go through these five, and also see more of this continuity and friendliness of adept practice within everyday practice. It says here, like, again, Our minds supported by the roots of goodness. Moistened by the clouds of the teaching. Moistened like rain. So that's number one. Four, the wisdom teachings moistened by the clouds of the teachings. I'll let the sutra be that poetic. I'll just put wisdom teachings.

[01:02]

And then it says, purified by principles that should be focused on. And that's wisdom phrases. Mm-hmm. But maybe now, before our break, I could speak about enlightenment. And I spoke about it this practice week. So for those of you who have heard this before, you're excused. Because one of the aspects of, Dogen says, of enlightenment practice is forgetting all about enlightenment.

[02:04]

So if those adepts who want to forget all about it leave, I'll forgive you. Maybe I'll leave. Okay. We should see this new movie out, Enlightenment Guaranteed. Well, maybe we should postpone the lecture until I see the movie. Enlightenment Guaranteed. I do not think enlightenment can be guaranteed. Except in a commercial framework. Think how many people would be here if I offered a seminar on enlightenment guaranteed.

[03:12]

Yeah, and how few there'd be for the follow-up seminar. Okay. I'd sell disappearing tickets. Okay. Well, there's sudden enlightenment. And sudden enlightenment is the enlightenment we actually know the most about. And wait the longest for. With the least... With the least amount of satisfaction. But this is the enlightenment that belongs to human beings. And it just happens to people.

[04:14]

And we can't explain always why it happens to people. But usually some kind of Usually it's a person capable of concentration. And it's usually a person capable of intense interest. Intense, caring, engaged observation. And I'm saying that because, you know, enlightenment is a... Some kind of enlightenment is a basis of most art. So I think that poets and painters and... I don't know enough musicians to know if that's the case.

[05:29]

Suddenly find themselves entered into the world or into their work as a writer or painter. Or perhaps into their music. In a way that all surfaces disappear. And in a way that you can never fully forget. And often continuing the art is a way to kind of return to the experience. Now, how does that differ from Buddhist enlightenment? Okay. Well, it doesn't differ. In content, sometimes it doesn't differ. And as I've pointed out often... descriptions of Protestant conversion experiences are virtually phenomenologically identical to Buddhist enlightenment experiences.

[06:53]

I'm sorry for the Catholics, there's no... The Catholics have sainthood. There's no Protestant saints, are there? Anyway, I'm just, you know. Anyway, but the difference, there must be some difference. Because after one experience you're a Protestant and the other you're a Buddhist. So the phenomenology may be the same. But somehow the larger content, the larger context influences how you understand the experience.

[07:58]

So there is, even though this experience certainly goes beyond culture, and it goes beyond the framework or container of the self, And it often feels like a profound identity with everything as it is. If you still have an idea somewhere in you that everything as it is includes God, That shapes the experience. If you don't have that idea, then the dynamic of it, how it turns in you, is different. Now another difference is that Buddhism does not really emphasize the experience so much.

[09:18]

It emphasizes the maturing of the experience. It emphasizes practice after enlightenment. Okay. Now, what does that mean? It means Buddhism is happy with very small enlightenment experiences. Because the maturing of that, opening up of that experience is what's most important. Now, part of the pedagogy of Zen practice is to present the teachings and present the practice in ways that increase the likelihood that your views will rub together in a way

[10:32]

that precipitates an enlightenment experience. I don't think this should be the exclusive emphasis of Zen practice. But it is an emphasis and it's up to each of you to the degree to which you really intuitively feel the possibility and take on with a very deep intention This kind of practice, often with wisdom phrases. And the intensity with which you can bring your intention to each moment of the present, to each perception.

[11:40]

Okay. What you see in artists is often they actually don't have successive enlightenment experiences. Their painting or poetry goes back to their original enlightenment experience, which is usually when they're young. and it's not matured usually, though their work itself may mature. So if I looked at painters like Picasso and Matisse, I would not only look at their work in terms of how they have been influenced by other painters and so forth, but the different enlightenment experience that was at the root of their decision to be an artist.

