«Дар освобождения», курс 25 «Совершенное прибежище», занятие 11

[Speaker 1]
All right, let's do some lam rim and then we'll do questions and answers, okay? We're at khyam dro gyu la kye mi kye. khyam dro gyu la kye mi kye yang, de gyu la kye man kye kyi nyen la Whether or not you have refuge within your heart depends on whether or not you have refuge in your heart.

That's what it says. de gyu khyam dro tsik bung ther sak kyang, khyam dro ngo gyu la ma kye pa ten dra mi che pa There's a tradition in Tibet that people will go on a retreat and try to collect a hundred thousand mental offerings, a hundred thousand frustrations, a hundred thousand going for refuge. So he says, it's okay if you want to do that, but it's more important that you feel refuge in your heart by refusing to answer someone who hurts you, right?

dra mi che war de gyu dang lo so, chung ma mayinpa shi gyu la kye tab la be ga So you have to make efforts to think refuge and not talk refuge. Think refuge and not talk refuge. de lang shing gi lo drup sing kway jo la mik ne Now we talked about a little bit about this the other day when we did debate, and here it comes.

Those of you, Nick and Aaron and Adam and Katie, when we were talking about cause refuge and result refuge. de lang shing gi lo drup sing So you can go to refuge to, for example, Buddha, which somebody else already achieved, like Gautama Buddha. You can take refuge in the Buddha who already reached Buddhahood.

That's called gyul khyam dro, means cause refuge. It's acting as a cause for you to become a Buddha. gyul khyam dro tsampo-wa That's called simple refuge.

dang rang gyu la jung gyur gyi gong chok la mik ne de nyi thob chak tha ched pa'i khyam dro kye par That's called normal refuge. And special taking refuge is to try to connect with the Buddha that you will become and take refuge in that Buddha who is still to come. As I said, it's a very sweet practice to talk to yourself, future Buddha, because future Buddha can see you.

Nancy Giovannanza Buddha can see you right now. Sometimes I just like to say hi. And your future Buddha is watching you now.

They're probably asking you to hurry up. nyi ne, re re lang kyepa sung gi sok chok khyam dro chen duk re yul ching Then there's a different level for each lamrim practitioner who takes refuge. rang re shung chenpo tsum chepa nga kyi khyam dro kyepa chen nyi la tsor pa'i gur gyi khyam dro che renpa na nong nyel che chepa dik pen mi thob par phelpa khyenpa gyenpe khyam dro dang kyepa ma jungwa ni tsum chepa kar nang du ma chok pa'i nongpa yin He says there's a difference between the way untrained people take refuge and the way that trained people take refuge.

So he's talking here about phelpa khyenpa gyenpo means like some old person who never got training on refuge, and they will go to the temple and make incense and say, I take refuge like that. But they don't understand how to think refuge. Think refuge is the problems I see are coming from me, so I can change them.

That's real refuge. Like your husband. shung chenpo mi shepa'i khyam kyi nyi tsangway go ne kway jok la lo neng gyel che shung chenpo mi shepa means people who didn't get trained properly.

Buddhists who didn't get trained properly. kyi nyi tsangway go ne kway jok la leng gyel che They can have this emotion that I put all my trust in the Buddha for the two reasons. There are two reasons for refuge.

Very famous. What are they? Number one.

It's like I grew up with three brothers, no sisters, and we had a lot of punching going on from time to time. My brother would hit me. That's the first cause of refuge, is pain.

The second cause of refuge is you think there's someone who can help you. So you run into mom's room and say, Mommy, he hit me. Those are the two causes of taking refuge.

You have a problem, and you have someone you think who can help you. Mommy will go tell brother not to do that. de'i tsul ni, nepa dak gi men da, menpa dang ne-yo la, re du chawa na So when somebody's sick, and they go to a doctor, and they try to take medicine, and they trust the nurses, they put their trust in those three things, doctor, medicine, and nurses.

lo yin tsul jik tar chungwa shen du che te We have to think like them. gyu ni tsaway go ne, kyem ne kor je la, nying ne lo kelwa na We have to make sure we understand why taking refuge. Number one, understand the problems you have.

Even if you don't have any problems now, you're alive. And you won't be for long. That's a problem.

That's already a problem. Being alive is a problem. Even if you don't think you have any problems, you have a problem.

The moment you're alive, you're getting old. The moment you're getting old, you're going to lose this body. And then where you're going to go after that, we don't know.

And this body is very brief and hard to keep alive. kor je la, nying ne lo kelwa kyem drang, nam dak gi la kye pa yinpe, de ni tsul chewa Secondly, I think that the Buddha can help me. nam dak gi la kye pa yinpe, de ni tsul chewa yin kyi Most important is to trust that refuge.

de min kyem druk tsik drang sok dang Then if you don't understand the concept of refuge in the sense of the emptiness, then tsik drang sok che Even if you say a million times, I go for refuge, drang sok dang, rin dzin du kye cheway, chi yang min jun te, rin dzin du kye cheway Even if you think you're a pretty powerful bodhisattva or a pretty powerful tantrica, if you don't have refuge in your heart, then it's not going to work.

ga dam ko ma tsoy she ne, The early Kadampa Lama said, ne ten shal mar sik chik dupa la, da du nampa sang gyepay chel du ma tsoy che sum shin droy yin Here's that famous quotation. I taught you all the ideas already. Now I just want you to hear it from scripture.

ne ten means abbot, elder, like the sixteen arhats. shal is honorific for face. mar sik means he's looking down on us.

