«Дар освобождения», курс 22 «Ретрит безграничной удачи», занятие 5

[Speaker 1]
Any questions about meditation? Okay. Microphone.

Microphone. Good morning. Would you specify the technique for concentration please?

Okay. When you teach this subject that we are learning now, Lam Rim, it's a step-by-step to Buddhahood. There's about thirty subjects.

So, for example, we just finished the death subject, and we're starting the subject of, where will I go after head night? And at the end of the Lam Rim, they talk about how to see emptiness. And just before that, they talk about how to concentrate, and how to meditate.

So, when we started this course, about five or six years ago, we decided to go to the end. So, we learned how to meditate first. Then we did emptiness.

Because I thought we're going to use it for each subject, so we should have the tool to meditate on each subject. And that took about a year and a half. And then I have a plan.

At the end of this Lam Rim, which should be, I don't know, about, if we live that long, 2025 I think it is, we will do it again, the meditation part and the emptiness part. From another book, which is Tsongkapa's Lam Rim. And his treatment of meditation and emptiness is 500 pages.

So, his Lam Rim is a little bit unbalanced. The last two subjects are half the book. But briefly, for concentrating, in Tibetan and in Sanskrit, it's called sama pati, sama pati.

Sama means balanced, and pati means to fall, like Patanjali, fell into the water, right? So, sama pati, or in Tibetan, what's the Tibetan? nyom juk, nyom pa jukpa It means, concentration means to balance.

Like riding a bicycle. Then, on one side, and a good meditator, is like a person driving a car, and if you watch their hands, they're constantly moving like that. So, a good driver is sama pati.

They are balancing all the time. So, for concentration, there's two things you have to avoid. One on the left side, one on the right side.

What are they? Worst word? Oh, yeah, yeah, you can call it distraction and sleepiness.

Okay. So, on this side, is distraction. Thinking about what's for lunch, or something.

And on this side is, you got a little bit sleepy. And the image in the meditation, when you're sleepy, it gets a little bit gray. It means the mind, it feels like you're in a room and there's not much light.

And maybe you don't fall asleep, but you're not bright. So, bright means, like if you go to a good movie, like in the best part of the movie, you're like this, you know. The guy's almost ready to kiss the girl for the first time.

Already two times they went like this, and then somebody interrupted them. Third time they're going like this. Everybody's popcorn stops.

This is bright. We call it bright. So, it doesn't mean light in the mind, it means good attention.

So, and then if there's a boring part in the movie, everybody's like this. The lady's crying for the sixth time, and everything gets a little bit dark. So, that's one extreme.

You can think of a road with two ditches on either side. If you come close to a sleepy mind, then you bring it back. And the way to bring it back is to think of something which inspires you, or something you enjoy.

You can bring Anton's face to your mind, and then you wake up. Then, naturally, that takes you too far, and you start thinking about the next vacation you guys are going to have. The correction for sleepiness becomes the problem of agitation or distraction.

So, now the car's going to the right, and you have to bring it back again. So, you're supposed to calm your mind down. The classic way in meditation is to think about death.

So, if the mind went to Anton and me going to our next vacation, think of someone you know who died, who you love. And automatically the distraction will go away. But then again it will get too low.

You'll get sad, and the mind will be gray again. So, a good meditator is samapati. It's like they're correcting, correcting, correcting.

So, that's a brief description of those 500 pages. And that's the essence. And it's just a tool.

It's not a goal. A sharp mind is like a microscope or something. Baseball players have, soccer players have sharp minds.

That French guy who made two goals against Germany, I'm sorry. He has a focus. He has a microscope.

But what he put under the microscope is not very important. Plastic ball with some air. It's not going to help him when he dies.

So, it's just a tool. What you put under it is football or death meditation or emptiness. By the way, that doesn't mean that a good Buddhist can't watch a soccer game.

When I went to see the new baby, Nicolas, it was in the middle of the French and German game. Me and Alex were watching in the hospital room the soccer game here, and the mom is here. And we're like, nice baby!

Oh, he made a goal! So, that's okay. You can enjoy your life.

But, you know, have both. Have a fun life, and do your death meditation. Then you can enjoy the game more.

So, it doesn't mean a Buddhist person should be very boring. They should never have fun. A person who does a lot of death meditation has more fun than other people.

Because the suitcase is ready. And they're happy. They're ready.

Okay, we're going to start the text. If we have more meditation questions, I'll do tomorrow. Or this afternoon.

Adam-la, are you ready? Kame Domba?

[Speaker 2]
Right? Am I right?

[Speaker 1]
Okay, we just finished talking about the bad deeds you do. You do four steps very well. And the good deeds you do, you don't do very well.

GANG NAS DON PA ZHIG BSTUN KYANG SEMS CAN GZHIG RTEN GYI CHOG LA YIN Even when you are doing prayers, or you're in a class, a Buddhist class, a lot of the time your mind is thinking about, what are you going to do next week? Like even in this class. I don't know, if I sit in a class like this, if I'm the student, I think about 30 or 40% of the time I'm thinking about my other plans.

