«Дар освобождения», курс 22 «Ретрит безграничной удачи», занятие 7

[Speaker 1]
So, I'm very happy that the teachers were teaching the last few days, and all of you should teach, okay? This is very precious things to learn. As I said before, it's like we're living in a big city like Mexico City or New York, and there's only two doctors.

So, we need more doctors in every country. Russia, you know, Germany, Mexico. We need teachers.

Then the first part of teaching is you have to learn something. So, take good notes, okay? It's not for you, okay?

It's for your students, okay? Like, it's really bad if you say there's eight hot hells. I can only remember four of them.

Okay? So, you have everything. In these classes you'll hear everything.

And we have 20,000 pages of ACI courses. They are teaching them in the sangha in Guadalajara. You have a good teacher.

You have a couple of good teachers. And you have 20,000 pages of courses. And there are, I think, 12 are translated into Spanish now.

More? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, all the homework questions are answered, are translated. Then there's a lesson plan. It tells you what to teach.

So, please think about being a teacher. No teacher lasts forever. Then the next generation must teach.

There will come a day when you have to teach. Then don't be a four hell teacher. Okay, then, so today's subject, we start the hell realms.

There's eight. It's not very popular to teach it. People don't believe it.

But you have to go somewhere after you die. You can't go to hell. You came from somewhere.

Don't believe it's chemicals, okay? Nobody was able to make consciousness from chemicals yet. And we believe consciousness can only come from consciousness of the moment before.

You cannot make a banana from ... I don't know. Anyway, it has to be the same stuff.

The cause of something has to be the same material. The mind cannot be made from chemicals. Chemicals can help the mind.

If you eat well, you will think well, but the mind is not the chemicals. So, you had a mind just before you were born, and you will have a mind just after you die. Then I always tell people about the frog in the well.

There's a story in India. It's from a book called Helpful Stories. In Sanskrit?

Hito Padesha. Hito Padesha. It became Aesop's fables, tales later.

And there was a frog who lived in a well. And he was the king of the well. Now he was, like all kings, he was pretty arrogant.

I'm the owner of the whole well. I'm the king of the well. Nobody's as big as me.

Then he had a friend, a crow, who used to come and sit on the side of the well. And they were good friends. And then the king got, King Frog got more and more arrogant.

Then Mr. Crow said, Can I show you something? Will you go with me? And King Frog said, okay.

And then Crow came down and Frog got on his neck, he pulled down to his neck. And the crow flew to the beach in Goa. It's a nice beach.

Then he said to Frog, he said, don't open your eyes. Keep your eyes closed. Then when they got to the beach, Crow landed and put him towards the ocean.

Put him down on the sand, facing towards the ocean. Then he said, on the count of three, open your eyes. Uno, dos, tres.

Then he opened his eyes. His mind exploded. He died right there.

Very messy. All the stories in Hiropadesha end like that. They're very depressing.

So, it means don't think this little world is the only one. Don't be like the frog. Don't say, oh, our planet is so big.

There are billions of other planets. Lots of people live there. Somewhere there's a planet where they're having the same class right now.

Because the odds are infinite. So somewhere, somebody who looks just like Aldo is listening to someone who looks just like Geshe Michael. Okay?

For sure, okay? There's countless worlds. So, your mind must go on, and there's countless worlds.

I went to the ... when I started the ancient book project in Russia, at that time KGB tells you where to go. So they put me in a Moscow hotel.

I think it has, I don't know, a thousand rooms or something. And it's a square. I feel like that's the world, the universe, you know?

There's a thousand rooms you can go into. Don't think your one hotel room is the only hotel room. Thousand.

You can go through any door. So, if someone comes and tries to help you, there's a place called hell. And it's real, because it's because it's coming from your own mind.

Okay, and then don't say they are crazy. Maybe it's the most important information you've ever gotten in your whole life. Because we are not just teaching about hell.

We are also teaching an easy way to guarantee that you will not go there. So, my boss in the diamond company, he's from Israel. You know, I worked there for 19 years.

Then I don't take a salary. I save it. He keeps it for six months.

Then he he gives it to me for charity. I took some for food. I took some money for food.

Then every six months he will write me a check for the input project. And I will say, I'll say, look, it says like $53,000. Then I will tell him, in Buddhism $60,000 is a very good number.

Then he'll say, he'll say, let's make it $100,000. $100,000. Then I'm like, wow, thank you.

Then I say, you are an Israeli person. Then why every six months you give me so much extra money? Then he said, we don't know which religion is correct.

I'm just covering all of my ... Okay, I understand. If there's 1% chance this is correct.

And if it's easy to avoid it, then if it's easy to get a guarantee that you won't go to hell, then cover your bases. Okay? If there's no hell, you can't lose anything.

You were just nice to many people. Okay? Nothing happened.

Okay? I'll keep it for a while. All right.

Okay, here we go. Adam, you ready? Where are you?

Adam got more handsome. Adam's having a massage with V this morning. Okay, here we go.

YANG ZOS, I think. YANG ZOS. Yeah, good.

So the first hell, the easiest hell is called YANG ZOS. YANG ZOS means get back up. GNAS DER SKYES PA'I NYAL GSUNGS GZHAN MED PAR Then most of the hells, they have hell ...

what do you call it? Maintenance personnel. They have people who torture you there.

