Серия ежедневной практики, курс 04 — Семичастная практика развития доброго сердца (1999, Гоа), занятие 5

[Speaker 2]
Session five.

[Speaker 1]
Okay, we've been working on the pledges. For Lojong, the pledges. She's recording my feet.

Pledges for the practice of trying to gain ultimate love, ultimate compassion. And they're very practical. I think those of you who have Bodhisattva vows and you're tracking them every day, they're kind of...

they can be a little general. These are very specific. These are things that really happen to you.

So we're going to finish those pledges and then we'll go back to the third part of the seven that we didn't do yet. And then we'll try to go in order after that. I just like to teach these pledges now, early in the course, because every time I've taught this course, we ran out of time at the end and we never got through the pledges.

And I think the pledges are the most useful thing. So here we go. What number are we on?

This is going to be fourteen. Fourteen, okay. Say dzog khel?

Dzog khel. Lang la?

[Speaker 2]
Lang la. Mi dzog? Mi dzog.

[Speaker 1]
Dzog khel? Dzog khel. Lang la?

Lang la. Mi dzog? Mi dzog.

Dzog is a yak. It's a kind of yak. I think it's a female yak, actually.

And so there's no such thing as yak butter. It's really dzog butter. But people can't say dzog, so we say yak butter.

Dzog khel means the load or the burden that you put on a yak. These things can carry a lot. They weigh like a ton or something and they can carry a lot of weight.

Lang means a cow. Lang la mi dzog means don't take the load off the yak and put it on a cow. I translate it as load your own truck, no passing the buck.

Sorry, loose translation. Anyway, what it means is first of all, in a specific sense to learn to take responsibility when things go wrong and don't try to avoid responsibility when things go wrong. If something doesn't go right then you don't try to find someone else to blame it on.

And if you work in a company I worked in a large corporation for over 15 years it's very useful if a certain number of people just refuse to not take responsibility. So you just say, OK, this went wrong. You don't have to blame anybody.

You can blame me. They used to pay me an incredible amount of money. They used to pay me well into six figures.

Because I just would say, OK, it's my fault. All the time I'd say, OK, you need somebody to blame. You can blame me.

Now let's fix it. You know what I mean? And just not to waste the half hour or the hour or the five hours or the five weeks it takes to try to squirm around and blame it on ten different people.

Probably ten different people have some part of the blame. Probably one or two people are mostly to blame. But at a certain point in your spiritual maturity you just learn to say, OK, you want to blame somebody.

You can blame me. Now what do we do? How do we fix this thing?

You see what I mean? And that's first of all the attitude. And in a more general sense just to learn to take responsibility for things in general.

Like there's a scary thing in a corporation is that you see a decision float around. You see? There's a decision that has to be made today and it will actually float around the whole corporation.

You know? In the course of the day on the phone or by email this decision will just float around the company like a ship in a bay. And then finally there'll be one person just...

it hits like a reef or something and there's one person who's sitting there firm and says, I'll take the decision. You know? And I think they used to pay me money, that much money just because I would take a decision.

Good or bad. Right or wrong. Well thought out or well not thought out.

This guy will take a position. You know? This guy will make a decision.

And then you can blame him later or you can credit him later. It doesn't matter. But at least somebody will take a decision.

You know what I mean? And you just take responsibility. Say, OK, we're going to do that.

You know? And then everyone calms down and they do it. You know what I mean?

And as long as there's some kind of question or ambiguity running around then everyone's uncomfortable. At least one person stands up and says, OK, right or wrong, I may not know everything, here's what we're going to do. And then people are just attracted to that.

People like that. So what this means is, when the decisions float by you, you just step in front of them and take the bullet. You say, OK, I'll make a decision.

I'll take responsibility for this thing. And a lot of times it's something that's not very pleasant and nobody wants to take responsibility for that or nobody wants to really get involved or stick their neck out. I think once you get used to it, it's very pleasant.

I mean, you don't feel bad anymore about having taken responsibility. Just do it. You know what I mean?

And then it spreads to other people around you. So this is the willingness to take a decision, to take responsibility, and especially to even try to seek ways that you can put the blame on yourself. Like, we'll be sitting around a board meeting table.

There'll be six vice presidents. And they'll be trying to figure out someone to blame for something. And the whole process is much cleaner and faster if you just say, look, OK, you can blame me.

I did make part of that decision. And then the whole thing just immediately calms down and you move on to fixing that problem. You see what I mean?

So try to overcome that human tendency to not want to be blamed. The Japanese are very good at that. They apologize to you in advance for things they haven't done yet.

That's a little extreme. But, you know, in Japan we learn the words to say, I'm sorry. We'd meet somebody, we'd exchange business cards, we'd show them a piece of jewelry, and we'd say, I'm also sorry.

And they'd say, thank you. And then you go on to your business. So something not quite that extreme.

All right. Number 15. Say, gyoku tse.

[Speaker 2]
Mitu. Gyoku tse. Mitu.

[Speaker 1]
Gyoku means, by the way, the translation says don't get hung up on speed. Gyoku means fastness or speed. Tse means the tip-top.

Mitu means don't direct yourself towards that. And what it means is like you're getting on the bus to the airport, you know, and you let everybody else get on first. You see, it's defined in the commentary, it says, when there is a common possession, in this case it's a bus with so many seats, that you always, you don't rush ahead to the front and get the first one yourself.

You always let other people go first. And that's the description of this in scripture. So in the case of a bus, you know, on the way to the airport, you say, okay, you guys go ahead first.

You don't rush on the bus and get the best seat and something like that, okay? You share, and you think of others first, and you let them go first. If you keep this up over a long period of time, like we travel a lot, we're often on airplanes, we spend half our lives on airplanes, and we just got into this thing that we're always last onto the plane and we're always last off the plane, you know?

We just sit there for an extra ten minutes. Everybody gets off, and then oftentimes the stewardess is standing there waiting for us to get off. And we're having a good time.

We get out a novel and read it together, or we get out our laptops and type some more emails, or, you know, we do something useful. We don't waste the time. And then when we get off the plane, we, you know, casually walk to the baggage thing, and the baggage is just coming out.

And we didn't have to stand anywhere. We didn't have to stand under the bulkhead with our heads down. We didn't have to have people crushing us with their luggage.

We didn't push anybody. You know, this whole idea that don't push your karma envelope, okay? You do have the karma to get off the plane, okay?

So who cares if you're the first off or the last off, you know? I mean, your karma to get off the plane is assured. Now why push the envelope, you know?

You may not be the first. Why do you have to be the first? You know, what's the point?

It doesn't mean anything. You see what I mean? Okay, you have the karma to be in the hotel.

You may or may not have the karma to get the exact room you want. So why push it? Just lay back.

Be happy to be in the hotel. You see what I mean? You don't push up to the front of the desk and say, I want my room first, or I want a bigger room, or I want that room, and I don't want that room, or I don't want to spare that person.