DGE BA CHEN PO'I YOD PA YANG KHONG PHRO DANG BLOG TE BYAMS And even if we do some pure good karma, after that we get upset at somebody, and it destroys the karma. Like five minutes of good anger can destroy one week of Lam Rim class. And he gives another example of destroyer.

BLOG TA, which means don't understand the pen. Think things are coming this way. So that also damages the good seeds we have.

BLOG TE BYAMS NI DGE BA CHUNG BA YIN RE ZHAG RER BDAG GYUR So, when we teach DCI, we talk a lot about karma doubles every day. The power of the seed doubles every day. Then if somebody says, why you say that?

You can say page, you can give this page. 186, front side, Tibetan page. Every karma you do doubles every 24 hours.

This is the sentence. And it's repeated in many other places. But if somebody asks you in a DCI program to prove it, it's folio or 186, front side.

So, even if you do a small bad seed, YIN RE ZHAG RER YIN means every day, but then he corrected himself. He made it more clear. He said ZHAG.

So, Adam, let's do a dictionary entry. What's the difference between NIN and ZHAG, or NIMA and ZHAG? Do you know, Mr. Synapse?

NIN means a day, and it comes from NIMA, which means sun. NIMA means sun. So, sometimes you can say, I'll meet you in three suns.

It means, I'll meet you in three days. You can say NIMA SU means in three days I'll meet you. But when you want to specify 24 hours, like a full day and a full night, you can say ZHAG.

Low tone ZHAG. What's high tone ZHAG? ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG PA ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG PA Yes.

Yeah, good. Monks, ZHAG. Yeah, his room, cell.

So, you have to be careful how you pronounce it. ZHAG Monk's room. ZHAG I'll see you in 24 hours.

ZHAG. Say ZHAG. ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG Okay, they're different words.

Like Germans have trouble with cheap and jeep. You know, if you ask a German, you want to buy a cheap jeep, they're like, what? Thai people have trouble with R and L.

Real...anyway. Chinese people. Anyway. ZHAG and ZHAG ZHAG and ZHAG ZHAG ZHAG What do you call?

What you use a C and what you use a CH. These are different, right? ZHAG and ZHAG.

Yeah. Anyway. So, anyway, every ZHAG, every 24 hours, he's clarified himself.

ZHAG means 100%. BDAB GCIG means, give me another quantity of the same thing. Like, if you have one kilo of churro, and you say BDAB GCIG, BDAB GCIG, then they'll give you two kilos.

PHAL means the karma increases. Every 100%. Every ZHAG.

Every 24 hours. DE TZAM MA ZAD Not only that, in your past life, LUN, you were simbol. Symbol means like some kind of you can stay like a...

It means like a monster or something. Like a, I don't know, crazy bull. MI MA YIN means spirit being, harmful spirit being.

They're called inhuman. MI MA YIN Or CHU ZIN means shark. Some bad fish, very cruel fish.

CHEN ZAN GDUG PA CHEN means powerful wild animal, like a tiger. I went to China, my friend has a tiger. A real tiger.

They're frightening, very frightening. Very, very powerful. He saved him from an animal dealer.

They were going to kill him for his skin. So he bought the tiger and he keeps it in a huge cage, like as big as this room. Don't put your hand in it.

And he comes up like and he's like and the steel goes like this. So, in your past life you were a shark. You were a tiger.

You've been a spirit who hurt many people. ZANG PO CHE You did very cruel things and violent things. You've been a soldier many times.

So you still have those karmas. You've killed children in their mother's arms many times. YOD PA'I KHAR means you still have that bank account.

It's not finished. And then on top of that you're putting icing on the cake. You are being jealous of the other students.

You're angry. You don't like Anatole's yoga, stuff like that. So you have a big bank account from your past life and you are adding more sweet things on top.

KHAR MTSAN DU'I YANG GONG DU MOD PA LTAR SDIG PA STOB CHEN DRANG MANG ZHIG ZAG YOD So, we're not just talking about bad seeds you have from this life. You have a huge bank account from the past. You've also done many beautiful things in the past.

You have saved many people's lives in the past. You have been a leader of country. You have built many temples and churches.

But you have all those seeds. ZAG YOD DE DAG LA MA ZHIG TSUN CHAD ZHAG DAM GYI TZAM ZING NAS ZHANG ZING BA SOGS MI NUS PA NI So, in this life we should pay attention to that old bank account and the new deposits we've made. And try to ...

GSUNGS BSNGAL BA means clean them ... how do you call them? Super clean?

What's that guy, Mr. Clean? You should make everything super clean. Mr. Clean. When they advertise new dish washing soap, and the lady comes in, of course the husband is washing the dishes in this system, and the lady's like, ooh, it's so clean! Thank you, honey. It's all sparkling clean.

