Занятие 4, часть 2

[Говорящий 1] (0:00 - 10:33)
I have an idea. So I was looking up... What was it called?

I wanted to write a satsang on the schedule. Because I like the idea of satsang. Satsang is this Indian custom where the teacher gets up in the evening and it's like just a big discussion.

And he says something, or she says something, and then people just... It's just a big like... So I thought I want to spell it correctly.

Because I hate Sanskrit that's spelled wrong. It's a personal pet peeve of mine. All these shakras...

I was honored. What's it called? What's this one?

Spanish? No, there's a better one. Srimananda.

They misspelled the name of their center. Anyway... So I said I thought I could do that.

We looked up satsang. There's no Sanskrit words in my life that I remember. There's like one or two.

So I'm like, that's weird. So I looked it up. And it's in the Tibetan's ancient translator's preface.

And it was satsangama. The folk word is satsangama. And it means...

It means to... In the company of the holy. It's beautiful.

That's how they translate it. In the company of the holy. So that's a custom, satsangama.

Is to sit together and talk about cool stuff. So... Let's do it a little bit, and then I'll give you a break.

And then we'll meditate a little bit. So... I want to propose a question.

So like... A huge percentage of the people... We go on these tours.

We do two days of open talks in the city. Anybody can come. Like in Kiev, 350 people came.

And we just did open talks. And then... Then we say, okay, we'll do a retreat on the weekend.

And then the retreat on the weekend, you get to act... You get to break out into small groups, discussion groups. And you can talk about your personal issues.

So people love that. And then, like, especially on this last tour... I would say that over a third of the people asked the same question.

And it was, what the hell should I do with my life, you know? Like, how do I find out what I really wanted to do with my life all along? Like...

How do I find my passion in life, you know? I heard this word over and over. People were saying...

How do I know what's my talent in life? How do I find what I really want to do with my life? What am I supposed to be doing?

Those of you who have found it, you know what it feels like to have it. You know? If you find it, it's so...

Pleasant. I found it when I was 17 or 18. I knew forever what I wanted to do.

And then I just copied my whole life. Because I'm doing exactly what I want to do. I wouldn't change anything.

And then... But you meet people who are 40, 50, 60, and they're like... I'm not sure I can do anything with my life.

And I'm not sure what I want to do with my life. And on the tours, in the breakdown groups... Maybe almost half the people sometimes, they have the same question.

How can I find what I'm supposed to do with my life? Because it's running out. And it's getting late.

And I still don't know exactly what I'm supposed to do. What I would be really good at. What I would want to do.

So I'm opening... I'm asking you a question. What do you think would be the common thing that I should advise them to do?

To find their passion in life. What should I say to that? Anybody?

Now raise your hand and talk loud, okay? Because the recognition is that... Maybe you don't have a mic.

Just talk loud. But yeah, go. Rejoice in other people.

I think that would be one. He said rejoice in other people. If you meet somebody who has a passion...

That's really cool. Like I was in... I don't know.

Like sometimes you meet a musician who's really... That's all... They know what they want to do.

And they're awesome. Or a jackpot or something. But they know...

They're really... They just be happy. That someone else has found their passion.

Anything else? Louder. Help people...

I guess identify people's dreams. Help them achieve them. In big ways or small ways.

Help people identify their dreams. Ask them what their values are. What they value in life.

Yeah. I like the idea of conversation. Like I was telling people...

Take people out to Stambouki. And... Just talk.

Everybody has friends who don't know what they want to do. Take them out. And just talk.

And let them... Sometimes when you talk about what you think you might want to do... It becomes clear, right?

Anybody else? Yeah. I know what it feels like.

It feels like you're in a stream paddling with the water. Instead of paddling against the current. And so...

I just picture that. Sometimes I try so hard to be something. Or work hard.

And I realize I'm paddling uphill. When I find that feeling. Where it's just flowing.

I know that's probably a good sign. Yeah. It's not a struggle.

Sometimes I define it as what it means to stay after spending the money. I really do. Without being forced by the dollar.

Yeah. Anybody? Yeah?

Yeah. It was in the Yoga Sutra. Love.

Passion. Joy. Affinity.

And then... The results of this practice will lead you to love everything you do. So then maybe...

A person who is doing this might find out that they love what they are doing. More than drawn to what they want to do. Yeah.

I think it's an option. I think what you're saying. I like that.

Sometimes I tell people maybe what you're doing you could love. But you don't have to see it as that. Like maybe...

