Занятие 8, часть 2

[Говорящий 1] (0:00 - 27:37)
Okay, we'll start. These classes really are free, okay? And you don't have to offer anything, all right?

In the monastery, the teachers don't get paid. They teach for free for 30 years. Each student, they do it for free.

And I respect that custom. I think it should be that way, okay? So don't feel obligated, all right?

If it's fun, that's okay, but it's not necessary, okay? All right, here we go. DE LTAR KUN LONG DGE SEMS BSKYED PA CHEN GYI SNGAG NAS KHYEN GROL SEMS KYI BYA BA STE We're on class number four.

I was going to try to finish five classes this week. So we'll be about 80% done or something. That'll be okay.

We'll make it up in Prescott. DE LTAR KUN LONG DGE SEMS BSKYED PA CHEN GYI SNGAG NAS So there are two steps to gathering your motivation before a meditation, okay? So far, we only said that you should look into your heart and check your motivation.

And we gave four examples of possible motivation. And now we're going to have his presentation on what would be a good motivation, okay? And so there's an extensive training about a good motivation to have for meditating.

And you can also use it for your yoga or for coming to a class or for serving people at the homeless shelter, okay? This is how classically you would raise a correct motivation before meditation. Now, this is a long presentation.

Okay, you ready? We won't do it all tonight. DE LTAR KUN So first is, say KHYAM GROL.

KHYAM GROL KHYAM GROL It's the only case in the Tibetan language where the prenasal is a labial before a dental. So it should have been KHYAM GROL. KHYAM GROL, you see?

And it's KHYAM GROL. Don't ask me why, okay? But you should know because you should pronounce it correctly because it's one of the most important words in Buddhism.

Say KHYAM GROL. KHYAM GROL Going for shelter or taking refuge, okay? And we have to talk about it.

There's a very, very, very powerful presentation about this in the textbooks of the greatest Tibetan monastery, which is Serme. There's a beautiful presentation. It's really, really powerful and you should know it.

So I'll go with his thing for a while, but I might go off on a long tangent. Where was Pabongka Rinpoche from? Serme.

Not only that, he's from Gerong College, which is our college. That's the one that I was brought up in. So this is probably the most famous book written in Tibet in the last 500 years or so.

And it was written from our college. So anyway, DE DAG We have to talk about what does it mean to go for shelter or to take refuge, okay? BDAG LEN LAM RIM SON DRAG PA YIN PAS So if you think about it, his presentation, there are eight important texts on Lam Rim, The Idiot's Guide to Enlightenment, All the Steps to Enlightenment, A to Z, A to Z of Enlightenment.

There are eight famous presentations. There are maybe a couple of hundred other ones, but there are eight most famous. He chose to use three in his lectures.

This is a record of lectures given in the 1920s in Tibet and written down and edited by the teacher of the current Dalai Lama, who was my teacher's root Lama. So the three books he's... So DAG PA, those of you who are studying, can you see it up there?

Ningbo, Lam Rim Son, DAG PA. DAG PA means to combine three or four commentaries as you teach. So the Lama would set out like eight commentaries and follow the same topics through each of the Lam Rims.

There's a very, very famous commentary called Lam Rim Shidat. If you really wanted to spend 20 years studying Lam Rim, you should study that. It's four commentaries on the Lam Rim Chenmo of Je Tsongkapa that you can follow simultaneously.

And they were printed interlinearly. They were carved interlinearly. And it's awesome.

It's an awesome tech. I don't think anyone's ever taught that publicly. It would take about 30 years, but it would be cool.

Anyway, we don't have time. I don't know, yet. NGES NA'I KHYAB DOR SEMS BSKYED So anyway, he's using three of them.

What are the three? Say, NIR LAM, BYAMS PA'I ZHAL LUNG, LO SBYONG DON DU MA NIR LAM means the quick path. It's a Lam Rim by the second Panchen Lama, Losang Yeshe, who lived 1663 to 1737.

BYAMS PA'I ZHAL LUNG is called the Word of the Gentle One. And that's the fifth Dalai Lama's great Lam Rim. And then LO SBYONG DON DU MA is Geshe Chekawa, his famous seven-point LO SBYONG.

It's a LO SBYONG practice, kindness meditation. He lived 1101, 1175. There's a debate about whether he wrote the LO SBYONG DON DU MA.

He was the first one to write it down. It's believed to have originated with Lord Buddha, but it wasn't written down until 1100 in Tibet. Anyway, the presentation you're getting for these 12 years that we'll be studying this text is based on those three Lam Rims.

