From what Christina and Ulrika said, it makes me think maybe I should say something about, or could say something about, suffering, physical, bodily suffering and psychological identity suffering. Suffering you feel through the body and suffering you feel mentally. But I also think Nicole speaks to me about this now and then. So why don't you say something? In case she goes more than five minutes, I need some help.

[01:22]

Oh, I will go more than five minutes. Okay. Somebody else? You're the first five minutes. Okay. Ja, wo anfangen? Also, ich habe gerade so ein bisschen nachgedacht. where, how I experience my own practice process, and especially in what we discussed yesterday, where Roshi took this picture of the Samantabhadra, the bodhisattva of the radiating practice, on the elephant, where he equated the animal nature with an experience of everything at once. And also this term that he has taught me so clearly for the first time, undivided activity. And what the process is for me as a person who practices this again, in this constellation,

[02:27]

Thank you. Thank you. In my practice, I have observed four steps that are necessary for me to approach the experience that I heard yesterday in the first draft. I would like to know also how Because I notice that, for me, when I look, and I listened very closely to what Ulrike and Christine talked about, to feel that, for me, it's the same.

[03:45]

In my life, which is a practice life, and where practice, life, suffering, and so on, are not separated from each other, but it happens in an experience body. There... How do you deal with it and in what place does it get in my practice? And I have a definition for myself, I think it's from Matthias Wager, but I think I heard it here, which has become extremely useful for me as a practitioner, as a definition of suffering. That I suffer when something that actually belongs to me is excluded. If something which belongs to it is excluded. They don't belong together.

[04:47]

So for me as a practitioner, this is a very undramatic definition, where I can start to take my suffering into account. I already feel it. And... In this process that I'm talking about, I notice that When I'm sitting here I don't have any experience of undivided activity. That's the question.

[06:18]

But maybe I have a feeling that such a conversation will trigger it. And how can I invite this feeling more completely into my experience and start learning adding to this definition of suffering that is helpful for me, the definition of practice. That is helpful for me. Practice is everything. Everything continues. Intention. Paying attention to what I am doing. Continuously bringing attention to attention.

[07:23]

Continuously bringing attention to attention. in front of me, I have a problem at this point, because the suffering experience, depending on whether you can distinguish again, is it a pure feeling that suffering, like Roshi just started to distinguish, physical, emotional suffering, or is it a full-blown drama, a narrative? That's different. As a practitioner, I would say that the full-blown drama and narrative, that fixes the attention extremely. It simply captures it. And that means for the practice, which is very simple, the attention is not available to be directed at oneself.

[08:24]

The definition of intention is to direct the attention to the attention. What is the difference between intention and this attention to the attention? In principle, the word intention is only there because it is not possible to interrupt. But in the intention, when I clarify the intention, And that is a clearing process. Yes, I have really understood that it is not possible to direct the attention to something, but it is possible to direct the attention to something. We continue to do this. In the experience, I don't feel the intention as my own element.

[09:52]

But it is still important in the dynamic. Okay. So if I just look at these four steps with the aforementioned, what I do to get closer to such an experience is I release the attention from the structures of consciousness. Most of you are quite familiar with it, maybe some of you are a little newer, but the structures of consciousness are just a certain experience of the world, as being out there, as permanent. And for me, in principle, the quality of consciousness that I clearly feel is the solidity of the world. I perceive it as a solidity.

[10:54]

Okay. hands and feet and also within the spine And then I take a step to bring the attention to the body points and then to the felt vitality of these body points.

[12:07]

For me, this is an extra step. You can always try to see how it is when I direct the attention to the heart area or just to the hand. So I'm really articulating this point in practice. And when in the experience the vitality of the body points has become clear, then I look at what Roshi talked about yesterday, I look at, ah, okay, now there is an openness, what is the feeling? There is nothing specific. There is nothing specific.

[13:09]

And these borders, on these borders, as well as with the intention that there can be an opening to stay. And that's what I just make myself familiar with and stay in it. So these four steps, that's how I approach it. That's four. That's four, right. What's three? Three is the vitality of the body. Three is the vitality of the body. Two is the body. So one is the release of the fixation of attention.

