Anyone guess? What? Yes? When he leaves his seat. Yeah, that's right. But where else is it suggested to go on? That's leaking. What? Yeah, that's the practice of fundamental reality. The first words, closing the door and sleeping. Closing the door and sleeping is fundamental reality.

[01:06]

No, no. So again, it's presented in this funny way, like closing the door and sleeping is the way to receive, to meet, face-to-face meeting, those of highest potential. So what I'd like to try to do here with this koan is use it, first of all, to present Buddhism's view of the world. Now I just spent most of January in San Francisco. I didn't intend to, but... A close friend of mine had cancer and was dying in the hospital and then died.

[02:10]

And this woman and her family sort of covered the spectrum of American society from very old rich families to Joan Baez to leftist political anti-Vietnam kind of world and so forth. So I had to You know, I don't know all that much about the practice of dying. But in American culture, a very large percentage of people have never even been with someone when they died.

[03:18]

It's more and more isolated in hospitals and... funeral homes and so forth. And the tradition in Buddhism is that it's part of your life and you take care of all the aspects yourself. So I found myself having to help with and be present with her dying and then a lot of the stuff having to do with the hospital and so forth. And then I had to do the cremation and the funeral. And it was a pretty big funeral. I don't know, hundreds of people. Coming from all over the United States.

[04:36]

Now, the way Buddhism imagines, feels, understands the process of dying, while the person is living and the process of dying that continues after the person is dead, Which includes a feeling for how a friend's subtle body is part of our own body. And how when a person dies, the friends and family have to release the person in yourself to help them die. Both before medical death and after medical death. And also how you nourish those parts of a person who stay with you and live with you as part of yourself.

[06:04]

Okay, this has to do with a particular way Buddhism sees and experiences the world. Now this is a little different than the custom in the West to see the process of dying and after death. And it's definitely different than the medical model. We even have such a simplistic idea, simplistic in my opinion, that when they give you enough morphine, your consciousness is truly unconscious. So I had to suggest to people

[07:06]

although the doctor said she was completely unconscious, that relate to her awareness don't relate to her consciousness. And once people started relating to her awareness, then she was responding in many ways constantly during the month or so we were together in the hospital. There were probably as many as 40, 50 people a day coming to visit her at the hospital. So it became quite a complex community event. In fact, the hospital had almost never seen so many people trying to visit somebody.

[08:26]

And we worked out a way in which people were with her 24 hours. It's interesting because it made the hospital treat her differently than they treated other patients. And they felt so emotionally supported, particularly the nurses. The doctors had a little more trouble with it, but the nurses felt emotionally supported by somebody sharing their caring. So to care professionally for somebody in a vacuum when no one else seems to care about this person is professionally what you're supposed to do, but it's quite hard to do. So finally we, through quite a complicated process, we finally get the hospital to be willing to unhook her from the machines.

[09:32]

And by this time, the amount of oxygen they were giving her, the oxygen itself was poisoning her. So she was struggling very hard to stay alive because she has an eight-year-old daughter that she didn't want to abandon. She actually, just so you know, it's not a mystery what she died from. had breast cancer for two and a half years and then did a bone marrow transplant, which undid her immune system, which meant she died because her immune system wasn't resistant to chicken pox and other things.

[10:56]

So she finally, when they were hospital ethics committee met and agreed with us to unhook her, Her whole body relaxed. And over 30 minutes she just sailed away. And it was for all of us very beautiful. And her daughter was talking to her in her ear, and her husband was talking to her, and we were all just there with her.

[12:04]

And it was truly a face-to-face meeting for all of us, including the woman and her daughter and so forth. And then we went through the logistics. We'd done it previously, getting the body released to us, which generally they don't want to do. And then all her close women friends washed her and we brought her home and we spent three days with her. And again, I mean, 50 or 100 people a day came and it was like a kind of party. Okay, but the point I was getting to in telling you this story, because I had to do this funeral ceremony for her at Green Gulch in the meditation hall there.

[13:12]

And they wanted a Buddhist funeral ceremony. But most of the people who came, including, she'd been a novelist and a kind of star reporter for the New York Times. And she was one of the women who kind of created women journalism in America. Anyway, so we had all these people from the East Coast of, you know, her old family and the New York Times and then all these hippies and... left wingers and music people all together in this room. All from different, with different ideas about what a funeral ceremony should be and so forth.

