Excuse me for wearing this fancy rock suit. But I inherited various things from Suzuki Roshi, and I never wear them, you know. So I thought, well, maybe I'll wear a castle. It was falling apart here and somebody repaired it for me. So I'll take it off after later, but right now it's kind of fun to wear it. It is said that the Buddha said, isn't that a good way to start?

[01:05]

It is said that the Buddha said, in this several foot long body, is the whole world, is the arising of the world, is the ceasing of the world and is the path that leads to the ceasing of the world. Now, could there be any stronger emphasis on the body? In this several foot long body, is the entire world is the arising of the world is the ceasing of the world and is the path that leads to the ceasing of the world the usual path

[02:10]

Now, yesterday I felt... What did I feel? I felt... It was a little dense. And maybe it was more, if it would be, it was more for people only practicing Zen, And even if it's only for people practicing Zen, it might take two practice periods to put all of that out. So I ended up the day feeling a little sorry for you and a little sorry for myself. Now you're recording him.

[03:44]

I gave up. Okay, good. I like reading Paul Ricoeur sometimes. Paul Ricoeur, excuse me. But he's French, so I don't know how you pronounce it in France. And I read it partly for what he's talking about. But mostly I read it to see if I can understand how he thinks. But he's so dense. that after a page or two you want to come up for air. Do you have that expression in German, to come up for air? I've never heard it like this, but we have it. Luftschnappen. Luftschnappen. Luftschnappen. So now today, I hope we're coming up for air.

[05:07]

And, yeah. So this morning I thought about what would, if I was a psychotherapist or psychologist, what would I want to take away from yesterday? What would I want to make use of, take away from yesterday? Now, I mean, what I'm doing over these actually 54 years now, I'm taking the Dharma doors or Dharma gates or views, teachings I received from Suzuki Roshi and planting them in my own life activity.

[06:09]

And then harvesting them. And then replanting them. And as I harvest and replant, etc., they evolve within the textures of my lived life. For me, they're still the teachings I received from Sukhiroshi. But they've been cultivated in my lived activity in this culture, which I also live. Now I don't have any interest in scientizing Buddhism or psychologizing Buddhism in any, including any reductionist sense. But on the other hand, I think that a psychotherapist or psychologist receiving these teachings and planting them in his or her life

[07:44]

and in their activity of being a therapist, I hope that too evolves, develops, evolves practice in the West. So I'm not interested in making Buddhism sound like psychology, as I always say, using psychology as a Trojan horse to sneak Buddhism into the West. Or to use science as a Trojan horse to bring Buddhism into the West. And many contemporary versions of Buddhism are too much versions of psychology or versions of contemporary rationalist science.

[09:33]

But I think as a psychologist or psychotherapist or a scientist, But I think that if a psychologist or a psychotherapist or a scientist... Like Ulrike here, who is 100% scientist and 60% psychologist... No, 40% psychologist and 60%... I don't know, something. Ulrike here, who is 100% scientist or, I don't know, 60% scientist, 40% psychologist or something like that. Yeah, I don't know. 60% Buddhist. Maybe 75. And then there's our friend Hans-Peter Dürer who definitely was influenced by Buddhism and how he developed his thinking. As a physicist. He actually came to visit me about two weeks before he died. We spent a couple of days together. He came and visited me a few weeks before he died.

[11:05]

We spent some time together. Okay. So I know, I am aware that not all of you are psychotherapists or psychologists. But the model for the teachings of this seminar is sort of psychology and psychotherapy. But that still shouldn't make what we're talking about useless to the non-therapists. In fact, what is psychotherapy except a way of meeting people? With a little professional training. But the bodhisattva, the practice of the bodhisattva is just a way of meeting people.

