httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDOUX2Hl-iE
Wow, that was 10 years ago.
Still sitting legs crossed on the chair, way above the floor/ground.
From this meeting the text is available:
| Germany, Chiemsee, September 10, 2001. | |
| > | There is a way that you can use your mind to try and relax. And there is a way where you can notice where you are tight and absolutely not do anything about it. And just be tender that it’s like that and let it be like that.
Would you like to say anything? |
| < | When I came here, the first few days I was flipping between I don’t have a clou where you are talking about und wie jetzt keine Fragen mehr aber. Haha. Oh, now I have to make up my mind. I’ll speak english.
So between I don’t have a clou, I have thousands of questions and no questions at all. Last night I was in the sauna and I was doing things like eh, for me the eternal paradox of thinking, the I-thought, I mean: when I am thinking, why the f*ck is I in the thoughts. Why is I in the construction of the thought? When I am thinking it’s always like ‘I want this’. But when I am thinking why is I there? [Here I react on the gigling and ask Isaac:] Do you understand what I mean? |
| > | Sure |
| < | Okay, that’s enough. And last night I was let’s say focussing on that, on where does the need to think come from. And then suddenly, I don’t have a clue how that happened, it dawned on me that by thinking the I is created. Something like that. It’s a way of telling what happened. And it’s as a thought something I know. But I had the experience. |
| > | You saw it, yeah. |
| < | Then, for the first time since way back I was in a state of eh.., then thinking disappered, really. And there was let’s say the idea: hé, this is what this guy is talking about. So and then I went out and there was this full moon and then I had some idea like this is the state that people won’t sleep for days and for practical reasons I just went to bed and had a good night sleep. And I want to ask you one of this thousands of questions, where my mind goes ‘yes but’ when you tell it. And that is where you do – hey, you are translating! – as an example of consciousness knows’ you do this. And then the mind says YES BUT a baby doesn’t know in an instant that this is a fingersnap, it’s something that you learned. So it’s just a reflex from the memory and then I go wawawawawa. So, something like with this instant knowing that does not come from the mind you say, and I think it’s a kind of stored instant thing like a reflex: it goes faster than thinking because it is already there, but learned. Can you react on that, please. [In reaction on laughter:] I could have been a clown but I just feel very stupid in this, really. |
| > | It’s a great question and I have to really look and see how to respond, |
| < | Ok may be tomorrow |
| > | because what you say is true.
When I reflect I can see that the only thing that I truly know is that I am here. And I don’t know if a baby has that sense. Because an insect or any life form has consciousness. And I think what makes the difference is that we have the capacity to know that we know, to know that we are. |
| < | It’s funny that you mention exactly this, cause I have the same reaction on knowing that I know. It’s the same as with this snap: it’s learned. And yeah, for me for the first time, that it’s something like consciously knowing, as if it is a proces. Consciously knowing, as you said to this french guy, hé, I mean when it is just like that [fingersnip] knowing, how can you be bored because it is so normal for you? So there must be some action, maybe not an effort, but action. And in fact it makes more sense to me than this myth, one of the millions of myth around ‘enlightenment’: that you get special, that you never hit somebody, etcetera etcetera. You’re just normal and there is something you have to maintain, as you were talking about it. |
| > | Yeah, you see, again, what you are saying is true ande it is like anything. For most of us, our way of focussing is focussing in a way that produces the I-thought. |
| < | Say again, may be different. |
| > | For most of us the way we relate to our thoughts is: we’re totally in them. We are in our thoughts, we believe our thoughts, our projections we believe, it seems real to us. |
| < | It seems real to us, but it’s not my experience that I am in the thought.That’s what I was |
| > | Okay, but for most people, when they think I like you or I don’t like you they are identified with that. |
| < | Ja, with the content. |
| > | With the thought, yeah, and the feeling of the thought. |
| < | Ja, but for me, I experience let’s say me and the thought. |
| > | Yes, so that |
| < | One of the things I can reconstruct that happened or I did last night… Or may be it’s easier to explain what happened the evening before: I was in the sauna and |