[14:29]

So I had to somehow do a ceremony which fit people's traditional expectations that met people's own needs to express their grief and their respect. But that also expressed the Buddhist view of reality as it was going, as it happened. So I, in a way, felt I had this sort of Buddhist funeral ceremony with its particular view of reality built into it. And then I had the Western sense of a funeral ceremony. And I had to settle this Buddhist funeral ceremony down gently into the Western expectations. So it didn't disturb anybody, but it actually became an education in what the Buddhist reality is.

[16:05]

So in a sense, I'm trying to do the same thing with this koan. I'm trying to settle this koan, which is very specifically about a Buddhist definition of reality, settle it into this meeting so that we can get some feeling for it in our own terms. And I hope that you don't feel that this is your Buddhist funeral. Maybe if we're in a church and it rains a lot and we all had umbrellas, we could do it. through a funeral ceremony like they're always in movies.

[17:19]

So your questions, anyway, here, we're going to, well, sit in a few minutes. So your questions about the koan help me give you a sense of what's going on in the Buddhist view of reality because if you don't know what the Buddhist view of reality is, you don't know where you're practicing. Because Buddhism assumes that your practice and your reality are interplaying all the time. And that's particularly the point of this koan. So that's enough for right now, I think. And what we'd like to do is the kitchen needs some help. Und die Küche braucht etwas Hilfe.

[18:45]

How many people? Satya has already asked some people. Also wer möchte Salat schneiden? Vielleicht sollte man den Leuten, die ein bisschen Schwierigkeiten mit dem Sitzen haben, auch die Möglichkeit geben. People who have a little difficulty receiving the opportunity. Yeah, the custom in a sashin is you let the new people who aren't so familiar with sitting to go help in the kitchen. It's better to chop vegetables than be chopped up yourself. So I'd like us to sit and those people who are going to help in the kitchen can go help in the kitchen. And maybe you'd like to take a stretch first.

[19:50]

Okay, I'd like to, before we talk about the koan again, I'd like to share something with you about meditation. And let's start with a simple proposition, statement, that different is different. A non-tautology. So you've all been breathing for most of your life. But when you bring your attention to your breath, your breath is different.

[20:57]

And when you bring your intention and attention to your breath, It not only makes your breath different, but it makes your mind and your intention and attention different. Okay. Now, if you also breathe obviously in your center of your body, you can feel your breath. This makes your body a little different. And I said last night to the group of people that we did some zazen instruction with, I said that the basic practice of

[22:17]

your breath is most stable when you visualize your breath going out this way and then coming up from the bottom. Okay. Now that's just, it feels like that because as you exhale, of course, it feels like it's coming out. And if you're not breathing with your rib cage, as you release your diaphragm at the end of the exhale, it feels like the air is coming in from the bottom. So when that happens, When you breathe that way, that's the, again, the stablest way to breathe in zazen.

[23:40]

There are other ways and there are nuances to breathing, but that kind of breathing, you can become very, very still and not shut your breath off. And what I mean by that is sometimes when you concentrate, you stop your breath. Like if you notice if you're doing something very precise, like taking a watch apart or something. When you're trying to do something very precise, you usually stop your breath right here. So sometimes there can be a problem if you... become concentrated, that you actually stop your breath, which then changes the way your blood and oxygen work in your brain, and you can have some interesting side effects.

[24:53]

So I can see several of you are planning to try it now. Anyway, so what you want to do is you want to breathe in a way that even if you become very still and sort of non-conscious, your breathing still continues in a very basic way. OK. Now, as I said, I don't know if I can go this next step, but I'll try my best.

[25:55]

Because it sounds a little kooky, but I'll give it a try. which is that if you breathe in the center of your body, it changes the center of your body. If you breathe with a visualization of the breath, it changes the space around you. In other words, there's a body space and feeling that we have, a kind of aura. Or a kind of presence. Mm-hmm. What do you mean when you say you visualize the breath?

[27:02]

You visualize your breath coming out. You follow it with your mind. You follow it with your mind. Okay, so in this sense you're not just counting your breath, but you're seeing the counting. Does that make sense? Yeah. I don't know. I'm just describing something. I don't know if it's accessible. It seems accessible to me. So if as you're counting your breath you go one, And you can see it as if it were going outside your body and then up in. And you're in a state of zazen mind. This creates a kind of visual field around you that you can feel.

