«Дар освобождения», курс 37 «Лучшее, что ты можешь сделать со своей жизнью», занятие 1

[Говорящий 2]
Hi, welcome back to Lam Rim. And we're at Diamond Mountain. And thanks to all the crew, especially June, Juan, Daniel, Paul, Archie, Pat, Alan, Janet, Joseph, and...

What's your name again? Jigme.

[Говорящий 1]
And this is a really exciting Lam Rim. I like it because we finally reached Bodhichitta. After 10 years of working on this Lam Rim book, we've reached finally Bodhichitta.

We have done 36 retreats already in 10 years. And this is number 37. And I just feel like we're sitting in a bath, in a warm tub, finally, after struggling through impermanence and the sufferings of all the realms and things like that, then finally we get to talk about beautiful things like Bodhichitta and being a bodhisattva.

[Говорящий 2]
So let's jump into it. This is a typical device used by the Buddhist teachers where they sell you an idea.

[Говорящий 1]
It's like, I don't know, in America we say like selling a car. If you bought a car recently, you go to the place and the guys, they're really good at it. By the time you leave, you feel like it's almost patriotic to buy this car.

But this guy, the car seller is a bodhisattva and he just wants you to have this car at a good price. And I don't know, it's very hard to not listen to them. They're very convincing and it's what they do.

And they judge you immediately. They understand how to talk to you immediately. And it's amazing.

So anyway, it's a tradition in Buddhism that you sell a great idea and you talk about how cool is it. So I think we're going to enjoy this particular Lamrim retreat because the whole thing is a sales job about why getting bodhichitta is so cool, why it's so cool to have bodhichitta. So for me, it's fun.

It's going to be a fun retreat. And then today, I think we have a special class. After this class, we'll have a special discussion between myself and Dr. Wu about the Medicine Buddha practice and where does it fit into the Lamrim and what we're studying now. So we'll do an hour of that and then we'll come back to the benefits of bodhichitta. I think it's important to... I'm lucky because I was not a Buddhist when I first heard these teachings.

So I had just got to Asia. I was just in my first classes. There was a Geshe teaching, Geshe Ngon Dargay.

He had a translator, Sharpa Rinpoche, who's in the Vajrayogini lineage. I didn't know anything. There was about 20 hippies from different countries and we didn't know anything.

So there were lots of misunderstandings in the beginning. The translator was very young and the Geshe was from a very strange Eastern dialect part of Tibet where they spoke a strange dialect. So the whole thing was a study in misunderstanding.

We would learn words and then we'd all talk about it in a mistaken way for a couple of weeks and then finally somebody would say, no, no, I figured out it's not that. So bodhichitta is one of those words that it took about, I don't know, it actually took a few months for us to figure out what it wasn't. And so bodhi means Buddha, right?

And then chitta means mind. So everybody was calling it enlightened mind or Buddha mind. And then it was confusing because you're supposed to get it.

You're supposed to study it in order to become a Buddha. But if you got it, how come you're not a Buddha if you already have a Buddha mind? And it was very confusing.

The whole transmission of Buddhism to these hippies in the Himalayas who made it to the Himalayas, some people took buses across Turkey and Iran and we didn't know what was going on. And it took so long to figure out that bodhichitta doesn't mean Buddha mind. It means the wish to become a Buddha.

So here chitta means wish, the aspiration to become a Buddha. And then you're like, well, that's why I came here to the Himalayas and it was hard. That's why I have diarrhea this week, the whole week.

Because I have a desire to become a Buddha so why do I have to study that? That's why I'm here. And then they say, no, no, no, there's the real one and there's the almost real one.

Sugar cane bodhichitta, it tastes like sugar but it's not real sugar. Sugar cane skin bodhichitta. So then we were like, wait a minute, bodhichitta is not Buddha mind?

Right. And Buddha mind means I want to be a Buddha mind? Right.

And there's a real I want to be a Buddha mind and there's a not real I want to be a Buddha mind? Right. And then we just got all confused.

And then the translator didn't speak much English actually. I don't know, but we learned better somehow because nobody understood anything and we had to figure things out. So anyway, I guess there's a point, right, where you have the real desire to become a Buddha.

Then there's a question of does it have to be a direct cosmic experience? Do you have to have something happen? Maybe while your channels are open.

Maybe while your pranas are running free. Maybe after you see emptiness directly. Do you get bodhichitta before that or do you get bodhichitta after that?

