Does anyone, I hope someone, has something they'd like to say? Yes. I have the feeling that through this winter program I feel more obliged to read the essential knowledge. I feel like through the Winter Branches program I feel more committed to reading the essential teachings. and especially through the reading about the practice of the Eightfold Path, I have the feeling that it is important not only to sit, but also to be constantly aware of the kinds of daily life. And particularly through reading and the practice of the Eightfold Path, I feel like it's not only important to sit, but also to be aware through breath in everyday life.

[01:14]

I heard that's true. Okay. Yes? Yes? In the beginning, when the Winter Branches program started, my head was filled with lists. Before it started or at the beginning? At the beginning. Oh, it's okay. And then I came... And also third part of the winter branches, I came up with just leaving it like that. I decided to whenever these lists would arise to just name them. Because it was an idea to remember through the Eightfold Path.

[02:33]

Can you say that again? Because it was an idea to remember through the Eightfold Path. Because it was a suggestion to remember the terms through naming. And then I took a break also because I was sick. I could not take in anything else. And I realized that I had understood these things very superficially. And now within the last couple of weeks of practicing, my phrase came back to me.

[03:48]

And I made the experience that now these lists are arising while I'm working with the phrase. And through that I gained much more awareness in practicing. And now I've found out... I've always wondered why I'm doing this with the list. The reason is that I'm coming out of my egocentric. And then I wondered, why am I doing this thing with the lists? And for me, the reason is to get out of my egocentric state. And then it helps me a lot to just take the Eightfold Path and open this up just by taking the first step, the right views to break this pattern.

[05:24]

And I don't do more at the moment. I always notice that when the devil's circle begins, when I get lost in the wrong view, in the egocentric view, that I become free again with the right view. And that's all I'm doing at the moment. I'm noticing that whenever this devil cycle... Vicious devil cycle. The... Schweinhund. So whenever this vicious circle starts, I take just these right views to open it up. And from that a question arose? You once asked whether we are holding the intention to free ourselves from suffering or to attain enlightenment.

[07:02]

whether we are holding such an intention in the first place. And that I was concerned with that for a long time. Because I think that when they're in the final phase in the last stadium, it's the same thing. I know that I have one of the balls, but why is it so important? And I know that I have one of those two, but I'm wondering why this is so important. Okay.

[08:20]

You have one of those two, and why this is so important. Why what is so important? The intention. This intention. Which intention? Well, I have the intention to get rid of the suffering. Yeah? More than... Yes, because I think I don't want to be so intellectual. Somehow it is linked with the mental intellectual structure also. Well, better than… We can have the intention to free ourselves from suffering. And we can have the feeling that some shift we can call enlightenment is the best way, is an effective way to free ourselves from suffering.

[09:31]

But if those intentions are not rooted in an acceptance of whatever it is, those intentions have no power. So whether it's suffering or lack of enlightenment or whatever, your first state of mind always ought to be acceptance. And that acceptance, it's not acceptance as resignation, I give up. It's acceptance... Not defeated acceptance.

[10:45]

I don't know what word to use. An acceptance which in some vital way connects you to the world. If that acceptance is really deep, it's not different from enlightenment. Someone else? Yes, Simon. In this body somehow there mainly lives a small boy.

[11:47]

In your body? In your body? Maybe in others too. Somehow I think so. Small girl lives in me. And he's just on the way going home. And he's actually on the way home. And he goes through... And he is walking through various various phenomena like storm and wind and dark nights and he rests on a cold stone.

[13:07]

I read about those boys before. And sometimes he has the feeling that maybe he's a little bit crazy in this world in which he's living. But every time he reads something about, or hears something about, something that reminds him on his home, he realizes that he's not crazy. And that's why I really enjoy when Roshi is speaking or Atma is speaking or Paul is speaking or several people from the Sangha.

[14:27]

And I also enjoy books like the one on the dynamics of mind. And I'm encountering these lists and drawings. And I don't know if I understand anything at all. And I have no idea whether I understand anything at all. But I feel home. And the picture that arose for me after reading Govinda When I decided to write the last page, I imagined, if any of you know the book, I think of Momo, who is currently at Meister Horat.

[15:49]

And after I closed the book, I felt reminded to this moment, like in Momo, I don't know if you know the book, it's by Michael Ende, the children's book, in the last moment when she encountered Master Hora. No, I don't know the book. This book I don't know. But if, you know, if there's a copy in English, I won't read it. However, the main thing, The most important thing in this encounter and the moment when I experienced this was one phrase. The sentence that Meister Hora says to Momo.

[17:03]

He says very simply, the words must first grow in you. You must have patience. He simply says these words need to grow within yourself first. You have to be patient for an entire cycle of the sun. And somehow, I guess this is like Navidharma lives in me right now. More I don't understand. Okay, I hope so. Maybe one more person and then I'll try to say something too. Someone who was at the winter branches last year who hasn't spoken yet. Were you with the winter branches last year?