What it means is to recognize that your current karmic level is in a certain place. Now you can either push it, or you can just live comfortably within it and relax and be more happy, you know? And then let other people get their thing.

You know what I mean? And I always think in the Abhidharma, third chapter, end of the thing, there's a description of Chakravartins. These are people who are rulers of the world.

They're called wheel-empowered emperors. Okay? Wheel emperors.

And there's three or four kinds. One with a gold wheel, one with a silver wheel, one with a bronze wheel. Copper and bronze or something like that.

Okay? And later, when I studied the Mandala offering in a commentary by Mucchidan Bhadra, he described this wheel. I thought it was like a disc, like that you see in the Olympics when they throw a disc or something like that.

And I thought maybe it had like boomerang powers or something. He says, no, it's about a mile and a half wide. It has chambers inside it.

The four armies of the king can file into these corridors in this huge disc and sit down in different rooms and sit down on these special seats and then the disc rises up into the air and then it flies to other continents where they do battle. You see, they actually, this is Abhidharma written in 350 AD that there's a flying machine shaped like a disc and that's why they're called wheel-empowered emperors. Chakravartin means they have these special discs that they get into and they lead their armies.

They can fit a couple thousand people in the disc and fly off and go do war with other continents. You see what I mean? And if you have a gold disc, there's this karma.

The karma to have the gold disc means that you have the signs of a Buddha on your body but they're off-center and they're not very clear. Like, you're supposed to have a wheel on the palm of your hand but let's say it's on your forearm or something like that. You know what I mean?

Or your bum's a little bit off or something like that. So there's this big debate in the monastery. Does anybody have the marks of a Buddha?

They say, yes. But are they distinct? You know, salad, sopa, are they distinct and are they in the right place?

They say, no, you know. And then, the guy with the gold wheel, the guy with the gold flying saucer, really, has the karma that everybody in the world comes and begs them to be king of the world. You see what I mean?

They don't have to have an election. They don't have to convince anybody. They have the karma that everyone in the world unanimously begs them to be king of the world.

Then the guys with the silver disc, they have to go through some election process. You know, like, there's two guys, there's two candidates, and then they have to go and talk to people and say, I'm better than the other one. And then they say, okay, you are, and they elect him president of the world.

And then the guy with the copper disc has to threaten people. He has to actually put out armies and say, do you think I should be king of the world or what? And there's a big debate whether he actually kills anybody, because could you kill anybody and have that much virtue to be king of the world?

And they say no. He just threatens people. He just shows a big gun.

And I often think about it, you know. I mean, what you're talking about is the same in a company, or it's the same in your workplace, or the same about the goals that you hope for in your life. You know, you want certain things.

You want a certain salary. You want to live in a certain house. And then there's this pushing your karma envelope.

You know, there's this tendency to want a little bit more than your karma has called for. You see what I mean? Okay, so you're going to be in this hotel somewhere.

So just relax, okay? Why push it beyond what your karma has... You know, why be a...

If you're going to be a bronze wheel king, or you're going to be a silver wheel king, then why try to be... Why push it? You know what I mean?

You have the karma to be king of the world. Be happy. You know what I mean?

Don't worry about which wheel you have or something like that. What I'm saying is that when a human being gets unhappy, it's because they're expecting a little bit more than their karma is offering them at the moment. And then...

I'm not suggesting that you don't be aggressive, or you don't be a go-getter, or you don't be... You don't have vision. You should have vision.

But work... Don't be unhappy when you hit the envelope of your karma. You know, don't make yourself unhappy by wanting just a little more than you'd be thrilled to have if you couldn't get in a hotel.

You see, it's all relative. It's just relative. You know what I mean?

You'd be thrilled to get off an Indian plane. Okay? So why, you know, let the other people go first.

You're going to get off. Don't worry. You know what I mean?

And just relax. Okay, you want to be a professor at Harvard. You're not going to make a professor at Harvard.

So take the position at Kansas State. It's okay. That's where you're at right now.

And then relax. And don't make yourself unhappy. Go for the big one.

If it doesn't come true, then just accept the level that you're at, karmically. See what I mean? And this all involves letting other people go first.

Look, you have karma to get refreshments. Okay? You may not get the first cup of tea.

You may not get the cookie that you wanted, the biscuit that you wanted. You're going to get a biscuit. You're going to get something to drink.

Just be happy. You don't have to push other people out of the way and go up to the first and demand that you be served first, that you get what you want first. This is a very holy instruction, okay?

I mean, it's like satisfaction with where you're at right now. And you just... Vasubandhu called it...

Master Vasubandhu called it dṛcchan cokṣe. Just deal with what you have. And don't be greedy.

And don't be demanding. And don't say, I need this. I need that.

You know? You know, you're going to get fed tonight. It may be dal, it may be vegetables.

Okay, so... It's okay. You don't have to fight for the vegetables.

You know what I mean? Okay? Or the dal.

All right. What? Fifteen?

Sixteen? Sixteen. Sixteen.

Say, tolo mi ca tolo mi ca mi ca These are really hard. Those of you who ever learned Tibetan, these are like 16th century expressions from Kansas or something, okay? to means grub, food, okay?

Like they don't call human beings food, to. Okay? Like pak to means pig's lop or something like that.

Okay? So tolo tolo means wrong grub. mi ca, don't feed the wrong face.

Okay? Don't feed the wrong face. And then when the commentaries say, you can take your Dharma practice and you actually have a goal in mind.

I mean, the goal of lojong is to starve your tendency to take care of yourself first. Okay? Your goal of this particular teaching this whole week is to identify and to admit your tendency to watch out for yourself first and not think of others.

And then, tolo mi ca means having identified your own real nature, which is to take care of yourself first and really ignore other people. Don't use these teachings to feed the tendency you have to take care of yourself and then ignore others. You see, the teachings themselves are like sustenance.

You see what I mean? If you feed your wisdom, if you feed your compassion, if you feed your empathy with other people, then it will get stronger and that will, conversely, it will starve your tendency to watch out for yourself. And what they're talking about here is, don't take your Dharma practice and start feeding, using it, twisting it around to feed your self-cherishing more.

You see what I mean? And that's the tendency of people. They used to have mental afflictions about their career, or they used to have mental afflictions about their family, and now they've transferred them all to their Dharma practice.

You see what I mean? And they're actually using the Dharma group they're in, or they're using the teachings themselves to reinforce all their negative qualities that they had before. You see what I mean?

For example, someone like me learns Tibetan really well, and then, instead of being proud about my college record or my job status, now I start to be proud about my Tibetan knowledge and start to display it to people and start to try to, you know, instead of using the Dharma to starve my tendency towards pride, I'm using the Dharma to feed it more. And that gets very dangerous because you're using the antidote to feed the enemy. So there's no weapon left against the enemy.

You see what I mean? If you take the Dharma itself and start using it to feed the same negative emotions you had when you came into the Dharma, then you're out of luck because there's no more weapons to use against the enemy, because you just took the ultimate weapon and turned it into food for your old negative emotions. You see what I mean?