The abbot is looking down from his throne. chik dupa la, da du nampa sang gyepay But he didn't become a Buddhist yet. We're hoping he will.

The abbot of the monastery, of one of the big monasteries, maybe 10,000 monks, he isn't a Buddhist yet, but we're hoping he will become one later. It's an old joke. shibpa khyab su songway pen yin la These are the benefits of taking refuge.

I put them at the end of your debate sheet. When do we debate? Tomorrow?

Must be. Some people are debating tonight in their cabin. But here are some of the classic eight benefits for taking refuge.

Not all of them are on your debate sheet, but most of them are. Number one, nampa sang gyepa tsupa If any person who refuses to answer another person who criticizes them because they understand that the person is criticizing them because they answered last time, then that person became a Buddhist. I like to think, 7,000 people came to DCI programs the last two weeks.

If they understood about seeds, they're Buddhists. It doesn't matter what they think they are. It doesn't matter.

They're Buddhists. Got it? It's cool.

That's number one. Number two, you need to take refuge in order to have Buddhist vows. You can't take lifetime vows.

You can't take ten commitments. You can't take monk's vows, nun's vows, bodhisattva vows, tantric vows. You can't take any of them if you haven't taken refuge.

If you don't understand what it is, then you can't... your body won't hold the other vows. Number two.

Number three, NGON SRAGS PA'I LAS KYI BRGYAD PA NAMS SRED PA RGYUR BA All bad karmas that you did are...what do you call it? Disabled by your current understanding. They cannot open.

They will just sit there in your mind stream forever. And they will never open. They are fed by not understanding things.

You see what I mean? Yeah, that's true. Any more?

We call SRAGS MED KYI RGYAS PA SRAGS CES KYI RGYAS PA SRAGS MED CHOS NAMS SRAGS CES SA PHANGS PA'I LAM MA THOB PA'I DU BYED NAMS SRAGS CES GANG CHUB DE DAG LA SA LUNG KUN NUS RGYAS PAR GYUR GSAL MED NAMS KYI BRGYAD PA NAMS BRDUL MED CHOS NAMS GSUNG YIN THAN NGAN GANG DANG NI SGOD PA NI RGYAS LA NGAN MA BDE PA Oh, that's the verse. I'll be done with question. RGYAS PA SRAGS CES means good things you do without understanding what you're doing.

And then those good karmas wear out. And then there's good karmas you do with understanding. Generally, good ones that you do that you appreciate, grow.

Good karmas that you do, ignorantly. And you don't burn them. Selfish is okay.

There's a beautiful debate in the beginning of the Madhyamaka Avatara where Chandrakirti asked the question, will a good deed done by a selfish person work? Will it have a result? And the answer is, yeah, it will.

But then the karma of the bad motivation will catch up with them also. So that's a famous question. But generally, the two things, anger can short-circuit a sin, a good sin.

And misunderstanding can short-circuit a good sin. And understanding can short-circuit a bad seed, like when you do the four powers. Is that okay?

Like that? Anything else? Did I miss something?

I'm just trying not to bias against good, but only the bad things. Say again? Oh, yeah, I understand.

Why isn't the process the same between good seeds and bad seeds? Yeah, that's a good question. Bad seeds get hurt by understanding.

Good seeds get hurt by misunderstanding. Okay. All right.

Number four, when you take refuge and you do something good, it gets stronger. It's more powerful. He says, he adds the word delakdr.

Delakdr means you don't have to put a lot of effort into it. If you're doing good deeds, trying to do the four steps, it works faster and easier. Number five, mi dang mi ma yin gyi nepe mitsupa Things that other people try to do to hurt you and things that spirits try to do to hurt you, don't touch you.

They don't reach you. That's number five. Number six, ngen song du mi duwa You will not go to the lower realms after you die.

Number seven, ne kap dang tar du kyi dun tam je pa'i me du drupa All of your dreams, whether short-term, like financial security, or long-term, like reaching enlightenment, you can reach effortlessly. Effortlessly. pa'i me.

And then number eight, nyer du tsang gya You become a Buddha faster. You reach enlightenment faster. Now he's going to explain those eight in more detail.

Very galupa. I'll go for a while. We're doing pretty well.

Not that well. But I'll go for a while, then we'll take questions. de dak kyang du, che kap shen gyi le mo, tar bu kha tsam dang Then he says, you know, like when we were in Thailand, there was 400 students in the class, in the retreat.

He announced that we're going to get refuge vows and everybody got excited. And the ones that didn't get excited felt pressure to do it anyway because everybody else was doing it. And that's called le mo tsam in Tibetan.

If you're interested, le mo, la da le mo, means, what do you call it? Following the crowd. Following the crowd.

tar bu kha tsam Don't do that. tzig tsam min bar Don't just say that refuge words. nying thapa ne khyab su song te Believe that there's some danger ahead of you and really, really ask them to help you.

Ask the Buddhists to help you. kyang du nam dak gi la nam kye pa na If you take refuge properly with your husband in the kitchen, nam pa sang gyepa tsu you become a Buddhist and de me pa If you don't understand that process, kyang du bum sak and even if you do the refuge prayer 100,000 times, which is a custom, nam par ma tsul it doesn't make you a Buddhist. It won't make you a Buddhist.

ten kyang du sok gur sewa le gyu la kye gur ser khen kun He says, yeah, nowadays you hear people say, I got to go collect... We use a rosary and we say, I go to Buddha, Dharma Sangha. Buddha, Dharma Sangha.

