«Дар освобождения», курс 25 «Совершенное прибежище», занятие 20

[Speaker 1]
Number 20, okay? Number 20. I put—it took me a long time, I found a photo of somebody putting water in a good cup of coffee and ruining it, okay?

I don't know if you've ever had somebody do that, you know, like, they have enough coffee for three cups and four people show up. My mom used to do this, she had four boys and no husband around and she got paid on Friday. On Saturday we had orange juice.

On Sunday we had half orange juice and half water. On Monday it was one-third orange juice, two-thirds water. On Thursday it was like horse piss.

Okay? And there's a refuge tradition, which is don't water down your refuge, okay? Like, don't mix other stuff into it, you know?

Okay, like, you hear things from people, you know, like, I like this idea that you can fix an air conditioner by helping other people with their air conditioners, but— it's the people who say but after that. Okay, but, you know, that's a nice idea, but— no, no, let's be practical, you know. From a—I understand that's the Dharma point of view, but tell me the practical point of view.

You know, and you got to look at them and say, the Dharma point of view is the practical point of view, okay, got it? You know, okay? People say, be practical, don't go to Lam Rim all the time.

I am being practical, I want to make money, I want to have a successful relationship, you know, I want to be healthy, you know. It is—this is the most practical thing, this is the thing that works, okay? So, don't let— don't water down your refuge like 50% refuge, 30% refuge.

Okay Geshe-la, I trust if I help other people, I'll have a good business, but, you know, I kind of have to cheat people now to get there. No, you don't know how many people tell me this. I mean, they don't say it like that, but they mean that, you know, so.

And when we get to this section in the book later, it's a hard section because he's very critical of things that don't work, you know, and he chooses some other worldviews that were in his country, in his life, in his time. Like, there was a worldview called Bön. People called Bon, Bon, Bo, Bön.

It's called Bön, okay? And they believed that the world was created by this person, and they had a— they had a belief, they still exist. And some people told this Lama, you know, my parents were Bön, they believed the world was made by Shemba or something.

And so, I'd kind of like to be 50-50. Is that okay? Like, I'll fix other people's air conditioners, but I'll also make a prayer to Shemba, you know, is that okay?

You know, and he says, well, if you keep doing that, it's like orange juice, you know, it's just not going to be very strong. The refuge won't be very strong, okay? So, it's up to you.

I don't mean disrespect your parents, I don't mean that. I go to church— I went to church a couple weeks ago, and it makes my family happy, and I learned good things. I learned some good things, you know, and that's okay.

But keep your... keep your worldview, protect your worldview, don't water it down. Don't put water in a good Starbucks cup of coffee, okay?

Everything's coming from me, 100%. Don't be a 50% comes from me, 50% comes from something else, okay? I mean, keep that view.

I have a close Christian friends, they said, can I still... can I still pray to God? I said, yeah, no problem.

It's coming from you. You know, that's okay. How can a person come from me and take care of me?

You made your mother, you made your father. You know, it's possible, it's okay. In Buddhism we say, Vajrayogini made the world, okay?

But I made Vajrayogini, okay? That's okay. Okay.

But below it is this belief that everything comes from you, and how you treat other people, okay? And I don't think it's... contradicts most of the great religions.

If you study the 30 pages of the New Testament, Jesus' words, we should like pull out this whole conversation about planting seeds on rocky soil or good soil, and he's talking about seeds all the time, you know, and that's the main thing. And Muhammad was the same. So, no problem, mayo and tea, okay?

But don't put water in your... okay? Because it won't help you, okay?

Everything comes from you. Everything comes from how you treat other people. Everything is your fault, okay?

Okay. Alright. So, I guess during that meditation you might think about, you know, are you watering down your understanding about seeds, you know?

Do you... How much do you believe a cell phone comes from you, you know? 30%, 25%?

Try to raise the percent. Try to struggle your whole life to raise the percent, okay? And it always comes from me, and it's another part of the sentence, from how I treated other people, okay?

It always comes from me, from how I treated other people. And... the building blocks of...

of existence are not atoms, they are kindnesses, okay? You got to get there. You got to get to where you...

you feel that in your heart, you know? This computer is not made of iron atoms and silicon atoms and copper atoms. Those atoms are made of kindness, okay?

It has copper atoms, it has steel atoms, it has aluminum atoms, but those atoms are held together by kindness, how I treat other people, okay? You got to reach that place sooner or later in your life, okay? Question?

We'll see when we get there, I think it does. Yeah, I think it does. Yeah, there's a...

there's a refuge vow number three, which is... after you take refuge in sangha, we are encouraged not to... associate too closely with people who think this is all crazy, okay?

Does that mean you can't have a Christian friend or a Muslim friend? It doesn't mean that. What's the sign of good refuge?

Yeah, you're just nice to everybody, okay? You don't say, oh, you don't believe copper atoms were made by how you treated your wife last week. I don't like you, you know?

You know, and you know, I pray that this organization never becomes like that. And I don't know how, you know, we have to be really careful, you know. I taught eighteen steps in the teacher training of how to teach the pen.

Second by second how to teach the pen. It took an hour or two hours. Eighteen different things you have to do in a two-minute presentation of the pen, you know?

And then, a week later, somebody came up to me and said, I think it's seventeen. You know, and then suddenly in my mind came this future thing, there'll be the seventeen step pen religion, and there'll be the eighteen step pen religion, and they will hate each other, and they will have wars, you know. You know, we have to be careful that it doesn't become like that, okay?

So, this vow, it's dangerous. The vow is dangerous, okay? It means, it means, you know, this one's really hard, I mean, you have to try to protect your view of the world from the whole world, okay?

The whole world believes copper atoms. The whole world. Every religion person in the world has the same religion called science.

Copper atoms. Copper atom— copper atomism, okay? Everyone is a copper atomist in the whole world, okay?

Then, you know, try to spend— when you choose your close friends, try to choose friends like, I said, Katie's mom, Janice, when I was talking about ten ways to fundraise, she's just looking at me like I'm crazy, and I got really uncomfortable, you know, and I said, are you okay? She says, yeah, I'm okay. I said, well, what are you thinking?

And she said, well, isn't helping other people with their fundraising the way to fundraise? And I'm like, you know, and you want that kind of people around you. You see, that's all.

You want to stay close to that kind of people who can correct you, Geshe Michael, when you have some other idea. You see what I mean? Okay, that's all.

Alright.