[18:17]

She understood it wrongly, but she has never said anything. But you can speak, it's okay. I had a lot of respect for these winter branches because this entire topic is very new for me. And already through this weekend I discovered a small system error. A small system error? Yeah, in her system. Okay. And it is directly connected with learning and experience.

[19:30]

And it is directly connected with learning and experience. on the one hand to understand in my own practice and also offer other people the possibility to learn. And to convey knowledge in this way. And to have lists that I do not understand immediately. because my system does not work that way, to understand, to combine that with the experiences, to implement them, or even to pass on orders at all.

[20:38]

Because my system does not function in this way to take the lists and to connect that to experience and to enact it and even to share that with others. And there were two possibilities. One is to reject the lists. or the other to take the list and look at what can I feel or understand and to start like Ottmar said yesterday start with a small thing and go on to a bigger thing or from the simple thing to a more complex or difficult thing

[21:47]

And I'm not sure whether this can be enough for winter branches. Well, it's a start. We'll see what happens. You're here now, so it's okay. Evelyn? I am also still at the beginning On the day of my lay ordination I had the impression On the day of my lay ordination, I had the feeling that made me very happy. I felt like a small drop that has found its ocean. No, it's stream, she said, because it's in movement.

[23:10]

And I'm noticing more and more that I want to know where this river is coming from. Because I can't swim upwards. Upstream. Upstream, yeah. In order to look at it. And I feel that in the winter branches, that it happens, that I slowly experience where the river comes from and the history of it. And I feel like through winter branches I slowly get a feeling for where this river is coming from and I get more of a feeling for its history.

[24:18]

And I am part of the winter branches and I managed to not read a single book within this year. Oh, tell me that. And I have an interesting blockage there, and I'm still waiting for the hot tip where my beginner's book would be. Okay. Okay. And at the same time I feel like I've learned a lot in this year. And I'm grateful if everyone is patient with me. If you can bicycle here from Baden and swim in the Rhine on the way, you can surely read a book. But be careful swimming in the Rhine.

[25:28]

It's dangerous. Okay. Is it short? I will try to make it short. I read something about the difference of hearing and consciousness of hearing. It's that a very experienced meditator can experience distinctly the difference or the space between those. So I understand that Scott tries to meditate for some years and not to know that. For me, it's not possible to make this distinction.

[26:29]

But I'll make some other experience. For example, Today or yesterday I experienced a constructed reference point. Our table, where we have the menu, I stand at this table and I feel emotion and I cannot identify it. And so for a short moment I think, I'm dizzy. I'm dizzy. Dizzy. It was a table, but I cannot make the distinction. I think, no.

[27:32]

I could not imagine it would be the table which is shaking. So, Why don't you speak Deutsch? I mean, she can speak English to me. It's easier, I think. Yeah, I see. Also ich hab die, ich hab da so ein kleines Beispiel gemerkt, wie ich einen, zum Beispiel einen Referenzpunkt konstruiert habe, wenn ich an diesem Tisch da draußen, beim Buffet, eine Bewegung gespürt habe, So, with a small example, I found out how I was establishing a reference point by seeing the table shaking. No, no, no. I constructed it. Yeah, okay, by constructing a reference point.

[28:45]

By seeing the table shaking and I... No, I feel, initially I feel... It's not easy. Emotion. You felt the motion of the table or the motion in yourself? Initially I felt the motion. I cannot identify... Where it was coming from. Yeah, so... I take it to me and then I realize it was the table, for example. For example. I've had this experience many times. Did you say that you can or cannot make the distinction between hearing, hearing and hearing as if it were outside? So did you say you can't, or you can't distinguish between listening and hearing? I'll say it in German. I mean, I can... I've read that there is, so to speak, the...

[29:49]

I read that there is a distinction between hearing as the hearing of the organ of hearing, hearing of the ear, and the consciousness, awareness of the hearing. And I think it seems to be a very small space between those two, and I do not think that I can distinguish them. Well, what you're speaking about is what's called the 18 Datus, and maybe I can speak about it. It's one of the big lists. Not as long as the 37 limbs of enlightenment, but it's half as long. But it's only six times three. Six senses, six sense fields, six objects.

[30:54]

So it's really a very simple list. Yeah, there's something called, which I haven't studied enough to really, and it's also speculative, called the Hebbian Synapse. Hebbian Synapse? The man named Hebb. Hebbian Synapse? Yeah. Oh, okay. Okay. So I haven't really thought about it too much, but anyway, it has something to do with when you perceive something, that synapses fire all over different places in the body, neurons fire. Can you do the beginning again? When you perceive something and notice something?

[32:19]

Fire? Yeah. What's missing? Something is missing. I don't know what's missing because I don't know what you said in German. All over the body. All over the body. So, for some reason, these look unrelated, but they begin to, as the short thing is, it fires together, it wires together. Anyway, the basic idea is you're creating pathways. And once you create the pathways, it becomes easier. But new things take a while to create pathways.

