And I then have a job, so I'm part-time and do a job that is relatively, many say, terrible with numbers. So I'm in the business exam. And yes, in this life with two children and this job, the life is very intense. And then it is sometimes like that for me, when it simply wins a certain intensity, which is the case in the profession simply because That there are demands that I want to fulfill, that I also like to fulfill, that I enjoy. And at home there are these two voices, these two little voices that are present all the time and where this life just sprinkles.

[01:03]

then it can be like, I talked about this with someone before, it can be like a wheel, a hamster wheel. So you are in this hamster wheel of work and you fulfill your tasks and then you come home and you are in the family's hamster wheel and you just ride in front of you. And Obwohl beides einfach für mich ganz tolle Dinge sind, die Kinder und die Arbeit und das Miteinander zu haben, es ist irgendwie schön. Und trotzdem das Bedürfnis, wo ist meine Pause? Wo finde ich jetzt in diesen Hamsterrädern die Punkte, wo ich eine Pause mache? Oder wo ich aussteige? Das Bedürfnis, einfach rauszusteigen aus diesen Rädern. And in this situation, for me, the practice of mindfulness is something that sinks into it and that allows me to feel a distance.

[02:17]

and when I heard that I was supposed to talk about my mindfulness practice, I of course thought, what makes it possible for me to enter this mindfulness practice, when I am overwhelmed by these professional stories at home, the children who come over me with their with their moods, their mood swings. And then I found out that there are two things that for me are something like The signals are for me. One is the so-called enemy. The enemy is the hurry. The enemy is somehow everything that has to be done or where I think it has to be done.

[03:29]

This is what I experience, this feeling, this feeling of the hurry in the body, to feel that this is possible. And that's just a signal for me. And I can take this signal and then just let go of this hurry or this feeling that it has to be now. und das verändert dann für mich die Situation. Und gerade diese Eile, gerade dieses Gefühl von unbedingt muss ich das tun, ist dann für mich der Punkt, wo ich in diese Achtsamkeitsübung hineingehen kann. Wo dann für mich... And for me, mindfulness practice is really the difference between being in the moment and experiencing the moment in its fullness, or really experiencing the parts, or somehow being washed away by the movements of the world, i.e.

[04:43]

the movements that are always exposed, whether the movements are from the outside, that someone wants something or so, or whether the movements are from the inside, that you yourself, that some emotions come and feel you away. So mindfulness is the point where it becomes possible for me to open the moment and to look more closely, to feel more closely what is actually there. And the second thing that helps me a lot, this mindfulness in everyday life, to let it come to you. And it is also a great concern for me, what you said, Richard, how difficult it is to come back from such a seminar or a session and this feeling that I am losing my practice or that it drifts away from me and this almost screaming for help.

[05:46]

Where can I stop now? Where is something left? And my experience is really this trust that you don't have to hold on to anything. That you can let everything go after a seminar, that you don't have to take anything with you. Und ich glaube, dass das wirklich ein sehr großes Lernfeld ist für uns alle, die wir nicht in einem Kloster leben wollen oder können. Dass das genau der Punkt ist, wo wir... in confrontation with our daily lives, we can always find the way back or simply have the trust that the moment can open up again for us. And the second thing that is very important for me in the mindfulness exercise is to accept. Man kann nicht wirklich Achtsamkeitsübung betreiben, wenn man nicht bereit ist, wirklich zu akzeptieren, egal was es ist.

[07:01]

Also wenn man versucht, also wenn ich versuche, irgendwas wegzuschieben, und sei es auch mich selber wegzuschieben, dann kann ich nicht wirklich in den Moment hineinkommen. For me, the key to mindfulness is to be ready to feel what is there. And this feeling becomes a horizon in which indem dann wirklich Dinge auftauchen können. And Pekaroshi has now presented these four foundations of mindfulness in this weekend and also earlier in Sishin, where I was able to participate.

