ACI 10 «Руководство к образу жизни бодхисаттвы, часть I», занятие 8

Class Eight: How to Fight the Mental Afflictions, Part Two
3/27/97
transcribed by: Juliette Pegrum



166a.txt

In the meantime we are proposing to do mini retreats,there are two large houses
on the property which you can sort of see in the.. one of them is hidden
there,you can see one of them in the picture and they are connected by a hallway
which is well locked at night because there are ladies on one side and men on the
other and it will fit retreats of right now six to ten people each and there are two
kinds of retreats. What are we doing retreats there for,we had many days
there,many many arguements,many many things to decide but basically the
decision is this that place is a meditation place,it always for meditation and
Godstow,Godstow is the original name of the place and we are required by the
contract to keep the original name and it means in tibetan.Do you know? {plasac}
okay and we decided to dedicate it for meditation. These classes are very good
you are getting already alot of what a geshe would be getting in the
monestary,you have studied if you have been here from the beginning each one
of the five great books of Buddhism to different levelsand so
philosopically,mentally,intellectually you are just about where you should be and
that's good. I don't think you can meditate very well in New York city,we do
try,the greatest enemy of meditation is what?Sound and aside from our own
mental afflictions [laughter] we said that last week. We need to meditate ,there
are five great levels of spiritual realisations in buddhism called the five paths and
the movement between each path is done only in deep meditation,you cannot
get to the five paths unless you are in deep meditation you have to be able to
meditate deeply,so we really have been seeking a way in which we can do
meditation together and that it"s almost like your one arm is very very strong
your philosophical studies have been very good,you are very very well educated
Buddhists but your other arm which is meditation, you can't do very well unless
you get the opportunity to do it in a very quiet place,very good atmosphere in a
very concerntrated way. You really you should be trying to do one month
retreats and things like that. It takes about nine days for,I can tell you from
experience,to bring your mind to a meditative state,in retreat. We don't have
that much time and also we don't have the [unclear] yet so we are ging to start
with mini retreats just so you can get the taste of the proper way to meditate and
then as when we get the [unclear] we have already been offered it seems help to
build meditation cabins there, we have already been, someone has already
contacted us and offered to supply the cabins so that will come,but this is kind of
like to get ready and to start working on it so we will have weekend retreats
there and there will be two kinds of retreats there will be limited to ten
people,the most people that can ever go up on a weekend will be ten people it
can be any mix of men and women but they must stay in seperate buildings and
there will be two sorts of meditation retreats they will always be devoted to
meditation there won't be any philosophical classes there devoted the place will
have the energy and theme of going there to meditate.If you do a weekend
meditation say from Friday to Sunday from Friday evening to Sunday
affternoon there will be silence kept,there won't be talking and then there is a
pretty strict schedule of meditation and then there's a pretty strict schedule of
walking meditation and there is a pretty strict schedule of work mediation of
about two hours on Saturday so that you start to get into the energy of the place
okay. Each retreat will have a differrent theme every Sunday morning you will
take the one day vows,okay these are the vows that you take,those of you have
been to Kopan. We rsearched all the great retreat centres in the world we
consider Kopan to be the best we rated I.M.S. pretty high,the Insight Meditation
Society,and then we also visited some Sivavananda organisations because they
do very good retreats there for the past twenty-five years or so and we studied
all of their set-ups and we think it is important to do the one day vows,so you
take them on Sunday morning and then you keep them untill the next morning,
Monday morning which gives you something to take home with you,so you
would be leaving Sunday afternoon and you would be taking the vows home
with you to remember what you did all weekend. So it will be a structured
retreat,meditation,heavy meditation the place is extremely good for meditation
it is totally silent and there's a hundred achres of forest and meadows for the
walking meditation which we are convincing the town is totally necessary for tax
exemption and beautiful lakes there and a beautiful house there and the karma
of the place is also very powerful it was the previous owners were the founders
of UNICEF. So there was a man who spent his whole life trying to help children
who had been hurt in the war,in world war one and world war two and he spent
his whole adult life mostly working for free his name waws Morris Paye and and
he did not take a salary for many many years and he did it,that was his base for
his,that is where he lived and so the karma of the place is very sweet the karma
is very powerful. He was offered the Noble Prize but turned it down,he said
give it to UNICEF instead and it was eventually given to UNICEF so the karma
there is very sweet,it is a very powerful place,very quiet and it is also very close
by it takes about an hour ,just over an hour by train,as soon as we got the
property they built a train station in the town and this old lady said "I don't know
we have been trying thirty years and you Buddhists move in and they build a
train station",so the train station is a few miles away and we can go there from
Grand Central station and it takes about an hour and fifteen minutes I think and
it's like eight dollars and thats the shbeal. So two kinds of retreats will go on
there in the coming year you have a little thing on the inside called pre-arranged
retreats and they will be limited to ten people so and also we will try to make
sure that everyone can get into one if we have too many people then we will try
to share it,or try to split it up so that everyone will get a chance to go but those
will be retreats on those specific subjects and we have some training for the
leader of the retreats there are six people now trained and they will be leading
the meditation retreats so you can sort of pick the subject you like or the teacher
you like or the weekend that you like and you can talk to Micheal Wick,Micheal
is the co-ordinator for all the retreats at Godstow he lives in this area and he is
very available during the the day and evening,he'll he'll be taking all the names
and he'll be scheduling people and he will be doing all the work of co-ordinating
people and that's the,that will be the thing so if you want to sign up for any of
these retreats here you would contact him and it on first come first serve for
now if it gets to be too much of a problem we were at I.M.S they have a waiting
list of something like a year or something now there is a lottery system cos too
many people want to go so right now it is first come first serve maybe later on
we will have to go to a lottery or build new buildings there okay. The other
neat idea that we came up with is that if you want to do your own retreat you
can organise a retreat that doesn't conflict with one of the dates hereand you can
get,we are asking people to try to get six to ten people together to do a retreat
and you can organize your own retreat. Now there are some rules about
organizing your own retreat,first rule is you have to use one of the certified
teachers whose names are on this list for now later on we will certify other
people,more people thats mostly so we can insure that what goes on there is
really Buddhism and stuff like that you also have to,if you start your own retreat
or organize your own retreat you have to get one of the administrators on the
bottom,those are the people who are doing the rent work,they are making sure
that the food crew is all put together,that the groceries have been bought,that
the people have brought their linens,you have to bring your own linens,we don't
have any laundry service and things like that they're the people who are in
charge of the facilities for that weekend so if you decide to orgaize a retreat right
now they are the only people who are authorized to open the retreat and to set
you up so if you decide to have your own retreat you have to find someone to
lead it from this list then you have to find someone to be your ,in tibetan it is
called your {nyapa} , {nyapa} means is the food guy the guy with the key the
guy who turns on the heat the guy that makes sure you clean up the bathroom
and stuff like that,so right now you need to have one of those to organize a
retreat. We had alot of arguements about what to do financially,the place costs
eight hundred dollars a week whether we use it or not when it was offered to us
because the went bankrupt we said can we have just like a few achres of it and
they said take the whole thing or don't take anything so we had all these big
meetings we decided for the sake of the future we would try to take it we also
have a very
kind sponsor who is sponsoring half of the basically half of the cost for the next
nine years,something,nine or ten years so we do have a sponsor for that,so what
we are trying to do is recover half of the half of the maintenance which means
the heat,the insurance,the taxes which we are trying to get out of and things like
that we don't feel comfortable charging people to go there so we made a dirty
diabolical system ten people decide to do a retreat there that group between
themselves has to come up half of the maintenance cost we figure three hundred
and eighty-five dollars which means if you are gonna use the place for a three
day retreat we ask you,you ask your group to come up with three hundred and
eighty-five dollars and the idea is that you get Fran Parullo or someone with a
good job to go [laughter] and they pay three fifty [laughter] and the other nine
people pay four dollars and the idea is that the inside of your group you try to
encourage the people who have better incomes to pay more and the people who
don't or right now don't have a job or trying to get their feet on the
ground,young people at college they would pay less but it works out to about
thirty-eight dollars per head for three days there I mean the total thing up at
I.M.S not to criticize they run at a loss and it costs,if you count the transportation
and everything else it comes to about,I don't know,the course was a hundred
and twenty,so it is like two hundred and something for food and costs okay,by
the way that money does not include food the food is up to you,if your group
wants to eat well you know ear well,if your group wants potatoe chips
[laugther],let them have patatoe chips that is up to you guys okay,but that is the
concept and that you can start,Micheal has the calendar. One weekend a month
is reserved for the sangha use,for the monks and nuns one of the primary uses
of this property and one of the primary reasons it was given to this organization
was for building a monastery and nunnery so the monks and nuns are being
kind enough to let you come up and help foot the bill for the place [laughter],for
retreats so I mean eventually we plan that we would give twenty-five achres to
a monastery,twenty-five achres for a nunnery and then like twenty-five achres
would go towards retreat cabins I figure that we can fit maybe thirty retreat
cabins there on there it's nice it's big
[student:what about work weekends?]

Just what they say [laughs] and no we'll talk about it and then the other area of
the land we're thinking to have translation activities research activities like that.
About forty-five minutes away is one of the best tibetan libaries in the world
which is [not sure] place and he has pledged that we can use the place any time
we want free access to the libary there and he has also pledged that any time
Andy's ready to build a monastery he has a freight of heavy equipement which
he said we could just use it for free so things are ready there. Somebody asked
about the work weekends they are called {zaygay} {zaygay} means {zaygay
tuga dowa} it is in the Abhidharma Kosha fourth chapter and it means you get a
special karma from taking care of temples like the way Ken Rinpoche has taken
care of Rashi Gampil Ling those of you who are aware he pays almost all the
grounds costs there himself and he has planted all the trees there he did all the
sidewalks he did all the fences he did all the drive way he built the garage he
built his house and all of it is called {zaygay} {zaygay} means "it is a special
karma" that comes to you if you,if you help build or work on a place which is a
spiritual centre monastery,nunnery,stupa anyhting like that and it's supposed to
be according to the Ahbidharma some kind of extrordinary virtue like Leon did
it today he fixed the shower on the second floor [laughs] congratulations
[laughter]and that's a {zaygay} means its some kind of extrordinaraily powerful
karma so there will be there are scheduled two is it? Two {zaygay} work
weekends and that is just going to be work and it is fun you know it's going to
be just go up help re-build the fences there there are beautiful white fences there
some of them are broken,help clear away some of the trees that fall down from
time to time and help to clean out the water there are two nice streams there's a
natural spring there and we have to keep those clean and just try to serve the
place like that and that's just heavy duty weekend Fran Parollo has promised
that anyone that goes will have free food you said? There's free food [laughs]
but generally it will be alot of fun and a chance to get away from New York city
the air up there is really cool and the place is extremely nice eventually we have
to build a temple a main temple we have to build a monastery we have to build
a nunnery and all year retreat cabins so you can spend your whole days there in
retreat so we will talk about it and I am serious okay and you have to start doing
long retreats the natural progression of this course and of these classes is that at
a certain point you start doing long retreats say a month each and I would hope
that everyone here could get up to the point where they are doing like two a
year one month retreats and that's just the natural progression that you have to
do in your life first you start to study then you start doing short retreats then
you start doing longer retreats and then all of this stuff will click and all of those
things will actually happen to you all of things that we are always describing that
happen to you a certain stages you must be meditating heavy duty so now we
finally have a chance to do that okay so that is much good.Did I forget anything
major? Nope.

[student:Micheal what about beyond the cost of covering the activities donating
something]

Oh Stearwell says if that the thirty-seven dollars or what ever thats minimum
okay I mean we are asking if you go up there and you are a millionaire and you
have a good time,there will be like some box and if you throw in another five
hundred thousand or so thats all [laughter] and I mean we are just trying to
meet the maintenance costs but I really don't like to do it we have had horrible
debates about it we will have to give the place back we will lose the place by the
contract if we can't keep it up to a certain payment thats the contract that we
have,we cannot,we have to meet the expenses we cannot brake the up the
property we are not allowed to brake up the property maybe there are tantric
deities and maybe they wanted to make sure that the monks have enough land
two hundred years from now I don't know thet will not allow us to make a
[unclear ] of the property we have to keep it one piece and we have to keep it
up,so we're just trying to find a way to do that I believe that it's not,it wouldn't
be out of the question that maybe in ten or twenty years we would have a
hundred monks and nuns there and then maybe five hundred and then maybe a
thousand this is the idea this is the goal and then you know,a hundred peopole in
three year retreats or something,from New York city or in their sixties or
seventies [laughter] and [laughs] like that.Yeh Michael

[student:Can you say that the work weekends are free [unclear]

Really!

[student:yeh]

Okay

[student:[unclear]

Okay, the work weekends are free [unclear]

[student:Are they limited to ten also?]
I think they are limited to ten or not? Are they limited to ten? Yeh we have to
limit it because of the zoning right now okay. You are visitors.

[student[unclear]

Also one more thing like if your new here and you don't know five other people
that you could get together in a gang and go up together then check this last
thing here the last thing on the form here is that look I don't know five other
people I would like to get in on one of these retreats that people organize and if
there's other people organizing retreats and they only have six or seven people
and they have three empty spaces left,please contact me because I don't know six
other people in this group or something like that you are welcome to do that
and anybody in this group can start a retreat it's totally up to you anyone in this
room can go around and get five friends five to nine friends and organize your
own retreat the only rule in order to keep the place from being trashed is that
you have to have one of the administrators there with you and you have to have
one of the teachers there that can keep you on the meditation schedule and thats
it that's the only rule right now,yeh.

[student:what if you wanted to do one that is not listed here?]

She asked if you what if you wanted to do a retreat on a subject that is not
here ,that's the whole point that's the whole idea you pick your own subject
also,we tried to list specialties of these people but if you have anything else
which you would like to organize a retreat about you contact that teacher and
say would you be willing to do a mandala retreat like a whole weekend on
mandala and meditating on mandala thats fine that's fine you can do that okay
and I think that you should use your imagination and you know it's really a it's
really up,we were really very addicted to the place you stay there a day and you
don't want to go home and it's really beautiful so you are welcome to go up,by
the way somebody asked can you do it during the week,you can do it during the
week fine no problem you know if you want to do a five day retreat with six
friends that's also,you are welcome to do that .