[14:23]

And that's also with gestures. I look at what it means to have something as a gesture. How does it feel when the attention holds something? And how does it feel when the attention lets it go? You mean with gestures, how does the body feel? Yes, of course. And that's really to practice. How do I let go of something that has been kept in mind with attention? That's the first sound thing. That's an identification. The fixed one is an identification. That's right. How can I let go of a mental dysfunction? I can hold it and I can let go of it. and let go.

[15:43]

For me it is really the same feeling to keep a mental structure and to look and let go. That's the first step. First step, then when she's let go, on the body, in the body, third step, look, for me it's like this, I first feel the hand or the belly, solar plexus, heart, as a body, and then on the vitality of the body. Okay. Maybe one last sentence. In this third step, in my practice, it is possible to introduce teachings at once. To introduce teachings. For me, there is the body, the mind, in a state where it is receptive.

[16:46]

That is actually the point. Teachings, yes. Exactly. You thought it was a thing or something? No, no, no. You couldn't do it. Thank you. The fourth. The fourth again, okay. So, the fourth step, that's maybe also the, I mean, I can say it, but I think many of you know it on some level. For me, the fourth step, if, for that, the third is important, that it is established. You can't just do the fourth. So the third is the feeling of being alive, of reaching the body points.

[17:51]

Okay. When that is established, then my body feeling at that moment is immediately that of an open receptivity. And in that I can now take the sentence from yesterday, what does it mean to feel everything at once? Everything all at once. Now I can ask the question, what does it mean to feel everything at once? I lost my translator. So this is the previous requisite to our question.

[18:53]

OK. Thank you. One additional to that from myself and from my experience with other people. a kind of resonance of acceptance before I let it go. That this point is really the one that needs a lot of support. And to be held in such a way, I would say, which is of course much easier. in a group, or as we are experiencing it right now, when you take a breath and realize again how it can be like that, the suffering or the problem, this full accepting acceptance, that's the next step.

[20:06]

So my experience is in the step which I described as a third step when there's a feeling of shifting into the alive of bodily sensation. how at that point, oftentimes for many clients or many people, it takes an extra step of fully accepting that whatever appears can be there. And that acceptance and that recognition, like we just had an incident where we all just stood together and were present with the situation, that can be an extra step in there. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. The crucial step, the crucial step in there, yeah. And could that, this step, also be seen as considering one's own experience of suffering or pain as undivided activity? And not to go to bed through a concentrated practice and to exclude it from the present practice and to skip this step and so on, is not possible.

[21:33]

Yes, and to not skip the step of fully accepting what appears. And thus, if we were to skip it, we would exclude it from Zen practice. Yes. Oh, there you are. Yes. For me, what also matters is suffering in a wider sense. Suffering that's not immediately recognized as suffering. but where somehow the observer keeps being actively switched on or is present. I find noticing different feeling dynamics or qualities, feeling qualities very important, noticing them.

[23:06]

Because when I bring attention to the feeling qualities, for instance, and then notice that thoughts arise around them, like, for instance, contemptful or wanting to disregard these feelings or something like that. Yeah. And to sense into the body and to see what happens with certain thoughts. Then one can begin to directly experience how pain oftentimes is linked with other sensations or emotions, feelings, yeah.

[24:31]

So, in this case, the body, to explore that, actually, always very, very rich. And it's possible, because if you give it time and space, And from that point of view, to deeply sense into the body is always as rich, as abundant with sensations. And if one gives space and time to a practice like this, then there is a feeling of everything all at once arises. There is a lot of pain and body activity due to strain. And when I deal with my inner self for a while, then I either have a feeling of harmonic vibration, that is, everything is okay, it is running by itself, or there are pain points, tensions, holdings, which then also attracts spiritual and other thoughts or inner images.