[08:12]

And that is, as he said, a way, an exercise that can also be practiced as a way. And for me it was a great opportunity to have this time in Sijin to really explore this first basis of mindfulness. In Sijin you get up very early and you have many sitting periods. So you really have the opportunity and you also have the time. So there is just so much time to sit that you don't know how to do anything else. So really to practice this first basis of mindfulness, because my first reaction was then, when Soschi introduced it, yes, the body, I know that, the body is there and that's all very self-evident anyway. And why should I really do that now, to deal with the body in detail?

[09:20]

I'd rather stay in this room, in this free space, where something can appear. And I did it anyway, this exercise where you somewhere begins with the hands and lets this body speak in very small parts. So simply by devoting attention to it, part by part, and the parts that then simply occur. That was really a wonderful experience, while she seemed to have so much time, just to experience these parts of the body. And that's why I put it in the context of these ten minutes to the heart, really to open up to this, that the body To be here, to have a body, that's something incomprehensible.

[10:27]

And the body is more than just a uniform form. It's like every part of the body is a gate where you can look through. It's like this and it's different. It's never the same. And yes, that's why I'm just putting this to your heart now. To really look at this foundation carefully. And to let every part speak for itself. Yes, I think that the body itself is like a wonderful craft.

[11:31]

The one we always have. Okay, thank you. Do you want me to make it short? I don't have that much experience in the language of the public. For me, mindfulness is very closely linked to breathing. So in occasions like these or For me, mindfulness is very much connected to the breath, where you are.

[12:35]

Circumstances are favorable to be developed, that you can develop the taste, that you can entwinkle a taste with. where you come to know what mindfulness can mean. For example, by Sashin, where you serve somebody or get to know them. Or for example, with the Oriopolis, where you can use two hands, and it's really... And the other person, there is a lot of time during social work to deal with that. And if you go back to your everyday circumstances, and you have a stressful life, then this is swept away. This calm communication or contact with the other things, people.

[13:57]

If I notice that there is no mindfulness at all, I mostly notice the breathing because the breathing gets shallow. I don't feel some parts of the body anymore. They are not filled with life. It's like parts of my body won't be there anymore. Then what helps, if you notice that, which happens very late sometimes. And we make a pause and concentrate on your breath. And then if you feel good movements, you do it very concentrated, do it with both hands, and in that way you can get your attention, your mindfulness back.

[15:06]

You shouldn't stress yourself out with mindfulness. I think it's better to do a little bit at times when you notice it, to bring mindfulness back in daily life. You shouldn't ask from yourself to have mindfulness all the time. To have it all the time, it's just too high a challenge. I try to do it in small steps again and again. And I also have a game which I do with myself. that I throw things in the waste paper basket in my office.

[16:08]

And usually I miss the waste paper basket. And then I'm forced to get up and pick it up with both hands. And I always ask Ben at once whether I will make it or not, and usually I don't make it. And very important for me are the dharma bodies. That there are other people you practice with and you meet your dharma bodies. Because the different practitioners are at different times in different states. So it can be that maybe you are not very mindful and you meet Eric and he is mindful very rarely.

[17:15]

I think that also helps to support yourself. I think practice doesn't work if you do it on your own. It really only works if you support each other at specific points. Michael, I think from USA will bring you a waste paper basket with a little net inside. If you make it that you put it inside it, there is a... Bell. No, not a bell. It's just... A cheer. A cheer, yeah. How can we do that?

[18:34]

She asks that we have a little break between everybody, every personal talk so that she can digest. Gerald.

