We could say that practice means recognizing that a difference in emphasis is a big difference. This morning, Julio asked, said to me that practice fades easily, or the more discriminating pole of mind takes over after a while. And I teased him and said that we have a room waiting for him at Crestone so that he can have more bio-entrainment.

[01:02]

But he'd rather have his bio-entrainment closer to home and he hopes, I think, that we get Johannes off. And it is true, I think, that it makes a difference if you can, even if you can't go to Crestone or if we have, if we did buy Johanneshof to Johanneshof, to know that some people are there continuing and it's available to you. It's accessible food. It's not Himalayan ferns that you can only buy in China. Yes, because it's important that food be accessible unless you want to starve to death. So anyway, Julio and others have spoken to me and suggested we have a meeting about Johanneshoff because we have to make a decision in the next two or three days whether we're going to do this or not.

[02:33]

We said we'd make a decision in three weeks and three weeks are up in a few days, I think. And if I'm going to join one of the meetings perhaps to make the decision with them at Ruta, I'll have to postpone my flight. I'm supposed to fly back to the United States on Tuesday. Anyway, the responses to the letter we sent out have been going to Beate's house here in Munster, and she'll be here this evening.

[03:40]

So it's been suggested we have a meeting at 8 o'clock tonight for anybody who wants to discuss whether we should buy this place in the Black Forest. First, whether we should. Second, whether we can. Third, If we do, how will that affect our relationship to Crestone? How will that change or affect our schedule here in Europe and so forth? And wonderful Frank Wesendahl, head of the house Distiller with his wife Angelica, pleaded with us the other day

[04:44]

To not abandon the house to still us for a place to do Sashits. 97, yeah. And partly he pleaded out of attachment and partly he pleaded because it follows up his schedule. I hope it's mostly attachment because I'm very attached to him. So is that all right? Shall we do something at 8 o'clock tonight? Anybody want to? Okay. And then if you need to, we could talk at lunch tomorrow or something like that.

[06:13]

Anyway, okay. You know, having just finished a practice period at Crestone, I would really like to have this kind of practice with you in Europe. So anyway, if we can, let's talk about it. Now this morning I tried to refine gold that's already been refined a hundred times. Which is, as you know, a statement from the koan about what real teaching should be like. And the most I'd like to think it'd be a great thing if I could just establish in you the fact of unstructured mind.

[07:24]

If not the fact, at least the belief in you or the faith in you that this is possible. For Zen emphasizes, while it's very nice to get rid of the obstructions to mind, these obstructions to realization, the most powerful way to do it is not to restructure the structure of the mind, To make it more harmonious or less obstructed. Or as Julio said, even your body and personality feels more in balance when practice is going well. So we do try to balance things and work with the structure of the mind.

[08:39]

But the big emphasis in Zen is on realizing, first of all, believing in the possibility of unstructured mind. And from the unstructured mind, it is much easier to restructure mind. Now, what was your question again, Ulrike? How to realize intention in a non-object-bearing mind or unstructured mind.

[09:49]

Yeah, we talked about a non-object-bearing continuum. Continuum, yeah. How to realize intention. Yeah, because for me, intention starts on a pretty conceptual level, and I have to carry it on a conceptual level and deepen it. And then eventually it may change the direction. Okay, do you want to say that? Since you know how to translate, would you? An important point with intention is that it starts for me on a conceptual or mental level. And I try to deepen this level. And at some point I hope that the direction changes or that it becomes a direction. And that the difficulty is to get from the conceptual to this current. And that was actually my question, how I can work with intention. During lunch, I sat with a number of people and it came up why I don't, wouldn't it be useful for me to have an assistant in working.

[10:57]

And, you know, I was my usual incoherent self when it comes to that. But the root of the difficulty I've had with this over the years is practicing with people the shift from a movement, a direction toward unstructured mind to a direction toward structured mind is actually quite difficult until you're fairly experienced. You mean the direction from structured mind to unstructured? The direction of the mind toward unstructured or the direction of the mind toward structured. And when I practice with someone, we are so intimately involved in the taste of this unstructured mind, it's very difficult to change the taste.

[12:12]

And that's one of the reasons why lay practice is so much more difficult than monk's practice. And why we in the West have such a challenge to establish real, adept lay practice, lineage-based lay practice. I believe it can be done. And I'm more than happy to die trying. In other words, I've committed my life to this. And you are teaching me all the time. But I do think we need things like Sashin sometimes and maybe three-month practice periods or at least some kind of way we can interweave lay life with practice life.

