«Дар освобождения», курс 29 «Большой побег», занятие 8

[Speaker 1]
We're going to do rounds three and round four, okay, together. All right. What's the other name for round three and round four and round five?

Yeah, nice. Okay. THUGS RGYAL GYUR TING NGAN ZIN.

VYATIKRANTA SAMAPATI. Okay.

[Speaker 2]
All right, here we go.

[Speaker 1]
THUGS RGYAL GYUR TING NGAN ZIN. So normally you don't start round three with what? Air conditioner, but since it's our first round today, ten breaths.

Michael and Melissa arranged for some wind that you could listen to. Heartbeat inside the heart. Heartbeat at a distance.

Sugar crystal. Ocean.

[Speaker 2]
Endless space.

[Speaker 1]
Turn off your mind. Block thoughts, feelings, images. Turn off your mind and let the thoughts go.

Come and go as they please.

[Speaker 2]
Don't attach to them.

[Speaker 1]
Think of one of your teachers in your life and ask them to come and sit with you. Think of how you first met them. What events brought you together?

What outside causes? Then cancel that wrong idea that you met them because of outside causes, events, and think for a moment how they come from your seeds in your mind. Each event that brought your teacher to you was actually coming from your own mind, from seeds in your mind.

Maybe they came to that first meeting in a car, but you produced the car also. Now explore your past life. Find the seeds that produced your teacher and the meeting and the car.

Have fun. Relax. Be creative.

Find detail. Make detail. Come back to those silver seeds in your mind.

Look at them, the seeds you planted back then. See one open. See the picture come out.

See it land, spread over your lama.

[Speaker 2]
It gives him the quality.

[Speaker 1]
Now you know how to make your lama stay in this life and future lives. Just plant the seeds. Now come back to the heartbeat, round four.

The purpose is to show off how you can jump between normal objects, increasingly subtle normal objects, and emptiness. So try to make the jumps very clear. One moment you're focusing on what you created with your teacher, and the very next moment you're focusing 100% on your heartbeat.

You have flexibility, shinjung, mental flexibility. Jump to something you would like to happen in the next few weeks, in your life, personally. Forget the heartbeat.

Immediately jump back to being inside the heartbeat. Quiet, cocoon, outside, the heart is beating. The outer world is gone.

Immediately jump to thinking about the things you would do to get what you want to happen this next few weeks, outside causes. What different things do you normally have to do to get the thing you want to happen in your own life to happen? Immediately jump back to the heart at a distance.

Forget what you would like to achieve. 100% focus on the heartbeat at a distance. How much flexibility do you have in your meditation?

Jump back to the emptiness of what you want to achieve in your life. It will not happen by outside causes. Picture what goal you have.

Picture it created by outside causes, actions, events, and cancel that. There is no such goal. It cannot be reached by outside causes.

Drop the idea and drop the attempt to make it happen through outside causes. Emptiness. Secession.

Jump back to the crystal at your heart. Tiny, tiny, tiny crystal. Drop the emptiness.

Show your flexibility. 100% on the crystal. You are the director of your mind and your mind is not directing you.

Jump straight back to dependent origination. Four steps plan. What will I have to do for someone else to plant the seeds to get what I would like to happen in the next few weeks?

What kind of help will I have to get to someone else? Drop the crystal. Show your flexibility.

Jump back to the ocean. Huge, huge, silent, peaceful ocean as wide as the world inside the tiny crystal. Drop the plans.

Enjoy the vast feeling. Enjoy the spaciousness of your mind spread far and peaceful. Jump back to your four step plan.

Who will be your karmic partner? Who will you choose to serve and help to plant the seeds you need? Jump back to endless space.

Your mind now expanding, stretching as far as space in all directions. Very pleasant, very wide, very calm, happy. Maybe you overlap other people doing the same meditation.

In other worlds.

[Speaker 2]
Say hi.

[Speaker 1]
Jump back to your four step plan. Where and when this week, next week, will you help this other person? Exactly.

Make some kind of commitment. Jump back to stopping your mind. Actively blocking thoughts.

Turn off. Show your flexibility. Control of your mind.

[Speaker 2]
Very quiet.

[Speaker 1]
Jump back to your plan for the next few weeks. Imagine yourself finished. Goal is achieved.

Enjoy. Rejoice. Imagine your future self.

This goal or this problem is it is stopped or the goal is achieved. Try to picture yourself how you will be in one month. Jump back to the fourth formless realm.

Mind is shut off. Thoughts are moving through the mind with no attachment to them.

[Speaker 2]
Super quiet.

[Speaker 1]
Enjoy.

[Speaker 2]
Back to your teacher in front of you.

[Speaker 1]
The one who is coming from you.

[Speaker 2]
The one that you can keep in your life if you plant the seeds by sharing what you know.

[Speaker 1]
Ask them for their blessing. Ask them to stay in your heart. They start to rise off their seat.

They get smaller and smaller. The size of your hand. The size of your thumb.

And they come and rest on the top of your head. They turn to face the same way. And they sink down into your central channel, chong may.

