AGOL 37, Q&A 1 — стенограмма

[Speaker 1]
Yay, welcome back to Lam Rim, and we're going to have an hour of question and answer, and please feel comfortable and happy to ask your questions. In my life, with my teacher, we lived together, I don't know, 30 years, and there were questions that were easy to ask, and there were questions that were hard to ask. So don't feel shy, you can ask the real questions you have, and don't be shy.

It might help somebody else also. So here we go, Tim.

[Speaker 2]
Okay, Geshe-la, first question for translators, it's number three. When does someone actually become a bodhisattva? Do they become a bodhisattva when they see emptiness directly, or when they first take their bodhisattva vows?

[Speaker 1]
Wow, that's a tough question actually. So the question is, when do you first become a bodhisattva? Is it when you see emptiness directly, or is it when you take your bodhisattva vows?

So here's some of the different steps we're talking about. Number one is, you make a commitment. It's called juktong, right?

You make a commitment to try to think like a bodhisattva. I like this idea that I could be the person, I could take responsibility, not for five other people like in a family, and not for, I don't know, a few thousand other people like your town, or a few million other people like your city, or a few tens of millions of people like your country, and very importantly, not for just this world, but for, I would like to be the person who takes care of countless, and then it's easy to say, right? There's a joke in the monastery, SEMS CAN THAMS CAD KYI DON DU, which means for the sake of countless living beings, and it's a joke in the monastery for people who wash the dishes poorly.

So, you know, somebody has to wash the dishes for at least 3,000 people every three times, a couple times a day. Anyway, then if you do a lousy job, there's a joke, and people say, people pick up the fork and say, ah, somebody claimed this for all sentient beings. Meaning he did a sloppy job.

Why do they say that? Because it's so easy to say, DGA RTE'I SEMS CAN THAMS CAD KYI DON DU, for the sake of all living beings. But if you really get that motivation, or dream, and you commit to that dream, what's that mean?

You believe it. It's not crazy, and it's not religious. It's not a religion.

It's an actual, practical commitment. It doesn't matter what religion you are really. I commit to helping countless beings.

Just to have that, just to hear about that commitment is a beautiful thing. It's a very rare thing in this world, to have someone say to you, you could make a commitment to help infinite living beings. So there's the first step.

Second step, take your commitment to the deeds of a bodhisattva, the six perfections, which is in the 64 bodhisattva vows. So if you take the 64 vows, how many main vows? 18.

How many secondary vows? 46, mathematically. If you commit to those, BDAG LTAR GZHAN MED CHOS NOR MI ZHES GZHIN ZHAG RGYAL MI NYAN THEG CHEN PO NGON DANG, DGOS CHOS DGOS DU PHYIR PO NGON MED TOG TZAM MED NGA'ANG RNAMS LA LTA LTOS SOGS BYANG MA BYANG DANG NYID DONG DANG RDZOGS BYANG SDOGS MA DANG PHUNG BYANG MA TZAD CIG MA GNYIS LA TZAD DU MED Like that.

If you commit to those, that's a commitment to act like a bodhisattva. So now we have two bodhisattvas, right? I commit to think like a bodhisattva, and I commit to act like a bodhisattva.

And then there's, those are, you can sit in a room and take those without much feeling, right? You can make those commitments verbally without feeling much. Then there's the feeling of it, in your heart.

In your heart you make a decision. I would like to do that. I would like to help all living beings.

That sounds good to me. Then there's in your heart commitment to the six perfections, and that's studying Lam Rim. I commit to studying Lam Rim.

I commit to follow those six activities. By the way, in the grand scale of things, we are about to start the six perfections. We are studying Bodhichitta and Lam Rim because we are about to start the six perfections.

Probably next year. Probably. If Geshe-la doesn't take a lot of detours.

So now what do you got? Heard about the idea and committed to it. Heard about the six perfections and committed to them.

Started to get the idea myself. Started to do the six perfections myself. Then at some point, you actually, in a deep meditation, you start jumping from planet to planet and making a personal connection with each living creature from viruses or what are the little guys called?

Bacteria, amoebas, up to elephants. You know, up to what's those biggest whales? Blue whales.

Yeah, so from all those kind of creatures, including people in there, somebody, you know, when you actually do that, then that's, I would call it the direct experience of Bodhichitta. Do you have to see emptiness to have that happen to you? It normally would happen close to each other within an hour or so, two hours, because your channels are totally open.