[13:35]

Until we can, as Bajang says, turn things around freely in ourselves. Okay. so Ulrike's question is unstructured mind has to start with an intention and an intention is a conception and that's a version of your question and several of the questions we had actually are versions of that I think So we have to use the mind to change the mind.

[14:36]

We have to use the processes of mind that come naturally to change the direction, to turn the mind around. Okay, now, one way is realizing, as I said this morning, when your body disappears in zazen, it's not your body that's disappeared, but the object-bearing continuum that carries the object, the mind, the body as an object. Now another way is to use perception itself. And that's the teaching of the five dharmas.

[16:02]

Which is, we could call a bridge between the two truths. The two truths would be like we have the wave again, which is and we have the dynamic stillness which is drawing the wave back to quietness. Now the two truths are not sequential stillness, that sometimes you're still and sometimes you're busy. But the two truths are simultaneous stillness and activity. We can call this simultaneous stillness dynamic stillness. that the mind is like a wave always trying to return to stillness, particularly when you don't identify with your thoughts.

[17:22]

So to realize the simultaneity of activity and stillness, or form and emptiness, It's what Buddhism means by the two truths. Now, what would be a bridge between the two truths? And the Lankavatara Sutra presents these as what they call the five dharmas. Okay. Are you ready? Let's go. All right. So I hold this bell up. And you see something here. I have a wonderful cactus in my room.

[18:27]

I meant to bring it, but I forgot. Very fuzzy and pretty and string-shaped. So this is easier to hold up. I can't wring it. But anyway, you see this, right? I think you do. Yeah, it has a smell, too. Okay. What you first of all see is an appearance. So the first of the five dharmas are appearance. Okay, but very quickly you give this a name. And what are its names?

[19:29]

One name is, what kind of flower is this? Chrysanthemum. Chrysanthemum, daisy chrysanthemum, I think it's called. Looks like a daisy, but it's really a chrysanthemum, I think. Okay, so you may call it a flower. You might call it a plant. Or a daisy chrysanthemum. Or you might call it that thing that guy's got in his hand. There's all kinds of possible names. But whatever we do, we tend to name it something. You must admit that's our tendency. And like me, if you don't know the name of it, you ask somebody, what the heck is the name of this thing? And even I had a little ego invested in it, because I should be smart enough to know the name of a flower.

[20:38]

So I feel mildly inferior if I don't know the name of a flower. Yeah, so this invests a certain energy in the naming process. Yeah, yeah. And so first it's just an appearance. And then I name it. And then I begin discriminating about it. Naming is the second dharma. And discriminating about it is the third dharma. It's a pretty flower. It needs to be put back in the water, poor baby. Or we have various discriminations. We've never liked this kind of flower.

[21:54]

Or whatever. We start a whole process of discrimination about it, right? So that process of discriminating about it, separating it, putting it into sentences, is the third dharma. Now the fourth dharma is right knowledge. Now right knowledge means everything we've been talking about. Right knowledge means the other of the two truths. And right knowledge, let's at least say, right knowledge means specifically the recognition that this flower is an appearance in your own mind.

[23:07]

We can say it's a recognition of the food of the meeting of the three. And your sense organs, you're apprehending me lifting it up. You're visually apprehending the flower. You might be able to smell it, I don't know. And from these various sense organs, proprioceptive, eye, and so forth, a field of consciousness arises. Now, when the field of consciousness arises through the meeting of the three, it's much harder to discriminate about it. the more you feel the meeting of the three, you feel, if you were speaking about this morning, your thinking kind of subsiding and your body being involved in the perception or the knowledge.

[24:40]

Now, if you also don't discriminate, this right knowledge would mean not to discriminate this flower as existing or not existing. I have a friend, a former student who just died, named Jerry Fuller. And he died only a few days ago. I talked to him on the phone. Maybe hours before he died, but not more than a day before he died. And we kind of joked about, we both knew, he knew he was dying. And we joked about it. No big deal.

[25:41]

You're going to close your eyes, and you've closed your eyes lots of times. This time you won't open them again, that's all. And death is timeless. If it occurs in time, you're not dead. So when you die, time stops, for you at least. So your death lasts no length of time at all. So why be afraid of it? It doesn't even take a minute. And as Jerry said to me, as long as I'm alive, I'm alive. So I'm fine, because as long as I'm alive, I'm alive. And he said to me, do you suppose practice has anything to do with the way I feel?