Why did we bring that up? GYOR CHOS LA YANG, SKYAB YUL TSOGS SHIN SOGS MIN DRA BA SO SOGS YOD PAS MA THUB PAR BYA DGOS Each of those three Lam Rims, which is the foundation of this Lam Rim, has their own way of visualizing the Lamas when you get to taking refuge. And when you get to the other practices of this section.

You're supposed to close your eyes at this point and visualize the Lamas of the lineage. And there will be three different ways to do it because there are three different root texts. And each of them has a different one.

That's all he's saying. SOGS MIN DRA BA SO SOGS YOD PAS MA THUB PAR BYA DGOS Don't mix them up. Keep them separate.

You can choose the one you like. In this case, in this training, which will take you another 10 years or 12 years, you choose one which calls to you and you use it. So you don't have to decide yet because you didn't hear what they are.

But eventually we will decide. I personally use the most simple one. But I'm not telling you, you have to.

THA THAG SOGS SU BYAG LEN LTAR GZO RGYUD KYI GYO CHUG GZUGS PA DE PHYIR DON PA YIN KYANG RGYUN GYI GZHAN DON NYUR LAM GYI GYOR CHUG BSTANGS NAS DZAD DGOS THA THAG SOGS SU In our current class, 1926 or 21, I don't remember, when he taught this the first time, when we, because it's easier, we've been reciting. They recited some texts before they had the class together in the temple. So we've been reciting what's called the GZO RGYUD, which means the preliminary practices of the GZO RGYUD.

Say GZO RGYUD. GZO RGYUD means Southern lineage. This is a lineage that developed in South Tibet.

GZUGS DE, it's easier. So we've been doing that. But GYANG RGYUN GYI GZHAN DON In general, I want you, my audience, to do it according to the system of quick path by the second Dalai Lama.

Quick path is almost a commentary on DE LAM, which is what? The path to bliss, which is the lamrim that was taught by the first Panchen Lama. And in the tantric training at Diamond Mountain, you are required to have a foundation in lamrim before you start the advanced teachings.

So we paused for a year there and you went through the DE LAM. You got the whole DE LAM, right? And then we did six more years of training, intense training, 20,000 pages of training from the scriptures.

And then people went into retreat. So they were trained for seven years. But they started with DE LAM.

They started with the foundation. So, LHO RGYUL GYI GYOR CHE GSUB DE PHYIR, SDUG PA YIN GYI GYANG RGYUN GYI GZHAN DON NYON NAM GYI GYOR CHE BSTENG PA'I TSE DGOS, KHYAM DOR BYA BA LA THOB MAR BSKYAB YOD SEL DEBS DGOS PAS When you take refuge, going into a meditation session, as a introduction to a meditation session, it's traditional to visualize something, the refuge. Where are you going for refuge?

So we taught in the prison. When was it? Sagan Dawa.

Two weeks ago? That's Monday, God. So they have many students in the prison in Southern Arizona.

And these are prisoners imported from other states, okay? There's like 5,000 from California, there's 5,000 from Hawaii, and there's, you know, out in the onion fields of Southern Arizona. There are these huge facilities, right?

So Nick and Jeff and Christine and Jigme, they're doing great work and they are teaching in the prison. So last time we went, some of the prisoners, one of the prisoners too, I don't remember. They wanted to take a refuge ceremony, okay?

It's traditional to stand up and explain it to them first, okay? And the vows, how many vows are there? 12 vows that they have to take, okay?

So we started, we got up to explain the idea of protection inside a jail. This is important. You see, inside a prison, there have been more deaths in Arizona, inside the prison, from fights and heroin than from execution every year.

I think it's 37 deaths last year in the prison, okay? So it's a violent place. It can be a violent place.

And, you know, the idea of protection is very important to them. So we talked about the idea of protection. And there's a story about it.

Lord Buddha, you know, he was supposedly a king. He was probably the headman of a small village or something. I don't know.

But he's a Shakyamuni, right? He was the head of the Shakya clan. And there's a story that after he became the Buddha, he was sitting in his hut in the village and the village was attacked by soldiers from another small village probably.

And people ran into his hut and they hid under his robes. One person hid under his sand, right? His shawl.

Buddha was wearing the shawl. The person ran in and clutched Lord Buddha's body and hid under his shawl. The soldiers came in and killed him, clutching Lord Buddha, okay?

Holding onto Lord Buddha's body. They just stabbed him and killed him. So then the question comes up in Buddhism, what can protect you?

If Lord Buddha standing next to you can't protect you, from your karma, who can, right? So it's very important. The idea of who can protect you in your life is important in Buddhism.