So, ZING NAS BA here. It means ... it doesn't mean just clean them, it means you're inside, you're sparkling clean.

Because you did ZHAG STONG. We talked about it. What's ZHAG?

ZHAG is open your heart. Tell somebody what you did. And STONG?

ZHAG comes from an older word which means to restrain yourself. This ... this STONG means restrain yourself.

So, I did something wrong, and I will try not to do it for three days or something. If you do a good ZHAG STONG, inside your ... you're so clean, sparkling clean.

SO MI NUS PA But if you can't do that, if you don't make your old bank account empty it out and make you sparkling clean on the inside, THA STE KHAR THAB DI ZHES you can guess what's going to happen to you if you look at how your life is right now. If you had done the sparkly clean thing last month, everything in your life would be beautiful. So, if you're not able to clean up this month, next month, you can guess what's going to happen next month from what's happening this month.

If you had done the cleaning last month, your life wouldn't be so mixed up right now. Good things and bad things all mixed up. So, we are having an unbelievable class, and then they just killed five more guys in Dallas or something.

Some guy just got up on a building and shot five policemen. Killed them. Then the police announced they have a new method.

They have a little ... You know those kids have those little cars they use with the remote control car? So, the police were very happy because they figured out how to put a bomb on the car and send it to the guy.

And they just blew him up. And they're so happy. So, our life is mixed up.

We have beautiful, peaceful class in Chapala. And then still those other things are going on every day. People are killing each other happy.

Oh look, we have a new way to kill somebody. If we had ... Or your shoes are filling up with water.

So, if we had done that cleaning last month, we wouldn't have this mixed up karma. Okay? Alright.

Like water in your shoes? Yeah. Nobody understands the lake comes from rain.

Okay. That's why I live in Arizona. Okay, let's go one more sentence.

We don't have legs. DE NA RGYAS MI RGYAS NYID NAS MI RGYAL BA RANG GOM RTOGS CHE BA DGOS MTSAMS SRED RUG PA YIN PAS So, if you check honestly your life, the small negative deeds are much more frequent than the good deeds. Nobody in this room is going to kill anybody or steal someone's laptop this afternoon.

But we do small things. Like, you know, I don't like what this person's wearing. This person obviously never discovered toothpaste.

And all day long, small worms. You know, we do small bad things all day long. And then they double every day.

So in a month it's the same as killing that person. Okay, so it's just bad mathematics. We have to deal with bad mathematics.

MTSAMS SRED RUG MTSAMS SRED RUG is an abbreviation for MTSAMS SRED RUG What's that? MTSAMS SRED RUG Yeah, you can confirm this with your own eyes. You don't need Buddhist philosophy.

There's a very common thing in meditation training. After people learn to meditate, the first few weeks are very exciting. Oh, I'm really having some great things are happening to me.

And then they always come to the Lama and they say, something's happening. What? My mind is getting worse because of the meditation.

You know, the first six weeks it was great. My mind got more and more quiet. But now I can see my mind is always thinking jealousy, anger, desire.

My mind is so dirty. You ruined my mind. Then the Lama says, no, no, you are just hearing what was there all the time.

For the first time you are really listening to your mind. So, if you learn to listen to your mind. Okay, there's two ways to listen to your mind.

We're going to talk about it this afternoon. One is, you're having jealous thoughts but you are inside them. So, you're just jealous.

Like, I don't like Vivian is getting so good at yoga. I don't like it. Okay, that's, you're inside the jealousy.

When you learn to meditate, you learn to step back and watch your thoughts. Then, instead of being inside the jealous thought, you are outside the jealous thought and you are watching your jealous thought. Then you tell the Lama, I'm getting worse.

This meditation is making me worse. But actually, you're just starting to succeed in your meditation. And for the first time you are seeing what your mind is really doing.

And if we continue like that, PHYI MAR MYAN GSUM TU GRO BA LAS DGOS MED Then PHYI MA here means in your next life, MYAN GSUM TU GRO BA means to go to one of those three lower births. What's OPA? OPA.

Apostrophe O-S A-NAR O-SA O-PA This is a little bit unusual word. I'll give you a clue. I like words, okay, I'm sorry.

The Sanskrit is ARH ARH A-R-H ARH The translation for this word is ARH. Yes, like Arhat. Arhat means somebody who reached Nirvana.

Yeah. It means to be worthy of. Okay.

So, that's a long story. I'll tell you anyway. Arhat is explained two different ways.

Arhat means someone who reached Nirvana. Is it the same as Arya? What's Arya?

Someone who saw emptiness directly. Then, because they saw emptiness directly, later they can become Arhat. And stop all their negative emotions.

So, that word Arhat has two explanations. You can divide AR HAT AR means enemy. ARI means enemy in Sanskrit.

Okay, then HAT. So, I have an Israeli friend named Ari and I'm always like, it's okay, it's okay. So, Ari, HAT means to kill the enemy.