In the middle of the top of your head. They come down in front of your spine to the chamber of your heart. They happily agree to stay there even when you're not thinking of them.

And help guide your life. Three long exhales share this karma with people in the world. And then slowly open your eyes.

Take a stretch. I think we got to do some lamrim because we didn't do much. And then we'll do the lamrim review.

There are lots of ideas happened the last three days I think in people's heads about how we're going to do the lamrim meditation teacher training. And I'm sure Jasmine decided everything during retreat. And we'll have some meetings and we'll talk to you about it.

Sarak ni Susan Stump has also helped, offered to help. Very experienced teacher, Susan. Okay.

Alright. Mr. Adam, we are at Nipah Ngom. Very nice.

Oop. Nope, that's last time. N-G-O-M-S N-G-O-M-S He said...

Oh, there you go. I'm sorry. You're right.

Nipah Ngompa Mepi Nyepi Ni. This is the second of the sufferings that we go through. Common six sufferings.

And... What's the picture in your book? I don't even remember.

I don't know. Second suffering. Second suffering.

[Speaker 2]
Where are we?

[Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah. Number... Gift 29, meditation number 5.

It's the book, right? It's the cover of our book. Okay?

Lam Rim book. Okay? I think it's page what?

Well, page number's changed. Okay? The first suffering we had was meditation number 4, which is what?

The book says no certainty. I prefer the word no guarantees. We don't know...

There are absolutely no guarantees in your life. You don't know if you'll be alive tomorrow. Okay?

You don't know if you don't have cancer right now. Okay? Maybe you live to be 110 and very healthy.

We don't know. There's no guarantee. And after you die, there's no guarantee where you will go, or who you will be.

And even in this lifetime, there's no guarantee with relationships. People who were your friends become your enemies. People who were your enemies become your best friends.

Okay? It's all crazy. It's all mixed up.

Okay? That was the first suffering. Second suffering is this one.

We are never satisfied. We never have enough. No matter how much money you get, you want more.

Okay? There's a song I like by Annie DeFranco. What is it?

I got everything I want still I want more. Oh. What's that song?

Anyway. It's human nature. What kind of paradise is this?

I got everything I want and still I want more. That's the line of the song. So actually, if you have Lam Rim, you pretty much have everything.

That's why I put the picture there.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
But it's human nature to be dissatisfied and want more. Okay? So we're going to go through the text now.

Alright? So here's the second suffering that people go through which is we never have enough. We always want more.

CHE MA LAS is the Tibetan word for mariposa. Butterfly. Okay?

CHE MA LAS. I don't know what it means exactly but it's a nice word. Sometimes they're called CHIN CIG LAM MO which means a goddess butterfly.

So it's a beautiful word CHE MA LAS. Okay? It can also mean a moth.

Okay? CHE MA LAS. CHE MA LAS GZUGS DANG RIS DAG So it's said that you know moths like somebody told me they had a bad experience in their retreat.

They had an illegal tea light going. You cannot do open flames at Diamond Mountain. You will burn down everything.

Okay? Illegal. But anyway, they said a moth flew into it and they felt bad.

I said you should feel bad because you had a flame. Okay. RIS DAG DRA.

RIS DAG means deer. And they like music.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
And I tested it one day. I was in retreat near the Grand Canyon and I was taking a walk and I ran into a deer. And he's like and I'm like and then I said I'm going to check this scripture thing.

And I sang the mandala to him and he was like you know. So they say deers like songs. Beautiful song.

Okay. PHUNG BA. Tea.

And flies like poo poo. Stinky thing. LANG CHEN REG CA LA CHAGS Elephants like to be petted or scratched.

Okay. CHAGS PA'I PHUNG PA LTAR All these are stories from ancient India about animals that lost their life because they were attached to something. So there's a story obviously moth who's attached to the flame dies.

The deer gets sung a song and then the hunter shoots it with an arrow. I don't know what happened to the fly but something. And the elephant got caught in a trap.

So PHUNG BA here doesn't mean PHUNG PO. Okay. PHUNG PO means heaps, five skandhas.

PHUNG BA means to be lost. What do you call it? Like disaster.

PHUNG meaning to fall or to fail. Okay. So it means disaster, lost everything.

PHUNG BA. Okay. Maybe you add that to your dictionary, Adam.

PHUNG BA LTAR KHOR BA'I DE SKYID DI MI LEN TSE CHU THUNG BA BZHIN So the happiness of this cycle of pain is like CHU means water, right? LEN TSE is an ancient word for salt. Okay.

So a very rare word for salt, LEN TSE. It usually refers to sea water. I was listening to NPR.

They were interviewing Sorry, it was a Christian radio station. I was listening to a Christian radio station which I do sometimes for fun because sometimes they're quite beautiful. And they were interviewing a guy who was on a ship in World War II and the ship got hit by a torpedo.

And all of them were in the water for three days or something. And many got eaten by sharks. And this guy survived, he said, by praying.

And it was very beautiful to hear him talk. But he described what happened to people who drink the water. You're in the water but you can't drink it because it will kill you.