So we don't believe that a picture or a statue can protect you, okay? We don't think you should think that if you ask this piece of metal to help you with your cancer problem, anything's going to happen. It's not going to happen, okay?

You can pray to the piece of metal or you can pray to the piece of paper on which someone's picture is printed and it's not going to protect you, okay? If Lord Buddha standing next to you can't protect you, then obviously a photograph cannot and a piece of metal cannot help you, okay? So what does protection mean?

And the prisoners got it. They're in a situation, if something happens, do they tell the guards or not? If they tell the guards, they might get killed anyway.

If they don't tell the guards, they might get killed also. So their protection is important to them, the idea of protection. So who can protect you?

Your knowledge, your understanding is the only thing that can protect you. Nothing else can protect you. In this system, in this tradition, nothing can protect you except your understanding, okay?

How? We can give the classic example of the yelling boss, okay? The boss who yells at you.

So you're at work. This happened to me, what? Every 15 minutes for 15 years.

The boss calls you up on the phone and says, can you get this order out? And you're like, but you gave me another order half an hour ago and it's a three-hour order and I can't do it. And they're like, you just say, goddamn, make it work and hang up the phone.

And then you have to figure out how to make it work, right? So your boss is yelling at you and criticizing you, right? Somebody is criticizing you.

In the moment that they are criticizing you, in the week that someone's criticizing me, what do you do? Can I stop it? Do I have the power to stop it?

No, we say no. Present moment criticism cannot be stopped. It doesn't matter how much money you have or how bad you want it to stop.

It's not going to stop, okay? That karma has already ripened, right? And it's too late to change it.

So what are you supposed to do? It's human nature when your boss yells at you. What's human reaction?

What's the normal reaction? You yell back. You want revenge.

You are criticized and you want to criticize whoever criticized you. This is human nature. Everybody does that, okay?

So in this system, when the boss is yelling at you, what are you supposed to do? Should you yell or should you be quiet? Should you confront them with how stupid they are?

Or should you just roll over and be quiet in the hopes that the criticism will stop? Which one? And you're supposed to say, neither.

It's a bad, those are two bad choices. Criticize back or just be quiet and continue to be criticized. Both choices are bad because they don't work because they don't work all the time.

If an action doesn't give the desired result all the time, it doesn't work, okay? It's like an airplane that doesn't always work. Would you get on an airplane if you knew it might stop working halfway to the other city?

You'd be stupid, okay? Would you buy a car if the salesman told you it only works three days a week? I don't know, if it was cheap enough, maybe.

So it's foolish to take actions which don't work all the time because that means they don't work at all. We have to get used to that. To respond to criticism with criticism or to respond to criticism with bitterness, quiet bitterness, right?

They're both wrong because they don't work. You learned that, I grew up with four brothers. We were four, no girls, no father.

We, man, we knew how to fight. And so then the question became, if your big brother hits you, for a while you hit back, but he's bigger, which so it doesn't work very well. And then after a while you say, okay, I'll just let him hit me.

And then he hits you more. You see what I mean? And it's the same internationally.

Do you fight back when your country is threatened or do you try to negotiate? You see what I mean? Both are wrong because they don't work.

Fighting back doesn't work because sometimes you fight back and they crush you. Negotiating doesn't work because sometimes you negotiate and they crush you. That means negotiating doesn't work.

And that means fighting back doesn't work. So what should you do? You should look for the seed in your mind from which this criticism is coming.

Okay, the boss is telling you you're stupid. Who created that? You did.

How? You said the same thing to somebody else last week or last month. It was smaller but it was the same thing.

You criticized somebody a week ago and now people are criticizing you. If you don't like being criticized, what should you do? Stop criticizing people.

Will it stop the current criticism? No. Can you stop the current criticism?

It depends on the seeds and you don't know what your seeds are. So don't worry about it. Don't go crazy.

Don't go, wow, wow. Okay, I'm being criticized. Do your best.

Do what you think is right. But in the end, it will only be what seeds you have in your own mind. What's the stupidest thing to do if you're criticized?

It would be to criticize back because then you would plant new seeds and then next week you'd be criticized again. The stupidest thing you can do is the natural reaction. When we are criticized or hurt by somebody, we try to hurt them back or we try to criticize back.

In this system, that's the stupidest thing you can do. That that knowledge is protection. That knowledge is refuge.

Refuge is an important concept in Buddhism because according to Buddhism, that's what makes you a Buddhist. In Christianity, it's baptism. I don't know what it is in Judaism, bar mitzvah and bas mitzvah, I don't know.

Like you're really in the church then. You see what I mean? In Buddhism, it's refuge.