[26:59]

I said, yeah, probably. Unfortunately. Anyway, When he said, as long as I'm alive, I'm alive, he's actually making no comparison between being alive or dead. He's not thinking at all in terms of alive or dead. If I said, Jerry, are you alive or dead? I don't know. How does he know? So to look at this flower without any categories of alive or dead, being or non-being, it's also a quality of right knowledge.

[28:02]

The flower is just there. Now, you may, and I maybe should talk about the three natures, but we'll see, but one, this is a part, a reference to it, You think tomorrow you're going to do something. This is called the imaginary world in Buddhism. Because if you die now you're not going to do that tomorrow. Yeah, I mean Let's hope. I mean, I'm looking forward to meeting with you tomorrow. Yeah. And it's depressing to have a funeral during a seminar.

[29:10]

So I plan to stay alive, you know, throughout tomorrow. But it's, from a Buddhist point of view, anything that does not exist if you died at this moment is imaginary. You only are imagining it. It doesn't exist. It's just imagination. It may shape a great deal of this moment for you. And it may also prevent you from knowing unstructured mind. It may prevent you from knowing the pure body of reality. Okay, so when you practice right knowledge, you see the appearance of this, you name it, and then you just think about it, And first you find yourself thinking in the usual way, conceptions about the flower, as Eureka says.

[30:30]

And then you turn those conceptions around to see this as impermanent. And then to see it as interdependent. And then to see it as beyond interdependent, absolutely independent. Having no future because any future is an imagination. And seeing this flower as something appearing in your mind, and that appearance in your mind is not graspable. In other words, the flower exists And I exist, but what really exists is appearing in my mind because nothing else really exists.

[31:44]

Because everything really exists through its mutual appearance through other things. This only exists through water, clouds, florists, fertilizer, all those things. So it only exists through other things. And yet it's absolutely independent. And the way it exists through other things can't be grasped. And the way it exists in its absolute independence can't be grasped. And its appearance in your mind can't be grasped. And it's changing all the time. When you turn discrimination into right knowledge, then suddenly the name of the flower or what it is disappears.

[33:00]

The discrimination, the mind, the continuum of discrimination disappears. And we're back to appearance. Unnamed appearance. So right knowledge is to withdraw the mind from naming. Withdraw the mind from comparative categories. Like it exists or it doesn't exist. Or I like it or I don't like it. And withdrawing the mind from those, then what appears is the fifth dharma called suchness.

[34:03]

And suchness, the qualities that I just described, are there no matter what I hold up. This is an appearance in my and your mind. And it... does not fall into the categories of being or non-being. At this moment, in the imaginary world, it does fall into the categories of being and non-being. But at this moment, nothing falls into the category of being and non-being. So it's in a timeless present And we need, we ache for this experience of timelessness in our life.

[35:05]

Whereas the Diamond Sutra says, you don't have a lifespan. While you're alive, you're completely alive. Mm-hmm. So whether I hold this up, it has the quality of suchness. Whether I hold this up, it has the quality of suchness. Which means it's an appearance within your sense and mental fields that does not fall into comparative categories. These are gates to unstructured mind or suchness. So in this sense, you're using the habit of the mind to name and then to discriminate about, and you're reversing the process. Now although this may seem to you a little far-fetched, it's powerful medicine.

[36:14]

And if you remind yourself of it now and then, It will begin to undermine the inaccurate assumptions of your initiating consciousness. When I was giving a lecture in Hamburg the other day, A woman asked me, how do you teach Buddhism to your children?

[37:19]

And I said, you know, practice is an adult decision. But they pick it up from your state of mind. So if you practice I mean I think you as a mother you know you're practicing for your children as well as yourself. And you can play little games with your kids as they get older. Like I made up a little story Like my daughter Elizabeth would come in to me and I'd say, what's it like out? And she'd say, Daddy, it's raining. And I'd say, what's raining? And she'd say, it's raining. Oh, would you go outside and bring me back that it?

[38:20]

But I can't find that it, Daddy. But you told me it was raining. What is it that's raining? She finds that she has to conclude that rain rains. Like sun suns. But we can say the sun is shining, but we can't say the Rain is raining. Yeah, we say, well, anyway, we say it rains in German too, right? So you can play little wisdom games like that with your kids. And it makes, it made Elizabeth realize there's no, nothing out there doing this. And again, it is one of those theological ideas built into the grammar of our sentences.