We have extra chairs for these guys. Over here. Over here.

Yeah, there's two chairs here. Okay, so there's no ... usually every hell has prison guards.

This one doesn't. Why? LAS NGAN PAS DBANG GIS Because of your bad karma, because of your bad seeds, DER SKYES PA'I SEMS CAN RNAMS PHAN TSUN MTHONG MA THAG GONG CHOG SKYES TE If you're born there, the moment you're born there, and you open your eyes, I saw Nicholas number two open his eyes yesterday.

Two days ago. I went there for a few hours Wednesday. Tuesday.

[Speaker 2]
Then he's like ...

[Speaker 1]
It looks like he had too much tequila. So, the minute you open your eyes, then you see somebody, you hate them. You want to kill them.

Everybody in that hell, immediately they want to kill each other. GONG CHOG SKYES, they lock to CHUNG TSE. Then they just look for something to pick up.

If I was born here in that hell, then I would take my cell phone and I would start to hit somebody with it. Take the microphone and they start to ... just they want anything they can reach, they start to hit each other.

LOG TU CHUNG TSE TSUN PHYAR RGYUR NAS, PHAN TSUN NON, they start to hit each other. RE'I KHYI LUS SDUG PA'I SDUG PA'I THUG STE, and some of them have like knives and they cut each other's pieces, cut the arm off, cut the ... THUG STE Then after like one hour, everyone's dead on the ground.

Arms are broken or pieces. YANG RNAMS KA NAS, from the sky, there comes a voice and it says, get back up. DGRA BCUNG BA NA, LUNG ZIL BUR DANG BA, and then a strange thing, this very nice, cool breeze comes up.

LUS POG PA'I RKYEN GYIS, and when it touches their body, all of those broken arms and pieces they come back together. And then they open their eyes, and they start to fight again, over and over, just millions of times. SNGAR LTAR GSOS, YANG SNGA GZHIN BYAS PA'I GNYEN NAS RGYAL BA LA, ZHI BA'I THA GNAD BYAS PA'I ZHI BSTAN RGYAL THAG MANG PO, every day they go through this hundreds of times.

ZHI BA'I THA GNAD BYAS PA, he doesn't say they die, he says, we can call it death, but then they wake back up again. This RGYAL BA, by the way, with a B, with a B in front, BA'O RAR GA LTA RGA YOD TE RGYAL LA RGYAL, you see, without the B, it means king, right? Or victor.

But with the B, it means to fall unconscious. So, it's a completely different word. Maybe it means all political leaders are unconscious.

I don't know. YOD PAS RANG REGS KYANG THA LTA DER GYIS PA'I GNYAM DANG, TSUN BDEGS CING RGYAL BA DANG, SROG BSOD PA'I GNYAMS DON DGOS, So it's important, as we said before, try to imagine being born there. So add it to your meditations.

When we meet together in Diamond Mountain in October, we will do these meditations. The meditations we're doing now are from the last retreat. So try to get some continuity.

TSIN DE'ER RANG LUS LA'I PHYI'I CHUNG NGO ZHIG, So you should meditate about that hell. You have been president of the United States countless times. I was going to say, who can I pick?

Even Nick and Tim, have been Miss America countless times. Countless times. And you have been born in this hell countless times.

And your mind is trying to block it. People say, Geshe-la, I'm ready to die. It's a new experience.

I take them up on a high building. He said, get close to the edge. Then I hold them tight and I go, and they go, they fight.

Why? You've been there countless times. You know what it's like.

You don't want to die. Nobody wants to die. People will do anything not to die.

Why are people so afraid? You have been there countless times. You opened your eyes and you started fighting.

You know, you remember. Part of your mind remembers. So instead of blocking it, in this tradition, you try to remember.

You try to take your mind there. Try to remember opening your eyes, and then taking anything and hitting people. Meditate about it.

It's not to get depressed. Okay, this is not one of those religions where they say, leave a donation, you don't have to go to hell. Okay, it's not like that.

Remember, and then take care of it. You know, make some karma. Learn the pen.

We're going to talk about it Saturday. Teach you how not to go there. But if you don't believe you can go there, you won't work very hard.

So try to remember, and then on Saturday, it's easy. I teach you how to get guarantee which cover your basis. Okay, TSEMS RGYAS RANG NGU DANG PHYI CHUNG NGO ZHIG TSUG NA PHYI THENG GCIG BYAS PA LA'ANG GCIG PA If someone comes up to you in this lifetime with a knife, and they just poke you once, then you're like, ah!

And THENG GCIG means, that's just one threat to your life. NA MTSOS BSAM GYIS MI KHYAB PA YOD NA And also, you feel terrible pain if someone just sticks you with a knife once. Then how can you live in a place where they do it to you all day?

And you die many times there. TSE MTSE KYANG RING BA'I SNGA MA DE'I PHER MI TZUN The lifespan of people in the hells is millions of years. So if you only have to stay there 50 or 60 years, that's okay.

But their lifespan is millions of years. ZHIG ZHING LAS There's a book called Letter to the Friend. It's written by Nagarjuna, about 2,000 years ago.

