin to bring these two streams together. So now you feel the percept stream and the mind stream are the same, but one is like the window and the other is like the flow of the world. Now you can use this process as an antidote to distraction. So you've recognized that you want to establish an attentional stream, a non-conscious attentional stream.

[22:25]

A non-conscious attentional continuity. But it gets, you know, you get distracted. And that stream goes up your thinking very easily. It goes away from your breath. Or it goes away from the body points of the spine. Now, when you notice that, you can practice setting up the mind. Setting up the mind. Setting up the mind field. Okay, so how do you do that?

[23:29]

All right. You need to at first mechanically stop again for a moment. Because really, we're a series of stops. We can be a series of stops for each dharma. I say pause for the particular. Or pause for the pause. Pause within pausing. Something like that. You're trying to find turning word phrases to catch yourself in a kind of stillness. So you start getting distracted. And you stop. And you set up the mind's mind. The mind's mind. The mind is like the train window.

[24:47]

So you just stop and feel the mind, which is like the train window. That can be very refreshing. It clears things up. And it's also a subtle samadhi. So when you set up the mind's mind, you're actually establishing a samadhi. And when you build up the spirit of the spirit, then you actually establish a Samadhi. And that concentrated field begins to be just present in your, you get used to it, it's present in your way of being. And this concentrated field, it's just there at some point and you get used to it.

[25:49]

It's present in your being. So every time you stop for a minute, it's a little bit like you're weaving the world, right? And one of the threads are the threads that are weaving the stream of non-conscious continuity. And one of the threads that... You lose touch with the thread of this continuity. You get distracted, you start thinking, etc. So now you've got a wisdom reminder. Let me see. Okay, stop. Set up the mind's mind.

[26:51]

And that's almost like you set up a loom. As Atmar was talking about, a loom, the other day of the threads of the loom. The warp and the woof, etc. So when you set up the mind's mind, you're kind of setting up the loom for a minute. And the threads that have been distracted or broken or too loose, et cetera, you're putting them back in the loom. And you put them back in the loom and you can feel it in your heart, you can feel it in your body, they're back in the loom.

[28:05]

Maybe you can even say something to yourself. Back in the womb. Back in the womb. No, no. Maybe you can even say something to yourself. Back in the womb. Back in the womb. But you feel yourself located again in this stream, this bodily or breath or mind stream of continuity. But you feel yourself located again in this stream, It's a very powerful medicine. Because it's not only a subtle samadhi and a developing samadhi. But it's an experience of equanimity and equilibrium. You feel yourself balanced in the world or proportionate with the world.

[29:17]

And this feeling of equilibrium and equanimity is also the front and back door of non-imperturbable mind. And the porch door, too. So, anyway, you have the ingredients here of the experience of imperturbable mind. Yeah, okay. That was a little bit of a technical talk, I'm sorry, but I don't know. Maybe it gives you something to do until I get back.

[30:19]

When I get back, I'll look at you all very carefully. Oh, look at that impermeable stream. I'll be very happy. And I'll think, oh, I can go away again then. No, no, no. I want to hang around with these imperturbable streams. And then I'm willing to go with the flow. And then I am ready to go with you to the river. Thank you very much.

[31:06]

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