[student[unclear][laughter]

Michael Wick has to investigate the fact that there is a work weekend and a
sangha retreat on the same date of the week in September I hope it doesn't mean
that the sangha has to work [laughter] okay.
[silence]

Okay tonight I would like to introduce you to [unsure] they are called
{nymen} ,oh by the way one more thing about Conneticut people from every
MST centre are welcome to organise retreats we are sending this out to
everyone in an MSTC centre where ever they are and you are welcome to bring
friends that you recommend okay so if you know someone who is not in MSCC
and you thing they would like to come you are welcome to bring them but you
are the one who is vouching for them and if they take off their clothes and run
around and stuff like that you will [laughter] which has happened we will
not,you will be responsible and next time you want to bring someone we will
say do you remember that guy you know [laughter],so it's just sort of a system
to prevent anything strange from happening we are still new in that town the
mayor,I had along talk with the mayor he had alot of strange concerns about us
and illegal concerns about us and we don't want to make any waves okay there's
a country club across the street and it costs twenty thousand dollars to join it
each year and we have to watch it so we are being a little bit strict about who
goes up anyone in this class is welcome and anyone from any other MSTC centre
is welcome and any one that you vouch for right now maybe later on we will
open it up when we have a huge dormitory and all that.Okay say {nymen}

[class:{nymen} ]

{nymen}

[class{nymen} ]

{nymen} means {nymen nyomo} means "secondary mental affliction" you met
the big six now meet the next twenty okay there are several explanations of why
they are called {nymens} some people say because they are close to a big
affliction some people say because they come from the big afflictions I kinda like
the second explaination but they are secondary in the sense that they like if you
have desire then that qualifies you for like six more mental afflictions which are
not quite so powerful okay and thats the idea of a seconary mental affliction. I
am going to give you very quickly the twenty okay the homework says you
have to name and describe any six of them on your homework and on your quiz
so you can sort of pick your favourites [laughter].
[silence]
say {trower}

[class:{trower} ]

{trower} means "anger' okay thats by the way why it's not so great to translate
the primary mental affliction as anger okay. That's what? What primary mental
affliction does this stem from?

[student:disliking]

Disliking things okay and this is sort of a natural progression of that alright it
starts with not liking something then it's like grrrr okay this is real anger this is
like what happens when your boss criticizes you at work stuff like that okay? It
is supposed to be the lead up to actually hurting somebody okay,it it it inspires
you to hurt somebody.

[silence]

Say {kunzing}

[class:{kunzing} ]

{kunzing} is a it is hard to translate into english it means "keeping your anger
over a longer period of time" like {trower} is the first blow up and then
{kunzing} is where you sort of feel angry at the person for days,or weeks,or
years you know I had a very nice nun in Tuson what's her name?

[student:{Tutrun Tutren} ]

{Tutrun Tutren} and she was describing how this phenomenon of how someone
says something to you that you don't like and you remember it for years and
they don't have any recollection of saying that to you,you know what I mean
years later you are still obsessing on this thing and still mad at them and they
were just joking or something and that was like two years ago and the only one
that remembers it is you and that is {kunzing} okay {kunzing} means I call it
keeping anger and retaining anger okay it is sort of like bearing a grudge okay
but it's not quite that it's retaining anger over a period of time {trower} is the
first five minutes or ten minutes after the person has left and you are still
seething and you still feel angry like an hour or a day or a life time thats
{kunzing} okay.
[silence]

Say {sigpa}

[class:{sigpa} ]

{Sigpa} .Do you guys know the word sig? Sig means,literally it means "to burn
something",to burn,but this verb this noun {sigpa} this is like irritation okay it's
like starting to get hot someones been bothering you,bothering you,bothering
you and you are starting to build up some kind of your heart starts to beat faster
it's not anger yet it's pre-anger okay {kunzing} is post-anger {sigpa} is pre-anger
and it's like,how do we translate it irritation okay and it's main functionn is to
make you say say something bad you know stupid,but it's the feeling that leads
up to that it's the way you start to get your heart starts to burn a little bit it
means irritation or starting to get irritated with this person and it's function,job is
done when you start to talk when you start to say something to that person
harsh harsh okay,that is called {sigpa} .

say {numsay}

[class {numsay} ]

{numsay}

[class:{numsay} ]

This is sometimes {numpa saywa} {numpa saywa} means we translated it as
"malice" but what it means is the state of mind in which you are ready to hurt
somebody you know it is a decision to hurt somebody either verbally,physically
or what ever but you in your mind you have decided to hurt somebody.Here
comes my specialty if anyone wants to lead a weekend retreat I can do this one.
Say {tugdoe} .

[class:{tugdoe} ]

{tugdoe}

{Tugdoe} means "jealousy" and it's just that I'll give you the definition in Tibetan
I mean translated there's a nice translation by Janice's mother Annie Chinila in
that green logic book which you can get at the Three Jewels it says this is a part
of anger an inner disturbance of the mind which out of a desire for gain and
honour cannot bare the site of another persons gain or happiness. Definition of
jealousy.

[Student:once more please].

[Laughs] Okay mainly it's a disturbance of the mind it wants people to pay
attention to me and it is unhappy about other peoples good fortune but their
happiness and it's a kind of anger it's a form of anger and again no need to
mention that it is totally hypocritical for a bodhisattva you are here by
honourary bodhisattvas okay and it's just totally wrong it is the opposite of
bodhisattva mind it's,a bodhisattva is going to go to hell if necessary to make
sure that other people get what they want and jealouy,someone else has got
what they wanted and you are like you can't stand it you know it's crazy it's
mental affliction and mental illness all in one you know it's like it's crazy to not
want someone else to be happy okay or to want to wish that it didn't happen to
them okay and it is very common in Dharma centres you have to be careful
okay, the mental afflictions cannot stand this kind of activity the demons that live
in the world and they do live in the world thet cannot bare this kind of thing
going on thats why it is so rare you know there's not alot of bodhisattva
charatara classes going on tonight in New York city although there are so many
million people here they can't stand it they get very very upset about it so what
they would like the most is if these Dharma brothers and sisters could somehow
split up from each other or get jealous of each other or like that would please
them more than anything so just to spit at them lets be let's not have any
jealousy and just be careful it grows very easily and stays in your mind and it's
very,very sick for a person who says they are on the bodhisattva track and I
confess to it and I admit it to everyone here you know I have it all the time and
it's bad and we have to try and stomp it out before it ever gets a foot hold
among these minds here so keep it in mind okay. Alright number six [pause].

Say {gyou}

[Students:{gyou} ]

{Gyou}

[Students:{gyou} ]
Um this is not the {gyou} with the [unsure] head letter which means "cause" and
this is not the {gyou} that is {gyimla} which means "maya",meaning illusion and
it also not the {gyou} with the [unsure] letter which means large intestine
[laughter] this is the {gyou} which means falsity or insincerity in the sense that
you will not admit your faults it's some kind of not being straight with yourself
not being sincere and trying not to admit that you have anything wrong with
you and what happens if you have {gyou} is that no-one can teach you anything
okay like if you do not admit to yourself that you have any short comings or
that you have anything to learn then no-one can teach you anything so {gyou}
has aa special function of blocking you from hearing it when you go to a
teaching cause you don't think it applies to you nothing,"i don't have that
problem" that's {gyou} okay.

[]Student:denial?]

Denial would be,yeh thats probably a nice way of putting it [pause].

Say: {yower}

[Students:{yower} ]

{Yower}

[Students:{yower} ]

{Yower} means "to shake like that",an earthquake is called {Sywom} they are
related {yower} means to trying to think of a way,it's to put on good qualities
that you don't have okay what do you want to call it I don't know..It's like
pretending to be very holy when you are not,pretense is good,by the way it is
very hard to translate some of them don't have good english ..words,but
{yower} means you want other people to honour you,you want other people to
respect you so you try to pretend that you.

[Student: hypocrite]

Like a hypocrite that you try to pretend that you have some qualities that you
don't have.There's the story about he guy who he wasn't doing any mandala
offerings or something,nop his alter was a big mess and then he wanted,he had
some important sponsors coming so he spent alot of time he fixed up his alter
really nice and then he realized that he had {yower} so he took a big pile of dirt
and he threw it all over the altar just before the sponsors get there and that was
an honest act and then some lama was teaching in another part of Tibet and he
said somebody just did something very virtuous [laughter] he had esp and he
could see and he said "someone has admitted their own hypocrasy and it's a
great spirtual event that has happened",you know,it's really cool.

[Student:[question]

Say it again.

[Student:[question]

Eh... yeh put on.Say {morsar newar}

[Students:{morsar newar} ]

{Morsar newar}

[Students:{morsar newar} ]

{Morsar newar} mor,mor the ancient meaning of this is that mor means "your
face" and sar means "to be hot" and it means "to blush" and {morsar} like if you
are debating someone at Sera and they something stupid you just go like
that,like you should be ashamed for saying such a stupid thing your debating
on,you don't clap your hands or anything you just go [laughter] like that so
{morsar} means "shame",{mosar newar} means "lack of shame".Shame here
means the opposite of this,by the way {mosar yerpa} is that you are ashamed to
do a bad deed because you yourself would be embarassed to yourself,it's like
some kind of self esteem thing this is not worthy of me ,I am a Buddhist,I am a
monk,I shouldn't be doing this thing and you stop you hold yourself back thats
{mosar} .{mosar newar} is the opposite you know like you don't have that
quality you don't hold yourself back and this referrs to shame in the your,Isa
always say in the privacy of your own room okay {mosar} is functioning
internally and no-one else can see it ,it means that in your own room or you
know somewhere where there is money there and if you stole it no-one would
ever know {mosar} is what keeps you from stealing it {mosar} is what keeps
you from doing a bad deed even if no-one else will ever know thats {mosar
newar} so it's important to understand that this eh.. mental affliction is the lack
of that okay,this mental affliction is doing bad deeds in private okay and thats
{mosar newar} .
[pause]

Say {toaw mepa}

[Students:{toaw mepa} ]

{Toaw mepa} you can shorten it to {toaw me} that's more common okay cut
that,the short,the short,the one we always use in the monestary is {toaw me}
okay .{Toaw me} means "the same state of mind" it's the opposite of {chow yer}
{chow yer} is I won't do this bad deed because it will have certain repercussions
on other people it will hurt other people okay thats {chow yer} the opposite of
thise is avoiding a bad deed when you are just about to do something wrong
you hold back because you are afraid of how it will impact on other people you
say such and such a person will get hurt or such and such a person will lose faith
in Buddhism if they see me doing this okay and that is {chow yer} this is the
opposite okay this one says I don't care what other people think I'm going to go
a head and do what I want to do and we translated it as lack of consideration just
because, considering the effect on others and not to consider the effect on others
is {chow mepa} according to the Abhidharma Kosha system which is not the
system I am using for this presentation the last two mental afflictions are present
in every case of none virtue any time you do something wrong you have one of
these last two there to some extent you don't have the self esteem the spiritual
self esteem to avoid this for your own purposes and you don't have the
consideration of what it,how it might impact other people either and that's the
Abhidharma system says that. Yeh.

[Student:[question]

I think it should be rather conscious you know when Je Tsongkapa get's into that
and it's kind of it should be rather conscious okay.

[Student:[question]

I don't know it just means some kind of consideration and {chow yer} is to have
that consideration I have never seen it in any other applications there are similar
words that mean tax same sound they maybe related they maybe not,okay say
{charpa} .

[Students:{charpa} ]
{Charpa}

[Students:{charpa} ]

{Charpa} is "hiding your faults" okay remember the other one was effecting
spirtual qualities that you don't have and this one is hiding the bad qualities that
you do have okay,it's especially important in the Vinaya if a monk brakes even a
minor vow and if we have {cherpa} if we try to hide it from the other monks
then it is much more serious if we admitt it quickly then the karma is much less
and the Vinaya consequence is much less so it is very important to ,time is a
factor with {cherpa}       okay     the longer you hide something the karma
exponentially builds and the quicker you admit it to someone the better okay so
if you have friends in California and you do a bad deed at night call them
immediately you know,because they are about three hours behind,don't wait
until the next morning you know the karma is much more powerful by the next
morning okay,it's very important to admit the things you do and not to hide
them okay and sooner or layer it comes out anyway and people are like dogs
they can smell people around you they know,they look at your eyes for thirty
seconds the way your eyes go and they know you people know other people
they sense other people the way,we used to have this really great dog called
Rusty that [unclear] and if a person walked through the door who didn't like
dogshe would just bite them right away [laughter] and you know they have this
kind of instinct and people are the same you know are the same you know you
can try to hide your bad qualities believe me everybody knows just admit it and
clean up your act you know it is much easier to admit it and to clean up your act
than to continue with the very difficult task of hiding it you know and sooner or
later it comes out anyways so better just not to have anything to hide and if you
have a bad quality that you can't stop then just admit it to other people and work
on it you know,a Buddhist should just be an open book you know and just admit
everything about yourself and fix it,but it is this act of hiding it which can create
some kind of denial in yourself and then you and then you don't fix it you know
you stop fixing things and so don't have {cherpa} {cherpa} is people shouldn't
know that I have this particular bad qualities.Eh yeh.

[Student: [question,unclear]

He asked the question that and number six ,let me see the definition of number
six means out of a desire for gain fame and honour and it's primary function is
spiritual instruction it's to shut you of from spiritual instruction some kind of
dishonesty {cherpa} is more like wanting,more like a Watergate state of mind it
wants to cover up it wants to do a cover up.

[Student:[unclear]

[laughs] Dawn says your friends will get bored if you are always confessing your
jealousy in front of classes and stuff.

[Student:[unclear]

It does,he says Atisha,Atisha used to carry around a little stupa and every time
he had a bad thought he put it down prostrate to it and confess and there are all
these stories, Master Atisha sorry, there are all these stories of him being on the
road you know everybody riding horses and he used to say "stop,everyone stop
" and they would stop their horses and he would get down take his stupa you
know protrate and confess that he just had a bad thought and they couldn't get
to where they were going all the time he kept stopping you know and I guess if
Master Atisha can do it Lord Atisha [laughter] then we can do it [unsure] right,I
don't know with in reason I,by the way if it stops having an effect meaning, you
know, Rinpoche when I used to do my {num chypas} would say hey, I am tired
of hearing that one can you just fix it you know [laughter] and it's alot easier to
fix it okay but if you can't fix it it is still better to keep telling somebody and if
you break a bodhisattva vow you know the proceedure alright some of them
have to be confessed infront of certain numbers of friends and they don't have to
be people with bodhisattva vows they just have to be someone that understand
about the bodhisattva vows ,when you break the secondary vows you must go
to a certain number of other people and admit what you did immediately you
know and I have like telephone friends like really all over the country and we
call each other and when we break one we call each other and we say I broke
that one if you break a primary bodhisattva vow what? If you break it in a
certain,totally then you have to take it over again okay.Say {sena}

[Students:{sena} ]

{Sena}

[Students:{sena} ]

{Sena} means,I don't know if there is a good word in,I mean there are alot of
colloquial words,cheap,stingy okay doesn't want to give anything wants to keep
everything,tight fisted,parsomonious.