[20:35]

As you told before, Christine, how difficult it is for you to bring me in everyday life of what happens at the seminar. I thought we have a really good situation to practice mindfulness at Johanneshof. But when I think about my own practice, I don't... I can't say that... I can't talk about Pix's success stories from my practice. Of course, to practice the situation at Johanneshof is a help and also a reminder Also in the sense, like Michael spoke, people remind you of being mindful. And also the way the building was set up for us, by us, is a reminder. but the decision to be mindful and if it's possible 24 hours a day I have to make this decision and I have to remind myself of it and I am succeeding only seldom and I accept this as part of my practice and I stopped

[22:40]

making myself accusations about that. So in the beginning I always had the feeling of failing. From the point when I stopped accusing myself of failing, it was easier to practice mindfulness. I want to make... I want to start talking from the point when I started practicing in 1979. For a reason I don't know, I went to Essen in Ruhrgebiet and I did a weekend seminar with a Catholic daughter who offered zazen. I was very curious. And in addition to that, there was an elderly lady who offered oi toni.

[23:52]

This is a painful thing, oi toni. Sazen was horrible to make it short. Sitting hurt a lot. I was really surprised and unprepared for what was coming up. And to the physical pain there was also the inability to deal with images and associations which came up when I started sitting still. To make sitting easier, everybody got a bamboo stick, which was laid down on the floor. We should lay down with the spine on top of the bamboo stick to feel the spine. This was really the top of things. And I left the weekend and thought, you won't see me again and I don't have anything to do with Zen.

[25:02]

And how everything was done was very unprepared. I just thought, I won't do that again. One or two years later, a friend of mine talked me into going to a Vipassana course in England. I just did it in favor of this friend to go with him. So we went there. This was a very deep experience for me. Ten days being together, ten days in silence, similar to a session, also getting up very early. The biggest part of the day is spent in the meditation group and being in contact for the first time with the Theravada tradition, which Uschi also talked about.

[26:16]

The schedule was we got up very early, had breakfast at 7, and the second meal and the last meal for the day was before 12 o'clock. That's the way it's done in the Theravada for British Edition. I thought, I can't do that. But I could make it because the beginners brought an apple in the afternoon. The instructions for these ten days were very simple. You can sit however you want. You could lean to something. You can also lie down. This was the first instruction. This was really a relief for me. The second instruction was, for the first three days, we practiced together to concentrate.

[27:23]

They are nervous for the first time to concentrate my mind for the first three days. Well, the in-breath hits the nose, the cold breath comes to the nose and turns into body, and then the out-breath is warm air leaving your body as part of your body. Part of your body leaves through your nose, your body. This was very difficult for the first hours and first days. After the three days I really started to concentrate, and then with that ability this concentration is used. to turn attention to the body, to the first foundation of mindfulness.

[28:33]

from perceiving the top of your head, going through the body, to neck, shoulders, arms, until the tips of the fingers, left arm, going through the lungs and the hips and the right leg until the soles of the foot and so on. Going through your body is one hour to do that. This intensity and this stuff glasses washing was not taught there. It was only perceiving of the state taught us the right geography. The shoulder was worn and there was a pain. It's 4.30, the pain was somewhere else and the shoulder was... It was just a point to notice how different the shoulder feels an hour later.

[29:48]

This was a very interesting experience because for the first time I experienced that everything is unchanged. Until then, this was only a concept and an idea. I could see it, but I really couldn't feel it physically. And there I could feel it physically. Even a minute later, the same space, It really feels differently even a second after I take away the attention. Only then the attention changes pain or whether it feels good or not. And this I experienced like a new world, which I carried around with me but never experienced before.

[31:15]

And also the experience was of ten days no speaking. And at the end of the course I felt there is nothing to be said, I want to continue being silent. After a few hours dissolved, there was a lot to talk and to organize and so on. With the new world, my body, which always is with me, I went home and from this point nothing was the same. And two or three times a year, I went to England and for several years I did that. This brought me back to Zen at that time.

[32:26]

When I went to England regularly, I met Baker Orochi. I visited him in San Francisco. And with this experience of passing, I was ready to do my first machine going out. It was, again, horrible. for a week, horrible, not only a weekend. Knowing that I cannot fall back behind my body, I went through the decision and my fear of going crazy. My body will dissolve. And I will somehow step out of my body. It didn't come back again because my body was so solid. From a part which Orochi also talked about. this was established, in this solidness was established.