And you'll go crazy before that. So they would drink the water, salt water. And then they would go crazy.

And they would actually hurt other people in the water and things like that. LEN TSA'I PHYUD LTUNG BA BZHIN PHYUD TZAM CHUNG RNAMS No matter how much salt water you drink SNGON PA MED PA SNGON PA is an ancient word for have enough. SNGON PA means have your fill.

You say, okay, that's enough salt water. Once you start drinking the salt water you can't stop. That's why they put salt in all the American junk food.

Which Chinese people should kick out of their country. My opinion. DPER NA DNGUL SANGS GANG MDO TZAM LAS MED PA ZHIG LA There are many of us in our earlier life, me too, we didn't have any money at all.

And we were okay. We were pretty happy. SANGS GCOD TZAM CHUNG RNAMS Then we got more money.

And then we needed it. We got used to it. And then we needed more money.

I used to go around India with a backpack. And now I have three suitcases and a limousine and I can't do without it. Okay.

Sometimes I look at the kids with backpacks and I'm like jealous of them. SANGS CHUNG RNAMS SANGS DE'I CHUNG BA'I TSE NA If you get pretty wealthy then you want to be super wealthy. YANG RGYA CHUNG NA SANGS DE'I CHUNG NA STONG CHUNG NA So you go from one to ten to a hundred to a thousand.

You cannot stop. You want more and more. SANGS PA CI TZAM CHUNG YANG MI NGOM No matter how much we get we want more.

[Speaker 2]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
And I had this experience in the diamond business. I started at seven dollars an hour. Later I was making a lot of money.

And I never felt like I had enough. In fact, I remember when we hit one million. When we hit one million and we threw a big Christmas party for all the workers and we gave everybody a big bonus.

When we hit a hundred million we didn't give anything. You see. It's the human nature.

You know. It's very weird. The more you have the less you want to share.

Okay. Very strange. DOG KYANG PHYIR ROL PA DANG LA'I KHYANG There is a sutra called LALITTA VISTARA which means the play of the universe.

And it says, RGYAL BA LHA'I DOD PA GANG YIN DANG MI'I DOD PA SANGS PO GANG YIN PA DOD PA DE DANG MI CHI KYIS THOB KYANG DE KYANG MI CHOG DE KYANG YANG TSA LO So it doesn't matter whether you're a king or you're a deva or you're a beggar. The minute you get something you still want more. Very, very few people have the power to stop even when they're comfortable.

I like to say I tried meditating in a cave. It does not work. Many bugs.

And I had a very dangerous snake came in. Green rattlesnake. If they touch you, you die.

And then I had a wolf come in. Then I was like, I need a house. this was in Clarksville near Cottonwood.

There's a secret canyon with water and beautiful caves. Many years ago I went there. Then I decided I need a small, get a small nice house comfortable for meditation.

If you're in Singapore, it's an apartment, right? Because there's more land at Diamond Mountain than at Singapore. So, get a nice comfortable place.

Small and make it sweet and be happy. Don't get hungry for more. ,GZHAN GZUN PA LTAR LHA MI DE ,GYI LTA BU LA BRTZON NA If we just take example of humans and last devas, worldly gods like Iron Man.

There are such beings. Thor, okay? There are such beings.

We can't see them, but they exist. In the old days, people saw them. Gyalpo Nga, they knew.

Then there was a king called Mandattar. He was... His father was a king.

He had many queens. And a lot of the queens got pregnant. The king decided the one who had his son would be the one that the son asked to drink the milk of.

It was a test. So, all the queens would call the child and say, suck from me. And his name became Mr. Suck From Me. Okay? Nga, they knew. Very famous, Mandattar.

LING SHI LHA NAS DANG PHYIR BAR DBANG BA CHUNG YANG In time, when he grew up he became the president of the world. And even he conquered part of the deva paradises. LHA CHUNG YANG, but he wasn't satisfied.

MA NGON PAR THAR SOS RNAMS ZAD NAS Finally, his karma ran out. TZAM LING DIR MA RLUNG BA'I KHAB And he fell to the earth and he was dying. KHA CHENG is a good word, Adam.

It means what do you call it? Final word? Like, what do you say when you're just about to die?

Like, you have to plan it, okay? Don't say, I need some more cappuccino or something. Say, the Dharma is wonderful.

Okay? KHA CHENG means your last words. KHA CHENG ZHAG PA BZHIN BDOD PA'I MI NGON PAR LAS KHYUN CHE BA MED He said, there's no greater problem in this life than not being satisfied with what you have.

And those were his last words. That, from the mightiest king who lived on this earth. He said, that was the biggest problem in life.

KHYEN MED, DE BZHIN DU YUL GCIG LA DBANG NA YUL NYID LA DBANG BYAS DU YOD PA DANG NYAMS PA As soon as you're the president of one country, you want to be the president of two countries. Okay? Or as soon as somebody votes you in for four years, you want eight years.

When you get eight, you want thinking about making it for life. Okay? DE BZHIN DU GCIG TZAM LA DBANG BYAR YOD KYANG MI NGON PHYIN So, it doesn't matter how much...

