«Дар освобождения», курс 37 «Лучшее, что ты можешь сделать со своей жизнью», занятие 14

[Говорящий 1]
Hi, welcome back to Lam Rim. I'd like to show you one of my most important students, one of my new students, who's watching the Lam Rim carefully. This is Joaquin, which is Alay's baby.

In Phoenix, right Tim? I'd like to thank Joaquin. I'd also like to thank Alay for helping so much, especially with this retreat.

She's one of Tim's main helpers. In addition to Tatiana, if I'm not mistaken, and Pachi and Pao and Jordan, and thank all you guys. Joaquin, try to grow up fast because we need you.

All right, okay. Let's go back to Lam Rim. I think we're at Shepadtar, right?

Shepadtar. CHOS KUN GYI SNYING PO'I YANG NYING DAG PO NI Sorry, are we? Yeah.

No, sorry, one more quotation. DE NA CHOS GYUR LAS, right Tim? DE NA CHOS GYUR LAS, DAM GCOD DBANG MA GZUGS PA By the way, Tim didn't know Tibetan five years ago, at all.

Now he's pretty good at it. Don't be lazy. If you're like Tim, you can learn to translate.

DE NA CHOS GYUR LAS, DAM GCOD DBANG MA GZUGS PA LAS, MAR KYI NYIN GUS BYUNG BA YIN They're trying to say that bodhichitta is like the most important thing. There's a story which is similar to the myth of the Big Bang. There's another myth called the world was created when Indra took Mount Meru and churned the milk of the great outer ocean and created the solid earth from that in the way you make butter from milk.

That's an ancient myth similar to the Big Bang myth that we like. They're all myths because they're all mistaken. But they say God made this world.

They held a mountain in his hands and churned the milk and it became butter and that became the earth. Why are they talking about that? They say bodhichitta is like the milk.

Then you churn it and you make the world. Love makes the world go round. How's that?

That's also from Master Shantideva. ZHES PA LTAR CHUG KUN GYI, NYONGS PA YANG NYING LTA BU NI, BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS DI YIN PAS Then he says in another sense, bodhichitta is like the butter that you get from all other kinds of love. If you mix all kinds of love and churn it, you will get the essence, which is the butter.

Ask Veronica about butter. When we go to a restaurant, we say, hey, can you give us some butter and bread? Anyway.

DI YIN PA'I THAMS CAD KYIS KYANG, GANG PHYI THUB KYI, DE SKYES PA THAB LA ZHUGS PA ZHUGS CING Then the Lama makes an unusual comment. He says, I beg you to lose yourself in this river. I beg you to lose yourself in this river.

I beg you to forget yourself and become bodhichitta. It's beautiful. The way he words it is very beautiful.

All rivers flow to the sea. You got a picture for me, you guys? All rivers flow to the sea.

Jump into the bodhichitta river and you will flow to the sea. It's a very beautiful thing. THEG CHEN GYI BSTAN PA YOD MED KYANG, BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS YOD MED KYI, RGYUR BYED GSUNGS BSGOM DOG BYAS PAS Whether or not you are practicing the greater way depends on whether or not you have this hope to jump worlds, from world to world and help people.

Then, okay, since you're here, this is a tough one. I'm not giving you the easy ones anymore. The relationship between being Mahayana and having bodhichitta is DRON DOG, and it's not the DRON DOG you're used to.

Say again? So the implication is, if you have bodhichitta, DRO, and if you don't have it, DOG. You flunk, you fail.

So the word is very delicate, as my Lama would say. It's a delicate word. If you get bodhichitta, you go.

If you don't get it, you stop. So this is a GO stop. In Tibetan, it's called a GO stop.

This is a GO stop. Bodhichitta is a GO stop. Why?

What's GO stop mean? If you got it, you go. If you don't got it, you stop.

You don't go anywhere. It's a very kind of depressing word because the stop seems to be more frequent than the go. THAMS CAD KYIS CHOS ZAB ZAB MO YIN ZE BA GZHAN RNAMS RE ZHIG ZHAG NAS I beg you, says the Lama, forget tantra for a while.

