«Дар освобождения», курс 25 «Совершенное прибежище», занятие 12

[Speaker 1]
Then relax your forehead, and relax the corners of your mouth, relax your eyelids, relax your fingers. Then smile. Try to keep that smile.

And then come to your breath. Long exhale. Then just invite your heart teacher to come sit in front of you.

Could be someone from the past, historical teacher, or someone you knew earlier in your life. Could be someone you haven't met yet, the perfect teacher for you. Or it could be someone that we are fortunate to have in our life now.

And let them come sit with you, quiet and peaceful and enjoyable. And bow down to them by thinking of something you really like about them. You can tell them in your heart what it is.

Then make them an offering, maybe. I think it's a very, very good offering to offer the three-day retreat you do. So those retreats are very, very important in your life.

It's good if you can do at least two or three per year. A weekend or five days. Offer that beautiful practice to your teacher.

Then open up your heart to your teacher. Almost literally split it open. And show them something you're not so happy about, about yourself.

Some bad habit. Ask them to help you get over this. Then think of some good habit you have.

Tell your mama. Thank them. And really try to enjoy this good side of yourself, this good part.

It's important. Then ask your teacher to teach you. Share with you.

But at the same time appreciating that they are coming for me. And you will have to share with others to have a good teacher. Then ask them to stay in your life.

Keep influencing me for the better. Then I'd like you to think about something you would like to achieve in your life. During the next month.

During May. May is a beautiful time in most parts of the world. Of new beginnings, spring.

And think of some change you'd like to make in your life. Or some goal you'd like to reach. Personally I have this dream of making more time to do the things I want to do.

It's not that I feel nervous or pressured. I just would like to do more things. I'd like time to slow down a little bit.

Have more time during the day to do the many things I enjoy. So try to decide on some goal for the next month. Could be a negative goal.

Could be I'm having trouble getting along with this person. I would like to... By the end of the month I'd like to be their friend.

Something like that. Then consciously take refuge. Decide, oh, I will take refuge to reach my goal.

Or I will take refuge to solve this problem I have. And really refuge is deciding that this thing you want, or this thing you want to improve, is empty. It's not going to be one way or the other by itself.

It's not going to happen. It's going to follow your seeds and make a little plan in your mind. Four steps, always four steps about achieving this dream you have.

So take it slow. Just relax your body. Park your body.

Go through the four steps slow. Sometimes I think we don't even have time to think about them. And make a little plan for yourself for when you go home from this beautiful place.

And how am I going to take refuge by using the four steps for this dream I have for May, the month of May? Don't forget to plan your coffee meditation in the evening for the month of May. It's a good way to fall asleep, thinking about good things you've done.

Helpful for other people. Didn't ask you, Lama, to come to your heart. You know what to do.

Bring them down your central channel and bring them into a tiny globe, crystal globe, the size of a grain of sugar in your heart. And please come back to your breath. Three long breaths.

Three long exhales. Don't open your eyes yet. Then you can open your eyes.

Take a stretch. Actually this part of the lam rim is the vows, the twelve vows of refuge. I taught them a little bit in Thailand.

Try to learn them today well, because then you can teach them to other people. All of you can give vows to other people. Anybody in this room can give refuge vows to other people.

You don't have to be a monk or a nun. You can give refuge vows. It's a very sweet gift to give to someone.

It's cool to give people a new name. It's like baptized over again. Born again.

You get a new name. You can do it. Anybody here can do it.

But I think it's nice to know the refuge vows. And I don't give people refuge unless they heard the vows correctly first. Okay?

So you should know the vows. You shouldn't give refuge unless you've explained the vows first. There's a bad custom in the world of lamas giving tantric initiations to people they don't even know.

It's supposed to be a very close relationship between the student and the teacher. It binds them together forever. It's more serious than getting married.

So you should know the lama, and the lama should know you for many years before they give you initiation. There's some like, what do you call it? Just kind of like good luck initiation.

That's okay. Give to 5,000 people or something. Like the Kalachakra.

That's okay. That's a different thing. That's called Mendokpay Sabud.

What's that? Yeah, plan an unstoppable seed for the future. They can get a real initiation.

So that's okay. That's okay. But in general, if you take a secret initiation or you give one, you should explain the vows.