[33:44]

This was my first stepping into this mindfulness training. The second was where I talked also in a little group about was a book. I don't know much more about it. This forest monk tradition from Sri Lanka. from Germany and England, Sri Lanka. They translated from the forest monk tradition. One of the books was a mindfulness training through spiritual awareness. Only the title struck me because I had some experience of mindfulness, but it made clear to me that it is really a continuous training.

[34:55]

Even if it is a line going up from the body to the tongue, this is a continuous process which never ends. And the third turning point after spending some years in Christ, I put the question before me, what are you doing? You didn't get much happier. the inside came to me. I'm always unhappy if I don't live in the moment. This came to me when I cut vegetables in the kitchen. For the first time it was possible for me If I want to be in this moment and I don't want to think about the past or the future, or I just want to be happy, then I have to be...

[36:12]

Suddenly all this mindfulness practice which wasn't integrated, I was able to bring that to the moment. I don't say that I can do it all the time, but I can do it more. I can also do it in situations where I feel good, because for a long time I just practiced it when I didn't feel so well. I'm just doing it now, whenever I'm reminded of it. I use the four noble postures to remind myself being mindful.

[37:26]

It's a relatively simple thing. When I'm walking to From the office, I talk to myself like Gerhard Augs or Hebo. When I take a cup, I say to myself, I drink. This describing brings me back to the moment all the time. But what really brings me to the moment is cutting vegetables with a very sharp knife. So concerning mindfulness, that's my real teacher.

[38:32]

Because if I'm not mindful when I'm cutting, I cut myself. And I'm in the moment immediately. I don't think about my pain. I'm just breathing and I'm really there. That's a really unpleasant experience of learning. So my practice is to get really the sharpest knife and only cut. And if I want to talk, I put the knife aside. One more practice of mindfulness was that Roshi said we should notice when we wake up in the morning in which state of mind we find ourselves, in which state of mind we come to consciousness. So if we are in this half-dream state and hear the alarm clock, so what do we do?

[39:50]

Do we think about the balance for the day? So this slips... slips away very, very easily. And what helps is really getting up very slowly so that I, what I do is that I set my alarm clock earlier and have time to get up and to so that I'm able to feel how blood goes down my legs and I can feel my spine when I come to standing. And I feel that I feel something in my body again.

[40:52]

like entering my body in you every morning. Of course I know that I didn't leave my body during the night, but I'm conscious to do that. Then I go very slowly to the window and I look outside. Then the day starts and I go to the toilet and it's not much time until the hand starts and And during the day it gets lost again. But it's really a place where other people support me myself by getting up. Sometimes it seems like they only get up to support me getting up.

[41:55]

And also the schedule, it's also a reminder. Look how you can really be in the moment, how you can be there. You can sit here somehow. Or maybe here. Here? And Roshi called two or three weeks ago and said, I have to go to this gathering in London.

[43:53]

And he said to me, well, then you have to continue this teaching. The feeling was... a hot feeling of fear, like in your stomach. And then he said that he would invite Paul, and a bit slower, I can't translate it. And then he said, Paul should also come and then this feeling of fear was relieved. But yesterday when we met and... Yeah? Sorry. This feeling came back and we sat up there after the meal and Roshi said everybody should talk about his or her mindfulness practice.

[44:59]

My feeling is I've been doing that for a long time. We met Roshi at 1988, so this is 13 years or so. My feeling when Roshi says sentences like, practice is only right if you continually reside in your breath body. Such sentences I don't like to hear because in my practice it's not that I'm continually mindful of all. And it's also true for my mindfulness practice. My experience is I'm not mindful all the time. I'm not mindful all day long. And then I asked myself And I put the question to myself and maybe I missed the topic.

[46:20]

I'm doing this for 13 years. I'm not all the time in my breath. I'm not mindful all day long. But in spite of that, it's a practice which functions for me, which makes me happy, and I have to think contrary to Gerald, which makes me much happier than I was before, contrary to what Gerald said. And I put the question to myself, what are the points in my practice which make that I feel satisfied with my practice? I also want to talk about how my practice is, what I am doing, what my day is like.

