wrote about characters who were so driven that they were unable to understand themselves. So through the practice of stability and absorption, you are able to see yourself. And to be clear enough that if you realize something, it affects you, it changes you. So this is the first step in the establishment of view through inner sight. And again, dependent on the practice of absorption. So it's in this kind of inner rational sight that you establish the world as three natures. And hold this view in view.

[01:13]

You have to actually make an effort to remind yourself, often through a koan like Mu or something, that this world is impermanent. Und ihr müsst eine Anstrengung unternehmen, um euch immerzu daran zu erinnern und manchmal durch ein Koan wie Mu an diese Unbeständigkeit der Welt. And you can use a Koan like Mu to get inside the three natures. Und man kann ein Koan wie Mu benutzen, um sich jetzt hinein zu begeben in diese drei Naturen. Or practicing your breath body and so on. Now, this breath-body practice is not dwelling in the realm of body-mind breathing in, not being caught in myriad circumstances breathing out.

[02:20]

This is the practice of the middle way. The middle way is the teaching of twin emptiness. Twin emptiness. To not say nothing exists, that would be an extreme. to say everything exists would be another extreme and the middle way is to say it exists but it doesn't exist the way we usually think and that both self and phenomenal world are empty So how do you practice the emptiness of self and phenomena? This koan is trying to give you a practice for this basic underpinning of Buddhism. Breathing in, I don't dwell in the realm of form.

[03:45]

It also means I don't even dwell in the realm of emptiness. So this is even a deeper understanding of the middle way in which we don't dwell even in the middle way. So I don't dwell in inner emptiness I don't dwell in outer emptiness I don't dwell in inner form I don't dwell in outer form And you keep practicing that with that attitude informing your breathing until little by little it comes to be true This is establishing your view The establishment of the three natures and of absolute and relative through your breathing practice.

[04:53]

Okay, and the practices of inner sight. I think I can mostly go pretty quickly and not take too much of your time. Yeah. I mean, I could go on till seven or eight, but I feel I got all this stuff I'd like to tell you. But I won't. Don't worry. Okay, so the next is a finer, more subtle way of seeing the world. It's not rational, but it's a kind of, we can say, discriminating wisdom.

[06:01]

Which means that you see the world in patterns. You see the patterns of the world. And you see them without a morality, it should be this way or should be that way. You see them with a kind of disinterest which is beyond like or dislike. which is also called equanimity, which also arises from absorption. And a deeper form of that even is non-discriminating wisdom. You feel these things, but you're not grasping them in concepts. So you're studying the world now with a finer sense of stability without the bias of likes and dislikes without the bias of ego

[07:07]

and with having left ambivalence aside in the first stage. This is also a kind of developed one-pointedness. Now, this means that you are To establish your worldview, you have to think it through, observe it through with this kind of inner sight based on stability. Now, you're also creating a sort of different kind of person here. Now, if you replace yourself as doctor, or psychologist, or scientist, or teacher, with now I'm a meditator, this is a big mistake. Now I'm a priest, or now I'm an adept. Now, one of the troubles with Zen is you know everything in the beginning and nothing later on.

[08:48]

Everything is there in the beginning, and the beginning student actually has a deep, often intimation, which we can even call initial enlightenment. And this initial thought of practice, actually, the initial thought of the possibility is your first enlightenment. And you intimate the whole thing at that point. then if you're able to have a consciousness with consequence even forgetting it you can open up this intimation and this sense of the well looks at the ass Or the ass looks at the well.

[09:56]

The commentary says, she goes by night. Or he goes by night. Like the guy who was going on the bridge the other night. Because, or reaching for your pillow at night. Because out of that original intimation, you start feeling your way. And part of that is establishing sort of inner stability. And then establishing your view. This is as much as you can do. And you have to become more subtle to find your way, more sincere and modest.

[11:03]

But the trouble is after you've been practicing 10 years, usually your life has changed. But your ability to know what you've done is quite limited. Often they say you should practice 10 years and then be fallow for 10 years. Work in a steel mill or sell newspapers at a kiosk or something. The problem is, you should know and you sort of know, and there's pressure on you to know from yourself and others. But you don't know. And there's a pressure to turn yourself into a new identity. Now I'm a doctor of Buddhism. Yeah, but this would be a little like saying, I know how to use the orioke eating bowls.

[12:17]

Now, having a certain pride in that is good. Pride is actually a very important part of Buddhist practice. But identifying yourself as now I deserve something and come to the next asheen because I'm good at the orioke bowls. would be substituting your college degree for an orioki degree. And the way in which orioki practice should be your identity is it appears when you handle things it appears when you have a coffee with schlag or a melange you The way you find your, the way you find, anyway, your practice with the orioke appears when you handle objects or when you do simple things.

[13:45]

And then it disappears after you've finished drinking your coffee. And it reappears when you need it. So you're developing a new kind of identity that appears when you need it and isn't there when you don't. And this identity which appears when you need it is part of the practice of inner sight. It's a relief. Even knowing it a little is a relief. Your heart begins to relax. Your heart begins to relax. Sound good? Sounds good.

[14:58]

Let's put it on a card. So the next, another way, another practice of inner sight, Now, you know very well how your mood affects how you see things. The way you feel some day affects how you look at your job and your clients and everything. And too often we're rational about our life when suffering or the need for strategy forces us into it. And you get very rational and serious about your life when everything's falling apart.

