«Дар освобождения», курс 26 «Реальность кармы», занятие 7

[Speaker 1]
Okay, let's meditate. So relax your mouth and suck in your stomach just a little bit. Relax your eyelids.

Relax your shoulders and your fingers. And your forehead. And then come to your breath.

We'll focus on our breath for a few minutes. Long exhales. And try to keep the mind on the breath.

Then ask your lama to come and sit with you. Make a lama offering something nice that you did yesterday. Then confess to your lama something not so nice you did yesterday.

And again, something beautiful you did yesterday, tell your lama. Then ask the lama to keep teaching you.

[Speaker 2]
And ask lama to stay in your life.

[Speaker 1]
Then please bring your mind back to the three good things we talked about yesterday that you did. One was from early in the day, one was from the middle part of the day, and one was later in the day. Try to remember the first one, the one from the morning, and then try to remember the fantastic huge result that could come thousands of times bigger from that good thing you did in the morning.

Then try to remember the thing from the middle of the day, and try to remember the result which is thousands of times bigger in a few minutes. And then try to remember the thing in the evening, and result which is thousands of times bigger than that. Then this morning I'd like to do the opposite.

All of us have some problems in our life, some troubles. And let's say I have a problem with some person. Let's say I have a disagreement with some person.

And it's been going on for a while, and it's pretty strong. Like I haven't been able to make friends with this person, and we still have a lot of tension between us. And if the second law of karma is correct, then the thing that bothers me about this person, it's coming from something I did.

Maybe long ago, maybe a year ago. And what I did was maybe 1% of what I see now. Like if this person talks too much, every time I want to say something, it's difficult.

They always talk, and I don't get a chance to talk. Then if I follow that bad result into the past, back into the past, and I try to find a cause which is only 1% of this size, it's like I'm looking at a tree, and I'm trying to imagine this tiny seed that it came from. So what I'd like you to do now in your meditation, choose one problem you have nowadays, and then trace it back into the past, maybe two or three months ago.

Something I did, which was only 1% of what I'm seeing now. So if I'm at the retreat in Chapala, and every time I have breakfast with this person, they are always talking. They don't let me talk.

If I take my mind backwards three months, back to, let's say, April, then can I imagine that in April, I interrupted my wife, or husband, or friend, just once while we were eating dinner? And they were talking, and I just interrupted one sentence. That's all.

Just one sentence I interrupted. And that seed grew thousands of times for three months. And now I'm at the retreat in Chapala.

Every time I have breakfast with this person, they are talking for 45 minutes without ... I have no chance to say anything. So instead of imagining a good seed today, which grows a thousand times in three months from now, we're going to take a bad result which is happening now, and trace it back to the past 1%.

So, take the biggest problem you're having in your life right now, and trace it back. Maybe you don't remember interrupting your wife, in one sentence, but trace it back and try to imagine what was the seed. And we're going to be quiet for about five minutes, and let's work on the biggest problem we have.

Now I'd like you to take the second biggest problem you have. I don't know, maybe it's a financial problem. And take it backwards in time.

Go back maybe three months. Maybe you had a chance to help someone with a small amount of money. And you didn't do it.

So, find the 1% seed three months ago of the 100% result that you have now. Even if you don't remember exactly refusing someone some money, use your third eye, the eye of logic, and try to imagine what you must have done three months ago, 1% small seed to have the problem you have today. Now a third problem, something that's giving you trouble nowadays.

Maybe a health problem. You have some kind of pain in your body. Or you feel part of you getting older.

And again, try to bring your mind back three months ago. Find the 1% cause, small seed. If you can't remember it, then use logic.

Just guess. And try to picture yourself making that mistake three months ago. Maybe your friend was feeling sick, and you didn't really help them very much.

And that was the 1% cause. And now it has grown into some pain in your body. Find a third problem, and the 1% seed.

And please come back to your breath. Three long exhales. Imagine you are sending the good karma of your meditation to other people.

And then you can slowly open your eyes. Take a stretch. So you can go both ways, okay?

If you're having a problem, like if it's a pretty bad problem today, you can go backwards. Use the second law of karma. It must have been something much, much smaller.

What's the first law of karma? Yeah, it must have been similar. If people around you are talking too much at breakfast, you must have been interrupting someone three months ago.

And it must have been much, much smaller. And then, depending how you feel, you can do that meditation sometimes. And then do the meditation we did yesterday.

And cheer up your mind. Take something nice you're doing today, even a small thing. And imagine what will happen three months from now, four months from now.

When you're meditating, what's the Sanskrit name for good meditation? You can say samadhi. You can say samapatti.

What's samapatti mean? Yeah, like in yoga you say samastiti, right? Equal.

You're equal. Equal between what? Yeah, feeling sleepy.

Which in Buddhism is called not clear. And it doesn't mean the picture in your mind is not clear. It doesn't mean that.

It means the mind is not bright and happy. Then on the other side, agitate. We call it agitation, right?

The mind won't shut up. It keeps thinking about too many things. Then meditation is a balance between the two.

How can you connect the meditation ... How can you connect the meditation we did this morning to the balance of your meditation? Ronit?

Say again. Say again.

[Speaker 2]
When the mind sinks down, goes down, it's dullness, and then you have to lift it up. So you use the good karma meditation.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
And the opposite.