A lot of people come to me and say I used to be... I used to love my work and now I hate it. I don't like it anymore.

Like I'm an architect and it got old. And I don't feel happy with it anymore. I used to love my work and now I don't love it anymore.

Yeah. The love for my profession has worn off. And then...

They want me to tell them which new profession to do. But then sometimes I think that. I think maybe they just need to recover the love for their own profession.

You see what I mean? Which makes you say... The idea of decision.

Okay? And I want to go back to the idea of decision. Okay?

So... A lot of people now because of the economy etc. They are faced with decisions.

Should I give up what I was doing? You know me, right? He owned an entire company.

And it just wasn't working financially. So he just went to nursing school. He just...

He's like collapsing this week. From his final exams. He decided to go to a different profession.

And people are asking me... Should I be a nurse? Or should I hang in there with the entire company?

You know? And then... In this system...

You would... Help somebody else who was having trouble identifying their passion. And then...

We were sitting in Bulgaria at the... Ubykhbank Litov. He was a Russian guy.

Looks like you. At the Ubykhbank Litov. It'll strike you in the face.

It'll hit you in the face. Your new profession will come and hit you in the face. You won't have to make a decision.

So you have to try to... When you're trying to help people, you have to deflect the idea of a decision. Don't try to say...

Should I stick with my old job? Or... Should I start a new job?

The question is defective. You should help someone else. Find what they want to do.

And then relax. Someone will walk up to you and offer you a new game. And then you don't have to...

I have a lot of trouble teaching this to people, because they don't get it. In Taiwan, they get it. I don't know why.

It was the only place they didn't get it. But try to imagine a life where you don't have to make any decisions anymore. You're faced with two courses of action.

Just help somebody else figure it out. And relax. And then the decision will be made for you.

Something will come. And you don't decide to breathe. It's decided for you.

And everything else can be the same. Just learn how to plan it. It's very...

Beautiful. The whole idea of struggling with what you want to do is... You will never know until you help somebody else figure out what they want to do.

And then it will come. And you won't have to decide.

[Говорящий 2] (10:34 - 10:53)
So this is kind of like a domino effect, because you're teaching us to teach someone. You're asking us to help someone find their goal by helping them. So we have to tell them, well, help someone find their goal.

[Говорящий 1] (10:53 - 15:43)
I like it, I like it. It's a good question. This is called the Guangzhou Computer Geek classroom question.

It's classic. It's in all the scriptures. So we went to Guangzhou, which is just on the other side of Hong Kong.

And this was the first talk to this group in Guangzhou, in China. They weren't allowed to read these things for 50 years. They tried to stamp out these ideas.

It was illegal to open the scriptures. So we tried to explain, look, aspirants don't really work if you help someone else with a headache before the aspirant will work. And if you haven't helped someone else with a headache before, and that's why aspirants sometimes work and sometimes they don't work.

Because they don't have anything in them that works. Then they ask you, what's the active ingredient? And you say, but it's not active because some people take it and it doesn't work.

So the active ingredient needs to be activated. And then they get it, you know. And then this young man, he raises his hand and he says, okay, let me give this trick.

I'm supposed to help somebody else with a headache, and then that will make my aspirant work, you know. And then we're like, yeah, you got it. And then he said, well, how am I supposed to help take care of your headache?

And then we said, you know, you can give him an aspirin. And then he's like, zah, you know. I'm like, what's the problem?

He said, you think that you're going to apply the comics to, by handing somebody something that doesn't work, it's going to make your aspirant work for you? And I'm like, you know, and no one asked me this question in 20 years. And I'm like, he's like, any help you render to someone else, which is not explaining this stuff to them, is defective.

You know? Even teaching Dharma is defective. There's nothing in it.

He said, let me give you this trick. You're going to give somebody an aspirin to help them with their headache. You know the aspirin may or may not work.

And then you expect that seed to make your aspirin work? And I'm like, God, I didn't think about that. So what Ana's saying is that logically, you would have to explain to them.

The only way to really help someone else's headache is to explain to them that they should help someone else who has a headache. And she's saying it would be a domino effect, or I would say it's a pyramid scheme. It's a Dharma pyramid scheme.

Nobody can stop. It's one of those letters that say you have to send it to someone. What's it called?

Chain letters? It's a chain letter. You know, that's not going to work unless seven people help other people.

Yeah, that's right. But then I told the guy, look, your intention. Like, somebody's getting mugged.