[39:32]

Now, if you play those games too much with your kids, they'll say, oh, there goes mom being zen again. I've been accused of that myself. So if you get a sense of these five dharmas, which are a little like playing with what is the it that reigns, What is the mind that names and what is the mind that takes the name away into suchness? And suchness is the gate of unstructured mind. as taking naming away is the gate to unstructured mind as noticing that everything knowing in the midst of seeing knowing the meeting of three the nourishing food of recognizing that everything is appearing in your own mind

[40:49]

And as that, it is your own possession. Not something you can own as a particular historical person, but that you can own right now in how you yourself flower within this appearance. Yes, so this is also what Yan Men meant by the flowering hedge. Now, just before lunch you had a question? Yes, I wondered how non-object-bearing mind and awareness go together, how they interact.

[42:04]

An object-bearing continuum is the basis of conceptual consciousness. I define awareness to be non-object bearing consciousness. Well, not quite, because awareness can carry intention and can carry images. But when you discover through meditation, for example, this, you kind of, if you imagine object bearing continuum like a pier on a lake, You're walking along on this pier and you can see the clouds and the sailboats and, you know.

[43:28]

I was just in Travemünde for a couple of days. I think there's more linear feet of dogs there than boats. Everybody who owns a dog in Germany seems to be walking along with their dog. So you see dogs and sailboats and dogs and water and dogs and boats. Yeah, and suddenly the pier breaks and you fall into the water. And you fell right through object-bearing continuum. And you're all wet. You can't see dogs or anything. That's awareness. You have to get used to being wet so you can see through the water, but you know, it's something like that.

[44:35]

But I'm kind of joking, but Kind of joking, I'm joking. But when you really find yourself free of object-bearing continuum, it's a rather dramatic event. Because we're so used to having, except when we dream, a mind, a wake mind means a mind that is always involved with objects. And through practice you begin to realize a conscious mind or an awareness that has consciousness that is not object-bearing. That can become object-bearing immediately or... return to a non-object-bearing continuum.

[45:44]

When you're a beginner, it can't be interrupted, but once you're more adept, you can go quickly back and forth between the two and maintain them simultaneously. Now, What is... There's a picture there in your mind even though the parts don't show it yet? Yeah. He could barely say it in English. Maybe he can't say it in German. Yeah, I'll show it to you. The other day there was this conversation between Roddy and me and I said in this context that I experience it as if I have a mosaic inside of me that lies on a table and I only have to put together the parts of the mosaic.

[47:06]

And in this context I thought, if that's really the case, then I have to have the third consciousness within me. It has to fit only for me. And so I experienced that, that it's really a search within me for something that is already there, where I only have to put the individual parts together. And that's how I came up with this expression, El Karoshi, from Borimain. Yeah, I really enjoyed, as I said earlier, all your questions or comments from everyone this time. I always do, but particularly You seem to... I've been struck this year that what a large percentage of you have begun to really know how to practice.

[48:17]

It just takes time, but some critical mass seems to have changed in the last year, where a larger percentage of you than used to have a real sense of how to practice. And as young men said, if you continue in this way, you will surely gain an entry. And I believe that if you continue in the way you've discovered how to practice, you will gain an entry. Now, what you described, no, no, this is exactly what you meant, but what you described... is exactly the reason Zen works with views that you hold.

[49:26]

Whether they're views like you brought up this morning of another mind or possibility of minds in addition to waking, dreaming and non-dreaming. Or the probing question you had. Or if you hold an enlightening view while you're looking at the world through your habits of naming and discriminating. Accurate views or enlightening views or antidotal views, antidotes to deluded views, held while facing the mosaic of the world, tend to begin to give the mosaic order. Now, the more you can have an unstructured mind, you then more let the world order itself.

[50:54]

This is expressed in a koan which is about this same topic we've been talking about. Now, what is the Dharma body or what is the pure body or something? And it's a donkey looks in a well. And the teacher says, well, you've got 80%. That's pretty good. And they say, well, what would you say then, teacher? It's the well looking at the donkey. And that means you let... I don't want to get into this too because it means a lot of things, but it does also mean to let, through your unstructured mind, the world look at you.