[28:03]

And this visual field extends into your body and surrounds your body. And I say visual field because it's a little bit like... Like you can see it, but it's like your body seeing, or it's like your body has a kind of light. Yeah. So I said this partly because I realized I'd never mentioned this kind of aspect of zazen practice before. But it also relates to the practice we're doing.

[29:23]

I mean, studying the koan. Mm-hmm. And to go back to something I spoke about last night is that the sense of being a model for younger people And being willing and able psychologically to take non-parents as models for your life. And I don't mean that the models have to be perfect. It just means that you You know, this isn't something you do in a book.

[30:34]

It's a feeling. It's something you're not comparing. Is this person the right one or the best one? If you think that way, you can't do it. It's just the feeling of learning from the presence of another person. But if you, for example, as you get older are willing to be the model for a younger person and not just your children then you actually have to feel differently about yourself to allow that to happen. Now, I'm not trying to lay a responsibility trip on anybody.

[31:39]

I'm just actually talking about one of the pleasures of our existence. One of the many possibilities and most fruitful of being with another person. A kind of mentorship, which is different from being a parent or a spouse. Hmm. Okay. Does someone have some... Oh, something else I should say about the koan.

[32:41]

Is it... Well, maybe it'll come up. I will say it. But let me just say that somebody else has something you'd like to bring up. Yeah. I'm struggling with this concept of leaking, because I have the feeling that leaking is not such a good word for what it's meaning. I have the feeling that this meaning is always somehow negative, because if something is leaking, it's not okay. It should be complete. And you said that the whole world is leaking or something like that. So there is no avoidance of leaking. It cannot be avoided. And in Brussels, you said you should do things which nourish you. So if the world is leaking, on the other hand, this leaking is nourishing oneself. So I don't quite understand it.

[33:43]

Yeah, that's the problem. So you want to say it in? So you want to say it in? My solution would be that leaking is not negative.

[34:55]

If you're a bodhisattva. Leaking is not negative, but it is negative. Okay, so let me come back to that, too, because that's such a major part of this koans. Okay, someone else? Yes. Oh, you've already spoken once, haven't you? It's okay. No, go ahead, but I'd like everyone to... Very short. Yeah, go ahead. Let's go on. Okay. Yeah, that's a big leak. It's from Tanahashi sensei's brush. And you also see he made a white mark, too, where he took the intent. That's all leaking.

[36:00]

I've got a question. Yeah. It has nothing to do with the poem, but does Zen meditation require group action, whether group context, or is it better performed individually? Well, that actually relates to this koan. Yeah, so you're lucky. That's also related to the koan, so you're lucky. So why do you suppose this is the first koan in the book? And why do you suppose in this koan and also in the Blue Cliff Records, number 92, it's the same koan, though?

[37:08]

If you want to read it in the Blue Cliff Records, it's number 92. But in this book, it's put first. Why do you suppose it's put first and the Buddha is not called the Buddha but called the world-honored one, Mr. Who? Mm-hmm. When I open this book and start reading, I'm ascending the seat? Yeah. And Mr. Who is not called the Buddha because it means anybody you can honor. Mr. Who is anybody you can honor. So the koan is first of all asking, are you capable of honoring someone?

[38:16]

So this stuff starts out, it's real simple. In the title already is a teaching. Are you capable of honoring someone? It's not a question of, is there somebody around worthy of your honor? But are you capable of honoring someone? Let me... Again, so many of us say, well, we don't honor anyone because I haven't found anybody worth honoring. But my experience when you meet somebody like Ivan Ilyich again or Thich Nhat Hanh, what characterizes them more than anything is they honor everyone they meet.

[39:27]

And I think it's what makes them actually involved in religious or spiritual life. Okay. So... Your question also is not just is it a group activity or is it something we do by ourselves, but should we even open a book like this? Because in a way, when you open a book like this, you're ascending the seat. You're deciding to look to a religious, spiritual, philosophical tradition for some teaching.

