Серия ежедневной практики, курс 05 — Медитация о смерти и о конце смерти (1999, Роли), занятие 2

[Speaker 1]
Lesson 2 Anyway, we'll cover them today. First one. There's 3 principles for death meditation and they go...

each of them has 3 rationales, okay? So, it'll be 3 times 3, it'll be 9, alright? So, a good death meditation has 9 main lamrims.

Lamrim, remember, can mean the whole path, the stages of the path, but lamrim can also mean... each step is called a lamrim, you see what I mean? So, when a lama says lamrim, you got to ask, are you talking about the whole lamrim or are you talking about each separate lamrim?

See, because each stage, like death meditation, is called a lamrim, meaning a step on the path. And then, lamrim means the whole steps on the path. And you never know which one they're saying.

Often they'll say lam kyi rimpa, the long one for the steps themselves, individually. And then they'll say lamrim for the whole path made up of steps. But anyway, you got to get used to that.

So, I'm going to talk about 3 lamrims. And inside of those are going to be 3 lamrims each. So, you got 9 sections to your meditation.

And we'll take you through the building, okay? The object is to get to the central courtyard, okay? Which is like enlightenment, alright?

But we're going to use mainly a death meditation to get there. So, when you visualize it as like a structure, it's easier to remember. So, you'll be going through certain rooms, you'll be going through certain hallways, and there'll be certain things there to remind you what you're supposed to meditate on.

And then, what you can do is stop at the one that you want to concentrate on. You can either do a sharbo, which is where you go through all 9 steps pretty much in order in the 23 minutes before work. Or you can go through 4 of them and then stop at 1 and spend, you know, 20 minutes there and then go on to the rest.

Do them very briefly. It's good to do all 9 briefly. It's like a series of exercises.

And then you stop on 1 and concentrate on that. And then you do what we call che gom, which is an analytical meditation. So, shar gom, a review meditation, means you'll go through all 9 stages in order, but you'll che gom on 1 or 2 of them, depending on how much time you have to meditate.

So, you can take a stop and do an analytical meditation on 1 of them. They say in the Lam Rim to do an analytical meditation on the one that you have trouble with, okay? The one that you're not so convinced of, okay?

And you stop on that one and work on that one. So, you take them in order. You're going to go through all 9 steps of the meditation.

And then you're going to think about, which one do I really have trouble with? Which one is hard for me personally to deal with? And then you stop at that one and you do a che gom.

And che gom means you set that one in front of your mind primarily. And then you work on that one for a while. And you argue with your own mind.

Che gom means arguing with your own mind. You know, the devil and the angel, you know? And you say, you know, you accuse yourself.

You say, you don't really believe you're going to die tonight, do you? And you say, no, I haven't died tonight for a long time, you know? And then you start arguing with each other, you know?

And he says, well, look, you're still like only... Oh, boy, it's getting on, you know? And then let the argument go like that.

And watch your mind and you'll catch your mind being stupid. And it's very upsetting, actually. It's sort of depressing when you finally hear your mind's most intelligent arguments against death meditation.

They're so stupid that you feel stupid. Because it is your mind, after all. Okay, so we'll go through the...

I'll list the 3 principles. And then we'll go through the 9... what they call the 9 reasons, okay?

We did some of them the other night. This is, for those of you who can't see, it's chiwa, C-H-I-W-A, ngepa, N-G-E-P-A. C-H-I-W-A, N-G-E-P-A.

Say, chiwa. Chiwa. Ngepa.

Ngepa. Chiwa. Chiwa.

Ngepa. Ngepa. Have to die.

Ngepa means definite. Chiwa means die, okay? Chiwa ngepa means you gotta die.

You must die, okay? Have to die. That's the first principle of a death meditation.

Okay, for those of you who can't see, it's nam, N-A-M, chi, C-H-I, ma-nge, M-A-hyphen, N-G-E, M-A-hyphen, N-G-E. Say, nam chi, nam chi, ma-nge, ma-nge, nam chi, nam chi, ma-nge, ma-nge. Nam chi ma-nge means, and it's not definite at all when you have to die, okay?

The timing is anything but definite, okay? So the first principle is you have to die. The second principle is it's totally uncertain when you're going to die.

You don't know when it's going to happen, okay? It could happen any moment, okay? Nam chi ma-nge.

There's these texts in the Tengyur. You know, we're typing in all the Buddhist texts, and we get to this book, and I get the data from India, and I'm checking it, and it's like stops in the middle of a sentence, and I like ask my lama, you know, what's going on here? He says, oh, there's a few books like that in the Tengyur, the guy died halfway through writing it, you know, halfway through a sentence, you know.

And they just carved it up to that half of a sentence, and they stopped, and they start the next book, you see. It's really weird. There's a couple of books like that.

For those of you who can't see it, it's G-C-H-I TSE, T-S-E CHE, C-H-U MA TOG, M-A-T-O-G MI PHEN, M-I hyphen P-E-N Say, CHI TSE CHI TSE CHE MA DOG CHE MA DOG MI PHEN MI PHEN CHI TSE CHI TSE CHE MA DOG CHE MA DOG MI PHEN MI PHEN CHI TSE means when you die, and at the moment of death, CHE means Dharma, your spiritual level, spiritual teachings. MA DOG means nothing else, MI PHEN can help you, okay? Except for whatever spiritual things you've been able to develop in your life, nothing else can help you when you die, as you die.

Nothing else will be of any help to you when you die, okay? Those are the three parts of a good death meditation, so we'll be going through all three of them, and each one will have three justifications, all right? There's three justifications for each one, making a total of nine.

So, a good death meditation has nine main stage lamrims in three divisions, and then just before that, you go through those three preliminaries, meaning thinking about how bad it is not to meditate on death, which we finished, right? That was before the bridge. And then thinking about how good it would be to be a good death meditator, an advantage of it, which is the bridge itself and dumping the stuff off.

And then thirdly, the right way to meditate on death and the wrong way to meditate on death. And the wrong way is to be paralyzed and frightened and freaked out and morbid and depressed and all that, which is the guys with the swords. And then the right way is to dance across the meadow, which is like, you know, when you really are a good death meditator, meaning you always act in your life, your daily life, as if you were going to die tonight.

It's like some kind of freedom, and you feel totally guilt-free. You feel like really that you're doing the right thing, okay? Even if you die at that point, it's a very easy death.

You see what I mean? And it feels much better. And again, there's this initial resistance to it.