And is there like a super bodhichitta where you can actually see all the beings in the world or something in the universe? So all these questions came up and we're going to try to straighten those out. So I guess the first thing to say is that bodhichitta, it's not that you're already enlightened, right?

Bodhichitta is what makes you, there are going to be ten different selling points for bodhichitta. As we go through the different advertisements for bodhichitta, then you'll start to understand what it is better. The first way to approach it traditionally is to find out how cool is it to get bodhichitta.

So I think it's going to be a really fun retreat because it's just 15 classes of how cool is it to get bodhichitta? How cool is it to get that? Then by learning how cool is it, we're going to learn about how to do it, how to get it.

It's not easy. They talk about it in this retreat, about Arya Sangha who worked for 12 years in a cave to get bodhichitta. They say it's not easy.

It's not like you're going to hear one retreat and then suddenly you're going to get bodhichitta. It's going to take a lot of work. So it's something that's like, I think it's like learning piano or something.

It takes a lot of commitment and it's going to take time and it's difficult. It's not that you can just sit down and start doing it. It takes a lot of work.

You have to work at it. And it's worth it. There's 10 cool things that are going to happen to you if you get it.

So the first cool thing we covered in the last retreat, number 36, and that was THEG CHEN GYI GZUG GO Say THEG CHEN GZUG GO And by the way, I'll go through the original language. First of all, because it's such a huge blessing. The teacher who taught this text, Pabongka Rinpoche, is probably, in my opinion, the greatest teacher of the last century.

An unbelievable teacher, able to teach to normal people. He was a Geshe from my college, Gerongkanthen, in Seramay Monastery, which is the best Tibetan monastery. Just kidding, not.

He was also a Lingtse Geshe, which is my level of Geshe. He wasn't the highest, highest, highest Hlarambo level Geshe, but he was a Lingtse Geshe, maybe called second level Geshe. And then he was known for his ability to talk to normal people.

So he was very popular among the normal people of Tibet, the farmers and the herders and the people like business people and the military people. He was very famous for being able to talk to normal people. So anyway, and the book he wrote was, the teaching he gave for 24 days, was edited by Tujang Rinpoche, who was my teacher's teacher.

And he's such a great writer and such a great thinker that, and I believe he spent about 10 years writing the transcript, fixing the transcript. I believe that this book is the greatest example of Tibetan literature there is. This is the greatest book ever written in Tibetan language, I think so.

And the language is the greatest that was ever written in Tibetan. And after that, because of the political problems in Tibet, the level of the language dropped. So I think it will always stand as the greatest example of Tibetan writing there ever was.

So I'm going to teach you directly from the book. And it's not just for you, it's for future generations also who maybe want to learn it. Otherwise it'll be gone.

I think this tradition will be gone. And my teacher taught it for 30 years. He taught it three times through.

So because I was his assistant, what do you call that? Attendant, slave. I got to hear all three.

I was the only person who heard all three. So anyway, it was an honor to be able to do it. So the first advertisement we already covered in the last class.

THEG CHEN GYI RJU GO THEG CHEN means Mahayana, the greater vehicle, greater capacity. People of greater capacity. We were just talking about moms, people who are moms, and they have more capacity.

I've never been a mom in this life. But I can observe that moms have greater capacity. than other people.

So they're just able to do more, to help more people. They're able to give up themselves for other people. My students, there's a virus, there's a second virus going on in Sedona.

It's a baby virus. Everyone's having babies. And I mean, from one way, it's very irritating for me because like a translator gets sidetracked for 10 years.

I have to put up with bad translations while the kid's growing. But on the other hand, they gain something, especially the boys who have babies. They learn selflessness.

They learn how to not be selfish. They learn to give themselves up for somebody else. So in the end, I think it makes them a great translator.

So I put up with the 10 years. It's okay. But if you've had a child and you've made those sacrifices, then you're a different kind of person.

So that's like Mahayana. THEG CHEN SBYUG DGOS means once you get bodhichitta, once you get the wish to become a Buddha for all human beings, then SBYUG DGOS means you enter Mahayana. You are in a different class of people.

I don't know the way I grew up. At Princeton I studied Buddhism. There's Mahayana historical schools and then there's Hinayana historical schools, Theravada schools.

It's a different school. I don't know. In Princeton it was quite dry.

