«Дар освобождения», курс 23 «Защита от жизни и смерти», занятие 10

[Speaker 2]
So in this meditation we're going to practice something. We'll go through some of the death experience, and then we'll reach the crystal, and we'll spend some time on emptiness, and then we'll reach the part where we say, that's me, which is dharmakaya, which is the dharma body.

[Speaker 1]
It's very cool, if you reach the dharma body at 8.30, then at 8.30 and one second, your paradise body comes out, with those five qualities. The first quality is what? Certainty.

Yeah, you have these marks, 112 marks. If you're coming to Kamalashila, we're going to read them very carefully. We're going to do them very carefully.

I never heard anybody teach all of them. It'll be very nice. I finished the text last night, late last night.

I just say that because the Chinese team has to translate it. It's 40 pages. That'll be fun.

We're going to practice that special moment. That's me. I'm in the body.

Like that. The minute you reach, that's me, then the next minute, then you're like, wow. Paradise body.

Then earth body is anytime after that. You're like, I think I'll wait till nine o'clock to go to Los Angeles to help somebody. You know, like that.

That's a different decision. But in this meditation, we're going to go through the death to the crystal. Then we're going to be inside the crystal and do four things.

Then we're going to look at the dharma body and say, oh, that's me. Then practice these signs. I want you to start with two signs.

One is here. Dharma wheel. It's not a tattoo.

It's three dimensional. It's bump. It comes up.

Like that. But not creepy. It's still nice to hold their hand.

It's not like holding a cow's hand or something. It feels nice. Their hand is also the softest.

You can feel the mark here. If you close your eyes, you can feel it. But it's very soft.

What? Both hands. If you want, you can do both feet.

Actually, there's four. There's many signs. One on the neck, one on the chest.

Different ones. I'll show you later. Then at the same time, we're going to call, it's called dzukpa.

[Speaker 2]
Here. Then it's a little bump here. Silver color.

Looks like silver. And not very big. Like olive?

They say olive size.

[Speaker 1]
Half an olive. Then just practice that. It's very beautiful.

That's where those Indian women wear this. There's a chi. There's a chakra here.

And there's a tigle. There's a bindu. In the chakra, there's a drop.

I want you to practice those two. You already have a drop there. You already have something there.

Some people get a mole here or something. That's very lucky. One woman in this group had a baby.

In Czechoslovakia, it has a big thing right here. That's a good sign. Very good sign.

It's already you have something here. So when you focus here during this meditation, it should change your concentration. You should feel different.

And if you want, you can breathe through here. And that's a good practice. So we're going to go through the death process, reach the dharma body, say, that's me.

And then it takes half a second, like boom. And then you're like, wow, cool. Better than tattoo.

Then you can feel it, because you're going to have it. So you know. Everybody knows the future a little bit.

And you already feel something on your hands. And I just want you to get used to it. And it will help you become a Buddha.

And don't forget this one, and then this one. Here we go. Ready?

[Speaker 2]
Blow your nose again. And then you are walking across this land. And in the distance you can see a mirage.

Slowly you walk towards it. Very close now to the mirage. And then through the mirage.

And then on the other side you're surrounded by smoke. Still walking. And then suddenly you see sparks in the smoke.

As you walk. A clear, a still flame. Candle flame.

And you're walking towards it. And it's getting bigger and bigger. And your mind is getting smaller and smaller.

And you walk through the candle flame. And on the other side, it's dark but at the horizon you can see daylight starting to show. Daybreak.

And you keep walking towards it. It's very quiet. And soon the daybreak surrounds you.

Sky is white. And you're still walking. And there's a red color on the horizon like a sunset.

And you're walking towards that. Then you're surrounded in red. Keep walking.

And then everything's black. Then go more black, deeper black. Very silent, very quiet.

Deeper black. And as though at the end of a very long tunnel, everything becomes crystalline. Just clear and crystal.

And you think, how much of this is coming from me? Did the mirage come from me? Did the smoke come from me?

Is it all coming out of seeds in my mind? Pictures coming out of seeds in my mind. How much is not coming out of pictures in my mind?

And then there should be nothing. That's more crystal, deeper crystal. And you understand this is emptiness.

Higher reality. It feels higher. It feels above.

How many things don't come from me? And super quiet. Andhe.

