I always think Norman should be sitting here. What am I doing here? Thank you for being so quiet, Sophia. She understands you. I don't always understand her. It's kind of great for her. child to have a secret language from the parents so easily. She doesn't have to make it up. It's all there for her. Well, we only have this morning, so we're going to see if we can fit in some way of ending between now and lunch. So at least we should start with some of the discussion you had yesterday since one of the questions I suggested was

[01:05]

What combination of things, Dogen, the process of practice, etc., has been useful to you and we should continue with until the end. And we should start with the discussions we had yesterday. And I suggested the sentences that Dogen brought. How are they helpful in your life? So who's going to be second? With some report of what your discussion yesterday. In our group, there were different perspectives, perspectives from which Simard, with a sentence, worked, and a sentence brought him to his feet.

[03:31]

Okay. In unserer Gruppe gab es... No, sorry. I should have had the meditation half an hour. We're all still in meditation. In our group we talked about the different views that so sentence can bring into the life. Ist das ungefähr? Ja. Different what? Views. Views, yeah. Different perspectives from which people bring a sentence. Yes. Already connected. and we started with the sentence, already connected.

[04:40]

And what we experienced is the difficulties to experience that connectedness with others, but also not to be too close to others. The difficulty is when you express such a connectedness with others. For some people it's too close, they feel people too close to them. And someone else spoke about an inner experience.

[05:55]

And to always have a sort of being connected with something she called community. Like feeling you're in a community with things and with others. And also to be there for such a community. And that this feeling to make decisions for oneself isn't there any longer that strong. Sondern dass Entscheidungen aus dieser Community auf sie zukommen. but more to let decisions come up out of such a community or being together with people.

[07:21]

And it's also a little bit the feeling that you don't have such a big choice. It's more you have to do what comes up. And for a third person there has been the experience as soon as you start to work with such a sentence the space will open up and the perception will shift and the senses are moving. What you sense is changing.

[08:22]

Yes. And it is actually like a feeling as if something had already been there and only waited to be discovered. A feeling as if something has always been there and just waiting to be discovered. And something else, in this process to work with such a phrase you start with a conscious intention but during the working with such an intention The intention is changing in such a way that you don't have to hold it that conscious anymore. And also the phrase might change.

[09:22]

It's more as if you're learning and the opposite of learning, de-learn or something, dis-learn, dis-learn, de-learn. Okay, unlearn. Unlearn, yeah, that sounds good, yeah. So you're using it and at the end you have less luggage. Mm-hmm. Sounds good. Okay, someone else. Yes. I was also in this group, and I want to add something. It was also... Was that to Agatha? It's good to start in German, I think, for everybody. Yeah. I also have been in this group and I want to add something. I have been, that's me, and I have been, I tried to practice for a longer time with such a sentence.

[10:57]

It's not really a sentence, but Norman made it into a sentence. As soon as I start to think, I think not thinking. And I'm figuring out that's a very radical way from not identifying with my thinking. And it's the concepts of thinking, yes. And it was nice for me to hear And it was nice to hear and great to hear how memories and experience I had with other people I know for quite a long time.

[12:18]

And how Norman pointed that out, that this experience is kind of swings in the words we use. This person's use. So he said something about knowing Richard Bay and Ottmar, and when they speak, you have the relationship now in their words, also the memories of Anna. And that was very important for me, because I was always afraid in this process, That has been very important for me because I had been a little bit afraid in this process, in this practice, to lose relationship with other people.

[13:25]

Yeah. Good. Excellent. We talked about that such a phrase also has a physical feeling. And if you don't want to repeat the phrase you can also hook up to the feeling of the body. And some of us, we didn't know how to use such a phrase, so it was unfamiliar to us. Like, I have such a phrase and then it's gone. I repeat such a phrase, but then it's gone and I cannot hold it in my mind all the time.

[14:52]

The phrase comes back, but I'm not able to hold it all the time. So, able I don't know, but I don't hold it in my mind. I don't know if able is the right translation, but I just don't do it. Yeah, I think that if your intention is there, you can trust the process, which disappears sometimes. Someone else? Yeah. We had people from three languages speaking in English. And we also had a combination of people who were speaking about the meaning of phrases to them from the practice and also people who were speaking about this

[16:02]

from their life experience, but not from the practice. In each case people were explaining to the group where these questions come from, if the statement is a question. And also sharing the experience, if this phrase has had a deep effect on their feelings, their understanding. And what we also shared is that the people then described what happens and how this deep connection is felt.

[17:09]

I observed whether the phrase was a question, as it sometimes was, or whether it was a statement. In each case... The experience the person had was trying to find the relationship between this phrase and himself. Yeah, thanks. Thanks. Someone else? I want to share something that happened yesterday evening after Zazen.