The difference between the schools was very dry and boring. I still remember how boring it was. So if you tell me, if you get this bodhichitta, you become Mahayana, I'm like, well, that's not so exciting.

It's just a different dry school. You go from one dry school to the other dry school. Wow.

Now you're Mahayana. It's not like that experientially. Mahayana here doesn't mean a different school of Buddhism or a different historical school of Buddhism.

What it means is you join a very, very select group of people. You join a very unusual group of people. We kind of do it in DCI.

In DCI we have a thing called Diamond Club. When we used to tour around the world before the virus, there would be maybe five or six, maybe 10 people in each country who were invited to join the Diamond Club. They would be extraordinary people.

Then those people in different countries, it was kind of cool because it's basically you took the 10 most amazing people from 20 different countries and then you kind of threw them together. It was a special experience. What I'm trying to say is you take a country of 100 million people like Mexico or 1.4 billion people like China or 1.39 billion India, which will pass China in this decade, I think, in population, and you take three or four special people from those people, then that's going to be a very unusual group of people. Now, if you take from each planet maybe 10 people from each planet, then think of that as Mahayana. Think of that as Mahayana. It's a club.

It's a... How do you say that? Not executive, but it's a very exclusive club of unusual people who have had a certain experience.

That experience is the direct experience of bodhichitta. They have... I don't know.

All I want to say for the next 15 classes is one thing. If you have that experience of real bodhichitta, then you have the experience of jumping from planet to planet, billions of planets, billions of inhabited planets. You have this strange experience of jumping from planet to planet and meeting each living creature directly.

So all the fish, all the birds, all the humans directly. You meet them one by one directly and you establish a bond with them. You establish a commitment with them.

So think of it as jumping and committing or something like that. Jumping from planet to planet and making a personal connection with... I think there's a hundred billion animals on this planet, for example.

So 80 billion, something like that. So you meet them directly. You make contact with them, each one, individually.

Then you become slightly changed by that experience. Then that's Mahayana. That's Mahayana.

It's not some school of Buddhism. That's not it. Mahayana means you have made a personal connection with countless billions of people, beings, and you've made a commitment to them.

A loving commitment, similar to what a parent makes with their child, deeper, to help them. That puts you in a special club. That's the first selling point of the Bodhichitta New Car.

You will join an exclusive, an extremely exclusive club. It doesn't mean to exclude other people. It's not exclusive in that sense.

It's just that if you just learn these instructions and if you just try to do them, then something will happen to you as a being and you become a different kind of being. You become a Mahayana being. So it's like a different evolution of a person into something higher, close to God, a being who is close to God.

Something like that. It's a very, very beautiful thing and it's a very small group of people who are able to do it. So even to hear the instructions, even to sit through this class for the next, what, 10 days, to hear it is extremely unusual karma.

You must be close to it if you get to hear about it because you don't get to hear about this. They didn't teach this at Princeton or anything. You don't learn this anywhere else.

You must be an unusual person and you must be very close to the door of the clubhouse to join that group of people, to enter the clubhouse of the Mahayana. You must be very close if you are listening to these instructions. So open your mind, open your heart, listen.

It sounds impossible. It sounds like, oh, Geshe-la, that's nice. I'm not that kind of person.

I'm not special like that. I'm not one person out of a million or 10 million. I'm just me.

I'm not that special. But he's going to, Pabongka Rinpoche is going to show why you are. And if you are listening to this talk right now, it already proves that you are qualified to be a planet jumper.

You are very close. By definition, you are very close if you are listening to this talk right now. So just relax.

Learn the instructions and then try. And it's so fun. It's so cool to jump over a few billion planets and meet everybody and make this bond with them.

That's what it means to join the Mahayana. So that's the first selling point for bodhichitta. And we finished it already.

We finished it in the last retreat. So let's go to the second. By the way, you guys have an image for me for the first one, right?

Which is, I like to call it, joining the tennis team. Tim, I have a setting. I'm seeing the settings over the poor tennis player's face.

The settings screen. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, so I don't know.

This means a lot to me because I spent many years in school trying to get on the tennis team and finally I got on it. It's only 10 people are allowed. I was numbered 10 and a half or something.

But I got in. And so it's sort of an exclusive group of people. And that's the kind of feeling I want you to feel.

Like if you work hard, you can make that team. And it's hard. And it takes hard work.

It does take a lot of hard work. All right. Let's go on to the second benefit.