There's this initial fear of really doing what you want to do and giving up the things that you have now. You see what I mean? They used to say at my job, there were two kinds of executives where I used to work, and they were clearly two different types.

And it was a huge company. It was 800 people, so we had lots of different personalities, many different people. And there were some managers who needed to hang on to their position.

They were very attached to it. And they would actually defend it, you know. They wouldn't teach anybody what they were doing.

They would never be sick, because they'd be afraid that somebody else could learn what they did and replace them. They had this thing about fear of being replaced, and they would protect their territory. And then they'd always end up having an ulcer, and they'd look terrible, and they were tired, because they were just constantly struggling to make sure they had their position.

And whenever there was a layoff, they'd get laid off first. It's the weirdest thing. You know what I mean?

And they'd figure out what they did within a day. It would take like a day to figure out what this guy was doing. Usually it wasn't too much.

But they'd have a few systems that only they knew how to turn on and only they knew how to run, and they would make sure nobody else learned, and they thought that was security. And then there's these other guys who... The boss would say, I want you to teach someone else your position.

And then they wouldn't say anything. And then you'd go home, and you'd say, maybe they want to fire me. Maybe they're trying to set me up for something.

And then you'd say, Ah, well, it's okay. I'll just teach them anyway. Because it's good for the company.

Even if they want to get rid of me, I guess they've determined that's the best thing for everybody else. So, this is very Bodhisattva. Okay, so I'll teach this guy everything I know.

And the boss isn't telling you anything. So you're getting nervous. You go home at night, and you wonder if you're doing the right thing.

But anyway, you teach somebody else everything you know. They're cheaper than you. I mean, you'd never get $10,000 less or something.

You know what I mean? And you're like, you know, okay. And you teach them.

And then suddenly the boss calls you and says, you know, this other guy can do your job. And you're like, Yeah, I know. And he's cheaper than you too.

And you're like, Yeah, I know. And he says, Well, I got this other job for you. I'm going to give you a raise.

I'll give you a transfer. This is a higher position. And that other guy can replace you.

Because now you're replaceable. And then those people would keep moving up in the company. It was really weird.

You know what I mean? And it was some kind of freedom from fear that made them successful. It was some kind of ability to let go of what they used to be so they could become something new.

And that's very hard. Death meditation is like that. It's very hard to redefine yourself.

It's very hard to give up what's comfortable and what's known to you. But if you think about it, you won't have time to move up unless you give up something. You see what I mean?

You won't have time to be available for the next promotion. And this is exactly in corporate life. It was exactly like that.

The people who made themselves redundant or the people who had what we call succession plan behind them because they cared about the company would keep moving up. And the people who were selfish and didn't want to let go of what they used to be were always what they used to be or fired. You know, laid off actually.

And so it takes some kind of courage and it also takes intellect. You have to understand that if you don't let go of some of your activities, you won't be free to do higher ones. You see what I mean?

And it doesn't matter where on the Dharma ladder you are. You know what I mean? Unless you're at the top.

Okay, that's different. But if you're anywhere else on the Dharma ladder, you always are faced with this choice. It's one thing to get on the Dharma ladder.

That takes a lot of effort. But once you're on, you're constantly faced with the choice of letting go certain... There's a Bodhisattva vow called doing deeds of lesser benefit.

You know what I mean? Not to do deeds of lesser benefit. Meaning, when faced with a choice, you're always going for the higher good.

You see what I mean? Because once you get on the Dharma ladder until the day of enlightenment, you're constantly faced with these choices. You know, you have to give up what you used to be to move up.

And it necessarily means giving up some of the activities you used to do, some of the practices you used to do, that are comfortable for you. You know, you took a lot of time to memorize this book, and you like to recite it every day. But you can't do the next one up if you don't let it go sometime.

You see what I mean? And you can't have both. You see, you can't memorize for four hours a day or six hours a day.

You have to move on. You have to move up. And you can't do that until you let something go.

So, especially in the death meditation, they're really cool because when you divest, then it leaves you free for other things. You see what I mean? Every time you give up an object, or you give up a relationship that's not as important, or you give up some activity which is not really very important, then you get a little crack of free time open for the next higher thing.

You see what I mean? So, you can't move up if you don't give up something. You won't have time to do both.

You know, normally we try to do the old thing half as well as we used to, and then do the new thing half as well as we could, just so we can possess both of them. You see what I mean? And no, you got to give up.

Okay? You got to move on. All right?

Spiritually, you have to keep moving up. Okay? And that's getting up to the door.

That gets you up to the gate. So, so far we have three preliminaries really. Okay?

Which is before the bridge, thinking about what happens if you don't meditate on death, which means you become this grubby little person who's just interested in getting a little more food or a little more money or a little more fame or something like that. And hurting others on the way. Okay?

And then the second thing is divesting. How good it feels to meditate on the benefits of death meditation. That's crossing the bridge.

And then the third part, we're talking preliminaries, right? To the nine. The nine are going to come later.

Third part being the guy standing at the bridge which is a stupid death meditation. And then flying across the meadow which is a smart death meditation. And a liberating death meditation.

Okay? So we got up to the door. Now we're going to start the three justifications behind saying you have to die.

Okay? And so I'll write those up here. And then we'll meditate on them.

Okay. Number one is the Lord of Death is unstoppable. And this is the first part of the meditation.

We'll be going into the door and there'll be something there and we're going to think about it. But anyway, the principle is that death cannot be stopped. You know, you can...

And your mind says, no, no, you can. You know, you get a really good doctor, they do a heart surgery, it's successful, death is stopped. You know, like you were supposed to die but death is stopped.

A couple of problems with that kind of thinking. Okay? One is that...

One is that nothing can really stop your death. You see what I mean? And you have to think about...

You have to think about karma and emptiness. Okay? That was the very first subject we ever had here.

The marriage of karma and emptiness. And all of these meditations, if you can inject them with an understanding of emptiness, then it'll be much easier for you when we get to the very end, just before we break into the courtyard. Okay?

So, we'll keep bringing it up throughout. Okay? What is the...

What is... What has karma and emptiness got to do with this? You see what I mean?

You have to understand that life itself is a... Now, here's the emptiness of life itself, okay? The fact that you are alive is a projection of your mind.

Okay? This is just a cylinder with five kind of crooked cylinders, in my case, at the end. And...

And then when you look at it, it's alive. Okay? The fact that you see it as alive is something coming from your mind.