By the way, that's money, right? Now he's talking about power. As soon as you get power, you want more.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
Very difficult for really powerful people to share their power. DBANG BYAR YOD KYANG MI NGON PHYIN GCIG TZAM GYI SBYANGS SBYOR ZHIG YANG BDAG DUNG BYUNG NA BSAM NAS It's just like money. You're never satisfied with the power that you have, and you always want more power.

Okay? And then you exhaust yourself trying to get more power. If you just stop and enjoy the power you have, you'd probably be pretty happy.

But human nature is to fight for more power and risk everything to get more power until finally you fail or you're exhausted. So the pursuit of power, pursuit of money, I've seen in my business, diamond business, I saw many, many, many super wealthy guys die. They got their heart attack this way.

They kept trying to get more. And finally it killed them. Very common, really common.

Same with politicians. As soon as you're responsible for everything, you also get blamed for everything, but they don't think of that. PHYOGS BZHIN MED NA NOR LONGS SPYOD BYIN DAG ZHIG RDZOM BSKYANGS BRTAM PO DANG KHYAD MED TE If you don't have satisfaction with what you have, then it doesn't matter how much stuff you get.

You'll be the same as a beggar in your mind. You always want more. NGON RGYA RGYUR NA UL PA DE PA So there was a beggar in ancient India called Surata.

And his name is DEPA in Tibetan. So that D-E-S is very, very confusing. Because D-E-S 99.9999999% of the time means buy that. But here it's a personal name. So many people have translated this really weird. DEPA is a personal name, Surata.

NGOR BU RIN THAMS CAD BA ZHIG NYES PA So I think, I forget the story. It's like that story in the West that there was a rock on the road. It happens here at Diamond Mountain.

Big rock on the road. And he was thinking this would hurt other people's horses. So he tried to move it.

And a rich man had put a precious jewel under the rock to see who would try to move it to help other people. And they would get this precious jewel. So he moved the rock and then under the rock is this priceless jewel.

ZHIG NYES PA DUNG BA DE LA BRDZUGS DGOS SHES RGYAL BU ZAG YANG LA BU NAS Then the owner of the jewel came up and said you cannot keep it. Then he said, well what do you want me to do with it? He said, give it to the most needy person in this kingdom.

And he gave it to the king. He went to the palace. He said, I have something for the king.

What? It's a priceless jewel. You beggar, why are you giving the jewel to the king?

I'm supposed to find the most needy person in this whole country and it happens to be the king. Because he doesn't have satisfaction. He has less satisfaction than anyone else in this country.

So he needs it worse. DGOS SHES RGYAL BU ZAG YANG LA BU NAS DGOS SHES RGYAL BU ZAG YANG LA BU NAS PHRAD ZANG NA JI LTAR PHRAD ZANG NA JI LTAR He gave it to this king. BU NAS RGYAL BU KHYOD CHOG SHES MED PAS DGOS SHES RGYAL BU ZAG YANG LA BU NAS Actually he got in trouble because he told the king you're the least satisfied person I know.

And there was some problem. I forget what happened to him. But it's not good to say those things to a king.

NGOR RDZAS MED KYANG CHOG SHES YOD NA DE CHUG PO YIN TE Even if you don't have a lot of money or things, but you have satisfaction and pleasure with the small things you already have, you are wealthy. I remember we were doing a three-year retreat and somebody came to me afterwards and they said if your three-year retreat is all know about karma, how come they don't have money? A lot of money.

And I thought about it because it bothered me a little bit. Then one day I was meditating I said, wait, they have satisfaction. So I think there's this karma.

First you don't have karma for money. Then you get more karma for money. Then you get a lot, a lot, a lot of karma for money.

And then you get to satisfaction and you don't care what money you have and you're happier. You see what I mean? So maybe if you keep giving money to people or helping other people make money, there'll be this ultimate, what do you call it?

Super rich position where you just have satisfaction. And maybe you have money or you don't have money. I'm not saying you have to not have money.

You should have enough money to live a comfortable, quiet life. But maybe the super wealthy people are the three-year retreatants. Okay?

Can you guys stand up, three-year retreatants? They gave their houses to you. Come on, come on.

Yeah. Maybe it's a sign that the three-year retreat was successful, you see? They gave away their houses for you, for them.

They built them with their own money. And most of them used up all their money. And then they...

Now I'm staying in Joseph's house. Thank you. It's very comfortable.

Okay. And it has a good feeling there. Really good feeling.

Okay. ZHES SPRING LAS ZHES SPRING is Nagarjuna's letter to a friend. KUN DU CHOG ZHES RDZIR GCIG CHOG KHYEN NA NOR MA'I RDOG KYANG YANG DAG SBYOR PA LA KUN DU CHOG ZHES RDZIR GCIG He told the king, try to be satisfied with what you have always.

CHOG KHYEN NA This CHOG means satisfaction. Okay. Khyen is honorific because he's speaking to...

Who's his friend? A king. Okay.