And we're going to start... Let's show the picture first, you guys. We have an image.

This is getting your college degree. You know, it's a funny thing. When I graduated from Princeton, I didn't attend the graduation because I had to work.

I was on scholarship and that was the last week of work. And then I paid off my loans the day I left in cash. And I worked three jobs for four years.

Anyway, I didn't get to go to the graduation. I was actually setting up the tables for the drinking party afterwards. So I didn't get to go to that graduation.

But I did. Not too long ago, my friends in Mexico invited me to the Congress. And UNAM?

Yeah. It's the oldest college in South and North America. And it has 30,000 students, I think, in total.

So they gave me a PhD. And I felt so honored to get a PhD in the Congress. But then they started calling me Dr. Roach and it sounded really weird, like some kind of insect doctor. I didn't really use the doctor after that. But to get a PhD after my name, even though I already have a Geshe, that was kind of, I don't know, it felt cool. It felt like a big honor to me.

To get up there and you wear a special suit and all these fat cats, what do you call them? Gato. Gato.

Gato. Gato. Gato Gordos.

They were all giving me stuff. And we became friends actually. And that's where Green Stretch Pin came from, from that.

This attempt to help all the kids in Mexico. But what I want to say is, it's nice to get a title. It's nice that someone says, you're a Geshe or you're a PhD and that's the second benefit of getting bodhichitta.

What's the title you get? Bodhisattva. I don't know about you, but this word bodhisattva is so beautiful.

I don't know about you, but there's a song in the hippie days called bodhisattva, won't you take me by the hand? And just the word bodhisattva sounded so sweet. And we didn't know exactly what it meant, but it was such a beautiful word and it was such a beautiful sound that, yeah, I'd like to be called a bodhisattva.

That's the second benefit. People will call you bodhisattva. You get your bodhisattva degree.

You get your bodhisattva title added to your name. And I know it sounds weird that, oh, you should work hard to get bodhichitta because then they'll call you bodhisattva Alex or bodhisattva Janice. And it sounds kind of artificial.

Geshe-la, it's more important to be a bodhisattva than to get the title. But it's nice, come on. It's nice when someone looks at you and says, oh look, there's a bodhisattva.

And it's the real thing. We tend to think that if someone's a nice person, they make you a coffee at five o'clock in the morning. You say, oh, that person must be a bodhisattva.

But to be called a member of the club of people who have jumped planets. I'm in the club of people who have jumped planets and billions of planets. And then to be recognized by anybody as a bodhisattva and to be called a bodhisattva, it's a big deal.

It feels really good. Especially if it's true. It feels amazing.

I like it. I'm happy to be Mr. Bodhisattva Geshe Dr. Roach. Let's not...

Okay, anyway. So let's go to the text, you guys. We're going to go through the text now.

I'm forcing you to go through the text. I've been doing it for 10 years. I have gotten 10 years of steady complaints from people who don't want to go through the text.

They say, it's too difficult. I don't want to learn that. Just teach me the thing.

I don't care. Just shut up and I'm going to teach you the text. It puts a huge seed in your mind.

The people who wrote these texts are bodhisattvas. This is what they decided to write. It's unbelievable.

It's just unbelievable. The whole purpose of this retreat is to put seeds in your mind. Very probably you won't be a bodhisattva by the end of this retreat.

But there will be seeds planted in your mind that will open into being a bodhisattva. Actually, if you're foolish enough to sit through these talks, you probably will get seeds that are unstoppable. So sooner or later you're going to be a bodhisattva if you sit through this retreat.

How soon is up to you. But you will get the seeds. A lot of the seeds are transmitted through the ancient wisdom, through the ancient books.

I really do think it's extremely important to stick to a real lineage. One thing I can say, without pride or without exaggeration, is that this is a real lineage. This lineage was carried on for two and a half thousand years.

One hundred generations. Purely, very, very pure. Extraordinarily pure.

If you just hang in there, you will become a bodhisattva. These are the correct instructions. They have a real lineage.

We are honoring that lineage by learning those ancient languages. You don't have to learn Tibetan or Sanskrit or Chinese. You don't have to.

But to hear it is a powerful, powerful seed. You will get that experience much, much faster of jumping. By the way, there is no more fun experience in the world except seeing emptiness directly, than jumping around planets and getting to know everybody in the universe.

There is nothing like it. Once you have had that experience, it's very hard to have a bad day. You can have a sort of bad day, but not a real bad day.