The root is HAN H-A-N When that root comes into English, the H changes to G and the A changes to U. GUN Okay. H becomes G, GUN and the A becomes U.

GUN Okay, GUN comes from HAN. And Ahinsa comes from the same root. A means no.

And Hinsa means violence. So, anyway, you can split it. AR HAT Or you can split it AR AR HAN AR HAN And AR means worthy.

Of prostration. So, if you destroyed your anger, then all of us should, if Kandy destroys her anger this afternoon, then it's worthy we should all bow to her. So, AR HAT can mean worthy of being bowed to.

Okay, so here UPA. Here it says the only UPA thing would be for you to go to the NGEN DRO. Here what they are telling us is the only worthy thing of prostration would be for you to go to the three lower realms.

It's appropriate. It means appropriate. It's correct.

Once you really know how dirty your mind is all the time, well, then it's worthy or correct you should go to the lower realms. Okay. But he did a MA YIN GAG for those of you who care.

it wouldn't be anything other than worthy if you went to the lower realms. Double negative. Double negative.

Now here comes a cool sentence. You ready? Then we'll take a break.

That's why this sentence is cool. NGEN SONG DU NGEN DRO BA LU DANG DANG Guarantee. Yeah.

Guarantee that you will not go to lower birth. Given the state of your mind, it's very appropriate that you should go to a lower birth. But NGEN SONG DU MI BRAL BA'I DANG but you can get a guarantee not to go to the lower birth.

You can damage those seeds. Then you can be angry all day and you can just damage the seeds. How?

SBYOR LAM GSOS PA The third step within the path of preparation. So there are five paths. They are hidden somewhere in a famous book.

Heart Sutra. There's a mantra. YED DI YED DI BO LO YED DI BO LO SANGS RGYAS NI Okay?

GATE GATE PARA GATE PARA SANGS GATE Okay? SO HA Okay? GATE GATE GATE PARA GATE PARA SANGS GATE PARA SANGS GATE BO DI SO HA BO DI SO HA This is the mantra from the Heart Sutra.

First GATE is first path. Second GATE is the second path. PARA GATE is the third path.

PARA SANGS GATE is the fourth path. BO DI SO HA is the fifth path. What does it mean five paths?

We talked about it last... My lama talked like that. He got a car accident.

He talks like Star Wars. I got a picture of him. You got that picture?

Someone gave me a picture this morning. I haven't seen that picture for 40 years or something.

[Speaker 2]
It's a picture of mine.

[Speaker 1]
This is the first retreat by by Ken Rinpoche in America. I think we had 15 people there. You know, 1970s hippies.

You guys see Chunila? Yeah, she's next to Ken Rinpoche. She's a nun now.

She's a good translator. My enemy is on the other side of Ken Rinpoche. He gets to sit close to Ken Rinpoche.

Okay. Okay. Anyway, GATE GATE Then my lama will say, I told you about the five paths last Thursday.

What happened last Thursday? When the hail fell down. Yeah, we studied Kamalashila.

What was the first thing we studied? The Vajra, right? Which contains the five paths.

And we went over the five paths. So, I'm not going to do it again, but I'll do it again. First path.

Path of accumulation. What happens during that path? You have a good tragedy in your life.

Your husband runs away from you. You lose a child. Something terrible happens.

I lost half my family in one year. So, we are six people. Father, mother, brother die in one year.

And I cut my hair and go to the lama. You know, I'm like, oh! So, that's called first path.

Path of accumulation. Second path, you start, by the way, well, we'll talk about it. Second path, you start to understand the pen.

Somebody explains the pen to you. That's called path of preparation. Path of preparation.

Then the third path, you see emptiness directly. It's called path of seeing. Fourth path, yeah, you can say habituation or getting used to what you saw.

When you understand there's two husbands in the kitchen when you come home and he calls you stupid, you are using your understanding of emptiness to stop your anger. And that's typical fourth path activity. Fifth path, yeah, you reach nirvana.

Now, in the second path, there's four parts. There are four periods in the second path. I'll tell you something cool.

If you reach the third one, which is during the explanation of the pen, if you reach the third part of that, you cannot go to a lower rebirth. It's not possible. Nick, you get a deng.

Okay, you get a deng. You get a guarantee. I'm not going to let Mr. Synapse answer all the questions. You get a deng. I always think of that song, deng me, deng me. It ought to take a little bit.

I'm singing a song. He understands. So, guess what, it's three majors.

Okay, so deng means guarantee. Okay, if you can reach the third one. Then, because of that sentence in this book, I would like to teach you two special classes about this third one.

First one will be this afternoon. Because they always say, everybody says, if you reach this, you don't have to, you get a guarantee. Buddha gives you a guarantee.

You don't have to go to a lower birth. And I would like to have this guarantee. So, what do I have to do?