I forget the king's name. Maybe this person is... NOR MA'I RDOG KYANG Even if you don't have money, YANG DAG SBYOR PA LA You are the most wealthy person.

He's giving advice to a king which was common for Nagarjuna. And we will be reading some of these texts starting next time. Oh, starting in Guadalajara actually.

Okay. And continuing at Diamond Mountain in the fall. Cool.

Cool. It's actually for me because I really want to spend some time with Nagarjuna. Kamalashila is good but Nagarjuna is like amazing.

Okay. RDOG DGON SANGS PA RGYA RAS PAS Then there was a lama in Tibet called Sangpa Gyare. RDOG DGON means protector of all people.

1161 to 1211 his real name is Yoshe Dorje. He's supposed to be an incarnation of Naropa. He said, PHYOGS CHE CHEN GYI DGO GANG NA CHUG PO DGON YANG CHE KHYING YOD TE DGOS PA CHEN GYI MA TSOR BA YOD PA YIN On the porch of satisfaction, the king is lying down with no blanket as the door guard.

This is a reference to India. If you've ever lived in India, they'll have door guards. They have a stick and they have to walk around at night and bang the stick on the ground so you know they're not asleep.

It's custom. All night long. And they're guarding the door.

They usually have to sleep on the ground outside the door. Other people that they're protecting sleep inside and when they can't sleep they hear the duck-duck of the stick and they feel more protected. Okay?

So he says, the king is lying outside while the people with satisfaction are having a good night's sleep. Got it? Those who have satisfaction are richer than the king.

The king is relegated to sleeping on the ground, meaning he's working hard to get more money and more power. All right. ZHES GSUNGS PA LTAR CHOG SHES MA CHUNG NA SNGON PA'I THA MA'I There's no limit to human desire.

You will always want more and more. DE NA CHOG SHES DANG SNGON PA MA'I PA'I DI RKYEN CHOS SU ZHIG YIN GSUNG Therefore, GSUNGS What's that mean? Said.

Who said? Somebody said there's no greater problem than lack of satisfaction. No, this is a wrap up.

When you wrap up in this text, who's talking? Trijang Rinpoche is reporting what Pabongka said. So he keeps, every time he finishes a section, he throws in, he said.

He told us. Meaning the Lama told us. Because remember, this is a video of the Lam Rim teaching.

Okay? All right? And don't forget Trijang Rinpoche is reporting his teacher's words.

Let's do one more problem since they're so cheerful. GSUNGS PA LUS YANG NAS YANG DU RTOR BA'I GNYER PA NI The picture is, what is the picture? Number six.

Oh yeah, Brad Pitt and Angela Jolie. Okay? The point of this meditation, you have done everything in your life.

I like to tell big, serious men with beards that they have been Miss America countless times in their path life. You know? You have been everything.

Countless times. Not once, not twice. You have been president of the world countless times.

I don't say much about people who kill a million people or something because I have done it also. And you have done it also. And you can't count the times you have done it.

So I even give them a little break in my mind because I'm like, okay, this is your turn, but I have also done it in the past. I have killed millions of people in a single lifetime. Okay?

And you have been the most handsome guy in the world. And you have been the most beautiful woman in the world. And you have had the most beautiful man or the most beautiful woman in the world countless times.

Okay? So the point of this is security. How can you keep something?

How can you keep things? And that means you have to give security to other people, even cows. Okay?

Try to help give security to other people. Make their lives more secure. There are millions of poor people in the world.

Help them. Why not? If you were them, you would want some help.

I think John Brady's project is incredibly brilliant because they are helping really, really poor people to make a living. And they are saving all the books at the same time. So that's really smart Mr. Brady. Okay. Where is that text? I have about a hundred texts up here.

Okay. GSUNGS PA LUS YANG NAS YANG DU MDOR BA'I NYES PA Specifically in the Lam Rim at this point they are talking about insecurity of your body. Okay?

You tend to shuck off, you tend to take off bodies like you take off your clothes every night. Like our condition of a living being in samsara is we take off bodies almost as often as we take off our clothes. Then you have to put on a new one.

And there is no security. This body, I like to call it a rental car. In DCI we call it the rental car, right?

When you were born you rented the car and you have to take it back to the airport. I went to see my step-mom's 90th birthday before I came here. they didn't have the car I booked, which was a modest car, Route 4.

And they gave me a very fancy Audi and it was a terrible thing. I've never driven one before and I got used to it in about 10 minutes. And I was like, those Germans know how to do something.

So anyway, Bavarians especially. So anyway, I was Why did I say that? Oh, then I had to give it up again.

Taking it back was painful. I was like wondering if there is somewhere I could just bring it back to Arizona. But that didn't work out.

So you have to keep taking your car back to the rental, your body, right? Anyway, nobody in my town could fix it. That's what I decided, so I'd be happier.

If you try to fix an Audi in our town, you'll be having a bicycle run. Okay, LUS CI LTAR LANGS KYANG YID BSTAN MED DE It doesn't matter how many, it doesn't matter what kind of body you rent when you're born, you got to give it back. ZHES SPRING LAS He's quoting a letter to a friend.