It's like, who cares about anything else if you have met everybody in the universe and made the commitment of a mother to a child to them? Then how are you going to have a real bad day? Okay, here we go.

First we have a quotation. BYANG CHUB SEMS SKYES GYUR NA SKYES BYAS SKYES You guys ready with the Tibetan? Here we go.

Yay! NYID PA NI up just above that means here is the second benefit of getting bodhichitta, which is you get the title of Mr. Bodhisattva or Miss Bodhisattva. BYANG CHUB SEMS SKYES GYUR NA SKYES BYAS SKYES If you get BYANG CHUB SEMS, which means bodhichitta, SKYES GYUR NA, if it comes up in your heart, SKYES BYAS SKYES, in a single finger snap, in a single finger snap, KHOR BA'I BRTZON RAB DANG PAS A person who is chained in the prison of samsara, a person who is chained into a mortal body, which is going to die and fall apart.

Those of us over a certain age, when we get together we just talk about our doctors. It's really funny. Hey, I got this new med, wow.

So we are locked to this body. We are chained to this body. If you are under 50 or 60, you don't know what I'm talking about yet, but you will.

It begins to feel like you are chained to a mortal body, which is what you are. So in a single instant, even a person who is chained to a mortal body, NYAM THAG means those poor, poor people who are chained to a mortal body. DE SHES SNAM GYI ZAD Third line.

DE SHES SNAM GYI ZAD SHES SPYOD CHA We call you a daughter or a son of the Buddha. Even you are chained to a mortal body that is falling apart. If your body is not falling apart yet, that's the worst thing is you don't even know it, because it is.

If you breathe, you are falling apart. It just shows, it becomes more obvious after a while. But even those people who are chained to a falling apart body, if they can just get this bodhichitta experience, then all the Buddhas say, Hey, that's my daughter.

That's my son. Hey, that's my son. That's my daughter.

Even as you are chained to a falling apart mortal body, the Buddhas are so proud of you. They are like, ah, that's one of mine. That's my kid.

So that's the second benefit. They will call you a bodhisattva or a gyel se. Child of the Buddhas.

Child of the victorious Buddhas. Nice name, really nice name. SHES SPYOD They will call you.

SHES SPYOD So I would say the next image, you guys, if you have it, of a father hugging his daughter. Yeah, this is how I like to imagine it. It's not just that you get a paper that says you are an official bodhisattva, now bodhisattva cat.

It's written, the Buddhas gave you your degree and now you can add it to your titles. It's not just that. It's that you enter a new family.

You take on a new status. Can you show the picture? Yeah, you got it.

Is there any way to drop the chat from my screen? Just so I can see the picture. Yeah, that's nice.

So I like this guy. I like to imagine that this father is a Buddha and that he is hugging Gyal Tse, his daughter or his son, his bodhisattva, the new bodhisattva. So it's cool that you get a new title.

They call you a bodhisattva. That's nice. But to me, what's more important is you become Gyal Tse, which means you become an official daughter or son of the family.

It's like a mafia family. You joined the family. You're in the family.

Now you're a Gambino or something. I don't know. You're part of the family.

Think of how it feels that the enlightened beings of the world sitting on the beach with you, they hug you because they're so happy you're part of the family now. That's, to me, that's the more important thing than the title bodhisattva. Yes, you are a bodhisattva, but more importantly, you're a jinaputra.

You are their special kid and they hug you like that. To be hugged by the Buddhas and be called their kid, that's such a beautiful experience. To join that family.

To be recognized as a member of the new family like you married into the family of Buddhas. That's awesome. It's an awesome feeling.

By the way, that quotation above was from Master Shantideva's Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life. In this section, Pabongka Rinpoche is going to lean heavily on Master Shantideva. The opening lines of that extraordinary work talk about the benefits of becoming a bodhisattva.

So, Pabongka Rinpoche is, a lot of the quotations are going to be taken from Shantideva's work. If you can study Shantideva's work, it's extremely important. That's ACI courses 10, 11, 12?

Very, very important. You have no excuse not to study them. By the way, I've been getting a lot of questions lately.

People say, well, now you've loaded Medicine Buddha on us and you loaded Lam Rim on us and you got all the Mixed Nuts classes. It's too much, Geshe-la. I'm starting to feel overwhelmed.

I say, I don't care. It's better to be overwhelmed than to die. So, I don't care.