[16:11]

Or you need to have some strategy for the future. So it means you're always being rational when you're in a bad mood. This is a very narrow kind of rationality. But we would consider if you were rational and made decisions about your life, when you were feeling particularly blissful after a day on the beach, Probably a mistake. I mean, making such a decision, you might end up living on a boat or something. It's like making decisions the third week after falling in love or something. It's great, you know, that we can do it.

[17:24]

Now, you know from your own experience that in finding your seat, sometimes you have very blissful feelings of completeness, of buoyancy. Now, it's also considered part of inner sight to study, observe, establish your view while being in a mind of bliss based on stability and lack of ambivalence. So you want to establish your state of mind, you want to establish your view of the world and of self,

[18:27]

not just when you're depressed or elated, but when you're in various states of mind, including blissful states of mind, or buoyant states of mind, when they are accompanied by stability and clarity. So the practice you might have during this coming year or the coming months or the coming lifetime is establishing your world view and your view of the world and self through the stability and clarity of absorption and through rationality, through conceptual states of mind, through non-conceptual states of mind, which means feelings of bliss, states of mind like bliss and so forth.

[20:22]

Shall we say, when you establish your view of self and the world in the bright clarity of the senses. Or the bright field of senses. Okay. So now I went through some of that because I thought this sense of vipassana shamatha or absorption and insight meditation or inner sight meditation should be clearer. And the most developed inner sight When you have the ability, which I've been talking about, the capacity during the Sashin, is seeing the world and self through the non-conceptual,

[21:48]

Through the non-conceptual continuum of interiorized seeing. So I would say through the non-conceptual interiorized continuum. Now, if Buddhism was more developed here in the West, we'd have a short term for such a thing as non-conceptualized, interiorized perception. See, but we don't. We could say, you know, sort of the Samadhi of the Dharmakaya, but, you know, I don't know. That wouldn't help you much. Now, when you establish your... I'm almost done.

[23:15]

Shall we have a nose break? All the noses can... How do we let air in? Open the door. I mean, I'd open everything. It's... Anyway, I'm almost done. Now, one of the things when you are beginning to establish, you have your identity in conventional reality. Now, the identity you establish in the relative and absolute world isn't just a substitute or a new version of your conventional identity. But it's an identity that rests nowhere and appears when needed. And takes various forms according to circumstances. And this is true, not false.

[24:16]

Now, from this identity, which takes form as needed, you study your conventional self. And you're also making space for your many selves. You're beginning even to practice that each moment is a different self. So we don't just have a fractal space, we have fractal self. So who am I right now? I'm... A talking Buddhist. And a talking, being translated Buddhist. And I guarantee you if I wasn't being translated, I'd be a different kind of talking Buddhist.

[25:57]

And if you people weren't in the room, I'd be a different kind of talking Buddhist. Because I didn't have any intention of what I was going to talk about before I came here. Everything I've said you've drawn out of me. There's not one thing I intended to say. Everything I've said has come from the chemistry of what happened. Between us, among us. So although you may be very familiar with me, some of you, if you look closely, there's a very unique me here. who won't ever appear again. And there's a very unique you who's here who won't ever appear again.

[26:58]

And then you want to be able to make space for that uniqueness that keeps appearing. the flashing into emptiness of self, which is sometimes described in general in koans as the manifestation of the unique breeze of reality. Because of the unique breeze of reality, this moment is very unique and we're each appearing. And within that uniqueness of dharmic appearance, There's simultaneously a continuity of being and that is understood over time in the conventional world. and understood as space in the undivided world.

[28:12]

So you are practicing through inner sight to create the space for the establishment of view, which includes the space, for your many momentary selves to appear within the continuity of being in both time and space. So this is partly the psychology of Buddhism, how you study yourself by creating the space for yourself. Now, the last thing I'd like to point out, not because there isn't more that I could say that would make this better or clearer or something, but this is a good time to find the hole in the donut. No.

[29:29]

Do you have donuts in Germany? Okay. So, I asked you the other day to ask yourself what you'd most like to resolve from the past. And what you'd most like to accomplish in the future. And what you'd most like to realize in the present. And these are three questions that are defined by the three times, the past, present and future. But I think you'll find through the practice of inner sight the more deeply you look at these three questions that these three questions are really one question that doesn't have conceptual form.

[30:41]

manifested in terms of the three times, it has a conceptual form. In the present, in the sense that this question joins the three times, and you have a very pure, open thought, but a thought which doesn't manifest conceptually, But I think you can feel it. And I think if you want to, you can even feel it as a kind of jewel. In other words, you can feel it not as something definite as a particular thought, But you can feel it as something definite that you can organize feelings around. Maybe you can feel it as a pounding in your chest.

[31:55]

Or maybe you can feel it as the thinking which produces tears in the eyes. Or maybe you can feel it as an uncanny feeling in your body where you don't know quite where you are. You can use such a thing, again, as a kind of jewel. which then becomes a kind of vow or deep intention or the jewel of innermost request that can guide your practice to resolve the past Accomplish the future.

[33:01]

And realize the present which includes all three times. And this is the hole in the donut. In the pretzel? This is the ultimate... Combination of German and American Buddhism, the donut and the pretzel. Food for a donkey. Thank you very much.

[33:33]

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