Buddha, Dharma Sangha. And you hear people say, I got to collect it on my rosary, but you don't hear them say, I got to collect it in my heart. I have to collect it in my heart.

nar dakpo gelong atar she There was a monk named Atar from a place called dakpo. dakpo che kyi kyang du sar This is a famous story. There was this guy named Atar and he went with a couple of other guys to like a cave and they all took their rosaries and they wanted to see how many refuge prayers they could collect in like a week.

Then, atar kyi kyang du dun la no sam lekpar korne Then Atar made a mistake. He did them slow and he thought about it. lekpar korne sakpe yun ring kor Then his friends finished their 100,000 like two days before he did and they got irritated with him because they had to wait for him.

shen la bu kyang du tsikdrang sokpa shing le ma chung wa gyokpa chung de The others finished faster because they weren't trying to think about what they were saying. bung te sin du nye wa na When they were close to finishing 100,000 kung tsu atar kyi chang ma long tong ne They got... tongpa here is a useful word.

It means suspicious or paranoid or schizophrenic. Here it means they had a suspicion that atar was too slow, was being too slow. ma long tong ne ji tsam su They asked him, how many are you up to?

Because they didn't want to wait for him. atar kyi kyung tsu kyang du drang ga sok kin yu dam serwa He said, are you just trying to reach a number? Is that all we're doing here?

He criticized his friends. He said, are we just trying to reach a number? serwa tar kyang du, mikpa kyong shin It's okay to do 100,000, but as you do it, you have to imagine taking real refuge.

We're in the kitchen. In some ways, I know the three-year retreatants will agree. Three-year retreat is a little bit of a...

What do you call it? You feel like you don't have all the opportunities you have in the outside world to take refuge. Because no one's irritating you quite at that frequency level.

Except for spiders and stuff. Sometimes I miss people when I'm in retreat because I can't make such good karma. kyang du, mikpa kyong shin, drang sang na ne du minpa'o If you think about what you're saying, then it makes it.

Okay, number two. It acts as a foundation for all your vows. dom sum gang gye lang kyang Whether you take Pratyumoksha vows, Bodhisattva vows, or secret vows.

kyang du Somebody asked me the other day, would you like me to come teach tantra to your students? And I'm like... It's like, you don't have tantra.

We spent, how many years? Seven years doing tantra. And we translated 10,000 pages of tantra.

But we didn't show it to anybody. Okay? Because tantra means secret.

And no, I don't need someone to teach my students secret teaching. Okay. kyang du tsul che du che, gur gyi, de mey par mi kye wa tsom che du che No matter which vows you want to take, kyang du tsom che du che It always starts from taking refuge.

gur gyi, de mey par mi kye wa But if you don't have refuge and you try to take vows, they don't grow inside of you. Okay. per na sa shing ni gang kyem dang, lo tok su shing nak tsel sok kyeway ten yinpa Then I gave you this meditation with a fruit tree.

And the idea is taking refuge is like the nutrients in the soil. And then your vows are like tree. And the fruits of your vows are keeping your vows.

And when the fruits of your vows grow, there's always a little refuge vow in them. So if you don't have that kind of fertilizer in the soil, there won't be fruits. They won't grow.

Where I live, you have to add gypsum and epsom salts and what do you call that stuff? Well, biochar. But anyway, okay.

mi kyewa per na sa shing ni gang kyem So the earth is the foundation of all houses, of all crops, of all trees, of forest, etc. kyeway ten yinpa tar It's like the... Who said that?

Lenin or Marx? The earth is the source of all wealth. The soil is the source of all wealth.

Ultimately, everything comes down in the soil. tar kyem dro ni donpa tar che kyeway she ten yin And ultimately, all vows come down to refuge. Like the soil.

All right then. Number three. All bad karmas you made are cleared away.

kyem dro yu na ngun sakpe le gyi dripa'ang mongpo dzepa gyalpo ma kye de rang gi yab sukchen nyingpo chel mi-yongway dripa togpa tongpa sok tsam me What's a tsam me? tsam me, not tse me. tsam me nga Yeah, five immediate deeds.

If you... There's five things, if you do them, you go straight to hell after you die. First one, kill your mother.

Kill your father. Kill and... Then draw blood from a Buddha in anger.

Okay, not as a nurse. What's the fifth one? Yeah, split the sangha.

kyem dro yu na ngun sakpe le gyi dripa'ang mongpo dzepa So he gives the example of a famous prince named Ajata Shatru. Ajata means not born yet. Shatru means enemy.

Somebody told his father, your son is going to kill you. He's your unborn enemy. When his wife got pregnant, this...

What do you call it? Soothsayer said, your son's going to kill you when he grows up. But still she wanted to have the son, right?

So his name was unborn enemy, Ajata Shatru. And then he killed his father, who was a chim-myong. What's a chim-myong?

Just before Arhat. Don't have to come back. Non-returner.

Just before Arhat. Killed his father. Who's Bimbisara?

Yeah, he sent the Wheel of Life to the other king. What's the other king's name? Yeah, Udayana.

Which is probably Raudrayana, but anyway. chim-myong dzepa tobpa drong drong means he murdered him, his father. And so he committed some...