Okay? It's something that's being projected from your mind. And when you see it die, when you see it stop moving, that will also be a projection from your mind.

Okay? And you have to get used to that. That's how karma works.

The fact that you are perceiving these five cylinders and the long cylinder like an arm rather than like a tree branch, which is, you know, or like something dead on the ground, the only difference is that your mind is making you see it like that. You see what I mean? Your mind is forcing you to see it that way.

And there'll come a time when it dies, your mind will force you to see it that way, as not moving anymore. Like, there is a short period as you enter the bardo where you're aware of your body. They say you float above the body and look down, and it's kind of like that according to the Buddhist scriptures.

And there will be a time that you can look at these cylinders and they won't be moving anymore. They'll be what you call dead. But whether they're dead or whether they're alive, according to Buddhism, is a projection of your mind.

Okay? The reason that you're seeing them as alive is a perception. And the reason that you're seeing them dead is a perception.

You see what I mean? So to go from alive to dead only requires what? A shift in your perceptions.

Okay? And a very slight one. It's like from here to here.

God, did you see that? No, it's just like from here to here. It's not a big deal.

You see what I mean? If you think of death as being self-existent, if you think of death as being something not empty, if you're not aware of the dependent origination of your arm, then you can't really do a very good death meditation. If you start throwing in emptiness and projections and perceptions from the beginning, you've got a real good chance to do a successful death meditation.

I'll go over it again. What makes me see this as alive is something from my mind. Something from my mind is making me see it move.

It's not like that I'm deciding to make it move or something like that. You can decide to make it move someday and it won't move. You see what I mean?

So it's not a result of your decisions. My karma is making me see something move. My mind collected karma.

Karma exists in my mind and it makes me perceive this thing as moving. And then at some time, like all other energies, what happens to that karma? It wears out.

By the way, that's what we call dirty good karma. There's a difference between dirty good karma and pure good karma. But dirty good karma wears out.

I was very happy when I heard this because it explained why I broke up with all my high school girlfriends. You know, I thought I was a bad person. But I was happy to...

I was really happy to find out that high school girlfriends are created by dirty good karma. You see what I mean? No, I'm not kidding.

I'm really not kidding. So they must wear out. You see what I mean?

It must... It must collapse. Okay?

And by the way, in the odd event that it doesn't collapse, like my roommate in college who married his high school girlfriend and spent their lives happily ever after until he slipped in a stream and died, that's the only two ways it can go. Okay? Either you break up before or by some weird chance it lasts a while.

One party dies. Okay? And then it's broken that way.

You see, that's the only way it can go. And... And that's all caused by dirty good karma.

Okay? Meeting the person, the thrill of the first few days is when the karma is peaking. You see what I mean?

And then the karma wears out. And it wears out slowly or sometimes fast. But anyway, there's a noticeable, you know, things get worse.

And then... And then... In the odd circumstance that it's not getting noticeably worse, one party dies or goes away.

Okay? So... So those things, what we call worldly happinesses, are created by...

by what we call dirty good karma. And the lousy thing about worldly happinesses is that they are created by dirty good karma. If they were not, they'd be okay.

And we wouldn't have to have Buddhism classes. You see what I mean? If there was a pure good karma that created any one of those relationships, then they would last forever.

You see what I mean? They could keep going on the way you think they're gonna go on. You see what I mean?

So, we have to figure out how to collect clean good karma, pure good karma. By the way, that's what creates a... a Tara.

She's a product of pure good karma. Nothing dirty good karma about her. Nothing about her gets old.

None of her relationships get worse. That's a different kind of karma has created that being. And we have to learn how to make that kind of karma.

Right now, all the good karmas we have in our karmic pockets are dirty good karmas, and they must wear out. Okay? What's it got to do with dying?

The karma that makes you see this thing move is gonna shift into a karma that makes you see it not moving. And that's called watching yourself die. Okay?

And watching yourself die is nothing other than that. Like, if this was the Heart Sutra, the Buddha would say, there is no life. There is no death.

There is no going from life to death. Get it? Okay?

Meaning it's not an outside thing that's happening. It's in your perceptions. And your perceptions are being forced on you by your past karma.

Okay? In this case, your past good karma, dirty good karma. What's dirty good karma?

Good karma done stupidly. Okay? Good karma done because your school said so, because your father said so, because the law says so, because it feels right.

Something like that. Without understanding. Without the perfection of wisdom.

Okay? So, that's dirty good karma. Things you do right almost by accident.

Or because someone told you to do it. You know, or your culture says that's a good thing or something like that. But not because you understand it.

You see? So, that kind of karma has created this body. And, and the shift must come.

You see, when they say, if you're a really good Buddhist, really good Mahayana, Madhyamika, emptiness, middle way Buddhist, you got to think that way about death. Think about it as a shift in your perceptions, which is what it really is. And that, you see, that you can do a heart operation and it's not stopping.

You see what I mean? That's not stopping anything. If the heart operation works, it's because you didn't have the karma to die yet.

And if the heart operation doesn't work, it's because you did have the karma to die yet. And once you have the karma to die now, you're going to die now. You can't stop it.

Okay? It doesn't matter. You can go to a doctor.

You can take vitamins. I always think it's funny. I always tell this story.

I went to... This is the same boss that wanted the maple syrup, okay? Hopefully you never meet her.

So she takes me to Tokyo. We go on a business trip to Tokyo. We have two hours.

They have this important meeting with a pearl, you know, big pearl supplier, you know, and she says, I got to stop at the beauty shop, you know, and I'm like, you know, so we stop at this... And she says, these are the most amazing cosmetics, you know, they crunch up shells or something and amazing, you know, it makes me look 20 years younger, you know, and I'm like, that's cool. And, so I'm standing outside.

It's like a mall, this huge Japanese mall, and I'm standing outside the store waiting for her, and she goes in. She disappears into the store and it's like an hour and a half goes by. And, you know, I'm like ready to fall down, but I have to keep standing there because I get in big trouble with this lady if I move, you know, and, and, and then it dawned on me that while she was in the store, she got an hour and a half older.

You see what I mean? Like, like, all this, you know, maybe some new wrinkles started or, or, you know, while she was in there to buy the stuff to make her look young, she was getting older. While, while you're in the health food store, you're, you're getting older.

You know, while you're selecting the vitamins to make you younger, you're getting older. You see what I mean? And, you can't, it's like that.