All your chakras are open. The chi is, prana is moving very smoothly in the middle channel. And you feel extremely happy.

And the emptiness, you understand it very clearly. And then you say, if I could become that, I would be a Buddha. And I could really help people.

In many worlds, all of them. So I will be this, empty. And then in that moment, you feel on your hands, body changes.

And some wheels come on your head. Dharma wheel, eight spoke. And enjoy the feeling.

The wheels are part of your skin. And then on your forehead, you can try to find the spot where there's a lot of prana, chi. You can try in different places on your forehead.

Focus on different places. Should be between your eyebrows, up about an inch, centimeter. And sometimes it helps to go into your skull.

Maybe a few millimeters, maybe half an inch. See if you can find the spot. And imagine a silver, half a silver ball there, like a hollow.

And I'd like you to breathe through this ball. So the breath is coming, not through the nose, but through the forehead. And we'll relax here for a few minutes.

That's the last thing. And just breathe through your forehead. Sometimes feel the wheels on your hands.

Then please come to your breath. Three deep breaths. Each out breath, try to share this good karma with other people.

And then you can slowly open your eyes. Take a stretch. Okay, Adam, we're at NGAN SONG GI.

[Speaker 1]
Nice. Okay, thank you. NGAN SONG GI SDUG BSNGAL PHRAD PA'I TSAD LA So we should always have an awareness every day that if we're not careful, we could go to someplace bad.

Okay? Right now we're like, oh, I didn't have a good shower because Gyelse's shower is only four feet high. I don't know why.

But it's enough to shower my stomach. So we feel like things are not perfect, but it could get worse. We could go to hell.

We could become an animal. Then the shower is too high. Why did it make so high?

So always when you're walking around and you're having a bad day, you could say, well, I could be in hell. Okay? There's always a worse thing.

My father, he fought in the Second World War. He was, I think, 17. He joined the Navy and they put him in a submarine.

Those were very dangerous and very small. Many of them just disappeared. They don't know what happened to them.

He said he used to complain about he didn't have nice shoes. But one day he saw somebody lost their feet. Then he said, maybe my shoes are okay.

So like that. Keep awareness in your mind all the time. Oh, I'm having a problem with this person.

I didn't get the money I expected. Part of my body hurts. But it could be so much worse.

It's only one breath dividing us from those. So we're okay. Life's okay.

Your life is not so bad. Okay? ,KHUN RGA'O ZIN MU, ,BU NYID SOGS, Ananda had a sister and she had two sons.

She decided to give them to Maudgalyayana, one of the two great disciples of the Buddha. By the way, before I forget, I keep thinking, this statue is my teacher's face, Ken Rinpoche. I would like to thank the Russia group for getting it here and making it.

That's Anton and Elisabetta. Thank you for that. He carried it on the plane.

Security was curious. This one also got a plane seat from the China group. That's the only way he got here safely.

So that was done by a very good sculptor in Russia. He's done many famous people's faces. Then he said, can I do your face?

Then I said, no, you do my teacher. That's from a photo. It's very beautiful, very heavy.

He was also very heavy. The Sanskrit root for guru is heavy. Guru, it means heavy.

That's why it's so heavy to carry. Ananda's sister gave her two boys to Maudgalyayana and said, please make them good monks. LHAG LTAS PA'I This LHAG LTAS PA'I, GA'O DANG LTAS Adam, we can make an entry here.

LHAG LTAS PA'I means to direct someone somewhere. Oftentimes it means to direct your mind somewhere. But in this case it means to turn over the boys to Maudgalyayana.

LOG PA MA BYAS PA'I SKABS But they were lazy and they didn't want to study. This LOG means to read books. Maudgalyayana, MAUDGAL KHYI PHUS NYAL BAR BSTAN PA NA Then he said, one day he said, I'm tired of these kids, they never study.

He said, we're going on a field trip to the hell. If you think studying books is bad, wait till you see the hell. So he took them on a little trip to the hell.

Suddenly they became very serious monks. So Pabongka Rinpoche said, we should try to keep this kind of awareness all the time. We will become better Buddhists.

Our meditation will be better. Our yoga will be better. Our study will be better.

Because we know it's going to protect us from going to those places. And they are close. They are always close by.