People like that, nyeway tsam me chepa sangyila khyap su songway ne dripa jangwa There's five deeds you can do that are close to that. He said, if you take good refuge in the Buddha, you can purify this. sanggye kyi tsen tsam gyurpa dang, shir chen gyi do ta bu tsa, tsa re lak dang, gyelpo mangpo dik dip jang Even if you just repeat the name of the Buddha, or your teacher, of course, or you repeat one of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras like the Diamond Cutter or the Heart Sutra, jing kang ching shing ching, pen yin, gyelpo mangpo dik dip jang many eons of bad karmas are erased.

do de ne, pen yin yang yang sungpa tar It's said in the sutras many times. Do you want to know what the five close ones are? I went and got it for you.

Oh man, stop. My computer's cranky. chang sem ne nye sepa'i ne ni pa sepa dang nyeway ni So the five close ones are close to the five real ones.

They have a, what do you call? Sympathy. Sympathetic?

They're sympathetic somehow. chang sem ne nye sepa'i ne To kill a bodhisattva who is close to reaching the goal is similar to killing your father. I'm about to tell you.

I went and looked it up. It's defined as a bodhisattva who hasn't seen emptiness directly yet, but who is going to become a Buddha within a hundred eons. I'll say it again.

A bodhisattva who hasn't seen emptiness directly yet, but he will become a Buddha within a hundred eons or less. To kill that one is called a close five. One of the close five.

Close to the main five. So there's five sam me, and there's five close ones. So that's supposed to be similar to killing your father.

dey shin du ma drak chenpa ma chenpa lo yin gyi sun jungwa If your mother is an arhat, and you rape her, that's close to killing your mother. So it's not as... it's close.

Got it? Pretty bad things. Number three.

LOD PA BAG PA'I SKYES BU SRED PA NA If you kill a person who's seen emptiness, but who hasn't reached nirvana yet, it's close to killing an arhat. CHOS BSTAN ZHUGS PA NI To destroy a temple or a stupa out of anger. DE BZHIN ZHIG PA'I GUS LA NGAN TZAM GYI CHA CHUNG BA It's close to what?

Taking the Buddha's blood out of anger. Making a Buddha bleed out of anger. Only one person has ever done it, by the way.

RGYEN RIM GYI GSHEL DU SDU BA'I SGO MTHOG Now this is a serious one. To misappropriate sangha money. To misappropriate sangha money.

Not to keep your finances carefully. Thank God we have Rob Ruessinger. Otherwise we'd probably do it a million times.

What's that close to? Splitting the dharma. So it's like stealing things from the sangha, using things from Diamond Mountain that you didn't ask permission.

Things like that. So you got to be super careful around sangha's possessions. It's very easy to break.

That's the only one that would be easy for us to break. So you have to be kind of anal about it. Careful about it.

Be super careful about it. Sangha's possessions. Okay, number four, you make great piles of good karma.

By the way, we're going to go for another half hour or so. BAR CHEN GDUG PA LAS KYANG The short version of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutra says, SKYAB SOGS SU RNAMS GCOD NI GZUGS CI NA GANG TSAMS DE YANG NUS DU BYUNG And we had this before. If the good karma you make from taking refuge properly took form, physical form, it wouldn't fit inside this universe.

I was in high school. We had a really cool principal. One day he made all the students go to the football stadium.

We all sat there. Then he said, let me show you something. He drove a car onto the football field and he put some chemical in the carburetor that made all the pollution turn into a red cloud.

It filled the football stadium in about two minutes. We were all like... Because you can't see carbon monoxide, you see?

If you could see it, you'd go crazy. You'd freak out. You'd say nobody should drive any car.

It's everywhere. So the good karma of taking refuge, if you made smoke out of it, it would cover the whole planet. It's huge.

BYAS PA LTAR BSKYEN MDU'O BYAS PA'I PHAN YON DANG GSOS RNAMS PAR GYIS MA LANG BA YOD There's lots of things in Buddhism that are not measurable, not even thinkable. We're going to get to a part in the Diamond Cutter Sutra during Kamalashila where he says... Subruti says, tell me how much good karma you get from studying the diamond cutter.

Buddha looks at him and says, do you value your sanity? You want me to make you crazy? You want to go to the mental asylum?

Subruti's like, it's okay, you can tell me some other time. He said, if I told you how much good karma you make from studying the diamond cutter, you would go insane. It's very interesting.

Kamalashila has a long description of mental illnesses that you can get from trying to imagine how much good karma you get. LHAG PAR SANGS RGYAS NI GZHING KHYER PAR CHEN DU SONG BA'I DE LA SPRUNG PA'I RGYAS TSA KUN NGON NAM DAG GI MA GZIN GYANG SOGS CANG THOB PA'I RGYUR NGES PAR BRAL TE Here is a place in the scriptures where you get sort of a confirmation for karmas that are done without strong intention but are extremely powerful because of the object. You can do something flippant towards your heart lama, not very serious, without much intention, but they are so powerful for you.

They are such a powerful karma for you that it still becomes very serious. That also means, if you make a cup of tea for your heart lama and you are lazy and you don't make it very well, you still go to paradise for 10,000 years or something. There are certain cases where certain objects are so powerful.

Just thinking about Buddha when you take refuge is very powerful, even if your motivation is not very strong. It's just the power of the object. GZHING KHYER SOGS CANG THOB PA'I RGYUR Therefore, it will, without question, become a cause for you to reach enlightenment.

Even if your motivation is lousy. SNYING RJE'I BSTAN PA'I MA GAR BUR DO NAS We did this part already. This is the Lotus Sutra.

