And the two people who, two of the people, Eric and Christina Griesler, who often translate for me, are coming up. tomorrow. From Lien. And with their two little children, so they'll take turns probably, we'll see. But since he has no kinder yet, I hope we ask him to. If he's I asked him if he would translate for me this evening. And you chose this title, The Golden Wind. Oh, okay.

[01:04]

Why did you choose it? Why do you like the phrase? You have some feeling for it that you like or something like that? Trouble with, you know, I like the phrase too, of course. And the trouble with, well, first, let's not start with the trouble. The beauty of these phrases from their typical Zen practice is they stick in you or you have some feeling for them. And that's really their point, that they...

[02:06]

stick in you. But they also, and they come to make sense, and they come to make sense as you turn them in you. And they come to make sense as you see them in the context of the koan. In the context of the teaching of the koan. But for people who aren't professionals and Buddhists it's a little complicated. Because even for the professionals it's not so easy. Because these koans are vehicles for the most subtle and profound teachings I know of in the world.

[03:22]

But part of the genius, perhaps, of Zen is that they take these practices and kind of find a surface that pokes up, that touches you. So you really don't have to know so much about the background of these teaching stories. The most important thing is to feel it catch you. And let the hook work its way into you. Now this is a This phrase is from a koan, 27, I think, in the Blue Cliff Records.

[04:51]

And a monk, you know, there's always a monk who asks these questions. Nowadays it would be adept layperson so-and-so asked because the revolution that's going on in Buddhism right now is a revolution for lay practice and in particular for women practicing. So the adept lay person asks, Also dieser Adepte fragt also, Wie ist es eigentlich, wenn der Baum verwittert und die Blätter fallen?

[05:53]

And Yan Men, who's very famous, one of the most famous Zen masters, said, answering, body exposed in the golden wind. So I'll tell you something tomorrow about Yan Men. He's quite an interesting fellow. There's another koan of Yan Men I'll give you right now. I'll just tell you the story at least. Again, another adept lay person asks, what is the pure body of reality? What is the pure body of reality? And the young man said, a flowering hedge.

[07:22]

And the monk, this was quite, I mean, the adept layperson, he was quite a sharp guy. Mm-hmm. And he said, how is it when one goes on this way? Now that's a funny thing if somebody says a flowering hedge and you say, how is it when one goes on this way? He said, a young man said, a golden haired lion. Now, these aren't stories like, you know, these aren't symbols of something.

[08:29]

Say you have a little kid. And you're a poet. And you say something like, this afternoon the sun is so hot and my child is playing here and there in the grass. Yeah, it's... We wouldn't look at the poem and say, ah, yes, the child is there as a symbol of his fertility. The child is there because he's enjoying seeing his child and he feels identified with his child. And in Western... Teaching stories, often the various elements are symbols of something.

[09:31]

And in Buddhism and in Chinese culture... It's very little like that. You enjoy seeing your child playing. In a similar way, you enjoy looking at the flowering hedge. And it's much more that everything is seen as an inside. So I could give you that as the first practice of the evening. To see everything as an inside. Not that there's this and you're out there. No, you're in there. Yes. We have to start with these kind of wisdom practices if we're going to get our way into Buddhist practice.

[10:46]

It helps to sit zazen, of course, and practice mindfulness. But Zen is a shortcut practice because of its use of wisdom phrases to cut through our habitual thinking. So these stories are exposed in the golden wind. Are phrases you put into the... the soup of your day. That you mix into your daily soup.

[11:49]

Along with the onions and carrots. There's a flowering hedge over there. And down at the bottom, a golden-haired lion. And on the spoon, it says, there's a little title that says, golden wind. Yeah. Well, you have to work with these phrases. It's not really about thinking. It's about stirring them into your life somehow. Sukhira, she always spoke about our innermost request

[13:14]

He was, as most of you would know, was my teacher. And there's a new book out, a biography of Sukhiroshi called Crooked Cucumber. Yeah, pretty funny. But that's what his teacher used to call him. Did you read it or look at it? Yes. So if you like to read English, in English, it's so far only out in English. And a friend of mine, David Chadwick, wrote it, and he created quite a good feeling, extraordinary feeling for this ordinary and extraordinary man. And you could look at his life And see that he himself was asking himself, what is my innermost, what is my inner request?