Because any anuttara initiation, higher initiation that you get, you have to take the vows. Whether you know about them or not. You get the vows in the initiation.

And then oftentimes, some teachers, it seems like they don't teach the student the vows. And if you don't keep the vows, you get terrible trouble. And if you keep them, the tantric initiation works.

And the vows are based on, guess what? Refuge vows. Plain old morality.

And being nice to other people. Anyway, it's kind of weird. I heard of a lama.

Someone met them in the airport. Some big lama. And they were leaving on a plane in 20 minutes.

And they said, will you give me refuge? And they like, blah, blah, blah, blah, and gave them a name and got on a plane. And that's not good.

You should explain the vows. So anybody in this room, and all the centers, Singapore, New York, you can give refuge vows. It's very sweet.

But you should explain the vows before you give them. So don't do the ceremony in a rush. Take two, three hours.

Have a nice big breakfast. And explain the vows slowly, carefully. Answer all their questions.

And then take refuge. Okay? Good?

Like all Pratyamoksha vows, you only have to take them once in your life. And technically you cannot take them again unless you lose them. But sometimes for good luck I will give people refuge vows again.

Just for good luck. But technically you keep them your whole life. You can't lose them.

All right, here we go. Unless you decide to give them up. That's your choice.

Are you okay? Yeah. SNGAGS PA BSKYAB SU SO BA'I BSLAB BYA LA GNYIS Here are the rules.

Here BSLAB BYA doesn't mean trainings. Here BSLAB BYA means rules. For taking refuge.

SO SO BSLAB BYA DANG THU MONG GI BSLAB BYA Then there are individual rules and there are combined rules. Anybody want to guess what that means while I drink my coffee? What do you think?

But what's it mean? Think of the twelve refuge commitments and give me a better answer. You know my stuff, I think.

No. There's a set of refuge vows that are particular to a different jewel. This one's for Sangha jewel.

This one's for Dharma jewel. This one's for Buddha jewel. And then there's refuge vows that combine all the jewels.

Okay, here we go. Number one. DANG PO NI These are, if you notice, the refuge vows start off with negative vows.

Don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. Then they go into positive vows. DANG PO NI SANGS RGYAS LA BSKYAMS SU SONG NAS This is refuge vow number one.

Once you have taken refuge in the Buddha jewel, JIG RTEN PA'I LHAG LA BSKYAB CHU LA SOGS MI BYAS Don't take refuge in other useless things. That's all. Like cell phone.

For you guys, taking refuge is going to be harder. If the student was not trained, ZHUNG CHEN PO LA THOS PA MED NA If they don't have training in the great teachings like Nagarjuna or Tsongkapa, then you can say, don't go to Baptist church if you're Catholic, or something like that. That's a simple and low way to explain it.

You guys have a more serious responsibility. You have to try not to think of things as coming from themselves. Like cell phone doesn't work from its own side.

Cell phone works because you helped a couple that was arguing, or you helped someone communicate with their parents better last week. That's why your cell phone works. You can drop your cell phone and it will work if you have the right seeds.

I dropped my computer yesterday. Boom. It's fine.

Cell phone works if you help other people communicate. So your responsibility as super well-trained refuge takers is to try to not take refuge in things. Take refuge in doing good.

The world is made of kindness, not atoms. That's our viewpoint. So that's the first vow.

Once you take refuge in the Buddha, don't take lower refuges. It doesn't mean that you can't take medicine, or it doesn't mean that you can't go to a marriage counselor. Okay?

It doesn't mean that. Yes, sir?

[Speaker 2]
Thank you for teaching. In the beautiful meditation we did just now, where we wanted to focus what we wanted to achieve in pain, I realized that whatever popped into my mind was a kind of refuge, before applying refuge to it.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good.

[Speaker 2]
So I'm like, when I'm going to refuge, I'm wanting this stuff.

[Speaker 1]
Well, that's fine.

[Speaker 2]
That's fine?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. I mean, the purpose of refuge is to get all the things we want. And the books always say, ne kap dang tar tu.

The things we want. I want a coffee this morning. I want a certain kind of coffee, AeroPress, with one and a half the normal coffee, like we discussed it before I came to class.

And that's okay. You know, this Buddhist thing that you should be unhappy, or you shouldn't go shopping, or Starbucks is evil, or, you know. Try to get over that.

