Yeah, good afternoon. I don't have to wait for a translation. I have to get used to not waiting for a translation. So I think most of you know Val left, and after talking with him this morning, I suggested that... agreed with him and suggested that probably he has more resources in the... his familiar world that he's established in Boulder to deal with his pretty strong depression now since his sister died. So and the main point of Buddhist practice is to free ourselves from mental suffering and so he's trying every way he can now anyway I'm very grateful also that Dan and Nicole and Christian gave all the teshos the last six or seven weeks I guess

[01:15]

Two weeks while I was in Europe and four weeks or so before when I, and I'm still, I'm still, I'm only 80% here actually. The 20% that's missing is not too important. We can do without it probably, but somehow I've never had a, whatever this is, influenza of some sort, lasts this long. But I'm mostly okay now. It feels like the same body I'm used to. For a long time it felt like somebody else's or some alien body that I happened to got stuck with for a while. Anyway, I'm very glad to be back and What I'd like to speak about is yogic culture and the yogic body and the seminars in Europe went quite well and we have this issue and one of the reasons I felt compelled to go is because there's this opportunity to purchase the property across the street which is

[02:32]

a once in a millennium, once in my lifetime, and from the point of view of the center, once in probably its lifetime. And I'm practicing full disclosure, I'm completely convinced it's absolutely necessary they do it, at least in terms which I see as necessary. But I really feel that the Sangha there has to make the decision. And it's interesting. It's in some ways dividing the Sangha. I mention it because it's not unrelated to what we're doing. In some ways it's dividing the Sangha and at the same time it's developing the Sangha. Just the process of how to make a decision is developing the Sangha. Because we can't just make the decision according to the German law's legal form that a Sangha takes or that a not-for-profit takes.

[03:40]

So we have to develop a large-scale Sangha, full Sangha-scale decision-making process. It's quite interesting, I think. But it's dividing the Sangha because a lot of people... don't want to feel that their lay practice isn't equally full of possibilities or the same possibilities, the same potentials as monastic practice. Simply not. The fact is, it's not. But it's full of potentials, not the same potentials. And if we recognize that, we can see what is characteristic to monastic practice and perhaps bring that in significant ways into lay practice. And one thing that should be clear is monastics are also lay people.

[04:45]

I mean, whatever we call lay life, a lived life, this occurs for lay people too. I mean monastics too. But lay people don't have the monastic experience, but monastics have the lay experience. And as I've said, I'm not going to go into it now, that we really should think of Buddhist practice not as a religion, but a profession. A profession like medicine is a profession. And it makes a difference what your training is. Okay. Now, Again, why a yogic culture is a bigger idea than Zen. The background, the basis and the background of Zen practice is a yogic culture. And I think if we can understand what I mean by a yogic culture is not the usual idea of

[05:49]

Hindu, Indian yoga, Hatha, certain kinds of physical postures. This is the yogic attitudes, conceptions, and views. And from that point of view, Zen practice is primarily mental postures. much more than physical postures. It's based on what Patanjali says is the most inclusive physical posture, this zazen posture. But then, from then on, it's primarily mental postures. Okay. Now, so I think if we can understand we can understand together, what I mean at least by yogic culture, we can understand probably more clearly and instrumentally, effectively, what the difference is between Western views and Asian yogic views.

[07:03]

And we can more specifically understand reflect on our own views and make use of the contrast. Okay. Now, the most basic assumption for Zen practitioners, the most basic yogic assumption for Zen practitioners is that, as you've heard me say innumerable times, all mental phenomena have a physical component, and all sentient physical phenomena have a mental component. And this is really worth, although you've heard it a lot of times, really worth absorbing. That when you sit down, if you have, let's just take satsang, when you sit down, if you have a particular state of mind,

[08:10]

which you like or don't like or whatever, or that's satisfying, or that occurs. You know, when you lie down and go to sleep, there's a certain point at which you feel you can fall asleep. Well, in Zazen, there's a certain point in which you feel you can fall into. You know, the word occasion means to fall into, to fall together. There's a certain occasion when you can fall into Zazen and fall out of your usual mode of mind. Or you can fall into a now new and usual for you, new usual mode of mind from practicing Zen. Now that new usual mode of mind, let's call it that, will have physical components. And they can be so precise, those physical components, that when you sit Dazan to Zazen, you can simply dial those.