We talked about it this evening, right? Somebody's getting mugged on the street. So what are you going to do?

Watch them? I mean, you have to try to help. You have to run up and try to stop the guy.

But you don't know that your action is not going to make things worse. Within your limits of your knowledge of the situation, you have to try. You can't just let the guy stand there and punch some lady.

You have to go try. Maybe he'll pull out a gun and shoot both of you, which he wouldn't have pulled out if you just let him do that quietly. But you have to try.

The intention to be of assistance is what makes the aspen work. Most of it. I think if you really wanted the aspen to work a thousand percent of the time, you have to explain to them about the aspen.

But sometimes they're not ready to hear. You know, many times they're not ready to hear. That's like you get up and give a business seminar in China and people say, when's the car going to make money?

And you say, you have to give money to somebody else. And then some guy raises his hand and says, would that include you guys in my company? They don't trust it.

You can't just pop it on people. You've got to weigh each other. You can't tell them you should give your money away and get more money.

Any other ideas about how to help someone find their passion? Because that's going to flow into energy. I think learning to meditate well.

I think learning to meditate well. Yeah. It would help them find their passion.

[Говорящий 2] (15:43 - 15:43)
Yeah.

[Говорящий 1] (15:44 - 26:42)
Because they would clarify their thinking. They would clarify their thinking and then NAR, developing their own NAR internally. Yeah.

What's NAR? Intensity. Passion.

Oh, okay. NAR in meditation. Meditative intensity.

Our understanding. Have a baseline for it. It seems like a life force.

When I feel the passion, it feels like it's coming from almost the same chakra. It's like we have something in morality. You know, like be true to yourself.

So when you're true to yourself and you're keeping those morality obstacles in your life, it seems like passion and inspiration is just promoting that. So be congruent with your own true to yourself. I think in China it's the 道道非常道.

Right? Like to flow with the 道. But there's a big thing about that in China that I really like.

It's like as long as you think your husband is complaining at you because he wants to complain at you, you're working upstream. You're going against the natural flow of truth. And then that's harder and it feels wrong and you don't feel passion and you're exhausted because you're fighting against truth.

And then when you turn it around and you say, okay, he's coming from me and I have to change myself and that will change him. Then you're flowing with truth. They say 道, right?

道. Yeah, the path, the way. Then you're flowing with the natural way of things and you feel passion.

I think that's what you're saying. Then you feel passion and inspiration and you're not struggling anymore and it flows and you do cool stuff and you just keep doing cool stuff because you're flowing with the proper, you're not fighting. I think though that ultimately to flow with the 道 would be to understand that your husband is coming to you.

That's all. That would be enough. Then you would do the right thing.

You wouldn't respond with anger. And then you'd be flowing with the 道 and then your whole life would be easier and then you'd feel more inspired and then you would find your passion in life. Something like that.

I like that. Anybody else? Yeah, we'll go for like a few minutes more.

I like that. Opportunity. So, Sierra's talking about people who are already exhibiting some of their passion but they don't have the materials to live out their passion.

And then you would find your passion. Like if some guy wanted to be an artist but he didn't have money for canvas and paint, right? Like he knows he wants to be an artist.

Or he wants to go to art school and he doesn't have the money. And then you supply the money to fulfill their passion. Rather than just helping them find their passion because they already know what their passion is.

But you help them recall. Actualize their passion. Cool.

That's cool. Anybody else? No.

I think it would be interesting to find people who already had a really strong passion for something and then to do the same thing that you said about like a husband. Convince them that something good that was happening is not out there but also coming from them. Because there's already a tremendous amount of energy when you really love something but then it kind of goes into something small rather than sharing that with more people.

Yeah, so Anatole's talking about someone already had a passion. And they were manifesting their passion. So they were already an intense musician or something like that.

They had found their passion and they were already living their passion. But those seeds will die. And they will lose their passion.

Something will happen. They will get tired. They'll get old.

It won't be so much fun to play saxophone. Something will happen. The seeds will wear off.

And the sad thing is that those people don't know why they have the seeds in the first place. They don't know that it's time for someone to have seeds. So they don't have any instinct that…

Like it's the people's third album, right? It's always that. And no, because their seeds are wearing off.

And then no musician would think… No typical musician would think, I better teach saxophone to three kids or I'm not going to be able to make a fourth album. It won't come.

If I want to sustain… We're talking about sustaining passion. If I want to sustain my passion, I have to keep reinvesting the seeds.