[12:51]

Okay, so that's a little riff on sudden enlightenment. Isn't that a coffee break? And this is an enlightenment clutch? It's fun to know only a little German. Okay. Okay, now let's talk about the enactment of enlightenment. Now, enactment, is that the word we decided on earlier for enactment, too?

[14:16]

Okay. It's kind of hard to translate, I guess, enactment. Yeah, not fair. Let me give you a recap here. We're just teasing you. How many tapes did you say there are floating around here of my lectures? Close to 700. She must have translated 600 of them. Or an awful lot. She dreams sometimes and she's translating. Translating herself. Okay. Now, the teachings of Buddhism are based on enlightenment.

[15:17]

The things I'm talking to you about really are based on enlightenment. Now the very common wisdom phrase I give you is already connected. To really come into the feeling that space connects us more fundamentally than it separates us. It's an enlightenment experience. When you find yourself in the midst of space as if it were a liquid of which you are an expression. This is an enlightenment experience. And you can see some such recognition, for example, in both Picasso and Matisse's paintings.

[16:20]

They're both painting a space that connects. And only incidentally, in a way, painting objects. The objects are an excuse for painting the space that connects. At least that's how I see it and experience it. But each of them are painting a different kind of space that connects. So if I give you a phrase, like already connected, or you could even take the word rebirth, reunited, so in each moment of perception you not only say ja, you say reunited. Or you say, because built into us is this phrase already separated,

[17:23]

You assume, culturally we assume that we're separated. If you contradict that with a wisdom phrase, already connected. And each of you take that on for the next months. already connected. Or if you take the phrase which people seem to like a lot, just now is enough. As a wisdom phrase. And now I'm talking about the fifth aspect of this, of these fundamentals of Zen practice. A wisdom phrase, like already connected, may make you... may precipitate an enlightenment experience. Now... I practiced with the phrase once, the north branch, the plum tree fully blossomed, on the fully blossomed plum tree, the south branch of the tree

[19:02]

And the north branch of the tree equally enjoy the spring. Some kind... That's not exactly the poem, but it's something like that. And it's a koan in the iron flute collection. And on that... I had a little tiny enlightenment experience. But it's the same as saying already connected. The south branch each fully enjoy the spring. So such a phrase particularly if your mindfulness has developed to extend you into the world.

[20:19]

And such phrases are meant to develop your mindfulness... A palpable mindfulness that you feel as presence. And at the same time bring this mindfulness in conflict with your usual view. So the developing mindfulness doesn't work with a view like already separated. And if in addition you have, if in addition a fully blossoming plum tree is blooming in your mindfulness, or you're bringing your concentration to this phrase already connected, It may, the two working together, the developed mindfulness and the phrase, may make you realize, yes, connectedness.

[21:31]

And now interdependence isn't just an idea, an ecological idea. It's an actual experience and it's not difficult to feel generous and compassionate. Because every person you see, you feel, there goes a version of me. And it's a fact. I mean, look at, I look at you all, none of you look like Martians. You're all versions of each other. Some with longer hair. Yeah. That's an idea only, but to know that each of us are versions of each other is a fruit of perhaps this phrase already connected.

[22:49]

Okay, now say that you don't have an enlightenment experience already connected. What you do repeat in a mantric-like way is the phrase. You're actually enacting enlightenment. Every time you say that, feel that, It comes into some kind of widening of the view we have that we're separated. And if you also really understand that there's no permanence to self, And you experience the, you remind yourself of the fluidity of self. And you remind yourself that everything points to mind. Every object you see,

[24:10]

you take as a practice to remind yourself that the object points at mind. that every, whether I look at all of you or one of you, I'm seeing my own mind seeing it. I can remind myself of this. And every time I remind myself of it, I'm enacting enlightenment. And it's like Tibetan Buddhism is, well, Tantric Buddhism is particularly focused on enactment. You enact a divine being, a bodhisattva. And the practice of enactment, done slightly different, is part of Zen practice too. When you sit, just when I assume this posture, I'm enacting a Buddha. The more I feel the posture sitting me, the more the Buddha is enacting.