When you see emptiness directly, your yoga practice channels are completely open. So it'd be natural for those two things to happen close to each other. If you become an Arya, the likelihood of becoming an Arya Bodhisattva in the same day is very high.

Especially if you've been studying Lam Rim and other subjects. Geshe-la, you gave a long answer. Just give us a short answer.

At what point are you a Bodhisattva? We call you a Bodhisattva at each stage. In the ceremony they will say, tell the Bodhisattva to repeat the vow.

They already refer to you as a Bodhisattva. It's kind of beautiful. So in the vow ceremony, the people taking the vow is already referred to as a Bodhisattva.

Then these guys who are studying how to have bodhichitta, they are called, what's it called? Sugarcane Bodhisattvas. CHOS MA CHOS MA means trying to do it, but not really there yet.

Pretending to do it. Like acting out like a Bodhisattva, but you're not really a Bodhisattva yet. But that's a very beautiful thing.

Then when you have that direct experience, then you're a real Bodhisattva. So I would say real Bodhisattva is when you have that planet jumping experience. But it's intimately connected to all those other kinds of Bodhisattvas who are kind of like student Bodhisattvas.

Is a training bike a bike? Is it a bicycle? So, you know, there you go.

A training bike is still a bike, but not really, because a bicycle means two wheels. Got it? Next question.

Anyway, the point is, when you jump from planet to planet and make a personal commitment, and spending time with each living being, because time is stretched, then you're a real Bodhisattva. But you're still called a Bodhisattva before that. Next question, Mr. Tim.

[Speaker 2]
So this is a question about someone sees someone in different ways. So how is it possible to have a conception of someone as sometimes as a Bodhisattva and sometimes as someone who is seems to be creating a lot of negative seeds? Like one of the questions is, for example, a leader of a country, you know, some leaders they appear to be doing good, and then other times they appear to be doing not so good, right?

And how can we think about that conception as it seems to be shifting for us? Are they a Bodhisattva, or are they not a Bodhisattva?

[Speaker 1]
Okay, good question. I was very excited to come to Diamond Mountain because I would get to do some retreat, at least a little bit. I have to work while I'm here, but I look forward to coming to Diamond Mountain because I have a deep love for this place, and I have a deep connection to this place.

And I did my three-year retreat nearby here, so it feels the same to me. so I always get excited that I'm going to do a retreat here, even if I know it's only going to be a few hours a day, that I really have time. I was excited because sometimes I like to I like to prepare my mind for a teaching here.

That's how I do it. I'll do a retreat, like I'll go through, I'll write a book in my head, and then I'll go write it down afterwards, or something like that. So I'll write a book in my head.

So the book I wanted to write in my head was, it's going to be called the Two Husbands in the Kitchen Sutra. Okay, and I have a strong instinct that that's the book people will remember me by. It'll be called the Two Husbands in the Kitchen Sutra.

And I intend it to be a real sutra. And the core of that sutra, because I've been thinking about it, I've been writing it in my head, is going into the kitchen and having your partner, if anyone listening today, has a partner, a husband, wife, partner, whatever, you know you've had this experience. They say something that really hurts your feelings.

And usually they don't mean to. I don't know, they say something and then you don't forget it for six weeks or something. They just say something.

I don't, you spend four hours making them dinner for them, right? And then they, you're like, the first minute when they put it to their mouth, you're like, and then they go, there's a lot of salt in here. And then your heart breaks, you know, and you're like, and you try not to say anything, you try to be polite, but you're like, god damn, you know, too much salt.

They don't realize I cook for four hours, you know. And they forget it after two minutes, one minute, and you hold it for a couple weeks, you know. Ah, they don't like my cooking, you know.

I worked so hard for them. so at that moment, how do you perceive the salt complainer? As very much coming from their own side, okay?

Otherwise you could not get upset, okay? You very much feel that they come from their side, okay? There's something wrong with their tongue, okay?

And it has nothing to do with you, you know. Okay, you cannot appreciate fine food. I'm sorry for you, you know.

The salt happens to be perfect. And you feel, in the moment of criticism, that the other person comes from their own side. You feel strongly, right?

And then if you go to a whole week of lamrim, maybe you go home from Diamond Mountain, you cook something, there's a salt incident in the kitchen, and you're like clear enough to say, I got to be more careful criticizing other people, you know. I lightly criticized someone at Diamond Mountain, and look, it's come back to me already. The day I get home, someone's already complaining about salt.

