Weeklong Retreat held at Seminarhaus Engl. 90 minutes from Munich.
Main house of Seminarhaus Engl
Section of the Dharma Hall
Christopher
This is the final evening of our retreat together. This period of time is for questions and answers. You can ask about your experiences, the teachings, any issues that have arisen, and aspects of the methods and techniques.
Question 1
What is the difference between the ego and the self? You said ego is an intensification of the ‘I’ and ‘my’, as well as everything we identify with. Could you highlight the difference?
Christopher
Yes. Definitions of ego and self, including Western psychological/psychoanalysis, can differ from the ones we offer here. We regard the ego as a mental formation. At the centre of this formation is the sense of I or self. Past influences support the ego clinging to the ‘I’ and its view of itself and the surrounding world. This view, or ‘package’ that forms around the self, distorts the perception and the experience.
Ego obscures clarity, insight and understanding found present in all problematic states of mind, such as the five hindrances described in the tradition – blind desire for pleasure, negativity, boredom/apathy, restlessness/anxiety and fear/doubt. Ego obstructs peace of mind, showing in reactive patterns. Without these old influences, mental suffering cannot arise. Use of I, my and self shows a shorthand for the body and mind. The fact that I am sitting here does not confirm ego. I am interested in what you have to say. This interest does not confirm ego. Ego casts a shadow.
Through meditation, we see that the self is not the centre of attention. There are experiences of the absence of ‘I,’ self, ego, including personal history — all the formations that make us who we are. We see what happens through causes/conditions rather than self and ego.
Question 2
I experienced a lot of energy during meditation, but then afterwards I got very tired. Where does this tiredness come from?
Christopher
You feel energised during meditation because the energy expands and flows through your being. This energy supports the mind and body as a whole. When energy fades, it leads to tiredness. It will fade sooner or later.
Question 3
Does this tiredness happen during meditation or later in the day? Is there any indication when the transition occurs from having lots of energy to feeling tired?
When the energy is full, it often adapts to the shape of the body. Your cross-legged posture becomes the container for it. If you move or change the posture, you might feel the energy seeping out. Cells experience the loss as tiredness. You need clarity for the experience, whether full of energy or depleted. With lots of energy, you might grasp onto optimistic or ambitious views, “I want to…” This is a signal the ego begins to shape the view. Tiredness makes us vulnerable to reactivity, feeling low and pessimistic.
When we’re tired, our minds may wander, making us more susceptible to irritation from sounds or other stimuli around us. This is tiring. There may be other important things in your life that require energy, output, and connection.You can feel tired through resistance or avoidance. Keep exploring to allow the energies to move easily freely.
Give your mind a chance to rest. Remind yourself to conserve energy after an activity. I tell people who go to work and then go home to their family to save some energy for the children and partner. The same principle applies to yourself. Your mind may respond to your instructions to the mind to act in a supportive way.
Question 4
You mentioned that you’re not a big fan of chanting. Why?
Christopher
There’s a full range of chants containing beautiful, powerful statements of the words of Buddha. In my view, chanting is a bit like getting a packet of medicine, reading the instructions over and over again, and not taking the medicine.
The most common chant is probably the one of connection to the Three Jewels – Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha. ‘I go for refuge in the Buddha. I go for refuge in the Dharma. I go for refuge in the Sangha.’
One woman told me she experienced a crisis. Her husband had left her for a woman 20 years younger. She lost her job. Her husband wanted to sell the house immediately — a house that the couple lived in and loved for years.
Depressed, she could not sleep at night and felt like self-harming. She told me she began chanting the Three Jewels for hours until she could see light at the end of the tunnel. The chant saved her life, she told me. After that meeting, I appreciated the power of chanting.
Question 5
My mind kept collapsing onto the breath and body in a guided meditation on choiceless awareness. It is supposed to be open and spacious awareness. I feel like I am experiencing my breath/body in a small location. I’m trying to expand it, but it won’t open up. How can I change to an open and expansive awareness?
Christopher
You question shows you reject choiceless awareness. That’s the problem. Choiceless awareness carries the image of being open and spacious. Choiceless awareness means choiceless awareness. Non-duality embraces breath/body and open/spacious. Experiences of breath/body focus happens. Choiceless awareness includes what’s happening with the breath/body. This takes skill and practice to recognise this expression of choiceless awareness.