[Speaker 1]
Okay, good. When your mind gets sleepy in a meditation, we call Seng Tupa. Seng Tupa means pump up your mind.

Think of something good you're doing. Imagine it multiplied a thousand times. Like, how cool is your future going to be?

And then if the mind is too distracted, your mind is too busy, then you can do the negative karma meditation. Think of some problem you have in your life. Meditate about the small 1% seed you must have done in the past.

And that will bring the mind down. The meditation texts, they say it's like driving a car. And you know, you get sleepy, so you think of some good karma you're doing.

Then the mind gets too excited. Then you have to think about some bad karma you're experiencing. And a good meditator, and a good driver, their hands are going like ...

their hands never stop. You know, and you learn ... I was teaching a young monk to drive in India, right?

And every time I say something, he says, what? And then I'm like, ah! And turn the wheel, you know?

So when you're a new driver, you tend to go too far. Later, you can just ... like Alejandro drove me here from Guadalajara.

I'm sorry, another driver. Anyway, he's talking and his hands are automatic like this, you see? It's not like, but his hands move automatically, subtle movements from one side to the other.

But it needs practice. So, in your meditation, inside your mind, you will get sensitive. I'm getting sleepy.

Let's think about something good I'm doing today multiplied by thousands in three months. Or, you know, now my mind is too stirred up, you know? I'm thinking too much.

Then think of some problem you're having. Take it back three months to a one percent cost, okay? On the positive side, you know, so I did Aaron's yoga class yesterday.

That was my morning good deed. And if I think like a thousand times better than that in three months, maybe I'll be very healthy. And that brings my mind up, you see?

Then I think of some problem I have. And it makes you feel like it makes you very sensitive to small good deeds and small bad deeds. Then you're a karma master.

What's a karma master? They are careful about small good deeds and small bad deeds. Then I don't know about you, but I had this very strong feeling during this meditation.

If this morning when someone talked for 45 minutes at the breakfast table and I couldn't say one thing, if that's really caused by interrupting my partner once, one sentence, then I have a lot of bad breakfast coming. Like, it's piling up, you know? The karma seeds are piling up.

I won't be able to talk for breakfast for six years or something. And that's true. That's the way it is.

So the purpose of this meditation is to help people If you start to feel like, no Geshe-la, that's not possible. I understand the bad habit of talking all the time creates people around me who talk all the time, but if it's just one sentence that caused one person to talk to me for an hour, then I'm in trouble. And that's the way it is.

And that's the second law of karma. People don't talk to you for an hour. People don't out talk you for an hour because you out talk someone else for an hour.

People out talk you for an hour because you interrupted somebody for an hour. once, in one sentence. And when thinking about that becomes depressing, you can think about the future.

I sat in the class for one hour and I listened to the laws of karma. That's going to create thousands of hours of happiness in three months. And that's also true.

So balance it. The point is that you get sensitive about small karmas. Then you're a karma master.

The four by four is not enough. I can tell you the four laws of karma. I can tell you the four steps.

That's not enough. That's not a karma master. Yesterday I was with some people for a couple of hours.

One of them needed a pen. Then I gave them one. I have lots of pens.

I gave them one. Then I went home to take my secret nap. Then like an hour later, somebody's banging on the door.

I opened the door. Here's your pen, Geshe-la. Then I know this person was listening in the class.

So if you become a karma master, then you care about small things. Okay, let's do some new stuff. We were going to start on the top ten good deeds.

And he promised us shi sampa jorwa tar duk. For each of them. So supposedly we're going to get like 40 different things.

So if you're not a shi sampa jorwa tar duk master by tomorrow, then you're not listening. Okay, number one. Protecting life.

DANG PO SOGS SPYOD KYI BZHI NI We okay, Tim? Okay, now BZHI means the first of the four steps, right? When you study it in Lam Rim, BZHI has a little bit different meaning.

BZHI means, in Lam Rim, BZHI means, who did you do this thing towards? So he gives an example. ZAS BYAS LUG LTA PO RANG NAS GZHAN PA'I BAR BUR PA YIN PA It must be another person than yourself.

And he gives the example of an animal that you kill for food. Okay, he says LUG. What's LUG?

LUG Sheep. Ida. Okay, sheep.

Ida in Sanskrit. Sheep. Borrego.

Sheep, the animal? Yeah. Okay, do you break the first vow if you kill yourself?

Buddhists said yes. So it's possible to do one of the ten towards yourself. My brother committed suicide, my younger brother.

So I talked about it a lot with my teacher. And he said, that's one of the worst kind of killing. And I said, why?

And then he said, a human body is like a temple, right? A human body can take you to enlightenment. So to destroy the vehicle that can take you to enlightenment, is a very serious negative deed.

Okay, now he goes deeper. He goes to Sampa. She's Sampa, second step.

In the lam rim, the second step has three parts. Say du shi, kun long, nyo mo, du shi, kun long, nyo mo. If you know them, it's cool.

So I'm going to give you a demonstration. I'm going to give you a DCI example. DCI started as a business training company.

And there was a famous incident in Guangzhou. Okay, some of you guys from other countries, you don't know what is Guangzhou. Guangzhou is not a restaurant, it's a city.