It's going for, taking shelter. Not in pictures and not in statues. Taking refuge in an idea or a concept.

If I respond to violence with violence, more violence will come. Okay, got it? That knowledge is protection.

So we finished this talk, I gave the same talk in the prison and it was really, really beautiful because they understood it. Should you go to a guard if someone threatens you? Hard to say.

I mean, sometimes they'll find out and they'll kill you. And sometimes you go to the guard and it works. Therefore, going to a guard doesn't work.

So if you're in a prison and you're being threatened by a gang, we teach in a prison where the inmates are mostly gang members who dropped out of gangs and they have to be isolated in a separate facility because they will be killed by the gangs. So we only, one of our main classes is for gang members who quit the gang. They were very interested in this idea.

They were like, wow, tell us more. If someone threatens you in the prison, what should you do? Try to protect another inmate.

Try to offer protection to another prisoner. See what I mean? That's refuge and that's protection.

Offer protection to another prisoner and you will be protected. Okay, got it? That's taking refuge.

You must take refuge before you meditate. That's part of your motivation. The whole few days now, we've been talking about the physical posture for meditation, which has how many parts?

I want to hear or. Seven or eight, okay? Okay, we did the physical posture.

Then we did the seat. The seat should be higher in the back, lower, et cetera. Now we're doing the mental preparation for a meditation.

And the first one is take refuge, okay? Take refuge. In what?

The idea of seeds in your mind. Take refuge in the idea of seeds in your mind. You want to have a good meditation?

Then plant the right seeds, okay? You want to have a good meditation? Then plant the right seeds, okay?

Whether there's traffic on the road tomorrow morning or not, it's coming from you, okay? If you have facilitated other people getting places, there won't be traffic. If you've blocked people from getting things they want, there will be traffic.

There'll probably be a car accident on the highway, okay? The same is true of the thoughts that come in your mind and whether the meditation is successful or not, whether you can concentrate or not, or whether you fall asleep in the meditation, or whether you can't stop thinking about breakfast, which are all three possibilities, right? That's coming from seeds in your mind.

So at the beginning of the meditation, take refuge in the idea or the concept that your life is coming from seeds in your mind and your mind is coming from seeds in your mind, okay? Whether or not you have a successful meditation depends on how much peace you have brought to others in the past, okay? If you have tried to bring peace to others, you will be able to meditate.

And if you have not, you will hear noise in your mind. Say, cha-cho. Cha-cho.

You got to smile with half your mouth, okay? Cha-cho. Like the Joker in Batman.

Cha-cho. Cha-cho means blah, blah in Tibetan, okay? If you haven't been kind to others, then you will hear cha-cho in your mind when you're trying to meditate, okay?

That's all. Meditation is coming from your seeds. Understand that and you have taken refuge.

And that makes you a Buddhist. We have this joke in DCI. 5,000 people came to the last DCI tour.

Three of the talks had more than 1,000 people. Guadalajara and Colombia, right? And we go to countries where it's illegal for me to wear my robes.

We give DCI tours in places where it's illegal for me to wear my robes, okay? And it's illegal for me to talk about Buddhists. So we talk about business or we talk about relationships.

And that's fine. Because if I give a talk about getting a boyfriend and if I suggest as a method what? Helping an elderly person who's lonely, right?

And if that person follows my suggestion, they are taking refuge and they are Buddhists, okay? And it doesn't matter what picture they have on their wall. I don't care.

It's totally irrelevant, you know? Put Mickey Mouse on the wall. I don't care.

It doesn't matter, okay? You lead your life by kindness to others and you're Buddhist. And I don't even care if you are.

It doesn't matter to me. Just be nice. Use seeds.

Then you have taken refuge, okay? If you have a rosary on your wrist all day and you have 24 photos of different kinds of 12-armed Buddhas in your house, and you can recite the whole Vajrayogini Sadhana from memory.

[Говорящий 2] (27:37 - 27:47)
SDUG GI SNOG DANG LAM MA BU ROL DOG PA YANG YOD NA ZAG PYI RGYUD LAM MA YOD NAM CHOG ZHUGS DGOS DU GSUM GYI RDZOGS KYI DBANG YOD DAG DANG NYON NAM GYI DAG DANG NYON GYIS But if you don't understand refuge, you're not a Buddhist.

[Говорящий 1] (27:48 - 40:54)
There's a joke in Tibet that the Abbot of Sera in Tibet got up on the throne and one of the monks said to the other monk, he's not a Buddhist. He could read his mind and he didn't understand what I just talked about. He yelled back at the boss.