[52:00]

And something deep happens. It's like we're talking about the activity of the wave and the simultaneous stillness of the wave drawing the wave back into stillness. Every element of the wave would have to be expressed through a kind of mathematics of stillness. It's not just that there's this simultaneous activity and stillness. But when you know this dynamic of stillness, It generates a mind. It's not just an incident of, oh, you notice the stillness that's present in activity, but noticing that generates a mind which changes the way you see.

[53:11]

Yes. Okay, I think that's enough before coffee break or tea break. The pause that refreshes. Afterwards, I would like us to meet in small groups. I don't know, seven or eight people or something like that in a group. I'd like no groups to be all new people. And I'd like some people who are more experienced to be in each group. Yeah, I really, as you know, I really think that we have to have dialogue with each other and with ourself to make these things clear.

[54:19]

I want you to start teaching yourself. I'm looking toward retirement. Okay, so let's see, what time is it? So maybe ten to five will take about 25 minutes. Gather here or in the next room too or whatever you want. And then after that we'll have, maybe we can talk a little more and then we can have dinner. Hey, life goes on, right? Thank you. Ah, my voice returned. You see how truly helpless I am.

[55:22]

But, you know, when you have discussions like this is the only time I really wish I could speak German. I don't know what it's actually like in German, but at least it sounds really interesting what you're saying to me. It might not be so interesting, but I think it is. Yeah. So is there anything you'd like to share with me that you discussed? Are there any problems you have with this or is it all completely clear? Yes. One of the subjects we talked about in our group was how to carry the mind we experience in Zazen into everyday life, everyday situation.

[56:52]

How to deal with some problems that may arise. And another thing was the question, what is meant with the term pure body, the phrase pure body of realization. It's the state of mind not based on thoughts. Okay, good. Yes. Oh, you didn't say what you said in German though, did you? Yes. And what comes next is that the question has arisen, what is the connection with your body, the approach of your body to reality.

[58:15]

Because a state of mind is not based on thoughts. Yes. Yes, we also had the topic of how one can transfer the Zen spirit to daily life. Some people said that it is not possible for them, that they find it a pity, that it is only because such individual points of view remain in life, where one tries again and again to achieve it and after a while to make sure that it is improved and how to make it. And then I realized that the sangha is so important. But there are also different attitudes. So not everyone does it or doesn't have everyone in the group. And yes, and one question was still what right knowledge is, that it was not understood. It's about how to get to the so-and-so. We had virtually the same discussion about how to transfer or transport zazen mind or a certain stillness that's experienceable in zazen into everyday situation.

[59:29]

And what a pity it is that in life you only have these rare moments where it sort of goes together, or this is possible. And we also talked about how useful it is to have a sangha, although not everyone in the group as a sangha available to them. And what we didn't quite understand was the explanation of right knowledge. I understand. I was thinking about that at the break, how difficult that must be to understand. Okay. I like these reports. Please, some more. In our group we have a similar topic. We talked about how much our everyday life has changed, in conflict situations, in decision-making situations, and how much individual elements, taken into the everyday life, give away a sense of this happiness of the pure body.

[60:49]

We also talked about something quite similar and how much our everyday life was changed through Zen practice, the ability to deal with conflict or decision-making processes and that through small experiences you get a glimpse of what could be meant with this pure body. Anyone else? Yes. Yeah. We were talking about the importance of mind and intellectual, of the intellect, to judge what we talk about or to judge our practice or to measure our practice. We were not quite clear or we're not quite...

[62:02]

We didn't have the same opinion about intellect, or I don't know. We were a little bit different, different opinions about how important it is. And the second thing was, as well, the right knowledge. It was a very difficult point, what you're asking. Yeah. We discussed how important the intellect is in the cell practice. I don't think we agreed on that. Okay. Yes? .

[63:18]

Okay. Although I didn't quite hear everything what she said, I think there was some similarity in our group, the discussions, and we also talked about how the intellect, which has such an important role in the West, how the intellect could be used in the right way, whether for practice the intellect is more like the basic or more an auxiliary function, and how to really work with the intellect in an adequate way. Okay. Any more? You spoke about differences in how people receive teaching, that some have a feeling of easy, intuitive understanding, some have a kind of difficulty, some have a feeling of difficulty,

[65:00]

miss the trust in their own intuitions. Then we had a discussion about the motivations for practice. You brought up the story of the death of the plant. The fact of death itself was discussed as a motivation for practice. Or the fact of just difficult situations in life and how you feel. Okay. Deutsch? Intuitive and easy to understand. And all the difficulties are in it. And the things that are intuitive and easy to understand.