I beg you. Take all those deep mantra, dharani, blah, blah. Give it a break.

I beg you, NEN TEN ZE Focus on bodhichitta for a while. Get your bodhichitta together. Then go back to your dharani.

How long should I work on bodhichitta? Okay, two hours. Really?

Then go back to your dharani. But you know, go back and forth. Because that's the gasoline for your Medicine Buddha mantras and your Vajrayogini practice and your Tara practice and your Manjushri practice and your Amitabha practice.

You got to have gasoline in the car. Keep filling up the bodhichitta gasoline and then go practice Amitabha or these other practices. It's like water in the desert.

Hey, picture. You got a picture for me. Yeah.

We live in a desert. I mean, we live in Arizona. We live in a desert.

If you give water to a plant, it goes crazy. If you don't water it, it dies. Like Gyelse's roses.

Somebody forgot the water in the... How long have they been there? Ten years.

The roses were there for ten years. Some retreatant didn't know about water and they killed them. So don't go.

Go stop. It's like water in the desert. If the plant gets water, it's going to grow like crazy.

If it doesn't, it's dead. It's sad. I mean, you should have thrown out the dead roses.

It's kind of depressing. DE LTA BU NAS MA SHES PA SA RGYAS SKA NYIN GYIS CHOS PA MANG PO'I TZAM RGYAL BA GDOD KYANG BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS MI DGOS PA SANG SNGAGS KYI RIM NI BSGOM STE There's a lot of people here in Tibet. They come from all kinds of traditions.

Sakya tradition, which is called the pale earth tradition because their main monastery is built on some pale earth. Sakya. There's Gelupa, which is the Tsongkapa tradition.

Then there's the Kagyu, which is the, I don't know, earlier than Gelupa. Gelupa came out of Kagyu and Sakya. Then Nyingma, which is the ancient ones, the original traditions of Tibet.

There's lots of people in all of our traditions. So Pabongka Rinpoche is talking, look, we're all the same. We're all the same.

We're different flavors of the same ice cream. All of us in each of our traditions, we want to get to Buddhahood. That's what we're trying to do.

But then some people say, look, I don't have time to learn about bodhichitta. I don't have time to learn lamrim about bodhisattvas. I'm practicing secret Buddhism.

I'm into tantra. I'm doing mantras. I'm doing dharmanis.

SANG RGYAL BAR BDOD KYANG BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS MI DGOS PAR I'm practicing RIM NYID of tantra. What's that? The two levels of tantra.

What are they in brief? Number one, hooking up with enlightened beings, angels. Number one.

What's it called? RIM NYID Then they teach you how to change your body, the channels in the body. Then you become a Buddha.

Those are called the two levels of the secret teachings. He said, everybody's talking about two levels, two levels, two levels. Nobody wants to talk about bodhichitta.

LAM NYON MER BROS DE RGYAL BA NI They hope to cut some time off the journey. They hope to speed up the journey to enlightenment. NYID JIG RTEN KHYAD PA'I RGAGS SKYES DU Hey, there's an expression for that here in Tibet.

There's an expression for that here in Tibet. You have to understand one thing about Tibet. The only cheap thing in the whole country, the only easy thing to buy at the grocery store was salt.

They had big salt flats. You take a yak out there, you load it up, you come back, you're in business. But there's something about much of the salt gives you a goiter.

It gives you a tumor on your neck. A lot of Tibetans had, in the old days, there's something wrong with the salt and they would all get these huge bumps on their necks. Almost everybody in the whole country had some bumps on their necks.

I guess it's from the salt or some chemical in the salt. Then he says, you're one of those guys who wants to have a neck without the goiter. You're one of those guys who wants to have the neck without the bumps.

What's it mean? What do we say in English? Yeah, you want to have your kick?

It's kind of like that. The implication is, I'll show you a good example. Look at this beautiful lady in the next picture.