How much do I have to pay? Like, okay, we're going to talk about it. So, two special classes.

And those are really cool. No one ever did that. In 2,000 years.

Nobody ever took all that stuff and put it in one place. So, it's not finished yet. I couldn't finish it.

I'm working on it. So, it's a work in progress. So, I'll share it with you and then we have to finish it.

Okay. I think Friday we have another one. Maybe by Friday.

Okay, MI SKYES TSUNAM MA THOB PAR MI SKYES You can't get that DENG until you reach that level. BYANG SEMS BDAG NI CHEN PO'ANG DE'ER SKYE BA YOD PAR GSUNGS Even if you're a very nice bodhisattva, you don't get that DENG. So, now we have to have a debate.

Can you be a bodhisattva and still not have a guarantee that you will go to a lower rebirth? He said yes. He said yes.

You can be a not just a bodhisattva, but a good bodhisattva and you don't have that guarantee. DE'ER SKYE BA YOD And it's possible for them to be born in the hell or other bad place too. Possible or not?

Which paths would the bodhisattva be on if he could still go to the hells? Yeah, like one or one and a half. So, even big bodhisattvas, if they don't reach this place, they can go to a lower birth.

They can also lose their good karma because of anger. But a person who reaches the second level, they get a DENG for not losing their good karma because of anger. They get a guarantee.

Their good karma is safe. They won't destroy their good karma by getting upset at somebody. So I think it's important we study these two because it would be nice to go there to a place where even some bodhisattvas didn't go.

Okay? Alright. Let's take a break.

Again, the goal is not to get sad or depressed. The goal is to maybe streamline your life a little bit. Cancel a few of those projects you have.

Focus on the more important ones. Okay? Like that.

Alright. We'll do a little bit more from the text. And this is actually the next death meditation.

,DE NA LDO RGONG BZHAG GIS PA NANG DU ,DEN BYAMS PAR BSTAN, This evening, maybe we will be in our room, and we'll be sitting on a nice, comfortable chair. There's the word shak again. High shak, room.

,SKYE SLONG LA GZUR BYED NAS NYAL, And someone says ,SKYE SLONG LA, This is the la that's Geshe-la or Adam-la. Okay? It's actually lak.

And it's a polite way in Tibetan to talk to somebody, like Susana-la. Literally, it means your is-ness. Good luck.

Your honorable is. So, lak is an old word for is. People say, SKYE SLONG LA.

SKYE SLONG LA means, oh honorable monk, dulce sueños. Sweet dreams. Okay?

SKYE SLONG LA. Dulce sueños. Have sweet dreams.

You know? And we go to sleep. ,BLO BUR KYI RKYEN NGAN ZHIG GIS, Then suddenly, due to some, something goes wrong in your body.

,RGYUD BYED DE ZHIG, Like you get a, what do you call that? Blood clot. And then, like eleven o'clock you die in the bed.

,SANG NYID SRED PA'I TSOS, SANG here means SANG NYID, which means what? Tomorrow. Good.

SANG NYID means tomorrow. ,SANG NYID means sleep. ,SRED means to wake up.

It's related to the word for kill. ,SRED means to wake up. You wake up.

,SRED means at the time you were supposed to, people come, you know, Jigme comes to my room around, what? 7.45 with Adriana. They bring me a green drink.

They knock on the door. They come in. So that's the time.

,SRED means the, it's related to Sema. The measure. Or the time when people were supposed to come to your room and give you your green drink.

,RI LUNG THAMS CAD MED GANG BA, But you are already gone. When she brings the green drink, nobody is there to drink the green drink. And I'm already in a country where the mountains and the lake is made of fire.

So when I wake up, I don't see this lake. And I don't see this mountain. I just see water made of fire and mountains made of fire.

,LAS TSAR, This TSAR means finished, right? But LAS TSAR means you have already arrived. Then JI LTAR BYED JI LTAR BYED means what are you going to do then?

You know, there's no time to practice there. I was talking to somebody about suicide because my brother committed suicide. We were kind of saying, if you stop when you commit suicide, then maybe it would be okay.

If you just disappear, then maybe suicide would be okay. If you get a cancer or something, have a big party with all your friends, and kill yourself. If everything just peacefully go into the black, that's okay.

But you never do. The light always comes again. You go into black for a few minutes.

Then the seeds make a new world. So, usually to make a karma you have to do something to somebody else. Karma is like an echo and karma is like a basketball.

You can't play basketball without a floor. You can't make an echo without some kind of wall. That's the other person.

But suicide is also a karma. So, you don't have ... Technically you can do a karma without somebody else if you hurt yourself.

But the problem is your mind doesn't stop and it just goes someplace else. And 90% of the time it's not a better place for practice. So, it's better to practice here even when you're unhappy than it is to kill yourself and have no place to practice.