Lord Buddha is saying something very similar to what Jesus said about if the soil is fertile, and if there's no stones, and if you plant a seed, and you water it, and you don't want it to grow, it's still going to grow. You can't stop it. If you even just think about the Buddha, the karma is so powerful that you will get enlightened very quickly.

Just daydreaming about the Buddha. Even if you don't want to become a Buddha, you will have to be a Buddha. All right.

I'm going to skip the rest of that part because we covered it. RGA MTSAN PA BDE BU DE BDE BU MA YIN PA RGYUR RAM Do you think that the fruit, the apple that grows on a tree after you plant an apple seed and it grows into a tree, do you think that if you don't want it, it's going to become not an apple? NYES PA LUS MA MI GRUG PA'AM GSOL BA BYAMS PA'I DE MA LAG SO No, I think it would still be an apple.

DE BAR BSHAD PA MA LAG SO GANG TZAB PA ANG NGAN DA Even if you're a person who is all caught up in samsara, all day long trying to get money, trying to buy new clothes, get your new Maserati, church in Sipa Lagawa, and that's all you want. But if you accidentally make an offering to a Buddha, and then you say, I don't want to be enlightened, I don't want to reach nirvana, you're still going to reach nirvana. Okay, got it?

Very powerful object. RGYUR BA'I GNAS MED GNAS MED, by the way, here, no place, right? RGYUR BA'I GNAS MED means it means utter impossibility.

It's completely impossible. GONG KHAB MED KYI KUN DGA' BA SANGS RGYAS LA SKYES PA'I DGE BA'I RTZA BA DE DAG MI BDOD KYANG Even if you don't want it, ANG NGAN NA you will reach nirvana. I say, if anyone asks you who says it, I said so.

Okay? The last thing Buddha says, I said so. I said so.

Okay. DE LTAR CI THAG TU SANGS RGYAS CHEN PO'I DE LA SEMS GCIG SKYES PA'I DGE BA'I RTZA BA SKYE PA DE DAG THAMS CAD KYI BDE BA'O NGAN NGAN LAS DE PA YIN TE THAMS YANG NGAN LAS DE PA BAR DU Then he repeats himself. He says, any good karma you make thinking about the Buddha will make you reach nirvana and nobody can stop it.

Two more. Hang in there. I already told you that one.

If you take refuge, you cannot be touched by spirits or humans who want to hurt you. We talked about the demon with the rope. We talked about all of those.

I don't know why we talked about those. We talked about Anadapindana. We talked about the bridge where the demons couldn't get by.

We talked about the thief who said, I'm glad there's no more than three. Okay. RANG RES KHYER LA THUG NA JIGS BYAG MI BYAS PAR We talked about that.

It looks like we came up with a popular... Yeah, we finished that. Yeah, we finished that.

Okay. We finished that. Okay, here's where we are.

Let's do a little bit more, okay? You okay? You were hoping for the popcorn after ginseng.

We're up to SBYO BO CHEN J-O-B-O-C-H-E-N There you go. SBYO BO CHEN PA'I KHYAMS ROL DANG LAS MDZAD KHO NA GNAS BYAS BAR ZIG NAS BSTAN PA'I TZAN LAM Then Lord Atisha, who helped bring Buddhism to Tibet, he considered refuge and the teachings on karma to be so important. He almost didn't teach anything else.

Okay. I had a... I was watching this sitar teacher online.

There are maybe a couple hundred standard ragas. And his advice was... He said he had only mastered two so far.

And he's like 80. In his life, only two songs he had mastered. And it's like that.

Atisha only mastered two subjects, karma and taking refuge. People used to call him Venerable Refuge. They just decided not to call him Atisha.

They said, I'm just going to call you Mr. Refuge. Do you know what Scott's secret name is? It's called Including Shavasana?

It means, we say, we're going to do yoga for an hour. And he says, Including Shavasana? Okay.

His name is Including Shavasana. All right. Lama Lende.

And then other people called him Venerable Refuge. Venerable Karma. They didn't call him Atisha.

Because he only talked about karma and taking refuge. So what you did, so Jogwa Senpai. He heard it.

He heard about this joke. People calling him Mr. Karma or Mr. Refuge. And he said, even my name helps the teachings.

Then, RANG RIGS CI DGA'I BLAG TU MI KHYAL BAS SKAD RDZO BSGOM BLO BYAS PA BAS So he says, when you get to the day of your death, don't try to remember some deep tantric thing that you didn't practice very well in your life. You got the teaching, you didn't practice it, and now you're dying. Don't try to do it.

Give it up. Just take refuge. That's better.

KHYAM SGRO RNAMS BDAG BYAS Just take a good refuge. RE GCIG LA NGAN TSUL MI STON BA THAG SPYOD PA YIN TE Then it's a decided, foregone conclusion that you cannot be born into the lower realms. SANGS RGYAS DBANG GIS GZHAN NAS There's a place in Tibet called Wun.

This lama's name was Sangye Wunten, teacher from Wun. And he's very early. SANGS RGYAS DBANG GIS GZHAN NAS SDOR NA PHYI BA MI RTAG PA BDAG GIS RGYUD LA MAR GYI NA SANG BA RDUG PA MI SAB STE PHYI BA RGYUD LA SKYE BA'I TSE KHYAMS RLUS TSIGS KUN GSAGS PA YIN SDOR NA PHYI BA MI RTAG PA If you have not spent time doing death meditations, do you remember any death meditations?