This lady, I think that was last year, surfing in San Diego. Now suppose this beautiful lady came to Geshe Michael and said, I want to go surfing but I don't want to get wet. I want to go surfing but I don't want to get wet.

I want a neck but I don't want a goiter. I want quick enlightenment but I don't have time for lam rim or bodhichitta. I'm going straight to the darkness.

I want to surf but I don't want to get wet. Yeah, okay, good luck. It don't happen that way, right?

You got to get wet to go surfing. You got to jump in the lam rim if you want to do darkness. I didn't say that.

Pabongka said that. Okay, all right. I love that picture by the way.

By the way, to be totally honest to the whole universe, we are at the advanced stage of belly boarding on our tummies and we gave up on the surfing. Okay, but I just want to, what do you call it? When you tell the truth in business?

Full disclosure. DE'I GSUM GYIS SANGS RGYAS THAMS CAD KYIS BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS MA SKYES PA SANGS RGYAS PA MED PAS No Buddha in the universe ever got enlightened using Medicine Buddha or anything else without bodhichitta. Never happened.

Never will happen. BYANG CHUB SEMS MI DGOS PA'I SANGS RGYAS ZHIG YOD NA SNGAR MA BRTAG PA ZHIG DBANG NYAN NYON He says, if somebody gets enlightened with Medicine Buddha mantras or Vajrayogini practice or Tara or Amitabha without doing Lam Rim bodhichitta study, that'll be the first one in history. He's like that.

It's a joke. Yeah. Let's see if it works.

If it works, we got to put it in a museum. We got to put this person in a museum because that'll be the first time ever in billions of years that anyone ever got their enlightenment without studying Lam Rim, without studying bodhichitta. That'll be a first.

In English we say, that'll be a first. All right. Now.

Okay, word. Time for a commentary. Now it's a difficult philosophical point and I'm going to see if you can do it after five years of working with you on Mixed Nuts.

By the way, the next important book to be published after the different kinds of karma book is going to be Words Commentary on the Mind-Only School. The most difficult book of all and he finished it and it's stunning. It's really beautiful.

It's the best book about mind-only I think ever translated on this planet. Really, seriously. It's coming out soon from the Diamond Cutter Press.

Why am I talking about that? Because Professor Smith is going to give us a commentary on an important Buddhist concept. You ready?

GYIS KUB NAS NYID MA ZHAR GYIS KUB NAS Well, I'm going to show the image while you give the commentary. You guys ready? All right, here's the image.

You got it? Can you see it, word? That's good.

All right, now we want a commentary.

[Говорящий 2]
In English, we say every dog has its day. No. Something like that.

[Говорящий 1]
The sun came out.

[Говорящий 2]
I know, but in Tibetan, it's like the sun even shines on a dog's ass.

[Говорящий 1]
Yeah, not bad, not bad. In Tibet, in the monastery, when you want to say something happened that never happened before, like someone got the Buddhahood using Medicine Buddha or any other mantra without bodhichitta, then GYIS KUB NAS NYID MA ZHAR Then the next thing that's going to happen is the morning sun will come up out of a dog's rear end. Okay?

It means what? It ain't going to happen. Okay, it ain't going to happen.

I just wanted to make sure your Buddhist education was complete. This is a very famous joke in the monastery. They say, I don't know, hey, the cook finally made something delicious in the monastery kitchen.

You say, ah, GYIS KUB NAS NYID MA ZHAR Then tomorrow the sun's going to come up out of this dog's rear end. It means that, I doubt it. Okay?

To get to Buddhahood without bodhichitta is like John Brady sitting in the sun in Dominican Republic right now listening to me. You're not going to get a sun tan from a sun that came out of a dog's rear end. It's not going to happen.

Okay, got it? It's enough. We don't have to belabor the point any further.

Something that never happened before and which will never happen again is happening to you if you can use tantra without bodhichitta, without studying bodhichitta. DE'I PHYIR SANGS RGYAS DGE SGOGS PA'ANG ZHIG DU DRIN PHYIR BYANG SANG GIS MED NA MI SBYUNG ZHING Therefore, it is a ZIN GANG SNONG. It's impossible to do without it.