So anyway, it's a perception. When the perception, when it's time for that karma to wear out, nothing in the universe can make it stay. Forget it.

You know, Lord Buddha, many stories, Lord Buddha at the side of a, of a very good Buddhist, you know, and unable to help them in the least bit not to die. You see, many people were killed within, within the arm's reach of Lord Buddha. And they sought refuge in Lord Buddha and said, protect me.

And he said, hey, you know, it's your karma, I don't know. You know, of course, Buddha will try, because that's a bodhisattva vow. But whether they're successful or not to protect you depends totally on your karma.

So, nobody can stop that. Nobody can stop that karma. Okay?

What's the proof of that? People die. Okay?

I mean, if Lord Buddha is compassionate, and if Lord Buddha knows what's going on, I mean, supposedly they're omniscient. saṅgye means, you know, omniscient, right? So, if they know what's going on, and if they care, then, of course, they'd do something, and people wouldn't die.

Kids wouldn't be burned in automobile accidents. You know what I mean? Innocent little infants wouldn't be burnt up in tenement houses in New York, you know?

I mean, they didn't have time to do anything wrong yet. They just got born. You know what I mean?

And then they're burning there. So, if Lord Buddha is compassionate, and if Lord Buddha knows about it, which supposedly he knows everything, then why are these kids burning? It must be that Lord Buddha cannot stop those forces.

You see what I mean? Lord Buddha cannot stop your karma. And nobody else can either.

Okay? Forget it. If they could, we wouldn't be here, or we'd be younger.

You know, if the Dalai Lama could loan us some of his karma, would he do it? Of course. Does he know we need karma?

Yes. But apparently, I mean, the evidence is that it's impossible. It's just impossible.

Period. Or people wouldn't die like that. Okay?

Or the third possibility, we call it phung sumpa in Tibetan logic, third possibility, these beings are omniscient, compassionate, I'm sorry, omniscient, omnipotent, and they don't care about us.

[Speaker 2]
You know what I mean?

[Speaker 1]
That's when you start feeling like God is like a horse stepping on bugs or something. You know, like they're powerful and they could help us, but they're just not aware of us, or they don't care, and they're just stepping on us by accident. Sorry.

You know, something like that.

[Speaker 2]
You know?

[Speaker 1]
I mean, if you've read Christian books like that, I mean, Christian novels, novels, Western novels, like, like, where is God? You know, I feel like a bug being squashed. You don't care about me?

You're like a big horse and I'm like an ant, and you're just riding on us like that. You know, you feel, you begin to feel like that. That's not possible.

The beings are not like that. Those holy beings, Jesus is not like that. Okay, so if they could help us, they would, and they can't.

They can't stop your karma. Your karma will, will wrap up and it will finish like that. It's very interesting.

If you think of all the good things in your life, the karma, dirty good karma wears out at a certain rate. Okay? So, you know, I have the karma to have one of my eyes changing now.

You know what I mean? And some, my good karma to have good eyesight is changing. You know what I mean?

And, and that's wearing out. And, and, and then I had another one, you know, maybe I had a nice job for a while and I had a good salary and that wore out. You know what I mean?

I had a good sponsor, that wore out. Okay? And, and they wear out.

You see, certain things wear out at a certain rate, like in December something wears out and then in February something wears out. It cannot be brought back, you know what I mean, normally. You can go get glasses and, and the karma has shifted slightly.

But, but the karma to have a healthy young eye is, is, is wearing out. And, and that's, that's the way it goes. Now, think of death is very interesting.

It's, it's the, it's the simultaneous wearing out of all those karmas. You see, if you think it's disappointing to lose your eyesight, your good eyes, or you think it's disappointing to go to menopause or something like that, you know, imagine all of your karmas wearing out in one five minute shot and that's death. You see what I mean?

It's just the fact of a lot of karmas simultaneously wearing out and then we call that death. And then you can't see this move anymore. Okay?

So if you find any, one of those things upsetting, you know, if it's upsetting to you to have to go to the eye doctor and get glasses or something, then think how upsetting it's going to be to lose all of those parts at once, you know what I mean? And, and you're going to be that upset. You know, multiply how upset you are to, to lose your last job times everything you have and then, and then you're going to do some Poha at that moment?

[Speaker 2]
You know what I mean? You know what I mean?

[Speaker 1]
No, take the upset, multiply it times five hundred, a thousand, because that's how many pieces of you are, you're losing and, and you know it. And you know you're losing all your family and your friends and all, all your favorite objects and, and, and then you're, the feeling at that moment is like extreme upset, you know. People tell me, I'm looking forward to death.

Death is an adventure, you know. I take them up on a rooftop in New York City, you know, and I get them on the edge and I say, okay, now think. What?

You know, you got to hold on to it real tight, okay? And then you see this reaction, you know, and there's this thing that you fight back and that's how it is because you know how much it hurts. From thousands of lifetimes, millions of lifetimes, you know how much it hurts to die.

You really do know. Deep inside you, it's there. You know how much it hurts.

You remember. That much you remember subconsciously. And people, when they get in a death-threatening situation, they fight, you know, and they'll fight you off if you have them on the roof and you're like, here, try this, you know, and, and there's this autonomic, you know, thing where subconsciously you remember how much it hurts and you don't want to do it, you know.

Yeah?

[Speaker 2]
Yeah. If all your dirty good karma wears out at once, Yeah. what kind of karma goes on in your stream?

[Speaker 1]
I said all, but I meant all to be a human in this realm, in this lifetime. So you still have huge karmic pockets, you know, and you, you know, it's almost impossible to have no good karmas left at all. Okay?

I mean, there's something close to that, but it's almost impossible to have no good karmas left at all. You will be able in the bardo, for example, to, to understand every kind of language you hear. You'll be able to walk through walls.

And you, and there's some parts of the bardo are kind of fun. Later, after the confusing part. And, and those are good karma.

That's a result of good karma. Yeah?

[Speaker 2]
You mentioned that the, the bad karma you're using that for eventually results in death. What about the flip side of that? If you're getting into doing the proper things, you know, morality, and so forth and so on, you could be upscaling or from an investment standpoint,

[Speaker 1]
increasing your,

[Speaker 2]
your positive karma in such a way so you could, while one, one aspect is, is going on toward a track of death, you're still raising the other portion of it, which is, from what I've read or you've shared with us, is talking about your future lifetimes, but it could also affect, I would imagine, your present lifetime. And the example that you were giving of the girlfriends, that could be, if you were going to the positive end, then you should be increasing positive girlfriends or their last names.