[25:46]

Okay, so second kind of enlightenment, and we could call this gradual enlightenment, is to practice enlightenment teaching which in effect has you enacting enlightenment. And that's the second category of enlightenment. And the third is Fundamental enlightenment. And since I'm sure you want to go to the toilet or have a break, we'll give fundamental enlightenment a short shrift. But fundamental enlightenment means the way we exist has to be based on enlightenment.

[26:50]

This is the basic Buddhist understanding. Is that the way we exist is enlightenment. It's just that we take it for granted. So for granted we lose touch with the mystery and miracle that there's anything at all. But this fantastic illusion of the world, I mean, look at the starry sky at night. All this stuff is floating in empty space that connects. The universe has expanded. creating space as it expands. Each of us is generating space through our living.

[27:59]

This is the basic condition of enlightenment. And so our practice is always in a way circling back to that. And our life is circling back to that. In a way, the way is a circle, as Dogen points out and Tanahashi Sensei points out in this new book. And we're more apt to notice this at the moment of death. that it's just amazing that anything appears at all. And as, whether we like it or not, our elements and constituents are dissolving, The subtle light of the mind becomes more apparent.

[29:06]

So fundamental enlightenment is often why death is called nirvana. Because there's a recognition or enactment of enlightenment at the moment of death, whether you like it or not. So that's fundamental enlightenment. And the fourth and last category of enlightenment is prior enlightenment. The most classic example of prior enlightenment, again very important to Dogen, is initial enlightenment. And initial enlightenment is often the moment you decide to practice.

[30:25]

We can't quite understand why we decide to practice. Maybe it comes out of some difficulty or stress. But there's all this stuff in our life leads us into the present and leads us into a present our culture has told us about or our fears and desires tell us about and at some point you just stop and all that drops away for a moment And you decide to practice. You decide to see what comes without so much anticipation. You decide to trust yourself.

[31:27]

You decide to take responsibility for yourself. Responsibility with a sense of knowing you can invent yourself. Or you can discover how you actually exist. So you decide to take the precepts. Or you decide to start zazen. And usually it's like a kind of door comes down. Which cuts you off somewhere from some aspects at least of your previous life. And that door clanks down, another one opens.

[32:27]

And you feel a moment of brightness. Now, some kind of territory like that is this decision to practice. Maybe extremely brief, but it's a change in direction. And then from that point of view, the rest of practice is unpacking that initial enlightenment. And of course these practices of enacting enlightenment, sudden enlightenment, all open up both fundamental enlightenment and prior enlightenment. And the other aspect of the other kind of prior enlightenment is because there's such a thing as fundamental enlightenment, actually many of our experiences have been enlightenment experiences.

[33:32]

But they like getting encapsulated in little bubbles because we don't know how to open them up in our life. Our life hasn't been moistened by the teachings or rooted in trying to live rightly. So these little, little bubbles of enlightenment experience are waiting to pop. And I can almost see them around you. And some of you kind of keep throwing, pushing them away. And when you're more settled or more in satsang, they begin to cluster. The zazen mind seems to draw them into your space. So the more your mindfulness is developed and zazen is developed, not only is there a flow of past causes,

[34:54]

unconscious and so forth and non-conscious there's a flow of the bubbles of enlightenment and as you practice let's just take the example of already connected again you suddenly realize yes, you know already connected And there's a relaxation in your body. A feeling of completeness. At last. And a lot of these bubbles, because many times you've recognized already connected. At least every time you fell in love. And so they accumulate and they all start to pop. And it reinforces this experience of already connected. And you have the experience of, it's so different, but it's so familiar.

[36:38]

And often, even in giving lectures, people tell me, what you say, I've never heard it before, but it feels familiar. We know these things. We don't know we know these things. And when we come into the knowing of these things, this is often the fruit of prior enlightenments. Okay, so that's enough. How wonderful it is to be able to speak with you about these things. This isn't just your everyday coffee clutch. This is our enlightenment clutch. Now, can we put that in the brochure next year? Enlightenment clutch. Okay, let's sit for a moment.