Sometimes I get scared. Now we finished our new building in Sedona. You're invited to come November 5th for the open house.

The road between my house and the new college is a small road and it has a very high speed limit. And people, cowboys, they have beer. They drink beer.

One day Anatole and me were sitting in my local gas station store. And we said, let's count how many beers leave the store in the next 45 minutes. Guess what's the number?

490 something. Then these guys get in their car and they start driving. It's a very narrow road and it's fast and people start going like this.

You can die anytime. Cars are a wonderful place to die. Unexpected.

Some drunk guy comes. It's not your fault. You're just dead.

Suddenly you're dead. Then you come. So if you think like that, you'll get your priorities straight.

BDE NAS SDUG BSNGAL DU THOS TE ZHES PA DANG Then Pabongka Rinpoche repeated the day's lesson. Don't forget, this is a book. It's a teaching that Pabongka Rinpoche gave.

I think it was 1921. Something like that. How many days?

24 days? 24 days. He repeated the day's class again.

Then he repeated the class again. It's a tradition. When you take a class in Buddhism, you should try to look at it three times before the next class.

Like yesterday we did the four bodies. If you're a serious student who's remembering hell realms, you would try to just look at it three times before today's class. You don't have to spend an hour just while you're eating breakfast.

You can look at it. Thank you. That finishes the 11th day of the teaching.

We had 23 retreats. 10 day retreats. We're almost halfway through.

Except I'm adding the lamrim chenmo at the end. The great lamrim. There's a part about emptiness, which is very important, and how to meditate.

I'm going to add that to the end. It might get a little longer. We're almost halfway through.

How many years? Six years I think. Maybe it takes 8, 9, 10 more years.

I don't know. If I don't go to the dog's place before then. Okay.

You want to hear the whole story of those two boys? That's why it takes so long to finish this class. I went and got it for you.

It's from the Vinaya Vastu, which is the main book by Lord Buddha about how to be a monk or nun. It's the first book in the Kangyur. I didn't have time to get ready for this class very well, because I had a fire offering, and translating Kamalashila.

It's ancient, ancient words. But I'll try. ,DE LTAR BPA BU GUNG RGA BA ZIN BU BU NYID RAB TU CHUNG NAS, Ananda's sister's two boys became...

What do you call it? Rab tu chung. Yeah, it means you can take robes, but you didn't take novice vows yet.

It's like those seven-year-old boys in the monastery. They didn't take vows yet, but they can wear robes, and they can run around the monastery. They're our telephone system.

,CHUNG NAS LAS NAN DAG BAR BYAS PA, And they spent the whole day doing nothing. ,'DI NYID ZHIG ZHING, ,'DU LA BAB NA, ,'DOD RGYAL BA'I RGYUR BA'I, ,'DI NYID GYI BSTAN DU ZHAG PO, ,'DI NYID ZHING DU DRAG TE, ,GAL TE ZHING NA, ,DE NYID DU ZHUGS PA'ONG, ,TSUL KHRIMS NUS PA LTA BA'I TZAM, ,DE NYID ZHIG ZHING,

[Speaker 2]
,BYUNG PA'I RGYUR DU DANG LA NA,

[Speaker 1]
I can't read it very well, but it says, I think it means they were threatened by something, like a car accident, something they thought they could die. ,RGYAL BA'I RGYUR NI, And then suddenly they thought, maybe I have to be reborn after that.

,ZHING DU DRAG, They got scared. ,GAL TE ZHING NA, ,DE NYID DU ZHUGS PA'ONG, ,BLO NYAMS NAS, And then they thought to themselves, well, maybe it could happen today that I could die. ,TSUL KHRIMS NUS PA LTA BA'I TZAM NAS, Then they were looking for someone who could help them.

,TSUL KHRIMS NUS PA LTA BA'I TZAM NAS, ,TSUL KHRIMS NUS PA LTA BA'I TZAM NAS, So they came to the monk, Madgalyayana, ,TSUL KHRIMS NUS PA LTA BA'I TZAM NAS, And he said, ,SKHAD KYI MTHONG DANG, ,BPHAG PA MTHONG NGO, ,DE NA CI YOD, ,DANG BA BDAG CI SO, Then he said, I'll show you something. And he let them see the hell realms. Then he said, do you see what I see?