At the end of your book? He says, if you haven't done your death meditations, BDAG GIS RGYUD LA MAR GYI NA then you decide you're getting, you're on your deathbed. You say, oh, I'm going to do guhyasamaja.

I need something powerful. I'm going to do tantra on my deathbed. MI SAB STE MI SAB means it won't help.

PHYI BA RGYUD LA SKYE BA'I TSE If you're going to die suddenly, if you get in a car accident or something, there was a couple of people who left Diamond Mountain. One of them hit a cow on this road. You have to be careful.

He broke all the bones here. Do you remember, did you go through that place with the big rocks, halfway to Tucson? Another lady, her car fell off and went down in Texas Canyon.

David stump-flipped his truck on the dirt road here. Three people have almost died going home from retreat. Got it?

Understand? If suddenly you're sitting there in Texas Canyon with your car on top of you, take refuge. Buddhadharma Sangha, Buddhadharma Sangha, Buddhadharma Sangha.

Okay? Then at least you'll be born where there's lots of pearls. Okay.

CI SANGS PA'I SGRUB PA'I THABS KYANG KHYAMS RDO LAS LHAG MED BYANG SEMS LA BRTEN BA'I CI SANGS SGRUB PA'I THABS KYANG If you want a method for getting your hopes, getting your wishes, fulfilling your wishes, wishes come true, KHYAMS RDO LAS LHAG MED There's nothing better than taking refuge. Then there was a bodhisattva named Raddenwa. Raddenwa is a famous monastery where Tsongkapa wrote the Lam Rim Chomol.

Founded by... Dromtengche. Thing.

Yeah. Raddenwa. BYAS TSONGKAPA'I NGOS BLO I'm sorry.

He was a disciple of Tsongkapa. Somebody translated it wrong in some translation of this book. He wasn't a student of...

Somebody said that he was a student of Tsongkapa and he was born the same year. RDE BA'I GZHAN GYIGS TSUL KHRIMS KYIS BRJOD PA'I NA Then he said, MI LA RE BA MA BYAS LHAG LA SU BA THOB That, I guess it was a... What do you call it?

A saying in Tibet? Like a stitch in time saves nine or something like that. It was a saying in Tibet.

MI LA RE BA MA BYAS Don't have much hope in people. Ask the gods for what you need. SU BA THOB LUS SKYES PA'I DANG PA BDAG GIS NAS RGAB THAG TUGS KYI BDEN THAMS CAD LA LHAG KUN GYUR SU MA SU BA THOB NAS DRUB PA If you're hoping for a new job or you want your business to do better next year or you want your husband to wash the dishes next year, then take refuge and strange dreams come true.

If you want your wife to wash the dishes, you can do the same thing. Okay. SNGAR DANG DU MI CHIG GI GAM CHUG TSOD PA SOGS KYANG DI LA BRTEN NAS RGYAL BA CHUNG Then he tells some stories.

One guy had a lawsuit. It's called GAM CHUG. He took refuge and he won the lawsuit.

SNGIR DU TZAG RGYAL BA YANG Also, if you want to just get enlightened, BDAG DAG KHYIM DANG PHYIR BA LA BSTAN PA'I PHYIR RGYUL THUGS KYI BRTEN PA'I BRTZON DU KHYING NGES GANG PHYIR YANG No matter what bad thing happens in your life, if you immediately take refuge, if you get used to taking refuge, then when you have a problem, it will come up in your mind about the second husband. BSKOM PA DE'I RJES SU SBROR BA'I PHYIR GNYIS YIN PAS Generally, whatever you think about a lot comes up in your mind when you have a problem. BLO NI GANG SGOM PA DE'I RJES SU SBROR BA'I PHYIR YIN PAS CI KHAR YANG SANGS RGYAS RJES SU BRTZON PA SOGS BYUNG DE If you happen to get in an accident and you're dying, try to take refuge.

SDOGS SDUG BSNGAL TZIG GI RGYAL PO LAS What's that sutra? SDUG BSNGAL TZIG GI RGYAL PO Samadhi Raja. It's the source of meditation instruction that Kamalashila gives, for example, in his steps of meditation, which you guys finished in the first Kamalashila.

You did it too fast. DE BZHIN RGYAL BA YIN NI DGOS BYED DANG Try to surround yourself with images of the Buddha. Put them on your heater.

Heater, right? So a cup is on your heater. I took a shower today.

She's got mantras all over her shower. It's a good idea. I was enjoying the mantras because it was too early to have hot water.

Now it's my fault. I should have done it yesterday. YES SHES PAR THU MED PA'I THUB RANG BRJAN Try to remember the Buddha.

Think about the Buddha from time to time. RTAG PA RJES SU BRTAN PA KHOM BYAS NA Things that you think about on a regular basis. DE LA SEMS SHOS RAB TU PA PA RGYUR Your mind goes to them automatically when you have a problem.

LUS DANG SNGAGS DANG YOD RAB DANG MA YIN RTAG TU SANGS RGYAS BDAG GIS SNGAGS PA SPYOD Then once in a while, just say out loud in your house when nobody's there, Oh, Buddha, you're so cool. Seriously, I'm not kidding. Go take a walk in Diamond Mountain and just yell, Buddha, you're so cool.

And they really like it because it means you believe them. You believe they can hear you. They like it.

Every once in a while, just you're driving in your car and you get stuck at the Holland Tunnel, just say, Buddha, you're so cool. Instead of sitting there like this, might as well use the time. They really like it when you do stupid stuff like that.