That means he doesn't have refuge. That means he's not a Buddhist. He's the Abbot of Sera, 10,000 monks, and he's not a Buddhist.

He's sitting up on the throne and he's not a Buddhist. Okay, it's a joke in Tibet. But I guess it was true.

I don't know. Okay, we have about 10 more minutes. SBYOR BA CHOS BSTAN GNAD ZHIG RGYUR KHYAM GROL BYA BA LA THOG MAR BSKYAB YOD SEMS DEBS DGOS PAS NYUR LA'AM LUG GI BSKYAB YOD NI Now he's going to explain a visualization which you can use when you take refuge.

Is it refuge? No, it's just pictures. It's just pictures in your mind.

It's not refuge. Refuge is not to yell back at the boss. Got it?

Because you hate him and you don't want to see him next week. Got it? It's an intelligent, what do they call it?

Dalai Lama calls it intelligent self-interest. Enlightened self-interest. Okay, anyway.

SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR HA CANG THO NA DGOS PA LTANG HA CANG MA NA CING BA RGYAS So say SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR. SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR Many, many Buddhist visualizations begin with SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR. SDUG GIS RNAMS SKAR means in mid-air, in front of me.

So it's traditional to visualize things here. Like someone sitting here, right in front of this chakra. It's traditional to picture that.

You know there are three kinds of meditation, right? Say DZOG DZONG, DZOG DZONG, CES DZONG, CES DZONG, SAR DZONG, SAR DZONG, DZOG DZONG, DZOG DZONG, CES DZONG, CES DZONG, SAR DZONG, There are three classical genres of meditation. First one, DZOG DZONG.

DZOG DZONG means fix your mind on a picture of Lord Buddha. Or fix your mind on your teacher. Single pointedly, DZOG DZONG.

CES DZONG means I have a problem. What? My bank account is rather low.

She's actually the kid. Then I would like to fix that in a kind way, in a good way. Then how should I do that?

Let me think of how I can help someone else to make some money. Let me think about who I might give a gift of money. Like that, okay?

CES DZONG means problem solving meditation. So the first kind of meditation is single pointed. The second kind of meditation is when you're trying to solve a problem.

In SAR DZONG, SAR DZONG means Geshe Michael taught us seven or eight components of a proper meditation posture. What were they? GANG PA, LHAG PA, KHYAD PA, SO CHU CHE.

I forgot. MIG. What's before shoulders?

Oh, MIG, sorry. Yeah, what's before eyes? Oh yeah, head, eyes, shoulder, and breath.

Eight. To go through that list is called SAR GO. SAR GO means you review a series of ideas or a certain logic or a list of meditation postures or something like that.

Those are three kinds of meditation. Before you start any meditation, you have to do a DZOG DZOG about what? Visualize your teacher, okay?

Ask them for help. That's a tradition. Your own personal teacher, whoever it is, okay?

The idea that 100 people could have the same personal teacher is probably incorrect, right? We're all different. Everybody needs a different kind of teacher.

You might need one who's more serious. You might need one who's more goofy. You might need one who's more scriptural.

You might need one who's more experiential. You might need one who forces you to cook for eight years before they teach you. You see what I mean?

Everybody needs a different... They say in Tibet, every hand needs a different glove. But in this tradition, before you start a meditation, you should picture your own personal teacher.

If you don't have one yet, make one up. They could look like some Jedi knight or something. You decide what you like.

Here we go, few more minutes. So, SDUG GI NAM GYI HA CANG THO NA Don't make them too high because you will get Gupa and don't make them too low or you will get ching wa. What's that mean?

Gupa means? Gupa means, yeah, thinking about something else, okay? Like breakfast, okay?

So if your head is cocked back too far when you meditate Or even if the visualization is set too high, you will get distracted. You will start thinking about something else. Physically, if your body is too like this, you will start to think about something else.

Or even with your eyes closed, if the object of visualization is too high, it will tend to make you think of other things and you'll get distracted. What's ching wa? Ching wa.

That's dullness. If you hold your head too low, like this, you will tend to fall asleep or you will tend to get tired. If the visualization is too low, you will also get tired.

So keep it at the right level. When you picture your Lama classically, it should be at this level. How do we do it in the Golden Room Meditation?

They're just in front of you. They're just sitting in front of you, but eye to eye. You see, it's straight.

They are looking at you with love and you are looking at them with gratitude. And you're just looking eye to eye. So that's the same thing.

It's not too high and not too low. If they're shorter than you, they should have a big cushion. If they're taller than you, you should have a big cushion.

But they should be level. That's a tradition. MA NA, RENG PA'I TZAM MIN TZAM GYI THEG TU This is called MIN TZAM.