[Silence]

Say {giyapa}

[Students:{giyapa} ]

{Giyapa}

[Students:{giyapa} ]

You wouldn't have any mental afflictions okay for example pride,pride is for......

[end of side one]

{Giyapa} in colloquial tibetan means "fat", chubby as a metal affliction it means
"focusing on your own temporary good qualities and being stuck up about
them" okay like I am very beautiful or I am very strong or I am very smart or I
am very spiritual and that's {giyapa} okay it's like a stuck up, puffed up yeh
{giyapa} okay alright. Say {madaypa} .

[Students:{madaypa} ]

{Madaypa}

[Students:{madaypa} ]

{Daypa} means "faith" {madaypa} means "lack of faith" not feeling faith okay
and obviously objects towards you should feel faith you know say the Dalai
Lama okay and {madaypa} is almost a kind of laziness or something where you
are just like you don't feel that admiration that you should feel it's sort of a
spiritual admiration laziness or something like that okay where you are just like
"oh he's just a normal guy,who cares" you know like that. That's {madaypa} .
How many mental afflictions total, now? Twenty-six okay and if we wanted to
spend the time how many?

[Students:Eighty-four thousand].

Eighty-four thousand variations okay these are just the top twenty-six okay
eighty-four thousand varients. Say {laylo} .

[Students:{laylo} ]

{Laylo}

[Students:{laylo} ]

{Laylo} sounds like {laylo} okay it means "laziness" okay laying low this is
probably one of the six that you can put on your homework [laughter]. Spiritual
laziness specifically it's opposite is {tundruk} and Shantideva {tunka trela dewa}
which means "a lack of joy in doing goodness" okay that's the worst kind of
laziness but lounging around your house and wasting your holy lifetime is also
{laylo} so even normal laziness is also {laylo} the ultimate {laylo} is to not take
joy in spiritual things. Say {barmaypa} .

[Students:{barmaypa} ]

{Barmaypa}

[Students:{barmaypa} ]

{Barmaypa} means "some kind of carelessness", not being careful in your
spiritual life okay they say the best way to get {barmaypa} is to have a few beers
okay they say that so if you want to know what {barmaypa} is it's sort of like
good inhibition or something like that and then you lose it when you get drunk
and then you are more likely to do something bad.

[Student:[question]

This means not having it not being careful not being spiritually mindful okay.
Say {jengay}

[Students:{jengay} ].

{Jengay}

[Students:{jengay} ].

{Jengay} is forgetting yourself or losing focus in meditation when you study the
art of meditation in A.C.I course number three {jengay} is in there as one of the
faults of meditation and it's where the object is you lose the object totally forget
about it being clear or not clear or intermitant or not intermitant your mind is
totally on to something else and that is {jengay} it's just you forget yourself
completely and it can function it can be all during the day like you decide I did
my four forces of purification this morning and I will not yell at my boss the
whole day and that's my restraint you know and then and then you just forget it
and yell all day long you know and then you get home and you say oh yeh I was
going to do that you know that's {jengay} {jengay} is totally forgetting some
virtuous thing that you were going to do and also in meditation to just totally
lose the object okay you know it's not like you were just distracted slightly you
lost it all together you don't even know what you were meditating about it
happens to me all the time. Say {sayshin myimba} .

[Students:{sashin myimba} ]

{Sashin myimba}

[{Stuents:{sashin myimba} ]



{Sashin} means "some kind of awareness" self awareness {myimba} means "not
being that way" in meditation this is the state of mind which is acting as the
alarm okay like if the mind starts to wander this state of mind is watching the
mind there's a state of your meditating,here's the mind that is meditating and
{sashin} is over here watching you know like a watch dog you can call it watch
dog mind {sashin mayimpa} is losing watch dog mind and when ever the mind
starts to wander this mind says hey hey you've started to wander and then
{drengpa} comes recollection and says get back here and then {sashin} stands up
again and watches you know and then the mind starts to get dull and {sashin}
says hey hey something is going on and the awar.. recollection brings it back up
it's two seperate mental functions {sashin} is the watch dog it's the red flag okay
it goes up {Sashin myimpa} means you don't have any red flags going of in your
mind you do what ever you want and nobody is raising the alarm there is no
part of you saying hey hey something is going on here it's mind the enemy is
mind really when you get to {sashin myimpa} you are just not having, you said
awareness, guardian awareness that's not bad. Say {moogpa} .

[Students:{Moogpa} ].
{Moogpa}

[Students:{moogpa} ].

{Moogpa} is literally the tibetan word for fog and it means "a dullness of the
body" or the mind like if you had a big meal and you did not have much sleep
the night before or you have a big lunch or something that's {moogpa} that state
of mind is {moogpa} and it's just some kind of stupid dull low level, dull state of
mind mental dullness something like that foggy mind and it's {torpa} it's like it's
it's self afflicted you know you did it to yourself when you shouldn't have stayed
out so late you shouldn't have eaten so much and then you get the rerward for it
you know your just like and it's like when you are at work around three o'clock
if it's like my office okay that's called {moogpa} . It tends to promote the other
mental afflictions if you allow yourself because of your appetite to or because of
other reasons to get into {moogpa} you are setting yourself up for otrher
mental afflictions you know it is like being tired and dull and then an
opportunity comes along to do something wrong or to think some anger or
something {moogpa} is very fertile field for those other mental afflictions okay.
Say {numyang} .

[Students:{numyang} ]

{Numyang}

[Students:{numyang} ]

{Numyang} is distraction mental distraction like your mind is being attracted to
a pleasant object.

[Student:What do you call it when you always like forget you keys].

I don't think that is mental affliction,she asked about forgetting your keys.

[Student:You know how you always forget about certain things a kind of a
block].

I don;t think forgetting your keys is a mental affliction okay.

[Student:what about misplacing?]
It's you know the {jengay} the mental affliction of {Jengay} has to be aimed at a
virtuous object like you forget that you weren't going to yell at your boss today
or you forget the object that you are meditating on or something like that eh
yeh.

[Student:[question].

That would be that last one it's pretty good yeh that's pretty good both physical
and mental it is important to say.Do you have a question?

[Student:The difference between sixteen and seventeen].

I was afraid you were going to ask me that in meditation {jengay} is losing the
object completely okay and it happens at the very low levels as the meditation
occur you know as you get better at meditating you rarely have {jengay} early
on in your meditational career you get alot of {jengay} it just like you just wake-
up for a minute and you say I forgot totally what I was meditating about you
know I don't even remember what I was meditating about it's at a very initial
point at your meditating career some people that initial point last twenty years
but [laughter] but it's that's you know you get to a pretty decent level of
meditation it doesn't happen any more {seshe mayimba} is where the guarding
mind which goes all the way upto buddhahood you know it is there all the way
upto buddhahood it's the state of mind which is watching the mind and is raising
the alarm like I mean a buddha, as you are progressing along the path pretty
high you would never have {jengay} again especially in meditation you would
never forget totally what you were meditating about you wouldn't be that bad
but {seshe myimba} {seshen} is something that you have to have all the way up
I mean all the way up to buddhahood or close to it you could have periods
where your mind is not calling the alarm and not saying hey wait a minute you
were supposed to be meditating you know wait a minute osmething is going on
here there's a mental affliction coming in you know close the door you know
wake up it's the wake up call okay and that is the difference between those two
so {numyeng} number nineteen is distraction towards a pleasant object and it's a
kind of desire it's it's it's it comes from that main mental affliction of wanting
things ignorantly okay. Say {gerpa}

[Students:{gerpa} ].

{Gerpa}
[Students:{gerpa} ].

{Gerpa} is a also during meditation it referrs to being unable to keep your mind
one pointed sometimes it is translated as scattering you just find yourself unable
to keep your mind on a single thought or single point and I think it must be very
typical in Manhattan and even with your personal life or my personal life having
too many projects going on in a macro way being unable to focus on things in a
meditational way it's going off your mind going off to other subjects {gerpa} can
also be towards a virtuous object like you canbe trying to focus on a Buddha
image and then start thinking about the charity you are going to perform at two
o'clock today that is {gerpa} and it is considered a bad deed you know once you
have decided to focus on a single virtuous object it's considered {gerpa} to then
get distracted to start thinking about all the good things you are going to do
today okay because the point of the meditation was to keep your mind on one
virtuous object does that mean you can't do many virtuous things at once as you
progress along the bodhisattva path you are encouraged to become multi
facetted {unsure] has a thousand arms you know the meaning of a thousand
arms is as you progress higher you should be able to juggle more virtuous
thoughts and that's no problem that becomes a good deed those of you who
have a {dakyay} practice Rinpoche,Ken Rinpoche twenty years ago twenty-five
years ago how can I be one pointed about this thing that has forty thousand
different visualisations in it and [unsure] Rinpoche said it's one practice it's one,
it's one movie going on you know and you focus on it from beginning to end
and that is one object now that is one pointedness so a bodhisattva once you get
up to that sort of strength spiritually you can have many objects of focus because
it's one spiritual life you know it is all part of one big network of virtue that you
are doing it's all one pointed virtue so it comes a point where it says that as you
progress further you get busyier it's okay as long as you are focusing single
pointedly on it last point then we'll take a break there's a verse in Master
Shantideva where he says you should love the path you know love the,get
attatched to the methods you have learned to fight your mental afflictions and
also please be sure to develope hatred for your mental afflictions and the verse is
very cool but you won't get the verse tonight because we couldn't finish it we
consider doing an all nighter there were to many we tried but we couldn't finish
last week but anyway next week it is a very beautiful verse okay I want all of
you to go out and try and develope attachment and hatred okay attachment to
what ?

[Student:[unclear]
For punching out the mental afflictions. Hatred for wat?

[Student: [unclear]

For this great enemy that has caused you all your mental and physical suffering
and [not sure] get's into this big debate he say's are these mental afflictions or not
you know is loving or being attached to the path and the war against the mental
afflictions is that a mental affliction itself and is it a mental affliction to hate your
hatred or to hate your own anger and he gets into this big debate because
unfortunately there's an early sanskrit commentary which says then later these
two mental afflictions and these two ideas will be finished you know there is a
later sanskrit commentary which says these two mental, he doesn't say exactly
mental afflictions but he says these two attitudes will be finished so many
commentators have taken them to mean that they are mental afflictions and that
okay you put up with them for a while and later your'll over come them the two
mental afflictions are enjoying the war loving to fight the mental afflictions and
being spitting on the mental afflictions and hating them you know and [unsure]
says that is not the point at all, cause if you read the verse carefully and if you
know tibetan you can read it more carefully he says {matowpa} which "these are
not mental afflictions" okay what that commentary means is once you've
punched out the mental afflictions you know once you have knocked them out
well then you won't have to do those two things you won't have to have a love
for that war anymore and you won't have to have this hatred for these guys as
they exsist in your mind because they won't exsist in your mind at that point so
then you will lose those two attitudes it doesn't mean they are mental afflictions
so what he is saying is that it is fine too love buddhism to love the war love
making war on the mental afflictions and then he is saying it's fine to spit on
your mental afflictions you know every time you get jealous you should take
great joy in being pissed off at your own jealousy you know very good very
appropriate get angry at your jealousy and very, very appropriate for buddhists
once you have kicked them out of your mind then you won't have to do that
anymore and that's where he said it we are gonna take a break and then when
wwe get back we are going to talk about the possibility of kicking the mental
afflictions out of your mind completely and exactly how does that happen is it
possible to beat this enemy in such a way that he never comes back.

[Break]

It's just the ideal of a bodhisattva, I swear to think like a bodhisattva, I swear to
try to get to a point where I would give the rest of my life to other beings to help
them reach enlightenment I'll get there first and on the way I will help them and
on the way I will really help them that's all you are doing you know it's not like a
you don't have to cut your arm open or anything like that okay that comes later,
no [laughter] okay we will try to go faster now Shantideva, Master Shantideva
gets into this long part next where he talks about is it possible to beat the mental
afflictions you know like what kind of war is this going to be is this going to be
like a normal war or not, you know, are we going to beat Germany and then
twenty years later they build up again and we have to fight them again you
know is that the kind of war it is or what kind or war is it and he discusses, sorry
[Julia] [laughter] my grandma was there but is this the kind of war when they're
gonna go back and regroup and build up their strength again or is it possible,is it
even theoretically possible to wipe out the mental afflictions permenantly and
then Master Shantideva gets into this verse which is very sweet and he says if
you think about it all the mental afflictions come from what? Ignorance which is
the tendency to see things as...

[Student's:self exsistent]

Self existent which is a mistaken state of mind okay it is a mistaken state of mind
it's a misperception it's a misunderstanding it is focusing on the world in a way
which is unreal the world is not that way and ignorance thinks it is that way so
all of the bad thoughts that you have the twenty-six that we have done the
eighty-four thousand that we don't have time to do they are all based on one
mental function which is mis-understanding your world you know mis-
interpretating your world and because of that says Master Shantideva it is
possible to wipe out the mental afflicctions permenently and once you cut the
root then you wouldn't have to worry about them anymore it's not like your
gonna be fighting, fighting, fighting and then you control your anger and then
you don't watch it for a couple of weeks and then it start's to come back like a
bad weed or something like that mental afflictions are not like that if you can
destroy them from the root which if you can understand emptiness you can
reach a point where they will not exsist anymore and they do not come back
they cannot come back because thet must be based if you were in Massacussets
they must be based at the rawest forms of liking and disliking which are the
rawest form of mental affliction are themselves predicated on mis-understanding
the world you know if you didn't mis-understand the world you couldn't get
those mental afflictions so therefore it is possible to destroy them forever and
they will not come back and that's very cool ,ah yeh.

[Student:[question,unclear]
In the next verse {laughter] Master Shantideva discovers, discusses the secret for
seeing things that way which we talked about up in massachusettes also really
out of six stages of mental afflictions growing the first stage is what can you
remember {up chmpa mewer} it's ignorance in the seed form as you go into
your next life it's the ignorance seeds for ignorance that you carry into your next
life and then even in the womb they start to grow you were right yeh the
ultimate point is that you have to be able to remove the seeds also and that's
true, eigth bodhsattva level or going into nirvana on a Hinayana track you
remove the seed for ignorance you can't have them anymore you can't have the
seeds for ignorance you cannot have the seeds anymore for thinking things are
self exsistent and all mental affliction depends on that and if that were not in
your mind then you could say that mental affliction be removed permenantly
from, he gets into a really sweet verse after that he says well is there some place
where they could hide out okay they don't go back home and get started again
but could they go to a third country and hang out and hide for a while is there
any place else that the mental afflictions could go if you cut their home base in
your consciousness if you cut their home base which is your ignorance well
could they hang out in some other part of your being and then get back at you
later somehow so that Master Shantideva goes through three possibilities let's
see where else would they hide out you know and he makes a list. Three
alternative hide outs for the mental afflictions enemies once you have kicked
their rear ends okay. Say {suksob yulah minay} .