[37:41]

Good morning. Good morning. Well, we've been praying for more snow so you can't leave. Thank you for six of you who consciously took the, intentionally took the precepts last night. It helps everyone, I think. Not just our Sangha, but everyone. I really believe it when someone takes the precepts. What a normal, simple thing to do. And I'm sure others of you during the ceremony examined for yourself these simple precepts.

[40:04]

Okay, is there something from yesterday, your meetings together that you'd like to bring up? Hmm. Yes. In our group it was so that ... there were some in the group for whom it was clear that enlightenment was not necessarily a goal or that there was something like ... It was clear that it had a lot to do with the way Roshi had learned about it in the past. It's something you shouldn't strive for or where the trap is, so to speak, if you strive for it. In our group it became apparent that some of the people weren't really aiming at or toward enlightenment and it wasn't really a big issue for them, especially the ones who practiced with Roshi for a long time.

[41:31]

Everybody gives up after a while if they practice with me for a long time. And Hans said that also they felt there was some relationship, also of course not exactly the one you tried to joke about, that you in your earlier teachings emphasized very clearly that enlightenment was something we shouldn't cling to or have as a goal in our practice. They can be a trap. No, but the most, except for the Chinese and even more Korean, some Japanese and most Korean Zen schools. Almost all of Buddhism says the desire to attain enlightenment interferes, makes it impossible to achieve enlightenment.

[42:43]

But how do you have the goal of enlightenment as an altruistic aim? That's something else. So it can't be a personal aim. In traditional Buddhism, yes. Go ahead. So it can't be a personal aim. In traditional Buddhism, yes. Go ahead. It was a relief, actually, for most of us that Roshi sort of lowered the, you know, the... What is it? Actually, the veil. I lowered the pole.

[43:44]

That's good. I'm glad because I get tired of it. the frustration you feel when you don't have this big experience. You're also great. I don't want to say I only like the ones who have enlightened me. Yeah. And in my lineage it's also, well, nothing. Go ahead. Yes? One question, I was together with Hans in the same group, after that point came up for me was, why do I sit, try to sit every day after not aiming enlightenment anymore, I don't have this big goal anymore, and what is it that makes me sit down, even though it's painful and we have so much struggle with it?

[45:27]

Would you tell me your secret? Deutsch, bitte. Oh, you did before. See how little I understand. Mr. Stevens. Yeah, but you never could practice. Certainly zazen is so much more fundamental than some experience. It's like sleeping. Do you sleep so that you can have an enlightened experience? No, you sleep because it's part of our life. And you sit zazen for Buddha. Rather than respond, I'd just like to hear some more. In our group it came up that prior enlightenment experiences almost were experienced together with crisis, personal crisis.

[46:58]

For example? There were crises in the work? Yeah? Crisis in relationship to your husband or to your... And how did this, and then precipitated, how is this related to prior enlightenment? I think as much as I understood, because I didn't have this child... Deutsch, bitte. In our group, it turned out that we liked to remember the basic lighting experiences that we had. And it was often the case that they appeared together with a crisis experience. The earlier ones, in childhood, were rather something temporary, oppressive, a real existential crisis. Okay.

[48:00]

Who is she? You must have something to say. Think of something to say. I come back to you then. Yes. Our group had some similar experiences in terms of experiences, not in early childhood, but in young adulthood without the experience of Sasen. The quality of these experiences is then actually only in the memory. Through the practical fantasies, these experiences have emerged again and have suddenly become very clear and can be remembered again.

[49:03]

In our group, some people had similar experiences, prior enlightenment kind of experiences, not in early childhood, but more like young adults before they started formal Zen practice. But through practicing sitting or zazen, then these experiences returned, better saying returned than remembering, but returned in their brightness, and that was good. Yeah. There was a beautiful dynamics in our group that through these doors an atmosphere was created that helped others to reconnect with similar experiences. And Ulrike said it nicely, maybe you say it yourself, but with the bubbles that you take with the script of life, you can do it better.