My teacher translated it, and he used a commentary by Je Tsongkapa's teacher. Who is? Randawa.

It was a handwritten manuscript. We found it. It's very rare.

And you can get that book. It's a beautiful commentary. DIN NA NYIN GCIG BSTUN MTHUNG GSUM BRGYA'I YI RAB TU PHRAG LTAB SDUG BSNGAL GANG LHAG PA DE NI NYAL BA'I SDUG BSNGAL CHU MU LA'ANG U LYANG MI YID BYA YANG MI PHOD DO So, in this world, if someone took a spear and they jab you 300 times, what pain do you feel?

It doesn't equal the smallest pain in the hell. YID BYA YANG MI PHOD DO is a very ancient way to say it's not 1% of the smallest pain in the hell. So, that finished the cheerful subject of the first hell.

Now we'll talk about the second one. The second one is called black lines. In Tibetan, it's THIG GNAG.

For example, when you draw a mandala, sand mandala, you have to use geometry and you take measurements with a string. So, Venerable Chunzong is going to do that, right? For the fire offering we will have tomorrow, if it doesn't rain.

If it rains, we'll take all the offerings and we'll offer them in the lake. And I will get an evening vacation. Or maybe we'll have a class.

Okay, but we'll see if it rains or not. But THIG means string, and THIG GNAG means black line. ,'DI NAS GSUNGS DMYAL BA'I GSUNGS MA, ,'A BA BLANGS GO DANG, ,YAG SHA BAG MO GZER BA SOGS YOD, So, in the seven hells, starting with this one down, there are special prison guards in the hell.

And they are like the bad guys in Lord of the Rings. They have strange faces and bodies. They are monsters.

Why do people make those movies like Lord of the Rings? How can they think of those monsters? A little piece of their mind is remembering.

They aren't just for fun. Where did that idea come from? They are remembering something.

All those horror movies. My Lama, if they start to show one of those, she gets up and she gets up and she goes, she leaves the movie. I like it, because then I can eat all the popcorn.

One monster is called Avalongo. His head is a cow. Then there's one called Parngo, which means pig head.

SOGS RGYUD PA'I GNAL GSUNGS LAS MKHAN RIGS LTAR BYED BA When they stand up, they are taller than that mountain.

[Speaker 2]
BFG?

[Speaker 1]
Big Friendly Giant? There's a new movie called BFG. It means Big Friendly Giant.

You have to see it. It's your Lam Rim assignment. And those Hell Guards are this big.

RIGS LTAR BYED BA NIG MA RWA Their eyes are all red, everything. CIG SRID RUNG BA DAG GIS RGYOP SU When you see them, you feel very scared. RGYOP SU RGYOP SU means, hit them, hit them.

BDAG BDAG PA RANG GCIG ZHING BDAG NAS NUS ZHIG DROD NYAMS CHAGS And when you hear them, say, time for beating, then it feels like your body is melting. DE NAS DE DAG GIS GSUNGS TE CHAGS ZAS KYI SA ZHIR RGYEN GAL DU BSKAL Then they grab you and they put you down on your back. Unlike the ground in the hell, it's like a frying pan.

It's steel and it's red hot already. And they put you down on your back. NUS CHEN PO CHAGS BTAGS ZAS PAS Remember your body is itself very big.

Then they take a steel cable and they make it red hot. They put it on your body, many places. They tie it over your body and each one burns into your body.

When they pull it off, there's a black hole. So they put many lines on you like that. ZHING SO BA'I ZHING LA JI LTAR BYAS PA ZHIN DU RGA ZHIG SO LAS Then other guards come and they have these huge saws, saws.

And axe. And long axe and short axe. And they cut you along the lines.

They cut your body along the lines. This ZHOG, obviously related to ZHAG PA, to split open. So the word in Buddhism for confession is split open.

And this is the same root, ZHAG PA. They split you open. PHAN TZAM DU MTHONG BA'I ZHAG KHAM TSE Then they take the pieces and just throw them.

CHAGS TIG And there's lots of blood everywhere. CHAGS SREG STENG GSUNGS MA And then those are like frying on the ground. And each piece has its own ...

each piece keeps your total consciousness. So if they cut off your five fingers and they throw it in five directions, each finger feels the pain of the whole body. Without blood, each piece of meat can feel the total pain of the whole body.

MA STONG BA'I SDUG BSNGAL RANG THOG TU MYONG RANG THOG TU means by themselves, each piece itself feels the pain of the whole body. DER KU'I RGYAS BA'I RGYAS NI What are some special causes for being born in this hell? MI RGYAS BA CHU CHAR Let's talk about CHAR.

Let's do a dictionary entry, Tim. You have to ... or Nick.

So when you say CHAR, after a number like GNYIS CHAR, GSUM CHAR, ZHIG CHAR The CHAR means all. So CHU CHAR means all ten. And you have to be careful because the same pronunciation means rain, CHAR PA and to appear, CHAR BAR So this one is a number thing.

All ten. Of the MI RGYAS BA What's that? Yeah, all ten of the bad deeds.

So Buddhism has the same list as Christianity. Surprise! Okay, I have to tell you a story.