[66:05]

OK. Satsang with Mooji Maybe I should say something about the intellect.

[67:25]

This is not a revealed teaching. This is not a teaching from some other world system. This is a teaching created by people like us. In situations not different from this. If this is a pure body of reality then if it's reality then it has to be here. Reality can't be somewhere where we're not. If that was the case, it wouldn't be real. So let's think about this idea of something and the capacity for that something.

[68:48]

If the Buddha achieved enlightenment, the capacity for enlightenment had to be there. Because he's not, in this case, the son of God or the daughter of a goddess or something. He was a guy. I mean, you know, might have been a special guy, but he was a guy. A mensch, yeah, it was a mensch. This guy was a mensch. Yeah, okay. So if the capacity for enlightenment was... there was there for the Buddha.

[69:54]

And the Buddha is one who is enlightened. Then the Buddha is a capacity or a principle. Because what the Buddha was, was not only a historical person, he was also a person who realized enlightenment. Now, realize enlightenment is shorthand for a whole lot of things, but let's just say he realized enlightenment, let's put it that way. So he realized not only enlightenment, but he activated enlightenment. capacity for enlightenment, which we could call a principle. In this sense, the Buddha is a principle, not just a historical person. So if the capacity for enlightenment exists, It's present now.

[71:14]

Now, does it exist in some special situation? No, it exists everywhere. Certain conditions make it more likely. But in this sense, the reality body of the Buddha is an expression of a principle. or the pure body of reality. This just means the Buddha, or one who is awakened. But here, instead of talking about the historical Buddha, it's talking about this principle of a pure body of reality. That means the Buddha is here. It's not in the past. You really have to know that and have faith in that to practice Buddhism. Dung Shan was asked by a monk how how can I meet, how is it possible to know Yunyan, your teacher?

[72:43]

You might ask me, how is it possible to know Suzuki Roshi? Yeah, and Dung Shan said, it's not difficult if there's no difference in age. Do you understand? It's not difficult if there's no difference in age. Suzuki Roshi died. But the principle of enlightenment or the possibility or the reality body does not age. So if you know this possibility... equally, then Sukhiroshi's body is right here. All the Buddhadharma ancestors are right here. Or this is exactly the same situation they were in 500 years ago, 1,000 years ago.

[73:46]

Yeah. Then the monk still wanted to say something. And Dung Shan interrupted him before he could speak. And said, say something in a different track. Do you understand? The first track, can I know your teacher, is like the imaginary world. So he said, say something outside of that track. If you can, you may know that there's no difference in age between you and the Buddha. Now we are unfortunately living in this modern age. And one of the characteristics of our age is we have endless choice.

[75:02]

And it really enforces our imprisoning state of mind of always being involved in likes and dislikes. And it makes practice more difficult for us. And I think we need to have a more thoroughly understood practice in order to contradict the distracted state of mind so easily available to us. In our lineage it's said that you have a deep capacity or deep functioning that's stuck in a position.

[76:27]

It doesn't function because of leaks. And your energy leaks because of wrong views. And your energy leaks because of being in a mind involved in likes and dislikes. So you can imagine if to come to the seminar you all wouldn't be here. But imagine if to come to the seminar you had to walk here. Or perhaps ride a bicycle. You'd be in a very different state of mind when you were here. And when you went to the store, you know, there was a few things there from the farmer which happened to be growing but you had very little choice of what to eat.

[77:44]

I mean, just if the condition of your life gives you less choices, you will in general be in a better state of mind. And it's important to know that. Because you've somehow got to withdraw your mind from this constant, I like this, I don't like this. In general, a mind involved in constant alternatives is always leaking. So, you know, it's nice to have good food and we had such a good stew at lunch.

[78:46]

But it would be nice to have a state of mind that, you know, whatever you eat, basically, it's great to have some food. And then if it happens to be especially well cooked, that's even nice. Nice. And then if there's no food, that's okay too. You had breakfast, you know. You know, hey, what's the problem? And one of the things that a practice period is designed and a sashin is designed to do is to create a situation where you don't have to make choices all the time. Or, and as I explained to this last session, you want a schedule that annoys you. Yeah, it should annoy you a little.