[50:17]

And Andreas said that I told the story about these dots you connect. Oh, yeah? You were in that group? Yeah. So there were these drawings. As children, we all grew up with these pictures that were dots, and you had to connect them. If you weren't an artist, this was the way to do it. I said I found that these bubbles that cluster around us, we connect them. So we connect these little experiences and then we have our Buddha nature. Whose Buddha-nature is that? Ours. I once told the story of these pictures, which we all probably made as children, where you connect points with each other. I had the feeling yesterday, these bubbles that Roshi spoke of, which stick to us when we practice a lot, when you connect them with each other, that then the story is not our personal story, but our Buddha-nature.

[51:24]

In the group we also talked about it, that was also a point that was more important to me, that, like Roshi has mentioned, that in our culture this is completely different from life, that no one tells us what it means when we have such experiences. So that it only works out for me when I tell Oshie or when I read in the literature that I know that too or I know something like that. And that, well, it is missing to be encouraged further. But that still, well, also the experience is, when there are such experiences, that they are still anchored somewhere in the body. So that they are still not lost, they do not die either. There was a similar process in our group that people shared experiences and we also found out that there's not much, if any, support in our culture for experiences like that, to treasure experiences like that and bring them to maturation.

[52:45]

And to believe in them and trust them. So a group like this or your teachings or books we read are absolutely necessary so we can continue this different kind of, you know, story is not the right word, but process. Yeah, I think so too. Yeah, and that it's really these bubble-like experiences or different experiences, they have an anchor in our body. So this is how we can also re-enter them and re-exist them. Well, I'm glad what I said yesterday made sense to you and to others. Yes. I for myself want to say that when I started with Zen practice I was very interested in enlightenment. And then when I was going on with the practice then I heard it's not so good to look for enlightenment.

[53:52]

So one told me it's not good, it's better for practice not to look at it. So I tried this and it's good, it's better not to look at it. going on, I still always had this idea, this mystery of enlightenment always. It's something that's interesting. Can you hear him, what he's saying? Not quite. Yeah. Maybe I should... So when I went on with my practice, I always had this idea, the mystery of enlightenment. I came on this idea, it's just an idea, and you never can reach an idea because it's too small, the idea. But to give it up totally, like there is nothing like enlightenment and you shouldn't look at it, that is just like losing the pepper for practice. Or the spice for learning the song. The hot sauce, yeah. So for me it's very important not to look too much to it, but still to have it in mind.

[55:01]

Okay. German, please. When I started my practice, I was very keen on enlightenment. Actually, that was the basis of my business, and that's why I did this interview. And I know that someone said, forget about the lighting. It's not good for the practice if you always have a goal. And so I gave it up. And it was also good for my practice to give it up, but at some point it got stuck again somehow. I know that it's just an idea, just a fantasy, enlightenment, and that's why it can't exist. So if enlightenment is something total, then it can't be contained in an idea, so you can't hang on to it either. But to give it up completely as a concept, I think that it takes out a little bit of the salt for my practice.

[56:11]

So I always hang around a bit. Yes, I would like to add more so. I think it's just a mixing of levels. It's on a personal level you have to forget the idea of enlightenment, otherwise your practice will lead to nothing. But on a deeper level, on this bodhicitta level or on this bodhisattva level, I mean, when we really say we will save all sentient beings, we will be in accord to all sentient beings, that means that we want to be enlightened, nothing else. And so it's a very central part, and it will ever be in my practice, this deep desire for enlightenment. But I also know this other personal level, if you are sitting in Sesshin

[57:12]

have in mind, oh, no, this big experience is coming. It's an illusion. It might happen, but, you know... Nice, dude. Yes, I just wanted to connect with Hermann. I feel that it's like two different levels that are being mixed. One is to think on this personal level, I want to have my great enlightenment experience now, certainly an illusion. and does not lead very far, but to be convinced at a deeper level that there is this kind of enlightenment and to be connected with all living beings on this level of enlightenment is something that I deeply carry within me and of which I am convinced, and I also believe that because one is not, it makes no sense.

[58:14]

I also think that in the West, due to Christian education, we have such a strange relationship to enlightenment, such an unnatural one, because we are immediately in this great, multidimensional, sacred area. I met a lot of people who immediately said, oh no, not me, not me personally enlightened. But Zen Buddhism has exactly the other claim, as Roshi said yesterday, it depends on every single person. And you are also a single person. What I added was that I think one of the problems with this enlightenment is because of our Christian background, that it's so holy. A lot of people say, no, that's not for me, it's too high up.

