And above all, is not to fear, not to fear at all. And above all, is not to fear at all. All the world is just a narrow bridge Just a narrow bridge Just a narrow bridge All the world is just a narrow bridge Just a narrow bridge And above all, and above all is not to fear, not to fear at all.

[01:05]

And above all, and above all is not to fear at all. Okay, we should probably start to wrap up because there's an early Zazen, so... And I'm sure some of you want to get up early in the morning and... Just stay here, all right? We'll just be here in the morning. This is a song from the Psalms.

[02:11]

It's a melody that I put to it. A song from the Psalms. And I have this melody composed. And the words are, protect me, God, for I take shelter in you. It's a very nice sort of mantra for feeling God's surrounding embrace. It's a very nice mantra for feeling God's surrounding embrace. Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God

[03:41]

For I take refuge in you. I take refuge in you. I take refuge in you. Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God. Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me God For I take refuge in you I take refuge in you I take refuge in you Shamreini, Shamreini, Shamreini Kale

[05:06]

Shamreni Shamreni Shamreni Shamrenike Shamreni Shamreni Shamreni Shamrenike Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me God

[06:20]

For I take refuge in You I take refuge in You I take refuge in You Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God Protect me, protect me, protect me, protect me, God For I take refuge in you I take refuge in you I take refuge in you This is a niggun from Rabbi Shlomo Karlebach

[07:58]

do [...] da [...]

[09:52]

do [...] Do do [...] it

[11:06]

do [...] Do, do, [...] do. Do, do, [...] do. Do, do, [...] do. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da

[12:49]

oh Hey. oh

[14:40]

Hey! Hi-yah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah. do it Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

[15:56]

do it From the depths of my heart. Aus dem tiefen meiner Herze. Danke vielmals. How many non-German speakers are there?

[17:28]

Baker Roshi asked me to tell you a little bit more about practice this morning, particularly the breath. And I thought I should do this before our sitting so then you can practice that during the sitting. And Baker Roshi yesterday and the day before spoke very thoroughly about the fact that body and spirit and cannot exist without each other, but that the real connection of both is a process that we learn and that we process through our spiritual practice. Pekka Roshi mentioned yesterday and the day before that although body and mind don't exist independent of each other, that the actual act of really integrating body and mind is a practice and is a skill we develop in our spiritual practice.

[18:44]

So what is the main skill or the main tool we have to bring body and mind together? The breath. And in Zen practice we say that with and through the breath we weave body and mind together. How do we do that? First of all, we begin with to take an inventory what the breath is, what the ingredients of the breath is.

[19:49]

And the ingredients are inhale, Pause. Exhale. Pause. We just start by looking at what the breath is. What parts does it consist of? What are the ingredients of the breath? And then we will see, it is inhaling. Pause. There is a fifth ingredient and that is noticing all this. And this noticing has, as everything in practice, has two aspects.

[21:17]

Mental and physical. Der mentale Aspekt ist die Intention, die wir zum Atem bringen, dass wir immer, wenn unsere Gedanken abschweifen, wir sie zum Atem zurückführen. The mental aspect of noticing our breath is that whenever our thoughts get dispersed, we get distracted, we just intend to always bring our intention back to the breath. How do we bring to our breath.

[22:27]

And intention and attention again have this weaving together of the mental and physical. And there are very subtle differences. And right there again we can practice that. What are the ways in which we can bring, through our attention, attention to the breath. Well, there are lots of ways. And in many different spiritual traditions, there is a very rich teaching about this. And you know, in Zen we are kind of simple people.

[23:40]

And we really start like kind of kids in kindergarten. We just start, for example, naming. Just the simple fact of naming the ingredients of breath is really a wonderful practice to bring consciousness to your breath. So you can start your sitting just with a period where you just go like, And as Roshi made clear to all of us, the pauses are very rich.

[25:13]

Well, that's one practice. And the second practice is not much more demanding. We simply count the breath. practice is we count when we exhale like one, breath comes back, two, and so forth and up to 10. And then we start again and It's a wonderful practice, and you will very quickly realize the practice of counting to one, as Roshi calls it often.

[26:41]

because it takes a lot of determination to actually arrive at 10. And a lot of things start happening after one. So don't worry. The more we enter sasen mind, the more difficult it gets to count to 10. Because counting is a concept. So actually we use the concept as an antidote for other concepts. So the more we enter sasen mind, the more difficult it becomes to count to 10. The third practice is you just follow the breath. Wherever the breath takes you, you go.