[09:21]

It's almost like dialing a radio station. You dial in that station. You dial in that modality of mind. You don't have to wait for it to happen. That's why Zen practitioners can often lie down and go to sleep instantly, because they simply dial the modality of mind, which is called sleep. Now, okay, so the point I'm making right now is to notice in everything you do, the physical components. It takes time to notice the physical components. But you can begin to notice the physical components. I mean, you can feel, for instance, usually a day or two before you get sick, that you're getting sick. You can feel a headache. And you can begin to notice exactly what little ping occurs.

[10:22]

It means a headache coming in half an hour. And you can begin to do something different. This is just typical yogic stuff. but it requires noticing the physical parallel expressions or cues that parallel mental and emotional states. Okay, now let's say you're trying to go to sleep. And something's keeping you awake, some ideas are keeping you awake. Okay. So, here there's a mental, you have thoughts coming up that are keeping you awake. Now this has nothing to do with being a monastic, except that the monastic, or the practitioner anyway, is more likely to notice these things than the non-practitioner. So, but everybody has the parents, you're lying in bed, you want to go to sleep.

[11:27]

I mean, particularly after you've flown that I just did from Zurich. And your body tells you it's four in the afternoon and not, you know, 11 at night or something like that. So your body, the physical component is waking, but the situation is it's time to go to sleep or be asleep. Okay. So, what do you do about, I mean, Zen practice, a lot of what Zen practice is, is recognizing that thoughts are just thoughts. Thoughts are not you. You is a mental posture. You is one of many mental postures. You-ness is one of many mental postures.

[12:29]

But you-ness is not you. Not your identity. It's maybe what you want to be your identity or the identity you're stuck in, but it is only, you know, if you're feeling suicidal, your body doesn't want to die. your body's quite happy to stay alive. But it's very difficult, if you're feeling that way, to take that and say, oh, that's just a mental formation. One can do it, and if you can actually cut the connection between mental formations and your identity, you're in a different world. It's easy to do and extremely difficult to do.

[13:30]

Interesting that some things are easy. It's possible. Easy. If you do it, you say, well, that was easy. But if you don't do it or can't do it, it's really not easy. Most difficult thing in the world. It can kill you. Okay. So, you know, it's looking at these, some of you, most of you, not the people in the practice period, I hope, have seen these images in Japan of the tsunami. Tsunamis which they have, even when I was living in Japan, every few years the tsunami would wipe out a fishing village. And the Japanese rebuilt the fishing village and moved back in. This one is a huge scale compared to this couple of tsunamis that happened in very specific coastal areas when I lived in Japan.

[14:35]

But if you live in an earthquake-prone place, as they do, and everything's next to the ocean, The Japanese are used to it, but this is another scale. But if you watch the images, you know, one of the things you teach kids, and it takes time. Sophia has a hard time watching movies because she identifies with the movies. But at some point, kids learn it's just a movie. It's not me. It's not my experience. It's just a movie. Sophia hasn't really... come to the point where she can't watch nature films with a shark chasing, you know, she's horrible for her. It's just a movie. Okay, but you know, it's strange watching these Japanese tsunami. It's also just a movie. That's a little scary the way, you know, when you watch movies these days, they have cars rolling over all the time.

[15:40]

They must have a whole bunch of cars that they keep rolling over in streets in these movies. And you know, it gets interesting. So you're watching this film about Japan, film, it's not a, you know, news. And a boat goes down a street. And then several cars. And then a truck goes down the street. And you think, oh, jeez, this is interesting. And then a house goes down the street. And then the whole street disappears. And it's kind of interesting images. And it's very hard to really see the tragedy that's happening. Because they're just images. Now, what is this disconnect? We know both sides of it. We know the side where it's just a movie. And we know the side where, It's our identity. Yeah, okay. So really it's simple. You just change, as much as possible, you change the emphasis.