Largest metropolitan area in the world, 30 million people, Vivian's hometown. Everything in this room was made in Guangzhou. The chair you're sitting on, the mats under you, the yoga mat, the pillow, the clothing you have on, the cosmetics you use, all the parts in your city, your cell phone, a lot of them are made in Guangzhou.

So we were giving a DCI talk in Guangzhou. It was about 50 business owners, pang mao, pang mao means fat cat. 50 big business people.

And those guys are tough. Those guys who make all the things that you're sitting on and all the things you're wearing, those guys are tough. And I was working very hard to show them how they can make more money.

By helping other people make money. Then this one lady, she's just not listening. It's very difficult to teach if one person is like that.

Then I said, anybody have any questions? And she's like, I have a question. I said, what's the question?

So, I have a big company already. I make lots of money. I'm not interested in your talk.

Then I'm like, you know, we teach you in DCI training school. Well, thank you very much for your comment. Then she said, I have a different question.

Can you use the four steps to fix your husband? I said, is your husband broken? She said, yes.

I said, what's the problem? We lived together for 30 years. I cook for him every night.

And of course, he never cooked one time. But he also never washed the dishes one time. Then it seems to me, if one person in the relationship cooks every night for 30 years, the other person can wash the dishes sometimes.

Can you use the four steps to force your husband to wash the dishes? Then I said, yeah, you can. I mean, they didn't teach us in the monastery, okay?

But I said, yeah, you can do it. Many months later, she invited me to her house. She said, I want to show you something.

We sat down in the dining room. She has a little bell, you know, and she ringed the bell. Her husband came out of the kitchen with a woman's apron.

Yes, dear. Is dinner ready yet? Almost, I'm almost finished.

Then she said, okay, go back, finish. Then she looked at me, she said, you know, the four step work, he started to wash the dishes. Then I said to myself, why stop with the dishes?

Let's force him to cook also. Why are we talking about that? That day started DCI, we started to teach people about relationships also.

That became a huge thing. There's a big thick book. Susana just translated it into French.

Karma of Love. Many people ask a very, very common question around the world. I don't have a partner, and I want a partner.

Can I use the four steps? Then we say, yeah, of course. And we are covering the four steps right now.

So, first one in DCI way, yeah, decide what you want. I want a partner. Number two, yeah, find somebody else who needs, who's lonely.

Find someone who's lonely. I like to say, find an old lady in the nursing home. Those people are so, so lonely.

Oftentimes they brought up a family. They got married, they had children, they had grandchildren. They are used to having many people around them.

They are used to controlling the finances and the house. And then suddenly they're alone in a nursing home, and no one's visiting them. So, they are super lonely.

Third step, visit them, maybe once a week, for like an hour. Maybe take them to the movies, take them to TARA coffee shop in Guadalajara. Okay, fourth step, yeah, that evening, every evening before you sleep, then think, oh, I'm so cool.

There's, by the way, there's two kinds of coffee meditation. Number one, I'm happy that I helped the old lady today. I took her to TARA coffee shop.

We had some nice cappuccino together. Who can tell me the second part of the coffee meditation? Yeah, this morning I was listening to a James Brown song.

I got soul, and I'm so happy. I got super bad. I got soul, and I'm super bad.

Then in the middle of the song, he says, I'm so cool I could kiss myself. When you have a translator, and he goes on twice as long as you did, you know something's wrong. Okay, yeah, it's okay.

Okay, anyway, second part of coffee meditation. It's so cool. I'm using the word using a new intelligent system to find a partner.

I'm not looking on the internet for 500 strange guys. I'm not walking to nightclubs full of smoke trying to find one guy who's not drunk. I'm trying a new system.

Nursing home. Okay, now, why are we talking about that? There's three ways you can make the four steps more powerful.

They relate to choosing the person. Step number two. And this is where they come.

This is the source here. So, DU SHES means conception. How do you think of the person you're helping?

KUN LONG means motivation. What goal do you have in mind? Then NYON MONGS, which here is a special use of NYON MONGS.

NYON MONGS normally means negative emotions. But in the study of the four steps, it always means, what is your emotion? How do you feel?

Now I'm going to give you those three how to use them to make the karma more powerful. I'd like to start with the third one, which is emotion. So, someone told you if you go to the nursing home and you visit the old lady, then you can get a partner, right?

But what the lam rim is saying here, how you feel about that lady makes the karma more powerful. Do you really love her? Or you're just using her?

How do you feel about her? And a big suggestion that you can use for feeling is the gratitude, feeling of gratitude. I like to call it a doorknob.

When you touch the doorknob of the old lady's room, check these three things. How do you feel about her? And you should feel gratitude for her.

You got that picture, Tim? Yeah. Yeah, you got the 19?

Yeah, in this picture, okay? Who's helping who? Yeah, the old lady is helping the young lady.

Why? She needs a partner. Okay, understand?

So, if you want to make the four steps mas fuerte, poderosos, then have gratitude for her, okay? For your karmic partners. Thank you ACIP refugees who are typing the ancient books.

For 31 years you made my companies successful. Thank you. Okay, that's how I feel about them.

So, I've had a few companies during that time, and all successful. Why? Because I have karmic partner.

So, you should thank them. You're not helping them, they are helping you. Or maybe you're helping each other.

So, that's here called NYON MO. How do you feel about your karmic partner? It's stronger if you have a feeling of love or gratitude for them.