[Student:{suksob yulah minay]

{Suksob yulah minay} the critical word here is {yule} which sometimes means
"country" but here means "object of your perceptions" okay what is the yule of
the I conciousness?     Colours and shapes what is the {yule}        of the ear
conciousness? Sounds okay so is it possible for the mental afflictions if you cut
their home base in your mind could they like hide in the objects for a while and
then come back and get at you later Master Shantideva is going through all the
possibilities you know could they go out into colours and shapes could they go
out into Tony Braxston's latest song and then hide there and then come back
later and get you you know so he discusses that he actually gets into it is it
possible for the mental affliction tendencies to park in the external objects of
your senses and your mind then come back and get you later of possibilities
okay and then he says no it is not possible why?

[Student:[unclear]
Well he asks the following question can arhats see colours and shapes so do
arhats get mental afflictions? No okay so if mental afffliction were by nature
something inherant in the world you know if it is some problem of the world
that we have anger you know if the problem is not in the mind but it is in the
world then anybody that lived in the world and that saw New York city would
get mental afflictions but it's not true people can reach Nirvana they can go to
Manhattan they can look at the Empire State Building and not get mental
afflictions so the mental affliction tendencies do not lie out in outer objects of our
senses they cannot hide out there he says. Yeh

[Student:[question][unclear]

{Nimay} means "they do not stay" I like to say they don't park and then there's
in the longer form it says by nature in the {yule} in the objects of viual forms
and the rest okay they don't stay in your outer world they can't if they could
then arhats could get mental afflictions. Say {mixo}

[Students:{mixo}

{Bongolah}

[Students:{bongolah} ]

{Mineh}

[Students:{mineh} ].

I mean what are all the possibilities for our mental afflictions to hang out at if
they are not in your mind they are not in your consciousness well maybe they
are in the object of your consciousness meaning the colours the shapes and the
sounds of the world but if they hang out there then arhats would also get mental
afflictions well what about if they hang out in the sense powers themselves in the
sense organs you know what if they could go and hide in your visual optic nerve
okay what we call the sense powers in buddhist philosophy what if thet could
stay in your ear or in the power of hearing or in the power of touch by the way
if you aliminate the mind and the sense power and the objects there ain't no
place else for them to go then you can say with finality they're dead if you get
them out of your mind they cannot stay even in an enlightened state in different
places of your being and this says {mic} {mic} means "the eye" {sor} means
"etc" {wambolah} means "those sense powers" {nimay} means "they don't stay
there" they cannot stay there because everybody knows that even a person who
is experiencing emptiness can still have an eyeball even though they cannot have
a mental affliction so it can't be that the mental afflictions are hanging out in your
eye in your eye power okay you can have an eye power you canbe
concerntrating on emptiness and you cannot have a mental affliction so they
cannot be staying in the eye power what he is trying to say is these are for
people who have studied Abhidharma okay first chapter Abhidharma kosha he
is trying to say look you can divide the world into the objects we we see into the
mind that sees them and into the eye which allows the mind to see the objects
and mental afflictions if you can kick them out of the mind by understanding
emptiness they can't go park in the eye and they can't go park in outer world
they are gone there is no base for them to come back to they are gone and they
have no place to build up their strength again and to get re-inforcements and to
come back and attack you again he is still talking about a war you know if you
kick them out of this one perimeter called your skull you know if you can get
them out of your mind then there is no place else they can go they have to be
permenantly destroyed they cannot re-group and come back impossible. Say
{parla mina} .

[Students:{parla minay} ]

{Parla minay}

[Students:{parla minay} ]

{Parla minay} is very simple what's a {bardo} ? In between being right {bardo}
okay {parla} means "in the middle" {parla minay} means "there no place else for
them to go" there is no other, what do you call it, option number three means
there's no other option they are not in the outer world which you are
experiencing if they are not in your conciousnesses and they are not in your
sense powers well then there ain't no place else for them to be and they are gone
so he is trying to prove that you can defeat them permenantly and you are
supposed to get happy you are supposed to say this is not like other enemies
that if you sort of beat them for a while that they rise up again like that. Did you
have a question?

[Student:yeh [unclear]

So, but he doesn't get a mental affliction.
[Student:[unclear]

It wouldn't happen I think at that point I don't think that he could get altzimers
just karmically I doubt it or he would be the first altzimers patient not to get
violent okay seriously and by the way I repeat it is possible for an arhat to die of
a horrible death but they'd never get upset about it never feel angry, never hate
anybody nothing like that okay. Yeh.

Student: [unclear]

Yeh,yeh right I was afraid you would ask me that and I was amazed that nobody
mentioned it and I was hoping to get away with it she said when you said that
people, I said you notice I only said perceived emptiness okay I was fudging it if
you are focusing on emptiness it is impossible to have a mental affliction period
but at that time it still possible to have an eye power and it can even be active so
I'll say i'll take a shot it doesn't say clearly in the text but I would say direct
perception of emptiness it's obviously you couldn't have a mental affliction but
you can't have any relative thought at that time period you cannot have an
emotion at that time it is impossible but let's even say then that you understand
the emptiness of an object even fairly well intellectually for that millisecond that
you are having that pure understanding it's totally impossible to have a mental
affliction at that time you cannot understand an objects emptiness even
intellectually clearly we say clearly is a big thing in the scriptures, clearly and
then still have a mental affliction at the same time totally impossible so you
canbe looking at that wall understanding it's emptiness and it would be
impossible during that ten seconds okay to have a mental affliction about the
wall it's impossible that is what he is talking about okay. Two things and then
we will stop almost on time we have reached the end of the war with the mental
afflictions were getting, we are cruising through the "Bodhisattva charyatara" at
about ten times normal spead okay Rinpoche took I think eight or nine years to
teach it we are trying to do it in a year which is difficult but you are getting all
the main stuff I can't see you know I can't see that we will get an opportunity to
do it longer than that so we have to kind of move at a certain pace that takes us
to the six perfections okay we have just reached the six perfections we will start
to s them we will start to discuss the six activities of a bodhisattva we'll assume
that you already did the ceremony next week okay and now you decided that
you want to get into acting like a bodhisattva there are mainly six main activities
of a bodhisattva okay and that is say {paratu chinba} .
[Students:{paratu chinba} ]

{Paratu chinba}

[Students:{Paratu chinba} ]

{Paratu chinba} means {para} means "the other side", the far side like if you are
standing on the east bank the west bank is the {para} okay {chinba} means
"went there" past tense went {tu} means there, to there so {paratu chinba}
means "went to the other side" and it is translated as perfection and that's a good
perfection a good translation one of the few ones that I agree with okay and it
means "perfection" okay in sanskrit the other side is {param} then {eter} is the
past tense of go so {param-eter} or {parameter} okay [laughs] okay perfection
and there are six. Why do thet call them perfections? I mean everybody talks
about the six perfections bodhisattva, the life of a bodhisattva is made up of six
perfections why are they called perfections?

[Student:reply [unclear]

Sykes says when you are a buddha they are perfected that happens to be the
perfect answer perfection answer okay that is exactly right okay when you reach
buddhahood they are perfected but these are talking about activities for people
like us who are not buddhas yet so why are they called perfections for us?

Student:[unclear]

Marcella said because she was in California she cheated okay just kidding,
because they lead you to perfection okay and that is {paratu chin che} . Say
{paratu} .

[Students:{paratu} ]

{chin}

[Students:{chni} ]

{che}

[Students:{che} ]
{Paratu}

[Students:{paratu} ]

{Chin che}

[Students:{chin che} ]

Really you are doing six {paratu chin che's} you are not doing six {paratu
chinba's} {paratu chin che} means "get you to perfection" takes you to perfection
you are if you are not a buddha already you're practising the six getting you to
perfections getting to perfections anyway there {paratu chin ches} okay when
you get to be a buddha they are {paratu chinba's} okay. I am going to write
them down very fast okay six of them alright and then we will be done mostly.
Six activities of a bodhisattva if you want this world to change before your very
eyes do these six. Say {chinba} .

[Students:{chinba} ]

{Chinba}

[Students:{chinba} ]

{Chinba} means "giving" okay some people call it charity, I think charity is like
good will and salvation army you know it is giving ,giving food, giving money,
giving houses, giving dharma, giving protection all those kinds of giving okay
{chinba} that's {chinba's} name and anytime you need an orange [laughter] they
will give you [laughter]. Say {sultrim} .

[Students:{sultrim} ]

{Sultrim}

[Students:{sultrim} ]

{Sultrim} means I like to call it "an ethical way of life" okay an ethical way of life
keeping your vows okay all the way from not committing the ten non-virtues
upto the hundreds of secret vows you might have that you don't even know
about okay you can call it morality, morality reminds me of Billy Graham Iprefer
to call it an ethical way of life nothing against Billy Graham okay.
[Students:Is ethics okay?]

Ethics is probably okay. Say [serpa}

[Students:{serpa} ]

{Serpa}

[Students:{serpa} ]

People translate it as patience I don't like it much to me it means being able to sit
in the doctors office or something, it is not getting angry when the time is right, I
like to translate it as not getting angry,patience is okay,not getting mad, maybe
we don't have a word in English I don't know.

[Silence].

Say {Sundru}

[Students:{Sunru} ]

{Sundru]

[Students:{Sundru} ]

{Sundrup} is translated in all sorts of ways fortitude, effort, energy I like to call it
joyful effort it is to find {sungpa trenpa jewaa oh} means "you get off on doing
good things" you get charged out of doing good things definition of it joy about
doing good things okay. Say {sumden}

[Students: {Sumden} ]

{Sumden}

[Students:{Sumden} ]

The ability to concerntrate, concerntration you can also translate it as meditation,
in this case. Say {sherab}
[Students:{Sherab} ]

{Sherab}

[Students:{Sherab} ]

{Sherab}      is wisdom okay understanding the ultimate nature of things
understanding emptiness understanding karma things like that okay {sherub}
wisdom. Those are the names of the six perfections we will spend the rest of the
year on these six perfections alright the next two courses and the rest of this
course are going to be devoted to that, these are the only things which can give
you the karmic energy to reach your own paradise in this life especially okay
must learn them must learn to be good at them and that's going to be your lifes
career you know you canbe a stoke broker on the side but you are going to be a
{Parameterer} you know you are going to be a perfectionist for the rest of your
life okay that is your real career is to folllow these six things and to learn to
perfect them learn all the tricks learn all the details of them okay. He gets into
one last point he says are the perfections mental or do they depend on some
outer perfection he gives the example of giving okay when you perfect giving
does it imply that every sentient being in the world is no longer poor you know
like does the perfection of giving mean that you give away money to everyone
you meet in other words have I perfected giving if one person around me still is
broke, do I have to go and physically make sure that every person that I know is
not poor before I can say that my giving is perfected and that is a good question,
no okay, why? Plenty of Buddhas around and plenty of broke people around I
can pledge, I can attest to it so they did perfect giving and there is still people
around that need money so it doesn't mean that the perfection of giving is that
every person around you is not broke anymore okay, it is the state of mind that
is totally willing to give up everything you have body, possessions and your
goodness to other people you know it is that state of mind it is the perfection of
that state of mind. Now we have to study {Madhyamika} it's very common for
the mind to go from here to here this state of mind says the perfection of giving
if I get perfect at it then everybody around me will have everything that they
need thats not true okay that is not the perfection of giving it is the willingness to
give them anything you have immediately without any hessitation everything
then the human mind goes from there over to here hey then I can sit at home
and think about giving you know cos Michael Roche is up there and he said
actually giving I can do in the comfort of my own home you know [laughs] and
you have to prevent that extreme also. You are not a bodhisattva if you have
anything that you can give and you are sitting at home thinking about it okay
that is not the point, I mean the perfection of giving it is true is only a state of
mind you can reach the perfection of giving and everyone around you canbe
dead broke you better not have any money okay what it means is obviously it
should be exspressing itself in your behaviour to say I perfected giving and you
still have something to give other people that would help them then it's just b,s
alright so perfection of giving it is a mental state but if it is not manifesting itself
in your activities then come on are we supposed to believe that now you have
something they need it lets get going okay you have it lets just give it to them I
saw I was with Rinpoche and we saw the Pope on T.V in Giant stadium and he
got up and said "don't give people your extra give them your capital" and
Rinpoche was "that's great" you know [laughter] don't give them your excess
you know, give them what they need give them what you have and if you don't
then don't say that you are at home perfecting giving in your mind it is a mental
perfection but it should display itself automatically how about the perfection of
what is the second one? Let's say killing, not killing so if someone around you is
getting killed if someone in your world if I am standing up here and someone in
Tibet is being tortured have I not perfected morality is that possible can I be
aware of someone being tortured and then because of that I haven't perfected
ethical living it is not true okay Shantideva goes through that, Master Shantideva
says it is possible that you can perfect your morality and your ethical life and
people are still being hurt in the world you cannot stop all of it impossible
because you are not the cause of it their mentall afflictions are the cause of it
okay you have to do everything at your disposal anything you can do you must
do for them but don't think that the perfection does not happened or something
if there are still people suffering in Bosnia it's not like that there could be people
being killed all around you and you canbe perfect in your own morality so that's
it doesn it mean you stand around and don't do anything if you hear someone is
getting hurt? No, then you haven't perfected morality you have to think about it
okay. The third one is what? Last question if it is possible that there is one more
angry person in your life does that mean you didn't perfect patience if there is
one more irritating person in the world does that mean you have been a failure
in the perfection of patience no there will be lot's of angry people on the day that
you reach Nirvana and end your anger for ever and reach the perfection of
patience total perfection there will be lots of people around you who are still
irritating okay so he says that is not the perfection of patience it's the mental part
of not getting angry ever again then you have perfected patience so that's just
another point in the verses okay. I think we have covered everything we are a
little bit late so we are gonna stop and we're going to go straight to the prayers
okay and we'll try to finish the reading by next week okay then again be ready
next week mentally bring nice stuff don't bring your excess okay bring some
major neat stuff okay, flowers make the place nice make it really nice, come a
little early and bring stuff which is really cool it doesn't have to be expensive but
it should be from your heart bring something from your heart.