I like stories. Vee and I were listening to a song this morning. It's called I Would Rather Dance With You Than Talk With You But she told me, you would rather talk than dance.

So anyway, I used to work in the diamond business and we sell sometimes 30,000 stones in one day. We have FedEx trucks under the building, special armored building and they come under the building and we just dump the diamond boxes in the FedEx trucks. Then in America, there's a company that has 1,500 jewelry stores at that time.

It's called Zales. They're in Dallas, Texas. Then there's a competitor's store.

Banks, Biddle and Bailey, B, B and B They are high end. We send the expensive diamonds to B, B and B and we send the cheap diamonds to Zales. We like it because we can use all the diamonds.

Then one day, I'm making the address labels. B, B and B headquarters. Fifth Street, Dallas.

Then I have to do Zales. Zales company. Then the competitor says, Fifth Street, Dallas.

Then like, oh my god, something's wrong. I went to my same boss, that guy, super, super smart. I said, Ofer, there's a problem.

The address is the same. One of them is wrong. He said, no, no.

This is the same company. I said, what? He said, one guy owns both companies.

Then I said, no, no, it cannot be. Because they criticize each other in the TV. The lady comes with a diamond ring in the TV.

She sells her girlfriend. Look, he engaged me yesterday. Then she says, oh, where did he buy the diamonds?

We bought it at Zales. Oh, he doesn't love you. Then they have the same advertisement.

B, B and B does the same advertisement. She shows her girlfriend, look, he bought me a ring. Where did he buy it?

B, B and B. Oh, your husband's a little bit stupid. He wastes so much money.

You can get the same diamond at Zales. Half price. Then they are criticizing each other.

Then I asked the boss, but he criticized his own company? Duh! Any place they go, he gets the money.

It doesn't matter. You see? It's just a trick.

All the religions are doing the same thing. They are doing the same thing. Oh, look like Jesus.

Look like Buddha. Don't believe the Christians now. Don't talk to Buddhists.

The boss is the same. One owner. Okay, understand?

Don't forget. Okay, you tell me. So in the third hell, it's called smash.

Bring them together and smash them. DER SKYES PA'I PHAL CHE SOGS SPYOD SOGS SPYOD Oh, why did I mention that? Ten bad deeds.

So the boss made them the same. They are almost the same in the Christianity and Buddhism. So if you want to go to the second hell, break that first hell.

Break those ten. Any of the ten. SPYOD CHAGS Or MI LA DE BYAGS PHANG BA SOGS KYIS KYANG BYAS PA YIN MI LA DE BYAGS ZHUGS In the writing it's DA BYAGS, but in the spoken it's DE BYAGS.

DE BYAGS means a horse whip. DE BYAGS means a ... how do you say?

A whip.

[Speaker 2]
Or whip. Or whip.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, okay, I was sitting with a government official from old Tibet when I was very, very young, 1975 in New Jersey and we're watching television and Nixon was president and 100,000 people went to protest against the Vietnam War and he was watching like this and then he said DE BYAGS ZHUGS BAS He said, they should just DE BYAGS these people. And I'm like, what's a DE BYAGS? This is where I learned this word.

He said, they should horse whip them. Then they won't demonstrate. Okay, so anyway, it was a common punishment in old Tibet.

So Pabongka Rinpoche he says, if you want to go to this hell you should DE BYAGS people. Use a whip on people. Okay.

Next hell is called bring them together and smash them. It's called DU SBYONG. There's a famous Lama named DU SBYONG it's not the same.

There's a very famous Lama whose name is DU SBYONG, it's not the same. DE'AR SKYE BA PHAL CHER SOGS SPYOD BYED PA'I SNANG MIN TE The karma you have to do to reach this hell is to kill animals or people. For example, killing animals for food.

If you buy the food you are killing the animal. It's worse than killing the animal. Why?

If you buy it. Yeah, you are double karma. You kill the animal and you cause the employee of the store or the shop to kill the animal.

So you get double karma. Then I had a cool thing when I was in college. I worked for Cesar Chavez for three years.

Very beautiful work. So he's Mexican-American and he helped the farm workers and I worked with them for three years and it was scary. Some guy tried to kill him and I was there.

He's a very beautiful man. He's non-violent. Many people tried to kill him and we used to hide.

We used to put him in a different house every night. His response was non-violent and he got an idea. He said, we will encourage people not to buy the food which was grown on the farm where the workers are mistreated.

So we called a boycott. We asked everyone in America don't buy that food. We went to a grocery store and we stand there for three years.

Every day, free day we have, we stand at the grocery store and we ask people please don't buy this lettuce or please don't buy these grapes and then it worked. The stores couldn't sell them and finally the store told the farmers you have to treat these people correct. So with non-violence and those farmers killed several guys and we we stopped the whole thing.

Why am I talking about that? Yeah, if we stop eating meat it becomes unprofitable to kill cows and then they will stop. So we can do it.

I saw it. If we stop eating it they can't make money and then they will stop. So we can stop it.

We just have to stop eating it. My brother loves to eat meat. I thought one day I'm going to bring the cow into the kitchen and give him a knife and say you kill it, I cook for you.

Okay. Why do we eat meat in the Lama Chupa? One piece.