Thank you, thank you for letting me to give you money. Yeah, without you I cannot succeed. Then I'm not exaggerating, okay?

I'm not being spiritual. People always say, Geshe-la, don't be so spiritual, just be practical. Spiritual is practical.

Okay, the best way to make money is spiritual. Okay, Dalai Lama called it intelligent self-interest. Okay, got it?

You can make the karma more powerful, if you're grateful for the people who let you to help them. Okay, let's go to motivation. KUN LONG Tim, that's the doorknob, okay?

That's a good doorknob one. When you touch the doorknob, of the old lady's room, by the way, I think you have our, yeah, you guys have our manual now, right? Number 20.

Meditation number 20. You have a choice when you touch the old, the doorknob of the old lady's door. You can think, I'm helping this old lady because I want a partner.

That's motivation. And it's correct motivation. Okay, I'm opening this door to help this old lady because I want a partner.

That's okay. But, if you want a really cool partner, then you should have a bodhisattva motivation. On top of the motivation to help the person, on top of the motivation to get your partner, you can have another motivation for free, which makes everything one million times stronger.

What's that? If I succeed in these four steps, if I get a perfect partner, then of course all my friends will come to me. Wow, you didn't have boyfriend for five years.

Suddenly you have this intelligent, handsome boyfriend with a job. Then, you know, tell me the address of the nightclub. Are there more there?

What's the website? Where did you find him? Then you have to say, at the nursing home.

Then they will say, he looks so young. Then what will happen? If they are desperate, they will try the four steps.

If they couldn't get a partner for five years, okay, okay, I'll try anything, you know. I will try voodoo. You know, I'll do anything, you know.

I will use your Buddhist four steps, even that. Then they will get a partner. Then their friends will come to them.

Then you will start a virus. It's like Mexico-Guadalajara baby virus. Everybody will go to the nursing home.

There will be long lines of young men and women at the nursing home. I was giving a talk in Vancouver. They said, don't walk through the park to the talk.

Go around the park, you know. I said, why? They said, the drug dealers are all in the park, you know.

Then they are, you know, it's so funny because everyone can tell a drug dealer except the police. I don't know. They always try to look like they're not talking about drugs, you know.

They're like, you got the stuff? Yeah, I got the stuff. You got the money?

Yeah, I got the money. Then the handoff, it's always like, everybody in the park can see, you know. Except the police.

I don't know what it is. So in the future, it'll be like this, you know. You got the stuff?

Yeah, I got the stuff. Old lady's phone number. Fifty bucks, fifty bucks.

Like this, okay? If you succeed in using the four steps with the old lady, you will start a virus. What will happen at the end of that?

Okay, understand? Mandala. Mandala means perfect world.

Everybody has a partner who wants a partner, because some people don't want, that's okay. You can do the four steps not to have a partner. But we are always doing this mandala, you know.

That's mandala. Okay, you find a partner by using the four steps. Then other people copy you, and other people copy them, and other people copy them, and the world becomes perfect world.

People who think like that, what is their name? That's a bodhisattva. That's the definition of a bodhisattva.

So motivation, second part of Sampa, when you touch the doorknob, you can have two different motivations. Both are correct, and they are not contradictory. You can have both at the same time.

That's a principle of the lam rim. Lower motivation, medium motivation, higher motivation. You don't get rid of the lower motivation when you get the higher motivation.

You build on the lower motivation. What's the lower motivation here? I'm going to get a partner.

What's the higher motivation? I'm starting a virus. I'm starting old lady phone number dealer trafficking in the parks.

Okay, and what I want you to realize is it doesn't cost you anything. It's just in your mind when you touch a doorknob. It's no more effort.

It's just a thought in your mind. Then you can go to the temple, you can go to the church, you can pray for people. DGE BA NI, DGE BA DGOS, ZHES NA MYA ZHIG MTHONG DOR CI, ZHES NA MYA ZHIG LAS BYUNG BA'I, DANG PA DGOS NI THOB PAR ZHOB You know, you can pray, pray, pray.

But this is the real thing. If you start a virus, that's bodhichitta. That's a bodhisattva.

It doesn't happen inside temple. It happens at the door of the nursing home. Cool.

That's the second part of Sampa. Let's do the third part and I'll give you a break, okay? Let's do it after the break.

No, it's too long. All right, let's do it before the break, in case you choke on the coffee and die. Okay, the third one is called conception.

Here it's called DUS SHES, DUS SHES. Those of you studying Tibetan, DENG BU with an S changes to a RGYUD KU. DUS SHES Yeah, so you might get confused.

Don't worry about it. Okay, DUS SHES means what's your conception? What's your conception?

And this comes to Tantra. Vajrayana. What's the two parts of Camino del Diamante?

What's the two parts? First part? Yeah, meet angel directly.

Real one. Real one. It's not in a dream.

It's not in a meditation. You are talking. You are having coffee with each other, okay?

And what's the second part of Tantra? Yeah, they teach you how to become an angel. So in Tantra, we try to develop a kind of paranoia.

Divine paranoia. Three people in this room are already Buddha. They are enlightened.

Okay, which one? Kids are especially suspicious. You can be very paranoid of a kitty.

Nicholas number two. Okay, so it's true. In any group, there's usually one or two Buddhas, minimum.