Yeah, it's fine. Cool, thank you. Yeah, want things, then get them in a beautiful way.

Okay. These Buddha paradises, they're not like cement rooms with no furniture. Okay?

Got it? They're always like, there's coffee in there somewhere. These fruits here are the sense objects.

All right. All right. ,GYAB BYUNG BA SOGS MI PHYIR, ,LTA LTA DGE SLONG DGA RES KYANG, ,DRA MA GRIG ZHIG BYUNG NA, ,'U THUB PA NA, ,JIG RTEN PA'I LHA BRTAN, ,TSAR GSUNG NAS He was referring to some...

A lot of this book is cultural. Tibetan cultural. It doesn't apply directly to us, but maybe we can find something there.

So in a Buddhist monastery in Tibet, monks will, if they get a small problem, they will take refuge and try to use the Four Steps. Then if the problem gets more serious, they'll go to fortune tellers and get their, what do you call, fortune told, and weird people. I saw it in the monastery.

We have an oracle. In our monastery, we have a really good oracle. People will go to this oracle.

One day I was asked to translate for the oracle. He was the secretary of the monastery. He's very nerdy.

I don't know, like Tim or something. He's a very mild and happy guy. He's quiet.

He works very nice. He was the secretary. Then once a month he'll do the oracle thing.

He goes to a special temple, a small temple, and he wears a whole ancient warrior's outfit with a sword. The real thing. Then he goes into a trance.

He's like, You have to stay away from him because he can actually hurt you. Seriously. You have to be in the room, but you got to watch because sometimes he'll go crazy.

He hurts people. You got to be careful. He's just controlled.

He's like, stuff coming out. So I was asked to translate for this Canadian lady. I went in there and I was like, stay back, okay?

I'll stay between you and the guy. There are all these monks there. Then she asked him, she was trying to find a boyfriend or something like that.

So she came in and we did this, we started the ritual. There are actually two or three guys holding him down, try to hold him down. It takes two or three big guys.

He's not a big guy, but when he gets the oracle inside of him, you need... So we started and he was like... These guys are holding him and he's got this sword.

Then I said, okay, ask a question. She says, you know, I'm really looking for a partner in my life. He's like...

He's like, okay, first, decide what you want. Number two, choose somebody else. Number three, serve them at Starbucks.

Number four, do coffee man thing. She's like, okay, okay. Then he's like, don't forget, study long rib.

Study long rib. She's like, okay, okay, I'll do, I'll do. Then I'm like...

It was so funny. Then she was in the monastery for like three weeks, listening to long rib. It wasn't enough.

She wanted to hear it from an oracle. So don't be like that. He says, some monks, they get a problem.

They go to some weird guy and then, you know, oh, tell me my future. In China, you guys do it a lot. It's a waste of time.

My Lama said, you want to know your future? Check your six times book. Okay.

Okay. CI BSTAN PA'I LHAG LTA GSUNGS CHAGS MAR GUR GUR GUS And they bow down to these oracles. SPYOD PA'I GANG ZHANG PA YIN TE Say GANG ZHANG.

Adam, you should still be marketing stuff for the dictionary, the online dictionary. So GANG ZHANG. GANG means leg.

ZHANG means to pull. And it means a disgrace. It's the Tibetan word for disgrace.

It's the monastic word for disgrace. You are pulling down the legs of the Sangha. It means you are a disgrace.

You're a Buddhist. You understand refuge. You know the four steps.

You should be at Starbucks, but you're in the oracle's room. You should be at Starbucks, but you went to the oracle instead. Understand?

Then that's a disgrace. Somebody took a lot of DCI courses and then when they have a problem they run to a fortune teller. This is a disgrace.

You should be embarrassed. All right. DGOS RGYU DGOS TSO BA NI SPYOD PA'I GANG ZHANG means you are pulling down the leg of the Dharma people.

SPYOD PA SNGAG BSHAD PA LTAR BSKYABS LA GNYIS RDZIN BSAM CHUNG NA RANG RGYUD KYI BSKYAMS RDOG DANG PA JIG RTO'I When you run to a fortune teller and you split your refuge object. You say, I have Buddha Dharma Sangha refuge object and I have a fortune teller refuge object. Then he says, RNANGS PA'I SDOM PA'I JIG You destroy your refuge vows.