So, don't feed the wrong face. Make sure that you're not relating to Dharma in exactly the same way you used to relate to your business career and your college career or your family or things like that, and just using it as another excuse to act out the same mental afflictions you walked into your first Dharma teaching with. Except now it's worse because now there's nothing that can fix you, because you've taken the antidote and you've twisted it around to feed your negative emotions.

You see what I mean? So, especially people who are thinking to become teachers or who get good at the philosophy part or something like that, it's a very great, serious danger that you have to be sensitive to. Don't transfer all your old mental afflictions to your new career as a Dharma student.

Okay? Say, LHA DU DU MI YAP LHA DU DU MI YAP It's not DU DU, okay. LHA is like the LHA in Lhasa.

It means... Lhasa means Los Angeles, actually. It means City of the Gods.

Okay? And LHA means Angel or God, and SA means City or Place. So...

And it's pronounced H-L-A. It was miswritten by the British and we got stuck with it. Like Mumbai was Bombay for some reason.

Okay? They fixed it, but they didn't fix Lhasa. Or Sri Lanka.

So, LHA means a Deva, a Deity. And DU means a Demon, the Devil. Okay?

MI YAP means... YAP means Drag something down to the level of a Devil. In the translation, it says Don't turn the sweet angel into a Devil.

Okay? What this means is very similar to the last one. This, by the way, is one of the most famous expressions of this lojo.

This is the one that you hear lamas quote a lot. It's become a cliche or it's become a very common phrase that people use in Tibet in monastery. And what it refers to is twisting the Dharma to your own ends.

Okay? I'll give you an example. I like this example.

Benjamin Franklin, he used to keep a book, by the way. He used to keep a book of his virtues and his non-virtues. And then every day he would check it.

And he kept it by having a grid. And then he would put dots with his pencil in when he had a mental affliction. And then at the end of the day he would check it.

And he said some of his mental afflictions got so bad that there were big holes in the paper. And so, there was a time when he was traveling a lot to England, I mean to France to work on the revolution, raising money for the revolution. He actually won the revolution.

He raised all the money. That he got on a ship for France and they went up to catch the current from Newfoundland and they got becalmed. There was no current and no wind.

And they just got stuck there. And they're just sitting there and you have to wait until a wind comes up. It could take two, three, four days, you know.

And he said he was sitting on the deck. He had just decided to become a vegetarian. And he was a great glutton.

He loved to eat, you know. And they had these brick ovens on the deck of the ship and people were fishing for food, you know. And they caught these fish and they would bring them up to the deck and they would cook them there on an open fire on the deck, you know.

And then he starts to smell this wonderful smell of the fish, you know. And he starts to get really hungry. And he starts to dream about eating these fish.

And then he goes over and he sees people cleaning the fish. And he notices that when they cut open the fish, often smaller fish are falling out of the stomach of the fish. So then he says, this great logic occurred to me.

I said, if the big fish can eat the small fish, then it's logical that I should kill the big fish. You see what I mean? Under the influence of hunger and desire, he said, my whole moral fiber twisted to what I wanted.

You know, here was a proof that I could twist around to use to do what I wanted. And then he stuffed himself, you know. And then afterwards he was sitting there and he said, you know, this moral logic stuff is just like, he was a printer, right?

And they had to use these lead bars to keep the type together. They would use vices to keep them all in a frame. And these bars you could just twist and bend and turn to any way you wanted.

He said, my moral discipline is just like those lead bars. You know, I mean, he's trying to say if you get good at it, you can twist any part of the Dharma around to fit exactly what you wanted to do anyway. And Geshes are really good at this.

I mean, we go through years and years of debate, years and years of learning to twist an opponent's argument. If you can't do it by logic, you do it by deception. You know, you insist that they said something that they didn't say and they had no intention to say, and then you get them to admit that they did say it and then you just beat them, you know.

And if you can't beat them fair and square, then you're supposed to beat them the other way, you know what I mean? And it's very common, you know. And then I'm afraid, frankly, that when they get out they're so stubborn and bullheaded that if they have anything that they'd like to do that's not proper, they're just very good at convincing themselves and they can pull out all kinds of scripture to show that, you know, what they actually wanted to do is okay.

And you can do that with the Dharma. I mean, there's hundreds of thousands of Dharma books in Tibetan, and if you know how to read them and you can just take anything and just prove what you want to prove, you can go with it, you know, basically. So what this is saying is don't do that.

Don't turn this sweet Dharma into a demon. Okay? Don't twist it for your own.

Try to understand that your mind has been having mental afflictions for countless years. There's a part of your mind which is very attached and very invested in that way of thinking. And as you try to take your mind out of that, your mind will defend itself.

The negative parts of your mind will defend themselves. And the negative parts of your mind And they'll put up a fight. And part of the fight will be just outright laziness, rejection of those ideas, refusing to admit that they're correct.

And if they can't win that way, they'll take your Dharma and they'll twist it around at you, you see what I mean? And they'll convince you that these mental afflictions should be able to survive in your mind because the Dharma says so. And they'll find quotations and things like that to support their view.

The first Panchen Lama wrote a beautiful book called The Debate Between the Mind The Debate Between Wisdom and Ignorance. And it's actually two little guys on top of a guy's head and they start to have this very interesting debate. And ignorance keeps twisting the Dharma around against wisdom and trying to catch wisdom into believing stupid things.

And wisdom keeps catching him and saying, no, that's not what we meant. And you've got to be careful with the Dharma, okay? And this is a good meditation.

Examine your own practice. See if you are concentrating on certain aspects that you feel comfortable with which are not very useful and not very beneficial for people just because it feeds your own mental afflictions. Okay?

Number 18. Say, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI, GYI... like it's a common woman's name in Tibet, , which means comfort and happiness.

GYI GYI , , means as a part of your happiness or as a supporter of your happiness. GYUK means... I translated this as crap, okay?

MI'I TSUL GYUK means bad stuff. MI'I TSUL means don't look for it. If you are studying Tibetan this is the same TSUL as the TSAL and CHAG TSAL meaning to seek a boon from the hand of your Lama, and that's the name for prostration.

So, Tso or Tso is the same thing. So it means, don't go looking for crap to make yourself happy. This refers to a specific state of mind.

It's actually really common. Buddhist scripture says we have 84,000 negative emotions. It's called the Geta Siddha, and versions of negative emotions.

Out of those, you can identify ten which are the top. Those are like the ten bad deeds, or the motivation to do the ten bad deeds. Number nine, okay, is what?

Of the ten bad deeds. It's called ill will. And the Abhidharma says, you know, if you made it into the top ten out of 84,000 different negativities, you must be happening almost all day long.

If some kind of negative state of mind makes it into the top ten of all time, then it must be something that we're having pretty frequently. And number nine, which is called nö sem in Tibetan, is the tendency to, how should we say, be happy when you see someone else having a hard time. And so what this last pledge of the Lojong Dundunma is saying is, don't look to maintain your happiness by watching for other people's problems.