In the meantime we are proposing to do mini retreats,there are two large houses
on the property which you can sort of see in the.. one of them is hidden
there,you can see one of them in the picture and they are connected by a hallway
which is well locked at night because there are ladies on one side and men on the
other and it will fit retreats of right now six to ten people each and there are two
kinds of retreats. What are we doing retreats there for,we had many days
there,many many arguements,many many things to decide but basically the
decision is this that place is a meditation place,it always for meditation and
Godstow,Godstow is the original name of the place and we are required by the
contract to keep the original name and it means in tibetan.Do you know? {plasac}
okay and we decided to dedicate it for meditation. These classes are very good
you are getting already alot of what a geshe would be getting in the
monestary,you have studied if you have been here from the beginning each one
of the five great books of Buddhism to different levelsand so
philosopically,mentally,intellectually you are just about where you should be and
that's good. I don't think you can meditate very well in New York city,we do
try,the greatest enemy of meditation is what?Sound and aside from our own
mental afflictions [laughter] we said that last week. We need to meditate ,there
are five great levels of spiritual realisations in buddhism called the five paths and
the movement between each path is done only in deep meditation,you cannot
get to the five paths unless you are in deep meditation you have to be able to
meditate deeply,so we really have been seeking a way in which we can do
meditation together and that it"s almost like your one arm is very very strong
your philosophical studies have been very good,you are very very well educated
Buddhists but your other arm which is meditation, you can't do very well unless
you get the opportunity to do it in a very quiet place,very good atmosphere in a
very concerntrated way. You really you should be trying to do one month
retreats and things like that. It takes about nine days for,I can tell you from
experience,to bring your mind to a meditative state,in retreat. We don't have
that much time and also we don't have the [unclear] yet so we are ging to start
with mini retreats just so you can get the taste of the proper way to meditate and
then as when we get the [unclear] we have already been offered it seems help to
build meditation cabins there, we have already been, someone has already
contacted us and offered to supply the cabins so that will come,but this is kind of
like to get ready and to start working on it so we will have weekend retreats
there and there will be two kinds of retreats there will be limited to ten
people,the most people that can ever go up on a weekend will be ten people it
can be any mix of men and women but they must stay in seperate buildings and
there will be two sorts of meditation retreats they will always be devoted to
meditation there won't be any philosophical classes there devoted the place will
have the energy and theme of going there to meditate.If you do a weekend
meditation say from Friday to Sunday from Friday evening to Sunday
affternoon there will be silence kept,there won't be talking and then there is a
pretty strict schedule of meditation and then there's a pretty strict schedule of
walking meditation and there is a pretty strict schedule of work mediation of
about two hours on Saturday so that you start to get into the energy of the place
okay. Each retreat will have a differrent theme every Sunday morning you will
take the one day vows,okay these are the vows that you take,those of you have
been to Kopan. We rsearched all the great retreat centres in the world we
consider Kopan to be the best we rated I.M.S. pretty high,the Insight Meditation
Society,and then we also visited some Sivavananda organisations because they
do very good retreats there for the past twenty-five years or so and we studied
all of their set-ups and we think it is important to do the one day vows,so you
take them on Sunday morning and then you keep them untill the next morning,
Monday morning which gives you something to take home with you,so you
would be leaving Sunday afternoon and you would be taking the vows home
with you to remember what you did all weekend. So it will be a structured
retreat,meditation,heavy meditation the place is extremely good for meditation
it is totally silent and there's a hundred achres of forest and meadows for the
walking meditation which we are convincing the town is totally necessary for tax
exemption and beautiful lakes there and a beautiful house there and the karma
of the place is also very powerful it was the previous owners were the founders
of UNICEF. So there was a man who spent his whole life trying to help children
who had been hurt in the war,in world war one and world war two and he spent
his whole adult life mostly working for free his name waws Morris Paye and and
he did not take a salary for many many years and he did it,that was his base for
his,that is where he lived and so the karma of the place is very sweet the karma
is very powerful. He was offered the Noble Prize but turned it down,he said
give it to UNICEF instead and it was eventually given to UNICEF so the karma
there is very sweet,it is a very powerful place,very quiet and it is also very close
by it takes about an hour ,just over an hour by train,as soon as we got the
property they built a train station in the town and this old lady said "I don't know
we have been trying thirty years and you Buddhists move in and they build a
train station",so the train station is a few miles away and we can go there from
Grand Central station and it takes about an hour and fifteen minutes I think and
it's like eight dollars and thats the shbeal. So two kinds of retreats will go on
there in the coming year you have a little thing on the inside called pre-arranged
retreats and they will be limited to ten people so and also we will try to make
sure that everyone can get into one if we have too many people then we will try
to share it,or try to split it up so that everyone will get a chance to go but those
will be retreats on those specific subjects and we have some training for the
leader of the retreats there are six people now trained and they will be leading
the meditation retreats so you can sort of pick the subject you like or the teacher
you like or the weekend that you like and you can talk to Micheal Wick,Micheal
is the co-ordinator for all the retreats at Godstow he lives in this area and he is
very available during the the day and evening,he'll he'll be taking all the names
and he'll be scheduling people and he will be doing all the work of co-ordinating
people and that's the,that will be the thing so if you want to sign up for any of
these retreats here you would contact him and it on first come first serve for
now if it gets to be too much of a problem we were at I.M.S they have a waiting
list of something like a year or something now there is a lottery system cos too
many people want to go so right now it is first come first serve maybe later on
we will have to go to a lottery or build new buildings there okay. The other
neat idea that we came up with is that if you want to do your own retreat you
can organise a retreat that doesn't conflict with one of the dates hereand you can
get,we are asking people to try to get six to ten people together to do a retreat
and you can organize your own retreat. Now there are some rules about
organizing your own retreat,first rule is you have to use one of the certified
teachers whose names are on this list for now later on we will certify other
people,more people thats mostly so we can insure that what goes on there is
really Buddhism and stuff like that you also have to,if you start your own retreat
or organize your own retreat you have to get one of the administrators on the
bottom,those are the people who are doing the rent work,they are making sure
that the food crew is all put together,that the groceries have been bought,that
the people have brought their linens,you have to bring your own linens,we don't
have any laundry service and things like that they're the people who are in
charge of the facilities for that weekend so if you decide to orgaize a retreat right
now they are the only people who are authorized to open the retreat and to set
you up so if you decide to have your own retreat you have to find someone to
lead it from this list then you have to find someone to be your ,in tibetan it is
called your {nyapa} , {nyapa} means is the food guy the guy with the key the
guy who turns on the heat the guy that makes sure you clean up the bathroom
and stuff like that,so right now you need to have one of those to organize a
retreat. We had alot of arguements about what to do financially,the place costs
eight hundred dollars a week whether we use it or not when it was offered to us
because the went bankrupt we said can we have just like a few achres of it and
they said take the whole thing or don't take anything so we had all these big
meetings we decided for the sake of the future we would try to take it we also
have a very
kind sponsor who is sponsoring half of the basically half of the cost for the next
nine years,something,nine or ten years so we do have a sponsor for that,so what
we are trying to do is recover half of the half of the maintenance which means
the heat,the insurance,the taxes which we are trying to get out of and things like
that we don't feel comfortable charging people to go there so we made a dirty
diabolical system ten people decide to do a retreat there that group between
themselves has to come up half of the maintenance cost we figure three hundred
and eighty-five dollars which means if you are gonna use the place for a three
day retreat we ask you,you ask your group to come up with three hundred and
eighty-five dollars and the idea is that you get Fran Parullo or someone with a
good job to go [laughter] and they pay three fifty [laughter] and the other nine
people pay four dollars and the idea is that the inside of your group you try to
encourage the people who have better incomes to pay more and the people who
don't or right now don't have a job or trying to get their feet on the
ground,young people at college they would pay less but it works out to about
thirty-eight dollars per head for three days there I mean the total thing up at
I.M.S not to criticize they run at a loss and it costs,if you count the transportation
and everything else it comes to about,I don't know,the course was a hundred
and twenty,so it is like two hundred and something for food and costs okay,by
the way that money does not include food the food is up to you,if your group
wants to eat well you know ear well,if your group wants potatoe chips
[laugther],let them have patatoe chips that is up to you guys okay,but that is the
concept and that you can start,Micheal has the calendar. One weekend a month
is reserved for the sangha use,for the monks and nuns one of the primary uses
of this property and one of the primary reasons it was given to this organization
was for building a monastery and nunnery so the monks and nuns are being
kind enough to let you come up and help foot the bill for the place [laughter],for
retreats so I mean eventually we plan that we would give twenty-five achres to
a monastery,twenty-five achres for a nunnery and then like twenty-five achres
would go towards retreat cabins I figure that we can fit maybe thirty retreat
cabins there on there it's nice it's big

[student:what about work weekends?]

Just what they say [laughs] and no we'll talk about it and then the other area of
the land we're thinking to have translation activities research activities like that.
About forty-five minutes away is one of the best tibetan libaries in the world
which is [not sure] place and he has pledged that we can use the place any time
we want free access to the libary there and he has also pledged that any time
Andy's ready to build a monastery he has a freight of heavy equipement which
he said we could just use it for free so things are ready there. Somebody asked
about the work weekends they are called {zaygay} {zaygay} means {zaygay
tuga dowa} it is in the Abhidharma Kosha fourth chapter and it means you get a
special karma from taking care of temples like the way Ken Rinpoche has taken
care of Rashi Gampil Ling those of you who are aware he pays almost all the
grounds costs there himself and he has planted all the trees there he did all the
sidewalks he did all the fences he did all the drive way he built the garage he
built his house and all of it is called {zaygay} {zaygay} means "it is a special
karma" that comes to you if you,if you help build or work on a place which is a
spiritual centre monastery,nunnery,stupa anyhting like that and it's supposed to
be according to the Ahbidharma some kind of extrordinary virtue like Leon did
it today he fixed the shower on the second floor [laughs] congratulations
[laughter]and that's a {zaygay} means its some kind of extrordinaraily powerful
karma so there will be there are scheduled two is it? Two {zaygay} work
weekends and that is just going to be work and it is fun you know it's going to
be just go up help re-build the fences there there are beautiful white fences there
some of them are broken,help clear away some of the trees that fall down from
time to time and help to clean out the water there are two nice streams there's a
natural spring there and we have to keep those clean and just try to serve the
place like that and that's just heavy duty weekend Fran Parollo has promised
that anyone that goes will have free food you said? There's free food [laughs]
but generally it will be alot of fun and a chance to get away from New York city
the air up there is really cool and the place is extremely nice eventually we have
to build a temple a main temple we have to build a monastery we have to build
a nunnery and all year retreat cabins so you can spend your whole days there in
retreat so we will talk about it and I am serious okay and you have to start doing
long retreats the natural progression of this course and of these classes is that at
a certain point you start doing long retreats say a month each and I would hope
that everyone here could get up to the point where they are doing like two a
year one month retreats and that's just the natural progression that you have to
do in your life first you start to study then you start doing short retreats then
you start doing longer retreats and then all of this stuff will click and all of those
things will actually happen to you all of things that we are always describing that
happen to you a certain stages you must be meditating heavy duty so now we
finally have a chance to do that okay so that is much good.Did I forget anything
major? Nope.
[student:Micheal what about beyond the cost of covering the activities donating
something]

Oh Stearwell says if that the thirty-seven dollars or what ever thats minimum
okay I mean we are asking if you go up there and you are a millionaire and you
have a good time,there will be like some box and if you throw in another five
hundred thousand or so thats all [laughter] and I mean we are just trying to
meet the maintenance costs but I really don't like to do it we have had horrible
debates about it we will have to give the place back we will lose the place by the
contract if we can't keep it up to a certain payment thats the contract that we
have,we cannot,we have to meet the expenses we cannot brake the up the
property we are not allowed to brake up the property maybe there are tantric
deities and maybe they wanted to make sure that the monks have enough land
two hundred years from now I don't know thet will not allow us to make a
[unclear ] of the property we have to keep it one piece and we have to keep it
up,so we're just trying to find a way to do that I believe that it's not,it wouldn't
be out of the question that maybe in ten or twenty years we would have a
hundred monks and nuns there and then maybe five hundred and then maybe a
thousand this is the idea this is the goal and then you know,a hundred peopole in
three year retreats or something,from New York city or in their sixties or
seventies [laughter] and [laughs] like that.Yeh Michael

[student:Can you say that the work weekends are free [unclear]

Really!

[student:yeh]

Okay

[student:[unclear]

Okay, the work weekends are free [unclear]

[student:Are they limited to ten also?]

I think they are limited to ten or not? Are they limited to ten? Yeh we have to
limit it because of the zoning right now okay. You are visitors.

[student[unclear]
Also one more thing like if your new here and you don't know five other people
that you could get together in a gang and go up together then check this last
thing here the last thing on the form here is that look I don't know five other
people I would like to get in on one of these retreats that people organize and if
there's other people organizing retreats and they only have six or seven people
and they have three empty spaces left,please contact me because I don't know six
other people in this group or something like that you are welcome to do that
and anybody in this group can start a retreat it's totally up to you anyone in this
room can go around and get five friends five to nine friends and organize your
own retreat the only rule in order to keep the place from being trashed is that
you have to have one of the administrators there with you and you have to have
one of the teachers there that can keep you on the meditation schedule and thats
it that's the only rule right now,yeh.

[student:what if you wanted to do one that is not listed here?]

She asked if you what if you wanted to do a retreat on a subject that is not
here ,that's the whole point that's the whole idea you pick your own subject
also,we tried to list specialties of these people but if you have anything else
which you would like to organize a retreat about you contact that teacher and
say would you be willing to do a mandala retreat like a whole weekend on
mandala and meditating on mandala thats fine that's fine you can do that okay
and I think that you should use your imagination and you know it's really a it's
really up,we were really very addicted to the place you stay there a day and you
don't want to go home and it's really beautiful so you are welcome to go up,by
the way somebody asked can you do it during the week,you can do it during the
week fine no problem you know if you want to do a five day retreat with six
friends that's also,you are welcome to do that .

[student[unclear][laughter]

Michael Wick has to investigate the fact that there is a work weekend and a
sangha retreat on the same date of the week in September I hope it doesn't mean
that the sangha has to work [laughter] okay.