And then, RNANGS PA'I PHYAL NAS BU You should write that one, Adam. PHYAL NAS BU G-R-A-L KHAR DOG DANG LA PHYAL NA SA NAS BA ZHIG GIS BU DAG BU PHYAL NAS BU means you just bit yourself out of the Buddhists. You got kicked out of Buddhists by who?

By you. Okay. It's a tough word.

It's kind of a rough word. You got kicked out by yourself. You split your refuge object.

All right. SLA LUS RGYAL TSEN SOGS LA MTHOR MA DANG SANGS SU RTAG NAS SPYOD DUN GYIS RDOG SPYOD BA TZAM RUNG YANG Then he says, it's okay to make MTHOR MA's and offer them to the local spirits. It's not like you're going for refuge.

So that's not... SPYOD DUN means that's okay if you do it with an understanding that the wind spirits are not going to help you if you don't have the seeds. But don't put all your faith in local spirits.

LUS means... LHA means local spirits. Here it's DE BA but it means local spirits.

LUS means Nagas. RGYAL TSEN means like spirits of power. MTHOR MA, you can offer that.

SANGS, I've made a note here, is to burn juniper. SUR is some kind of cheese MTHOR MA. DANG NAS SPYOD DUN GYIS RDOG SPYOD BA TZAM RUNG That's okay, but RGYAL TSE BRDOR MI DGOS.

But don't take refuge in them. Don't put all your hopes in some local spirit. GZHAN LA NGAN PAR BSTAN NAS LAS SKYES ROG SPYOD BA LA BSKYAMS SU DROG MI DGOS PA DANG DRAG GZHAN LA NGAN PAR BSTAN NAS LAS SKYES ROG SPYOD BA LA BSKYAMS SU DROG MI DGOS PA DANG DRAG So when we...

he just says it's inappropriate, for example, to go to a government official and pay them some money to try to get something. That's not real refuge. Paying a MTHOR MA, making deals with local spirits, is not taking refuge.

What is that? Oh, yeah. I looked up SUR.

It's an offering of cheese and it has what they call the three white elements and the three red elements. And I looked them up. The three white elements are yogurt, milk and butter.

And the three red ones... I thought it was some kind of tantric thing, but it's not. I asked Geshe Lothar on the phone.

He said it's something like honey, sugar, and GUR means... What do they call that in India? Jaggar?

Jagra? Jagri. It's a chunk of brown sugar.

Really tasty. That's one of the best sugars in the world. Okay.

All right. So I got to fix this. Notes.

So it's not meat and blood and all this. Honey, sugar, and brown sugar. It's good for cooking, Indian cooking.

What's that? Really? Same thing?

Oh. Oh, cool, yeah. What do you call that stuff?

Mole? You use it in mole? Yeah.

You have to make me a mole. Show me your grandmother's secret recipe. Real tantra.

Okay. All right. Okay.

I made a mistake on the notes here. This should say... Oh, I corrected it.

That's weird. SPYIR LUS KYABS SU SONG NAS Once you've taken refuge in the Dharma, SEMS CAN LA GNOD TSE MI BYED Don't hurt anybody, including animals. GAL TSE Somebody snuck into the bottom of the compost thing.

Yeah, they made a tunnel. Just like that gang guys in Mexico. They broke into my compost.

Anyway, that will explain the watermelon rinds around your whole neighborhood. SPYIR LUS KYABS SU SONG NAS I think I got them all. GNOD TSE MI BYED GNOD TSE YANG I also broke one of your dishes.

I'm sorry. Anyway, I'm confessing. GNOD TSE YANG SOGS SPYOD SDUG BSDAG GROG PA SOGS GNOD PA BYAS LTA CI Then obviously, I don't have to tell you that it's wrong to beat living beings, to hit living beings, to strike a living being, to kill a living being.

I don't have to tell you that. Obviously, you can't be a meat-eater and keep this vow. Obviously, you can't be a meat-eater and keep this vow.

SOGS GNOD PA BYAS LTA CI What we're going to talk about this afternoon is there are just some things that shouldn't be food that are foods. They shouldn't be foods. Shouldn't eat them.

We don't eat people's meat. That would be weird, right? I think 100 years from now, they will say we were really weird.

In these days, the early American, what do you call these very smart people like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, they kept slaves, human slaves. And then if you ask them why you keep a slave, they will say, this is not a person. They believed that.