So, JI LTAR BYAS means then how are you going to practice if the place you go to is made of fire? DE LTAR NGAN ROL SKYES LUGS KYANG BAR LTA MO LTA BA LTAR BYAS NA YIN CHUNG MI SKYES Let's do a dictionary entry. DE MO LTA BA So, the word LTA BA means to look or to view.

DE MO is related, right? Same spelling. But it means like a TV show.

Like a ... what do you call it? A spectacle.

So, there's two ways to look at the hell realms. You can DE MO LTA BA say, oh those poor people, they are in the fire. It's like watching a TV.

You're not in the TV, you're watching the TV. But Pabongka Rinpoche said if you do your meditation about the hell like you are watching a TV show, it won't have the correct spiritual effect on you. You have to put yourself there.

So, when you do these hell meditations, the idea is to try to put yourself in the TV show. And you are running from the hell guards. So, there's two ways you can meditate about hell.

One is like you're watching a TV show. And the second one is better. Put yourself in the TV show.

And imagine you are burning or you are running. So, he's encouraging us to when we meditate on the lower realms, you can do a sparrow meditation. Like a bird?

Small bird, yeah. Those small sparrows. I have a lot of them at my house.

I feed like, I don't know, fifty of them every morning. So, I watch them. Because my bees ran away.

So, actually I had to move them. Watch a sparrow sometime. You can do lower birth meditation.

They are like this. You know, they're watching their whole life from birth to death. They are watching, you know, somebody going to eat me.

Half of their mind is you know, they are watching. The ones who didn't watch are already dead. You know, they just eat the sunflower seeds.

You know, the big bird comes and kills them. So, fish, birds, it's nice to imagine you are a bird. So, don't just look at the birds.

Think about, if you are a bird, how does it feel? And then do the meditation like that. Who is it?

King Arthur was taught by Merlin, the wizard. And he put him in a bird's body. He said, see how it feels.

And he's like, oh, this is scary. That's how he made him a good king. When he was a boy, a magician put him into animals' bodies.

And he got compassion by seeing how they live. Okay. ,LTA MA DAG PAR BYED NA YIN CHUNG MI SKYE ZHING, Then Arya Nagarjuna said, ,RAB TU RTZA ZHING DRA BA'I NYAL BA NYID MA GCIG BZHIN DRAN, In a single day, you arrive in the hells where it's burning and also cold.

So, two kinds of hells. Hot hells and cold hells. By the way, which word did he use for day here?

Yeah, no, he used NYIN, which is an abbreviation for NYID MA. NYIN So, NYIN Not 24 hours. He didn't say shark.

He said NYIN. By the time dawn comes, you're in another world. So, let's do that meditation.

We never know when we go to bed what world we will wake up in. Okay, maybe animal world. Maybe hell world.

So, many people go to bed in the human world and they wake up in the animal world. They're like, they wake up like this. Why do birds fly away when you come close?

Or wild animals. They're afraid of you. They don't want to die.

So, they fly. So, we're going to do this cheerful meditation. Where will I be tomorrow morning?

I took a lot of time to choose a good photo because later, when you practice by yourself, you can just put the photo on your phone and you can try to remember what's the meditation. So, what's the photo for number twelve? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Maybe that's your sister. And you died and you became a dog and your sister won't give you the stick. All you can think of is, I want to bite this stick.

I want to bite this stick. I just imagine. There's lots of stories in Buddhism where the mother or the grandfather became the dog of the grandchild.

Maybe before the grandmother wouldn't let her play or something. And now the granddaughter is telling the mother, no, you cannot play. No, it happens many, many times because you have a connection.

You are related. You collected all your seeds together. So, it's very common that the puppy that you buy for the grandchild is the grandfather or the grandmother.

Okay? So, treat them nice. You want to hear a story?

Before meditation. So, Buddha had two great disciples. They're called Sung Nyi which means the great pair.

One is called Maudgalyayana and one is Shariputra. You know Sharip in Chinese? In the Heart Sutra.

So, Maudgalyayana he's famous for miracles. He can do miracles. He can fly in the sky.

He can visit other planets. So, in one morning he can go to a hundred other planets. So, there was a guy living near a lake.

Let me get this story straight. He had a beautiful wife and his father and mother lived with them. Then the father, his father that used to go fishing every day in the lake.

And his mother was very attached to the house. She's always cleaning. You know you go to those people's house who have a beautiful carpet?

Beautiful soft carpet. And they put the plastic on top of the carpet because they don't want it to get dirty. So, nobody can enjoy the carpet.

[Speaker 2]
She's like that.

[Speaker 1]
She's like this. And the couch also has plastic on it. Then the wife is very beautiful.

And all the boys neighbor men are trying to have sex with her. And then one day the husband saw the neighbor man looking at his wife like he got really angry and he killed him. He killed the neighbor man.

Then at some point the father died. And the mother died. And his wife, he and his wife had a baby.

Then Maudgalyayana came in the morning one day to ask for food. Which as we learned in the Diamond Cutter Sutra it's just a trick for the monks to help people. So, he knocked on the door.