Who does that except Buddhists? Really good Buddhists. Just blurt out, Buddha, you're so cool.

Talk to them. They can hear you. The world will think you're crazy and the Buddhists will think you're enlightened.

Which is better? Don't do it in the store or something. NYIN TSE BDE'I RGYUD BSTAN BSGOM PA MTHONG And then you never know, you might run into Buddhists.

You might run into Buddhists. NAM ZHIG DE NI NA ZHING MI DE NA When people are sick, ZHIG LA THUB PA'I SDUG BSNGAL TSOGS BYUNG NA When they think they're going to die, SANGS RGYAS LA NI BRTAN PA MI NYAMS TE The Buddha, thinking about the Buddha will come to you. You're so cool.

SDUG BSNGAL TSOGS PA'I THOB PAR YONG MIN GYUR And then you can die with a beautiful smile, happily. All right. One more sentence, then we'll do, what do you call it?

Questions. And after that we have a special section on how to go for shelter. DER MA ZAD KYI SKYE BA THAMS CAD DU BDAG SBYOR THO If you take refuge regularly, you will always be born in a good place.

BDAG SBYOR, right? You'll have lots of chances to practice Dharma. You'll be surrounded by nice people.

People will... There will be DCI programs in your city every half hour. SKYE BA THAMS CAD DU You will meet the Buddhists.

You will have protection. SKYE BA THAMS CAD DU You will never be born without taking refuge. THA THUB LAM LA BSLAB NAS KHOR SBYOR GSUM RANG RGYUD LA GRUB TE NUS DU TZAM RGYAL BAR OM And then quickly you will reach Buddhahood.

All of this if you just take refuge. Where? In the kitchen.

In the kitchen. Don't forget. You got something special.

The whole world thinks they do this at the temple, right? And you understand that you do it in the kitchen. I like it because you can get more to eat there than at the temple.

Okay, we have a few minutes for questions. Joel's going to choose, not me. So if he doesn't choose you, it's his fault.

[Speaker 2]
I just took refuge.

[Speaker 1]
Geshe-la, a practical question. I have a close team member in my team who is also a DZS student and come to Lamrim before. But they are...

You know that nowadays there are a lot of this new age thing and they do healing business. Like they can see people's chakras energy and they can tell you, you should do this, you should treat your parents well. They tell people nice things to do.

So today you were talking about not mixing things like science versus science with seeds. I have been keeping my mouth shut because they also need to do this job to make money. But when I tried to do the DZS project with these team members, I see their worldview also affect other team members because we are all new.

So I don't really know what to do. Should I just stop them? I don't know what to do.

And they are very close friends. It's easy to get your mind into a bind about it. You say, should I kick them out?

Or should I talk to them? Or should I shut up and hope they change? It's easy to get your mind caught in a knot of choices.

And the Buddhist method, the taking refuge method, is to examine if you are doing anything like that and stop doing it. And then they will stop. Because they are coming from you.

So you must be doing something, small, small thing, which is similar in taste. You must be doing something like that. Small, small.

Because karma grows every day, right? So you are not doing what they are doing, but you are doing something small. And I don't know what it is, but if you focus your energy not on this other person and not on the choices you have to correct them, but rather focus on how you might be doing something similar in a tiny way, they will change immediately.

It's kind of cool. So don't let your mind get, should I do this or that? Just find something similar inside of you.

Avoid it slightly and they will stop. Any other questions?

[Speaker 2]
We have seven more minutes. Well, thank you for teaching us Geshe-la. Yes, dear.

[Speaker 1]
I didn't see dear here for... I've been coming here for 17 years. We just saw four.

Only four? I didn't see one. Ah, okay.

No, not in the valley.

[Speaker 2]
I didn't see in the valley. I saw him over here. Well, I went to the first retreat in Guadalajara.

Monica took me. And I didn't understand anything. But now I am very, very happy that now I understand.

And I know it's going to change my life. Thank you very much for that. Yay!

Thank you. And thank all the lovely people that make this possible. Yeah, thank you.

[Speaker 1]
Thank you for coming.

[Speaker 2]
This beautiful sangha. Yeah. Well, two of my closest people in my life died in the term of last year.

My mother, a year ago. It was a big, big and sad loss. And last week, my closest friend, 32 years of friendship, he died too.

And both of them died sedated. They died what?

[Speaker 1]
They sedated.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, my mother from pneumonia. And they had to put some tubes and sedate her.

And my friend, he was sedated too. I know that you have to take refuge by yourself. And I don't know if it's possible, like, in that instance to do something for them.

They are gone now. But if I have the same situation in the future, is there something we can do to try to do something for them in that last moment, even though they are sedated? Or in the other case, if they are awakened and they are in the steps before the death meditation, what can we do for them to try to do something for them to go to have another opportunity?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good question. I had this problem with my dad. He got lung cancer.

And they did a terrible operation. Maybe you heard of it. It's where you cut the back and you break all the ribs.

And then you try to cut the cancer out. But they broke his ribs, they opened him up, and they said, ah, that's not going to work. And they just closed him back up quietly.

And I sat with him while he was dying for a couple weeks. He was in a lot of pain, and he was taking Brompton's solution. Maybe Connie knows.

It's morphine, heroin. It's a cocktail of heavy drugs. But he could still talk with me.

We say it's very similar to Catholic faith. We believe it's very, very correct, what the Catholic tradition, to confess to a priest just before you die. We believe that's an extremely cool idea, and very helpful.