[47:23]

As Cristina said, we have two little children. They need a lot of attention. There is a lot of sorrow and there is a lot of work to do in the household. sociologist, I'm working scientifically. It absorbs a lot of my thinking. All day long I'm thinking, sitting in front of a computer. If I'm not thinking, I have to organize projects and so on. And this is a work which doesn't support mindfulness. I am drawn away.

[48:30]

I have to identify with that which I should not identify as insane. If you are thinking, I am occupied with thinking my thoughts and refine them as much as possible. And also my identity comes from that my thoughts are in. That's my job. That's what I have to do as best I can. So that's poison for doing sin. There are the good advice. You could put on your screen, breathe, floating away on the screen safe. And this works for one day or two days. Okay, I'll come to the screen.

[49:31]

And after two days you just push a button and it goes away the screensaver and you are... And what I'm doing now is drawing a negative picture of... But still my practice is very satisfying to me. So I want to tell you what my practice is like, and it's not very spectacular. It's very important for me, so I get up every day earlier than others, so I get up to sit for 30 minutes. So sometimes this works, and sometimes it doesn't, because Leopold cries, or Julius comes and wants my attention. This is like a sun which sends rays in the whole day.

[51:12]

So satin is very important to me. It's like renewing yourself every day. So even if I lose this every day, There are not much moments during the day where I say, well, I'm not mindful, I have to be mindful. Satsang is where you can feel during all the day, you can feel the satsang, also in relationship with other people. where I feel that I can be more relaxed. What is really important concerning mindfulness is cooking. I'm doing the breakfast for all of us. This is really routine.

[52:21]

It's like a restaurant. Because there are so many details if you do this. Leopold wants his bottle with soy milk and cacao. Julius wants it with cow milk and cacao. Christine wants her muesli. And I, I hate porridge. and we drink tea and at this point I'm usually alone in the kitchen and for me this is very beautiful to do all this simple just do this with my hands putting the bottles there opening the fridge putting the milk and

[53:26]

in turning on the stove and putting pot on the stove. The Easter brownies are melted into the pot with the milk. So putting on the water for the tea, doing the tea. And some... Then life starts in the flat. And I thought about what are my mindfulness practices. So these are my mindfulness practices. These are practices which I like to do when I can relax. And the same is true for the evening. I come home in the evening, I'm tired from thinking, And what I like is that they leave me alone and I go to the kitchen and I prepare supper.

[54:32]

Some people would say, you prepare supper, it's strange somebody else should do that. And Maybe you should rest. For me, it's doing supper, preparing supper. Again, this simple... things with your hands, it's relaxing and it brings me back into my body. Not only into my body, in a feeling of relaxation and calmness and joy. What's also important for me?

[55:39]

It's going to work for me. That's also a good feeling for me. So there is this feeling of sasin in me and the feeling of preparing breakfast so I'm always in a good mood after the post. So we live at the outskirts of Vienna. There's lots of green around. It's great to experience this green and the air when I'm going to the train so then I go either by train or by train then I experience all the details which are happening there so I will take it up with me but I really don't want to read I just want to sit into the train and want to experience it in

[56:41]

If I would read a book, then it would be somehow closing myself down. So just going in the train or tram is like a mindfulness practice for me. Also when I'm going home... But when I go home, it's more like gathering after sitting in front of the computer and doing all the thinking. What's also very important for me is what Michael also said, is to have Dharma friends. I don't think that alone I would have to to go on with my practice without a sitting group where we meet Tuesday morning, Thursday evening, sometimes Sunday.

[58:06]

The main problem in the practice of mindfulness, I think, is that from the perspective of usual people, this is really something strange that you are doing, so this is not supported. What we are doing. So Christine and I, we take tours when we go to Sase and Tuesday morning we go with the first tram, which is at five o'clock in the morning. So if you enter the tram, train in the morning at five, it's really a shattering experience. I don't know whether anybody did that. It's beautiful. Because people are just hanging in this train and they have to do this.