[40:33]

So the book starts out paradoxically right from the beginning. The highest is closing the door and sleeping. Das Höchste ist, die Tür zuzumachen und zu schlafen. So, well, we can just close up the book. You're going to sleep this afternoon. Sie einfach das Buch wieder zumachen und heute Nachmittag schlafen. So you have to think about, why don't you just sleep all day? So kann man sich fragen, warum schläft man nicht den ganzen Tag? Why don't we meditate all day? Warum meditieren wir nicht den ganzen Tag? Or whatever, you know, eat watermelons all day. Oder warum essen wir nicht den ganzen Tag Wassermelonen? So it also suggests the attitude with which you approach a book like this, which is when you open it up and read the first case, can you approach it as if it was on a throne or a seat or was the Buddha?

[41:45]

But it then clearly says that to receive those of highest potential, which means to enter your own fullest potential, is to close the door and sleep. So what is closing the door and sleeping? And what is looking, reflecting, and stretching? Now, you make a mistake if, as some of you have been asking me and I've been saying and volunteering, that this means that. But even though this means that, don't forget about this. This is an algebra where you have 5x equals 5 apples.

[42:48]

These are still apples, pears, peaches that you can eat. So when it says looking, reflecting, and stretching, it basically means mindfulness, meditation, and yoga. Looking. Reflecting and stretching. But that doesn't mean it's not also looking, reflecting and stretching. And looking, reflecting and stretching is the source of mindfulness, meditation and yoga. I'm sure yoga developed from somebody stretching and say, geez, I should stretch like this every day.

[44:12]

Could you say Jesus? Yeah, why not? Where are we? So, and then his or her stretching just became more and more refined. So the next level here is those people who practice meditation and so forth and mindfulness. And that's the way to meet the middling and lesser people. And that's what we're doing here today, meeting our middling and lesser selves.

[45:26]

Okay. So this also means those who can practice mindfulness as a practice, but now ordinary looking is mindfulness. Ordinary looking is now mindfulness. It's a loop. It starts out, you just say looking, and then you realize that's mindfulness, and then developed mindfulness comes back to just being able to look. And even in a more developed sense, to look with the body the way I just said, you create a feeling of a visual field around your body, in and out of your body. So in koans almost never is anything a symbol of something else.

[46:36]

It's almost always a story told on a conventional level which loops to a more subtle level and loops back up and makes the conventional level even more subtle. So you can never read the conventional level as just a symbol for the more subtle level. That makes sense. Are you following me? Okay. Okay. Now, what is closing the door and sleeping again? The tradition of this yoga comes out of looking at the

[47:37]

that there are three states of mind we're born with. Which, as most of you know, are waking, dream sleep, and deep non-dreaming sleep. And concentration Or the absolute or emptiness is most similar to deep non-dreaming sleep. Except in this non-dreaming deep sleep of meditation, you're conscious. So it becomes a fourth state of mind that's not waking, dreaming or non-dreaming sleep. So the first state beginning of the koan is talking about by saying sleeping means this meditative state which is similar to deep sleep and the emphasis in this koan because you're studying a book and opening a book for the first time

[49:33]

is the relationship of this deep state of samadhi to other people. So it says this deep samadhi is the way to know people of the highest potential. So this is also meant to be, it's that state of mind where you recognize a Buddha or you meet your teacher. Now if you turn to page five, the third page of the koan, It says, and in German it must be... You don't have pages on the photocopy.

[50:45]

On the photocopy there's no pages, so it's the last page. How did they unphotocopy? Last paragraph or they put it all on one side. Okay, right before the added sayings of the case in the last little poem, carefully to open the spice tree buds. It says, why are gathering in and letting go not the same? Okay, this responds to your, Eric's comment about leaking. Why are gathering in and letting go not the same? Okay, so this is two ways of practice called the gathering way and the granting way. Now, the gathering way means you stop all outflows. There's no leaking.

[52:14]

Okay. So this is a state of mind you can develop in practice where you completely contain yourself in samadhi. We, as much as possible, try not to talk throughout the week. We try to organize Kin Hin so we don't run into each other as we're walking around the room. We work out all the details of Sashin so you don't have to think about anything. You can stop all outflows. That's why after a sashin, when you start talking about doing something, you immediately feel a leaking because you've stopped outflows and you begin to lose. Suzuki Yoshi used to call these two ways gathering and granting.