These big enlightened guys who made America, they believed that. 100 years later, 200 years later, we say, oh my God, these guys were crazy. That was really ignorant.

Super stupid. Extreme stupid. BZHIN DU NYID NAS BUD PA And then I think 100 years from now, people will look at us and say, can you imagine?

They used to grow cows and kill them. It was so weird. Okay.

Then, yeah. My theory of milk is that they have to be kept pregnant to make the milk. When they're kept pregnant, they have babies.

If they have male babies, they kill them immediately because they can't make milk. There is places where they take care of the cows forever. There are places in the United States, in New York, New York State, where they will take care of the cows.

They won't kill them. And they'll take care of them. I don't know if it's nice to make them pregnant all the time.

Generally, when you're trying to decide whether something is right or wrong, see what that food does to you. I think meat makes you unhealthy. All right.

NYID PA'I MTHAL DGA' BA means inordinate tax, a tax which is not fair. That's also hurting other people. Not paying your taxes.

It's hurting everybody. SBYUNG DRO LTA BA LUGS DANG MI MTHUN PA'I GAL CI And to mistreat animals. MING DGA' BA TSUN YANG NUS TE YIN PAS MI RUNG So once you've taken refuge in the Dharma, we shouldn't hurt animals either.

I'm going to go for five more minutes and we'll take a break. So those of you with pee-pee, five more minutes. Then a sign of successful refuge is that you're nice to other people.

If you understand emptiness, what's a sign you understand emptiness? Do your eyes go up in the top of your head? And sometimes you go like this.

What's a sign you understand emptiness? You treat people nice. You become much nicer.

It's not some weird thing. If people are empty, they're coming from you. If they're coming from you, they're coming from your seeds.

If they're coming from your seeds, you should plant nice seeds. Unless you like being around irritating people. Got it?

Therefore, people who understand emptiness are just nice. And that's a sign of someone who understands emptiness or who takes refuge. All right, negative vow number three relating to Sangha.

,RGYEN DON LA RGYAL TSUL SONG BA'I GRO, ,MUD DEG DANG MIN GRO PA STE, Once you take refuge in the Sangha, as we said to Elizaveta's question, try not to... If you have choice, try to hang around people who understand seeds. That's all.

Try to hang around people who understand seeds. It doesn't mean you should hate other people. It doesn't mean you can't talk to your uncle if they don't understand seeds.

It doesn't mean that. Never use religion as an excuse to dislike people. It's all fine.

You should learn to fit in with people that you're with without doing bad things. When you're with normal guys, you should talk about football. That's okay.

Make them comfortable. Learn a little bit about football. When you go to your family's holidays, then you can talk about football.

That's okay. Don't use religion as an excuse to dislike other people or to say they're not us. But people you hang around with day to day, if they're people who understand seeds, then they will keep you in the right track.

,BUN BRDZIN MU THEG PA NGUL MED KYANG, ,DE DANG BYANG RDAG BA DGON BYANG DANG, ,LAS GRAS ZER BA, ,DE BYANG ED BDEN NA, ED BDEN You should write that down, Adam. ED BDEN Really, when we write it, it's ED BDEN. When you say it, it's like this.

AYIN AYIN Do you believe in Buddha? AYIN I ain't so sure. Maybe yes, maybe no.

Do you think the best way to fix an air conditioner is to help other people with fixing their stuff? AYIN AYIN AYIN means, could be, but I don't know. It's kind of weird.

Like wishy-washy in English. Maybe it's true, maybe it's not. AYIN AYIN ,RDZAN DANG LAM MA DANG, ,DGE BZHED DKA' DE BA BDAG GIS, ,SHES PA TZAM YIN ZER BA, Then he says there's a very bad habit in Tibet where somebody will come up and say, my friend's looking for a partner.

Then you say, okay, I have a suggestion. What? My Lama said they should go to the nursing home and visit lonely people.

And then this person, these are, we call reasonable devils. Reasonable devils. They'll say, what?

And you say, my Lama said if you want to find a partner then go to the nursing home and visit lonely people. And then they'll say, you know, it sounds nice. I understand that your Lama wants you to visit nursing homes.

It's probably, probably it's just a way to get you to go to the nursing home. It's unreasonable to believe that that would get you a partner. This kind of very reasonable person.