[14:32]

And if you open yourself to this question, really, what is my inner request? How do I want my life to be? How do I want to look back on my life when it's over? To really... To ask yourself this question is also to expose yourself in the golden wind. You know, I can remember once I worked for the University of California for quite a number of years in the sixties. I think some of you think the First World War occurred in the 60s. Or the Second World War.

[15:45]

No, no. I'm feeling old today, I guess. Anyway, I was... For some reason, I had to go to a meeting or something, and I was... driving somewhere in the afternoon. And I remember, I mean, when I looked at this koan, one of these real fast images floated into my head. And when you practice mindfulness over years, you're exercising the muscle of attention. And as you can find yourself attentive in each moment, and another practice I can give you this evening,

[17:06]

is to bring your attention equally to each moment. To bring your attention and your energy equally to each moment. It's not so much the... Attention is equally as important. If you really want to have a sense of freeing yourself from your habitual self, You have to free yourself or redirect. Generally our energy flows into the products of self. By just trying to bring your attention equally to each moment, you begin to widen the boundaries of knowing.

[18:21]

You know the word maya in... Hinduism and Buddhism. Means illusion and delusion. And the real illusion or delusion, the real delusion is to see this illusion as real. Or rather as the only reality. Because this is real. It's just... Anyway, yeah. I don't want to get deep water here. And the word Maya comes from, is related to the word to measure or meter and so forth.

[19:33]

And Alan Watts years ago spoke about how Maya means to put everything in a frame. And that's a good image to try to measure everything. So when you do a simple thing again like bringing your attention and energy together Equally to each moment. Whatever arises in your senses each moment. This simple thing radically changes the dynamics of how you are. This simple thing It changes the surfaces in which you find your living.

[20:51]

I don't remember whether it was Thoreau or Emerson. Yeah, the New England transcendentalists. One of them on his, I think it was Emerson, wrote on the frame around his door, outside door. He wrote the word whim. I don't know if you know the word. Does anybody know the word whim? Yes. No. Wim? Wim, no. To do something on a whim, on the... No, accidentally? It's kind of like to do something spontaneously just because you thought about it.

[21:54]

Why did you go to the movies? Why did you go to the movies this afternoon? I don't know, it was a whim. So this is interesting, the most influential of American philosophers emphasizing whims. I mean, what Emerson and Thoreau and others did at that time is, you know, they were... deeply familiar with European philosophy. But they thought European philosophy was kind of trapped in its own history.

[22:55]

So they thought, here we are in this new country, we've got to rethink everything. So how do you really, how do you rethink everything? And this is very much like Zen practice. To rethink your life. And this kind of meditation posture is to give you the strength and stability to rethink your life. And they thought we should pay attention to our whims. Not our inspiration. That's kind of serious. Oh, yeah. Just our whims.

[23:56]

So... You know, again, if you practice mindfulness regularly, you know how an insect, when it flies through the air, it's very hard to see its path. But if it lands on water, you immediately see its tracks. And as you Get in the habit of mindfulness.

[24:59]

The mind becomes more like water. And thoughts and images are slowed down and you see their tracks. I'm saying these things just to give you a feel for practice, for ways to look at it. So when I first looked at this koan, the flowering hedge, this nondescript, nondescript, there was nothing interesting about it, nothing distinguished, just nondescript means an ordinary, boring, So here's this nondescript intersection in a kind of poor neighborhood in Berkeley, here in my mind.