You got to eat as much as I can feed you and you just have to do it. I'm sorry. I'm reminded of a moment in my diamond business when the owner of the company called me in and said, how long does it take you to buy 10,000 diamonds?

The factory manager is complaining about you. I said, well, it takes about two weeks. He said, well, I want it in 24 hours now.

I'm like, you can't buy 10,000 diamonds in 24 hours. It's not possible. He said, FedEx delivers 25 million packages every day, overnight.

You can buy 10,000 diamonds in 24 hours. Just do it. I'm like, it's not possible.

He says, what's your title in this? Show me your business card. At that time I was a manager.

He says, you're a manager, right? I said, yeah. He says, manage.

God damn manage. Get out of my... He threw me out.

He said, get out of my office. You're a manager, so manage. You're a bodhisattva, so deal with it.

You're going to get a lot of teachings. You should be happy. You shouldn't be kvetching.

You know this Yiddish diamond company word? Don't complain. Somebody complained to me, Geshe-la, I live in a tent.

All the courses you wrote take half the tent up. I don't have room to sleep. Okay, so sleep outside.

I don't care. Deal with it. You're a manager, manage.

Learn everything. Later you'll thank me. That's an all parents day, right Jim?

Later you'll thank me. All right. Here's a very famous line from Shantideva.

You guys ready? ,'PHYIR NI SANGS RGYUD GZUN GYIS, ,SANGS RGYUD ZAS SU BDAG GIS DANG, ,BDAG GIS BDAG GIS GZIN GYIS, ,GANG RIGS LA BRTZOM PA'I LAS BRTZOM PA'I GYUR MI, ,BRTZOM PA'I LAS BRTZOM PA'I GYUR LA, ,YOG PA MI NYID DE DAG BYA, Very, very famous. This is part of the bodhisattva vows ceremony.

In fact, if you just say those lines, supposedly you can get bodhisattva vows. At least a commitment vow. ,PHYIR NI SANGS RGYUD GZUN GYIS, Today I have become, Today I have joined the beautiful family of the Buddhas.

,SANGS RGYUD ZAS SU BDAG GIS DANG, I have become a child of the Buddhas. That's again a very, very famous line from Shantideva. I'd like to read you the whole line.

His version, which is not the version used nowadays into that. Here we go. ,THEG DUS BDAG TSE BDE BA YOD, ,MI'I SRID PA LAS PAR THOB, It's not in the text.

,PHYIR NI SANGS RGYUD GZUN GYIS, ,SANGS RGYUD ZAS SU BDAG THEG GYUR, ,THA NI BDAG GIS BYIN GYIS KYANG RIGS DANG, ,THUM PA'I LAS BRTZOM STE, ,KYIS ME TSUM PA'I RIGS BDE LA, ,YOG PA MI NYID DE DAG BYA, Very famous. I'll just translate quickly. ,THEG DUS BDAG TSE BDE BA YOD, Finally I did something useful with my life.

,MI'I SRID PA LAS PAR THOB, You can say I have truly taken on a human birth. Why? ,PHYIR NI SANGS RGYUD GZUN GYIS, Because today I joined the Buddha's family.

,SANGS RGYUD ZAS SU BDAG THEG GYUR, I became a child of the Buddha today because I took my bodhisattva vows. ,THA NI BDAG GIS BYIN GYIS KYANG, Now I have an extra responsibility. ,RIGS DANG THUM PA'I LAS BRTZOM STE, I have to behave in a way that reflects well on my family.

I can't embarrass my family. I've just been accepted into a new family. Now I'm Buddha family member, Buddha clan member.

Now I have a new opportunity. I can embarrass my new parents if I act in a selfish way. If I don't sacrifice my desires for others, then I will embarrass my family.

They'll wish that I hadn't married into their family. ,THA NI BDAG GIS BYIN GYIS KYANG, ,RIGS DANG THUM PA'I LAS BRTZOM STE, ,RGYUD MA'I BRTZOM PA'I LAS BRTZOM STE, ,LA NYOGS PA MI GYUR BYED PA BYED, Therefore I promise, I will never NYOGS PA my family. NYOGS PA means if you make somebody a nice cappuccino and you accidentally pour some engine oil into it.

That's called NYOGS PA. What do you call that? Adulterate it with some crap.

It's called NYOGS PA. I will not adulterate the Buddha family with my crap. I will be a good kid.