We are making a prayer that later this should be illegal. It's illegal to eat a human. It should be illegal to eat a cow.

We take one piece to remember. So in higher Buddhism Diamond Way every two weeks we take a small piece to remember. On the tenth day of the moon rising Yeah?

Today is Sechu. Okay? So today if you have a chance maybe a piece of egg or something.

Okay? Then just remember. I hope this is illegal.

Okay? Alright. Come in, come in, come in.

Leon is here. Hola Leon. We have a meeting at 5.30 don't forget. Alright. DU SBYONG So if you want to be born in the third hell just kill animals. Eat meat.

MIN TE RI RA LUS KYI SDOM PA LTA BU PHAN TSUN GNYIS KA RGYUG STE SHEN DUR DRU SA MED PAR Okay. One day I decided to do a real retreat. I went to a canyon in the desert.

It's near Cottonwood and it's awesome. It's a secret canyon underground and you can't see it and it's like ten miles long and it has a small river and it has a lot of caves. So I thought I'm going to do a real retreat in a cave.

So I hiked down there. You have to take food with you. So your retreat is limited to how much food you can carry.

So I chose one cave and sitting there it started to get dark. Then I my eyes are closed but I heard this I'm like I think this is somebody's cave. So it's getting dark and I found another cave.

I saw a cave and I climbed up there then I just put my face over the ledge and there's a green rattlesnake and I'm like okay, this is your cave. If the green one bites you, you die. There's no cure.

If they bite you, you die. I'm like, okay, that's your cave. Then it started to get dark and the moon came out and I saw a couple of caves up higher I thought, which cave?

Then there's a big moon and in front of the moon I can see the top of one mountain one small peak and the shape looked just like my llama's face the shape of the mountain. So I climbed up there and I'm safe. I found a nice cave.

Just 500 spiders. So I put the tent inside the cave Why am I telling this story? In this hell there are mountains all around you and the shape of the mountain is the shape of the animal you killed.

So like sheep head, cow head, pig head. GYUG STE PHAN TSE GNYIS GANG NAS GYUR TE GZHAN GYI MTHU'I BSAM MED PA DE BA DU TSOS Then these hell guards are hitting you, chasing you. So you run between these two mountains and then they fall into each other like this and you are between the two stones and your body is smashed.

Then open up again and you try to run smash again. There's a thing called claustrophobia. People afraid to go into small spaces.

They are remembering. Part of their mind is remembering. That's why people are afraid of small spaces.

You've been there many times. And then your body just recovers. In the hell you cannot die.

You want to die but you cannot die. Many people who commit suicide go here because it's the worst kind of killing. Your own body is your ticket to freedom.

So if you destroy it you go to this hell. RANG LUGS RANG LTAGS YANG YANG DE BZHIN DU BYED PA It happens over and over. Then there's RANG LTAGS RANG LTAGS means this big...

You see in India the cow walks around the stone and it grinds the grain, the corn or wheat. So some people's body is thrown in there and they crush it. Andriana has a almond butter making machine like that.

Right? When I saw it I was like, oh! Or DUN DUN means mortar and pestle.

They smash you in a big one. RGA SHAS KYI CHAGS KYI BRJOL MED When you make wire, like this wire, you take a piece of metal and you pull it through a small hole. It's called a wire die.

That hole is called a ... Sometimes they use a diamond. And you draw the wire.

They do that to some people. Push their bodies through a hole. BRTEN PA SNGAR SOGS BYAS SKABS BAR ZAD CHAGS GANG YIN PA Whichever is the animal which you used to kill, DE RNAM PAR CHAR BA STE RANG DE BAR TSUL BA SOGS MIN DRAG MANG PO YOD So each thing which they use to smash you reminds you of the face of the animals you used to kill.

DE BAR BAR DU TSIR BA TSIR BA means to squeeze. Like when you make momos you have to TSIR BA the dough. DE NA DA LTA ZHIG SEMS SRED NA So in Tibet they had a lot of bed bugs.

People say, oh, I want to go study in the monastery. Better to study in Guadalajara. But when I first went to the monastery you feel these, at night they come out of the bed.

They live in the bed and they come out at night and you can feel them. They are very small and in the morning they are hanging on the wall. They are much much bigger and deep red color and they are digesting.

Anyway, you can't get them out of the bed. Anyway, people squeeze them pop them with their fingernails. Guess where hell you go to.

You see? Because you squeezed them. So that causes you to be born in this hell and the mountains will look like fingernails.

Okay? Happy? All of this death meditation I was a little bit worried about the WeChat.

Maybe Chinese government will think we are crazy or something. But it's not like that. It's not for make you sad.

I'm not trying to get your donation after you die.

[Speaker 2]
Not like that.

[Speaker 1]
If you understand your life is short and it will pass like that. I just realized I'm playing bass guitar for 50 years and then I'm like, what happened? 50 years.

It will go like that. So we have to meditate about it. Then you won't waste your time.

You will use your life and you will be happier if you do these depressing meditations. You will be super happy. Geshe Michael is not like ooo, ooo, ooo.

[Speaker 2]
I'm good.

[Speaker 1]
The more you do these meditations you feel more free. Then if you do the pen, if you understand how not to go there, if you get the guarantee deng that you don't have to go there you feel so free. Then you're not afraid to die.