We say the devil comes that way. Buddhism says the devil comes that way. You want to see a demon, they're not like, they're like, you know, it sounds cool.

It's very sweet. I really respect your Lama. It's a really nice thought.

It's really sweet. But, you know, come on. He just wants you to go to the nursing home.

Don't expect to get a partner. Come on. Be reasonable.

Be practical. When someone says, be practical, you should run away. That's it.

That's a demon. Demon came. Don't look at ants all day.

What are you thinking? Be practical. YOD PA'I DE DAG DANG SBYOR GYIS MI NYAN GYIS means hang out with those people.

Don't hang out closely with those people. One more, two more minutes. RANG RES SEMS LA BSTAN PA MA THOB PAS We are not so strong in our understanding of the seed system.

We are not that strong. We are influenced by other people. My brother killed himself.

He went to Hawaii because he was a really good surfer. I went to be with him for a few months before he died. We surfed some big waves.

One day we broke both our surfboards in half on this wave. But he had some really weird friends. They were doing drugs and stealing things.

I thought, something is going to happen. These people are weird. It's not good for him.

Be careful who you put around you. Be careful who you hang out with. If you have a bad habit, if you have a weakness, like alcohol or something, or anything, it's very common to find friends who support that habit.

They'll say, come on, you're strong. Let's go have a drink. You're strong enough.

It's not going to kill you. Be careful getting close to people who have the same weaknesses that you have. Try to hang around people who are stronger.

If you want to lose weight, hang out with Anatole. Don't hang out with someone who's going to give you chocolate bars all day. All right.

All right. DE DAG GI GANG LA BRTED NAS LONG GYUR NEN YOD PAS Our tendency is that if we stay close to people who have the same bad habits that we have, it will spread to us. ROG NGAN DANG BRTEN DRA DANG KYANG ZHING DGOS Keep them at a distance.

Keep them at a distance. It doesn't mean hate them. It doesn't mean be unfriendly to them.

But keep a little personal space from them. Don't quite buy into their view of the world. So it's important to know how to keep a distance and still be sweet and friendly.

But keep a little distance. All right. But do try to stay close to the bathroom.

So we'll take a break. 10, 15 minutes. Okay.

See you at 9.45?

[Speaker 2]
Yes, Shalabi. The other day when we were talking about Buddhist images, and you mentioned that there was one, the very first one in some book. I was wondering if you had the picture you could show us?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. So I've been really working hard on the Wheel of Life because we want to do a book, Hector's helping me. So I've been reading all the old sutras on the Wheel of Life.

Vasubandhu wrote a very beautiful, long commentary. If you know Vasubandhu, he's most famous for Abhidhamma, which he didn't believe in. He was asked to write it by his brother, who was a sangha.

And he didn't believe it. So his style is cramped. But when he gets to the Wheel of Life, the 12 links, it's a long, long commentary.

It took me several months to finish it. It's awesome. It's unbelievable.

And you see Vasubandhu as a different person. More like a rock and roll guy. He's not this little Abhidhamma.

Sorry, Stanley. He's doing the Abhidhamma Kosha. But anyway, I found several references that say that the first rendering of the Buddha in this world was the Wheel of Life.

So the Buddha, which is now up in the corner of the Wheel of Life, in those days, the main image was Lord Buddha. And the wheel was a little tiny piece on the painting. So by tradition, that's the very first image of the Wheel of Life.

And, sorry, the first image of the Buddha in this world. I don't know how similar the current paintings of the Buddha in the Wheel of Life are to the historical Buddha. And we're working on that.

We're working on finding some early paintings. Two more things. According to those sources, the first written Buddhist books are the Wheel of Life.

The two verses at the bottom are the first thing that the Buddha wrote down. Because he was an oral teacher. So that's some of the first written Buddhist teachings are also on the Wheel of Life.

Some of the earliest statuary of the Buddha is Gandharvan, which is the custom of the Buddhists of Afghanistan and Pakistan. And Xuanzang walked through those areas on his way to India. Those are interesting Buddhists because they look more like Western people.

And the earliest statue I've seen of Vajrapani looks like Winston Churchill or something. So it just makes you aware that how people paint the Buddha or Jesus, they usually, when the British were the world's power, they painted Jesus like a British man. But he was a dark-skinned Jew in the Middle East.