I made this person. I made this person, okay? So that's actually an answer to your question already, okay?

That's already an answer to your question. Some days you experience a world leader or your partner as a bodhis, or your dog as a bodhisattva, and then some days you're like, I don't know why I thought this person was a bodhisattva. Look how crass they are behaving as a leader this week.

Then you get disappointed. So the question is a false question. The question is a false question.

Everybody's a bodhisattva or nobody's a bodhisattva depending on you, depending on your state of mind. If you think someone's an inconstant bodhisattva, that's your problem, okay? Because they're coming from you.

So that's a that's an easy answer. Tantra, in tantra, your practice is so strong that everyone strikes you as a bodhisattva all the time. But that takes a lot of practice.

That takes many years of lamrim. Okay, next question.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you Geshe-la. So this is a fun question. When a bodhisattva is by themselves and they dress up or make food for themselves or like, you know, they go out by themselves, what do they think?

How do they think? Because there's no one else there, but at the same time they're, how do they think about those or conceive themselves in that moment?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, okay, cool. So let's say I'm a bodhisattva and I'm giving talks in a certain city and I don't know anybody there really, except the organizer or something. And then I go out, you know, to get a pizza on my own and I'm sitting there in a foreign country, in a restaurant I've never been to and I will never come back.

And I'm just sitting there by myself eating pizza, right? Then how do I feel at that moment? And I would say that beautiful thing about a bodhisattva is that they are never alone.

Okay, they are always with their family. So, you know, if you're at home, and you live in a big family and you're in the, you get up early because you have to go to the Lam Rim and you eat breakfast and you're eating breakfast alone because the Lam Rim starts early. Are you alone?

Do you feel alone in the house? And you say, no, I mean my mom's sleeping in the next room, my brother's in the next room, my wife is in the next room. You know, you don't feel alone, right?

You're at home. So bodhisattvas are always at home because there's always infinite living beings sleeping in the next room. So I would say when a bodhisattva is out having a pizza by themselves in a strange town, they never feel alone.

And that's not in the ten benefits, was it? But it's a beautiful thing that you never feel like you're alone. You're always aware of being in a huge family.

Of the big family, right? The Buddha family, but also the family of all all the beings that you have personally met. So actually no one's a stranger to a bodhisattva.

After the moment of bodhichitta, you never again meet a stranger. That's kind of cool. Next question.

[Speaker 2]
Geshe-la, this question is about, turn it down, number two. So this question is about reciting mantra. So after reciting mantra in the recitation, it seems like there's another part of my mind that continues to repeat the mantra.

Like when I'm cleaning the floor or when I'm cooking, it just seems to be in the back of my head. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? Because it doesn't seem like I'm really focused on the mantras themselves.

It just seems to be repeating over and over again.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, okay, great question. So, you know, someone granted me a mantra and I started to do it during my meditation periods. And then when I put the rosary down and I go walking around doing my normal stuff like cooking or cleaning, then the mantra is talking in my head.

Is that a good thing or a bad thing? And why you would think it's a bad thing, maybe it becomes almost, there's a special kind of gossip, okay? Bad deed number seven.

Okay, of the ten bad deeds, there's a special bad deed of the ten, which is number seven, which is useless talk, you know. And it's amazing how fast it can start, you know. Atisha said that once two people are together, useless talk will start.

I'm trying to perfect it with one person, but it's a little difficult. It's possible, I think. But anyway, as soon as two people get together and they start, and it's amazing how fast time goes by when you're just talking about something meaningless.

And there's a special kind of useless talk, bad deed number seven, which is to say a mantra and think about something else. And it's a sad thing. If you do mantras on a rosary, for example, and you start thinking about something else, you are actually committing bad deed number seven.

So, oh Geshe-la, so if the mantra is running through my mind while I'm cleaning the floor, am I doing bad deed number seven? Like that's the question, right? And the reason, one of the reasons mantras were invented was that they are nicknames for holy beings.

The real meaning of a mantra, as Mr. Wu said recently in his talk on the first day, it's like calling for your mom. When you're a kid and you fall down, then the first thing you do is, mom! He said mom, it's kind of cute.

And we call mom, right? So, mantra is, probably it's called ma-ntra. You want to call ma?

It's supposed to be, it's designed to stick in your head while you're cleaning the floor. That was how the Buddha designed it. Medicine Buddha, for example, designed the mantra to stay in your head.