And they said, oh Arya, we see, we see. What do you see? DE NA CI YOD, SEMS CAN NYAL BA BDAG GIS SO We see the hells, we see the realms of hell.

DE NA CI BYED What's going on there, he said. And the two kids said, Oh, uncle, people are cutting each other open. People are splitting the bodies of other people.

People are beating people. People are ripping other people apart. BDAG GIS BYIN TE NA, GANG CI NI SOGS LAS BDAG GIS ZHES PA BYED Some people are being cut with a sauce.

GANG CI NI RANG THAG BDAG GIS THAG PAR GYIS Some are being hanged. GANG CI NI SANG PO CHOS KHUNG BA'I BDAG GIS NANG NAS TSUL BA'I RGYUS Some are being thrown into big vats of molten steel. GANG CI NI RANG THAG BDAG GIS, TSUL BA'I RGYUS DE NAS BYAGS KYI SANG PO BYED NI ZHUGS KHO BA'I PHYI PA MTHONG NAS BDAG BYAGS KYI Then they saw two big pots of metal melting, but they were empty.

Nobody's in there. BDAG BYAGS KYI ZHIN NAS, BDAG TU NYID SU YANG MI ZHUGS RGYAL Then they're like, are those for us? DE NAS KYI ZHIN NAS, TSUL YANG MI ZHIN TE We would rather not go.

ZHIN TE, DE LTAR BPAG PA GUNG RGA BA, ZHIN MO BUD DIN RAB TU CHUNG NAS And so he said, okay, now, if you don't... those are waiting for you guys. But if you don't want to go there, let's study more seriously.

CI ZHIN LTOS LA SPANG DANG, DE'I RGYUN BA'I RGYUR YIN, DE NYID KYI RTEN DU ZHAG PA'I PHYIR YOD, And they become very serious monks. Then they became DGE TSUL, novice monk, 36 vows. DE LTAR NYID MED DI DAG TU, ZHIN DAG KYANG NAS DANG PHYIR MO TSUL DUR GYI ZHIN Then the boys became very good advocates for study.

And every time they saw somebody being lazy, they would tell them what they saw. They said, don't do that. We saw what's happening.

LTU BA'I NYID ZHIN GYI RGYU ZHIN, DE NYID ZHIN DU RTZOM PA LHAG PA CHAL ZHIN TZAM, GAL TE SNGAG GROL SEMS CAN GNYEN BAR BRAL NA, NI SEMS SA BA YANG MI BYAS And then it came that in the morning when they woke up, if they remembered what they saw, they didn't want to eat breakfast. They couldn't eat breakfast. GAL TE PHYIR DOR BRAL NA, SEMS NI RGYUD PAR GYUR, And if they didn't remember the health in the morning before breakfast, and they ate their breakfast, and in the afternoon they remembered what they saw, they would throw up the food.

DE NYID KYANG BA SEMS SEMS PAR GYUR PA, Then they got very skinny and very pale. NYAM CHUNG BA DANG, SKYE BA DANG, GANG PA DANG, LUS MA DANG PAR GYUR NI, And they were almost ready to die. DE MED PAR TSAD DANG LDAN PA KUN DGA' BA DE NYID CHUNG BA BYAS ZIN DO, Then Ananda said to Malgayayana, you did a good job.

Now they're serious. Then he said, let's cheer them up a little bit. So you shouldn't go too far.

Buddhism is the middle way. Don't go crazy. I saw at Diamond Mountain, many new people came from places like China to America, and they're all excited, and they're like, oh, I'm going to stay in a cabin forever.

Then after three days they quit. Just like, in English we say, turtle beat the rabbit. They had a race, turtle and the rabbit.

Then rabbit is very like, turtle is like, so our dharma should be like turtle. Then somebody say, you're like, then the rabbit is like, and then he gets tired and he quit. Then finally turtle beat the rabbit.

Srimananda, Swami Srimananda, I like him. He said, should be like a donkey. Just like, persistent.

Then people tell you, do this, do that, blah, blah, blah, blah. You're like, yeah, okay. I'm just doing my practice.

Little yoga every day, little meditation every day. Don't quit. Just like donkey.

I had a donkey when I was a boy. We had a donkey for carrying stuff in the desert. You can beat them and beat them.