Maybe we should do that one at Diamond Mountain. I'm not sure. I'm still thinking about it.

I like that book because it's half emptiness and half lamrim. Ancient lamrim. LHA YOD DU DE SHIN DU CHEN PO DANG Beings in the Deva realms.

Deva realm, how do you get to a Deva realm? You do the eight meditations, okay? You do the four formless realm meditation.

That's how you get to be a Deva. What do they look like? They look just like the Marvel movie heroes.

Iron Man, Wonder Woman, Thor, Batman. Those people exist. Those beings exist.

Many more. If we could see them, we could make a lot of money making movies. Somebody was checking me the other day.

They said, have you had any great realizations? I said, I'm not supposed to talk about it. Then they said, well, have you seen hungry ghosts?

They were adamant to check if I had seen hungry ghosts. And, you know, we're teaching emptiness all day, every day, and they want to know if I saw hungry ghosts. You know, anyway.

I said I couldn't, anyway. Okay. LHA YOD DU DE SHIN DU CHEN PO DANG TZANG NYID CHAGS BRTAL DE BA THOB NAS LA RANG TZANG NYID means, TZANG means Tsangpa.

It's the Tibetan word for Brahma, which is like Wonder Woman, Super Wonder Woman. CHAGS BRTAL DE BA THOB NAS LA RANG So, you can, NAR MED MED YI PHU ZHING GYUR BA YI You go from Thor to being fuel for the hell realm fires. Okay?

Your body is burned like, PHU ZHING means yeah, firewood. CHAGS BRTAL by the way means the lack of attachment that people have when they do the form and formless realm meditations. Free of the, what?

Air conditioner. Okay? CHAGS BRTAL But, there's two kinds of desire, right?

One is desire for, I don't know, Audis. Now I have this problem. And, I don't want an Audi.

Don't buy me an Audi. I like my RAV4.

[Speaker 2]
Old RAV4.

[Speaker 1]
And I like my old RAV4. And it works fine. I'm satisfied.

So, I'm not hinting. So anyway, those big form realm beings, they got there by not having attachment. They got there by doing the eight levels of meditation.

So they're enjoying the result of that, but they didn't use it to see emptiness. So there's two kinds of desire. In the scripture you should know there's two kinds of desire.

Which in the Wheel of Life? Who is desire? The chicken.

Or the pigeon. It's desire. There's two kinds of desire.

One is desire for Audis. One is desire for self-existent things. I can get what I want in my life if I just do this, this, and this.

If I talk to this person. If I email this person. You think like Guan Shi Guan.

If I have connections, I can get what I want. You think like that. You have desire for self-existent things.

It's the second husband in the kitchen. Doesn't exist. That's the higher kind of desire.

Guess which one you want to get rid of. Yeah, the second one. Don't have desire, don't have attachment to things that don't exist.

What don't exist? Things you can get by doing something. Forget it.

There's no such thing. That's attachment. That's real attachment.

If you understand real attachment, you can have all the Audis you want. That's not attachment. Got it?

Okay? That's not attachment. If you understand where they come from.

Why? Because then you will share your Audis. You will make other people happy.

Got it? It's not wrong to have an Audi. Okay?

That's not attachment. Attachment is you don't want to share it. Low attachment.

Higher attachment? You don't understand that sharing it is how you got it. Got it?

I have an Audi dealer. I'm not asking for an Audi. Alright, don't send me one.

I don't want one. Okay. NYID MA BDAG BA NYID TOGS RANG NYID KYIS So in the old days, it was believed that the sun and the moon were living beings.

Okay? So in ancient Indian scripture, sometimes you will see the moon and the sun referred to as deities. Sun god, moon god.

TOGS RANG You can achieve that state. RANG NYID KYIS YUL KYI JI RTEN THA DAG NANG BYAS TE And the light from your body is illuminating the whole planet. Okay?

So that's real power. Okay? You are the sun who causes all life on earth.

You are the moon that makes everybody crazy on the full moon days. Okay? Your body's light is illuminating the whole planet.

Then LAR YANG MUN NA MAG TU CING RGYUD NAS Then there's a special kind of rebirth you can take where you die and you're just born in the middle of space, outer space, and you're surrounded by cold, freezing asteroids and everything's dark and you cannot die. You don't have to breathe. And you're just in darkness your whole life.

In empty darkness your whole life, outer space. You can be born there and you can survive there. Thinking that breath and green drinks is what keeps you alive is a mistake.

Breath does not keep you alive. Green drinks are tasty, right? Andriana?

But they don't keep you alive. Okay? Karma keeps you alive.

So you can be born in terrible, lonely places where you live by yourself. You never eat, you never breathe. Okay?

So you can go from being the sun which gives life to this planet to living in the darkness out near Pluto. It happens. LAR YANG MUN NAG PA MUN NAG PA This MAG means darkness.

MUN NAG means dark. He's got three words for darkness here. MUN PA, NAG PA and MAG RUM It's called MAG RUM.