I mean, I'm asking that as a question. I don't know if that's...

[Speaker 1]
No, I love the question. Somebody asked me in Australia that question. And I'll re, I'll phrase it this way.

I mean, there's a couple of answers to that. Yeah?

[Speaker 2]
You mentioned that the, the bad karma you're using that for eventually results in death. What about the flip side of that? If you're getting into doing the proper things, you know, morality and so forth, you could be upscaling or, from an investment standpoint, increasing your positive karma in such a way so you could, well, one aspect is going on toward a track of death.

You're still raising the other portion of it, which is, from what I've read or you've shared with us, is talking about your future lifetime, but it could also affect, I would imagine, your present lifetime. And the example that you were giving of the girlfriends.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
That could be, if you were going to the positive end, then you should be increasing positive girlfriends or their last names, I guess. I mean, I'm asking that as a question. I don't know if that's...

[Speaker 1]
No, I love the question. Somebody asked me in Australia that question. And I'll re, I'll phrase it this way.

I mean, there's a couple of answers to that. One is, the whole point of tantric practice hinges on the fact that karma can ripen in three time periods. And we studied it in New York recently.

Karma can ripen, this tong gyur gyi le means, karma can ripen in this life. See, if you do especially powerful karma in the earlier part of your life, it can ripen in later part of your life. Direct quotation from tantric scriptures, okay?

And from the Abhidharma, which is the, supposedly the lowest of the schools. So they all agree. Secondly, I mean, the other two kinds of karma are that you see in the next life and then in the following life.

But, but, but our tantric practice relies on the idea, on the principle accepted by all Buddhist schools that if you do extremely powerful karma, it can ripen in this lifetime. Okay? Now I'll tell you a little bit about dzog rim, highest tantra.

Secret, secret. Stage of completion, you know. Stage of completion, which is the highest tantric practice, depends on the relationship between the mind and the body, the mind and the winds.

Okay? Lungsem jukpa jipa means the inner winds, you know, spiritual body, the winds that move in the channels, are right in tandem with the mind. So, this is a very interesting fact.

So if you get like angry a lot, eventually you get an ulcer. You see what I mean? Because the, the winds are disturbed by the anger.

They're actually choked by the anger. The, the winds are choked off by the anger. And they can't move properly.

And if that happens enough, and frequently enough, it begins to affect the outer body also. You see what I mean? So, as the mind goes, so go the winds, and so go the body.

So, the theory is that if you are good enough, and if, especially if you overcame the two biggest obstacles of practice, seeing things as self-existent in sutra, and in Tamil Nangshan in tantra. Okay? If you overcame those two biggest obstacles in your life, the winds would start moving, and your body would change.

You see? Your body would get younger as you get older. Okay?

And, and you would reverse the process of aging. And you, you really would become like that. And Rome's not built in a day, and it works very gradually, and it's fun to watch.

You know, once you know how it works, and you actually begin keeping your vows carefully, which is the trick, you see? Tantric vows, Bodhisattva vows were designed to make this process speed up. You see what I mean?

So, if you keep those vows very carefully, like, I don't know, check them every couple hours or something like that? Tundruk, okay? Then, then, that, that affects your mind, that changes the winds, that begins to affect the physical body, and the body starts to get younger.

And so you're like 40 years old, but you can do stuff that you couldn't do when you were 30, and you're like, hey, this is getting interesting. You know what I mean? This is cool.

And then you say, you know, once you get some corroboration, once you get some evidence that it works, then you're on a roll. Then you're like, oh man, I got it figured out now. You know, I just keep my vows better.

And then, and then you get better and better. And yeah, and somebody asked me in Australia, they said, well, what if you were keeping your vows, what if you were married, and you're keeping, you're both keeping your vows really well, you know? Then what, what, what would happen to that thing about degeneration of relationships and stuff like that?

I said, no, it's like Mr. and Mrs. Chakrasamvara. You know what I mean? Okay?

And it's not a joke. I'm not joking. Okay?

Yeah, you can reverse that also. You can reverse the trend of aging. And you can reverse the trend of, of relationships collapsing.

And you would actually become like a holy tantric pair. And then, and then turn into tantric deities together. And that's how you would live, like that.

So, it's not, that's the whole point of tantric practice. And that's what we're trying to do. Okay?

And that's a beautiful, beautiful scenario, you know? So, yeah, it doesn't have to, you don't have to die like this. And that's, and people tell me, oh, this is Michael Roach's take on Buddhism.

You know? I didn't hear any other teachers, all these Tibetan teachers came, nobody's up there talking about you don't have to die, come on, practice harder, keep your book, you know? But, then I always quote the Middle of the Heart Sutra, marikpa me, marikpa sepa me pa ne, gasshi me, gasshi sepa pariyam me dom.

If you overcome your failure to understand how these things work, you don't have to get old, you don't have to die. Period. Lord Buddha said it.

Anybody says, I made it up, you send them to the Heart Sutra. Okay? And it's not metaphorical or something like, you know, Buddha said, there's four problems with your life, kye ga na chi, rebirth by, forced on you by karma, getting old, getting sick, and dying.

And then he promised to remove them. So, what is it, metaphorical or something? You know what I mean?

You see, like, I mean, the point of Buddha's practice is not just to be calm or to be a nice guy, I mean, you can be a nice guy too, but, I mean, don't die and be a nice guy or something like that. And I'm very sincere about it. I'm very, very much, I won't see you guys for three, four years.

You know, I'm going on retreat. And, you can do it. Okay?

It's possible. It works. The tantras are designed for that.

And, you just have to try. And you have all the information you need. You have that little book.

People come to me, I didn't keep my book, I was too busy. And I say, okay, then die. You know, it's a choice.

That's a choice. You know, it's not, it's not for me. You know, I have my own problems with my book.

You know, okay. Okay. Mortal death is unstoppable.

Okay? Meaning karma, the old karma you have is, I mean, you can't stop it. Okay?

You can't even slow it down really. All right? You will die when that karma wears out.

It doesn't matter what vitamins you take. People are probably choked on the vitamins.

[Speaker 2]
You know.

[Speaker 1]
I know people have died putting on their seat belts.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
I mean, you know, really, it's the same thing. When the time comes, you can't stop those. Okay?