[33:24]

Some process like this is involved with Dharma perception. And when we When you take, again, a simple phrase like already connected as an antidote to the assumption we're separated. The assumption we're separated. Yeah. You're not just confronting an assumed worldview with a contrasting worldview, you're also creating new neurological pathways.

[34:29]

And this actually takes a fair amount of time. So these lists are not just lists, they're neurological pathways. So at first they're just like this thing, and then after a while they start to create pathways in you. So what I see you doing, or several of you doing, is you're actually acquainting yourself and beginning to make a shift. It simply takes some months or years even. No. In this room, we've, I don't know, have a few hundred years of shared experience.

[35:32]

That can't be duplicated. You can't go somewhere else and have that. So it's something very precious. And even if you're new, you begin to be part of something that has been developed over a long time. So let me just say just one... Let me speak about the skandhas again briefly. What I said yesterday, really. I'll try to look at it again. And then we'll have a break. Okay. So, I've been teaching the skandhas more than any other particular list since I started teaching in Europe.

[37:09]

As I said, Buddhism is nothing but lists. Yeah. The Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path, these are lists. Mm-hmm. Okay. And the five skandhas are a list. And the five skandhas assume that consciousness is a construction. And we have enough information in our living to notice that the skandhas are constructions. Yeah.

[38:12]

The example I gave, I think this is rather important, so I'm going through it again. If a cloud goes across the sun, it can change our mood. Well, that shows you that consciousness is a construct. Or, as I said, if you see a letter that reminds you of something disturbing, then you're stuck with these disturbing thoughts. So, somehow... The disturbance has changed how your mood is constructed.

[39:12]

But perhaps we treat consciousness rather as if it were like a dashboard of a car. You can turn on the radio, you can turn on the lights, and you can do various things, but you can't mess with the engine. You might see the oil is low, so you go get something to eat. But we distract ourselves to change things. We take a cold shower or we go to see a friend. It doesn't really occur to us that consciousness is a construct.

[40:25]

Or what to do about it. It's like the flower, one petal is red and the leaf is green, but one petal is white and the leaf is green, but the flower can't change the color of its petals. It just happens by dying, being older. Okay, but if you assume consciousness is a construct, This is actually a very big assumption. And one which our culture has not really come to. I mean, you can say it, but it's not meaningful. Okay, now...

[41:27]

One reason I mentioned the kind of experience we have here together is because you can read about the Eightfold Path and all this stuff. And it's intellectually interesting. But it's very different when you find yourself engaged in a sangha and over some months can begin to practice these things. The practice of these things has very little to do with the list themselves. And so as I said, the understanding of consciousness as a construct means that in how we're constructed is the path. bedeutet, dass darin, wie wir konstruiert sind, der Weg liegt.

[42:58]

We enter into our own, the path is how we function. Der Weg besteht darin, wie wir funktionieren. So one assumption again is consciousness is a construct. Also eine Annahme nochmal ist die, dass das Bewusstsein ein Konstrukt ist. Secondly, another concept is it's continuously under construction. It's one thing to see it as a construct. But it's quite an additional thing to see it's actually always under construction at each moment. It's not being constructed once a long time ago. And modified a little bit. But at each moment actually it's under construct. And that we can know the ingredients.

[44:02]

And we can know the process of the construction. And we can know the context of the construction. And then we find out that the entering into the... Okay. Then we find out it's not only a construct. And that we can participate in the construct. But that when we participate in the construct... How we participate in the construction can transform consciousness itself. And can even free us from suffering. And... Yeah. And... And knowing and participating in consciousness as a construct allows us to participate constructively, that's a kind of pun, allows us to participate constructively, positively, with others.

[45:20]

Because we participate with others in how they are also constructed. Now all that information could be in noticing that a cloud across the sun changes our mood. But you're probably not going to notice it. Because you're going to look at other reasons why. You won't know how to make, take this, oh, consciousness is a construct. This is my path. So it's our practice which allows us to understand this. And it's the teaching which allows us to see the five skandhas. the ingredients of the construction, and allows us to see that an actually submerged in consciousness, submerged underneath, like underwater, within consciousness,

[47:03]

are other kinds of consciousnesses of knowing which have power independent of the overall consciousness. In other words, your consciousness is constructed this way. just living here and wherever you live in Germany and Europe but it takes practice and teachings before we realize that consciousness itself is our path practice to realize that consciousness itself is our path Okay, so let's have a break. And after the break, let's have small groups.

[48:04]

And maybe talk about, not the five, no, the five skandhas perhaps. From the point of view of noticing that we can look at the ingredients of how we put together our knowing. So essentially, when I've been teaching the five skandhas over the years, I've been teaching you the Abhidharma. Even though the skandhas predate the Abhidharma, they're one of the seeds that developed into the Abhidharma. Okay.

[48:59]

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