[26:05]

A nondescript intersection where two roads meet. Yeah, one of those guys. In a poor neighborhood in Berkeley. This is good, we're working together here. Yeah, it's fun. See, if you hear it from him and you hear it from me, you know the truth is neither. It's something that has to happen in you. And not in the language. Sorry, but I'm... Looked at this koan the other day, the flowering hedge. What is the pure body of reality?

[27:08]

Now, what a question this is. Can you imagine going up to your aunt or uncle and saying, Auntie, what is the pure body of reality? Oh... Or someone asks you, what do you do? Why are you practicing Zen? Oh, I'm trying to discover the pure body of reality. Yeah, I thought you were that kind of person. But it is an extraordinary question, what is the pure body of reality? I mean, I hear the pure body of reality. So you can ask yourself, what is reality? It's not very tangible that way.

[28:31]

But to ask, what is the pure body of reality? Or if you can feel your way into this more. So I happened to look at this koan. Also, ich guckte mir dieses koan an. And young man saying, flowering hedge. And the adept woman, what is it to go on in this way? What is it to go on in this way? Yeah. So for some reason, this nondescript Berkeley intersection appeared momentarily. So I thought, hey, come back here. Why did you appear? So I opened up this flicker of an image. And I found myself in a car at this intersection.

[29:45]

And I remember now I had to turn left to go back to work. And I remember I had a thought at that moment. The quality of this ordinary afternoon is more important than anything I might do at work. And I remember also thinking, and the people I spend my time with is more important than anything else I might do. So I felt that. I could feel that. And I turned left to go back toward my office.

[31:06]

And in some funny way, I left my office behind. Because I was able, I remember at that time, to recognize so fully, yes, this just ordinary, this ordinary afternoon. is the most important thing to me. So I turned left also into the life I have now. Now, I'm not recommending you all after the seminar go quit your job. Because you want to lie in the sun, you know, near Kinsey. But I do suggest you feel your way into what is important to you. And how much baggage you need to put down to even ask yourself the question.

[32:24]

So I went back to work. I worked there for, I don't know, another couple of years. Stuff like that. But somehow this moment there, that intersection, we say in Zen... Yeah. When you come to a crossroads, when you come to an intersection, take it. So anyway, I took it.

[33:24]

And it added to my intention to practice. And definitely contributed to my being here now this evening with you. Oh, I'd like to give you... Well, I just gave you another practice to ask yourself, find a way to ask yourself... be open to the consequences of asking yourself, what is my innermost request?

[34:37]

What is my innermost request? Now, I've given you several practices, suggested several practices this evening. You can try all of them if you want. Or you can just trust your basic intelligence. To let something choose for you. So maybe you can come away from this evening saying, well, I'd like to do one of these practices.

[35:41]

And just whatever one occurs to you, try it. Whatever your whim is. Everything is inside. Everything is inside. Now, this was all to say I'd like to give you one more before the evening is over. I mean, obviously, you know, Buddhism talks a lot about freeing yourself from a sense of a permanent self. And intellectually or philosophically, this is fairly easy to understand. The fullness of your life is not contained in this thing we call self. Self is a way of functioning. A necessary way of functioning.

[37:01]

But it's not the whole of our living. But even if you know this, still we have a subtle sense of the permanence of self. So, I mean, for example, those of you who meditate, practice meditation, you try to, usually the beginning and... Forever instructions are to bring your attention to your breath. To your breath and to your body and to just what you're doing. Once your attention keeps going back to your thinking.

[38:03]

Yeah. Why? Well, maybe our thinking is really interesting. And sometimes it's not so interesting. And sometimes you really would like this kind of sunbathing, just resting in your breath. But our attention goes back to our thinking. And I think the fundamental reason is because we think our thinking is us. We identify with our thinking as us.

[39:07]

And that means you believe the self is permanent. Every time your thinking, your attention returns to your thinking, It means you have a feeling that the self is where I'm seeking continuity and permanence. Seeking continuity and eternity. This is very, very difficult to free yourself. And the practices of mindfulness, of breath and body and phenomena is to try to shift your sense of continuity to the body, breath, and phenomena.