They were having a Sunday brunch and Maudgalyayana knocked on the door and he said, he looked inside. He can see in the kitchen. The mom, sorry, the father, the man has his new baby on his lap.

And the wife is upset that day. She cooked a nice fish breakfast and they have a dog. That's why I remember this story.

The dog is pretty big. He keeps jumping up on the table and eating the stomach of the fish. And the wife is like, get down!

[Speaker 2]
Oh my god.

[Speaker 1]
Then Maudgalyayana knocks on the door. The dog is jumping around, the baby is crying. The husband comes to the door.

Yeah, yeah, what do you want? It doesn't mean give me the best, it means give me the leftovers. He says, get out of here!

We're having a bad day. Just go ask somebody else. Go away.

And then Maudgalyayana is like, And he left. Then Shariputra was watching across the street. Then he got pissed off.

Then he went to the house. Knock on the door. Then the husband came.

Do you realize who you just told to go away? This is Maudgalyayana. He's like the Buddhist number one student.

If he wants to go to Starbucks on 2,000 planets, he can go in one hour. He can make gold with his hands. He doesn't need your little stupid fish.

He's trying to bless your house. And the guy is like, Oh, no, no, no. I'll tell you something else.

That fish that you wouldn't give Maudgalyayana, that's your father. Remember he used to fish in the lake all the time? So, after he died he was born in the lake.

And you caught him yesterday. You are eating your father. And the guy is like, No, no, no.

Not only that, your wife just hit your mother. What? The dog is your mother.

She's attached to the house, so she was born as the house dog. And your mother is trying to eat your father. You're so stupid.

You are hitting your mother. Your mother is trying to eat your father. You stopped your mother from eating your father because you are eating your father.

And the guy is like, No! And I'll tell you one more thing. That little baby on your lap, that's the dude who was trying to make it with your wife.

After you kill him, because he wants to have sex with your wife, he was born in her womb. You are holding your enemy on your lap. You are beating your mother because you want to eat your father but you don't want your mother to eat your father.

And he just slammed the door. Next time, don't say no to Maudgalyayana. Okay, that's a good story.

Let's do a meditation. So, for your WeChat assignment today, I'd like you to just imagine that you went to sleep, and before you woke up, you were born someplace else, and tell us a story. How did it feel?

Like to be a fish, or a dog, or a bird, some kind of animal. Just tell us how it felt from the inside, not from the spectator. Maybe there's some good things there too.

Like a dolphin or something. Alright? Just how does it feel?

Yeah? Lower rebirth, she asks. Yeah, lower birth, yeah.

Lower, lower rebirth. Mainly animal. Mainly animal.

Because we didn't study the hells yet. But we're going to do it right now. Let's see how far we get by tonight.

SHES SOGS GSUNGS PA LTAR YID DAM GYI LHA'I SKYE RIM BSGOM PA BZHIN RANG NGAN SONG DANG DE DANG DE'ER KHYAD ZIN PA'I NYAM BSTOD NAS BSGOM STE JIG RTAGS SKYE PO DGOS So we had a very nice question yesterday about isn't it a little bit dangerous to do these meditations because doesn't it maybe plant some bad seeds to become that thing? He has an answer here. YID DAM GYI LHA'I SKYE RIM BSGOM PA Say SKYE RIM ZOG RIM SKYE RIM ZOG RIM So these are the two parts of Vajrayana practice, tantric practice.

Nowadays I don't like to use the word tantra because it has so many bad meanings in America and other countries. I was in Buenos Aires and I flew to Montevideo, right? Uruguay.

And I gave a talk to a soccer team in Punta del Este. Then in the airport I saw a big magazine. It said tantric sex secrets.

So there's a lot of wrong ideas about tantra. So even we took it out of the website for the books, where they keep the tantric books, we changed the name to ... There's another word for tantra called Vajrayana.

It means diamond way. So maybe that's better if I call it Vajrayana, okay? Higher Buddhism.

What's the difference between higher Buddhism and regular Buddhism? If someone teaches you Vajrayana after giving you an authentic initiation, you can become Buddha in one lifetime. And if you don't study Vajrayana, it's not possible in one lifetime.

So, I can tell you some detail about Vajrayana even though it's secret. Because he did. And he's the boss.

Khyerim, what he mentions here, Khyerim, is what we talked about. You have that photo of in Tibet in 1945, 1942? Somebody had it up on the projector.

There's two stages to Vajrayana. One is called Khyerim, and one is called Dzogrim. Yeah.

So leave it up there for a while. Khyerim means you try to make contact with angels. Like Amitabha.

You don't pray to them, you try to make direct contact. So the first part of Vajrayana practice, what he mentions here is called Khyerim. And you try to make contact with those angels.

And the teacher teaches you how to do it. And that's called Khyerim. During the second stage, it's called Dzogrim.