And this I call the O.J. Simpson syndrome. I was traveling overseas during most of the O.J. Simpson thing, and it was amazing how the whole world was captivated by one man's misfortunes. The whole world, through the offices of CNN, etc., they were captivated, they were engrossed. The whole world was in love with this idea that here's a man who got to such heights, and then maybe has slit his wife's throat and all this other guy, and the amazing thing is nobody can prove it or disprove it. And everyone was engrossed with the idea that such an important person could have such a terrible problem. And then this is the...

I even saw it in my own company. The company I worked for is privately owned. Two people own $150 million of equity in the company.

And then somebody would make a big mistake. I remember, I was in on one of them. We sent a...

when we were small, we sent a $50,000 package to the wrong address. Diamonds. Somebody just opened their mail one day and got a bag of diamonds.

And this is kind of embarrassing. And, you know, we were sitting there trying to explain it to the boss. And the other investor's eyes just lit up.

This person had sort of a mean streak in them, it seemed like. And they were so captivated and so turned on by the fact that a major employee could make a $50,000 mistake like that. And I was sitting there watching this person's eyes light up with the idea that they could use it against me for the next year or so, or ten years.

And it occurred to me that we're all going to lose money here. You see what I mean? Like, the person who's happy about it is losing $50,000 because it's their money, it's not my money.

And then I'm going to lose my Christmas bonus. Any excuse around October to November is used to cut your Christmas bonus. You see what I mean?

So I'm watching my bonus go down the drain. I'm watching their money go down the drain. And I'm wondering why it is that human beings are so captivated by other people's misfortunes.

You know what I mean? Even when they themselves are going to lose money. You see what I mean?

And that's just human nature. So what it means is, it's a tendency if you don't like someone to take some comfort in their problems. Especially if there's been a disagreement.

You know, you're in a Dharma organization. This person has attacked you or caused you some problems. And you would do anything if something happened to them that everyone would agree this is a bad person.

See, right now the way it stands is maybe half the people think they're a bad person and half the people think you're a bad person. Now if there could just be some confirmation that they're really the bad person, then you'd feel really happy. You see what I mean?

If they would just make some major mistake, if they would just have some major problem, then you could smile and say, Aha, you know, I showed you. I told you. I'm right and they're wrong.

You see what I mean? And this is this human tendency to take comfort in other people's problems. Especially people you don't like.

And what Lojong is saying here, the pledge, the Dhamtik is saying, if your happiness depends on trying to locate other people's misfortunes, then it's kind of a sick way to live. It's not a very Bodhisattva way to live. And don't live like that.

Don't let your happiness be derived from waiting for other people to make mistakes that you can gossip about or you can take joy about or things like that. It's a common tendency or else it wouldn't be number nine on the ten biggest bad deeds of all time. We must be doing it pretty frequently.

Okay. I'm going to cover the rest of the fifth reading, which is just the first page of it. Let me give you that, okay?

Okay, it says, the first line says, I'm going to read it just for the lung part, okay? ,CHOS KUN GONG PA GCIG TU DUS, ,BANG BO GNYIS KYI RDZOGS SUNG, ,YI DE BA ZHIG GYUR NI BRTEN, ,YANG KYANG THUB NA SBYONG BA YIN, It says all Dharma comes down to a single point. By the way, this section of the seven parts is the fifth part, and it's called the TSE.

TSE means, at what point can you say you have succeeded in this practice? TSE means, at what point can you say that you're doing pretty well at bodhicitta? And he says, all Dharma comes down to a single point, meaning, if your tendency to take care of yourself first is getting less, then we can say that you're practicing Dharma, okay?

Like, are you practicing Dharma or not? And then the answer has to be, like if someone comes up to you and says, do you have a daily practice? And you say, yeah, I do.

And they say, are you a Buddhist? And you say, yeah, I am. And they say, are you practicing Dharma?

And then if you think, if you say yes, it means my tendency to take care of myself first is getting less every day. So yes, I am a Dharma practitioner. I do practice Dharma.

And that's the TSE. That's how you know whether or not you're practicing Dharma. So that's all.

That's it. In the Lojong, that's it. Are you a Dharma practitioner?

Yeah. Are you a Buddhist? Yeah, I'm a Buddhist.

Why? Because my tendency to take care of myself first and ignore others is getting less every week. And that's the only answer you can give.

It's not because you read certain books or you go to certain teachers or you have certain statues on your table in your room or something like that. It doesn't mean anything. Are you a Buddhist?

Yes. Why? Because my tendency to watch out for myself first and ignore other people is getting less every week.

I am a Dharma practitioner. What do you practice? Dharma.

What makes something Dharma? And then the answer in the Lojong here is anything that lowers your tendency to take care of yourself first is Dharma. Okay?

People ask me, you know, can you be a Christian and practice Dharma? They asked His Holiness, I remember, can you be a Christian and take bodhisattva vows? Can you be Jewish and take bodhisattva vows?

You know, I had a rabbi take bodhisattva vows. Rabbi Burt, right? He took bodhisattva vows from me.

I said, can I take them? I said, of course you can. It's Dharma.

You know what I mean? What makes it Dharma? If it lowers your tendency to watch out for yourself and ignore others, it's Dharma.

So are you saying that the Bible is Dharma? And I say, does it lower your tendency to think of yourself first and ignore other people? And if they say yes, I say, yeah, it's Dharma.

Oh, prove it. We had this debate in the monastery, ceremony monastery. I remember it.

It was in Prajnaparamita class. That was a 12-year class. And they get into a thing called Sakya Gacchinle.

Sakya Gacchinle means, what is the activity of a Buddha? What is the activity of enlightened being in this planet? And then they say, actually it's any virtuous event, any virtuous teaching.

Any time that someone is inducing other people to help other people or be good to other people or think kindly of other people, this is Sakya Gacchinle. That's the definition of the act of an enlightened Buddha in this world, of an enlightened being. So, you know, somebody comes up to me and says, is Jesus teaching Dharma?

Can you think of it as Dharma? Can you think of Moses teaching as Dharma? There's no problem.

That's not a problem. That's not even a debate. I mean, in Sara monastery it would last about two minutes.

Somebody would pull out the definition of the activity of an enlightened being and say, well, is it inducing other people to virtue? And I say, yeah. Well, what's your problem?

Of course it is. Of course it's Dharma. You know what I mean?

I'm not suggesting that you go out and mix all the religions of the world and try to practice that. That doesn't work. Okay?

What I'm saying is that any time that someone is teaching something which lowers other people's tendency to be selfish or induces them to be good to each other, that's Dharma. That's the definition of Dharma. By the way, the secondary definition is if it lowers your tendency to have mental afflictions, it's Dharma.

And you know if you're succeeding at Dharma if your mental afflictions are getting less. Okay? If you have less anger, less pride, less desire than you had six months ago, then you are a successful Dharma practitioner.