[59:24]

But I think, like you yesterday said, yesterday evening, it depends on every single person. in this practice. Of course, some people think it's too high up, so they think, ah, that's for me. Mahakali? I want to add to what Dominique just said. I was in the same group. For me, I have a certain experience in my past. They came during my early childhood, during Sashins and so on. And after a while, they get somehow in the... in the background and I can hardly remember them. They are somehow disappearing, similar like the stars in the night and in the day light comes. They are just not visible. I know that I have had them, but I don't have this access to this.

[60:27]

And for me, if I would have direct access to all my experience, my life would be much more... I would be a different person if I could get access to all this which I already had. And this is the point for me. If I could re-establish this connection, then I wouldn't look for this big enlightenment experience anymore, because I would have enough. I have a little supply here. Deutsch bitte. If I were in the same group as you and we talked about it, I would have had this experience in my early childhood or during the shins. And if I had the experience or the permanent one, then I probably wouldn't look so much at any enlightenment experiences, to look at new or bigger ones, because that would probably make me happy, what I would have then. And for me, the question is how I can maintain this.

[61:38]

That is a very important point for me at this point. Perhaps you can say something about this. Supply? Okay. Maybe so. Yeah. If I can say something about that. I have very, very good memories of my experiences. But these are memories to which I cannot find a very intense physical contact. So I can no longer take away these feelings that are associated with it. And I feel the same way when I try to describe these experiences, then it is simply not possible to give back the purity and the poetry that is associated with it. I want to add what Mahakavi said. With me it's slightly different. I have very good access and memory of these experiences, but what I'm lacking is a physical access.

[62:44]

I don't mean the memory. I also have access in my memory. I can reconstruct this. I can go to this point and remember and then I know. But this is not what I meant. I meant this, what you said, the skull which is missing in the... The difficulty to re-enter the experience fully. Yeah, but... At the same time it's difficult to describe those experiences because of its mystery and poetry and so on. And in our group we talked about this thing too and I want to add one aspect too that... Starting as I said, I had a very strong experience and it was a great motivation to continue. And then there was frustrations that didn't begin also.

[63:48]

But my experience is nowadays if I continue, this has no more importance. And the second is that those experiences, enlightenment experiences, I don't know, have had also the result that they changed me. In fact, that really changes my personal life and my feeling for myself. And so it's nothing which was lost. Deutsch, bitte. In my case, such experiences played a major role of motivation at the beginning, and then came such a time of frustration that I could not let it live again, and I realized that the longer I sat, the less it played a role of motivation, and the second thing I added was that these ...

[64:56]

Yes. I was also in a very interesting group yesterday. I also found it exciting to think about it. I think this word enlightenment is something that awakens in me. Actually, I don't think the word fits so well. When I started to remember many little things in childhood, I noticed that the longer I practice, the greater my access to these small, so to speak, enlightenment experiences, which I think everyone experiences in their life, and that's a cycle for me.

[66:05]

Well, it's a memory, but it's also a feeling that I can call out again as I go deeper into the practice. And then it disappears, then it's no longer this past, so to speak, but I'm in there and it's just anchored in me. The more I can recall these things or stand in the middle of them, if I can dissolve them now, the more I get rid of them. The smaller the steps, the more fulfilling they are. And that was very nice in our group, because I also found this togetherness, this connection, very interesting.

[67:12]

This feeling has then also moved me into other past stories. In the beginning, we were silent for a while. Everyone talked about it and it was a beautiful thing that you know. It's something that comes together. You're making a nice little summary in English. Well, Jutta gave a very beautiful description and picture just of the atmosphere the group was in and how they actually experienced a lot of this together, what we all shared here. And there was silence, there was connectedness. there was remembering and Jutta's personal experiences that also through practice she discovers more and more the depth of those experiences she's had before and it's like a cycle like you remember more of these experiences and that motivates you to continue with the practice and then the practice helps you re-access experiences it kind of feeds into each other

[68:35]

and also connects you very much with everybody else. Okay. Yeah, okay. So maybe... Maybe I could say something. Go ahead. Oh, yes. You mentioned the other day that Dogen had this basic phrase he started with for his practice, which is, why do we practice if we have the seeds of enlightenment already? Why do we practice if we're already enlightened? If we're already enlightened. And you were talking yesterday about the here and now, so to speak. We are constructing our presence, our present moment. And so in terms of that, is there a part in...