[12:12]

So in that vein I was pondering this morning, what would I, if I was a therapist, take from yesterday? And I thought of eight things. Why are you laughing? Well, we may only get part way through the list. Everybody changes their posture, get on a chair. But I'm expecting you to increase the list or shorten it. And I will start with just a couple, the first two things. one is to take bodily time as a reference point and the other which sounds the same but as a practice is different

[13:32]

is to take the mindfulness of the body as a departure point. So the first is to, in any situation, when you feel yourself in the midst of appearance, you initiate or anchor or deepen that appearance by locating yourself in bodily time. Heartbeat, breath, metabolism, etc. The feel of your organs, your spine. And a sense of this is fundamental time, not planetary chronological time.

[14:55]

And we don't always notice the beginning and end of an appearance. But when you happen to, Give it more depth by turning it into bodily time. You can take a little vacation in bodily time. Nothing to do. Breathe a little. That's good enough. Now, to take mindfulness, the mindfulness of the body as a departure point, this is more like noticing yourself in a transition, shift or something.

[16:27]

Or if you're a therapist, a client is coming into the room. So you bring mindfulness, you... initiate a mindfulness of the body and you can develop for yourself over repetitions the particular paths and changing paths that you bring attention to the body in a mindful way. Then you continue that mindfulness to the client or to the room and the space and so forth. So that's the first two I mentioned.

[17:51]

Now I'm asking, does that make... Probably you all already do something like that. So any thoughts about it as two aspects of meeting anyone? Any thoughts about it as two aspects or ways, procedures, to meet anyone? If people have thoughts about it? Yeah. None. None? Keine Gedanken. I'm leaving. Dann gehe ich weg. Yes. Also mir ging das schon gestern so in diesem dichten Ende des Nachmittags. I already felt yesterday during the dance ending of the afternoon that I was always considering the therapeutic contact encounters in my practice.

[19:04]

And that's exactly what you're talking about now, this shift that doesn't exist for me when the human comes in, because that's still a bit of a... And that's exactly what you are now speaking about, this shift that for me is not present when the person first enters the room because that's more of a social space. And then there are often times a few minutes when that's still there. And then there is something that I non-doingly do. Non-doingly do, this is good. That's right. And I have asked myself yesterday, so what am I doing in this shift that I feel very precisely? And there definitely is an aspect of not doing because I lean back.

[20:30]

This has a connection to what concerned me this morning with the bodhisattva, the physical body in connection with the inner, intentional body. And this has something to do with what I was thinking about this morning in relationship to the bodhisattva contemplates the physical body in relationship to the inner attentional body. Because when I sit down for zazen, then it happens quite quickly and sometimes very quickly, sometimes a little later, that my body-body actually... then what happens relatively quickly, sometimes a little later, sometimes sooner, that my physical body, my bodily body, somewhat disappears.

[21:41]

And then what I come into is something that I call an atmosphere, some sense of its mildness. And then there was a picture of earth and atmosphere, with which I played a little earlier today. And I had this image of earth and atmosphere. That's something I played with this morning. So the matter and the atmosphere and the way that they influence, condition one another. And actually in the patient, in this contact, in this shift, And in the contact we encounter with the patient it's similar, I also step out of this solid feeling, this material feeling and lean back into this mildness.

[22:54]

And then what arises is this field that also guides me. And I have this image that in the best-case scenario we both collapse into that. And then there's nothing more to do and things happen from that field. Well, I'm sitting here and I'm luckily sitting right in front of you. I'm imagining myself as your client. I feel very good being in psychotherapy with you. I'm collapsing already. Yeah, and you brought up one of the eight things I thought of, which is to explore the contrast between the outer attentional space and inner attentional space.

[24:14]

And I suppose if I was a therapist, I'd be wondering now, yes, because I do zazen, I'm familiar with inner attentional space. But as a distinct experience, non-practitioners are probably not aware of that at all. Very little. Now, is that fair to bring an unfamiliar to your clients space into it, is that a good thing to do? Or what is the effect? I suppose if there's the practice of, as Ralph Sweepo used to mention,

[25:21]

resonant mind of the therapist and the client in free association, if that's brought into the practice, Then a Buddhist-influenced psychotherapist can, I think, almost take as a professional skill how to bring inner attentional space into the relationship. Okay, thanks. Someone else? Yes?