[40:20]

When I look at you, I see the continuity of your body. And I've known Martin a long time. And I've known Gisela even longer. And I've known Gisela even longer. He didn't want to think I'd known anybody longer than him. And I see the continuity of their body. Mm-hmm. But I think Martin probably perceives the continuity of his thinking far more than I notice, of course. His identification with his thinking. And so... The practice is to try to shift your continuity and sense of eternity out of your thinking.

[41:32]

To shift your sense of continuity. To shift your sense of continuity. Out of your thinking. To your body. Yeah. Anyway, this is difficult to do. So one practice is to notice in each moment. And this is like noticing everything is an inside. To notice the ways in which you abide in, the distinction between self and other. Create the distinction between self and other.

[42:41]

For example, what is your name? Simone. Okay. So Simone and I may have a conversation. And I think, well, this is Simone. And you're telling me something. And I'm thinking, well, I do agree or I don't agree or something. When I'm doing that, I'm creating a distinction between self myself and you. And if you're talking to somebody who you really are bored with or you don't agree with you really have a sense of yourself and this other person. So in each and If you notice this habit we have,

[43:52]

In each encounter, we generate a sense of self. There's a general sense of self. But in each encounter, we generate a sense of self. Which is different on each encounter. If you know someone well, it's less. If you're in love with someone, it's much less. Hopefully, it's much less. Hopefully. And this of course reinforces the general sense of self.

[44:58]

But you can't practice very easily with the general sense of self. But you can practice with this moment by moment generation of a sense of self. So you can create one of these wisdom phrases. No self, let's just make it simple. No self, no other. So while I'm talking to you, And I have these frames and measures of, you know. And I say to myself, while I'm talking to you in the background, myself. No other. And you suddenly may find yourself exposed in the golden wind. Exposed in non-dualism.

[46:01]

It may be a moment, and then you go back to... Because it's scary. And then you go back to the self and other. So Youngman meant when he said a flowering hedge. It's that time when you see something and there doesn't seem to be any outside. Like sometimes in meditation you hear the birds or whatever it is within your own hearing. The birds make you hear your own hearing. Hearing your own mind. The sense of a permanent self. In each encounter with someone, you can have this feeling, no self, no other.

[47:35]

And feel so much drop away. And you can notice also just how much you create this sense of self and other. So what I'm trying to do here is, so these koans are... are... are... distillations of the whole of Zen practice. Here we are together till Sunday afternoon. We have to start from where we can. We have to start from where we are.

[48:36]

Where we could be. Knowing our innermost requests. Or noticing how much we create this distinction between self and other. And sometimes having the confidence to Dissolve it a little. With a simple wisdom phrase. Like, no self, no other. Thank you for translating so well. Great, thank you. Can we sit for a moment or two? Oh, I have a bell, but I didn't bring it, but I have it in my room.

[50:03]

Bing. Usually I ring the bell three times to start and once to finish, so... Bing. Bing. Bing. I said it would only be a moment. Good morning.

[51:17]

Okay. Martin has transformed herself. Okay. And this is Christina Griesler. And she has a baby. How old now? Five and a half months. Five and a half months. So we have to take a nursing break as well. I mean, you can just have coffee. So when we first start to practice and when we're first developing our sense of a way we're actually very receptive to to the teaching.

[52:42]

And small changes seem to force their way into our consciousness. with more power than they do when our practice is more developed. This is actually a challenge for those who are committed to practice for a long time. Because you go through a long, dull, kind of boring period. So it's good to, I think, when we're all, you know, Beginners of some sort, most of us.

[54:08]

Beginners is the first few years. Particularly as a lay person, because your practice develops more slowly than if you do it full time. it's a good time to bring in a phrase like this, the golden wind. And it's a challenge for me to figure out how to do it. And I like the challenge because I believe in your practice. But exactly how to make a phrase like this make sense. First of all, its power is partly that it doesn't make sense. Because it's speaking of and from the wisdom body.