Their job is to look like normal person. What are the four steps of a karmic path? SHI SBYOR BA THAG THUG SHI SBYOR BA THAG THUG They try to act stupid, okay?

And they are very patient. Why? They can be very stupid.

They can see all time at one time. At 9.38 on Thursday morning in Guadalajara, a Buddha can see all of the past, all of the future, on all planets in the whole universe. So, they don't live in a moment.

They live in countless years. We are stuck in the present moment. We are like a very rich man who has a very big house with 100 rooms, but he wants to stay in the closet all the time.

The closet is called the present moment. We are stuck in the present moment. It goes from ...

it's between 9.38 and 9.39. We are stuck there. But a Buddha lives in all time and all space, you see? Why am I talking about that?

It's very possible for a Buddha to look ahead 80 years. Probably they're sitting in a Buddha paradise with the other Buddhas. Their alarm goes off on their iPhone.

Oh shit, I'm late. Why? Oh, I forgot.

My phone went off, you know. What? I got to get down to earth right now.

I have an appointment. What? I have to get born now.

You know, now, now, 1925. You know, in Leon, in the hospital on the third block. I must go now.

Why? Because someone's going to visit me. When?

2017. 80 years later, you know. I have to get down and get born now, so the lady can visit me in the nursing home.

I'm late. I have to go by. Buddha will be born, okay?

In Leon in 1927 or something. Why? She's on a schedule.

She's on a schedule. Yeah, the baby. Because she has to be in the nursing home in 2017 in July.

Why? Because I need someone to visit so I can get my partner. Then they can see that.

90 years ahead, they can see that. Are you telling me a person will go through 90 years of life just to reach the nursing home so I can visit them and get a partner? What's 90 years to a Buddha who lives in billions upon billions of years?

They live in all time. 90 years is nothing. It's like a friendship.

It's like a snap. It's like a finger snap. You have a ...

yeah, it goes like that. So third thing, du she. Conception.

Be suspicious of the old lady. Be suspicious. Suspicious.

You don't have to lie to yourself. You don't have to say, I know you're a Buddha. Come on, tell me the truth.

Come on. Because actually we don't know. Maybe she's just a regular old lady.

But to be suspicious of Kiri or Nicholas or the 90 year old lady, that's a pramana. That's an accurate perception. To be suspicious of the old lady is correct.

Because it's very possible. And that divine suspicion, divine paranoia, that makes the karmic seed grow super fast and super big. Super fast, super big.

So cool, I could kiss myself. Okay, so that's the third way to make the karma more powerful. So you guys in Guadalajara, you're very famous because you have t-shirts, you have coffee cups, she, sampa, yor, wa, tar, duk.

Now you have to make a new one. She, sampa, du she kun long nyo mo, yor, wa, tar, duk. Okay, like that.

She, sampa, du she kun long nyo mo, yor, wa, tar, duk. Okay, now you've got seven. Now you are advanced karma master.

And you can plant seeds much faster. Okay, now you can go to the bathroom faster also. Okay, see you in a while.

Okay, let's start. So we introduced the idea of conception, motivation, and feeling. In the case of visiting the old lady, the feeling is gratitude.

Usually when we do something nice for other people, we feel a little bit like, I'm helping you. I'm so nice. But if you're a karma master, you're like, oh, thank you for letting me make your coffee.

You're so nice to me. Thank you for letting me wash the dishes. I washed the dishes for my lama for eight years.

I did his laundry for eight years. I'm paranoid and worried all the time. It's going to wear out.

And Rihanna will say, Geshe-la, why don't you make your own cappuccino this morning? Okay, feeling. Thank you for ...

I'm so grateful you're letting me to plant a seed. Motivation. If I can prove the four steps works, then the whole world will copy me.

I will start a virus. I will save the world. That's a bodhisattva.

And there's many kinds of conception. But the highest one, which is tantra, what's the name? Sexy name.

Divine paranoia. Divine paranoia. Maybe this old lady is not what she seems to be.

When you become a Buddha, the first thing in your Buddha paradise, you're going to be sitting with all those old lady Buddhas, and they're going, oh my god, it was you! I knew it was you! When you become a Buddha, you're going to see your old lady in the Buddha paradise, and aha, it was you!

I knew it! I suspected it all the time. Okay, so now in the study of killing, we have to go back to killing, okay?

We're going from old ladies back to murder. This is a very common Abhidharma conception. Your conception, for example, of the animal that you're killing, must be correct.

To make a full karma, it must be correct. Like if you're in a war, and you see a helmet come up, and you shoot. But that's just on a stick.

Somebody put it on a stick, okay? And you think, oh, I shot somebody. You do not make a full karmic path, okay?

You are driving your car, and the wind blows a leaf across the road. And you see something, and then you go, and then you say, oh my god, I killed a mouse or something. It's not a karmic path.

It's not a karmic path, because it wasn't a real mouse. You see, the conception was mistaken. I was talking about this with Nick and Erin, and Erin said, so Erin's a lawyer, right?

And she said, oh, it's a lot like, all this stuff is very similar to the law. Did you really intend to kill the person? Were you sane or were you insane?

Okay, the motivation for the first of the ten, it has to be, I want to kill this person. So, a lady came to one of these retreats, she killed a person in her car. And she never recovered.