So whatever passion I have, rather than narrowing it and saying, and just concentrating on my own next album, or worrying about why my last album wasn't so good. When we see it, we know it's great. Then their focus tends to get narrower and narrower on themselves.

And then if you could do the opposite. The guy in Singapore, what's his name? He makes the cartoon.

The last… Java is something. Yeah.

Yeah, he's a very famous cartoonist. I said how famous are you? He said, you know Simpsons?

I said, yeah. He says, I'm the Simpsons of Singapore. I said, you're famous then.

He said, yeah, I'm famous. And then he started to get less famous. And he didn't know what to do.

And I said, teach other animators. So he did this thing. He arranged this thing at his house once a week.

And all the young animators in Singapore came and he trained them for free. And then the government of Singapore made him the animator of the country. He oversees all animation for all parts of the government.

Which is a lot of animation. So… No, so he did that.

Rather than narrow it to himself, he expanded it to helping other people get their passion. Madeline. So, if you want to find your own passion, and you are having a hard time, then you can work on the scenes by doing Tom Lennon, somebody who can't find their passion.

Just manipulating the scenes that you have for not being able to find your passion. And then if you want to show somebody else, then help somebody else find their passion and just teach them how to do it. Yeah.

We always said, a good way to plan scenes to find your own passion would be do Tom Lennon. Take away the suffering from somebody else who doesn't know how to find their own passion. And then you could teach Tom Lennon on passion to people who have trouble finding their passion.

And then that would be better than an aspirant. Because you would be giving them the means, the real means, to find their own passion. Teach people Tom Lennon about how to find their passion.

I like, that's good. Yeah. I was going to say, plan, you know, after the Lama Chitra, to search for those.

But I also have a question. So, there's a lot of people, you know, kids especially, that have their passion. And I feel it's not as simple as conditioning.

Where you know what you want to do, but you're afraid that you can't. You think you're not good enough, or it's too hard, or not. My little girl wants to be an actor.

My youngest, you know, that's it. I was an actor. It's a really hard way to live.

You know, it's really. So, how do you work with that kind of rational awareness of what it's really like, without being negative? I'll throw it out to the group, okay?

I'll just phrase it shorter. Let's say you, Uma Thurman came to my country, before she got dangerous in my home, and her father. And they asked me to hire her as a second man.

He's so. Every time he sees me, he thanks me for not hiring him. But you know, so, what she's saying is that, suppose the person knows what they really want to do, but it's a little bit of a dangerous path.

Like acting. Like it's, it's not likely to be very easy, or successful. So, they have the kind of seeds for their passion.

But they also have other seeds for fear, or hesitation, about jumping into their passion. So, what would you do? I'm saying all this because, hopefully, I would like most of you to go on tour with us.

Some of you are going to ask me these questions. You're going to be in a group, in Buenos Aires, or Santiago, or I don't know where. And somebody's going to ask you.

You know, I know what I want to be, but I'm a little bit afraid. Because it's not exactly practical, and it's difficult path. So, it seems to me that based on, it seems to me that based on what you've been saying, that the best thing you can do is to teach them the real causes, for them making their careers successful.

Despite of any sort of construct that's in their mind, that's potentially dangerous, or futile in any way. Just teach them how to have the correct seeds to make them successful. Yeah, so there's certain seeds to find their passion.

But then there's other seeds to make it practical, to make it successful.

[Говорящий 2] (26:44 - 26:58)
If you're experiencing fear, find somebody else who is experiencing fear, and help that person get over their fear. Yeah. Like whatever you're experiencing yourself, that you don't want to do the opposite to somebody else.

[Говорящий 1] (26:59 - 27:13)
I'd say that too. I mean, help them with the seeds for fear. Help them with the seeds for fear.

But I mean, your question got a little bit into the practicality of fear, and the usefulness of fear. Well, I think we'll talk about that. Okay.

[Говорящий 2] (27:14 - 28:04)
Well, I was just going to say that, sometimes people might be entering a work that's not necessarily, like my mother was very nervous when I decided I was going to be a yoga teacher. She's still nervous, actually. And like what makes me feel, I mean, I don't make a lot of money as a yoga teacher, but I'm very, very happy.

And so what I've learned over the years, through the kindness of my Lamas, is that I can turn anything I do, and you've been talking about this for the past two days. If you ask yourself why you're doing whatever you're doing, right? Then you find a good reason why it can be for somebody else, and even acting can be like that.