[55:25]

If it made sense, it just falls into our usual conceptual way of thinking. So strangely, these phrases in Chinese and Japanese and English and German, they retain a power. They retain a power. It ain't a power because they don't quite make sense in any of the languages. So why would you play with the phrase the tongue? Doesn't make sense.

[56:36]

I think for two, two or at least two reasons. One is there's some wisdom, intuition or something. Yeah, it makes some kind of sense, you feel. And I think that is good if it's accompanied by a faith that, what can I say, a faith in the wisdom body. So how do you get this faith? Again, it's a kind of intuition. But it also can be touched, exposed by this desire to know what you really, your inner request. Or when you really try to satisfy yourself.

[57:52]

with three advanced academic degrees and a small electronic firm going public and you have most of everything everyone wants. Or things they want. Yet still there's some gap. The more you feel or see this gap, and yet we're alive, and yet we are alive, And there must be some way we can have some faith to fill this gap. Mountains seem to be quite happy and unambivalent.

[59:20]

Dogs are quite happy. They seem to be quite happy unless you beat them up too much. If dogs and mountains can be happy, why not us? I know that's not very convincing. But somehow, to me, it's been convincing. Okay, so to talk about something like this, we have to have an experiential basis. I don't think this will make sense unless we have an experiential basis.

[60:23]

And of course the main experiential base is the practice of meditation. The regular practice of meditation. And the regular practice of mindfulness. But we have a third, not a substitute, but a shortcut. Which is again to work with a wisdom phrase. So I would like to go back to my old saw. Do you know what an old saw is? That's something you've said so often it's become a cliché. Maybe an old saw is like a saw that doesn't cut anymore.

[61:24]

So my old saw that space connects. Mm-hmm. By the way, speaking about space connecting tomorrow or after the break, it'd be nice if you sat a little closer, so we had less space separating. Now, so what I'd like to do is to take this... Space connects. And speak about it as a practice. And then I would like to open up this phrase as much as I can.

[62:24]

And this experience as a practice and activity. as a practice and activity, and as a power. Now, all of the things I said last night, dropping the inside-outside distinction, noticing how much you create the self-other distinction, All these are related to this sense of space connecting. And this seems to me this morning the best way to work come into this being exposed in the golden wind.

[63:48]

Because it's a wonderful experience and courage if you can do it. Perhaps it's the main courage. courage as a challenge and courage as a way to come into our own power. And then I would like to go back and forth with you, is some discussion. Because I can find out better how to proceed.

[64:52]

If you're actively involved in sharing your own feelings about this. Your own feelings and understandings. Because really to do something this subtle, we need the power of all of us here in this room. Yeah. Because if space connects, so does mind connect. And one of the reasons we constantly create the self-other distinction is because others' minds drag us down.

[65:52]

But others' minds can lift us up too. The Bodhisattva is simply one who's discovered mind-lifting. Lifting one's own and lifting others' minds. Okay, so let's go back to this old assault. You, sorry, but coming back to this, but you're there and I'm here, right? And we commonly think space separates. But this is a cultural idea. We just take for granted that space separates us.

[67:07]

In fact, you know space connects us. Otherwise it wouldn't make sense. All of the women here, and to a lesser degree the men, have their periods with the moon. The men? Yeah, to a lesser degree. She doesn't believe this shit. That's interesting. I think if a man is sensitive, he sees that he has a monthly rhythm, like a woman, but it's not as obviously manifested. And none of us have ropes attached to the moon, so something is connecting us. So somehow you need to come into a faith that we are connected. In fact, we usually know almost a very large amount about each other instantly.

[68:23]

and we access this knowledge intuitively but we don't access it consciously so I'm sorry to take away your privacy But maybe it's something wonderful to realize everyone knows pretty much everything. As we always say in Zen, nothing is hidden. There's another phrase I like, the bent mind. Something that's bent. The bent does not hide the straight. So you need to come into this experientially Since the problem in knowing that space connects is that our conceptual basis is that space separates.