They're like, say go, go. Put all the stuff on them. Go for camping.

And they're just like, you hit them when it's thick and they're like. We have to be like that. Don't get all excited.

Oh Geshe Michael, wait a minute. You will see Geshe Michael pick his nose and do stupid things and you will quit. So don't get all excited.

I'm just human. You're just human. We do as good as we can.

And then we become Buddha. That's the way. Not some, budu, budu, budu, budu, budu.

Just every day. Meditate. Do your yoga.

Study a little bit. Reading clubs are great. Shanghai reading clubs are the best.

Okay, we reached the twelfth day.

[Speaker 2]
We'll have a break in a while.

[Speaker 1]
You getting hot yet? No? Not hot yet.

She's sitting in front of the air conditioner. Okay. So every day.

By the way, he taught this book, I don't know, to 500 people before electricity. Okay. And what we covered in six years, they covered in 11 days.

Okay. By the way, people told me during the debate, I can't hear what the other guy is saying. It's too loud in here.

In our monastery, 1,000 monks will be in here. You can't hear anything. And then your voice finished.

And what happens is, your voice gets strong and you become a better teacher. So there's a purpose to all the noise. And you can focus.

You learn to focus. So there's a purpose for everything in Buddhism. We're supposed to make you uncomfortable.

We're doing a good job. CHOS KYI RGYAL PO MTSONGS SKABS PA'I CHEN PO'I BSRUNG MTSONGS SKABS Then when he starts a new day, he always gives some inspiring words from High Lama. In this case, MTSONGS SKABS.

BRAL BYOR NYE DKA'I BRTZE LA LUNG MED PA YID LA BSGOMS PA'I TSE LIS SNANG ZHES SDOMS BRAL BYOR NYE DKA'I To get a chance like you have right now at Diamond Mountain is extremely rare. BRTZE LA LUNG MED PA And you don't have very long to live. You cannot come to Diamond Mountain many times.

It's hard to get here. And your life is short. You cannot do this many times.

YID LA BSGOMS PA'I So get used to that. TSE LIS SNANG ZHES SDOMS So Adam, we should make a dictionary entry on SNANG ZHES. So it's a very unusual word.

You won't see it anyplace else. SNANG ZHES means big interest in this life stuff. Like, oh, I need a new car.

Or they're selling some new shoes at Zara. And I got to get there. I heard there's a new perfume at Sephora.

It's good to have a good perfume. It's good to have nice shoes. And I like a good car.

But don't keep a little bit of your life separate. It's just your practice. I didn't tell you you have to drive a broken car because it takes more trouble than a good car.

You will spend more time on your car. And you should look nice. It's okay.

If you're going to look like a Buddha you should dress up sometimes. You should dance sometimes. You should look cool sometimes.

When you come to their party on the 5th you have to look nice. You have to dress up a little bit. That's okay.

But don't go crazy about it. It's not going to stay very long. You should have a healthy life now and a healthy future life plan.

Both. Then you can be happy. If I die everything is taken care of.

DEN PAR MDZAD NAS KUN LONG CHOS PA DOR DU ZHIG BRTZAL TE Then the Lama asked us, please remember your motivation. Every day before Dharma teaching we should ask the people in the class, please remember why you are here. Why are you doing this stupid ACIP project?

Why are you stuck out in Diamond Mountain in a little cabin cleaning toilets? Sometimes you got to stop and remember you're trying to get the whole world enlightened. You got to remember why you're doing it.

Otherwise you'll quit. When it gets hard you'll quit. Somebody like Tahiya is like super glue.

The harder it gets, the tougher she gets. Sometimes remember why you're doing all these projects and things. When you're exhausted at DCI and somebody says, I didn't do this.

Then you're like, okay, you're one of those people I have to say, I remember. DOR DU ZHIG BRTZAL TE SNGON DU SA BYAS RNAMS GSUM BYAS Then he reviewed some of the SA BYAS. In colloquial Tibetan they call SAP BYAS.

What's a SAP BYAS? Good, it's the outline of what we did so far. Like all the animal realms, all the hell realms, how you die, things like that.

There's a beautiful outline of the whole Lam Rim that people memorize when they have time. They go into retreat and memorize the whole thing. It's all the steps to Buddhahood.