[16:43]

You can't, as I said, all mental phenomena have a physical component and all sentient physical phenomena, our sentient physical, have a mental component. And I find when I, if you have a dream, if I have a dream and I trip in the dream, I'll jump and my leg will jump as if I were actually tripped. So the physical component of the mental image in the dream makes my leg move. Okay, so what do you do? Well, you simply, as much as possible, get into the habit of shifting the attentional body, of shifting attention to the physical, easiest, the breath. Okay, so you're trying to go to sleep and there's thoughts about this, that. You simply bring, you get the, it doesn't sound like a big skill, but it is something, the skill to fully bring your attention

[17:50]

away from the thoughts to the breath. I mean, I'm sure everyone tries to do this when they can't sleep. And if you can do it and you can continue the emphasis on the physical component and not the mental component, you actually develop the skill to really break the karmic tsunami, the karmic push that keeps carrying us into self-thoughts, future thoughts, etc., anxious thoughts. And you get the ability to do this all the time. And that's what... To notice the interrelationship of physical and mental components is probably more likely if you're a meditator in a mindfulness practice.

[19:02]

But to decide to bring that into your daily life is a yogic practice. So if you simply, hey, you notice, well, if I can really bring my attention, my attentional body, let's say, into breathing only or into just the physical presence of lying in bed, suddenly the mental stuff is gone. There's no identification with thoughts as me or as, you know, et cetera. Well, if I can do that in sleeping or when I'm going to sleep, I can do that all day long. And that's one of the strengths of the Japanese right now is everyone is noticing how helpful each people are to each other and how there's no looting. I mean, in our culture, Europe and America, in the Near East, if something happens, everyone starts looting.

[20:09]

There's no police, et cetera. You know, it may happen less in some countries than others, but it's very common. There's no looting. And I think it's that partly there's no why me culture, There's no like, there's no outside force saying, we're doing, and you know, a lot of people are now saying, it's even on Russ Limbaugh here, that the Japanese are being punished for something. But for, because the Japanese, more than any other culture I know, and any other Asian culture, continuously practice, particularly, and more as you get older, because you develop it, practice manifesting their awareness through the hara.

[21:13]

Now, it's not, we can talk about it more later, but the hara is not really so much a chakra point, it happens to be a very useful point to bring your attention. And if you bring your attention there, you are maintaining an emphasis on the physical component and not the karmic or mental component. And then, okay, so you got that? All right, now let me try to say. In Western culture, we say, know thyself. Socrates, et cetera, know thyself. In yoga cultures, they say, know the mind. What's the difference between knowing the mind and knowing the self? Well, you can hear it right away. I mean, if we know ourselves, in Buddhist practice, you know thyself, you know thyself enough to know it's only one mental posture and not a mental posture you have to identify with.

[22:22]

Okay, we've taken care of Socrates' question. What is it to know the mind? Well, how do you know the mind? Well, there's the mind and the body. We know that much. Now, let's not... I don't know how much time I have here. We have to examine and think about this distinction of mind and body. As I said, there's no mental phenomena without a physical component and so forth. Okay, but it's not just a simple mind and body because the body is also the lungs and the liver and the stomach and so forth, kidney. And your lungs can be sick as mine are getting better, but my lungs can be sick and my kidney is just fine.

[23:26]

And the brain, in that sense, is an organ. There's the brain, and there's what we call the body, and there's the brain, and what we call the mind. And the brain can be sick, or the brain can be healthy, and the lungs can be healthy or sick, et cetera. So we have to really look at what we mean by mind and body. And it's not just a simple matter that mind and body are inseparable, because we can experience them separately. And Zen practice isn't simply about joining mind and body. It's also knowing how to use the separate, knowing how to use the experienceable separateness. And the experienceable separateness is very useful. And the experienceable separateness is developed by Zen as well as the way to join, connect, weave together.