The breath/body is in a state of constant change. These sensations of the breath/body will change into something different. Stay true to choiceless awareness. Meditation on open and expansive awareness is a different meditation. In choiceless awareness, the space could be big or small. Explore choiceless experiences and receptivity within them. There are many insights to discover confirming the power of such a meditation.
Question 6
What is a jhana?
Christopher
Jhana refers to a deep meditative absorption that can arise in any posture Their are four significant depths revealing a profound happiness, joy, inner peace and equanimity. These experiences can arise in meditation and outside of meditation. All reveal a calm, concentrated mind including reflection n the first jhana. Absorption is an inner state of being releasing much energy and confirming wellbeing of the body-mind in such times.
Question 7
Why is it so important to explore choiceless awareness?
Christopher
It is a common experience in daily life. That’s why. Some experiences seem to emerge from nowhere, out of the blue (metaphor for the Infinite). We have no choice in the matter. Cause and conditions occur that bear no obvious relationship to self, to the world of I and my including welcome and unwelcome experiences. Keep meditating.
We have the potential to see at a very subtle level the arising, the staying and the passing of phenomena. These experiences reveal much the same as birth, life and death. Knowing choiceless experiences frees us up to see clearly without attaching all situations to the self. This is choiceless.
An important realm of perception and experience reveals infinite space. There is a genuine sense of the vastness of space. The world of objects shrinks in size and importance, including our existence of body-mind. There is no division of inner-outer space. This realm of experience opens our life up free from repetitive thinking about self and other.
The Sangha has a growing interest in experiencing and sharing such experiences of meditative absorptions and formless realms such as infinite space. Those who have had a taste of such experiences realise their potential for profound states of awareness and ongoing benefits for daily life. These experience are rarely forgotten.
Question 8
Hearing you talk about your daughter (Nshorna) makes me feel more connected to the Dharma than all the other retreats combined. I am curious about you as a person and as a teacher. I don’t want to inflate your ego by telling you how good you are. Would you recommend going on more retreats with teachers?
Christopher
You are asking a teacher of several hundred retreats and more in the past five decades. Keep your eyes open. Some teachers emphasise reduction of stress, intensity in the sitting posture, calm, insight, use religious forms, rituals, three jewels, eightfold path, loving kindness and explore liberation and emptiness of I, me and mine.
The depth of the Noble Eightfold Path, ethics and the Three Jewels contribute significantly to grounding in the Dharma. Practitioners explore mindfulness and meditation, love and compassion, self and non-self, emptiness and dependent arising.
Retreats and practices in daily life can make available all of these experiences and more.
Others develop experiences leading to deep absorptions into happiness and peace of mind. This happiness is sweet, profound and far more subtle than pleasure. Perceptions of the infinite realms take the breath away with the capacity to reduce the inflated and deflated self. Desire and striving to have and repeat gets in the way of these experiences springing from calm, clarity, practices and receptivity.
Question 9
When did you come into non-duality? I view the goal as non-duality, enlightenment and freedom.
Christopher
My childhood and upbringing were heavily influenced by Catholicism. I never felt distant from God. I cannot think of any moments when the link with God was broken. This life has been blessed with a foundation of ongoing support. Over the years, I have engaged in all kinds of exploration.
I love the word ‘God’.’ The Buddha did too. Brahma is th Pali/Sanskrit word for God. For example, he gave teachings on Brahma Vihara – Abiding with God. Dharma teachings do not require belief in God, nor the rejection of the belief. The Buddha’s approach is non-dual. That’s one of the reasons why I love the teachings so much,
I believe freedom includes the adventure of life, exploring consciousness and engagement with creatures, natural world and people. Sometimes, there is the risk of making errors of judgement. Such exploration requires the willingness to take full responsibility for what unfolds as a feature of the adventure. Life is far too short to make comfort and security the main priority.
I regard the best spiritual/religious traditions as free-spirited while remaining deeply committed to not bring any suffering whatsover into this world. Such an approach transcends controlling secular, religious and cultural orthodoxy that places such demands and stress on our life.
Dharma offers vast fields for exploration, welfare and awakeninig of oneself and others leaving no stone unturned.
Join one of my upcoming retreats in late July and October 2025 in the Waldhaus Buddhist Zentrum, Andernach, an hour from Bonn, Germany. See link below. Check out other retreats in your country or further afield.
https://buddhismus-im-westen.de/
May all beings uncover what has been hidden.
May all beings shine a light on everything
May all beings wake up the mind-body from entrapment.
www.insightmeditation.org
www.thebuddhawallah.org