And I talked to her, we talked together about it. She's from Europe. And she said, she said, did I make a full karma?

And I said, no, you didn't. This motivation is incomplete. You didn't get in your car and say, I hope I can run over somebody today.

So this covers accidents. Now, in a negative way, the emotion can be three different possibilities in killing, in the act of killing. Number one, anger.

To kill from anger. Like you hate somebody and you stab them or you shoot them, this is out of anger. Desire.

You want meat or you want leather, for example, or you want a fur coat. That's killing out of desire. Then out of ignorance.

Then there was a big custom in ancient India. And I guess in Latin America, North America, to have sacrifice. It's a big custom in the ancient Bible.

When they called Jesus the lamb, it means the lamb ... they used to kill a lamb to clean their bad deeds. So that's killing out of ignorance.

To think, oh, this is not a bad thing, to sacrifice an animal, for example. Then I put three meditations in there for you. So I lived with my lama for many years.

I saw many hundreds of people come and go, ask him questions. And I think three questions, three things come up about killing. The first one is eating meat.

So this gets into cultural background. So you and me, most of us here, we were born into a world. We were born in a country where our parents believe it's okay to kill an animal for meat.

Then generally, the wisdom which is passed down from generation to generation, it's mostly very correct. All the things my parents used to tell me not to do, now I understand I shouldn't have done them. But some things that your parents do or did, as you get older and as your thinking becomes more mature, you have to say this doesn't make sense to me.

And I had many arguments with my family and also with my lamas. Most of my lamas ate meat. And I say, when I stopped eating meat, I had to do upaya.

Upaya means spiritual trick. So I had a dream that someone was killing a cow for meat and the cow was screaming in human language, not in a cow language. Then I decided, I don't want to eat meat.

Even though my parents, we had meat at every meal, I think. So I was living in the monastery, I was the cook. Then I have to cook meat every day.

Then I thought, I don't want to insult the monks. So one day I said, I don't feel so good. They said, do you need to go to the doctor?

I said, yeah, I think I have to go to the doctor. Then there's a place near Howell, maybe Nancy knows, called Farmingdale. It's a little tiny town near the monastery.

There was a very cool doctor. Any person who's, any religion priest, like rabbi or Buddhist monk or Christian priest, they pay five dollars for everything. So I drove there in the car, and I sat in the car in the parking lot.

I didn't get out. I waited one hour, and then I came back. Then they said, what did the doctor say?

I said, the doctor said I have to stop eating meat. They said, but you still have to cook for us. I said, okay, that's okay.

Then I cooked meat for many years, and I didn't eat it. All of my friends told me you will have protein deficiency. You will get sick.

All of those friends are dead from heart attack, stroke. All of them, I think it's connected to killing. The fat in meat, the cholesterol, is very high.

I think it's connected to killing. So it's been about, I don't know, 40 years. They're all dead.

I feel fine. I'm happy doing yoga, and other things. So this thing about protein is just BS, okay?

I'm happy doing yoga, but this thing about protein is bull shit. You can eat those god parts. Avocado?

Never mind, never mind. I'll tell you later the joke. There's lots of things that have lots of protein.

You don't need to eat, that's not true you need to eat animal. It's just not true. It's just a mistake.

Your parents made a mistake. I told you when we did Lama Chupa, like in America, 200 years ago, 300 years ago, we talk about George Washington and Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. These are the great leaders of America.

Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin. And when Americans, when we talk about them, we're like, oh, George Washington. We put him on the dollar, right?

But those guys believed that a black people is an animal. They believed it. And they keep a slave.

And now we look at them and we hear, oh, they kept a slave. They said it's okay to keep a black person because they are not human, they are an animal. Then we look back and we say, how stupid is that?

How unbelievable stupid can that be? In the 1990s, 2000s, can you believe it? People spend two billion dollars per year to take care of their dogs and cats in the United States.

And then they say animals can't feel anything. Just kill them. A hundred years from now people will look at us like we are looking at George Washington.

Then you go to the Oxxo in 100 years, say, can you sell me some hamburger? They will laugh at you. We don't sell meat.

What do you mean? Right now, if you go to Oxxo and say, I want human fingers for breakfast, maybe they will even call the police. I think, I hope, twenty, thirty years from now, it will be like that with all meat.

So I think when you're thinking about the first of the ten mistakes, be careful with meat. If you eat a lot of meat and you cannot stop right away, then stop one day per week, then stop two days per week, like that. What should I do if I go home and my parents offer me meat but I'm vegetarian?

Generally, you should respect your parents. Take the meat, eat the potato, and when nobody's looking, push the meat off and give it to the dog. But don't, generally, don't feed the dog.

Don't make your Buddhism unpleasant for other people. Oh, I'm a Buddhist. You go to the store, get me a veggie burger.

Don't hassle other people with your Buddhism. Be a quiet Buddhist. Don't say, you got to believe the four steps.

That's not cool. All right. Third one.

Oh, second one. Abortion. So when I was in college, when I was in high school, my teacher said abortion is okay.

And it's legal. So when I was in college, I was involved in an abortion. And then after that, a couple things happened to me.

I mean, I got to know many people who had abortions, and it almost made them crazy. And then my Lama told me, no, no, when the conception, in the moment of conception, this is a child. Then I said, well, I did that before I met you, I did that.