He probably had a big nose and black hair. And he was strong because he was a carpenter. Just different people paint the Buddha in their own image.

And I don't think it's so bad. I think maybe it's okay. There is a tradition in Tibet, and there are ancient scriptures about the correct dimensions, like from here to here and here to here.

And that's why Tibetan painters will paint that grid because there's rules about to make it correct. But I think in modern times it would be interesting to interpret the Buddha's face. So we're doing a paperback version of this big red book so people can afford it.

And I'm going to send Scott to Nick. I'll send you the picture of the Asokapa. What's the internet here, Scott?

Anyway, we're playing around with new images of Lord Buddha and Asokapa. I'll show you one. Okay, any other questions?

Mr. Droll. Oh, that was yesterday.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you, Geshe-la, and thanks everybody. Just a question about how to deal with the reasonable devils that you mentioned.

[Speaker 1]
We talked about reasonable devils. It means people who say, you know, I understand you went to a retreat and you're all excited about it, but just calm down. You can't run your life that way.

You have responsibilities. You can't do all that. So how do you deal with those people?

I can give you normal advice, which is devil advice. Or I can give you the Diamond Cutter Sutra. This morning, I came down here at five and worked on the internet.

I was thinking what to call the Kamalashila course. In the Diamond Cutter Sutra that we're going to cover, this course, the student, what's his name? Subhunti.

He starts crying in the middle of the sutra. He starts crying. I thought it was so beautiful.

I thought to call the course Arya's Tears. The Tears of an Arya. Because it says, there's an expression.

It's called the Tears of the Arya. They talk about that in the sutra. The Tears of the Arya.

Then somebody asked him why he's crying. He says, there's nothing reasonable in this whole sutra. I like it.

There's no normal advice. It's not like try to be nice to them, or maybe change your hairstyle. There's nothing like that.

Every single verse, Buddha says what he really wants to say, which is use the four steps. Use the four steps. Use the four...

He doesn't say anything but emptiness. No, there's not one normal advice in the whole sutra. Fix them.

Which means try to catch yourself being reasonable. Because they're coming from you. You have a small tendency somewhere inside of you, like a vein running through a stone.

There's a small tendency somewhere to think that all this is not very practical. Then attack that and they will change. See, then you don't have to change your relationship with them.

They will just slowly change to being friends who talk about seeds all the time. That's the real answer. Then lesser Hinayana answer would be try to move closer to Tina's house, and stuff like that.

You can do that also. You ready?

[Speaker 2]
Thank you Geshe-la.

[Speaker 1]
You're welcome. We're playing with something like that. I don't know.

For Tsongkhapa. But what I mean is maybe we can change what we think is a Buddhist painting. Maybe we can paint the Buddha in many different ways.

That's my godson, actually. Okay. All right.

One more question, I think.

[Speaker 2]
Hi Geshe-la.

[Speaker 1]
Hi.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you so much for this opportunity.

[Speaker 1]
Thank you for coming.

[Speaker 2]
Earlier when you talked about surrounding ourselves or not to surround ourselves with those who have the same bad habits or weaknesses as we do, what if we do surround ourselves with those with the same bad habits and weaknesses? Are we helping them, serving them by helping ourselves to remove those bad habits as well?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, that's why he said RANG RES SEMS LA BSTAN PA THOB Just the last sentence. He said RANG RES SEMS LA BSTAN PA THOB RANG RES means us guys. SEMS means our mind.

BSTAN PA means well established in our worldview. Well established in our worldview. So if you can hold on to it and hang out with your old friends, that's okay.

Because then you're helping them. So that's best, if you can do it. But be reasonable about how much you can do.

Don't... I keep thinking about alcoholics. They tend to look for friends, or people who can't stop using drugs, they tend to make friends with people that are using drugs.

And after they become Buddhists, they say, I'm going to fix them. Then they go out with their friends and they end up doing drugs. You see what I mean?

So just be honest with yourself about how much you can... how strong you can be. If you can be strong and affect them, that's best.

That's best. Thank you so much. Okay, let's do yoga.

Maybe. Oh, what's next? Yoga.

Right? Not yoga, yoga. Your hearing is something.

Yeah? Is it next? She said, oh yeah.

Okay. Thank you for being so sweet. It's a really unusually sweet group.

I enjoy it. I enjoy going deeper. All right.