I'm ready. I'm going nice place. Maybe better than Real de Chapala Hotel.

Then you feel happy all the time. But first you have to do those meditations. Otherwise you are like the whole world is no, I'm not going to die, I'm not going to die, I'm not going to die.

You are just lying to yourself. And it takes a lot of effort to lie to yourself. Oh, prince died.

Oh no, prince. Not me, not me. Not like that.

It takes a lot of effort to deny. So if you embrace it and you get ready then you're like super happy. It's a lot of pressure to deny death.

It's a lot of pressure to deny it. If you get the guarantee then you just feel comfortable. People ask me, can I meet my relatives there?

Pao's grandmother died yesterday. So we had birth and death in this retreat. People ask me, will I see my grandmother again?

Yeah, for sure. You have to get enlightened. Go to heaven.

Amitabha heaven. All the people that you love who died, they are there. You can have a much better time than you had with them here.

No problems there. No family fights there. Then some stupid people told me, oh Geshe-la, no family fight?

Just happy all the time? This is so boring. It's not boring, okay?

It's fun. Much more fun. It's not true that you need pain to have pleasure.

It's not true. That's a stupid idea. You can be happy all the time.

No problem. Okay? Take a break.

We'll come back in ten minutes. Okay, we're going to do a little bit more and then I'll take some questions. This is the fourth hell.

It's called, it's just called screams. Screaming. In Tibetan it's mu-bu, mu-bu, mu-bu.

If you sneeze, it's called mu-bu. ,JAG RTZE GYI GANG PO DGO MED PA CI, ,CI RNAMS BSGOM DU MED PA'O BA'I ,RNAMS DU BCUG STE This is the one that reminds me of the the soldier who was put in the iron cage and they burned him inside the iron cage. And maybe those people who burned him were remembering something from their past.

So there's a small iron cage but it has no door. You are born inside and it has no door and you just suffer. It's made of iron and the iron is red hot and you are inside it.

,'DI LAS LTA BU'I LTA BU MI NYES Then this hell, there's no story, there's nothing to do, you can't get out. So all you can do is scream. In that hell, there's nobody poking you or there's one guard put you inside there and then you just stay there and you scream.

So in that hell, only screaming. What is it? Alegre?

Dante? Alegre? Anyway, Dante.

Alegre? If you read his book about hell, it's very similar. I think he saw it or he remembered it.

You should read that book sometime. Let's do one more and then we'll take questions. Fifth hell, fifth hot hell, it's called more screaming.

DNGOS PO CHEN PO ,RDAN DROD BYA GANG NYID RIM DU BCUG PAS Instead of one iron chamber, there's double wall. Then if you really work at the cage for a long time, you can break it. And you feel so happy, oh, I broke the door, I can get out.

Then you realize the small cage is in a bigger cage and you can't break through the second one. Maybe this is the hell for disappointing other people because you have great hope you break through the first wall. Then you realize the small cage was in a bigger one and you can't break out of it.

Why are you born there? MI DGE BA CHUG DKA' CHUG DKA' is the same as CHU CHAR. Yeah, you did the ten bad deeds, any one.

CHUG DKA' implies you did more than one, like maybe you did five of them or something. And there's a special other karma BYANG BAG MED DU MTHONG BA BYANG BAG MED DU MTHONG BA to take alcohol, meaning without being very careful. So that implies you can take alcohol carefully.

And what they're talking about today is called ZAD ZHU. It happens twice a month. If you have empowerment or special permission, which is called the empowerment name is DBANG DBANG The special permission name is BYAS RNAMS So if you have special permission from your Lama, on this day you take a small amount of alcohol.

And you have to be very careful about your motivation. I'm taking this to remember that alcohol ruined the lives of many people. Both my parents died from alcohol and my whole childhood I saw every day what alcohol does to people.

It's a great poison and very addicting. Everybody who got addicted they didn't think they would be addicted. Geshe-la, I just take a little wine before dinner.

Then after a few years all they can think about is what wine they're going to have. Then they get some kind of trouble in their life. Like divorce.

They get sick. And then they take refuge in the alcohol. Then they start to drink serious because they already have a habit.

And then they go crazy. So those people even if they don't have enough money to feed their family they will buy alcohol. So even if you have that tantric empowerment extremely careful.

Big motivation during that ceremony. I'm taking this so I can shut down the hell. If you slip and your motivation is not strong, not good this is the hell for you.

BYANG means alcohol. BAG MED means without being very careful. LTUNG BA means drink it.

Then he quotes a sutra and the sutra answers a question that many people ask me. MDO LAS means the sutra says BYANG LTUNG DNGOS PO GNAS SU SKYES SDUG BSHAN DE'I KHOR DU SKYES If you drink alcohol without being careful DNGOS PO GNAS SU SKYES you are born into the hell called screaming. And the people who gave it to you serving it to another person DE'I KHOR DU SKYES they are born in your hell family.

Somebody asked Buddha is it okay to drink alcohol?

[Speaker 2]
Where's that flower? I just need one petal.

[Speaker 1]
They said Buddha was teaching in a park as usual and somebody asked him if we are Buddhists can we drink alcohol? He picked a piece of grass and he said if you drink this much this drop don't call yourself my student. The word is very hard he didn't say you are not Buddhists he said don't call yourself my student.