| > | Can I finish my track and then I am happy to listen to you. Okay, so, from being the thought, completely being ‘I like’ or ‘I don’t like’. Then there is awareness of the thought, which then the thought becomes an object: you become the observer. And then, there is where you just are and no thoughts even come up. And it’s not an act of will to silence the mind. You’re simply present and there is no attempt to try and control the thoughts or stop the thoughts or anything like that. You just are presence. And in that presence, if thoughts want to come up there is not much interest in them at all, so they don’t even come up. But like with anything, we’re not to used to that, so at first we have to get used to it. But it’s like anything, once you do get used to it, it’s like when you drive a car: you don’t have to think ok now I have to throttle down and and and, you just drive it, you don’t have to think about it. Just like when you we’re identified with the thoughts to begin with: you just did that automatically. You did not think oh I am going to identify with these thoughts, even though it takes effort to do that. And then, as you start to recognise that you become the observer of the thoughts, once that starts to happen, it kind of happens automatically. You see that to be cought in the thoughts is painfull. This being the observer just starts to happen and that’s less pain than being right in the thoughts, but then at soem point you start to see that being the observer is still painfull. Because there is still you and the thoughts. So only when really thoughts stop there is rest. That you don’t feel like you have to do anymore. If you are the observer you still fee like you have to do. You have to stay alert and things like that. |
| < | What you started with was, you said, the sense of presence is a little different then the sence of presense of a baby. It has simular qualities in that it is innocent and that there is no effort to control anything, but there is a knowing quality and a recognition of that. But there is not even a labeling. When you are just present and everything is as it is, everything appears to your senses and there is a registering of sight and sound and all the rest of it. But there is no energy expanded in labelling it or reaching for it or trying to get away from it. |
| > | Yes. |
| < | I have the experience the last few minutes that I hear you speak and sometimes, let’s say, what you say makes sense. In the sense that I hear what you say and sometimes even I hear you speak. |
| > | Yes. |
| < | And I have to go to my mind or my intellect or whatever to make sense out of it. And I had, let’s say, the courage or I took the guess to not do it. I once was doing this [blinking] with my eyes and even that’s enough to access the intellect and I just gave up and that’s so funny. Then you are talking and I hear exactly what you say and when there is a sentence or a word or something that I don’t get immediately, I have to go like ‘what is he saying’and when I didn’t do that, and then eh, a real strange experience. |
| > | Yeah. It’s not a state of the will |
| < | What is not |
| > | This state. |
| < | For me a remarkable thing is that I keep looking and looking and looking at you and I keep seeing your face. |
| > | Yes. |
| < | I hear people laugh, so I say more. When I look at other people after a minute or so the image fades away. |
| > | Yes. |
| < | Yes. |
| > | This is a state of nothing to do. Can you feel that? Finally at peace, you see, nothing to do. Nothing to manipulate, nothing to change. Not even to understand. |
| < | That one is very new. |
| > | So let’s look in this state. How does knowing happen? |
| < | The thought that comes is ‘there is no need to know’. |
| > | There is no need to know. |
| < | This one says [I point at my head] : nonsense. |
| > | There is no need to know. That’s really important. What knowing is necessary is there. Like to go to the toilet. Easy. |
| < | Or not. |
| > | Yeah, or not. |
| < | The moment I go into thinking, the need to know gets enormous. |
| > | And you can feel the effort and the whole strain, the whole sense of I and everything that is associated with it. |
| < | The last – now I go into thinking – eh. The last days, or today, last night, I don’t know, I’m kind of coming to: I have a core belief that I have to be able to understand everything |
| > | Yeah man. [in reaction on laughter:] Ja, that’s what you get when you loose control. And what is dawning on me here is that this need to know, this huge need to know is based on fear. |
| < | Yes. And then seeing the fear and not even having to do a single thing about what you’ve considered to be fear before. |
| < | Ah, here it is. My |
| > | This is a totally vulnerable state, you see, there is no defence in here. |
| < | I go to the chill out room. Thank you. |
| > | Thank you. |
Love