Then he said, you have to do four powers. So personally, I started a children's study group. And we did it for many years, 10, 15 years.

And I cleaned this karma. Before I did my three year retreat, in 2000, I was giving a talk in New York, and one lady asked me, I'm thinking of having an abortion, what do you think? And I said, well, it's your choice.

She said, what does Buddhism say? And I said, well, Buddha said, MI'AM MIR CHAGS PA MI'AM MIR CHAGS PA means to kill a human or to kill a fetus, same thing. He said, same thing.

So she said, I'll think about it. Three years later, I was teaching in New York, and they had some problem with the microphone. So I'm waiting outside.

And I'm a little bit bored, and there's this beautiful girl in a pink dress, and she's dancing around the waiting room. And I was thinking, oh, she's so pretty. Then this woman came in, and she said, I met you before your retreat.

And you told me maybe it's not so good to have an abortion. So I had the kid, and this is the kid. And this is the happiest thing in my life.

Then I felt like, now I'm a real Buddhist teacher. I saved this child. So anyway, that's the Buddhist teaching on abortion.

I don't, you know, I'm a male. We don't have to carry the baby for nine months. We don't have to have someone open us up like a hamburger.

It's easy for male to say abortion is wrong. We just do something for an hour. We don't do anything for nine months.

But still, I'm just telling you, this is the teaching in Buddhism. When the sperm meets the egg, this is a person. So it's possible something can be legal and be a mistake.

And some things are illegal, which are correct. So, in Tsongkapa will say, in the end you have to make your own decisions. You can't just blindly accept everything that the government accepts or the government doesn't accept.

Or the country accepts, or your parents accept, or the law accepts. You have to make your own decisions. Then, okay, that's a shi sampa.

Let's go to jorwa for killing. Third step. So, in the lam rim, jorwa means take the action.

With a knife. He gives the example, duk tsun rik nak. duk means poison.

Use poison to kill somebody. tsun means a weapon, gun or a knife. Rik nak means there are special magic you can do to kill people.

So he says, in some countries people study magic. And you can kill people with a magic spell. Okay, what's the tartuk?

In lam rim's system, tartuk means the person dies. Okay, the thing is finished. What happens if you stab somebody and they survive?

Do you get a karmic path? Is it a complete karma? Okay, so when you hear karmic path, in your mind you should think, translate complete karma.

So in the lam rim system, tartuk means, this is kind of funny, this is the Abhidharma definition. That being must die before you do. So if you have a cowboy shoot out with another cowboy, and you shoot them and they shoot you, and then you're dying, and they are dying, but you die first.

He got tartuk, but you didn't. Okay, got it? That's the lam rim system.

For us, tartuk is, we'll talk about it. Now there's many ethical questions, but a very important one he talks about now. GZHAN LA GSOS DU BCUG NA'ANG RANG GIS BSAD PA DANG BSKYED PA MED PAS If you cause another person to kill another person, you get the same karma as the killer.

Then he quotes, guess whose book he quotes. Stanley Bandu. Stanley Bandu.

MAG LA SOGS PAR BRON CIG PHYIR THAMS CAD PHYIR PA BO BZHIN DE'ANG In the case of a war, and somebody on the front line shoots a gun and kills another person, everyone who supported that war gets the same karma as pulling the trigger themselves. So, if your country loves to make wars, like some North American country I know, it's important to not cooperate. When I was younger, I was smarter.

I went to jail during the Vietnam War, but I'm older and more lazy now. So, at least you should write a letter to your congressman. You are killing people in Afghanistan, Iran, with my tax money.

And I cannot stop you, but I want to tell you I'm not connected with it. You cannot use my taxes this way. I understand I have to pay tax, I don't want to go to jail, I will pay tax, but I don't agree to this.

That's important to protect yourself. It's important to protect yourself so you can tell them, look, I understand I cannot stop this war machine, and I also understand I have to pay taxes, I don't want to go to jail, but I don't agree to you using my money to kill other people. So, for your own protection, I encourage you, I always encourage you, to pay your taxes.

And if you live in a country where the taxes are used for corruption, I was in a country in Europe, which I will not name the country, okay? I'll name the country. It's the largest country in Europe.

And we were going from the capital to the retreat place. And we were on a small road, and there was terrible traffic. And I said to the driver, I said, why don't you take the highway?

Geshe-la, this is the highway. Then we got stuck so bad, everyone turn off and drive across a corn field, destroy all the farmer's corn. And I said, what are you doing?

He said, this is how we get to where we go, and in my country this is what we do. Then I said, well, why didn't they build a highway? Don't you pay taxes?

Yeah, we pay taxes. The guys steal the money. And there's no highways.

There's one highway from the airport to the capital city. Just one highway. In the whole country.

Largest country in the world. Largest country in Europe by land. Your job is to pay your taxes.

Then let them know you don't agree with what they are doing. Especially a country like America, which is very violent. They think the only way to solve problems is with violence.

Okay, a few more minutes. Eight more minutes. By the way, I made the morning session very long, because people are fresh in the morning, mostly.

And I know it's difficult to sit there for three hours. I know. I sat through many, many, many years of classes in the monastery.

No air conditioning, no water, nothing. And I made a promise. When I become a teacher, I will make my students sit longer.