This place in the body has a separate name in Tibetan. It's called MIN TZAM. In Sanskrit, in the yoga tradition, it's called BRUBOR MA RGYAS.

Say BRUBOR. MA RGYAS BRUBOR is the ancient word for your eyebrow. BRUBOR is the dual case, which is only in Sanskrit.

Separate spellings for everything that's two, which is a hassle. BRUBOR is the genitive of the dual, between the two, in the middle of the two. MA RGYAS means in the middle.

So in Sanskrit, it's called BRUBOR MA RGYAS here. In Tibetan, it's called MIN TZAM. There's an important chakra here named AJNA.

So when you visualize your Lama, they should be on the level of the AJNA chakra. It's tradition. Or eye to eye, see what I mean?

Their BRUBOR MA RGYAS should be the same level as your BRUBOR MA RGYAS. MIN TZAM to MIN TZAM. What do you call this in English?

I don't know. Third eye is pretty good. I mean, I hate the word, but it's descriptive.

It means this place in your body, here. All right. So it's not really between your eyebrows, it's a little higher.

And if you want to get technical, it's inside, about half an inch. But we're not going to get technical. SRENG NYID CHEN PO RGYAS KYI DE PAS RIM PO CHE PHYIS BZHIN DU CHE BA ZHIG SEMS BDAB So it has become a tradition to...

This thing I'm sitting on, this platform thing, it's not a chair exactly, right? And they call it a throne, but it's not a throne either. I mean, a throne should have arms and gold, jewels.

And this platform, teaching platform in Tibet is called a tea, say tea. So this kind of platform that a teacher sits on is called a tea. When you visualize your teacher in this tradition, the tea is a piece of wood like teak or mahogany or something, supported by eight lions.

Eight lions are holding it up. Then there's all this big debate. I mean, I studied it one time.

I spent quite a time studying it. They are supporting it on their back and they are facing out. So there'd be one on each corner and one in the...

There'd be eight of them. They are supporting the... There's a tradition that they are supporting this throne on the backs of the lions.

You can see those lions in China a lot, in Hong Kong. Shanghai. There are always two snow lions in front of...

What do you call it? Mong Hong. How do you say bank?

Ying Hong. In front of all the Ying Hong, there's often two snow lions. And traditionally there were eight and they're holding up the throne.

I think it's kind of cool. All right, living lions. RIN PO CHE PHYI BZHIN DU CHO BA ZHIG SEMS DANG This throne in this visualization should be as big as this room.

Okay? All right? That's tradition.

So the Lama is sitting on that throne, that platform. We'll finish in a few minutes. We'll do just a little bit more.

DE'I RTEN GDU'U DANG CHOG SHER CI CHUNG NA YOD PAS In the middle and on the four directions, the four cardinal directions, there are five lesser platforms resting on this platform. So in the middle there's one and then in the four directions there are four more. YOD PA'I YOD MA CHUNG ZAD TO BA'I KHAR NGO BO RANG GI RANG NA CHUD DONG PA'I RGYUN CHEN TSA BA'I LAMA YOD PA LA RNAM PAR BSTOD PA'I DBANG PO DON CHA LTAR BSKYED On the platform in the middle is sitting a Buddha, classical Buddha.

We call a Coke classic Buddha. There's a word in Tibetan, I forget. CHOG KYI THUG BU Like declassical.

This is classical. The small Buddha image here is classical. By the way, it's illegal to point at an image.

This is considered bad karma. You got to go like that. All right?

So, TSA BA'I LAMA LA RNAM PAR BSTOD PA'I DBANG PO DON CHA LTAR BSKYED Outward appearance is the Buddha. Inward essence is your own heart teacher, okay? Even if it's like your aunt or your child, on the outside they should look like a Buddha when you do this visualization, like a classical Buddha.

RGYUD ZHIG RTZA BA'I LAM YIN PO LA RNAM PAR BSTOD PA'I DBANG PO We're almost done, okay? Hang in there. There's a good place to stop, but we're not there yet.

DE YANG LAM DE GYI RTOG PA THAMS CAD LAM MA LA BRTEN NAS SKYE DGOS PA'I SNGO LAM PAR BYA DGOS Any spiritual progress you can make in this life is only due to your own personal teacher, okay? All spiritual progress that you can make is due to your own spiritual teacher. Therefore, the most important thing you have to do, which will come later, is find them, create them, okay?

How do you create a teacher? What's the karmic seed for a teacher? Share what you know.

Share what you've learned with others, okay? Do your homeworks. Do your quizzes.