[79:57]

I don't like this. I don't want to do that. This is crazy. We shouldn't get up. So you can be constantly arguing, but at some point you say, hey, it's all right. I'll just do what the schedule is. And you know, if you sit for seven days and you follow the schedule, nothing bad is going to happen, you know? Yeah, I mean, the pollution of the environment will increase slightly, but no more than if you did something else. So the annoyance actually helps you become more non-discriminating. And what you're also trying to do is discover an energy that moves

[80:58]

continuously over on the surfaces of everything. On the tip of every hair. That's what this meaning of the golden maned lion is. It means that on the tip of every hair is the whole of the body of the lion. And this is an ancient Huayen teaching. Huayen is a Zen school, a Buddhist school. But it also fits in with now a little from the hair of a lion, you could get the DNA of the whole body or something like that. It's that kind of idea. Anyway, the sense is that in every minute particle, the whole world has to be there for that minute particle to be there.

[82:21]

So if you have that mind, that mind is also the mind of the Buddha. So, anyway, we need a... We need the kind of energy that can pay attention to details. Continuously pay attention to details without getting tired. Now, if your mind is constantly caught in your thinking and then trying to pay attention to details, you'll get very tired. It's got to do one or the other. So, mostly, if you're a beginner in practicing, you have to kind of go along with your thinking.

[83:42]

But sometimes you make it an attention to really be mindful to body-mind-feelings phenomena. To be mindful as if the tip of every hair counted. So here she used to say, if you could just have the energy to follow our way. So one thing is to have this kind of energy, and once your energy isn't caught up in your thoughts, it's much more relaxing than thinking. Okay. And then this more non-discriminating or neutral mind, not caught up always in liking or disliking.

[84:43]

And this neutral or this more neutral or non-discriminating mind is much more open and much more easy and sees, begins to After a while, begins to see things differently and interfere less. And you begin to feel the world in a kind of rapport with you. So when you stop this kind of the leaking of likes and dislikes and of wrong views, this deeper capacity of mind begins to move out of its frozen position.

[85:59]

Now you may not completely understand this sort of spiritual psychology yet, But if you have this feeling or faith or view, it will begin to change things. And you bring this view to your mind as often as you can. So, on the one hand, you're working with holding a wide view, like the pure body of reality. And you're also, at probably other times, because we generally do things in succession, You are bringing your mind into your breath, your attention into your breath.

[87:25]

Or you may be practicing this feeling of names, appearances, names, discrimination, and then another kind of discrimination. Now I started to say something about the intellect. This was made by people. And it's an immense intellectual creation of human beings. So the intellect's involved. But in general, the intellect, we usually know it in thinking in sentences, thinking logically from one thing to the next. is necessary to establish some things.

[88:29]

To establish that everything is changing. To establish that maybe doing zazen is a good idea. So that's one kind of thinking. That doesn't get you very far, actually. It only establishes basic conditions. Now the second kind of thinking, which is called inner seeing or special insight, is thinking based on the continuity of mind itself rather than the continuity of thoughts. Now the example I use repeatedly, and I guess I will do it again, because it helps to get this vocabulary down.

[89:34]

If you concentrate on this, you create a mind that arises on this object. And if you can really concentrate on this object without distraction taking you away from it, We can take this away. And then you are now concentrated. And if you still remain concentrated, what are you now concentrated on? What is the object of concentration? Mind itself. Ja, mind selbst. So the object, you now have an object, first you have this object of concentration, but you take it away, you stay concentrated, you're now concentrated on mind itself.

[90:47]

Zuerst hat man ein Objekt der Konzentration, dieses Objekt entfernt man, und jetzt konzentriert man sich auf den mind selbst. We can call that samadhi. Und das nennen wir samadhi. Now, when I bring this object back up into that concentrated state of mind, and you can observe it, but you're still Real object of concentration is still the mind, but you're observing the stick. That's what's meant by vipassana, or inner seeing, or insight. Now, when you think that way about things maintaining the concentration of mind rather than the objects changing your concentration you think about things differently.

[91:48]

This is more like thinking zero one, zero two, zero seven, et cetera, instead of one, two, three, four, five. Now, Buddhism as a practice is really developed on this kind of thinking, which is called insight. Insight is not such a good word for it, inner seeing, maybe inner thinking. Thinking from mind to the object rather than thinking from object to object. Now this kind of thinking is very much a part of practice.

[92:49]

Now another kind of thinking is analysis. This kind of thinking Through the mind in which you analyze things. And this kind of analysis, instead of the dividing analysis, is to divide things into parts. If you divide things into parts,

[93:19]

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