Okay, number two. This says, life leaks away continually. The text also says you can't add anything on.

Okay? Yeah, life leaks away continually. And the text, Lam Rim says right after that that you cannot add any moments onto it.

You know, you can't go out and buy extra lifetime. And people have tried, you know, extremely wealthy people, my boss, okay, with millions and millions of dollars collected from certain people's sweat, will, couldn't slow it, you can't really slow it down. I mean, one of the saddest things to see is a very wealthy person like my boss.

She has her own hairdresser that does her hair every morning. She has her personal fitness trainer who comes every morning to her penthouse suite on Central Park. The biggest problem they had was how to get the jacuzzi up there.

And they rented this huge crane and put it up on the, you know, and so she has everything. And she's had, like, she often comes with these little, you know, band-aids on her eyes here and here, and, you know, and she's, oh, I got in an accident, you know, you know what I mean? Which is like the plastic surgeon like tightening things up.

And, and she looks unreal. I mean, she's about 50, but she looks about 30 or something, I mean, ostensibly. But then when you get, but then when she has a bad day she looks like 50, so she goes 20 years in one day.

And it's very sad. It's actually very sad to watch, you know, like, she has all the money and she has the motivation. And I'm not judging her.

Actually, I think she's something very special, but she's showing me these things so I can say something in class, okay? And she, and she, just to see someone age 20 years on a bad day is very depressing, you know, you can't, you really can't slow it down, okay? It's going like that.

And in the time it takes to go to the plastic surgeon, you know, in the time it takes to go to the health store, health food store, you're dying. You know, standing in the health food store picking out the right foods, you're dying. You know, time is, is slipping away, inexorably.

You see what I mean? You are one hour older when you get out of the health food store than when you walked in. And that's all.

You can take good care of yourself, you can exercise. You know, at a certain age you get this panic and you start to exercise and eat well and then after five years you're like, oh, forget it, you know? you know what I mean?

And, and it, it just doesn't work. You know, it's just slowly, then you start exercising and then you notice that the amount you can do gets less every year because you're, you're wearing out. It doesn't matter, you cannot replace, I had this big debate with some guy once, you know, and he says, well, what about the principle that when you go to exercise your muscles get bigger?

They're not, you see what I mean? I was saying everything falls apart. And, and we had this serious, it was in the back of my boss's limo, this is the husband, and we had this debate one day and he says, no, no, when you weight lift, you know, the muscle gets bigger so you can't say that the body is wearing out at that moment.

But catch this, you see, as the muscle is getting bigger it's getting older. You see what I mean? On, on a deceptive level the muscle is getting bigger.

On a, on a time, on a different dimension, meaning as we go through time, as it gets bigger it's getting older and it's falling apart. You see what I mean? So it doesn't matter if you look better this year than last year because you're a year older and the thing's a year older and it's working a year older less than it used to work.

You see what I mean? And that's, and then eventually you get to where you can't do those exercises anymore. You know, they'll be your last trip to the gym.

You know, and, and that's it. You see what I mean? And, and that, and that was caused by the first trip to the gym.

You see what I mean? You got to think that that's the truth. You know, that's, that's what Buddhism is very big on that.

Okay? So anyway, it leaks away continually. You can't slow it down, you can't stop it.

Is it good to take vitamins and take care of your body? Yes. Why?

You can practice longer. Okay? When you get to Dzogrel and stuff like that you have to take care of your body.

The big deal about being so kind to your parents is that they gave you a human body that if you take good care of it you can do Dzogrel. You know? If you take very good care of this physical body you can do the highest practice of a tantra well.

So you do have to take good care of it. Like it's a temple and you shouldn't put junk into it. You know what I mean?

But is it because it's so pretty and wonderful and the wonderful human mechanism, you know? No. It's that you need it to do, to do your practices and especially the highest practices.

You need to be in good health and you need to take good care of this temple. You know, so you can leave it behind when you're ready. Okay?

That's all. Okay. Third one.

For those of you who can't see, number three says, You will die without having had enough time to practice Dharma. Okay? You will die without having had enough time to practice Dharma.

There's this famous joke in the Lamrim. I don't remember it exactly. The guy is 60 years old.

He's a great Lama. He says, I spent the first 20 years of my life wasted, you know, goofing off. I spent the next 20 years thinking about practicing and the last 20 years I was too old to practice.

Something like that. You know what I mean? And, I can say, honestly, I've gone on one-month retreats.

I've, you know, went to work. I talked my boss into it. I lost thousands and thousands of dollars, you know.

Cut my pay, anything. I've got to have a tantric retreat, you know. Okay, let's say a quarter, okay?

Alright. And then I go, you know, and then I'm like very motivated. Like I've paid for this time, big time, you know.

And I'm aware of that. And I have like four weeks, you know. So I get to Flagstaff, Arizona and I rent a cabin out in the woods and that takes me a day or two and then I've got to get the groceries and that takes me two, three days.

I've got a little bit of work to tie up on that CD-ROM stuff and take another three or four days. Turns out to be a week, you know. And got those last emails off and then, then I've already lost the first two weeks, you know.

Very common in a tantric retreat. And then I get to the place and I sit down and start to meditate and then the mice come, you know. And I have to work on the mice for a day, you know.

And I get there and then there's a rainstorm and the roof is leaking and I've got to fix that. And then, this is all with no other responsibilities, you know. I'm like, I'm cut off from the world, you know.

And then I have to think about what to cook and what to eat, you know. And then I make up new little jobs to keep myself busy because I can't really, I don't really want to meditate all day and maybe I should edit this lecture, it's very important, you know. And the laptop comes out and just an hour, you know.

And then, and then it's two hours and then, you know. And then basically, even if you had an opportunity out in the wilderness with no other responsibilities and all the food is already there, you would still waste all the time. You would still not be able to practice the whole day.

And trust me, anyone who's done long retreats could tell you that. You know, I've met people who did three-year retreats and they told me it was like the same thing, you know. They just basically figured out a way to fritter the whole day away.

And then they had a couple hours of practice during the day. But even if you are pretty strict with yourself, you get up at 3.30, 4 o'clock, you do the offerings, you clean the room, you know, you set forth all the scriptures you need and you get going. Even if you're doing a perfect job, you can't meditate more than 3-4 hours a day, really.