[69:47]

So we have to have an antidote to the conceptual basis. And since we have a habit of establishing space as separating because it protects us we have to come into some kind of confidence and mental stability that allows us to experience this connectedness. So I suggest you just take the phrase, space connects, and repeat it to yourself. Yeah. As much as you can.

[71:01]

All day long. As you're walking around. As we're sitting here just now. Because normally, as soon as thought arises, immediately, the idea that space separates is already there. So this view that space separates is there before thought arises. So it immediately organizes your perceptions to reinforce this. So your perceptions confirm that space separates. But the reason they confirm it is because this view is like the sheepherder and it's organized all the perceptions.

[72:07]

And if you try to undo this habit or counteract this habit like with a simple repetition to yourself of space connects every now and then and more and more you'll have little flashes of space connecting. For example, I remember when it first began to happen to me, I felt like I was in an aquarium. You know how fish swim by, something in the seaweed goes, and you know. And I suddenly felt like I was in some kind of liquid and everything, we were all weaving back and forth together.

[73:15]

And sometimes I was outside the aquarium looking in and thinking, this is pretty fishy. Sometimes I was in and it was the biggest ocean imaginable. And this also gave me the feeling that mind is like a liquid. Hmm. So what I want to do is give us the possibility of an experiential basis for this phrase, the golden wind.

[74:18]

So that we can do this together. And we can join our mutual sensitivity and realizations. I ask that you put this possibility of space connecting in the back of your mind. Just ask yourself to keep noticing it. Keep reminding yourself of the possibility. Because even after the first intimations, And even continuous awareness, the depth of this practice has no end.

[75:23]

And we can say all of Buddhist teaching is rooted in this experience. So now I'd like to have an alternative with something from you. How does this make sense to you, or what do you think? Do you have any questions? The first person is always the best person. This is a manipulative statement.

[76:24]

The first person is the last person. If you could complete this practice that space connects, this would mean the end of violence, isn't it? End of violence? That's a good way to motivate yourself. If everybody had that experience, yes. Or let's hope that would be the case. It's pretty hard to be violent or attack something if we realize how connected we are.

[77:28]

I have a big problem with this feeling of connectedness, especially in negative experiences. Is it something you can speak about, your negative experiences? For example, at work there are very positive and loving contacts, but also exactly the opposite. And my problem is to cope with these differences. Because there is not a separation in the space.

[79:20]

That's work. You mean the physical space or the mental space? I also feel very vulnerable. Okay. Okay. This is the view of our culture and the habit of our culture. And I'm not saying that some other societal culture is better. Okay, so we're talking about introducing a wisdom culture into a societal culture. Does that make sense as a distinction? Okay. So you're living with people who have a habit of separating themselves and often trying to, there's power relationships and competition and everything.

[80:38]

And there's simple dislike and like. And stupidity. Ambition. This is the territory in which we live. So it doesn't mean when you experience connectedness you stop experiencing separation. Or stop experiencing and acting on the level of separation. Yeah, so as you come into this way of being, You can allow yourself to experience the connectedness while you function through separation.

[81:52]

And if you do that, it actually makes the other person who is perhaps in the midst of attacking you Quite difficult to... It changes the way they relate to you negatively. Mm-hmm. And even if someone's attacking you, if they're attacking you like on the street or something, unless they're on some kind of substance, if as you defend yourself, you have an experience of still being connected with them, I remember a story, it changes the situation. The woman who's presently abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center, we don't

[82:57]

In English we don't say abbess and abbot much anymore, like we don't say actor and actress, we just say actor. Yeah. She was quite a leftist, communist type, youngish person. So back in the 60s when the... She's now 74 or something like that, but back in the 60s. And I think the daughter of a physics professor at Berkeley. She was involved in the... She was an older person but involved in the student revolution.