If you want it, I'll give it to you. ,'JIG RTEN PHYI MA RGYUR BAR RDOR BA NYID DU DE DUG BSAM PA, ,SNGON DU SDUG BSNGAL GYI GUR LA GYAL ZHES RDZAD CING, ,SNGON DU SDUG BSNGAL GYI GUR LA GYAL ZHES RDZAD CING, Then he went, you know, the first subject is death, right? We can't live forever.

Then after that, there's only two ways you can go, down or up. So the Lama repeated how unpleasant it is if you have to go down. GYAL ZHES Adam, we should add that.

GYAL ZHES means to review. Or he repeated. GYAL ZHES RDZAD CING ,DE LTA BU DGOS NAS BDAG BAR BRTAN LA NYID PO LEN DUS, Then if your meditation in these retreats is going good, you should feel like I got to use this rental car now.

They have two choices in the rental car. One is you pay per mile and one is you pay per day. So you pay per day.

This is pay per day. How many miles you drive is up to you. You got this car.

There's no limit, mileage. You can do any dream you want. You can build a big bunch of rooms here and a swimming pool for future, all those working on that.

Just they gave you a rental car, they said you can drive anywhere, no limit. It's not per mile, it's per day. Then you got to take a trip.

Use it for something cool. Don't waste a day because you don't have many days. Don't waste any day.

Have a good time. Do lots of dharma. ,LTA LTAN GNYIS PO LEN DUS, ,SNGAN SONG GI SDUG BSNGAL BSAM NAS, ,JIG RTAR CHEN PO CHUNG NAS If you always feel a little bit nervous about what could happen after you die, ,GAL PA'I GAL PA'I PHYI MA BDE BA'I THABS TSUL ,DOD CHUNG NA you will automatically ask the question, who can help me?

Who can protect me? That's the next subject. That's called refuge.

Shelter. Who can help me? There's two parts of the Buddhist practice of refuge.

[Speaker 2]
There's always two parts. I found this cool picture.

[Speaker 1]
Jiggy, maybe. I found a cool picture of me and my three brothers and my mom when we were very young.

[Speaker 2]
You don't have it. I don't think you have it. You have it?

Yeah. Can you give it to... I like it.

There's a basic...

[Speaker 1]
What do you call that? Dynamic. Between four brothers and their mom.

Okay. So we're always fighting. We're always fighting.

We fight without stop. Four boys. No girls.

We are fighting, crazy. And then sometimes one brother will hit the other one pretty hard. The last fight I had with my older brother, we broke the chairs in the house on each other and one window.

And we put a hole in the door. And then we got... We're like 15 years old and then we shook hands.

We said, we have to stop here. And we never fought after that. But when your brother hits you, there's pain.

You're scared. He's going to hurt you. So you run to mom and you hold mom.

You can see the picture. You hold your mom and you're like, he hit me, he hit me. You don't tell her what you did.

Taking Buddhist refuge is the same thing. There are always two things, two causes. They say two causes for refuge.

Number one, you have to be scared. Oh, something bad's going to happen. I could go...

On the way back to Tucson, I could become a dog. I could enter the hell realms before I hit the thing. You know the thing?

There's a...anyway. Before I reach Tucson, I could become a dog. So you shouldn't feel nervous. Then what's the second part?

You have a mom. Mom! Help!

So you believe someone can help you. When there's a fire, you call the fire department. When you have a medical emergency, you call the ambulance.

When you get sick, you go to the doctor. When someone doesn't... businessman doesn't do what they expected, you go to the lawyer.

But in dharma, you go to Buddha. You go to a Buddha. That's the two parts of refuge.

So we're going to spend a long time on that. And we'll be doing it in Thailand. So we'll be discussing these two parts in Thailand.

We'll be in Thailand in December. I just found this picture. I'm on the right.

Every day for two minutes we stop fighting. No, it's... We decided to stop fighting.

So that's a dynamic. So you have a problem and you run to mom and you say, mom help me. That's the Buddhism also.

Say, okay, okay, no. But she had four kids and later she didn't have a husband and she was very beautiful. Very patient.

[Speaker 2]
Very good person. So who can help you?

[Speaker 1]
What's your mommy if you're trying to stay out of the three lower realms? Lama Kway Drol Su.