[53:15]

And he characterized the grasping way as, you are not Buddha, this is not Buddha, this is, you know, et cetera. Everything is not Buddha. And the granting way is, you're Buddha, everything is Buddha. Mm-hmm. Okay. Now, if you're going to practice meditation, you have to be willing to be completely alone. And you have to be willing, as we talked about before, to have experiences no one ever had before. And that's particularly difficult for us because our culture of democracy and individualism also has built into it a kind of thought control.

[54:43]

If you start having thoughts or feelings or images that other people don't have, you sometimes feel you're going crazy. And this is also, you know, sometimes you think the work of the devil, you're suspicious of your own thoughts. So there's a kind of threshold built into even our most private thoughts that somebody ought to have those thoughts even if we don't tell them. And I think you can see it in religious life, whether the Christian religious life, whether it's on the side of trust in the Lord or fear the devil.

[55:49]

And if it's more on trust the Lord kind of thing, then you can begin to have experiences that you can't explain, but you can trust that, you know, it's okay. So part of the answer to your question is that whether you do it with other people or not, practice with other people or not, you have to be willing to be completely alone. As many of you know, this very tension was part of Jung's breakthrough into his psychology because he was taught in his Protestant Swiss background to fear images that weren't Christian Orthodox images.

[57:08]

And when he was flooded with other images, he thought he was going crazy, but he began to trust them as himself. And out of this courage to trust himself, And what he found coming up, he built a psychological system. Okay. So mostly this practice is something you do alone, whether you do it with others or not. But this practice is also about a relationship with yourself, with the world,

[58:13]

And with others. The main way reality presents itself to us is through others, through our general sense of the world and through ourselves. And you can't separate those three. You can practice them separately sometimes, but ultimately you can't separate those two. And as I've said before, I don't know any... I know very... Let's put it this way. Most of the time when I see somebody who's made a success of their practice, they've always had a friend. Not necessarily somebody you discuss your practice with. But somebody you feel you're in the same boat with or practicing in the same way with. Hmm. So I think there's both.

[59:47]

There's practice, which is ultimately your practice is alone. And practically speaking, it's almost essential to have a friend or some friends you practice with. And as I said in Brussels, actually the friends you practice with are All in all, more important than your teacher. At least in the sense of who you spend the most time with. A teacher you don't have to see so often, but your friends you should see quite often who you practice with. So that's why I'm supporting you and glad to see you having small groups that you practice together with others.

[60:52]

Now, in this commentary where it talks about the three levels, The first one, the world-honored ones ascending the seat, is the unique breeze of reality. This emphasizes the Dharmakaya or the absolute. and space.

[61:55]

And in that sense, this first one represents closing the door and sleeping. And the second one, reciting his verse, means the Sambhogakaya body where you're in the bliss, the contained bliss body of the direct experience of emptiness. The third is my further inquiry That's the Nirmanakaya body or the Buddha or the Bodhisattva teaching in the world. So that means that your questions are both leaking and the activity of a Bodhisattva.

[62:58]

So these three go together as really one kind of realization in different phases. There's our 30 minutes of meditation we just did. And sometimes you may feel a very big space. And sometimes you may feel a kind of awakening of your energy body. And third, we're doing this discussion. And this discussion and your entering into the discussion equal is the same importance as your having outflows or leaking or any discussion, making yourself vulnerable is the nirmanakaya side and is equal with stopping outflows and being very concentrated.

[64:19]

And this is the activation of form and emptiness. And it's why they say the unique breeze, the activity, it's something you do, it's something you make happen. That's why they keep using the image of a loom and weaving and so forth, because your activity and your meditation are constantly weaving the world. And practice is to, until you, when you enter and you feel this, you don't say, this is alone and this is with somebody else and this is, it's all one kind of weaving in which you're just working with different threads.

[65:32]

Anyway, that's the basic image of the koan. And I didn't mean to get into the koan this far by answering these two questions, but that's what happened. Excuse me for saying so much. I'm only supposed to tell half, it says here. He saved a half and then parted a half. And I can tell I leaked a little during that. And it says, but not that I'm anything like Manjushri, but it says Manjushri can't stop. That's what can be done about Manjushri's leaking. So it's always a little negative.