It's like a bad rock and roll song. Just stays in your mind all day, right Pachi? You got to clean it out.

You go to a fine French restaurant in Paris and you eat a nice, what do you call it? Hors d'oeuvres? And then they come and give you a little bit of sherbet, ice cream, and you're like, wow, that's expensive.

A dessert already came. It was $100 and all I got was this little salad. They're like, no, no, no.

This is not dessert. This is to change your palate. This is just meant to change your palate.

When somebody plays a really bad rock and roll song and it stays in your mind, and then you have to clean your palate, right? You got to turn on a real good song by Ben Gibson. And it cleans your palate.

The mantra, if it's going to your head all day long, that's a wonderful thing. It is not a bad deed number seven. So Geshe-la, what's the difference?

If I want to do bad deed number seven, how can I do it? Well, then you say I'm going to do a three-year retreat, or I'm going to do my hundred thousand Vajrayogini mantras, and you sit, you rent a cabin at Diamond Mountain, and you sit down, and you get your rosary, and you recite OM MANG MONGS SAR BUD LA RGYAS. Then you think about the ice cream store that used to be in Bui.

Then it becomes useless talk. Okay, got it? So because you are a sloppy practitioner, your mind is not where your mouth is with the mantra.

That's almost a negative deed. Of course, it's a great thing that you came here. It's a great thing that you're trying to do retreat.

That's a good deed. But to be lazy and recite a mantra and think about something ordinary. It's a negative seed.

But for the mantra to sing in your heart and your mind all day long, that's exactly what it was designed to do. That's perfect. So if you're cleaning the floor and Medicine Buddha is singing in your mind, that's you.

You're successful. You are successfully doing the mantra. But if you committed to a hundred thousand mantras, you don't get credit for the cleaning the floor mantras in your head.

Okay, I'm sorry. That has to be with a rosary. I'm kidding.

[Speaker 2]
So this question is about, now that I've learned about bodhichitta and something that I want to develop, in my practice, it seems like I vacillate between trying really hard and then failing. And I've also heard that one of the ways, the seeds that I can help with this is actually finding my own heart teacher who can help me understand myself so I can plant different seeds. So the question is, how do I plant the seeds to have that teacher come to me?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good question. I think, first of all, we got to talk about failure. Failure of your Buddhist practice, okay?

Like bad days. You know, when you say, look Geshe-la, I tried to do the mantra. Geshe-la, I tried to think about bodhichitta and I had a really bad day.

All I could think about the whole day was how irritating this other person in the Dharma group is. You know, and I ruined my whole day. I was intending to think about bodhichitta.

I woke up. I went to the Lam Rim class and then I was going to work on it all day. This happened to me yesterday.

I was going to work on it all day. And then I had a problem with somebody and it started to take over my mind. It started to push out the bodhichitta part and I started worrying about this person.

What am I going to say to this person? And then it feels really bad because here you are teaching bodhichitta at the world center of bodhichitta retreat. And then you can't even think about it during the day because you're worried about some person who irritated you with an email.

So then, okay, you feel like a failure. You feel really bad. You feel like you know, you feel worse than if you never came to Lam Rim.

Then you start to say maybe I should have stayed home and just worked in the garden or something. Maybe I shouldn't have come here because now I'm supposed to be doing bodhichitta but I'm doing the opposite. Then that experience where you're trying to be a good person and you're trying to change yourself and you keep failing, the name of that is Buddhist practice.

The name of that thing is Buddhist practice. That is Buddhist practice. I don't know why but we think we think because we went to Lam Rim this morning, I will be a perfect person all day.

It don't work like that. In fact, Lam Rim stirs up the other crap. Okay, so, you know, try to remember one thing and never forget it, okay?

From a person who's been practicing about 50 years. Practice means struggle. Struggle.

Okay, practice means you know, baseball practice is not fun. Soccer practice is hard. You know, kicking the stupid ball 300 times is hard, you know.

It's not smooth. Those guys who won the World Cup, was it Brazil? No, it's Germany.

Kicked the ball in falling down backwards like five years ago. He won the World Cup. Those guys, that's not practice.

That's after 50, call it 12 years of practice, 15 years of practice. He kicked the ball in the World Cup, you know. So practice means it's hard and you make mistakes, okay?

So if you try to be a bodhisattva and you keep messing up, that's called practice and that's how you become a bodhisattva. Nobody ever became a bodhisattva without having problems in their practice. It doesn't exist.