[26:01]

And, so to speak, the acceptance of all stances as they are right now, this no for anything, but the acceptance of everything, that's a moment of liberation for me. All at once, if you will. Yeah, so my experience also is that sensing what appears in the body often is always linked to schwingungen, like... not vibrations, but resonances, harmonies and disharmonies. So there can be a feeling of one's mental body, the mental state being in harmony, or when there's disharmony, then that disharmony also takes form as thought patterns and feelings and so forth. And to fully accept, again, the step to fully accept, to let be what is, can...

[27:09]

Yeah, einfach so. You completed a degree in psychology at Oldenburg, is that right? Mm-hmm. Okay. And you were a good student, and the professor team wanted to write a book with you and stuff like that, or have you teach with them, right? Mm-hmm. Instead, you chose to be a Zen nut or a practitioner, right? Okay. Now, is there anything that you said... Maybe you should translate that. You have a degree in psychology at the University of Oldenburg. You were a good student. The professors wanted to write a book with me and wanted me to... Yeah, and she was such a young person that I always supported her to do whatever she wanted to do and finish school and so forth. And at some point I said, you know, But if you're going to do this, you have to really do it.

[28:35]

And I think that caused some suffering. Now, is there anything that you've said about these four steps and the body points and things like that, that has come to you through Zen practice and wasn't something that was part of the program in Oldenburg? Everything. It was nothing from the program in Oldenburg. So what I'm... Not a single word, I don't think. Really? Okay. So what I'm trying to look for is what... What can we bring into our Western life and our Western practices that actually enhances the therapeutic and psychological processes?

[29:36]

Yeah. Now, I don't consider When I do a seminar present with you as a Zen practitioner, I don't consider myself doing therapy with you. And in fact, in general, if I find myself... in some kind of therapeutic role with a practitioner, I usually suggest they see a therapist. But if the person is able to use Zen practice in their evolution, I try to Find out how that's possible.

[30:56]

I explore how that's possible. And maybe I mostly see three categories. Identity suffering, I call it. bodily suffering. So one is more mental suffering, the other is more emotional suffering. And we could say delusional or traumatic suffering. And that's the same. Delusional or that you have the suffering that arises because your view of the world is dysfunctional. Okay. Oder verblendetes Leiden. Also das Leiden entsteht, weil deine Weltsicht dysfunktional ist.

[32:01]

And there's suffering that arises because you have some blockages or... traumas that you haven't brought into view. Now I find, I said the other day that, again, everything's inactive. Our bodies are activities. And we suffer through our bodies. We suffer through the potentialities of our bodies. We suffer through the way our bodies articulate us in the world. And I find that the many people I practice with over half a century,

[33:07]

I would say in general, the same problem causes emotional suffering in a woman and more mental suffering in a man. Yeah, and one, the emotional suffering you just have to go through, breathe your way through it. And the mental suffering usually requires a re-grounding or a new grounding of your experience, the experience of your identity. And it is interesting that all these years I've been practicing, and I said this the other day, that women usually get closer to what practice is about, sooner than men.

[34:46]

Yeah, but they may not put it together as a life as often as men do. And somebody brought up, when I was here last seminar, uncontrolled body movements that come with, called the Zen disease sometimes. When trying, the closer you get to stillness, sometimes people have these movements, literally leap off their cushion. And I've known, oh, let's say 10 to 20 persons who this has happened to.

[35:47]

And it goes on for a year or so. Every time you sit, your body jumps around. And in my experience, it's only been one male and all the rest have been female. Und in meiner Erfahrung, ich habe bisher erst einen Mann gekannt, dem das so ging, und alle anderen waren Frauen. And this is involuntary and uncontrolled, so something's going on, habits of women. Und das ist eben unwillkürlich und unkontrolliert, also irgendwas ist da doch, was bei Frauen anders ist als bei Männern. And the man who did have it, the male who did have it, is very emotional. Clearly in a very emotional person. So something different is going on. What do you think? Why don't women put it together? You did?