[84:14]

She was asked to go to San Francisco State College to stand between the students and the police. And So here she was with her husband, I believe, and some other people. And the students behind and the police over there. Some sort of bullhorns, you know bullhorn? Megaphone. Bullhorn said, you have five minutes to disperse. But after about 30 seconds, the police started charging. They didn't wait five minutes. Charging. So they were coming with their sticks and all that stuff.

[85:16]

And she suddenly found herself in the middle, right? That's where she put herself. and she was quite frightened and suddenly there was a policeman right in front of her and his face is right like that in front of her and she looked in his eyes and he was equally frightened so the two of them just looked at each other like that and then they couldn't do anything because they just looked into each other's eyes So after this experience, She sought for the next, I don't know how long, a couple of years, this experience again that she had looking in this policeman's eyes.

[86:17]

She never found it again until she met Suzuki Roshi. She looked in his eyes and felt the same connectedness she'd felt with the policeman. So out of this experience, she started practicing then and practicing with him and is now the Abbot of the Zen Center. Were you there when she came to visit? You'd left? Because she came to, she and Norman Fisher, the other abbot, both came to Crestone for three days, the end of April. And also, coming back to your question, because it's so central to what we're talking about,

[87:25]

I think we also need to know how to seal ourselves but not armor ourselves. And that's a kind of, this practice I suggest to you, which I've been mentioning a lot recently, To bring your attention equally and energy equally to each moment as it arises. and even have the feeling of completing each moment as it arises this is a practice which seals you but doesn't armor you so you feel complete at each moment it's very hard for someone to disturb that Something else?

[88:29]

Yes. If space collects, will space, then and once, shrink or rise? It can stay just as it is. But it becomes a kind of gummy or elastic feeling. And you feel it's a kind of, you can move closer, you can move it. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yes, when we hear and feel connectedness in a psychological or emotional framework, it has this kind of special emotional flavor, like closeness, like friendliness,

[89:49]

Intimacy. I have the feeling that my fitness in practice has a different flavor. It's not, what I'll say, has this emotional or psychological baggage with it. When we talk about such goodness, then it is always emotionally and psychologically also related, it has to do with closeness, with friendship, friendship, maybe even intimacy. And I ask myself whether in the practice the connection is understood in such a way that it can carry this emotion. Yeah, we get into Buddhist molasses here. You know, we pick up this and it sticks to that.

[90:55]

Yeah. Well, I think that the word intimacy is good. So I would say that responding to what you suggested that this fundamental connectedness you can experience through practice through realization or the taste of realization has the qualities of intimacy but also the qualities of detachment.

[91:55]

Detachment. Germans are never detached? You don't have a word for it? Oh, in Austria you don't have a word for it. Well, non-attachment is not really the translation of detachment. Yeah. You have a word, non-attachment? Yeah, he suggested non-attachment. Yeah. But it sounds like a Buddhist word. Yeah, it is. So, but when you're attached to somebody, how do you say, I feel detached? Attached. Abhängig. Abhängig, oder? Dependent. Dependent? Yeah. Attached means dependent for me, at least. Because detached in English has a somewhat negative.

[93:21]

I feel detached from all that. You know, it can be negative. Yeah. Okay, anyway, there's a quality of feeling of detachment and non-attachment. Because as long as you have preferences, the kind of preferences associated with an emotional baggage, shall we say, as you put it, then you don't have this sense of space connecting. You have a sense of connectedness with you or with you or any of you, but you don't have a general sense of everything's connected.

[94:27]

But when you do have this more detached in a positive sense sense of connectedness and you don't have preferences you don't care much how the other person feels Or you're not trying to control or have preferences about how they feel. Then you're much more open to the emotions. emotions of the other person. And your own emotions. So there's an emotional intimacy, but it's not, I think, what you were speaking of.

[95:29]

Maybe we should have a break soon, but anybody else want to say something? You know, this being connected, just I'm just saying, hmm, and, and, and I started to extend our directions, and I found, hmm, I can be, be more, really me, or myself, just, and at that, just everything connected, and everything is really here, much more. And, um,

[96:07]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_72.04