I will make my family proud. My new family. Let's go back to the Tibetan.

Are you guys ready? ZHES PA LTAR ,RGYAL BA'I SRES SU, ,BRAL MI BRAL DI LA RAG LAS TE, The whole big question in your life is did you get into the family or not? Were you accepted into the family or not?

,DE MA SKYE NAS, ,SNGON SHES RDZUS CHOS BSTAN PA'AM, I don't care whether you can read other people's minds. I don't care whether you can fly in the sky. ,RIGS NAS SNGAGS, I don't care if you have mastered, if you have PhDs in every subject in the world.

,STONG NYID NGON TSUL DU RTOG PA, I don't even care if you've seen emptiness directly. ,NYON MONGS ZAS PA'AM LA SOGS, I don't care if you have eliminated your mental afflictions. ,YIN KYANG, ,CHAN GYIS SEMS PA, If you don't have this attitude, we don't call you a bodhisattva.

You don't get to be. You can see emptiness and not be a bodhisattva. You can fly in the sky and not be a bodhisattva.

You can heal people and not be a bodhisattva. ,RGYAL BA'I ZAD MIN, And not be a child of the Buddha. ,THEG CHEN GYI MTHIL SU'ANG MI TSOD, We can say you haven't joined the family yet.

Have you jumped the worlds or not? That's the question. Next paragraph.

,SEMS PA'I RGYUD LA SKYES PA NA, I like this one. You guys got the image of this animal? This handsome animal?

Yeah. That's a jackass. Brutal is different.

Brutal is stubborn but useful. Jackass is just painful. Why I showed it here.

Keep it up. ,SEMS PA'I RGYUD LA SKYES PA NA, If you manage to get bodhichitta in your heart, ,DE PHYI BAG SOGS DRUNG DO DANG, ,YUN DANG GZHAN MED PA'I LEN PA, ,PHUNG PO DANG DRA BA ZHIG YIN YANG, ,THEG CHEN GYI MTHIL SU'ANG MI TSOD, You could be a dog. You could be a pig.

You could be... ,YUN DANG GZHAN MED PA'I LEN PA, You could be as stupid as a jackass. But still, you're part of the family.

,THEG CHEN GYI MTHIL SU'ANG MI TSOD, You have been accepted as a member of the family. I love this paragraph. Each paragraph of this text is packed with meaning.

You could take one paragraph and meditate on it for a week. It was very hard for me to choose which paragraphs are more important. It's very, very difficult.

Every single paragraph is stunning and exquisite. So anyway, this means, look, we all are human, right? We all have faults.

If you spend your whole life, which I have, trying to be a good person, and you fail many times, then you start to feel like some kind of idiot or a donkey or a horse or something. You feel like a spiritual idiot. Like you try really, really hard and then still you have bad habits that you can't get rid of and bad attitudes that you can't get rid of.

Some lamas spent their whole life trying to fix you and you still feel like an idiot. Then there's hope. Pabongka Rinpoche says there's hope.

Even you guys who tried so hard for so many years to improve yourself and you feel like you haven't made much progress. He said, still you can be part of the family. We love you kind of guys.

We especially enjoy welcoming into our family people who have bad habits that they can't get rid of. But as long as you jump a few planets, you can be in the family. You don't have to be perfect to be in this family.

You don't have to be perfect to be a bodhisattva. A bodhisattva is studying to be perfect, but they are not perfect already. The reason you become a bodhisattva is to learn how to be perfect.

We love imperfect bodhisattvas because if you're a perfect bodhisattva, you're a Buddha. We don't take Buddhas into the family. They are already family.

We want bodhisattvas. Bodhisattvas are people who are imperfect and they have bad habits that they've been struggling against for decades, many years. They have broken all these vows that their Lama gave them and they have not been able to do their practice.

Netflix took over their mind. We love those guys. That's the kind of people we want in the family.

We want bodhisattvas who are trying to be good. DE'ER NING SANGS RGYAS RIGS SU SKYES Today we welcome into the Buddha family imperfect people who want to be perfect. That's what we really want.

Those are the people we are really looking for. We're going to stop there today and we'll take a break and go run and have a pee-pee and a coffee or something. Then we'll come back in about 10 minutes and we'll have a nice conversation with Dr. Wu about the Medicine Buddha practice and the Lam Rim practice. You can see all your bodhisattvas in about 10 minutes.