[silence]

Okay tonight I would like to introduce you to [unsure] they are called
{nymen} ,oh by the way one more thing about Conneticut people from every
MST centre are welcome to organise retreats we are sending this out to
everyone in an MSTC centre where ever they are and you are welcome to bring
friends that you recommend okay so if you know someone who is not in MSCC
and you thing they would like to come you are welcome to bring them but you
are the one who is vouching for them and if they take off their clothes and run
around and stuff like that you will [laughter] which has happened we will
not,you will be responsible and next time you want to bring someone we will
say do you remember that guy you know [laughter],so it's just sort of a system
to prevent anything strange from happening we are still new in that town the
mayor,I had along talk with the mayor he had alot of strange concerns about us
and illegal concerns about us and we don't want to make any waves okay there's
a country club across the street and it costs twenty thousand dollars to join it
each year and we have to watch it so we are being a little bit strict about who
goes up anyone in this class is welcome and anyone from any other MSTC centre
is welcome and any one that you vouch for right now maybe later on we will
open it up when we have a huge dormitory and all that.Okay say {nymen}

[class:{nymen} ]

{nymen}

[class{nymen} ]

{nymen} means {nymen nyomo} means "secondary mental affliction" you met
the big six now meet the next twenty okay there are several explanations of why
they are called {nymens} some people say because they are close to a big
affliction some people say because they come from the big afflictions I kinda like
the second explaination but they are secondary in the sense that they like if you
have desire then that qualifies you for like six more mental afflictions which are
not quite so powerful okay and thats the idea of a seconary mental affliction. I
am going to give you very quickly the twenty okay the homework says you
have to name and describe any six of them on your homework and on your quiz
so you can sort of pick your favourites [laughter].
[silence]

say {trower}

[class:{trower} ]

{trower} means "anger' okay thats by the way why it's not so great to translate
the primary mental affliction as anger okay. That's what? What primary mental
affliction does this stem from?

[student:disliking]

Disliking things okay and this is sort of a natural progression of that alright it
starts with not liking something then it's like grrrr okay this is real anger this is
like what happens when your boss criticizes you at work stuff like that okay? It
is supposed to be the lead up to actually hurting somebody okay,it it it inspires
you to hurt somebody.

[silence]

Say {kunzing}

[class:{kunzing} ]

{kunzing} is a it is hard to translate into english it means "keeping your anger
over a longer period of time" like {trower} is the first blow up and then
{kunzing} is where you sort of feel angry at the person for days,or weeks,or
years you know I had a very nice nun in Tuson what's her name?

[student:{Tutrun Tutren} ]

{Tutrun Tutren} and she was describing how this phenomenon of how someone
says something to you that you don't like and you remember it for years and
they don't have any recollection of saying that to you,you know what I mean
years later you are still obsessing on this thing and still mad at them and they
were just joking or something and that was like two years ago and the only one
that remembers it is you and that is {kunzing} okay {kunzing} means I call it
keeping anger and retaining anger okay it is sort of like bearing a grudge okay
but it's not quite that it's retaining anger over a period of time {trower} is the
first five minutes or ten minutes after the person has left and you are still
seething and you still feel angry like an hour or a day or a life time thats
{kunzing} okay.

[silence]

Say {sigpa}
[class:{sigpa} ]

{Sigpa} .Do you guys know the word sig? Sig means,literally it means "to burn
something",to burn,but this verb this noun {sigpa} this is like irritation okay it's
like starting to get hot someones been bothering you,bothering you,bothering
you and you are starting to build up some kind of your heart starts to beat faster
it's not anger yet it's pre-anger okay {kunzing} is post-anger {sigpa} is pre-anger
and it's like,how do we translate it irritation okay and it's main functionn is to
make you say say something bad you know stupid,but it's the feeling that leads
up to that it's the way you start to get your heart starts to burn a little bit it
means irritation or starting to get irritated with this person and it's function,job is
done when you start to talk when you start to say something to that person
harsh harsh okay,that is called {sigpa} .

say {numsay}

[class {numsay} ]

{numsay}

[class:{numsay} ]

This is sometimes {numpa saywa} {numpa saywa} means we translated it as
"malice" but what it means is the state of mind in which you are ready to hurt
somebody you know it is a decision to hurt somebody either verbally,physically
or what ever but you in your mind you have decided to hurt somebody.Here
comes my specialty if anyone wants to lead a weekend retreat I can do this one.
Say {tugdoe} .

[class:{tugdoe} ]

{tugdoe}

{Tugdoe} means "jealousy" and it's just that I'll give you the definition in Tibetan
I mean translated there's a nice translation by Janice's mother Annie Chinila in
that green logic book which you can get at the Three Jewels it says this is a part
of anger an inner disturbance of the mind which out of a desire for gain and
honour cannot bare the site of another persons gain or happiness. Definition of
jealousy.
[Student:once more please].

[Laughs] Okay mainly it's a disturbance of the mind it wants people to pay
attention to me and it is unhappy about other peoples good fortune but their
happiness and it's a kind of anger it's a form of anger and again no need to
mention that it is totally hypocritical for a bodhisattva you are here by
honourary bodhisattvas okay and it's just totally wrong it is the opposite of
bodhisattva mind it's,a bodhisattva is going to go to hell if necessary to make
sure that other people get what they want and jealouy,someone else has got
what they wanted and you are like you can't stand it you know it's crazy it's
mental affliction and mental illness all in one you know it's like it's crazy to not
want someone else to be happy okay or to want to wish that it didn't happen to
them okay and it is very common in Dharma centres you have to be careful
okay, the mental afflictions cannot stand this kind of activity the demons that live
in the world and they do live in the world thet cannot bare this kind of thing
going on thats why it is so rare you know there's not alot of bodhisattva
charatara classes going on tonight in New York city although there are so many
million people here they can't stand it they get very very upset about it so what
they would like the most is if these Dharma brothers and sisters could somehow
split up from each other or get jealous of each other or like that would please
them more than anything so just to spit at them lets be let's not have any
jealousy and just be careful it grows very easily and stays in your mind and it's
very,very sick for a person who says they are on the bodhisattva track and I
confess to it and I admit it to everyone here you know I have it all the time and
it's bad and we have to try and stomp it out before it ever gets a foot hold
among these minds here so keep it in mind okay. Alright number six [pause].

Say {gyou}

[Students:{gyou} ]

{Gyou}

[Students:{gyou} ]

Um this is not the {gyou} with the [unsure] head letter which means "cause" and
this is not the {gyou} that is {gyimla} which means "maya",meaning illusion and
it also not the {gyou} with the [unsure] letter which means large intestine
[laughter] this is the {gyou} which means falsity or insincerity in the sense that
you will not admit your faults it's some kind of not being straight with yourself
not being sincere and trying not to admit that you have anything wrong with
you and what happens if you have {gyou} is that no-one can teach you anything
okay like if you do not admit to yourself that you have any short comings or
that you have anything to learn then no-one can teach you anything so {gyou}
has aa special function of blocking you from hearing it when you go to a
teaching cause you don't think it applies to you nothing,"i don't have that
problem" that's {gyou} okay.

[]Student:denial?]

Denial would be,yeh thats probably a nice way of putting it [pause].

Say: {yower}

[Students:{yower} ]

{Yower}

[Students:{yower} ]

{Yower} means "to shake like that",an earthquake is called {Sywom} they are
related {yower} means to trying to think of a way,it's to put on good qualities
that you don't have okay what do you want to call it I don't know..It's like
pretending to be very holy when you are not,pretense is good,by the way it is
very hard to translate some of them don't have good english ..words,but
{yower} means you want other people to honour you,you want other people to
respect you so you try to pretend that you.

[Student: hypocrite]

Like a hypocrite that you try to pretend that you have some qualities that you
don't have.There's the story about he guy who he wasn't doing any mandala
offerings or something,nop his alter was a big mess and then he wanted,he had
some important sponsors coming so he spent alot of time he fixed up his alter
really nice and then he realized that he had {yower} so he took a big pile of dirt
and he threw it all over the altar just before the sponsors get there and that was
an honest act and then some lama was teaching in another part of Tibet and he
said somebody just did something very virtuous [laughter] he had esp and he
could see and he said "someone has admitted their own hypocrasy and it's a
great spirtual event that has happened",you know,it's really cool.
[Student:[question]

Say it again.

[Student:[question]

Eh... yeh put on.Say {morsar newar}

[Students:{morsar newar} ]

{Morsar newar}

[Students:{morsar newar} ]

{Morsar newar} mor,mor the ancient meaning of this is that mor means "your
face" and sar means "to be hot" and it means "to blush" and {morsar} like if you
are debating someone at Sera and they something stupid you just go like
that,like you should be ashamed for saying such a stupid thing your debating
on,you don't clap your hands or anything you just go [laughter] like that so
{morsar} means "shame",{mosar newar} means "lack of shame".Shame here
means the opposite of this,by the way {mosar yerpa} is that you are ashamed to
do a bad deed because you yourself would be embarassed to yourself,it's like
some kind of self esteem thing this is not worthy of me ,I am a Buddhist,I am a
monk,I shouldn't be doing this thing and you stop you hold yourself back thats
{mosar} .{mosar newar} is the opposite you know like you don't have that
quality you don't hold yourself back and this referrs to shame in the your,Isa
always say in the privacy of your own room okay {mosar} is functioning
internally and no-one else can see it ,it means that in your own room or you
know somewhere where there is money there and if you stole it no-one would
ever know {mosar} is what keeps you from stealing it {mosar} is what keeps
you from doing a bad deed even if no-one else will ever know thats {mosar
newar} so it's important to understand that this eh.. mental affliction is the lack
of that okay,this mental affliction is doing bad deeds in private okay and thats
{mosar newar} .

[pause]

Say {toaw mepa}
[Students:{toaw mepa} ]

{Toaw mepa} you can shorten it to {toaw me} that's more common okay cut
that,the short,the short,the one we always use in the monestary is {toaw me}
okay .{Toaw me} means "the same state of mind" it's the opposite of {chow yer}
{chow yer} is I won't do this bad deed because it will have certain repercussions
on other people it will hurt other people okay thats {chow yer} the opposite of
thise is avoiding a bad deed when you are just about to do something wrong
you hold back because you are afraid of how it will impact on other people you
say such and such a person will get hurt or such and such a person will lose faith
in Buddhism if they see me doing this okay and that is {chow yer} this is the
opposite okay this one says I don't care what other people think I'm going to go
a head and do what I want to do and we translated it as lack of consideration just
because, considering the effect on others and not to consider the effect on others
is {chow mepa} according to the Abhidharma Kosha system which is not the
system I am using for this presentation the last two mental afflictions are present
in every case of none virtue any time you do something wrong you have one of
these last two there to some extent you don't have the self esteem the spiritual
self esteem to avoid this for your own purposes and you don't have the
consideration of what it,how it might impact other people either and that's the
Abhidharma system says that. Yeh.

[Student:[question]

I think it should be rather conscious you know when Je Tsongkapa get's into that
and it's kind of it should be rather conscious okay.

[Student:[question]

I don't know it just means some kind of consideration and {chow yer} is to have
that consideration I have never seen it in any other applications there are similar
words that mean tax same sound they maybe related they maybe not,okay say
{charpa} .

[Students:{charpa} ]

{Charpa}

[Students:{charpa} ]
{Charpa} is "hiding your faults" okay remember the other one was effecting
spirtual qualities that you don't have and this one is hiding the bad qualities that
you do have okay,it's especially important in the Vinaya if a monk brakes even a
minor vow and if we have {cherpa} if we try to hide it from the other monks
then it is much more serious if we admitt it quickly then the karma is much less
and the Vinaya consequence is much less so it is very important to ,time is a
factor with {cherpa}       okay     the longer you hide something the karma
exponentially builds and the quicker you admit it to someone the better okay so
if you have friends in California and you do a bad deed at night call them
immediately you know,because they are about three hours behind,don't wait
until the next morning you know the karma is much more powerful by the next
morning okay,it's very important to admit the things you do and not to hide
them okay and sooner or layer it comes out anyway and people are like dogs
they can smell people around you they know,they look at your eyes for thirty
seconds the way your eyes go and they know you people know other people
they sense other people the way,we used to have this really great dog called
Rusty that [unclear] and if a person walked through the door who didn't like
dogshe would just bite them right away [laughter] and you know they have this
kind of instinct and people are the same you know are the same you know you
can try to hide your bad qualities believe me everybody knows just admit it and
clean up your act you know it is much easier to admit it and to clean up your act
than to continue with the very difficult task of hiding it you know and sooner or
later it comes out anyways so better just not to have anything to hide and if you
have a bad quality that you can't stop then just admit it to other people and work
on it you know,a Buddhist should just be an open book you know and just admit
everything about yourself and fix it,but it is this act of hiding it which can create
some kind of denial in yourself and then you and then you don't fix it you know
you stop fixing things and so don't have {cherpa} {cherpa} is people shouldn't
know that I have this particular bad qualities.Eh yeh.

[Student: [question,unclear]

He asked the question that and number six ,let me see the definition of number
six means out of a desire for gain fame and honour and it's primary function is
spiritual instruction it's to shut you of from spiritual instruction some kind of
dishonesty {cherpa} is more like wanting,more like a Watergate state of mind it
wants to cover up it wants to do a cover up.

[Student:[unclear]
[laughs] Dawn says your friends will get bored if you are always confessing your
jealousy in front of classes and stuff.

[Student:[unclear]

It does,he says Atisha,Atisha used to carry around a little stupa and every time
he had a bad thought he put it down prostrate to it and confess and there are all
these stories, Master Atisha sorry, there are all these stories of him being on the
road you know everybody riding horses and he used to say "stop,everyone stop
" and they would stop their horses and he would get down take his stupa you
know protrate and confess that he just had a bad thought and they couldn't get
to where they were going all the time he kept stopping you know and I guess if
Master Atisha can do it Lord Atisha [laughter] then we can do it [unsure] right,I
don't know with in reason I,by the way if it stops having an effect meaning, you
know, Rinpoche when I used to do my {num chypas} would say hey, I am tired
of hearing that one can you just fix it you know [laughter] and it's alot easier to
fix it okay but if you can't fix it it is still better to keep telling somebody and if
you break a bodhisattva vow you know the proceedure alright some of them
have to be confessed infront of certain numbers of friends and they don't have to
be people with bodhisattva vows they just have to be someone that understand
about the bodhisattva vows ,when you break the secondary vows you must go
to a certain number of other people and admit what you did immediately you
know and I have like telephone friends like really all over the country and we
call each other and when we break one we call each other and we say I broke
that one if you break a primary bodhisattva vow what? If you break it in a
certain,totally then you have to take it over again okay.Say {sena}

[Students:{sena} ]

{Sena}

[Students:{sena} ]

{Sena} means,I don't know if there is a good word in,I mean there are alot of
colloquial words,cheap,stingy okay doesn't want to give anything wants to keep
everything,tight fisted,parsomonious.