[26:39]

Ralph? Marcus? Yeah, Marcus. Yeah. Thanks. Thank you. So the most important difference that I'm noticing in bringing these things into therapeutic meeting is to generate this kind of awareness while speaking, because that's maybe the most important difference, that when we meditate, we do this all in silence. The tendency is simply, I think, as I have encountered it again and again, to be very much in the language of the outside, or that this simply creates a different kind of consciousness and to establish this connection again and again, not only with ourselves, but also to charge the opposite and to stay in connection with the inner process during this social contact.

[27:57]

I hope you are interested. And at least for me, it's always difficult to find a way to stay in touch with the inner process because the language process tends to, there's a tendency that it would draw me out. But not only for myself to stay in touch with this inner process, but also to continuously invite the client to be in touch with their inner process in the midst of this sort of social contact. yeah of course giving talks I'm trying to do something similar yeah Angela, you always have good ideas. So I yesterday also spent a long time thinking about where the stress starts, either in working or just in daily life. The stress Yes, the tension.

[29:15]

A certain kind of tension that becomes effortful. And I noticed that often the connection is lost when I have to do something that I am not really convinced of, something bureaucratic or something that does not contradict my other being in my body. And what I noticed is that I oftentimes lose the connection when I have to do something that I'm not fully behind, that I'm not fully convinced of, like bureaucratic work or something that doesn't work. And that's something I notice even more with my clients because they oftentimes work in professions that are even further away from where sane or healthy life actually happens.

[30:19]

And on these days I was particularly shocked, because on TV there was a report about how sick the soldiers are who have to work with drones, because that's a completely divided world. It's like a computer game, killing people, and on the other hand, this healthy field of consciousness that we were talking about, so completely rotated. And then I was particularly shocked by seeing a documentary report on soldiers who worked with drones, the flying machine, who have to work with drones. You know, they're sitting in an office and killing people thousands of miles away. That's exactly what you just said, where it feels like, you know, it looks like it's a kind of computer game or something, but it's actually killing a person and the split that happens in a person when there's that kind of thing. And it's known anyhow that mental illnesses increase, but it was interesting that in the news what they spoke about is that that kind of split that happens for a soldier like that, that that produces consciousness illnesses.

[31:47]

My wish is to talk more about this connection between what one calls the field of consciousness and the body and what one does in the field of intention and the field of mind. So then my wish would be, but that's what we are exactly in the midst of doing, is to speak about how to re-establish the connection between one's inner processes, bodily processes, and the activity, the actions of what does. Marcus, you mentioned yesterday that there was some overlap between what we're talking about and Arne Mendel's work. Yeah. I mean, you don't have to repeat it. I'm just... It's interesting that we contemporary people concerned with these things are overlapping in our...

[32:52]

I would like to come back to this therapeutic field between therapist and client. And what I experience is that this is the space that I offer, but that it also has something to do with the actual room in which... The space that you offer, is that what you said? It's okay. It's like the Zendo is a very particular place in which we meditate, where objects are arranged in a particular way.

[34:10]

And I do something similar in the room, the space in which I am working as a therapist. It is as though my inner space extends into the outer space and the client steps into both of these spaces. And then there are clients who perceive that. And also people who need a long time with their daily life consciousness to arrive there. And I specifically notice that when new people come, there are these two groups. One group that directly enters, dives into this.