[59:25]

They get up much earlier than me because they have to go to work. Somehow it's sad to see that. But we are doing this because we want to do that. I don't think we had the strength to do that if we didn't know that somebody else comes who also comes, not only because he shares this madness, craziness. But because we also share the joy.

[60:32]

It is a joy to sit together and experience it together. And there are also details in this practice which are not related to making bottles in the morning. So there is the altar and there is the incense. thinking that if you put incense into the incense holder, this is a possibility to gather yourself and come home again, and thoroughly feel I feel well-being, and well-being is much too weak to express.

[61:36]

This is what keeps practice alive for me. Thank you. Let's sit for a minute. What time is the hour?

[64:46]

Seven. Take a break for 25 minutes? So a 25-minute break. And then we have a discussion? Yeah. I would like to say a few words about the vendor, because people have not asked what they cost. It would probably be seven, eight or nine vendors. And since they cost 700,000, we will send a little more than the package. And the easiest thing would be to send Regina's money now before the end of September and send it to the vendor. But still, when I snuck in and sent him a cheque, it's always white. It's very difficult. And expensive. And expensive, yes. It's all because it doesn't exist.

[65:49]

But a cheque is a cheque. A cheque is a cheque. I would like to introduce something. There is a magazine called Der Baumpflanzer. It is also a means to stay in touch and to hear something from others. There is always an article by Roshi in it. in English and in German and also from others who write something. So you can write an article and the people who do that are very happy. They are sitting at Johanneshof and you can also subscribe and then you get a tree planter from time to time. And I have some copies here. This is not the last one, but the penultimate. You can have a look at that.

[66:52]

I have some here. You can also buy them if you want. As a follow up to the mindfulness practices that people have presented. And this can include a question or Also some experience you have that you think may be useful for others to hear about.

[67:56]

Das kann auch eine Frage sein oder eine Erfahrung, die ihr gemacht habt mit Mindful, also Achtsamkeitsübung, die vielleicht für die andere nützlich sein kann. It's raining. I looked at the trees. Wow, are you beautiful. In German, please.

[68:58]

It's dark and no good lighting. What's that tissue? I don't know what it is. When I listened to these presentations of practice, for me a situation came up, especially when Gerald mentioned cutting the new finger.

[69:59]

The path we have to go when I take my little daughter to school. And at the same time we have to watch the traffic. Listen to her or what thought she has about the first and second lesson which are coming up for her. And all this coming together, the walkers and the bus and the traffic signs coming together. And at the same time, there's 100% this call from Lina to be present for her, because it's so important what she's bringing up.

[71:10]

This was just a quick resonance of what he said. Simultaneously in the head there is something in me which can divide this attention. Otherwise I would have hit the car more often or something like that. And I would have heard what she said to me. There is a question in me. Is the intention only the concentration on one I don't hear in one ear And I walk with my wife very often.

[72:49]

And if I walk not in the country, but in the city, I think my wife feels like you, and I'm like your daughter. And because I can't hear where things are coming from. And my sense of the awareness I think my wife is very aware of many things. And I'm aware of my wife being aware of many things. My experience we can compartmentalize content.

[74:06]

So we may arbitrarily say, this is a sound, and this is a feeling. But my experience also is that that's arbitrary. A practice Baker Roshi gave me, maybe because of my hearing, and I also can't smell very well, When I was in college, I boxed. I was a boxer. So I earned my nose and lost my smell.

[75:07]

So Bekiroshi suggested to me, because maybe an hour and a half each day we walk in the hills near our home, he suggested that I taste the path with my feet. So I'm starting to mix things up a little. And at the beginning it sounds like some Zen story. My wife says for her Zen is like somebody hits somebody else over the head with a dead cat and they get enlightened. So Bekharoshi is careful. He doesn't say to my wife, taste the path with your feet.