A lot of people think they're not successful if they didn't memorize this 12-page thing that their tantric Lama told them to. A lot of people think they're not successful if they don't ring the bell at the right time in the ritual. A lot of people think they're not successful if they do not have a shaved head or a red suit on.

A lot of people think they're not successful if they don't know Tibetan grammar or they don't know the 12 divisions of the 14 divisions of the third thing. You know what I mean? And I mean in the Lojong and in Dharma in general, the only measure of your success is your mental afflictions getting less or not.

Are they getting less or not? And if they're not, you're a failure. And it doesn't matter if you're Abbot of Serra Monastery.

You can sit up there and memorize 24 texts and you know the 14 divisions of the 13th category of the Four Things and you ring the bell at the right time and you're still as mean as you were last year. Then you're a failure. You're a Dharma failure.

Okay? And you're not practicing Buddhism. Okay?

And that's the tse. Okay. And that's what the text means when it says this.

There are two judges keep the main one. Pongbo in Tibetan means witness. Do we have a pongbo here?

I'm going to sign this contract. Pongbo means witness or judge. And they say there's two judges.

You can either judge your success by what other people think of you or you can judge your success by what you know to be true about your own inner self. Okay? And they say stick to the right one.

Okay? So, I mean, you can imagine mu shi mu sum. Okay?

Mu shi mu sum mei bei che. Between inner judge and outer judge. Mu shi mu sum mei bei che.

Nobody can give me the three or four combinations. Mu shi mu sum yo ta. Show.

Show me someone who's a failure on the inside and a success on the outside. I mean, theoretical case. We never know, right?

[Speaker 2]
Yeah. Looks like.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
Hitler before he got...

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, maybe Hitler before he fell down or something like that. Or somebody who sits there. I can give you an example.

Someone who can sit upright in perfect full lotus position for two hours and they're just thinking about dinner. Okay? No, I mean, it's theoretically there's people like that.

You know? That's a dharma success. The outside judge is other people.

They watch this person for two hours. Because they don't twitch. You know?

And on the inside they're just spacing out. Which in our system is a very grave mistake. Just spacing out for two hours.

Okay? So that's a mu dhammo yin bei che. Is that the first one?

Yeah. Mu dhammo shak yin bei che. How about success on the inside and failure on the outside?

[Speaker 2]
Your example of Naropa.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, Naropa. The example of Naropa. He's sitting there slaughtering fish at the banks of the Ganges.

You know, inside he's a tantric wise man. And he's doing this only to help Marpa. You know?

And in fact he has a power to put the fish back in the water and they swim away. So, on the outside he looks like some bum and a dharma failure. And on the inside he's a great...

he's one of the greatest successes of dharma of all time. And tantricas are often like that. Okay?

Ni ka yin bei mu shak yin bei bei che. How about somebody who's both?

[Speaker 2]
My holy lama.

[Speaker 1]
My holy lama. Okay. Whoever your lama is.

Okay. Okay. I mean, presumably somebody like His Highness, okay, is great on the inside and great on the outside.

Seems to be doing everything right. They satisfy the external witness or judge and they satisfy the internal judge. Okay?

And then you can imagine somebody who's just a wreck spiritually on the inside and they look like a wreck spiritually. Okay? Just be aware there's those four.

And the main judge is the inner one. Okay? What it boils down to is this.

The easy interpretation is you know, obviously don't be so concerned about how... What should I say? Be more concerned that your own moral life is straight and that you understand what you're doing on the inside than how other people perceive you.

Okay? Like, don't be too worried about what other people say about you or think about you if you're aware that your inside moral life is correct. Okay?

On the other hand, and that frees you from trying to look like a good person when you're not or something like that. Don't... There's also a very big thing in the Dharma about don't try to...

I mean, just try to be honest about who you are. This saves you a lot of trouble. And it saves you, you know, they say a lie stands on one leg and the truth stands on two.

Meaning, if you have personal faults, okay, so admit them. Let other people know. Okay?

Don't try to put on a show in front of other people and know that that's not the way you are. You know, sometimes I'll just purposely, flagrantly show somebody my mental afflictions just so I feel more comfortable around them. You know, like, okay, I'm a monk, I do teach people and I do have these mental afflictions and here, I'll prove it to you.

Watch me do this. I'll just do something that I do in private in front of people just so they know that I really have that. Then that takes all the pressure off you to pretend.

You know what I mean? Admit who you are and fix it. You know what I mean?

Rather than trying to show something that you're not. It's very uncomfortable and it doesn't last very long. Sooner or later it breaks down.

Alright, the next line says be joy alone in an unbroken stream. This is tricky. In the Abhidharmakosha there's a very interesting line.

It says, if you take all of the sad feelings you could ever have, unhappy feelings that you could ever have, all of them attached to except one are bad karma. Okay? That's a very profound thing.

I mean, I used to sit there and get depressed about it, which is bad karma. You know what I mean? There's an implication in the Abhidharmas that is, and they have special views on karma, which the higher schools don't accept, but the idea is that being unhappy is itself bad karma.

You know what I mean? Being upset, being irritated, anxiety itself is a bad karma. You know, you can imagine what the only kind of sadness which is good karma is regret over something you did which was wrong.

Like, if you hurt somebody and then you go home and you regret it and you feel sad about having done something wrong, that's a virtue, that's a good karma. But on the whole, says this one interpretation of the Abhidharma, all kinds of sadness, irritation, anxiety are bad karma. Now that could be very nasty, see?

Because then you'd get more bad karma and then you'd be more sad and then you'd have more bad karma and then you'd be more sad and it's just like an endless circle. You've got to understand that feelings of irritation or anxiety or being upset are all based on not understanding the emptiness and karma thing. You know, not understanding the pen thing.

Like, something happens in your life which is not going the way you wanted it to and then you get sad. You see, that means you don't understand karma and you don't understand emptiness. Okay?

The reason the thing is happening is because of something you did a long time ago. It probably has very little with what you're doing now. Like, especially if you are sincerely trying to practice Dharma and things seem to be going wrong, there's no cause and effect relationship there.

You see, I mean, Jesus said and the Buddha said and it's their most profound teaching, laya-nyerpa, the Buddha said, Jesus said, you don't get grapes from thorns or figs from thistles. Meaning, it's very, very, very profound. You cannot undertake a kind action towards another person which fails.

It's impossible. Kindness is miluwa. Kindness is infallible.

Consideration, kindness, trying to do good for other people, trying to help other people, is karmically airtight, impossible for it to backfire, impossible for it to have any negative result. Conversely, it's impossible ever to do a negative action, for example, lying and get money out of it or something like that. It's just totally impossible because the content of the two actions is not similar.

We call mitumba. Mitumba means if the content of the action is negative, the reaction or the consequence must be negative. If the content of the action is positive or sweet or considerate or kind, it cannot lead to a negative action, negative reaction.

What it means is all the crap that ever happens to you in your life cannot be traced to your attempts to practice dharma and your kindness to other people. That's impossible. It's just impossible.

So if something bad happens to you, what should your reaction be? You just chill out. Just be happy.