[66:43]

Because I feel a little loss from saying so much. So something else? Yes. My question is, why not let the unique or ultimate breeze blow in my eyes? I always felt I should make contact with the world through my eyes. Yeah, okay, say you shouldn't.

[67:45]

Oh, that's a kind of irony. Because he's taking the poem. You see, Buddhism doesn't want you to take anything too seriously. It's like someone might say, you know, this person is really the Buddha or a Bodhisattva. And you say, oh, who cares about a bodhisattva? He spills his coffee. There's always this flavor in the koans of kind of turning it the other side. And sometimes it's quite serious and sometimes it's not. So here, the unique breeze of reality, what do you suppose that means?

[68:59]

It means just what it says. It means that everything is absolutely unique. That's exactly what it says. Everything is absolutely unique. That different is different. That this particular moment in this group, there's something unique here that can't ever be replaced. And as I said in this piece, you know me pretty well, but right now I am absolutely unique. And I've never been this person I am at this moment before. And you are just now absolutely unique. And if you don't feel that, you don't know something about yourself.

[70:19]

If you think, oh, I'm the same as I was, and I'm the same... That's in some senses true, but that's for the middling and lesser. So it's this unique breeze of reality. Don't mess around with it. Don't let it blow in your eyes because once you do, you can't get free of this stuff. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. It says right here. weaving the ancient brocade, incorporating the forms of spring.

[71:32]

My question is more, what is the ancient brocade? Okay. You want to say it in Deutsch? The ancient brocade is the imagery field of the repository consciousness. Yeah, the Lagerhaus. And the more you... But what... That's the Alaya-Vijjana. But what the Alaya-Vijjana means in relation to sense processions, in relation to brocade, this is quite, you know, esoteric stuff. But from this koan, we could talk about many volumes of sutra teachings. But it depends how much we want to go into it. But this is fun, yeah. Tomorrow is better?

[72:54]

Let me check my watch. It's opening the door, yeah. Yeah, okay. You want to say it in Deutsch? Because I can't. You have to. Well, it's real to us at a very simple level.

[74:12]

Say that you're practicing meditation. And you've got a pretty good feeling for zazen. And you know what helps you stay concentrated and what distracts you. So, do you watch television or not? If you're a vegetarian, and you're trying to stay on a diet too, When you're out with friends, do you have a steak? It's like that, simple. Because that's where the weaving is done in your life. And the style in Zen tends to be And it's a style which teaches you something, but it's also a style.

[75:22]

You don't have to follow it. That in a sashin, you're quite strict. When you go out to a restaurant, you're quite indulgent. And you can see it in Zen teachers very clearly in Japan. They overdo it a bit. They're totally strict in the sashin. And then after the sashin, they're forcing you to drink sake. At one time, I mean, this one Fujiyama Roshi kept filling my glass with sake, you know. And he had all the monks filling my glass. I happen to know that I can out-drink most Japanese.

[76:24]

Mostly because I'm a Caucasian Westerner. Because Japanese are very sensitive to alcohol. So it wasn't a fair contest. But I couldn't get him to stop having all these monks filling my glasses, so finally I just got up and sat beside him and held the bottle. And every time he took a sip, I filled his glass, and finally he stopped. But because I could never... I mean, I'd consumed about two bottles of sake, and I was not going to consume a third. So... Anyway, that's a kind of style. But it comes from this teaching of sometimes you let go, etc., and sometimes you protect yourself, watch your energy, etc.,

[77:38]

And there's a kind of pulse of gathering and letting go, gathering and letting go. And it's actually quite subtle, and it's present all the time. And part of this teaching is to become aware of this pulse. Does that make sense? I mean, right now, there's a pulse in how much I pay attention to my breathing, how much I speak what kind of energy I'm putting into speaking and I'm quite aware of this and I can feel it as a pulse of letting a little more energy or containing myself a little more so I feel it moment by moment like that and that's the weaving they're talking about here

[78:45]

And that's what it says right here. The weave is dense and fine. A continuous thread comes from the shuttle. Making every detail. And here detail means dharma. Every little unit, every little detail. So this is saying that when you, as your practice develops, you are more and more, every little detail is present in a kind of non-discriminating consciousness. And the secret of getting to this point is to have your mind on your breath all the time. So you're no longer just counting your breaths in meditation, but you can feel your mind and activity and energy on your breath all the time.