[24:36]

The breath is almost like a shuttle in weaving that can weave mind and body together. Or the breath is almost like a saddle that you can ride. You can ride the saddle of the breath into the physical world and into, the way the body functions. Now, I can try to find various images to give us the feeling, but it's not just a simple matter of weaving mind and body together. Zen weaves mind and body together in a very particular way. And my friends who are thorough practitioners of, say, Hindu yoga, they weave the mind and body together differently. and they develop the separateness differently. So when you practice Zen, you're choosing a particular way to develop the separateness, the experienceable separateness of mind and body, and the weaving together of mind and body.

[25:45]

Okay, so... I've introduced about four or five or seven or eight or seventeen or sixteen things which take a lot of unpacking. We can't do it today. But I want to continue this sense of a yogic culture. So let me just say a few things. When you bring attention, when you bring attention to the breath, what is attention? Attention is a form of mind. Let's call it that. So when you're bringing attention to the breath, and the breath is a physical activity, by simply bringing attention to the breath, you're physicalizing the mind. And a physicalized mind through the attention of the breath can be

[26:50]

becomes an instrumental mind, a mind you can physically tune. And you're not only physicalizing the mind through the breath, you're also mentalizing, I don't know, there's no such word, mentalizing the body. Because you're bringing attention to the autonomic nervous system, you're bringing attention to the volitional and non-volitional breathing which is you're bringing the attentional mind into the breath and then into the body both the autonomic or non-voluntary processes and the voluntary processes. Now, this doesn't happen if you do it once or twice. It happens if you do it continuously. You will not learn these yogic skills unless you do them 24 hours. or all the time you can remember to do them.

[27:57]

It's a skill, like playing the piano or something like that. And the more you practice, and they've done studies for some decades now which show that given a certain level of talent, the real difference is how much you practice. And that's true for Zen practice, too. So you're physicalizing the mind, mentalizing the body, stabilizing the mind, because the mind related to the body becomes more stable. That's why we practice stillness, why the entry to mental practice is through the body, because the body allows us to stabilize the mind primarily through stillness, physical stillness. Okay, so you've got the experienceable mind, the experienceable body, you bring them together.

[29:06]

That's the first step. First you have to really notice the experienceable mind, really notice the experienceable body, and you bring them together, and you bring them together through the alchemy of the breath. And then, once you've really got the experience, and it's most of the time breath and mind are one component almost one unison which is not a unity a unison you then join the breath mind to immediacy now let's say not to the present because the present has the boundaries past future you join the breath mind to the boundless immediacy the immediacy which has no boundaries and that immediacy is transformed by the attentional breath mind body this is yoga practice

[30:19]

So, what's happening, and I would say that of all the body cultures in Asia, Japan is the most body culture, and what they're doing is they, it's, you know, I know it's part of their, you know, people say in the news, they say, oh, the Japanese like order, they're orderly. It's not really that they're orderly. It's that they are They have a culture of learning to join the breath mind through the hara, really they do, with the immediacy of the world. The immediacy of the world means they're not thinking, why me and why am I being punished or why is this happening to me? Their reaction is, it's happened, that's all. It's happened and there's no choice but acceptance. If you live in a culture where there's no choice but acceptance, I mean, you can do something about it, but the first thing is you have to accept.

[31:37]

I mean, if you're in an airplane that's crashing, you can say, I wish I wasn't here, but you might as well accept it first. You'll probably be calmer. But the person you were going to be, you thought, oh, I'm going to be so-and-so when I land in New York. Well, you're not going to be that person anymore because you're not going to be such a person. You might as well accept it. But you might have the calmness to go out and find the pilots drunk, which does happen, I know. Crashes which have occurred because of that. I mean, I'm kind of making the story up, but it makes a difference if you accept and then decide to do something. And because of this sense of joined to the immediacy which has to be accepted because there is no other choice, you feel part of the world you're in. So we can see dramatically in Japan right now, in this horrible situation there is, what difference it makes for the whole culture when they feel joined physically to immediacy and not to past and future or self-referential identities.

[32:56]

This isn't Zen, but it's closely related to Zen. So to know the mind is to know the mind and the body, join the mind and the body, and then join this mind and breath body to the boundless immediacy. Okay, that's enough for today. Thank you very much. May our intention equally penetrate every being and place.

[33:42]

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