It's not possible. That's like saying the World Cup final goal kicker never kicked a ball before. You know, it don't happen like that.

You, practice means you fail and then you come back and you work at it. If you ever had a day of bodhichitta practice or mantra practice and it went perfectly, then you don't need to practice because you're already a Buddha. Okay, so if you're...

So try to remember, okay? People doing Medicine Buddha practice, people doing Lam Rim practice, people doing them together, which is the best thing to do. Don't get discouraged when you have a bad day because it's the bad days that make you a Buddha, okay?

All right, Mr. Tim.

[Speaker 2]
Cool. So this question, this is two separate examples.

[Speaker 1]
So one is... Okay, you know what this is really? This is getting two questions for the price of one.

It's an old trick. Okay.

[Speaker 2]
Actually, this is the combination of two questions and one question. So one participant has a question about wanting to set up their altar in their house and they live in a house where the family is not Buddhist and they don't quite understand and feels that they may be upset about it and they may not understand. And then the other question is similar that where there's people around us who may be who may be negatively afflicted by our...

by the way that we practice outwardly, right? They may say, well, that's not what we do in our religion. That's not what we do in our practices.

So what are some skillful means that we can use to still do our own practice, but also be with other people who may not necessarily accept what we do?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good question. I remember I had all of these problems when I first came back from India, when I first went to India. I studied with a group of hippies from a great Geshe.

And so everybody in the group was trying to do the same practices and we all had similar altars and we all were doing similar strange things in the marketplace, trying to be bodhisattvas, you know, like standing at the only fuel truck for the month to get our kerosene to cook dinner and waiting till everyone else was done first. Anyway, so we were all doing the same strange things in this little village and we felt very comfortable. Then we all went home.

Then we all went back. We all went back home. Then for me, I remember I went back home and my dad cooked a nice barbecue.

For me, maybe they do that in Argentina. I don't know, probably. He made shish kebab.

It's some Arab thing. Chunks of beef and green peppers and tomatoes and pineapple. And then a special sauce and then cook it on the fire.

And he said, oh Mike, you know, you came back, you know, here let's have some shish kebab, you know, and marinate it. And it's delicious, I have to say. And then I'm having this breakdown, you know, like my dad is asking me to eat meat.

I don't want to eat meat, you know. I like contact my lamas, lamas, lamas. I'm like something's going on.

I like run, call them. What? My dad's welcoming me home from India.

Yeah. What? He's making barbecue beef, you know, for me.

You know, what should I do? Should I eat it? You know, I finally, the word got to the high lama, you know.

Geshe Mike, I wasn't Geshe Michael. Mike needs to know should he eat the barbecue or not? And the lama's like, of course you should eat the barbecue.

What are you talking about? You know. I'm like, what?

And he said, you're at home, you know, you're with your parents. These are heavy karmic objects, you know. They made dinner for you.

Eat it, eat every piece and tell them how delicious it was. You know, and I'm like, wow. And he said it's more important that you, it's more important that a bodhisattva feels close to the people around them than keeping small details of your vows, okay?

That's the bigger vow. The bodhisattva's bigger vow is to make the people around them comfortable and to be sweet to them and to take care of them. So if you're learning to make an altar and you set one up in your home and you're living with your parents or something and it makes them very uncomfortable, then you're not doing bodhisattva activity, okay?

That's the opposite. You're making people uncomfortable. So, do your altar a different way, okay?

Do your altar a different way. Why not make your mom the Buddha? And why not offer your the Buddha some flowers every morning?

And that's your altar, it's her bedroom. You take flowers to your mom's bedroom in the morning and offer them to your mom. Then you don't have to set up some 12-arm blue Buddha that's going to make your mom uncomfortable all day.

You know, if you think there's a problem with your mom being a Buddha, you already failed in making your altar. Okay? So, if you're a thap kepa, what's that?

Upaya. Not papaya. Skillful means.

Skillful means, okay? Let your mom be your altar. Cook her breakfast.

That's much, much better than putting an apple in front of a 12-arm purple guy with six eyes, which is going to make your mom uncomfortable. So, if you're a real bodhisattva, you can find ways to make people comfortable. I have another example.

I used to take the bus to New York every day to the diamond company. Two hours each way. Two hours into New York, two hours back.

That's why I memorized so many books and why I slept so much. And one day the bus broke on the way home. And we were out in the middle of nowhere and the only telephone, there's no cell phones in this era, is in a bar.