Okay? Just be happy. The sadness cannot fix that problem.

The being upset cannot affect that problem. Okay? It can't.

And it's not a result of anything you've done right. Okay? It can't be.

This is really good for people who are trying to be compassionate, they're trying to be good, they're trying to practice dharma, and just things still don't seem to be going right. That's all bad karma. It's got nothing to do with what you're doing now.

So just be happy. Okay? So now we've got two situations in the world.

A. Something's going well. Be happy.

Okay? I'm happy. I did good karma.

Thanks. Thanks, Mr. Joe Karma, meaning your past life. Thanks, Joe Karma.

You know, you did a good job. I appreciate it. I get to have the front room at the Goa beach, you know, and sit out on the balcony and spy on my students.

And then Geshe Dagye used to do it to me. I guess it's karma, right? In Dharamsala.

Anyway, he had the roof room and I had the bottom room diagonally, and I used to see the curtain move all the time. So I was like, sit up straight and everything. So, you know, thank you, Mr. Karma. So if things are going well, be happy. And if things are not going well, being unhappy doesn't help at all. So just be happy.

You know, and this gets very, very profound. This gets very profound. Someone is actually yelling at you at this moment.

Someone is saying something unpleasant to you. Okay? You have two choices.

You know, be unpleasant back to them, or just chill out and think about something else. You know, just think about something else. Okay?

This can't be a result of your being good at this moment. You see what I mean? If you want them to go away, the only way is to be happy right now.

You see what I mean? So, there's proof that you should be happy during the bad times. And it's easy to be happy during the good times.

So, be joy alone in an unbroken stream. That's what that line means. It's there when you can keep it unthinking, means you've learned this lojong well when you don't have to correct yourself anymore.

You see what I mean? Somebody yells at you and you're just, let's think about something else. You know?

Like, you're just happy. You know what I mean? It doesn't depend on what's going on around you.

You see what I mean? Your happiness has to get to a level where it's independent of what's going on around you. Okay?

The food's not good, you're still happy. Someone's saying something unkind to you, you're still happy. Things aren't going your way with that last deal, you're still happy.

Because that's good karma. And that's going to create something good in the future. And this crap that's happening to you is coming from old karma.

So, there's no reason to be unhappy. Unhappiness is dysfunctional. Okay?

It just doesn't work. It makes your mind mixed up and you're not able to do the right thing. If you believe the Abhidharma system, you're actually collecting new bad karma by being upset or unhappy.

Okay? Okay. Hang on a sec.

Let me see if there's any more here. Ehh. Yeah, that completes the...

That's class five. I'll take one question then we'll take a break and then we'll cover class three. Actually, go ahead.

[Speaker 2]
Because look, mental states are also the result of previous good or bad karma. So, if you're feeling sad, then you should get some healing. Being able to just realize like...

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, okay, good. Um... There's this thing in the courts, you know, and I...

where you can't be tried twice for the same offense. You know what I mean? Uh...

So, it almost seems like karma is working in an unfair way. Meaning that if you're upset about something that happened to you, you've got two bad karmas happening there. You see, there's one bad karma which makes the thing happen, like somebody's yelling at you, and then there's a second bad karma that makes you unhappy that they're yelling at you.

You see what I mean? It's actually two separate karmas. And the karma of being unhappy comes from having been unhappy in the past.

So, it seems like you can't win. And in fact, in the Abhidharma school, they say that bad karmic results like a car accident can't be a cause for anything else. They say, once you get punished once, it should be over.

You see what I mean? In the higher schools, they say, if you, because of your past karma, are attracted to killing and kill again, then you'll be attracted to killing more. So, it's almost like you're getting punished twice.

You see what I mean? You kill somebody because you're attracted to killing because of your past karma, and then that makes you kill somebody again. So, it's acting as a cause for your new bad deed, and it is a bad deed.

You say, so how do you ever get out of this vicious circle? You know what I mean? In the Abhidharma school, they say, once a karma ripens, it's done, and it doesn't act as a cause for another karma.

The higher school says, no, that's not right. You kill once, you'll get into the habit of killing, and the karma of killing, one of the karmas will be to enjoy killing, and you'll do another act of killing, and that will be a new karma that will make you enjoy killing more, and it seems like you're getting double whammy. I think that's something like that.

[Speaker 2]
There was the other part of the question that was, you know, like, if your spiritual practice is getting better and better, you should be feeling happier.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah. By the way, OK, spiritual practice should be getting, we're saying that the TSE, the measure of success in Dharma is that your mental afflictions get less. She's saying, if your mental afflictions are ripenings of old bad karma, how can you ever see if you're having any success at all?

OK? This gets into the four powers, meaning, there's a certain level of Dharma success where the success itself starts to wipe out old bad karma. OK?

There's a certain level of your practice of Dharma where the very success of your Dharma practice starts to remove old bad karmas that will never go off. You see what I mean? And we're going to talk about that during this class.

We're going to talk about how to make it happen. OK? Generally speaking, the answer to the overall question is, yes, when you get upset, it's a karma ripening from getting upset in the past.

OK? That would seem to imply that you can never get out of this thing. OK?

And again, as we said yesterday, it's only an understanding of emptiness that gives you any hope. OK? If you understand the emptiness of why you're upset or why you shouldn't be upset, you'll be able to stop it.

And if you don't, you never will. Nagarjuna said you can't stop negative thoughts if you don't understand emptiness. It's impossible.

You never get out of the cycle. OK? And that's true.

[Speaker 2]
OK?

[Speaker 1]
So, you've got to understand the emptiness. When someone's yelling at you, the only way to not yell back is to understand that the reason they showed up is that you yelled back in the past and to stop yourself on that basis. And that's the only way you can break the cycle.

Otherwise, yeah, it's true. Getting upset would cause the karma to get upset again and you'd be in a constant samsara. And that's what the word samsara means.

So the only hope you have is wisdom. Just understand the emptiness of it. OK?

All right, we'll stop there. Take ten minutes break and then we'll do class number three.

[Speaker 2]
OK.

[Speaker 1]
OK, we'll start again. We're going to talk about part three of the seven parts. So we did something like one, two, and then we did five, I think it was.

And now we're skipping back to three. OK? Part three is called Using Problems as Opportunities.

OK? And you know like Lama Tsopa wrote a nice book and the title is something like that. It comes from this particular text.

OK? The whole practice of using problems as opportunities comes from this particular lojong. OK?

And I'm going to read you the original. nö chö dikpe khaway tse kye ngen chang chok lam du gyur nö chö means the world and all the people who live in it. OK?

Literally it means best life content. dikpe khaway tse full of bad deeds, full of bad karma. tse means when you see the world full of bad karma.

kye ngen chang chok lam du gyur means take that bad thing and convert it into a path to enlightenment. OK? And this is a very deep practice and basically it goes like this.

It's very interesting that he didn't say when the world is full of problems make it into a path to enlightenment. He didn't say that. He said when the world is full of bad karma then use it as a path to enlightenment.