[76:24]

But I find if I limit taste to my tongue, there's many things I'll never taste. So mindfulness is not just doing things very deliberately and slowly. Though I might prefer it that way. But if you're in traffic with your daughter, or my wife's in traffic with me, It's a luxury to do things very slowly. That sometimes we can't afford. And we may have capacity that we aren't usually aware of. a capacity we aren't usually aware of, because of the way we compartmentalize what we think is tasting,

[78:13]

or the other senses, which includes the mind. So one of the things that originally attracted me to practice, which I told a couple of you at a meal, I saw a picture of a monk, a Japanese monk from the back, not the face. And it communicated some presence to me, some sense that that back had. And some awareness that the back could have that was beyond the face or the eye consciousness, which is so dominant.

[79:35]

So yesterday when Bekriyoshi was parsing, like a verb, declining his hand, Like declining a verb. Past and present. I felt the sense organ of his hand. That I can't describe in tasting or touching at the same time or at different times.

[80:49]

Sorry? At the same time, simultaneously or differently. So it might happen we can understand taste in our hand and then later we can see in our hand and later we can feel in our hand. So I'm encouraged to not limit my experience? Does that help answer your question? It's not really a question, it was just something I wanted to bring up. Thank you.

[82:01]

May I tell a story to that? Last year I did a seminar with Sogyal Rinpoche. He did a ritual for us. It's called Chok. And you need about 20 monks who perform music? Or that's ritual? He had four people on video cable devices, like recorders, on different recorders, and he directed them, his prayers, and he pointed to them, and also he had these devices, these holy devices, and also bringing in of Buddha rituals, and it was really a big thing, very powerful.

[83:29]

The people on these recorders, they made a mistake. Then he said, I can do 100 things at the same time. Why can't you do that? You have to learn that. I think this is also a food produce of this practice. I thought he could manage an enterprise with 100,000 people. Everything at the same time in his head. You know, something short.

[84:36]

Promise. When you said, smelling with the soul, I came up to me. I never taste a dish, but it still works pretty good. tasting the food, it really irritates me more than it helps the food. So I just mix the ingredients. So I just estimate it by seeing it and feeling it until I think it's okay. So I'm also tasting by different senses. In what you just said there is a lot of answers in it and a lot more questions.

[85:49]

All the stories we've heard about mindfulness have been about one person doing one thing. And has anybody got stories or experiences or advice About mindfulness when you're communicating with one or a group of people. Especially not in a... to giving him respect for a situation like this. To the average workplace. I just want to come into that question and also answer this question.

[87:22]

In the many years I'm practicing Zen, I succeed more and more to have this feeling that I'm present. This can happen on the street. And then I happen on the street and then I feel everything around me. Everything is there suddenly. It's difficult to describe it. And the word which comes up for me is simply presence. It's really a wonderful feeling that I attribute this to the constant practice, and I think Eric said, it's like the rays of the sun which start functioning through your practice, through a constant practice.

[88:30]

And you should not attach to your expectation, but this really seems to be like the earnings you get from your practice. I have two experiences I could share with you. And they both have to do with breath. One is, particularly if I visit somebody that's sick, one is, particularly for visit a sick person. There's an old monk, Philip Whelan, who's in a hospice.

[89:39]

He was dying and went to the hospice to die. And all of a sudden he got much better, so he's not dying. And they don't know what to do with him now, because he's still sick, but he's not dying. But when he was very sick and I went and visited him, and I held his hand, I immediately could feel my breathing in accord with his breathing. Like we were helping each other breathe in some way. And I have several different kinds of work that I do.

[90:49]

This is unfortunately what I do all the time. And one is in a business that brokers... food, large truckloads of food back and forth. And I find many people don't breathe. And when I go in, particularly, there's one partner who really doesn't breathe. And when I go into his office, I take a deep breath. And he takes a deep breath. And it makes me much more aware of my breathing when I'm with him.