[Speaker 2]
Three jewels and your lama. Then how you can take good refuge is you have to understand karma.

[Speaker 1]
SITS SBYONG SRID You have to understand SITS. So we're going to study that. SPANG SLUNG TSUL BZHIN BYAS PA NYID Learn what you should do.

Learn what you shouldn't do. So we reached... Like every two years we reach a new subject.

So I'm happy to say you survived that three day retreat and you reached a new subject. And that's a big deal. You can say, I finished the three lower realms and I finished death and now I reached...

This is called how to go to a higher realm or how to stay in a higher realm. So we're going to study for the next year, I guess, how to stay in a higher realm. I don't think financially most of us can go to every lam rim.

I don't think it's possible. Your spouse will divorce you. You will lose your job and then you won't have money to come.

You'll become Dharma bum. And to be honest, if you have money or you have a way to do it, that's okay. That's great.

But you have to balance your life and your Dharma. You can't tell your family, oh, I'll see you in eight years. You have to have a nice balance.

You have to have a happy family. You have to have some way to pay your bills. You shouldn't grub off of other people.

You should make your own way. Have your own income. And it's stressful.

I don't know if I should work this week or I should go to lam rim. You have to balance those things wisely. You shouldn't quit all your job.

You can't live that way. But if you don't hear the Dharma, you will go to hell. So there's a balance.

All of these classes, after they're finished, they go online for free. It's called Knowledge Base. And you can always listen to them over and over.

People, when they're driving to work, they listen to them. Some people listen to them while they're working. So you can have Dharma and money at the same time.

Just kidding. While you're working, you should work. So you can always listen to them.

The ones you missed, you can go to Knowledge Base. It's free. And now they have the Chinese translation also.

It's there. On the ones that were translated. So balance your life.

Don't go crazy. If you do only Dharma, you will quit. After a while, you will quit.

If you do only business, you'll die. So you have to balance. You have to be smart.

Balance those two. Family, you have responsibility. If you got married, if you have children, you made promise to those people.

So you have to keep your promises. DE NA NYID PA JI RTEN PHYI MA BDE BA'I THABS BSTAN PA LA NYID There's two parts to how to stay in a higher realm or go to a higher realm. And this is one of the higher realms.

BSTAN PA LA BCUG PA'I DGOS DAM PA BSKYAMS DOR BYA BA DANG First one is learning how to take refuge. It means how to get an insurance policy that things are not going to go bad when you die. What's the Dharma insurance company who can give you some kind of guarantee?

And then you can be happy. Then you're relaxed. If I get hit by a truck, it hurts for a couple minutes.

Then I know where I'm going. I know who my teachers will be.

[Speaker 2]
I'm happy. It's not a big deal.

[Speaker 1]
I know where I'm going and I know who my teachers will be. Those two things are like two nicest parts of the insurance policy. And then you can relax.

And only an Arya can really relax. They're like, ah, okay. They can listen to music and they're not worried they're going to die in the middle of James Brown or something.

THABS BSTAN PA LA GNYIS BSTAN PA'I DGOS DAM DE LAS THAMS CAD KYI RTZA BA LEN DU YID BYED KYI BDE BA SKYES PA Then we have to study about seeds. How to make good seeds. What are the laws of karma?

Things like that. Those two subjects we're now starting. First one is how to take refuge.

I don't like the English very much. Sometimes I like to say go for shelter or something like Rolling Stones. Shelter.

Give me shelter. We don't say give me go for refuge. I don't know who started that.

But it means find protection. We call it protection in this class. Find protection.

That subject has... By the way, we're going to stop in five minutes and take a pee-pee break. That subject has five parts.

Number one. Why do you want protection? Why?

Why? Number two.

[Speaker 2]
Who can protect you? We're starting a university, right? We're opening in January.

We'll have this stuff up Monday? Or tomorrow? Or today?

Tomorrow? Today? Yeah, I do.

2-7-5? Okay. We'll try to have the website up tonight.

[Speaker 1]
And you can sign up for teacher training. It's a small college. It's a little bigger than a McDonald's.

We don't have any money. But the subject we're teaching is more important than any other university in the world.

[Speaker 2]
Who can help you with the big stuff?

[Speaker 1]
Like death. Who can help you? We'll give you a degree.

Somebody say, what's your degree? And you say, death. It'll be strange.