Now bad karma means anytime you say something bad, anytime you do something bad or anytime you even think something bad. Better get into just answering the question when the guy pauses because Geshe Thutthun Rinchen he's like when he notices everybody is zoning out he's like and the three categories are you know he'll look at you and if you don't yell back he starts yelling at you. He often stops in mid-sentences and wants you to yell back to answer.

You know you can sit outside the window of his house and just hear people screaming at each other you know. All day long. He teaches all day long.

Anyway it's interesting that you see bad karma just means the stuff you're doing now. You see. So why didn't he say when you have problems try to use them as an opportunity.

He says when you have bad karma use it as an opportunity. He's trying to get you to think of the problems as bad karma. He's saying when you have a traffic jam or the road from Varanasi to Bihar to Bodh Gaya is full of holes or the weather is too hot or anything is going wrong you see it's when things are going wrong that you can investigate the emptiness of the situation.

You see people don't pull their hair out when things are going right and say hey why me? You see I mean you don't ask that question when things are going right. You assume you're a good person you deserve this good karma and I should have the front room at the Goa hotel you know it's just natural I'm a good person you know and then when something really bad happens you're like why me?

You know I don't understand I don't understand why this thing is not working out I'm a good person I do everything pretty good I don't understand why this is happening to me. In other words you don't investigate the source of suffering until you have some suffering ok and it's interesting that the real teachings on emptiness in Master Shantideva's Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life occur in the chapter on patience ok they don't occur in the ninth chapter it's only in the wrong chapter in Bhagavad Gita ok it's not in the chapter on wisdom he covers emptiness most sweetly in the chapter on patience and patience meaning the crap that happens to you during your life all kinds of crap inner crap outer crap ok bad roads diarrhea financial problems relationship problems you know any kind of problem that's when you have an opportunity to turn your mind and investigate the emptiness of something and in fact later on in this section he says where is that emptiness is the master's protection ok in Tibetan it's tong nyi sum wa la na me so how does he jump from you know when something bad happens to you try to make something good out of it see the silver lining and then he jumps within two lines he's off to oh emptiness is the only thing that can protect you you know the point is that you don't think about emptiness until something goes wrong ok you don't investigate the nature of something until something goes wrong so on the most basic level you have to be thankful for all the things that go wrong in your life because they force you to investigate why ok so he's saying the first opportunity you can always make out of things is to sit down and say why you know what's the emptiness of this situation why am I in this current situation ok and then that's the first way in which you can make problems into opportunities ok I had a thing with my brother we used to live in Hawaii he was this surf bum in Hawaii he talked me into going there I told you about it ok and we lived in this this beach house on Kalapana Black Sand Beach and we went surfing everyday like you knew the surf was good because your bed would be rolling around the room you know what I mean the bed would be like shifting around the room and then you knew the waves were really big you know and then you'd get up and go out you know and then sometimes there's just no surf happening and you know a couple of 18 year olds with nothing to do is really dangerous you know and we had this deal he was studying what do you call that thing that Maya does Aikido and I was studying Taekwondo and we had this deal that we would try to hit each other anytime anyplace in the house you know on days when there's nothing to do you know so I'd try to sneak up behind the guy and punch him in the back or something and it was just this practice to see if you could be aware all the time you see what I mean so it was actually the best way to be aware all the time because it was like you would always be ready you know and then you'd turn around and do that move that you learned you know and it was really a cute thing you know we did stuff like that besides from other crazy things and the point is that problems are the same for you you know you treat them as as some kind of opportunity you know I mean you can see that all the time they're keeping you aware they're keeping you sharp you see what I mean and and nothing is a real problem I mean and when you get up into the higher schools of Madhyamika which those of you who studied Mahamudra you studied it already Svatantrika viewpoint of emptiness lo nuh me la naway wang anurangituma mohe wajaluk su dupa you know you studied this thing their view version of emptiness is that things come the pen is half way a pen from its own side and half way a pen from your side they're not ready to go all the way to the other thing ok there is a pen that is out there and it attracts your mind to think of it as a pen and so the pen is 50-50 ok and the application The definition of that kind of thinking is that no problem is a problem from its own side.

It's just not. Any problem can be used as an opportunity. You can turn anything that happens to you into a teaching.

The most basic one is to figure out where it came from. The first thing is sit down and decide where this thing comes from. Oh, I'm seeing this problem because I did something wrong in the past.

And then you convert it into an opportunity. You turn it into an opportunity to get rid of your bad karma. Actually, if there were people around you, close to you, who cared about you, if they really cared about you, they would be like my brother in the house.

They would try to figure out what's your weak point, spiritually. And then they would try to exploit it. You see what I mean?

Like, if you had a problem with jealousy, and if you had a close friend who really cared about you, in a Dharma sense, then they would take every opportunity they could find to make you jealous. Because they want to help you get over that. So you can imagine that everybody else in the world is enlightened already, and they're very well aware.

Unfortunately, they have to listen to your mind, like the last mind in the world that still has mental afflictions. It's driving everybody crazy like a loud radio. And they say, you know, what's this guy have a problem with?

He's still jealous, you know. And you say, okay, well, let's exploit his jealousy. Let's give him all these chances to be jealous.

Let's make him miserable. So miserable that he wakes up and says, oh, I better fix this. You know what I mean?

So really, I mean, kindness level number one is to avoid making other people jealous who have a problem with jealousy. That's a kind of kindness. I know you have a problem with jealousy.

I know who you're jealous of. So being a considerate person, I won't mention them when we're together. Every time the conversation comes around to this person, I'll change the subject.

And that's a kind of politeness or kindness that you show to people. It's a kind of deference to their mental afflictions, right? But then there's this higher kindness, if you can do it.

It's the Nasruddin kind of kindness, where you know this guy has a problem with jealousy. The kindest thing you can do is spit right in his face. Find something for him to be jealous about and put it right in his face.

And then help him get over it. You see what I mean? Like, go to his assistants.

Make sure that the person they are most jealous of is nearby them all day long. And make sure that you pay attention to this person more than you pay attention to them all day long. And drive them crazy with their jealousy.

And then get up and teach them about emptiness. And teach them about how to overcome mental afflictions. You see, that would be a higher level of kindness.

And lamas are really good at that. My lama told me... One of my lamas, he was Mongolian.

His name is Geshe Lawangkelbin. He said, I know you're jealous of Ardengo. And you're really lucky that he's around.

Because he's a little bit better than you are. And he'll drive you to excellence. You'll keep striving to try to be as good as he is at what he does.

And then you're really lucky. So I suggest that you cultivate your jealousy. And try to keep that jealousy as long as you can.

And I'll help you. I'll keep telling you how he's a little bit better than you. And then I'm like, I can't believe he's saying it.

I'm just staring at him. And then at last he's like... He had a tuberculosis.

He had one lung taken out in Baksa. And then I'm walking out the door and he says, Oh, one thing. And I turn around and he says, But later you've got to drop the jealousy thing.