[69:47]

in this moment where we are reconstructing something that we remember, that we experienced earlier, that is part of our humanity, human being. So are we only constructing the presence right now, or are we... feeding out of the something else in addition to this precious moment? Roshi quoted Dogen a few days ago with the sentence that he practiced with Dogen Why do we have to practice when we are already enlightened? And yesterday he talked about the fact that the current situation is being created again and again, now the moment is being created. And my question relates to the fact that, yes, the situation is being created, but is there still something that is being reconstructed, that is somehow being remembered, or that is part of our, yes, our structure, our human structure, that still plays into it, so to speak?

[71:05]

Okay. Well, in a pretty long time of practicing with people. There... You know, there's a... always a few people, you know, sometimes four or five in a short period of time, and sometimes four or five people I've been practicing with over a longer period of time have an enlightenment experience.

[72:34]

Well, they start to practice because before starting they had an enlightened experience which they didn't know what to do with. Or they continue practice because on the third day of their first seshin they have a big enlightenment experience. And in my lineage, our lineage, as I started to say earlier, You don't announce enlightenment experiences to the group.

[73:39]

Yeah, I mean, I might discuss it with the Tanto, for instance, if the Tanto is responsible for practicing with this person when I'm away or something. And you sometimes hardly acknowledge it to the person. Sometimes it's important to let the person know they've had an experience or confirm it. And sometimes it's better not to because they still have ego tendencies to turn it into some kind of personal merit. But if I look at people who've had enlightenment experience very early in their practice, It's almost always come out of an innocence and not an intention.

[75:00]

A kind of sincerity that they really, okay, this makes sense, I'll try it, but they don't have any idea that this is something to do with enlightenment. So my own observation is that a deep sincerity about practice is more important than the intention to practice. realize enlightenment. And then there's the larger percentage of people I practice with, say, you know, 60 to 80 percent of who don't have a big enlightenment experience during their practice.

[76:12]

But it's clear to me that somehow they're practicing from some kind of enlightenment. Or it's clear they wouldn't be practicing or they wouldn't understand what we were speaking about. Okay, so that's one aspect of the subject. Another aspect is that there's different kinds of enlightenment experiences. Okay, there's mental or intellectual or philosophical enlightenment.

[77:13]

That's quite important. And... Yeah. Yeah. and overall may be the most important if other things follow. But intellectual and philosophical, let's call it enlightenment, if it's just that, you can remain pretty much an asshole in the rest of your life. And this I know instances of. Some big-time instances of.

[78:13]

So you can't, I mean, you don't want to idealize. This is an experience that affects part of you or all of you perhaps. Okay, there's also emotional enlightenment experiences. And there's also physical enlightenment experiences. Ideally, you want to bring these three together. Now, often I'm practicing with someone and I simply wish they could have an enlightened experience. Because I can't get past something in their personality that... that blocks their relationship to themselves and their relationship to other people.

[79:21]

And the most difficult ones like this are people who don't have an emotional lightning experience but are pretty smart intellectually so they can think their way around most things. Now there's people, for instance, who are... Their character is very good. In fact, this is quite common in Zen people who practice Zen, usually people with good character. What did you say? You said that when I say people laugh. I wish I had this gift.

[80:34]

Didn't I say the same thing, what he said? Maybe what I said was funny. It's only clear in German. When I said that, it has nobody in the Dharma Center. Okay. But sometimes people's personality, for instance, is quite different than their character. And their personality feeds on feeling superior to others.

[81:34]

What did you say? Feeds on, feeling superior to others. So they really don't want to do that, but their personality is so constructed, they have to keep making other people feel below themselves. And because such a person is often actually smarter than other people, they're convinced they're right. But they somehow also need the constant reinforcement of their intelligence. Okay, so you have this kind of situation where there's different kinds of enlightenment.