Okay, but be patient. GSUNGS PA LTAR MI RGYAS KYI LUGS GCIG SRED NA DE'I SDIG PA SGO BZHAG BYAS DU MED PAR MI RE RIG LA RUG RE SRED PA'I SDIG PA CHA TZAM RE BYUNG If eight people kill one sheep for meat, it's not that each person gets one-eighth of the bad karma. Each person gets 100% of the karma of killing the animal.

MAG PON LTA BU MAG NI MANG PO DANG DE GZOD PA'I SKABS So suppose there's a leader of an army who directs his men to go kill other people. MI STONG THAG GCIG SRED YOD NA If they kill 1,000 people, MAG MI SO SO LA RE RE CI TZAM RE SRED PA'I NUS PAS SDIG PA RE RE DANG Each soldier gets the karma. Each soldier only gets the karma of how many people they personally killed.

But the leader of the army gets the total sum of karma of the soldiers. The leader gets the karma of killing 1,000 people. And the taxpayer, you are directing people to kill for you.

And you can see those guys that they send. I saw them in the Phoenix airport when we left for Guadalajara. Yeah.

They are young. They are stupid. They saw too many movies.

They think they are going to be famous, and they come back without a leg. And then they become a drug addict for the rest of their life. My nephew, his work is to take care of these guys.

And it destroys their whole life. Once you kill one person, your life is destroyed. U CHOG DIR MIG LTOS SANGS YANG CHOG PHAN TSUN DU RAB TU CHUNG BA'I KYANG MI GZHAN ROG BRTAN PA'AM ZHIG YIN ZER NAS GZHAN LA CHUG GSOD DU SBYUGS NANG MOD In Tibet, well, there's a special vow.

For example, as a monk, even in a country where they eat meat, you're not supposed to ask someone to kill an animal for you. And then there's this custom. In Tibet, there were no Buddhist butchers.

There are no butchers. All the butchers are Muslim. Then the Buddhist people pay the Muslim people to kill their cows.

DE NI ZER GAN DE DANG GSOD DU SBYUGS CAN GNYIS GAR SOGS CHUGS PA'I SDIG PA RE RE'I DBANG ZHING But they don't understand the person who killed the cow and the person who paid the person to kill the cow, they make equal karma. My brother asked me, can we have steak tonight? And I had this fantasy, but I didn't do it.

I wanted to bring a cow into my house, tie it to the kitchen table, give him a big knife, and say, you kill it, I will cook it. And I had this fantasy, but I didn't do it. But I was afraid to get fly boats in my house.

What's that? The boat that the fly rides on. Ah, okay.

He's talking about the story of the fly riding on the cow's poop. And he calls them planes, boats, fly boats. That's it, fly boats.

DE LAS RANG GI LAG LTAR TE ZAN NA SDIG PA GCIG LAS MI'ONG BA'I If you kill the cow yourself, there's only one bad karma. SDIG PA GNOD MA SOGS CAN ROG MI BRAL BA RANG GI SDIG PA GCIG PA ZAD PA RGYA YOD It would be better ... if you're going to eat meat, it would be better to kill the cow yourself.

Why? Yeah, when you pay someone else to kill, you make two bad ... you kill twice.

It's like killing twice. You cause the other person to make the bad karma. Then I had this debate with a Geshe, you know, he's a Geshe, and I said, why do you guys eat meat?

And he's a Geshe, you know, so he can debate. He said, when I go to the store, I don't buy a car, I buy meat. You know, it's in a package.

I don't get in my car and say, I'm going to the store to kill a cow. I say, I'm getting in my car to go to the store to buy some meat. It's not my conception.

I'm not getting in my car to go kill a cow. I'm just getting in my car to buy my butcher's knife, or my steak. Then when I was young, I worked for Cesar Chavez.

I worked for three years for him. He's an amazing man. And our strategy is that we convince everybody, don't buy lettuce.

Until the workers get a good salary. Then it worked. We stopped all the lettuce in all the stores.

We are at every grocery store in the United States, we are stopping people from buying lettuce, you know, and it worked. So I asked a monk, you know, I have this experience with lettuce, but I'm thinking, if everyone refused to buy meat, the store will not sell meat. Am I correct?

He's like, I don't go to the store to kill cow. I don't go to the store to kill cow. I just buy meat.

Then like the next day, I had some fun with him. I came home, in New York, there's all these guys on the street, they are selling stereo system, sound system. And they steal it from the stores.

You know, maybe. They will steal, then they will go out on the street and they will sell. New sound system, you know.

Steal in the box. Then I came home, I asked this monk, you know, I saw a sound system today. It's like $2,000 sound system.

The guy is selling for $200, you know. Then he said, buy it, you know. Then I said, I don't know, I'm pretty sure it's stolen.

He said, no, no, you cannot buy something which is stolen. Then I'm like, okay, you can't eat meat anymore. You can't buy meat anymore.

Why? Stolen. That cow didn't agree to give it to you.

You took it. Then he's like, many years later, he got cancer. I helped him to get his operation.

And he came home and he said, I will stop eating meat now. Just by instinct, he understands something. When he gets cut, he understands something about cut, you know.

Okay, all right. You don't need it, okay? You just don't need it.

There's no reason to eat it. Yeah, okay. Green drink.

Juice. Okay, good for you. All right.