In the second stage, those angels teach you how to change your body. So they teach you how to change your body into Buddha's body, in a Buddhist mind. So that's Vajrayana.

If you want to know the whole tantra, this is the whole thing. Two stages. First stage, try to make contact with angels.

Second stage, they teach you how to become angel. Part of the first stage practice, we talked about it yesterday, you just kind of, I don't know how to say it, like if you are a kid, and you want to be a fireman, your parents will give you a fireman outfit, like small hat, small, or you want to be Spiderman. Your parents will, for Halloween they dress you as a Spiderman.

Then you start to feel a little bit like Spiderman. Just knock on the door and say, give me some candy. And when you get that outfit on, you already feel a little bit like Spiderman.

And that's first level Vajrayana. So maybe, I don't know, if you're trying to be Amitabha, you want to meet Amitabha, then Amitabha is connected with a red color. So, every day you wear something red.

Like, I don't know, red shirt, or red shoes, red socks. The angel I like is red color also. Then, I always wear red socks.

Anywhere I go. I gave a talk in Mexico City, and somebody asked, I think it was Scott, I don't remember. He said, Geshe-la, is his eyes okay?

Scott's like, why? Is he color blind or something? I don't know, I don't think so.

He's always wearing red socks. It looks terrible. Okay.

Then, it's a sign to my angel. I like a Muslim custom. When we invited a Muslim imam, a priest to come to our group in Phoenix, he showed us how to do the prayer.

They have to do three times a day. They bow, and then he goes like this. Hi.

[Speaker 2]
Hi.

[Speaker 1]
He's good. Then he does the prayer. He said, anybody have any questions?

I said, why do you do this? He says, everybody has two angels. They are coming with you all the time.

Every day you should say hi. You can't see them, but you should respect them. So, if you watch a Muslim person when they do their prayer, and that's a very good custom.

So, in the Vajrayana first level practice, we try to wear Spider-Man outfit. If you are practicing Amitabha, maybe anything red. Like keep a red notebook.

Keep a red pen. Paint your door red. Just to remember.

So, these lamas are they are actually wearing a wig. During the prayer. Because they want to call that angel.

So, then you to get the angel to come, you pretend you are the angel. It's like that wolf who put on the sheep's clothing and go into the sheep's. So, wear something that that angel knows, oh, she wants to be me.

She wants to meet me. And there's a lot of choices in Vajrayana. There are many, many angels.

I think Nick, how many in the 165 or something in Tibet? There are 165 tantras. Each one has its own literature.

So, you can choose. And when you do initiation, sometimes the lama will give you a feather. And then they will put the different colors of the different angels on a table.

And they say, close your eyes and let go of the feather. And the feather will land on a certain angel of color. Then that's your angel.

Okay, like that. You can do many ways. But we can't talk about that yet.

So, here in this sentence, Pabongka Rinpoche said, you know, some of us already had Vajrayana initiation. Then during the daytime we're supposed to think sometimes, I am Amitabha. I am Amitabha.

Then at the same time, NGAN SONG DU DE DANG DE'ER SKYES ZIN PA'I NGAM BRTAN You can practice, you're in the hell also. In the TV show. Not watching the TV show.

So, that's a question somebody asked. Wait, wait, I'm trying to be an angel. I'm not trying to be a sparrow who thinks he's going to die.

Then why do you want me to do this meditation? Because if you practice the sparrow, you can become an angel. Okay?

Because you will be scared to do bad things. Then you will make good karma, and you'll become an angel. So, in this sentence, he's answering a very famous question.

There was a young man, a young monk. He got initiation into yamantaka. Yamantaka is like Buddhist rap.

He's like, and he said, I want to be that angel. Then Lama said, sometimes you can go like this, under the table. Don't show people.

You're not supposed to show people. You can think, I'm yamantaka. I'm like Spiderman.

You can think like that. Then later in the evening, the Lama said, did you do your four powers today? Did you clean your bad seeds?

Then the student's like, he said, are you crazy? Yamantaka doesn't have any bad seeds. I don't have to do that anymore.

I'm yamantaka. And the Lama said, yeah, yeah, you're yamantaka, but do your confession. That's the answer, okay?

Yeah, yeah, you're a Vajrayogini. But I want the WeChat about the animal you became today. Yeah, yeah, you're an angel, you're an angel.

[Speaker 2]
I understand.

[Speaker 1]
The angel's going to be a sparrow for a few minutes. Because imagining the sparrow makes you the angel. Because you won't want to do any bad karma.

It's very cool. This is very, very important. He's an unbelievable Lama.

And every sentence he's talking about very, very high things. Yeah, yeah, you're yamantaka, but do your confession. Okay, got it?

Let's stop there, it's a good place to stop. Don't forget your WeChat. Scott's going to help me get our WeChat today, so I'm actually going to look at them.

Anybody over 50, we don't use WeChat because we don't know how to put it on our phone.