MI SBYUNG ZHING DE'I DANG BRAL NA SANGS RGYAS DGE SGOGS PA'ANG THOB PA'I RE BA GREL BA YIN PAS If you don't want to study bodhichitta, you can forget trying to become a Buddha. YIN PAS DE LA NEN RTEN BYAS DGOS Please work hard on it. Please.

That's the Lama talking. RE DGOS ATSA DE BYAS GRUB GANG PA LA There was a famous, or not very famous, Tibetan Lama called RE DGOS ATSA DE He said to another Lama named GRUB GANG PA LA SKYE DBANG PO NA BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS KYI STAM THOB KHOB YANG SRENG NYE BA RE When you come over to my house and we sit down for some tea together, you always bring the conversation to love. You always start talking about love.

Bodhichitta. Then somehow I feel my heart opens. When you come to my house among all my friends and you sit down for tea, you always talking about loving, or love.

It just makes my heart open. I feel good when you come to my house. BYAS BU YOD, GZHAN THANGS SANGS MED LA STAM DE ZHOS SANGS MED GSUNGS I really don't feel like talking to other people.

People come over to my house and gossip about politics and stuff. You come over and you start talking about love. Can you visit more often?

Can you visit more often? It's a beautiful thing. DE BZHIN DU RANG RE GANG CIG GI BYANG CHUB KYI SEMS DE RGA BA'I MI KHYER Now he makes a comment about our attitude, about bodhichitta.

Geshe-la just spent a week talking about doing my meditation so good every day that suddenly I experience jumping from planet to planet and meeting billions of living beings and making a commitment to each one personally. Geshe-la keeps talking about this. RGA BA'I MI KHYER Geshe-la, that's way past me.

Give me some mantras. I appreciate it. It sounds nice.

I believe maybe somebody could reach that. But hey, it's too far. Give me a break.

I'm just a normal human being. It's too much. I don't think I could do that.

I have trouble just sitting down once a day. I have trouble getting 15 minutes for meditation. You think I'm going to travel from planet to planet in 20 minutes?

It's too high. Give me something more reasonable. Give me something I can do.

That's one attitude on this side. Now what are we going to have on this side? By the way, in translation, this is called anticipatory.

Anticipate what he's going to say next. No, one guy says, whoa, too high. Oh yeah, yeah, right.

Come on, that's easy stuff. I'm a tantric. I'm studying tantra.

I'm doing magic. I don't need this weird normal old love stuff. Come on, that's for movies.

That's for romantic Netflix movies. That's too far below me. Some people are going to say, oh Geshe-la, that's too high.

Other people are going to say, ,GA'I PHYI'I DE'I THEG CHEN THON PA BA'I YIN, Come on, that's basic Lam Rim. ,DE BA'I SAB PA RIM NI SOGS BSGOM ZER TE, I'm focusing on the two aspects of tantra. I'm a tantrica.

I don't need that Lam Rim stuff. ,DON DU NYAM LEN BYAS KHYAD NYON, ,DON DU means, in reality, the people who are really practicing bodhichitta, not so many. Some say, it's too high Geshe-la.

Some say, I'm beyond that. But people in the middle trying to love other people. He says, you don't find so many.

Two extremes. Yay, we got a picture. I've been using this picture for the two extremes in emptiness.

But it occurred to me you could use it for the two extremes in bodhichitta. What's the two emptiness extremes? I'm going to stop calling out words because it's a bad habit.

What's the two extremes as far as emptiness? Yeah. If the husband yelling at me in the kitchen, it's not my fault.

He doesn't exist. Okay. Got it?

Either he's his fault. One extreme. He had a bad day in traffic or he's hungry.

Men. How to get men to be irritable? Don't feed them.

[Говорящий 2]
Right?

[Говорящий 1]
Either he's angry because he's hungry or he don't exist. I was studying emptiness. I learned that in the kitchen.