[Говорящий 2] (40:54 - 40:56)
Do your final exams.

[Говорящий 1] (40:57 - 55:30)
Learn the subject well, then teach it to other people. That karma creates a teacher. You don't have to go to India.

You bring them to you. It's cool, okay? I want a personal teacher.

Bring them to you, okay? How? Share what you know.

Teach ACI 5 in Guadalajara. Oh, you did that already. Okay, maybe that's why you're here.

Okay, NAM PAR THUB BU'ANG DU BYAS PA NI BSTAN PA'I BDAG PO YIN PAS CHOS KYI GUNG STON PA'I BYAS DU YIN So why picture them as the Buddha? Why go through that exercise? It's to remember where the tradition started in this planet.

It started with this historical Buddha. It's to remember the historical Buddha, okay? We're almost done.

I wanted to get to this particular part. What's the right hand of the little Buddha over here doing? Yeah, it's touching the ground.

Can you see it? Can everybody see it? You want to hold it up, Brooks?

This is classical Buddha mudra, classical hand position. The right hand is touching the ground and the left hand is in this position, okay? This is the classical position of the Buddha's hands.

He's going to explain why. Right now he's going to explain why. You ready?

Hang in there. Four more sentences. Okay, here we go.

I know it's late. I know you had a long week. So did I.

CAK GYI SEMS RIN GYI LHA'I BU'I LTOS BYAMS PA There are four demons in the world, okay? The Christian tradition has one. I mean, mostly it's the devil, right?

In the Buddhist tradition, there are four devils, okay? Big devils. There are four evil forces in the world and negative forces in the world.

Here they are. The first one is called LHA'I BU. Say LHA'I BU.

LHA'I BU I grew up in a very Christian tradition and I still love Christianity. I love it very much. And my church is nearby here where I grew up and I love to go there.

So this freaked me out when I learned this one. The first demon in Tibet is called the son of God, okay? And don't get superstitious about it and don't think it's bad luck.

It has nothing to do with Christianity, okay? But I was all freaked out when I first saw it. So don't think, it means the son of a powerful worldly being who's a bad guy, okay?

That's all it means. It doesn't mean what it means in Christianity. So don't freak out on me, okay?

Don't, yeah, anyway. LHA'I BU DGOS BYAMS PA His hand touching the ground means he has defeated the first of the four devils, which is called the son of the, or the child of the powerful God or something like that. So it's rare to find a good explanation of what this being is, okay?

What kind of demon is that? What do they do? Because he's not going to tell you here.

So I went into the database, 25 years of typing there by hundreds of Tibetan refugees. I think it's the greatest income of Tibetan refugees is our project, which is where every penny of my money went to, okay? Which is why I don't, anyway.

Which is why they're passing around a bag. LHA'I BU DGOS BYAMS PA Here's a description of what that devil does. There's two descriptions, okay?

These are hard to find. They're not very common. NAM YANG PHYA'I BU'I GCOD KYI MI THUN PA'I PHYOG One describes this demon as being the demon who distracts you from meditation, okay?

When you get distracted in a meditation, they're pulling you away, okay? They're sidetracking you, okay? The other function of this demon is to support jealousy, the emotion of envy or the emotion of jealousy, okay?

So you can think of that, either one, okay? So when you're going to picture your teacher, if you use this particular tradition, there's going to be three you can use. I like the last one, it's easier.

But if you choose to do this one, your teacher's going to have their right hand on the ground. And that means they have overcome distraction and jealousy. Okay, like that.

SRUNG ZAD NANG GI DUS KYI DE YANG SNGA BA MED PA MEN GYI DUS KYI And they are holding, traditionally in the left hand, the left hand is traditionally like this, okay? And traditionally there's a bowl in the left hand. And inside that bowl is a myrta, a myrta.

What's a myrta? The nectar of deathlessness. Am means not, like apathetic means not enthusiastic, right?

Atheist means doesn't believe in deus, the god. Am myrta means cannot die. Myrta means mortuary, means death, okay?

So in his left hand, there's a cupped hand because there will be a bowl filled with nectar, deathless nectar, okay? I like the Greek word nectar. Nectar, nec means what?

Necrophilia means what? To have an obsession with death, right? Tar means to cross over.

It's the root of the word Tara, the goddess Tara. She brings you across the ocean of samsara. So nectar means to go beyond death.

The word nectar means a myrta, okay? It's nice. Anyway, THEG CHEN NANG DU TSIS YANG NA'ANG MED PA'I MED KYI DU TSIS And with that nectar, he destroys the second devil of Buddhism.