[92:03]

And I know because when he takes a breath when I come in, he's aware of his own breathing too. So those are a couple of little Das sind ein paar Punkte. Auch die Kinder reagieren sehr gut auf das. Even small children react very well with one breath, one deep breath you take. Maybe not yours.

[93:07]

My niece, for example, a daughter of a friend, she's maybe one year old or so, If you just go there and sigh, they also do this, and they laugh. This really can establish it. Ich habe auch eine Erfahrung beizusteuern im Geschäftsleben. Das war eine nicht sehr freundliche Situation für mich. Und zwar, die Aufgabe der Wirtschaftsprüfer ist es ja, Feststellungen zu treffen. Und Feststellungen werden dann getroffen, wenn etwas nicht in Ordnung ist. Und das muss man dann auch dem Kunden mitteilen. Und diese Situation war so, dass ich einen sogenannten Aktenvermerk geschrieben habe.

[94:08]

Und den habe ich dann dem to the affected gentleman. And he had time to look at it and should give me a reply. And then I called him and asked him for the reply. And he said, yes, that would be something, what I would say. And I said, just so blue-eyed, yes, then I'll just come up and we'll discuss it. And I went up and there he expected me together with a colleague. And they are both lawyers. und ich bin nicht Juristin und dann haben sie mich miteinander in den Mangel genommen. Es war eine eher, es war nicht wirklich eine unfreundliche Situation, aber es war eine große Herausforderung für mich, weil Ich habe in dem Aktenvermerk einfach meine Sichtweise der Dinge dargelegt und Sie haben dann, Sie haben, das war ganz klar für mich zu sehen, ich habe konstruiert und Sie haben konstruiert, wie die Dinge sind.

[95:18]

Und wir waren dann konfrontiert mit den Konstrukten und natürlich ist es darum gegangen, welches Konstrukt wird jetzt wirklich, Which construct is real? Which construct is what really holds? So I had to defend my position and this conversation turned and turned. I think without this practice I would not have been able to remain clear in this situation and really present my position again and again, even if they have always tried to bring in a new perspective and to return to that. just to stir up the whole thing for a long time. And then I only got to the point in the course of the conversation to bring myself to leave my position.

[96:19]

So they really wanted me to change that and to follow their opinion. And for me it was in that situation, on the one hand, it was of course Einfach zu viel für mich, da wirklich da zu sitzen und jetzt in meiner Position als Wirtschaftsprüferassistent da jetzt das zu verteidigen gegenüber den beiden Juristen. Aber gleichzeitig war das für mich eine ungeheuer vergnügliche Situation. Und das Ganze hat dann drei Stunden, ich habe geglaubt, es hat ein paar Bemerkungen, das dauert eine halbe Stunde und ich gehe dann in die Sitzgruppe. It took three hours and then the heat got to me. I don't know if it was the heat of realization now, it was more of a heat of great concentration and also somewhere this feeling, well, that's enough for me now.

[97:28]

But I enjoyed it somewhere, it was somehow It was like playing with each other. It was like a room. I mean, they didn't shoot me off. You could have been even more unfriendly and lift me up. But it was really a game to see, how can I argue now, how can I catch up now. And I think that enjoying yourself in the situation, no matter how difficult it is, that's something you can work with in such situations. That was at least my experience. I tell it afterwards to him. My feeling is... I'm working in an ivory tower or something.

[98:57]

I have my project and I have to do this and then I present it in some reports or something like that. For me it's helpful to feel my own standing point, to sit there and be firm, but also to see what needs the other person, what I have to give to the other person so that the situation can develop in a good way. And this can be breathing, but it also can mean just see the other person and respect the other person, give them the feeling that what they say is important.

[100:06]

and this is also somehow like a trick you can do but it's really feeling that respect what the other person says and that it's important what comes from the other person So that somehow you leave your position and at the same time you are quite firm in your position and give something to the other person. That's my experience. Yes.

[100:50]

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