[80:09]

And that's not very hard to do. It only requires that you continue breathing And that you have the intention to do it. And you make the effort without criticizing yourself when you forget. Okay. Buddhism in one easy lesson. It's true. Should we have a break? I have a question. Oh, you do? I can't see you on the right. My question is very simple, or maybe a little silly, actually. I like silly questions. I wonder why it's always talked about to put the mind on the breath from all the bodily functions.

[81:16]

I mean, I have a heartbeat. I have a pulse of blood flowing in my blood vessels. I have movements in my bowels. I mean, it's why... You do? I thought women didn't have things like that. I mean, there's one million of bodily activities, and why is, in all spiritual teachings, why was the breath chosen? I mean, just for esoteric reasons? My question is, why is it always about focusing your mind on the breath, or training everything on the attention to the breath, and not on any other physical process, like heartbeat, or any bowel movements, or the blood flow in the veins, or skin. There are many, many body processes. I'll come back to your question and some of the other questions after we have a break.

[82:24]

But I'll respond to Ulrike's question. Actually, it's a tradition in Buddhism to ask silly questions. To ask obvious questions for others. Even if you know the answer. This would be a good question at this point. I'm not saying shoot about that, but... That's what it means here. Is my further inquiry the unique breeze of reality? Is my further inquiry the unique silly question? Well, I think in Ulrika the question is also why in Christianity, for instance, is spirit the same word as breath?

[83:37]

At the simple level, the answer is breath is the most obvious and easiest thing to concentrate on because it's the autonomic bodily function which is also under our will and is both exterior and interior. So it's accessible to your intention and it's also automatic. And if your intention interferes with your breath, it's not serious.

[84:41]

But if your intention interferes with your heartbeat, it can be sometimes a little bit of a problem. With the breath, too. What? Excuse me. But when you're doing meditation, as we did those 30 minutes a while ago, what happens when you can begin to have your mind more with your breath? is in the space of breath mind, which is a kind of space. You can feel your heart beating. And you can feel your lungs begin to kind of open up. And residues of dead air that have been hanging around your lungs can kind of come out.

[86:05]

Sometimes your neighbor may not like it. And your stomach can settle and you can kind of change the bile acid sort of level in your stomach. And you can feel your intestines more kind of opening. So that's a first level of paying attention to the rest of your body. The next level is you can kind of be aware of the whole pulse of your blood and other systems throughout your body. And there are little pulses going on all through your, just under your skin level and things like that, that you can begin to feel. Actually, when you meditate, you're for some reason bringing intention

[87:05]

and attention and awareness to your breath, can have as big a difference on your overall health and longevity as sleeping does in your life. You know how lousy you feel if you've only had two hours of sleep or something? So if you then take a nap of a few hours, you feel much better. Once you get experience at meditation, you feel that much better from meditating as if you had a good long nap after not sleeping. Now, the more subtle reason why we concentrate, bring our mind to our breath, is that mind also, I mean that breath also has a quality like a more subtle kind of wind or energy that's in your body.

[88:27]

And that more subtle wind is affected by the same skill that you learn to bring mind to breath. You can bring mind to this more subtle skill in almost exactly the same way. And how you bring mind into your breaths, which is a kind of like a space, Because breath, air and space are closely related. The way you bring your mind to your breath is also very similar to the way you bring mind and consciousness into non-conscious awareness. And the part of the way that's done is to drop any comparison to anything else, including any concept of past and future.

[90:00]

And this becomes what we mean in Zen by being in the present. And then this mind joined to very subtle breath or wind Without any comparison to past or future. It's what in this koan called the unique breeze of reality. And it's not just called the unique breeze of the Sambhogakaya body. but of reality because it weaves inner and outer together. So it's a kind of shuttle.

[91:12]

The shuttle is what brings the thread back and forth through the weave. So your intention and joined to this subtle wind or awareness is what keeps weaving the details of our life and our joining with others. So there's both an obvious reason for why we pay attention to our breath is because it's the easiest And also because it's the most subtle, inclusive factor that weaves inside and outside together.

[92:19]

Okay. Let's have a break. Thank you for your question. Thank all of you for your questions.

[92:49]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_74.71