And then one of his students said but you know my mom likes to have a glass of wine before dinner. Can I serve it to my mom? Anyone who serves this much to your mom or anybody else don't call yourself my student.

He's like you can do it but don't call yourself my student. Many years ago I was translating Abhidharmakosha. Me and Rinpoche spent 12 years on translating Abhidharmakosha.

In 1981 I was flying to a big initiation by a big lama in an airplane and there were some Tibetans on the airplane and the guy next to me is Tibetan and he ordered a beer and we drank it. And I was like you know then I was translating Abhidharma and that story is in the Abhidharma. So I just opened that page then I said are you Tibetan?

He said yeah I said I don't understand this thing The Buddha is picking grass So So you have a naughty lama It was fun. Okay, questions. Can we have a microphone?

[Speaker 2]
Thank you lama for teaching. I had a question about a couple days ago you were teaching us about hold up your left hand and point to one thing in this room that's not coming from how you treated other people in the past.

[Speaker 1]
And in an earlier teaching that you gave you talked about two kinds of absences absences and one of them was absence of identity and one of them was just absence of identity Okay, oh yeah, okay. So I had a question when you say point to something in this room and that's not coming from your seeds it seems to me like you're checking different objects in the room and you're saying well, not her, not him they both come from seeds and then you're coming up with is it that you're coming up with an absence of identity and then when you can't find anything then that's the sheer absence Could you just talk about what an absence of

[Speaker 2]
what is that?

[Speaker 1]
Okay, good. So in what's interesting in Buddhism is that everything has its own emptiness. The laptop has its own emptiness.

The cell phone has its own emptiness. The microphone has its own emptiness. And Michael has its own emptiness.

So you have to get used to that. There are many emptinesses in this room. The irony of life is that you are surrounded by thousands of emptinesses all the time.

If you see one of them for twenty minutes directly your body starts to change into an angel at that moment. It starts like I don't know if you can touch your nose you can become Buddha then you're like how, how? It's all around us all the time and we can't see it.

So now we have an interesting question just not your question but I want to talk about it anyway. In Buddhism we have a difficult word dependent origination comes from other things. Let's change dependent origination to comes from other things.

It's the same thing. So this thing has two qualities. Emptiness and comes from other things.

Let's talk about the second one first. Does this come from other things?

[Speaker 2]
Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Factory in China or that's not the real one. It's true. It was made in China or I don't know America or something.

So it comes from other things. But when we say comes from other things I'm talking about the deeper causes. What's the deeper cause?

Yeah, my seeds. So in Buddhism when we say does it come from other things? Then you say yes.

What's the deep cause? It comes from a seed in my mind. Why?

You helped other people to communicate with each other in the past. Aldo, please talk to Daniel. He has a special message for you.

So when I do that it plants a seed for a cell phone. Does this cell phone come from other things? Yes.

First question. Second question. Does this cell phone not come from other things?

[Speaker 2]
Does this cell phone not come from other things?

[Speaker 1]
No. Okay, one person is listening. Thank you.

I'm going to ask the question again. Does this cell phone not come from other things? No.

It means it does come from other things. But when you put two no's no, it doesn't not come from other things. That's emptiness.

Emptiness is always two no's. It's always the first question is does it not come from other things? When you say no, that's emptiness.

So at the same time this phone has two qualities. Number one, it comes from other things. My seed.

What about the factory? What about the plastic? Your seed also created the plastic and the metal and the factory and the workers in the factory to make the iPhone.

Okay, so no problem. Shallow seed Plastic, metal, factory, workers. Who created those?

My seed. Okay, that's the first question. Does this come from other things?

Yes. You can call it dependent origination. You can call it come from other things.

I think come from other things. That word came before dependent origination. Buddha used to say di kyeway na di kyeway everything comes from other things.

Then later some philosophers got a hold of that and they called it dependent origination. So when you hear that word don't worry about it. It just means it comes from other things.

Does it not come from other things? That's gong shing. Now his question is not ...

So things are easy. Talk about ten, talk about iPhone. That's easy.

You can ... even you can imagine a seed going like a movie projector. But the projector is also empty.

Okay, the mind. Michael. In this case Michael and mind are both the subject.

Michael is making the phone. Michael's mind is making the phone. So the subject, the person, the projector on the table, it's also empty.

I'm also making the projector. Okay? Did the projector come from other things?

Yes. That's dependent origination. Did the projector not come from other things?

No. That's emptiness. And what we said the other day is when you're studying about it, when you teach people, start with something easy.

Outside thing. Like a pen. Later, when you see it directly, you always see your own emptiness first.

The first emptiness Geshe Michael saw is Geshe Michael's emptiness. Directly. Did I cover it?

Yes. So it's more difficult about yourself. If outside thing, raise your left finger, point to something outside which didn't come from other things.

Then you can go like this. This is universal language in every DCI country for emptiness. Now, is there anything about you which is not coming from you?

Your face, your hair, your arm, then that's the emptiness of you. The most difficult part is your own thoughts. What you hear in your mind is also coming out of seeds.