[Silence]

Say {giyapa}
[Students:{giyapa} ]

{Giyapa}

[Students:{giyapa} ]

You wouldn't have any mental afflictions okay for example pride,pride is for......

[end of side one]

{Giyapa} in colloquial tibetan means "fat", chubby as a metal affliction it means
"focusing on your own temporary good qualities and being stuck up about
them" okay like I am very beautiful or I am very strong or I am very smart or I
am very spiritual and that's {giyapa} okay it's like a stuck up, puffed up yeh
{giyapa} okay alright. Say {madaypa} .

[Students:{madaypa} ]

{Madaypa}

[Students:{madaypa} ]

{Daypa} means "faith" {madaypa} means "lack of faith" not feeling faith okay
and obviously objects towards you should feel faith you know say the Dalai
Lama okay and {madaypa} is almost a kind of laziness or something where you
are just like you don't feel that admiration that you should feel it's sort of a
spiritual admiration laziness or something like that okay where you are just like
"oh he's just a normal guy,who cares" you know like that. That's {madaypa} .
How many mental afflictions total, now? Twenty-six okay and if we wanted to
spend the time how many?

[Students:Eighty-four thousand].

Eighty-four thousand variations okay these are just the top twenty-six okay
eighty-four thousand varients. Say {laylo} .

[Students:{laylo} ]

{Laylo}
[Students:{laylo} ]

{Laylo} sounds like {laylo} okay it means "laziness" okay laying low this is
probably one of the six that you can put on your homework [laughter]. Spiritual
laziness specifically it's opposite is {tundruk} and Shantideva {tunka trela dewa}
which means "a lack of joy in doing goodness" okay that's the worst kind of
laziness but lounging around your house and wasting your holy lifetime is also
{laylo} so even normal laziness is also {laylo} the ultimate {laylo} is to not take
joy in spiritual things. Say {barmaypa} .

[Students:{barmaypa} ]

{Barmaypa}

[Students:{barmaypa} ]

{Barmaypa} means "some kind of carelessness", not being careful in your
spiritual life okay they say the best way to get {barmaypa} is to have a few beers
okay they say that so if you want to know what {barmaypa} is it's sort of like
good inhibition or something like that and then you lose it when you get drunk
and then you are more likely to do something bad.

[Student:[question]

This means not having it not being careful not being spiritually mindful okay.
Say {jengay}

[Students:{jengay} ].

{Jengay}

[Students:{jengay} ].

{Jengay} is forgetting yourself or losing focus in meditation when you study the
art of meditation in A.C.I course number three {jengay} is in there as one of the
faults of meditation and it's where the object is you lose the object totally forget
about it being clear or not clear or intermitant or not intermitant your mind is
totally on to something else and that is {jengay} it's just you forget yourself
completely and it can function it can be all during the day like you decide I did
my four forces of purification this morning and I will not yell at my boss the
whole day and that's my restraint you know and then and then you just forget it
and yell all day long you know and then you get home and you say oh yeh I was
going to do that you know that's {jengay} {jengay} is totally forgetting some
virtuous thing that you were going to do and also in meditation to just totally
lose the object okay you know it's not like you were just distracted slightly you
lost it all together you don't even know what you were meditating about it
happens to me all the time. Say {sayshin myimba} .

[Students:{sashin myimba} ]

{Sashin myimba}

[{Stuents:{sashin myimba} ]



{Sashin} means "some kind of awareness" self awareness {myimba} means "not
being that way" in meditation this is the state of mind which is acting as the
alarm okay like if the mind starts to wander this state of mind is watching the
mind there's a state of your meditating,here's the mind that is meditating and
{sashin} is over here watching you know like a watch dog you can call it watch
dog mind {sashin mayimpa} is losing watch dog mind and when ever the mind
starts to wander this mind says hey hey you've started to wander and then
{drengpa} comes recollection and says get back here and then {sashin} stands up
again and watches you know and then the mind starts to get dull and {sashin}
says hey hey something is going on and the awar.. recollection brings it back up
it's two seperate mental functions {sashin} is the watch dog it's the red flag okay
it goes up {Sashin myimpa} means you don't have any red flags going of in your
mind you do what ever you want and nobody is raising the alarm there is no
part of you saying hey hey something is going on here it's mind the enemy is
mind really when you get to {sashin myimpa} you are just not having, you said
awareness, guardian awareness that's not bad. Say {moogpa} .

[Students:{Moogpa} ].

{Moogpa}

[Students:{moogpa} ].

{Moogpa} is literally the tibetan word for fog and it means "a dullness of the
body" or the mind like if you had a big meal and you did not have much sleep
the night before or you have a big lunch or something that's {moogpa} that state
of mind is {moogpa} and it's just some kind of stupid dull low level, dull state of
mind mental dullness something like that foggy mind and it's {torpa} it's like it's
it's self afflicted you know you did it to yourself when you shouldn't have stayed
out so late you shouldn't have eaten so much and then you get the rerward for it
you know your just like and it's like when you are at work around three o'clock
if it's like my office okay that's called {moogpa} . It tends to promote the other
mental afflictions if you allow yourself because of your appetite to or because of
other reasons to get into {moogpa} you are setting yourself up for otrher
mental afflictions you know it is like being tired and dull and then an
opportunity comes along to do something wrong or to think some anger or
something {moogpa} is very fertile field for those other mental afflictions okay.
Say {numyang} .

[Students:{numyang} ]

{Numyang}

[Students:{numyang} ]

{Numyang} is distraction mental distraction like your mind is being attracted to
a pleasant object.

[Student:What do you call it when you always like forget you keys].

I don't think that is mental affliction,she asked about forgetting your keys.

[Student:You know how you always forget about certain things a kind of a
block].

I don;t think forgetting your keys is a mental affliction okay.

[Student:what about misplacing?]

It's you know the {jengay} the mental affliction of {Jengay} has to be aimed at a
virtuous object like you forget that you weren't going to yell at your boss today
or you forget the object that you are meditating on or something like that eh
yeh.
[Student:[question].

That would be that last one it's pretty good yeh that's pretty good both physical
and mental it is important to say.Do you have a question?

[Student:The difference between sixteen and seventeen].

I was afraid you were going to ask me that in meditation {jengay} is losing the
object completely okay and it happens at the very low levels as the meditation
occur you know as you get better at meditating you rarely have {jengay} early
on in your meditational career you get alot of {jengay} it just like you just wake-
up for a minute and you say I forgot totally what I was meditating about you
know I don't even remember what I was meditating about it's at a very initial
point at your meditating career some people that initial point last twenty years
but [laughter] but it's that's you know you get to a pretty decent level of
meditation it doesn't happen any more {seshe mayimba} is where the guarding
mind which goes all the way upto buddhahood you know it is there all the way
upto buddhahood it's the state of mind which is watching the mind and is raising
the alarm like I mean a buddha, as you are progressing along the path pretty
high you would never have {jengay} again especially in meditation you would
never forget totally what you were meditating about you wouldn't be that bad
but {seshe myimba} {seshen} is something that you have to have all the way up
I mean all the way up to buddhahood or close to it you could have periods
where your mind is not calling the alarm and not saying hey wait a minute you
were supposed to be meditating you know wait a minute osmething is going on
here there's a mental affliction coming in you know close the door you know
wake up it's the wake up call okay and that is the difference between those two
so {numyeng} number nineteen is distraction towards a pleasant object and it's a
kind of desire it's it's it's it comes from that main mental affliction of wanting
things ignorantly okay. Say {gerpa}

[Students:{gerpa} ].

{Gerpa}

[Students:{gerpa} ].

{Gerpa} is a also during meditation it referrs to being unable to keep your mind
one pointed sometimes it is translated as scattering you just find yourself unable
to keep your mind on a single thought or single point and I think it must be very
typical in Manhattan and even with your personal life or my personal life having
too many projects going on in a macro way being unable to focus on things in a
meditational way it's going off your mind going off to other subjects {gerpa} can
also be towards a virtuous object like you canbe trying to focus on a Buddha
image and then start thinking about the charity you are going to perform at two
o'clock today that is {gerpa} and it is considered a bad deed you know once you
have decided to focus on a single virtuous object it's considered {gerpa} to then
get distracted to start thinking about all the good things you are going to do
today okay because the point of the meditation was to keep your mind on one
virtuous object does that mean you can't do many virtuous things at once as you
progress along the bodhisattva path you are encouraged to become multi
facetted {unsure] has a thousand arms you know the meaning of a thousand
arms is as you progress higher you should be able to juggle more virtuous
thoughts and that's no problem that becomes a good deed those of you who
have a {dakyay} practice Rinpoche,Ken Rinpoche twenty years ago twenty-five
years ago how can I be one pointed about this thing that has forty thousand
different visualisations in it and [unsure] Rinpoche said it's one practice it's one,
it's one movie going on you know and you focus on it from beginning to end
and that is one object now that is one pointedness so a bodhisattva once you get
up to that sort of strength spiritually you can have many objects of focus because
it's one spiritual life you know it is all part of one big network of virtue that you
are doing it's all one pointed virtue so it comes a point where it says that as you
progress further you get busyier it's okay as long as you are focusing single
pointedly on it last point then we'll take a break there's a verse in Master
Shantideva where he says you should love the path you know love the,get
attatched to the methods you have learned to fight your mental afflictions and
also please be sure to develope hatred for your mental afflictions and the verse is
very cool but you won't get the verse tonight because we couldn't finish it we
consider doing an all nighter there were to many we tried but we couldn't finish
last week but anyway next week it is a very beautiful verse okay I want all of
you to go out and try and develope attachment and hatred okay attachment to
what ?

[Student:[unclear]

For punching out the mental afflictions. Hatred for wat?

[Student: [unclear]

For this great enemy that has caused you all your mental and physical suffering
and [not sure] get's into this big debate he say's are these mental afflictions or not
you know is loving or being attached to the path and the war against the mental
afflictions is that a mental affliction itself and is it a mental affliction to hate your
hatred or to hate your own anger and he gets into this big debate because
unfortunately there's an early sanskrit commentary which says then later these
two mental afflictions and these two ideas will be finished you know there is a
later sanskrit commentary which says these two mental, he doesn't say exactly
mental afflictions but he says these two attitudes will be finished so many
commentators have taken them to mean that they are mental afflictions and that
okay you put up with them for a while and later your'll over come them the two
mental afflictions are enjoying the war loving to fight the mental afflictions and
being spitting on the mental afflictions and hating them you know and [unsure]
says that is not the point at all, cause if you read the verse carefully and if you
know tibetan you can read it more carefully he says {matowpa} which "these are
not mental afflictions" okay what that commentary means is once you've
punched out the mental afflictions you know once you have knocked them out
well then you won't have to do those two things you won't have to have a love
for that war anymore and you won't have to have this hatred for these guys as
they exsist in your mind because they won't exsist in your mind at that point so
then you will lose those two attitudes it doesn't mean they are mental afflictions
so what he is saying is that it is fine too love buddhism to love the war love
making war on the mental afflictions and then he is saying it's fine to spit on
your mental afflictions you know every time you get jealous you should take
great joy in being pissed off at your own jealousy you know very good very
appropriate get angry at your jealousy and very, very appropriate for buddhists
once you have kicked them out of your mind then you won't have to do that
anymore and that's where he said it we are gonna take a break and then when
wwe get back we are going to talk about the possibility of kicking the mental
afflictions out of your mind completely and exactly how does that happen is it
possible to beat this enemy in such a way that he never comes back.

[Break]

It's just the ideal of a bodhisattva, I swear to think like a bodhisattva, I swear to
try to get to a point where I would give the rest of my life to other beings to help
them reach enlightenment I'll get there first and on the way I will help them and
on the way I will really help them that's all you are doing you know it's not like a
you don't have to cut your arm open or anything like that okay that comes later,
no [laughter] okay we will try to go faster now Shantideva, Master Shantideva
gets into this long part next where he talks about is it possible to beat the mental
afflictions you know like what kind of war is this going to be is this going to be
like a normal war or not, you know, are we going to beat Germany and then
twenty years later they build up again and we have to fight them again you
know is that the kind of war it is or what kind or war is it and he discusses, sorry
[Julia] [laughter] my grandma was there but is this the kind of war when they're
gonna go back and regroup and build up their strength again or is it possible,is it
even theoretically possible to wipe out the mental afflictions permenantly and
then Master Shantideva gets into this verse which is very sweet and he says if
you think about it all the mental afflictions come from what? Ignorance which is
the tendency to see things as...

[Student's:self exsistent]

Self existent which is a mistaken state of mind okay it is a mistaken state of mind
it's a misperception it's a misunderstanding it is focusing on the world in a way
which is unreal the world is not that way and ignorance thinks it is that way so
all of the bad thoughts that you have the twenty-six that we have done the
eighty-four thousand that we don't have time to do they are all based on one
mental function which is mis-understanding your world you know mis-
interpretating your world and because of that says Master Shantideva it is
possible to wipe out the mental afflicctions permenently and once you cut the
root then you wouldn't have to worry about them anymore it's not like your
gonna be fighting, fighting, fighting and then you control your anger and then
you don't watch it for a couple of weeks and then it start's to come back like a
bad weed or something like that mental afflictions are not like that if you can
destroy them from the root which if you can understand emptiness you can
reach a point where they will not exsist anymore and they do not come back
they cannot come back because thet must be based if you were in Massacussets
they must be based at the rawest forms of liking and disliking which are the
rawest form of mental affliction are themselves predicated on mis-understanding
the world you know if you didn't mis-understand the world you couldn't get
those mental afflictions so therefore it is possible to destroy them forever and
they will not come back and that's very cool ,ah yeh.

[Student:[question,unclear]

In the next verse {laughter] Master Shantideva discovers, discusses the secret for
seeing things that way which we talked about up in massachusettes also really
out of six stages of mental afflictions growing the first stage is what can you
remember {up chmpa mewer} it's ignorance in the seed form as you go into
your next life it's the ignorance seeds for ignorance that you carry into your next
life and then even in the womb they start to grow you were right yeh the
ultimate point is that you have to be able to remove the seeds also and that's
true, eigth bodhsattva level or going into nirvana on a Hinayana track you
remove the seed for ignorance you can't have them anymore you can't have the
seeds for ignorance you cannot have the seeds anymore for thinking things are
self exsistent and all mental affliction depends on that and if that were not in
your mind then you could say that mental affliction be removed permenantly
from, he gets into a really sweet verse after that he says well is there some place
where they could hide out okay they don't go back home and get started again
but could they go to a third country and hang out and hide for a while is there
any place else that the mental afflictions could go if you cut their home base in
your consciousness if you cut their home base which is your ignorance well
could they hang out in some other part of your being and then get back at you
later somehow so that Master Shantideva goes through three possibilities let's
see where else would they hide out you know and he makes a list. Three
alternative hide outs for the mental afflictions enemies once you have kicked
their rear ends okay. Say {suksob yulah minay} .