[35:25]

And then there's immediate intense therapeutic contact. And then there are people where it just takes a long time. Yeah, thanks. Martin? You haven't said anything. But I'll wait and come back later. You haven't said anything yet, but I'm glad you're ready. I don't have as much experience in Buddhism as in psychotherapy. but something that the thoughts in Buddhism help me for psychotherapy, that is to sharpen my mental activities,

[36:46]

and reactions. Sharp by sharp you mean make more precise or more noticed by you? Noticeable. Because I am convinced that in the therapeutic relationship what happens to me has to do with the client and the patient. that that has something to do with me or with the client. The client evokes something in you. And the more I can register this in me, the better I can work with the patient. The more accurate I am in noticing this in myself, the more precisely I can work with the client.

[38:10]

this concept, this common fields, this deceptional fields. And what really impressed me yesterday was this concept of, well, common mutual field Because when that's there, I think that what we have done is a good therapeutic contact that we can work with very well. And completely convinced. That it's not technique that's crucial in therapy, but it's contact. So it sounds like the field of contact in itself is therapeutic and healing, even if no matter what happens in the field.

[39:26]

But can be the case. But before I can heal somebody or help somebody, I have to try to understand him. I have to make an effort to understand the person And this field can help me to understand the person Yeah. I used to know this with Sri Krishi that people would go in to see him and he had this... they'd come out feeling healed or better or he really understood me and then he'd talk to me and he'd say, what's really going on with them? And then I would explain as a Westerner and he'd say, oh, but I didn't give them the feeling of being healed the way he did just by creating a field where they felt really accepted.

[40:33]

Mm-hmm. I often noticed with Suzuki Roshi that the people came and talked to him and that they then left this encounter and somehow felt healed or helped. And then he often came to me after such an encounter and asked me, what did they actually say? What was going on with them? Then I explained it to him as a Wessler and then he didn't understand it at all. But they didn't feel so healed or helped by me as they did by him, where he had created this field. I'm not working in a therapeutic setting, but more in organizational development. And I sit in a lot of conferences or meetings where there is no well-being atmosphere. und die kurz sind, wo Entscheidungen schnell getroffen werden und die nicht gut vorbereitet werden können, weil man so viel von diesen meetings hat.

[41:48]

and those meetings are short and decisions have to be made quickly and they are not well prepared because you have to have so many of those meetings. There is often only one opportunity to really make a change in something. What I noticed over the years And something that I've noticed throughout the years is that, including myself, I've even lost the faith that I could do something good. Because the struggling for resources, power, and... influence and so forth, all of that overshadows everything else.

[42:51]

So what I've started doing is to, before such a meeting, I really, although there's only very little time, I use the time to work on my inner attentional space. and also on the faith that it's possible to decide something really wholesome and to anchor myself in my body. in the discussion, when I try to complete small things in the moment when everything goes so well, things really as Roche taught us to do. And what I've noticed is that I can communicate that if I can manage to make small things, just like you've taught us, to make small things really feel complete.

[44:00]

Completely. And then this feeling of completeness and attention in the body, not consciously, but somehow... And then to bring this feeling of completeness and mindfulness on the body to bring that more into the meeting than words. And sometimes it's as though you could really just take a hold of this mark point. And sometimes miracles can happen. It's not that I'm doing the miracle. You're the catalyst. I'm not applying any particular technique. Just by breathing and things like the way you hold the bell and things like that, that changes everything.

[45:08]

And that's something that has surprised me more than anything else. And that way you can, even in activities that seem a little hopeless, you can always do something about them. That's encouraging. Yeah, I mean, there's no technique involved here except 2,500 years of practice. And the sweating horses of the past. und den schwitzenden Pferden der Vergangenheit.

[46:09]

I think it's... I'm loving our conversation and you and so forth, but I'd like to have a break and then you'll be after the break, okay? Also, ich liebe unsere Unterhaltung und es gibt ja noch mehr Leute, die was sagen möchten. And after you is Martin. Aber ich möchte gerne, dass wir eine Pause machen und dann Martin. Norbert. Dann Norbert. I'm way down the list. And you haven't said anything yet. No. But I'm waiting. And luckily I'm patient. And maybe not so much. I must say this is an ornate window into another world. Oh, thank you so much.

[47:08]

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