The second devil is your body because it's going to kill you, okay? The second devil is your own body because it's going to kill you, okay? In its current condition, it will kill you.

With higher practices, you can change that. But right now, left by itself, this body will kill you. You can lock it.

I always imagine there's a safe. Maybe you know that safe. It's on Fifth Avenue and 43rd Street on the northwest corner.

There's a huge window and some bank has their vault all lit up. Maybe it attracts more deposits. I don't know.

It's this huge vault with a big round door and all these bolts coming out, you know? And you could easily fit an elephant in there. And you could put yourself in there and lock it.

And you could pump pure oxygen into there. And you could only eat healthy food. What do you call it?

Vegan food, right? And your body would still kill you, okay? You see what I mean?

Buddhism says you don't have to meet up with a car accident to die. Just stay alive long enough. And your body will kill you, okay?

So the fact that Lord Buddha has his hand like this, this means I'm committed to the spiritual path. I'm not distracted. This one means I'm not going to die.

I'm going to defeat the devil of death. How you do that, we can talk about it, okay? We can talk more about that, okay?

Number three, Chidaki. I'm sorry, scratch that. I made a boo-boo, okay?

It's like in the newspaper, they say we made a boo-boo yesterday. So I made a boo-boo, sorry. The second devil is your body, but it means a body which can get sick, not die, okay?

That comes later. The second devil is your body, but it means the fact that your body can get sick, okay? And in that case, the liquid in his bowl, in his hand, represents freedom from illness, okay?

So number two is just getting sick. Number three is death, all right? The third demon is death.

The third devil is death. And in that case, you can think that the same bowl has another liquid in it called a mirtha, okay? So the third devil is death, and there's a mirtha in the bowl.

We're almost done, one more sentence. Then he also has a sakpa meype yeshe kyi du tsi. He also has infinitely pure nectar of wisdom, with which he will defeat devil number four, which is your own negative thoughts.

Your own negative thoughts. So if you're in the debate ground and somebody says, who are the four demons? Who are the four devils?

You're going to say distraction from the path. You're going to say illness. You're going to say death and negative emotions, which is what creates the first three.

Got it? Good? If you nod, you can go home.

Cherie's going like that. What are you, troublemaker? Okay.

Okay, so anyway, one more sentence, I'm sorry. DE YANG LTON PA RANG GI SNGO BSKYAL GYI DU BZHI SNGO BSKYAL, the word SNGO BSKYAL is extremely important. For those of you who want to learn Tibetan, SNGO BSKYAL means the corresponding antidote or the corresponding problem.

That's a tough idea that we have to study someday. But anyway, LTON PA, the Teacher, capital T, Lord Buddha, has overcome, already he has defeated his own four demons. What's he going to say next?

Tell me and you can go home. He. He has overcome his own four demons.

Yeah, but he's also working to help you overcome yours. RANG BCAGS KYI DU BZHI GNYUR DU SBYONG BAR GYUR BA'I BDUN DU BSAM DGOS When you picture the hand of the Buddha, when you see the bowl with three nectars in it, you should think they represent how the Buddha defeated his own four demons and how, due to his guidance, we will quickly defeat our own. He says quickly, which is knife.

We will quickly defeat our own. A lot of people present Buddhism as some way to cope with your problems or something like that. There's all these self-help books by Buddhist people.

If you're having trouble with, I don't know, self-esteem, then read this book and you'll feel better. But the real goals of Buddhism are much higher. Death itself, right?

The suffering of the entire planet. The goals of Buddhist practice are much higher than that. I think it's important to talk about it.

My job, if I'm teaching you this course, 10-year course, my job is to give you a viable means of stopping death itself. He said, I'm not trying to make you feel better about your problems or something like that. Okay?

Because death makes it all meaningless, right? You can teach someone how to get a family and have a house and be happy with their uncle, but if everyone's going to die, what's it matter? You see what I mean?

In the end, we got to talk about the big problems. And then we solve the small ones, by the way, okay? So, when you picture your Lama, picture someone who has defeated death, okay?

And can help you defeat death. This is the reason to study these things, okay? All right?

That has a long day. Okay. Ula, are you ready?

Yes. GUR DI BYOG SHING LEN DONG DANG RIG RA MI ZHIG DIN PAS KYIN PA NI SANG NYE SHING DU MI THE NGON NGON DU RUK KUN NAM DRA SHING LA CHE PA SHING KI DANG BUN NU AN NA MAN NA KUN MI RAT TA YANG RIG RA MI ZHIG DIN PAS KYIN PA NI GYE ROL KUN SU NAM NI SHING SONG SOG SHING OK. Thanks.

See you tomorrow.