[18:32]

I met Ingrid and I saw her the day before for the first time. And after a few sentences about who are you, where you're from and so on, Their space opened up and in this space we could talk about the dying of her father and my mother. And Ingrid told me in the situation when she has been with her father, a sentence popped up. And this sentence was, watch closely. And this phrase has been, observe, watch, yeah, watch closely, yeah.

[19:44]

And I also had this experience when I was dressed as my mother. And when I have been with my mother I also made that experience. And I noticed an experience which I would like to have to put in words. And that has been this instruction, have an empty, open and ready mind. And with such a state of mind I have been able to be beyond this relationship of mother and daughter, to be with the... accompany her during she was leaning courageously into something unknown.

[21:10]

And we went on in our discussion we had yesterday evening. And it also has been about us, the grieving daughters. And that there has been a space. I remembered these three natures we talked about in the last time. An experience in which the presence of the deceased people has been there and another sort of communicating. And I'm sure that's not the imagined nature.

[22:26]

Not the conventional at all, that's true. And that's it. Thank you. Thank you, Ingrid. Anyone else want to say something? Norman, do you have anything you want to say about what's been said? Just that from the experience in the group that I was in and also from hearing all this, it strikes me that From the experience, from the group in which I was and also from what you have just said.

[23:34]

And working with such a sentence is very subtle and it can take on different forms. And as you just said, sometimes even disappears altogether, even though it's still going on. So that's very interesting and unusual, very subtle compared to how gross we usually describe things and think of things in life. And that is very subtle in comparison to how rough and superficial we usually describe things in our lives. Yes, in relation to what...

[24:42]

Dieter reported... It's true that practice, particularly working with a phrase like already connected, makes you recognize or establish an intimacy... ...that often doesn't fit into... Yeah, a conventional cultural way of relating to people. And... Dieter said that someone said to be ready for this community or ready for this intimacy. And that's a good way to conceptualize the process. Because you have to observe the cultural conventions you're in of distance between people and

[25:52]

you know, the physical distance between people and the emotional distance that a culture requires. And... But you can be ready for this emotional intimacy. Yeah. But if you don't have a certain skill, it can be misread. But I think Uli and Ingrid meeting for the first time... And they're both practicing. They could feel safe in establishing intimacy fairly quickly. So anyway, it's... Yes, practice does change how we relate to people and then we have to figure out how to deal with, how to have skills within that change.

[27:40]

Somebody want to say something before we decide what to do next? I find such words are like a symbol. I find such words are like a symbol. because when they pop up you suddenly experience what's connected with the teaching and suddenly you again have a relationship to the people you meet And that brings you in a certain ease.

[29:00]

Yeah, I read an interview with, part of an interview with the Japanese novelist Murakami. Ich habe einen Teil eines Interviews gelesen mit diesem japanischen Romanschreiber Murakami. Who's usually reviewed as the least Japanese of the prominent Japanese novelists. Der erwähnt wird als der japanischste unter den japanischen Schreibern. My own opinion is he's the most Japanese. Und ich habe, meine Erfahrung ist, er ist wirklich der... And he said that he's learned most of how he writes from listening to jazz. And he said I ran a jazz club in Tokyo for years just so I could listen to jazz all day. At some point I decided to be a novelist. And he said, I had a jazz club in Tokyo for years, just so I could listen to jazz.

[30:18]

And at one point I decided to write. Yeah, he said Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis... Ornette Coleman. They've taught me to write. It's all right. I used to listen to them myself at the Five Spot in New York. I didn't decide to be a novelist, though. Yeah. And he said that certain sounds open up a channel. Or certain words, he says, open up a channel and then the novel flows through that opening. And I think something like that happens when we practice with a certain channel. channels open up to our more deeply embedded life as well as our more active surface life.

[31:31]

And he reported somebody asking, if I remember correctly, Thelonious Monk, Thelonious monk. Not a Buddhist monk. Thelonious monk. He said, somebody said, how do you get those unusual notes? And he was a pianist. And he said, What new notes? All the notes are there on the keyboard. I can't make any new notes. They're in the keynotes. But I have to find the notes I really mean. And when I find the notes I really mean, they sound different.

[32:44]

So Murakami said, I don't have any new words. but I have to find the words I really mean, and they open a channel. I love reading something like that, because I read it and I think, oh, somebody who, at least from my point of view, knows what's going on. Now, it seems like a reasonable time to take a break. And then Norman and I can share the time after the break. That's okay with you. Yeah.

[33:44]

And what I'd like to do is I gave those two... statements of Dogen which I never got to. So I thought I'd at least like to run through a commentary on them. To give you a feeling of how I think they are meant to be practiced or understood. Yeah. As at least a way to, from my point of view and what I've So I don't know whether it makes sense for, I'm just doing a commentary, or I should go first or second.

[35:05]

I don't know. Roman and I will discuss it. Okay, thanks.

[35:08]

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