[28:21]

Wherever your breath goes, you follow it. You try not to think about it. You just stay in this wonderful, non-graspable feeling and just attach yourself to the subtle movement of the breath. It's a wonderful way to explore your body. And sometimes the breath will take you to places where you realize they feel kind of dull and dark. Something's happening there.

[29:22]

And you can almost bring light to that area of the body. and to the part of the body. And you will notice that the breath sometimes leads you to places of your body that are somehow dark and painful and where there are energy blockages. And you can almost use the breath as a light that heats up these places. And in the end, you can develop your own practice, how you draw attention to the place and the world. It was a certain phase in my practice where I experimented with it a little bit. Counting and naming is really just the beginning of a great diversity that is possible there.

[30:29]

We can work with colors, with sounds, with images, with each breath a different color. It's such a rich practice we can really develop our own way of bringing attention to the breath. When we learn to sit still, the recovery of the silence that gives us time, gives us space, to devote ourselves to breathing, the body and mind weave together. This is not limited to sitting. We can practice this whenever we sit at the desk, at the computer, in front of a class, in a crowd, and so on. These practices are really a bridge to our everyday life. And when we practice stillness and when we rediscover stillness in our life, it gives us a chance to really work with these practices and develop them, stabilize them, stabilize body and mind through the breath.

[31:44]

And then it's easy to take the practice out of sitting and do it wherever we are, cooking, teaching, sitting in front of the computer, being in the crowd. These practices are not limited to sitting. In the stillness of our sitting, we develop subtleness that really leads us back to these basic functions and treasures of our life. There's one last aspect I'd like to mention about the breath. These practices, how we bring attention to our breath are paralleled with some other practices that we use in order to break out of our small self.

[33:05]

These exercises with which we bring attention to our breath, they have a reverberation in other exercises with which we try to get out of our small self and to find a connection to this big self or big mind. And that is almost a therapeutic exercise. We Westerners, as we heard from three different people yesterday, we are so identified with our life story and it's such a hard job for us to let go of that. And in Buddhism, we talk about the three functions of self.

[34:10]

So that we can simply function in the world. And these three main functions are to establish continuity, Separation and connectedness. The important functions of the self are that we build up a feeling of continuity This is really what our life story does for us, to give us this feeling of continuity, that we need to know that we are also separate. You really need to know that this is my voice and not some voice you hear inside of you.

[35:18]

And of course, we all need to develop a sense of connectedness. What is very important for us is a feeling of connection with other people, with the world, with the plants, with the minerals. So back to my question, how are these functions paralleled with our breathing practices? Can you guess? When we name the breath, we practice continuity. When we practice counting the breath, we practice separation.

[36:27]

Because counting is little units. When we count the breath, then we take contact with this being separated. And last, we just follow, we connect it. If we just follow, then we are connected. So no matter how simple these practices sound, feel and are, they stretch into this vast field of weaving body and mind together, establishing ourselves in the world in our practice and leading us to this larger identity.

[37:34]

A wonderful student of B. K. Roshi is Isan Dorsey. He set up the Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco and a hospice for people with AIDS. He died from AIDS himself a few years ago. It was a great grief for all of us. One disciple of Baker Roshi, Issan Dorsey, he established the Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco and also built up a clinic, a hospice for people with AIDS, and he died, unfortunately, of AIDS himself.

[38:46]

Really radiant person, full of energy, life, and such a wonderful role model for all of us. He always had the gift of referring to the simplicity of practice. And he said to Roshi at some point, finally I have discovered the breathing body and you have been telling me that for 20 years. Why did it take me so long? And at some point he said to Bakeroshi, finally I discovered the breath body. And it took me 20 years. Since 20 years you keep telling me to pay attention to my breath. Why did it take me so long? So we all need our time. And we have a lot of time, especially when we sit still. I think we all need time and we have time actually, particularly when we sit still.

[39:56]

So let's sit together. Just leave yourself alone.

[41:04]

the body, the mind, and even the breath. Whenever some distractions come in, just return to the breath. Don't invite them to tea. And whenever distractions are there, just return to your breath. Don't invite them to tea. There's nothing to do and nowhere to go.

[42:30]

Just arriving. weaving mind and body together again and again and again.

[44:48]

Immer wieder Körper und Geist zusammenweben.

[44:57]

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