[37:24]

Yes. I couldn't control it. Oh, another one. Yes. It was only once a sheep. Okay. So, for two days. Why do you think that women don't put it together as a life? Why don't they do anything with it? Well, they do do something with it. You are, for example. I think it's mostly culture, primarily cultural probably, is that men are more career-minded than women. Or something is wrong about culture. Well, that too.

[38:24]

Okay, let's blame it on culture. Blaming, but analyzing. Yeah, but it's also the case that women, in the field of some thousands of people I practice with, women take on more obligations to take care of their father or their mother or their baby, et cetera, and the men don't. So that already makes a big difference because you are... Not in the Zendo because you have your period. Or you're not in the Zendo because your child is sick. Or you're not in the Zendo because you decided to go visit your mother who's got Alzheimer's. And the men do that less. I have to translate a whole lot. I will take a nap. It's true, women make something out of it. You make something out of it, for example.

[39:25]

I have the impression that there is a cultural phenomenon that women are less career-oriented in general than men. And that there is something cultural in it. And the other thing is perhaps also quite practical, that women perhaps engage in more connections, that they, for example, do not come to the broadcast because they have their days or that they do not come to the broadcast because the mother who has Alzheimer's is sick or because the child is sick or something like that. Yeah. But look, there's more women here than men. I mean, I feel outnumbered. But let's look here, because there are more women... That's my girl's side. There are more women here than men.

[40:26]

Yes, go ahead. I just say that because it's just a guess. that women, possibly with this unknown, with something that is simply not known, are in a different connection than men. I'm just putting that out there, maybe women have a different relationship to the unknown, with what is not known, than men do, maybe. Und ich habe, das sage ich aber jetzt nicht nur so als Vermutung, sondern ich habe da, wie ich auf der Gynäkologie mein Praktikum gemacht habe, Ophthalmon, des Bezirks. I'm not really just saying this as a suspicion or a guess, but when I did my practicum in the gynecological clinic I had some experiences around that notion.

[41:42]

a feeling or as if you could extend the tattling through the women who are open on their side and extend the tattling in an area from where, for example, a new image arises. And I had some feeling as if through the women I could almost like reach into filaments or tentacles, reach into and that they themselves could reach into also an unknown territory from which new life is generated, is born. Okay. Well, again, this is, first of all, there's a political correctness dynamic, which is that we're supposed to assume that all people are equal and all mental formulations are the same and so forth.

[42:49]

And, of course, legally or something like that, that ought to be the case. And it's very difficult to speak about the subtleties of the difference between practicing with men or with males or with females. And as I said last weekend, this is new, what we're doing. This has never been done before of men and women practicing equally together. Now we have Jasper Johns just deciding to, instead of making regular rectangles, he made physical rectangles.

[43:56]

And we decided, just because I'm mentioning this, because things turn on very small events. Und ich erwähne das, weil sich Ereignisse um, weil sich die Dinge häufig an ganz kleinen Ereignissen auffängen, also daran sich in die eine oder andere Richtung wenden. When Sikirsi came to America, there was no question for him that he was going to practice with men and women. And I couldn't imagine anything else myself. But when we found it, when I found it, Sukhiroshi agreed.

[45:11]

I found Tassajara and he agreed we'd start a practice center there. Kadagiri Roshi, who was Tsukiroshi's assistant teacher in San Francisco. immediately decided we should make two places, one for women and one for men. That was unacceptable to me completely and also to Suzuki Roshi. So the first monastic practice center in the United States, which was like the first in Europe too, made the decision it was going to be men and women practicing together equally. Yeah, and as I said yesterday,

[46:12]

or last weekend, I like to see things historically, which is part of undivided activity. I think the fact, excuse me for saying so, the fact that all transportation, all movement that was required was horsepower, and men take care of horses, women don't. They can ride horses, but usually it's the man who ties the horse up to the carriage and so forth. So the bicycle liberated women from horses. Yeah. And the bicycle became a symbol of women's liberation in Europe and America.