So if you plant nice seeds, you will hear nice thoughts in your mind. If you have a company, or if you're doing online training or something, a very useful thing to teach people is the karma for creativity. I want to write a book.

I want to paint a beautiful painting. I want to write a beautiful song. How do you plant that seed?

You want to know? But I think it would make a good business course for a corporation. Because there's a lot.

You can do it for a couple days. It's a very nice seed. I always remember my business was a jewelry business.

We put the diamonds in the ... The best way to sell a diamond is put it in a piece of metal. So we sell both kinds of diamonds.

We call loose diamonds. You can't make my surprise profit because everybody pays the same for the loose diamonds. But if you put it in a little piece of metal and it's new style, you can sell for more.

A lot of diamond people start jewelry factories just to make extra money. Then every year we have what do you call it? Jewelry show in Switzerland, in Basel.

I don't know, 3,000 jewelry companies will go. They will show the new styles. Then we will spy on the other companies.

Usually you hire somebody so the other company doesn't know them. They will walk through the jewelry show and if they see a new idea they will say, let me take a selfie! Then you go back to your office.

If someone made a really nice piece, we feel jealous. Why didn't we think of that? Like love.

In my time there was love, a ring called love. In the O they put a diamond. Somebody else invented this.

We were so jealous. Oh, we should have thought of that. Then they made copyright.

So if you're jealous it's a bad seed. If you're a Buddhist, diamond dealer, go directly to their booth at the jewelry show. Meet the owner.

Man, you are killing us. Your new ideas are so cool. You're so smart.

Damn, let's go to dinner. I'm going to buy you dinner. I just want to be near a smart person like you.

Like that, a Buddhist person should be happy. They are supporting the other company. Then we gave a talk in Berlin last month, right?

One big businessman left the talk. He said, you are crazy. I should be happy?

My competitor made love ring. I couldn't think of it. But that's the karma to be creative.

So tell other people, especially your competition. Man, that's so cool. I can't believe it.

So that's the karma to have your own mind, to see new ideas come out of your own mind. So your mind, Michael's mind is also empty. Michael's mind is also empty.

I hope that covers your question. That's the second kind of emptiness. First kind is things.

Outside things. Second is more difficult. Inside things.

And what we said on Monday was you must start to understand the emptiness of your own mind to reach level three of the second path. And we'll talk more about that on Saturday. So if you're from Guadalajara, encourage your friends to come.

If they can't pay something, we can sneak them in. But it's an important class. Alright then.

One question more, then we have to stop. Wait for the microphone. I mean cappuccino.

I mean microphone.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you. Can you turn up the volume? Thank you Michael.

I'm just following the same subject. What is the effect of planting a Dharma seed? I can understand that it changes my reality.

How does that change other beings' reality? How is it that a Buddha plants a Dharma seed?

[Speaker 1]
How can that affect the reality in other worlds?

[Speaker 2]
Cool.

[Speaker 1]
The way to plant a Dharma seed is to share what you learned. And the book always says as much as you understand, share it. So if you only understand ten percent, that's okay.

But share it with other people. But we are not allowed to bother other people with the Dharma. You have to listen to me.

Especially husbands. You have to listen. I found out the truth.

You must agree with me. A is not cool, and B we're not allowed to do that. But if your friend is having problems, their husband is always cheating on them.

But they themselves are always lying. So you can say, take them out for coffee, talk for two hours. Somewhere during the talking for two hours, you can say, maybe there's a connection between what you're doing and what he's doing.

When you help your friend like that, you are teaching Dharma. You don't have to call it Buddhism. I don't care.

Buddha doesn't care if you call it Buddhism. It just doesn't matter. Just help people.

I realized after many years, religion is a cultural thing. I went to the cathedral in Chapala yesterday. I went to the cathedral.

It is so beautiful. You go in there, if you're a Christian, you feel, if you grew up Christian, you feel, ah. So keep it.

What your parents did, what you grew up, keep it. It's a beautiful cultural thing. My friend in Ireland, Gishi Michael, I decided to become a Buddhist.

Now I'm Buddhist. Then I said, you have a daughter. This is Kevin Thornton.

You have a daughter, right? Yes, I have a daughter. Si, tengo una hija.

Are you going to marry her in the basement of your house with a Buddhist deity that has three heads and six arms? Or are you going to go to the big cathedral in Galway with organ music? Maybe I'll go to the cathedral.

Okay, so keep the good things from your parents. Keep it. And then what good ideas you heard about karma, use them.

[Speaker 2]
Then if you use them, you'll become a happy person.

[Speaker 1]
Then people, when they have trouble, they will say, oh, that guy looks very happy. He never gets angry. He never gets upset.

Then they will ask you for help. So, best Dharma advertisement is that you are a happy person. And then people will ask you questions.

How to create a Dharma country where people are all spiritual? Be a good example. Yourself.

I don't know. Like to learn how to program a computer is a great skill. To make the computer do what you want takes some training and it's very cool.

A Buddhist person is like a sculptor. They are making a new person. Your job is to make a happy person.

It takes a couple of years. Then when you're finished and there's a happy person called you, then that will cause Dharma to spread. Not in the books, just people's behavior in your country will be spiritual.

Okay. That's Dharma seed.