Like, ride on it and then get rid of it. And I didn't, but anyway. But that's a very important thing.

So really, someone drives you crazy. They're really just trying to... Maybe they are a tantric deity who's trying to help you with your mental afflictions.

Maybe the person who bothers you the most is the one person in the world who cares about you the most. So consider that possibility. And try to see it as an opportunity.

Say, this person really pushes my buttons. This person above all other people in the world makes me irritated. And I'll get you in a second.

There's a story about Lord Atisha. And I told it to you before, maybe you didn't hear it. He's coming to Tibet.

He's already almost 60. The oracles have predicted that if he shows up in Tibet he's going to die young. Because of the rigors of the travel.

So he's struggling to learn Tibetan. And so he doesn't know the words for things. He keeps using the wrong words for things.

They're riding around. And he had this one student that he brought with him from India who was the most irritating person you could ever meet. So Lord Atisha had hundreds of qualified students in Nalendra monastery.

Hundreds. He was the cream of Nalendra. He had hundreds of highly realized students.

So who does he bring to Tibet with him? The biggest asshole he could find. And they say, he reaches Tibet.

And the Tibetans, you know, the first few days you meet the attendant you're like, oh, Lord Atisha's attendant, you must be pretty special. And then after a few days you get to know them. And then finally a few people start asking Atisha, just between us, why did you bring this guy?

Out of all your students, why did you bring this one to Tibet? And he says, this guy is special. This guy is my constant patience meditation.

I searched all of Nalendra monastery to find the one guy that could irritate me the most. And I brought him with me. And he's making me stronger every day.

Every hour we're together. He sharpens my patience. He tests me.

He challenges me. He's very precious to me. So one day they're out riding around on a horse.

And he gets down off the horse. And he says, Atisha, Lord Atisha, I got a problem, you know. And they say, what's wrong?

And he says, I want to have a pebble in my boot. I have to get a pebble out of my boot, you know. So you're supposed to say dew.

Dew means pebble. But he forgot the word for pebble. And he remembered the word for boulder, which is pabong.

And pabongka means the one from the boulder monastery or something like that. So he says, I have a pabong in my shoe. And then all the Tibetans start laughing.

Their heads off. Because in Tibet, Tibetan humor is different, okay. There's nothing funnier.

They can't think of anything so funny as this high lama saying, I have a boulder in my boot and I have to get out. They're like laughing, you know. And then he looks around, you know.

And he waits for everything to quiet down. And he says, Now I can send that guy back to India. It's very famous.

And he used to do that all the time. Meaning if you really understood the quest, the spiritual quest, then you would value the worst things in your life. You see what I mean?

If you really understood that the goal of life is to become enlightened, a big part of which is to remove your own mental afflictions, then you need the people around you who bother you. And you must keep them close to you, you know. Traffic jams, diarrhea, bad colds, people around you who irritate you, people around you who don't pay their hotel bills, you know, stuff like that.

These are very precious. If they bother you, it means they've been sent by God, you know. They are God sent.

They are the one person that you need the most. So if you have a choice between giving up all the people that you love and the people that you feel simpatico, you know, you feel good about them, you feel close to them, if you had a choice between giving up them or giving up the people right around you who irritate you the most, you should choose the ones who irritate you. Because they sharpen your practice.

They are the ones that until the last person in the world who can irritate you is gone, you're not enlightened yet. So you need those people. Master Shantideva calls it a strategic alliance.

He says, go up to those people and say, I got a proposal for you. This is a business proposal. You provide the object for me to be patient about.

I'll provide the patience. And between the two of us, we'll get me enlightened. Like you go to all the people who bother you and you say, please come be close to me.

Stay with me. Stay close to me. Be around me all day long.

And I'll provide the patience. You provide the irritation. And we'll get me enlightened.

So really, any kind of problem is a blessing. And you have to see it that way. So two advantages of problems so far.

A. They force you to think about where suffering is coming from. And then you start to understand emptiness.

You see what I mean? B. If someone can bother you, or if a situation can bother you, then you're not enlightened yet.

And they're a blessing. They should come. So it's like people, instead of not mentioning the person you're jealous of, you should ask the people around you to mention them as often as possible.

And praise them as often as possible. You see what I mean? So that you can deal with your jealousy.

And that's an easy way to turn problems into an opportunity. You know, which raises questions why my lama kept me in his house for 25 years. Okay.

The blame all belongs to one person. Practice seeing them all full of kindness. The blame in any situation only belongs to you.

The people around you who you don't like are cylinders and balls and colors and vowels and consonants and decibels walking around. And there's only one reason why your mind organizes those things into irritating data. You know, irritating events.

And that's because of the karma that you collected in your own mind. There is no unhappiness which you can experience, mental or physical, which you didn't directly create yourself. You can't blame a single other person.

I mean, really, on a very basic level, the most extreme emotion you can think about is sadness or depression about how stupid you are. And on a higher level, just to feel like compassion about it. But never blame someone else.

No one else can hurt you. It's impossible for another person to hurt you. There's no such thing.

There is no such thing. Suppose someone were to throw a spear at you, and you had different karma. You didn't have karma to be hurt.

What would happen? You would experience it as a shower of flowers. You see?

It's very interesting. They would experience it as throwing a spear at you. And halfway through the air, in fact, you would never see a spear.

You would see just these flowers coming at you. This actually happened to Lord Buddha under the Bodhi tree. This is the last temptation of Lord Buddha, you know.

Mara is throwing these weapons at Lord Buddha. And then Lord Buddha is just experiencing this shower of flowers, you know. That's not a metaphor.

That's not some pretty legend or something like that. That's a teaching on the emptiness of harm. It's a teaching on the emptiness of other people trying to hurt you.

Nobody can hurt you if you don't have bad karma. You see? It's impossible.

And you often see really good people, really good lamas, really good Buddhists. People are around them, and you're shocked what they're doing to them. Like, this person is really talking bad about them.

Or this person is really hurting their projects. Or this person is really out to hurt them. And then this guy is just sitting there like, Yeah, yeah, that's fine.

It doesn't matter. I don't mind. It's not a real problem for me.

Or they just don't experience it as a problem. You see what I mean? Because their karma is totally different.

They're sitting there saying, I really like this person. You say, Yesterday they were out telling someone how bad you are. You say, No, no, they wouldn't do that.

I don't see that at all. They're not doing that. You see, they don't experience it that way.

To you it looks like they're naive. To them, they can't experience it that way. And they're not experiencing it that way.

It's very interesting. The spears are turning into flowers halfway towards them. They just don't experience it that way.

What I'm trying to say is no one can do anything bad to you. There's no such thing. No one can hurt you.

Nagarjuna wrote a book called Kalejigme. It means nobody can hurt me at all. You know, he named a book that.

Nobody can hurt you. Your karma can hurt you. You can hurt yourself.

Nobody else can hurt you. Give up the idea that anyone else can hurt you. It's not true.

It's just simply not true. No one else can hurt you. Last thing and then we'll stop.