So if you can get the person to think about things they did to hurt people, and just in their own heart they kind of say, I'm sorry I did that. So my father, in his case, in World War II he killed many people. He never talked about it, but I knew about it.

And then I asked him, he's dying, you know? He's going to die in a few days. I said, Dad, would you do that again?

And he said, no, no, I wouldn't go. I would refuse to go. I would never do that again.

So then, according to Buddhist belief, he was giving that up. He was apologizing for it. Then he died very well.

So one thing is important for people who are dying. He wasn't religious. I'll tell you a funny story.

When he was hunting deer in Utah, he slipped and he fell on a rock. Then he went to the hospital, Mormon hospital, and they took an x-ray. The doctor came in and said, you're so lucky you fell down and hit your ribs because we took an x-ray and now we know you have cancer.

God's glory. My dad was like, why the hell did God give me cancer, man? He was so funny.

So anyway, he wasn't religious. He didn't take any interest in religion, but in his final days, he apologized for hurting people. We believe that's a very good way to die.

So I think that's one thing you can do when people are dying, is to try to get them to forgive other people who hurt them and think about who they hurt and apologize for it, even in their own mind. So that's good. If they're sedated, or even after they stop breathing, they can still hear you.

In that case, we try to do mantras. We do just some kind of mantra. During that, mantras have a way to reach the core of the brain and help the person, even though they don't think about it.

So if your father believed in Hail Marys or something, then you should do Hail Marys quietly in their ear. Then it will bring back all these memories of Jesus or things like that. So something they can relate to.

If they're Buddhists, you can do OM MANI PADME HUM. If they're Catholic, you can do Hail Marys. Whatever they grew up with, whisper it in their ear.

They can hear that. Then after they die, for 49 days, they can hear you. We believe they can hear you for 49 days.

Again, it's kind of a cool custom to just talk to them. We believe they can see you, but they can't touch you, and it frustrates them. It's like they are separated by a piece of glass.

So they can see you crying. They can see you at the funeral. They're trying to bang on the glass, and you don't hear it.

They get really frustrated. So if you talk to them, and try to remind them of good things they did in their life. Like, Dad, do you remember when you took me to see my aunt who was sick?

Or Dad, do you remember when you saved that guy's life? Remind them of good things they did for you and did for other people. So even though they're sedated, or even though they're dead, they can still hear you.

So you can still do a lot. You can still do a lot. They say you shouldn't make loud noises, or scream, or things like that.

You should try to be calm. It makes them happy. But that thing about talking to people who died is a very beautiful practice.

I had a woman whose daughter died very young, and she started to talk to her about 20 years ago. She's still doing it. She's still doing it.

And she's very, very happy. She's really happy. And she feels like it helped her daughter a lot.

They can hear you. Okay, one more question. Joel decides.

Then we go to bed. Yay! Thank you, Joel.

Thank you, Geshe-la, for your beautiful teaching.

[Speaker 2]
You're welcome. And my question is, as you mentioned just now, you say because the Buddha is a very special treasure object, so even though we haven't got the pure motivation, we can plant the good seed to...

[Speaker 1]
Get enlightened. Yeah, get enlightened. But also, you told us Buddha is just a little genie.

Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
He's not a real Captain John. So I got confused about it. It's kind of a contradiction.

This is the first question. And second, we haven't got any Buddha, or we treat everybody like a Buddha, like we understand emptiness, so we treat everybody like a Buddha, so we can plant this kind of seed, even though we haven't got the pure motivation?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
Like, for example, if I treat you like a Buddha, even though I have some selfish motivation, but I serve you, I work for you, and I haven't got good motivation, can I plant the seed to get enlightenment?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, it's true. There's many stories of a student who treat their Lama like a Buddha, serve them like a Buddha, and the Lama actually taking advantage of them. Lama just wants money.

Lama just wants attention or other things. But the student, from student's side, they treat Lama like a Buddha. Then the Lama go to hell, and the student become a Buddha.

There's many stories like that.

[Speaker 2]
But my question is, if I, as a student's side, I have some kind of bad motivation, not pure.

[Speaker 1]
Nobody has pure motivation. Nobody. If you have pure motivation, you won't be here.

Every person born in this world who is not a Buddha, who's pretending to be a normal person, every normal person here, got here because they don't have a pure motivation. The proof that a person is defective is that they're here. All of us.

Lama has, a really good Lama has 98% bad, and normal people have 99%. Okay. We're all the same.

Or we wouldn't come to this place. This is not a good place. This is where they send all the stupid students.

This is a special classroom. So anyway, we never have a really pure motivation. It's impossible.

We can't have. So, it's useful, as you said, to imagine as many people around you as Buddha as you can. And tantra is all about that.

That's a big subject in tantra. So yeah, if you even just pretend the people... Geshe Michael is the last person in this room who's not a Buddha.

All those people come to DCI program, they're all Buddha. And they just come there so Geshe Michael will talk about Buddhism. So it will help Geshe Michael.

You see what I mean? And they are very kind to come and pay the money, and volunteer, and rent the place. And it's all just a big show.

And they're just hoping Geshe Michael will do what he talks about. So we can all finish and have Buddha party. He's the last one left.

That's okay. That's great. Yeah, that's true.

That's tantra. It's called using the result as the path. So you decide everybody's Buddha already, except me.

And treat them all like Buddha. And then you become Buddha. Cool?

Good question. Thanks, Krishna.