[47:34]

You know, when I was young, after dinner, in more formal situations, the men went to one room and the women went to another room. It's not the case usually anymore. So now, I think contemporary societies, not just us here, but contemporary society has allowed a new way men and women can relate together. So we're in the midst of not a fact, but an experiment. Yeah, like we're in the midst of a tribal experience with populism, populist ideas and stuff. Trump is part of the experiment. Anyway, so this all comes from what you said, Christo.

[48:52]

Which is I can't say exactly because I'm in the middle of the experiment with you. And I feel very sorry I'm not more androgynous. But yeah, I'm stuck with me. But what I do notice If I say something like the five senses show us a world in those five categories plus mind as a source category and as the accompaniment of each of the five senses. is that the five senses show us a world in the categories of these five senses and the mind as a sixth source that is accompanied by the senses.

[50:15]

What I notice is that men grasp that as quickly as women do. Now this is also the category of knowing which it isn't knowing unless you practice it. To know about it means almost nothing. And men tend to know about it more than they practice it. And I've noticed that for 55 years now. And knowing about it seems like somehow enough. And women tend to feel that's not enough. It doesn't feel right. And then the real emphasis on the five senses and the sixth is that it's only five pieces of an infinite pie.

[51:19]

The depth of the recognition is that we're in the midst of a mystery. And to be open to that mystery, I find women immediately are more open to the mystery than men are. No, we're supposed to have lunch or something by now almost. But I want to say one more thing. In these categories of knowing I offered you, And I've been trying to feel what does knowing feel like? It's knowing, knowing, knowing, knowing. feel knowing.

[52:50]

And feeling knowing opens you to knowing in another way. So immediacy as the third condition for knowing. Things coming into being, much as Krista mentioned. Okay. There's knowing which requires practice. And there's knowing which requires ripening. And ripening is ruled or conditioned or actuated. by infinitesimal little changes.

[54:13]

I mean, without going into embryos, changing cell by cell, but something, an awareness of infinitesimal changes ripening a situation. So the third realm of knowing of immediacy, immediacy means the recognition of the acknowledgement, act knowing, of the experiential durative present. Now, there's a material durative present, If I put a brick down here and I don't move it, it'll still be here tomorrow probably.

[55:26]

And it'll look pretty much the same. But in an old building in Wien, A brick doesn't look like a new brick. It looks like an old brick. So the old brick or new brick are part of this ongoing activity, but it's at a different pace or rate than our experiential durations. So you don't want to confuse the durative present where you put a brick with the experiential durative present, which is experiential. And I think most of us, most people, conflate the material durative present with the experiential durative present.

[56:45]

And okay, so if you locate, you can locate yourself in the experiential derivative present. Through experience. the experiential viscosity of space, through the patiality of successive instants realized through attentional breathing, And the awareness that all of it's governed by uncertainty and not fate. Within the midst of that durative present, things are maturing and ripening in little tiny ways.

[58:11]

And to notice that is a fundamental difference in the relationship to time than when you don't notice it. And I find males like me have to learn from women how to be more in an attentional field of my new changes. And this different bodily relationship to time makes practice evolve differently. And has a difference in sureness and openness and so forth. So that's some of the fruits of my practice over half a century.

[59:46]

And I wouldn't say it public, this is sort of public, but I wouldn't say it publicly. I'm not sure I'd write this down, but this is actually my experience. And you want to say something? After lunch? No. And this, let's say, feminine aspect that you just mentioned, And this, I'll just call it a female aspect that you just spoke about. In men and in women. I think it is time, especially in event practice, to manifest it more. I think it's time, especially in Zen practice, to manifest this more. Of course, I have no idea what that should look like.

[60:51]

But I think it is very important and ripe. Well, we're going to let it happen, and we're hoping there's more women like Nicole who decide to make this their practice in life. I mean, I'm not forcing you anything. You know, you may change your mind, but I hope. Yeah, but also that this aspect matures or that this aspect ripens in men just as well. I'm not joking either, but we do have to end and go to lunch, so I'm trying to change the seriousness a little bit. Okay. That's writing the autograph.

[61:41]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_74.2