I mean, you can do an hour and a half session, then you're exhausted, your mind's been wandering the last half hour, you know, you're tired, you sleep, you know, and even on a retreat where you have nothing else to do, you can't get in more than, I would say, four hours, four or five hours if you're really kind of strict with yourself, of pure practice. Now forget it when you're in your normal life. What are you going to have?

You know, how much time are you really going to have? In that little window between being too young to care about practicing and being too old to do it well. You see what I mean?

And you will get too old to do it well. You know, your body will start to hurt more, your knees will start to hurt more, every year that goes by you have more responsibilities, more liabilities, more dependents, you know, more things that you're supposed to be doing, and then it just gets worse and worse. So there's a peak, you know, and the peak happens.

You know, in certain scriptures the peak is very young. You know, they state the peak, I won't tell you, okay, it's depressing, you know, but you peak out before halfway through your life, okay, and so, you know, you don't have much time, you have very little time. By the time you get really interested in Dharma it's usually, you're already peaked, you know, physically and mentally.

So then you have to really, the book, by the way, has a little line that says, exception for people who try really hard, you know, like, no, it really does, honestly it does. It states the peak and then it goes on to say that a person who studies emptiness well might have a chance, you know, a better chance if they work really hard on it. But basically the time you have to practice is very, very, very short, you know, and you don't have much time.

How much time does it take to do what you have to do? I mean, you have to be able to basically get into a state of samatha, you have to be able to get into a state of deep meditation, you have to do study, a lot of study. When I say study I'm talking thousands of hours of study.

Seriously, I don't want to depress you or try to sell more of my correspondence courses, but, actually I don't sell them, I lose money every time one gets, but you need hundreds and hundreds of hours of study. I'd say three to four thousand of hours of study is good. Is this new information?

Not necessarily. But it's the act of going through it again and again and again. You have to hear everything many times before it sinks in.

And you can understand it intellectually and not get it. You see what I mean? And that process takes what they call tuh sam gom.

Say tuh tuh sam sam gom You have to go through this step by step. Tuh is hearing it over and over and over again. And I encourage you in this center, you're in uh what do they call uh la lo la lo la lo ke lumba.

You're on the border of the Buddha Dharma. You're in the hinterlands. You know, and I really encourage you to get a full-time teacher.

I really really encourage you. You know what I mean? There's, because you you need to be around Dharma constantly.

You know, whether this person is perfect in your mind or or whatever, it doesn't matter. Just to have uh hearing it every day or every two days or every three days is necessary for your spiritual health. You need it.

Uh, so something going on every two or three days. You need it. You must have it.

Okay? Uh, so you need a you need that tuh and then sam you have to be meditating daily. Okay?

Have to be. Uh, and you have to do at least an hour or two hours. Or otherwise you just won't make it.

You'll never get there and you'll die. and then gom, tuh sam gom, gom meaning meditation but I would count it as retreats. You must start doing retreats.

You know? You must go study personal practice meditation, right? And retreats.

You must do retreats. Okay? You must have and I I don't mean weekend retreats.

Okay? That's just one long meditation session. Okay?

Uh, you have to design your life that I'd say twice a year you can get away for two to four weeks. Okay? Personally, I don't come on in a retreat until the fifteenth or the sixteenth day.

So, if you never do anything more than fourteen, what's going to happen? You'll never know. You know?

It takes my mind and I've been doing them for a long time. It takes, it literally takes fifteen to sixteen days. It's almost like clockwork.

You know? Before I get into it. You see?

And, so I'd really say you need three to four weeks. Okay? Uh, six weeks is good because you'll fritter two weeks away.

Okay? So, in my mind, you have to study, you have to be doing, uh, personal practice, meditation, and you have to be doing retreat. And those things take time.

Benjamin Franklin's theory, I think, is the best. Uh, you can't feed your current lifestyle and, and take the time I'm talking about. All it will cause is tension between you and your boss.

You see what I mean? You can't feed your present lifestyle, uh, you can't hope to feed it as you are doing now and still do all the practice you're hoping to do. You can't do it.

It's just, you'll just get into conflict with your boss and somebody will be unhappy or your wife or whatever. You have to decide. My personal idea is to, to lower your, this is the Vinaya, this is the point of becoming ordained.

You don't have to become ordained to get this point. Lower your expenses. You know?

Cut them down. Franklin said, a penny saved is a penny earned. Meaning, if you don't spend something, you made something.

You see what I mean? Two ways to, to live. Two ways to have enough to live on.

One is to make more or the other is to spend less. You see what I mean? So just strip your life down to the essentials and then you'll have time to practice.

You see? It's a domino effect. Strip life down to where you don't need much.

Uh, consciously move to a lower income thing than you're capable of. People tend to work as hard as they're capable of to make a certain income. Just consciously move down to the next level.

Say, I don't need that level. And, and I have the brain power to stay at that level, but I choose to spend some of that time and energy and brain power on the, on my practice. Meaning, in the world they start, I'll have to move down one level.

You see? So you just move down economically one level. Now some people, that'll be hard because they're already at the bottom.

[Speaker 2]
You know?

[Speaker 1]
But you can find ways to, you know, just figure out ways to lower it. And, and, and this means an ego lowering too. I mean, if you're at a big corporation and, and people admire you and you're a very successful businessman and then you consciously move down two levels, down below what you could have been or what you are already.

Say, I don't want to be a vice president. I'll be a manager. And, and the old manager can be my boss.

That's very hard on your ego. And, but it's very smart. And, and I sometimes go back to my old workplace and see the new vice president who looks terrible now.

And I'm like laughing at him. He's like, he's like, you tricked me. You know?

I was happy as a manager. You know? Now I'm this miserable, overpaid vice president.

You know? I never go home. I don't see my kids.

You know? And anyway, it requires that to create time you're going to have to move down in other things. And you won't be as respected.

You know, at work they'll call you a slough-off or, you know, they'll say, oh, he doesn't come half the time. He's not serious. And you just smile and do the best you can while you're there and then go on your retreats.

Okay? We'll take a break and then we'll do a short meditation. I think we're over time already.

anyway, it's all the time we have, right? Take a 5-10 minute break. Okay, so, we'll go through a quick preliminary.

Let's start by watching your breath, which is the, watching the feel of the breath on the inside of the nose. And take rather deep breaths and expel all the air, but without, like, forcing it. Take refuge, meaning, try to divide in your mind your life into two parts, worldly part and spiritual part, and all the worldly things that protect you, like your house and the money that you have and the people that you know.