If your husband yells at you, you can think he doesn't exist. Those are the two extremes. Now, what's the two extremes?

Give me the picture. What are the two extremes in bodhichitta?

[Говорящий 2]
It's too hard.

[Говорящий 1]
Yeah, it's too hard, Geshe-la. I can't pluck my eye out and offer it to somebody. What's the other extreme?

I'm a tantric man. I'm doing mantras. I'm doing dharmanis.

I don't need lamrim. Like that. What's the ideal middle way in this case?

Do your mantras. Do your medicine Buddha. And?

Love people. Okay, that's all. Not very hard.

All right. How are we doing on time? We still got some time.

DE NYID DPER NA, YI ZHING GI SNOG PO RGYA MTSOR MI TZAM PA LA RANG GI MI BRAS KYI CHUD LAS TSUL BA DANG DRA Let's look at this picture. It took... No, there's a better picture.

Oh, there it is. I'm sorry. You're right.

In the main picture, you have the ocean. Pacific Ocean as seen from the sky. It's seen from a drone, I guess.

I don't know. It's difficult to see the picture in the upper left. But that's a bolak footprint, a footprint of a cow in the mud in India.

If you've ever been to India, you've met this. Lots of time. Try to imagine the amount of water you could put in a bolak footprint.

It's like half a cup or something. Try to imagine that much water. Dirty water.

Really dirty water. Then close your eyes and imagine the whole Pacific Ocean. This beautiful crystal blue water.

Billions of gallons. Billions of gallons. Then where are jewels found according to Tibetans?

In the bottom of the ocean. You have to go to the bottom of the sea to find a sapphire or a ruby or a diamond according to ancient tradition. All precious jewels come from the bottom of the ocean.

By the way, the only way to mine, one of the only ways to mine amber is to sit on a Mediterranean beach and wait for it because it's lighter. It floats on water. It's lighter than water.

When a storm comes in the Mediterranean, there are deposits of amber on the seabed and they break off and they float into the beach. Like that. That's the only way you can get amber.

But Tibetans, that's probably where the tradition came from. The only way to get sapphires, rubies, emeralds is to go to the bottom of the sea. What's the sea in this case?

Bodhichitta. Love for other people as vast as an ocean. I'm not talking one planet.

Don't be these prejudiced people who say, I come from Rimrock, Arizona. We support you-know-who for president. He whose name must not be spoken.

They think Rimrock, Arizona is the whole universe. Then they go to Phoenix. You can tell people from Rimrock in Phoenix because the flies go in their mouth.

Oh look, a real grocery store. Oh look, what's that mall? Scottsdale Fashion Mall.

They go to Scottsdale Fashion Mall. They walk down the mall. Don't, come on, don't be like a Rimrock, Arizona person.

Your planet is nothing. It's a little hole in the wall. It's earth.

It's a tiny, come on, in the universe? In history? It's a finger snap.

This whole planet and all human history, everything people ever did on this planet, is nothing. Don't put your head in a dirty little bull-hoof puddle. Don't keep your brain in a dirty, muddy, little bull-hoof puddle.

Take it to the Pacific. Take your brain to the Pacific because that's the only place you're going to find the jewels. Got it?

That's what he's saying here. Bodhichitta is the Pacific. Don't stick in your little local crap.

Try to think big. Go to the Pacific. That's where you find the jewels.

Imagine yourself jumping from planet to planet and put your mind there. I don't want to hear you talk about this world. This is nothing.

All right. ,'JES LA MED KYANG, ,DE LTAR BZHIN NAS RGYAL ZAS PA'O RNAMS RIM CHEN ,SAMS SBYOR THUD DAM MTHIL DU BRTZIN, Therefore, all the RGYAL ZAS, those warriors, warrior RGYAL ZAS, they go to the ocean and they get the real jewels. They put it in the palm and they make it their main practice.

Got it? Three minutes, Tim, I'm watching, I know. Wait, are we going to do a...

Okay. But we're not doing a lottery or anything like that. Yeah, well, let's stop it.

That's a good place to stop actually.