[83:00]

And in a certain way, practice makes you more open, more able to mature your enlightenment if you have an experience. But in some ways it makes you more immune. In a way you get smarter about how to protect your precious self. Okay. How would you behave to somebody who is, in a way, thinking he is superior, or is better, more intelligent?

[84:10]

How do I behave towards such a person? Friendly? You know, I try to... communicate what I feel underneath the occasions. I try to communicate what I feel underneath what's going on on the surface. That may improve their relationship to me, but it doesn't necessarily improve their relationship to others. Then it becomes more complicated.

[85:18]

How do you create a situation so that the Sangha helps this person get out of this habit? But that's only one example. There's many such habits. Some people have a habit of always trying to bond other people to them. Some people have a habit of using their greater vitality to kind of subject other people to it. These things are very hard to... We don't want to talk about all these things, but they're very hard to do much about. And I think really, to really work with them, you virtually have to live in a sangha.

[86:19]

Because in a way, the definition of individuated life is also a way to protect ourselves from too much confrontation from others. So if you live in your own apartment, you know only the people you like to know and get along well with and so forth. You don't really have the same kind of situation, which is very difficult to do, just to live with people. in a daily basis, 24 hours. Sukhira, she used to say to live rubbing together until we're like milk and water. It's a problem in Western Buddhism because even if we live at Crestone, for instance, or in a Sangha, most people don't live there for very long.

[87:29]

And to really refine the personality takes years, 10 years, 15 years. And the refinement of the personality or perfecting of the personality, as Sukhiroshi would say, is the latter part of practice. Yes. I have a question. I really like solitude and feel it completely nourishing, and I think it has something to do with what you said earlier, that certain experiences or states of mind really need lack of conflict. And I just enjoy being in a situation when I'm by myself, since I also have a lot of contact with people in my work, that then there's not this constant kind of like background tension through constant interaction with other people.

[88:32]

So is that something you would discourage me or whatever? Deutsch, bitte. I am very happy for myself alone or in a kind of personal retreat situation, because exactly there an atmosphere is of a freedom of conflict. And Roshi also said yesterday that certain experiences are simply reprehensible when you have conflicts. I wanted to finish this discussion before our break but I guess I can't so I'll respond to what Ulrike said and then we'll have a break and then I'll come back to some of this and then hopefully go on a little bit in what we could should maybe talk about during the seminar

[90:00]

And then after the break I will come back to a few other points and continue with what we should and could discuss during the seminar. Yes, okay. So, different is different. So solitude is different than being with people. And some people seem to be so structured that they need a fair amount of solitude. Or certain periods in their lives they need solitude. But some people think that... In the ancient times, people like... I spoke recently at this meeting about the genius of Sangha being why the Kang dynasty Zen masters were so profound in their realization.

[91:14]

Again, if there's an evolution of consciousness Which I think Buddhist teaching assumes. Which I don't think all Buddhist teaching assumes. Then why are the Sung and Tang dynasty masters so extraordinary? I don't think it's because they were necessarily smarter than us or more spiritual or something. But I would say it's because they had a superior sangha. Yeah. Okay.

[92:17]

Now, some people think, oh, but they also had more solitude. And I don't think so. Not in China, they didn't. Yeah. Though there was some hermit tradition, it's a very, very minor part of Zen Buddhist practice. But what they did have is a more normally engaged life. A slower paced life. like if you came here you had to get here by some means other than a train and airplane so the trip itself was extraordinary and then after a trip like that you didn't go back right away He stayed a while, and there was more person-to-person contact.

[93:28]

Okay. But still, during certain periods of one's life, solitude may be very healing. Now, Zen teaching has been developed to be practiced in really monastic type situations. So if you imagine, like some Zen teachers will say, always stay in a certain state of mind. And you have to look, never let a certain kind of thought ever appear in your mind.

[94:40]

Well, this is actually possible. If you live in a monastic community with 30 or 40 people, that's about it. Yeah, and your meals are taken care of, and basically there's not too many problems other than getting through the day.

[94:59]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_76.37