Number three. What did we say? Oh yeah, number three.

How do you know when you got your insurance policy? Three. What's it look like?

Guarantee. You're okay. You won't go to the three lower realms.

What does it look like?

[Speaker 2]
How do you know I got it? Okay. Then number four.

[Speaker 1]
How cool is it to have an insurance policy? pen yin What are the great things about having your insurance policy? And then number five.

There are some traditional advice about protection. That's just like some heart-to-heart thing about how to have protection.

[Speaker 2]
I'm going to pause there.

[Speaker 1]
First part is why to look for protection. We just have a few minutes. khyam dro nam da'o mi-o rang gyu la khyam dro gyu nam da'o yu me la rak le Whether or not you get a good Dharma insurance policy depends on whether you have the correct causes.

Two causes. khyam dro gyu ni driwa lhag sam rab kar kyi dri le losang she pa'i dayang ne He's going to quote I believe it's this is some question and answer that Tsongkapa students did with Tsongkapa. And he talked about it.

It's called Lobsang's Song or something like that. It's a questions and answers. Sometimes like 600 years ago they will write down the questions and answers of a teacher.

Like my teacher's lama is Chidan Rinpoche and there's a book of question and answer and I like it because my teacher's question is in there. He asked a question to Rinpoche. All right.

khyam dro ngo wa yi tiwa rang ni lhagpa jikpa dang gwang chok kyo pa'i nin den du she le chungway khyam dro la tam je khyam par kye ni she So you who are the omniscient one Buddha I like to call it I don't like the word omniscient. We don't use it in English. We use Mr. Know-it-all. Buddha is Mr. Know-it-all. Literally. So you said Buddha, you said This is a poem by Tsongkapa.

You said the essence of protection is two parts. rang ni lhagpa jikpa Number one, you should be afraid of something. You should be afraid of something.

Number two, gwang chok kyo pa'i nin den du she le and you should understand that the Three Jewels can help you. And we'll talk more today in the debate classes about the Three Jewels. ye choy khyam dro la tam di khyenpa kye ni she This is what you Mr. Know-it-all said was the essence of protection. You have to be afraid of something and then you have to see that someone can help you. And then you will go to them like to your mom. There was I'm sorry, I got the wrong writer.

It wasn't Tsongkapa. I went and looked for it. It was a different Lobsang.

What other famous Lobsang? Yeah, First Panchen Lama. Lobsang Chukyi Gyeltsen.

Different Lobsang.

[Speaker 2]
All right. Yeah, it's by the First Panchen Lama.

[Speaker 1]
je sungpa tar rang korwa dang nyen song du ngel la yin jikpa dang You have to be afraid of the three lower realms and later your fear has to get more sophisticated.

[Speaker 2]
What's that mean? Human life is also scary.

[Speaker 1]
Human life is also bad. Once you have flesh and blood you're in trouble. There's no happy ending for this.

So later your refuge should get more sophisticated where you want to change this into life. By the way, when you're changing into life don't worry. You can still shake hands with people and do other things.

No problem. It's solid but very beautiful. du ngel la jiye yi By the way, when you become a Buddha you can meet all your old family members who died or you can hang out together.

That's also cool. du ngel la yi rang gi long gel nu na jikpa de le kyepa nyipa kwang chok la yupa yi chepa nyi yinpe gyi de nyika tsang gu And then to surrender, to be afraid and to surrender to the three jewels someone who can protect you is the two parts of refuge.

[Speaker 2]
long gel Adam long gel means surrender.

[Speaker 1]
kyun ni lama kyun ni lam kyun ni What is that? Yeah, in the Lama Chupa which we did Friday night, Offering to Lamas. The most famous line someone can find me the page in the Three Treasure Book You're my lama You're my protection You're my shelter You're my god You're everything Okay, here I am Just take care of me In this life and the next even after I die It's very famous in the monastery I asked Michael to take care of Mr. Wu's coming Monday Then in the monastery you just say kyun ni lama kyun ni lam It's you You take care of it It's a joke in the monastery You quote that Lama Chupa and you say It's all up to you I'm headed for vacation So it just means long gel means I just trust you I give everything over to you You take care You take care of it I think we have to stop there So those two causes have to be We'll do some more this afternoon