RANG GI LAG PA KYANG BA'I MI THONG BRGYUR Anybody tell me what KYANG KUM means? KYANG KUM Nice! Oh, serious?

What have you been drinking while I haven't seen you? He went like this. That's exactly KYANG KUM.

KYANG means spread out your arms. KUM means... How did you think of that?

Some synapse went... One of Vajrayogini's names is KYANG KUM. Her knee is bent and her hands are extended.

She's called Mrs. Reach and Return. Okay? It's a name for Vajrayogini.

What it means here, guess. He's talking about your LAG PA and he said MI THONG. You can't see your own hand.

You can't see your own hand. You have been the sun. Then you die.

And now, for your whole life you cannot see your hand KYANG spread in front of you. You can't see your fingers because it's so dark. People do that.

That happens to people. Alright. Now that you are well depressed, let's go to some idims.

Okay? And we'll come back to the Lam Rim. Again, we'll have some meetings with Jasmine, Tim, Jiggy.

We'll figure out how we examine people. You're going to debate it today. Maybe we examine you next time.

I don't know. It's up to the boss. But let's go to the Lam Rim pictures for the idim.

Okay? Which one are we on? Wow, we're doing good progress.

Okay, oops. Okay. Now, most of the idims I tried to split them up.

But this one was, the parts are too short to split up. Okay? So I didn't want to take up seven or eight different pictures.

Okay. So this is one of the few idims that I tried to put seven or eight things together. These are called the meditation posture.

Correct? Meditation posture. And it's called the posture of Vajracana.

Okay? Which is the Buddha of appearances. Why?

This Buddha has an extraordinary ability to look like a normal person. Like, right, Andriana? Okay.

We know. Okay. Okay?

So this Buddha is called appearances, meaning they can take many appearances. All your friends could be Buddhas, okay? Vajracana.

Vajra means many different, lochana, loch or roach means to shine. Like roach's head. Shining.

[Speaker 2]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
Me and JB. So there are seven or eight parts to the meditation posture. Somebody give me, give me some of the seven.

Eyes, eyes closed or slightly down but don't look at anything. And if you choose to open your eyes and look down, don't do the natural thing and lower your chin because then you will get sleepy. Okay, first thing eyes.

I don't care the order, give me any order. Straight back like a stack of coins. Chin level, good.

If it goes too high up, you get, sorry, gupa, you get a distraction. Busy mind. And if it's too far down, you get sleepy, normally.

Okay, next. Shoulders, yeah, equal. I have a good friend who meditates like this and it's not good for your prana.

Okay, next one. I don't think belly is in there. Huh?

Legs? Yeah. Legs, whatever is comfortable.

Okay, sit on a chair if you have to. What do DCI people say about sitting on a chair? Buddha didn't have a chair.

Okay, next one. Huh? Hands.

Yeah, you have many options, you know that. Okay. We're missing one more.

Smile. Huh? Tongue, yeah, natural position of tongue in the mouth.

Okay. And then eight, if you add eight, is breath. Behind you?

Yeah, your breath, okay. Okay, so you guys all know that. We don't have to go through it.

But I was looking at recently at ACI course three. For some of the meditation stuff, because I took it from Tsongkhapa's Lamrim, it's better than Pabongka's Lamrim for some of the meditation stuff. So, if you're going to teach meditation, use the ACI course also.

Now, item 36. By the way, page numbers for these items. I spent a couple hours, I went in, I put all the page numbers from Gift of Liberation in English by searching the Tibetans, so it's accurate.

But, I realized when I was doing it that a huge percentage of the Lamrim, for example, this section on meditation, came from many, many other books when I was teaching it. So, back nine years ago when we started these retreats, and during the 29 retreats, I've been pulling many, many, many things from other books. So, I wanted to warn you, it's not enough to read the book, okay?

The book is maybe 20% of what you heard, and you got like 80%, whatever I was translating at that time, I was pulling from that, huge amounts from other things. So, I would really encourage Jasmine, find a way that these teachers have to listen to the videos. That means people like Jing Mei and Jamie have to make sure we have the videos up as well as we can.

I know some, the camera died or somebody lost the videotape or whatever, but to do your project, to teach meditation teachers, it'd be useful to have the videos, okay? And then to link the videos to the explanation, okay? Which is a huge amount of work, good luck.

We did cover Mahamudra meditation. Maha means big, mudra means a seal, like the seal that a king uses on their orders, okay? Which is why I put the picture of a seal, okay?

This is a famous meditation where the object of meditation is your own mind, okay? It's supposed to be less likely to get sleepy. Why?

It's so interesting. And it's moving target. It's changing every few seconds, you know?

So, it's supposed to be easier to avoid dullness if you choose your own thoughts as your meditation object, okay? When you do that, it's called Mahamudra meditation, okay? There are...

Then what's the next thing you do after you start watching your mind? Huh? This is how Tibetans in a debate say, what did you say?

They go, huh? Huh? You're just supposed to watch your mind?

Yeah, we do that. You can try to bring it to a present moment meditation. It got into the Lam Rim because I was studying the first Panchen Lama's devil angel at the time.