[Student:{suksob yulah minay]

{Suksob yulah minay} the critical word here is {yule} which sometimes means
"country" but here means "object of your perceptions" okay what is the yule of
the I conciousness?     Colours and shapes what is the {yule}        of the ear
conciousness? Sounds okay so is it possible for the mental afflictions if you cut
their home base in your mind could they like hide in the objects for a while and
then come back and get at you later Master Shantideva is going through all the
possibilities you know could they go out into colours and shapes could they go
out into Tony Braxston's latest song and then hide there and then come back
later and get you you know so he discusses that he actually gets into it is it
possible for the mental affliction tendencies to park in the external objects of
your senses and your mind then come back and get you later of possibilities
okay and then he says no it is not possible why?

[Student:[unclear]

Well he asks the following question can arhats see colours and shapes so do
arhats get mental afflictions? No okay so if mental afffliction were by nature
something inherant in the world you know if it is some problem of the world
that we have anger you know if the problem is not in the mind but it is in the
world then anybody that lived in the world and that saw New York city would
get mental afflictions but it's not true people can reach Nirvana they can go to
Manhattan they can look at the Empire State Building and not get mental
afflictions so the mental affliction tendencies do not lie out in outer objects of our
senses they cannot hide out there he says. Yeh

[Student:[question][unclear]

{Nimay} means "they do not stay" I like to say they don't park and then there's
in the longer form it says by nature in the {yule} in the objects of viual forms
and the rest okay they don't stay in your outer world they can't if they could
then arhats could get mental afflictions. Say {mixo}

[Students:{mixo}

{Bongolah}

[Students:{bongolah} ]

{Mineh}

[Students:{mineh} ].

I mean what are all the possibilities for our mental afflictions to hang out at if
they are not in your mind they are not in your consciousness well maybe they
are in the object of your consciousness meaning the colours the shapes and the
sounds of the world but if they hang out there then arhats would also get mental
afflictions well what about if they hang out in the sense powers themselves in the
sense organs you know what if they could go and hide in your visual optic nerve
okay what we call the sense powers in buddhist philosophy what if thet could
stay in your ear or in the power of hearing or in the power of touch by the way
if you aliminate the mind and the sense power and the objects there ain't no
place else for them to go then you can say with finality they're dead if you get
them out of your mind they cannot stay even in an enlightened state in different
places of your being and this says {mic} {mic} means "the eye" {sor} means
"etc" {wambolah} means "those sense powers" {nimay} means "they don't stay
there" they cannot stay there because everybody knows that even a person who
is experiencing emptiness can still have an eyeball even though they cannot have
a mental affliction so it can't be that the mental afflictions are hanging out in your
eye in your eye power okay you can have an eye power you canbe
concerntrating on emptiness and you cannot have a mental affliction so they
cannot be staying in the eye power what he is trying to say is these are for
people who have studied Abhidharma okay first chapter Abhidharma kosha he
is trying to say look you can divide the world into the objects we we see into the
mind that sees them and into the eye which allows the mind to see the objects
and mental afflictions if you can kick them out of the mind by understanding
emptiness they can't go park in the eye and they can't go park in outer world
they are gone there is no base for them to come back to they are gone and they
have no place to build up their strength again and to get re-inforcements and to
come back and attack you again he is still talking about a war you know if you
kick them out of this one perimeter called your skull you know if you can get
them out of your mind then there is no place else they can go they have to be
permenantly destroyed they cannot re-group and come back impossible. Say
{parla mina} .

[Students:{parla minay} ]

{Parla minay}

[Students:{parla minay} ]

{Parla minay} is very simple what's a {bardo} ? In between being right {bardo}
okay {parla} means "in the middle" {parla minay} means "there no place else for
them to go" there is no other, what do you call it, option number three means
there's no other option they are not in the outer world which you are
experiencing if they are not in your conciousnesses and they are not in your
sense powers well then there ain't no place else for them to be and they are gone
so he is trying to prove that you can defeat them permenantly and you are
supposed to get happy you are supposed to say this is not like other enemies
that if you sort of beat them for a while that they rise up again like that. Did you
have a question?

[Student:yeh [unclear]

So, but he doesn't get a mental affliction.

[Student:[unclear]

It wouldn't happen I think at that point I don't think that he could get altzimers
just karmically I doubt it or he would be the first altzimers patient not to get
violent okay seriously and by the way I repeat it is possible for an arhat to die of
a horrible death but they'd never get upset about it never feel angry, never hate
anybody nothing like that okay. Yeh.

Student: [unclear]

Yeh,yeh right I was afraid you would ask me that and I was amazed that nobody
mentioned it and I was hoping to get away with it she said when you said that
people, I said you notice I only said perceived emptiness okay I was fudging it if
you are focusing on emptiness it is impossible to have a mental affliction period
but at that time it still possible to have an eye power and it can even be active so
I'll say i'll take a shot it doesn't say clearly in the text but I would say direct
perception of emptiness it's obviously you couldn't have a mental affliction but
you can't have any relative thought at that time period you cannot have an
emotion at that time it is impossible but let's even say then that you understand
the emptiness of an object even fairly well intellectually for that millisecond that
you are having that pure understanding it's totally impossible to have a mental
affliction at that time you cannot understand an objects emptiness even
intellectually clearly we say clearly is a big thing in the scriptures, clearly and
then still have a mental affliction at the same time totally impossible so you
canbe looking at that wall understanding it's emptiness and it would be
impossible during that ten seconds okay to have a mental affliction about the
wall it's impossible that is what he is talking about okay. Two things and then
we will stop almost on time we have reached the end of the war with the mental
afflictions were getting, we are cruising through the "Bodhisattva charyatara" at
about ten times normal spead okay Rinpoche took I think eight or nine years to
teach it we are trying to do it in a year which is difficult but you are getting all
the main stuff I can't see you know I can't see that we will get an opportunity to
do it longer than that so we have to kind of move at a certain pace that takes us
to the six perfections okay we have just reached the six perfections we will start
to s them we will start to discuss the six activities of a bodhisattva we'll assume
that you already did the ceremony next week okay and now you decided that
you want to get into acting like a bodhisattva there are mainly six main activities
of a bodhisattva okay and that is say {paratu chinba} .

[Students:{paratu chinba} ]

{Paratu chinba}

[Students:{Paratu chinba} ]
{Paratu chinba} means {para} means "the other side", the far side like if you are
standing on the east bank the west bank is the {para} okay {chinba} means
"went there" past tense went {tu} means there, to there so {paratu chinba}
means "went to the other side" and it is translated as perfection and that's a good
perfection a good translation one of the few ones that I agree with okay and it
means "perfection" okay in sanskrit the other side is {param} then {eter} is the
past tense of go so {param-eter} or {parameter} okay [laughs] okay perfection
and there are six. Why do thet call them perfections? I mean everybody talks
about the six perfections bodhisattva, the life of a bodhisattva is made up of six
perfections why are they called perfections?

[Student:reply [unclear]

Sykes says when you are a buddha they are perfected that happens to be the
perfect answer perfection answer okay that is exactly right okay when you reach
buddhahood they are perfected but these are talking about activities for people
like us who are not buddhas yet so why are they called perfections for us?

Student:[unclear]

Marcella said because she was in California she cheated okay just kidding,
because they lead you to perfection okay and that is {paratu chin che} . Say
{paratu} .

[Students:{paratu} ]

{chin}

[Students:{chni} ]

{che}

[Students:{che} ]

{Paratu}

[Students:{paratu} ]

{Chin che}
[Students:{chin che} ]

Really you are doing six {paratu chin che's} you are not doing six {paratu
chinba's} {paratu chin che} means "get you to perfection" takes you to perfection
you are if you are not a buddha already you're practising the six getting you to
perfections getting to perfections anyway there {paratu chin ches} okay when
you get to be a buddha they are {paratu chinba's} okay. I am going to write
them down very fast okay six of them alright and then we will be done mostly.
Six activities of a bodhisattva if you want this world to change before your very
eyes do these six. Say {chinba} .

[Students:{chinba} ]

{Chinba}

[Students:{chinba} ]

{Chinba} means "giving" okay some people call it charity, I think charity is like
good will and salvation army you know it is giving ,giving food, giving money,
giving houses, giving dharma, giving protection all those kinds of giving okay
{chinba} that's {chinba's} name and anytime you need an orange [laughter] they
will give you [laughter]. Say {sultrim} .

[Students:{sultrim} ]

{Sultrim}

[Students:{sultrim} ]

{Sultrim} means I like to call it "an ethical way of life" okay an ethical way of life
keeping your vows okay all the way from not committing the ten non-virtues
upto the hundreds of secret vows you might have that you don't even know
about okay you can call it morality, morality reminds me of Billy Graham Iprefer
to call it an ethical way of life nothing against Billy Graham okay.

[Students:Is ethics okay?]

Ethics is probably okay. Say [serpa}
[Students:{serpa} ]

{Serpa}

[Students:{serpa} ]

People translate it as patience I don't like it much to me it means being able to sit
in the doctors office or something, it is not getting angry when the time is right, I
like to translate it as not getting angry,patience is okay,not getting mad, maybe
we don't have a word in English I don't know.

[Silence].

Say {Sundru}

[Students:{Sunru} ]

{Sundru]

[Students:{Sundru} ]

{Sundrup} is translated in all sorts of ways fortitude, effort, energy I like to call it
joyful effort it is to find {sungpa trenpa jewaa oh} means "you get off on doing
good things" you get charged out of doing good things definition of it joy about
doing good things okay. Say {sumden}

[Students: {Sumden} ]

{Sumden}

[Students:{Sumden} ]

The ability to concerntrate, concerntration you can also translate it as meditation,
in this case. Say {sherab}

[Students:{Sherab} ]

{Sherab}

[Students:{Sherab} ]
{Sherab}      is wisdom okay understanding the ultimate nature of things
understanding emptiness understanding karma things like that okay {sherub}
wisdom. Those are the names of the six perfections we will spend the rest of the
year on these six perfections alright the next two courses and the rest of this
course are going to be devoted to that, these are the only things which can give
you the karmic energy to reach your own paradise in this life especially okay
must learn them must learn to be good at them and that's going to be your lifes
career you know you canbe a stoke broker on the side but you are going to be a
{Parameterer} you know you are going to be a perfectionist for the rest of your
life okay that is your real career is to folllow these six things and to learn to
perfect them learn all the tricks learn all the details of them okay. He gets into
one last point he says are the perfections mental or do they depend on some
outer perfection he gives the example of giving okay when you perfect giving
does it imply that every sentient being in the world is no longer poor you know
like does the perfection of giving mean that you give away money to everyone
you meet in other words have I perfected giving if one person around me still is
broke, do I have to go and physically make sure that every person that I know is
not poor before I can say that my giving is perfected and that is a good question,
no okay, why? Plenty of Buddhas around and plenty of broke people around I
can pledge, I can attest to it so they did perfect giving and there is still people
around that need money so it doesn't mean that the perfection of giving is that
every person around you is not broke anymore okay, it is the state of mind that
is totally willing to give up everything you have body, possessions and your
goodness to other people you know it is that state of mind it is the perfection of
that state of mind. Now we have to study {Madhyamika} it's very common for
the mind to go from here to here this state of mind says the perfection of giving
if I get perfect at it then everybody around me will have everything that they
need thats not true okay that is not the perfection of giving it is the willingness to
give them anything you have immediately without any hessitation everything
then the human mind goes from there over to here hey then I can sit at home
and think about giving you know cos Michael Roche is up there and he said
actually giving I can do in the comfort of my own home you know [laughs] and
you have to prevent that extreme also. You are not a bodhisattva if you have
anything that you can give and you are sitting at home thinking about it okay
that is not the point, I mean the perfection of giving it is true is only a state of
mind you can reach the perfection of giving and everyone around you canbe
dead broke you better not have any money okay what it means is obviously it
should be exspressing itself in your behaviour to say I perfected giving and you
still have something to give other people that would help them then it's just b,s
alright so perfection of giving it is a mental state but if it is not manifesting itself
in your activities then come on are we supposed to believe that now you have
something they need it lets get going okay you have it lets just give it to them I
saw I was with Rinpoche and we saw the Pope on T.V in Giant stadium and he
got up and said "don't give people your extra give them your capital" and
Rinpoche was "that's great" you know [laughter] don't give them your excess
you know, give them what they need give them what you have and if you don't
then don't say that you are at home perfecting giving in your mind it is a mental
perfection but it should display itself automatically how about the perfection of
what is the second one? Let's say killing, not killing so if someone around you is
getting killed if someone in your world if I am standing up here and someone in
Tibet is being tortured have I not perfected morality is that possible can I be
aware of someone being tortured and then because of that I haven't perfected
ethical living it is not true okay Shantideva goes through that, Master Shantideva
says it is possible that you can perfect your morality and your ethical life and
people are still being hurt in the world you cannot stop all of it impossible
because you are not the cause of it their mentall afflictions are the cause of it
okay you have to do everything at your disposal anything you can do you must
do for them but don't think that the perfection does not happened or something
if there are still people suffering in Bosnia it's not like that there could be people
being killed all around you and you canbe perfect in your own morality so that's
it doesn it mean you stand around and don't do anything if you hear someone is
getting hurt? No, then you haven't perfected morality you have to think about it
okay. The third one is what? Last question if it is possible that there is one more
angry person in your life does that mean you didn't perfect patience if there is
one more irritating person in the world does that mean you have been a failure
in the perfection of patience no there will be lot's of angry people on the day that
you reach Nirvana and end your anger for ever and reach the perfection of
patience total perfection there will be lots of people around you who are still
irritating okay so he says that is not the perfection of patience it's the mental part
of not getting angry ever again then you have perfected patience so that's just
another point in the verses okay. I think we have covered everything we are a
little bit late so we are gonna stop and we're going to go straight to the prayers
okay and we'll try to finish the reading by next week okay then again be ready
next week mentally bring nice stuff don't bring your excess okay bring some
major neat stuff okay, flowers make the place nice make it really nice, come a
little early and bring stuff which is really cool it doesn't have to be expensive but
it should be from your heart bring something from your heart.
Course X – Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, Part One