And then try to think of the spiritual side of your life that protects you in a much stronger way and after you die also. So, try to get a feeling for the difference between worldly types of refuge and then spiritual types of refuge. And think about bodhicitta and imagine what it would be like, for example, if you could emanate thousands of bodies in different places and help different people at the same time.

Next, invite a holy being to come and meditate with you, the holiest being that you can think of, that you've heard about or that you feel close to. And think about the thing that you most admire about that being, whether you understand it fully or not. In your mind, bow down to them for that.

Then make them offering, something very beautiful in your mind, especially the offering of your own practice, something you've done well or something you may do today, later on, that might please them. And then think of something negative you thought or said or did in the last few hours or last day. The important thing is to admit it and see that it was silly and decide that you'll try not to do it again for a short time at least.

And then equally, with equal attention, think about something good you did. And the inner ones are more important than the outer ones. Like, teaching a class is not as important as having one, you know, thought inside of yourself that corrects yourself or changes yourself for better.

So mostly rejoice, be happy about something inside that you were able to deal with spiritually today. And ask for teachings, formal teachings. Ask that you be exposed to formal teachings.

And then ask for those exquisite private instructions that the people that irritate you give you and people like that. And lastly, pray for the long lives of your teachers and the people who influence you in a good way. Even if they're not Buddhist, it doesn't matter.

People around you that you work with or people that you know who are kind or considerate or have other good spiritual qualities and pray that they stay near you and that they live a long life. If you have to shift around, do it here. That's the end of the preliminaries.

And then go back to your breath. Now you see yourself in front of the door of the building. The building is like, it's made of like adobe or something like that and it's low.

And it has a courtyard in the middle. But there are many rooms that you have to go through to get to the courtyard. And you're coming in from the outside.

You came over the drawbridge and you came across the meadow. And now you're at the first door and you go into the first door. The first door is like a yellow color, gold color, and big.

Then when you come inside the first room, it's like cool inside of an earthen home. And to your right, chain to the wall with a huge chain is this, like a huge dog about standing to the size of your shoulder, like a five feet high dog. It's huge.

Think of the nastiest German shepherd or pit bull. In my mind, it's a German shepherd from the Nazis or something, but it's big and it's tall. If it got loose, it could certainly tear you into nothing.

And it's like rabid and it's like wild and it's trying to get to you. And that represents the first part of the meditation on the certainty of death. That death is unstoppable.

If this dog touches you, if this dog gets away, there's no way you can live. And look up at it and think about it. If your karma wears out, nothing can help you.

Then you walk towards the center of the room. To my mind, the room is like circular, not square. And you go across, straight across to the center and there's a waist-high stand or something, and on the stand is an hourglass.

And you look at it and most of the sand is gone already and the sand is moving, flying down quickly. And this represents the second step or the second justification for meditation that death is certain. And you're looking at the time of your life and it's flying by and nothing can stop that flow.

And even as you look at it, you're losing more time. And get a sense of your life flowing on. You can't take a rest.

You can't stop. It's not like you can sit down and not have another hour go by. And you're losing time as you sit or whether you're eating or whether you're enjoying yourself or not.

And get the sense that your time is flying and you can't even slow it down and you're moving closer to your death. And that's what the... Think of those things as you look at the hourglass.

No rest. No time to stop. Even while you sleep, you're dying.

Then you're entering a long corridor. I think of it as stone on the sides and you're running down the corridor. And on the walls are pictures of the teachers you've had or the Dharma books you've read or different teachings you've been through.

And you're running. And they... The teaching you had with Lama Sepa one time or the teaching you had with Geshe Tsoga or each teaching, you can see it on the wall like a painting on the wall and then you're running and you don't have time to even think much about it.

And then it's gone again and then you're still running and then the next teaching is going by. You don't have time to stop and learn it well or study it or meditate on it. You're like running on to the next thing and the thing has gone already.

And imagine some of the teachings you've had and how little time you've had to think about them or study them carefully or meditate on them properly or do a retreat on them and you're just rushing by them and then they're gone and then the next one and then that's gone. And this represents the fact that even while you're alive you have so little time to study Dharma and so little free time, so little time that you really want to study Dharma and that's what this quarter represents. This is just an easy way to remember the three parts of the meditation on the certainty of death.

Think of some of the specific teachings you've had that you didn't really digest or didn't really internalize because you were rushing on. So now we have six parts of the meditation. Three that were like a preliminary or warm-up and then we had three that relate to meditating on how death is certain.

First we were coming out of the forest loaded down, fighting for food at the table, which is what's wrong with not thinking about your death. The second one was crossing the bridge and that was thinking about how good it would be to meditate on your death and you were dumping things off your back. Then we passed the wrong idea about death meditation and went into the right one, which is like a freedom to do what you always wanted to do, Dharma-wise.

And then we came to the first door, which is to, when you look at the door you have to think, oh, now I'm entering the three justifications for why we can say that death is certain. And then you enter the door and then there's the dong on the right, that's the death is unstoppable. And it represents your karma, dirty karma.

And then move on towards the center of the room, circular room, and there's the hourglass. And think about how your life has leaked away so far and it keeps leaking away at the same rate. You can't even slow it down.

And then you're running down the hallway and don't have time to study all the things you've learned or to learn all the things you've heard about. No time to meditate on them anyway. And that's the end of the first, of the three big divisions of a death meditation.

Then it's always auspicious to bring the Lama into your heart. So, like we did last night, ask that Lama to come into your heart and stay with you and affect you. And they get smaller.

First of all, there's this thing where they get very happy that you ask. And they're very, like, attracted towards you. And they rise up and come down like Peter Pan on your head.

Very small, very light, facing the same way. And then straight down like an elevator shaft to the level of your heart, behind your heart, about a half inch in front of your backbone. You make a beautiful little, like, chapel there for them with a huge, beautiful flower, like a big bed.

And on top of that is a beautiful cushion of light, pure golden light, warm. And then they're sitting on it. And they're very happy with you.

And their love and their help, the inspiration they give is flowing through your veins in that golden light. And it's always warm there. And it's always open and light in that little chamber.

And then you think about all this good karma and you want it to help other people. So you think of the light bursting out of the pores of your skin, like little needles of light. And they go out into your town, into your city.

And they touch the people there and give them help and make them happy. People all over Raleigh, Durham, on Saturday afternoon, suddenly something feels great and they don't quite know what. Then we'll do a short prayer.

Okay? This is the end of Session Two.