I mean, anything can be like that, right? So, do whatever you're doing for somebody else, and then you'll be satisfied, even if you're not making a million dollars as a yoga teacher, as an actor, or a yoga teacher.

[Говорящий 1] (28:07 - 28:12)
That was more of a question, I guess. Is that right? So, um...

[Говорящий 2] (28:15 - 28:18)
Jeff, Jeff, he's the only one. He's the only one.

[Говорящий 1] (28:21 - 30:12)
We'll do one last one. But this whole idea about doing something, knowing that other people are going to see it. So, say you had a fear of who was acting, then maybe what if you picked another fear that may not be so difficult, and faced it, and just went for it, knowing that other people would watch you try to get through it, you know?

Like, faced a fear, and just, like, went for it and did it. Even though you were a little scared, knowing other people would watch you attempt that. I think what might be useful there, and then we'll take a break, and we'll come back when we're working.

Rather than focusing on how it would affect you to be an actor, you think about how many other people would be inspired if they knew that acting scared you, and you did it. And then that would kind of season you to not be afraid. Like, he's an example for all people who are afraid to do what you want to do, by trying to do it bravely.

And then other people would see you, they would see the movie, what's it called? How Young and Worth It. Well, how did they, how did you guys mess up my role?

It's a working title. Anyway, they made a Hollywood film out of one of my books, and he was the actor, so we got all this beautiful magic. Okay.

We'll take a ten-minute break. And then we'll just have a few minutes, we'll do a short meditation. I gave some teachings on the heart surgery in medicine here in the 18th grade.

What year was that?

[Говорящий 2] (30:12 - 30:13)
1999?

[Говорящий 1] (30:13 - 30:19)
1999? 2000. Yeah, that was going to be the last teaching.

[Говорящий 2] (30:20 - 30:22)
Oh, that was 1999. No, it was 2000.

[Говорящий 1] (30:22 - 42:58)
It was the last teaching of all, and we went into retreat. So it was very poignant, you know, they put a big thing in Mandela magazine, last teaching they did for Mandela. And like, I don't know, people came, and we did the heart surgery very carefully.

And so many, he, he, he, massaged the video into something that you can look at. Because this is like pretty rough video, I imagine. It's like a 10th generation video copy.

Yeah. And the audio, they did something quite nice to the video. Yeah.

So you can just close your eyes and listen. But, I want to thank him, that's all. And yeah, he's happy to make copies if you want a copy.

And maybe we'll figure out a way to split it up by money. Seriously, figure out a way. That's your problem.

Okay. Alright. We're going to do a short meditation.

We'll continue tomorrow on the same idea, okay? So stay, close your eyes. Start to track your breath.

Bring to mind someone you know who's having a transition in life. I think the most typical cases are college students graduating from college. People who just got laid off of their job.

People whose company just closed. People who just lost their spouse. Someone, bring someone to mind who's not sure of what to do next.

Come and sit with them in their room. They are sitting alone in their own bedroom. Come and sit with them, invisible.

Try to feel their uncertainty about what to do. Desire to find a passion in their life, something that they really can devote themselves to, something meaningful. Then we'll do a Tongren meditation for them.

Try to imagine all their uncertainty about what to do with their life. Their inability to find their passion in life. All of that, those feelings.

All that uncertainty. Seeking what they should be doing with their life. Mixed together at their heart.

That's a small pool of life. I think you make a decision that you would rather bring that uncertainty to yourself and destroy it than to see them continue without finding the great love of their life. Having made that decision then, with each inhale of breath, bring that cloud of darkness out of their heart, rising up out of their throat, into their nostrils.

Then it begins to flow through the sky, through the air between you, towards you. Let it stop just in front of your own nose. All their doubts, all their uncertainty, all their desperate desire to find what they were meant to do in this life.

We draw out of them with each inhalation that we take. In the count of three, we'll take a deep inhale. The darkness will come into our own chest, our own heart.

And then in a split second, before you take your exhale, all that darkness is destroyed by a burst of light. One, two, three. There's nothing left of the darkness except some smoke, like cigarette smoke, just disappearing into the air.

And I think maybe the most important step is to look at them sitting on their bed in their bedroom, and suddenly they feel a great burden is lifted from them, and they suddenly feel some clear insight into what they would like to do with their life. And just sit and enjoy how it feels to watch another person be happy because of your efforts to take away their their hurt. Just sit with them quietly and enjoy how it feels to have helped them, to see their to see the happiness in their face.

And slowly come back to your own breath. And when you're ready, open your eyes.