He has a good Mahamudra meditation in there. And he wrote the book on Mahamudra. He wrote a whole book about it.

It's the book we use, okay? But that's not what I wanted. Where do you go?

Yeah, you go to emptiness. What's the emptiness of your mind? It's not when you can't think of the answer, okay?

It's... What's the emptiness that you did in the lion's dance? Yeah, there's seeds producing your teacher, okay?

Now, when you do an emptiness meditation on your mind, you try to realize that what you hear in your mind is not you. It's coming out of seeds, okay? The seeds, what you hear inside your own head all day long is coming out of seeds, okay?

And by the time you hear it, it's too late to change it. It's very much like... What's the example I always use?

Huh? Two husbands fits everything. Light from a star.

Light from a star, okay? By the time the light reaches you from a star... They had a special thing at the Chicago World's Fair because the light from the star they were looking at left that star at the last world a hundred years before.

You see what I mean? So, by the time the starlight reaches Diamond Mountain and you guys are now brave enough to go out and look at it, just make noise, okay? If you're very quiet, a pig might come up and smell you.

Just move around a lot. I used to meditate on the top of my house, my yard, except I used to kept sliding off to watch the stars. So anyway, by the time you see the starlight, that star could be dead.

That star could already die, okay? And it's the same with your thoughts. By the time you hear your thoughts, they have already come out of the seas.

It's too late to stop them. See what I mean? If you want to have a good meditation on your mind, you have to start a week before.

Be nice to other people. Do not ever, ever, ever... My Lama used to say, ever, ever, never disturb another person's mind.

If you want to be a great meditator, never, ever, ever disturb another person's mind. And that's the way you can tell a great meditation teacher, okay? If they're talking about that, they know about meditation.

If they're not talking about that, they don't really know about meditation, okay? The most important thing about meditation is that it's coming out of how you treated people last week. Period, okay?

Learn how to not upset other people, okay? Especially with this dangerous instrument called your mouth. Okay?

It's so easy to upset another person with what you say. So think carefully before you say things. Get in the habit of thinking carefully before you say things to other people.

Say things which are true, but which will inspire them and encourage them, okay? And watch what your mouth does, okay? Then your meditation will be good next week.

And if you don't watch what your mouth does, it doesn't matter how many books of meditation you read or what teachers you go to, it doesn't matter at all. You won't be able to meditate, okay? Got it?

It's a simple thing. It's a non-self-existent. Meditation is non-self-existent.

It's also coming out of seeds in your mind. If you understand that. And that was Tsongkhapa's breakthrough in his letter to Rang Drakpa Tsako Umbo, the friar from Tsako, okay?

Which is in ACI course number. That's the Three Principal Paths, is also a letter. But I'm talking about...

Yeah. I think it's in course... I checked it yesterday.

It's in course three. It's in the tenth class of course three. I translated it for you, I think.

There's a letter. No. It's a letter that he wrote to...

He banished his student to East Tibet. He banished one. He said, come back after you build a hundred monasteries.

I don't want to see your face until then. Okay? I'm thinking to do something like that with the ACI studios.

But, come back when you finish a hundred. When he finished the hundredth one, he called it Datsang. It's still there.

You can still see it. Datsang means, ha, I'm finished. I reached a hundred.

It's called, I reached a hundred monasteries. Okay? So anyway, he sent his student to East Tibet.

You know, come back when you build a hundred monasteries. He finished Datsang, the hundredth one, he came back. But, in the meantime, he wrote a letter to Tsongkapa saying, I just ordained the first monks and nuns in this area of East Tibet.

Then Tsongkapa wrote him back a long letter about why the most important teaching about meditation is understanding that it comes out of seeds of what you did last week. Okay? Very, very famous letter.

Very, very important letter for us. I translated it in, I think it's class 10, ACI 3. Maybe Courtney can check it out.

What's it, aboot? How do you tell a Canadian person? They don't say about, they say aboot?

Who's the other Canadian we had here the other day? No, it was Joel said aboot. Anyway.

Okay? That's the emptiness of your mind. What?

That meditation is not, not coming from what you did last week. That's the emptiness of your mind. Okay?

Got it? And that's Mahamudra. There's a higher Mahamudra where you use prana to see the emptiness of your mind directly.

That's a tantric teaching. I cannot give it to you. Okay?

You need to hear more lam rim. But, I want to tell you guys, the people who have been coming here regularly, I'm sneaking tantra in. You don't even know.

Okay? You're getting tantra and it's only you that I trust to give it to. Not the people who come here because I said I'm teaching tantra.

Understand? So I'm leaking tantra to you all the time. Okay?

And you're going to get more and more if you come regularly.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
Like fire offering. I'm not supposed to tell people how to make tormas or how to do fire offering. But I'm teaching the people khanda lam rim by experience, not by classroom.

Understand? You are getting leaked tantra. Okay?

You don't even know. That's the way it should be. Okay.

We finished two. That's not enough. But we ran out of time.

Right, Tim? So, Joe, just with a boat. Thank you.

[Speaker 2]
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