There's a bar, like a strip bar. You know, and I'm sitting outside the bar. You know, I can walk home.

It would take about three hours. Or I could go in the bar and call Art and get a ride home in about 10 minutes, 20 minutes. But should I go in the bar?

I said, I don't feel like walking. I went in the bar. I'm sitting at the bar trying to use the phone and there's all these drunk cowboys sitting around me.

And then I'm like, I felt like a Martian, you know, who came to earth. And I'm like, you know, and then I said, wait, I'm a bodhisattva, you know. These are my people.

This is my responsibility. These guys are my responsibility. I'm supposed to be a bodhisattva.

So would a bodhisattva come to the bar and make everybody else uncomfortable? You know. Or would they try to make people comfortable?

So I'd like turn to the guy next to me. I said, did you see that football game? You know, can you believe it?

And actually I didn't see any football game. But this is how you start a conversation at a bar. Can you believe what they did?

And the guy's like, that's right. You know, I couldn't believe it. You know, and then I just let him talk and I got to be friends with all the people in the bar.

And that's bodhisattva. So make people comfortable. That's part of a bodhisattva.

It's not going to hurt you to put your 12-armed purple Buddha with six eyes in a box and make breakfast for your mom as your altar. That's very, very nice. And my parents in time, they love my Buddhist practice.

My mom, I saw her a week ago and she's so happy with my Buddhist practice. And she's one of the biggest donators to all of our projects. She said, I don't know what this is, but I like it.

You know, he's like making me breakfast every morning. So let that be your altar. Be clever.

This is upaya. This is skillful means. Don't irritate everybody with your Buddhism.

That's not bodhisattva. At the same time, draw the line if someone asks you to hurt somebody. Like, you know, offer to make your dad vegetarian food the next week, the whole week, and don't let him make barbecues.

That's another thing. Okay, next question, Tim.

[Speaker 2]
This is a really, really important question, Geshe-la.

[Speaker 1]
They're all important questions.

[Speaker 2]
Who is your favorite sci-fi author?

[Speaker 1]
Oh my god. Okay.

[Speaker 2]
Science fiction for the translators.

[Speaker 1]
The greatest science fiction book ever written is by Robert Heinlein. H-E-I-N-L-E-I-N or I-E-N. I don't know.

And it's called Stranger in a Strange Land. So in my humble opinion, it's the greatest science fiction book ever written. You should read it.

It's amazing. And it's very, it's very bodhisattva.

[Speaker 2]
All right, going back to another really important question. In one of your answers when we asked about the seeds for a spiritual teacher, I don't think you quite answered that question. I think you went around.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, I forgot that part. Yeah, I'm sorry.

[Speaker 2]
So I'm wondering if we can answer that question.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. What are the seeds to get a spiritual teacher? So I often tell this story.

And by the way, when you get to my age, you forget which stories you told people and where. So if I told it to you yesterday, I'm sorry. But I had a problem in my life that when I got back from my first studies, I couldn't get permission to be with my teacher.

My teacher had other responsibilities and I couldn't be with them all the time. And I remember sitting on the front steps of a retreat cabin and crying because I couldn't make the seeds to be with my teacher. And I remember sitting there crying and I was like, how can I do that?

How can I make the seeds to be with my teacher? And then I found the seeds and it worked. And then I was always with my teacher.

So what happened? This is a strange solution. But I think longing for your teacher, wanting to be with your teacher, wanting to find your heart teacher, and wanting to be with them and never giving up that hope is the seed to be with them.

Okay, got it? So I'll say it again. If you didn't find your heart teacher yet, or you found them but there's some circumstances that don't let you be with them, like they live in another country or something like that, or they're just not available.

So, start planting seeds to be with them all the time and no matter how impossible it seems, it will happen. Okay? Because seeds make everything.

Seeds make everything happen. So, my first advice is never give up on that wish. Okay?

You can do it. I don't care how far away they live. I don't care if they died 20 years ago.

Okay? I don't care. You can make it happen because everything comes from seeds.

You can have your dream teacher with you all the time and you can have a dream relationship with them. Sometimes you get your dream teacher nearby and then you don't get along. But I'm talking, you find your dream teacher and you plant the seeds to be with them all the time and to have a dream relationship with them, perfect relationship with them.

Okay? And I say the seed for that is to want it. Okay?

The seed for it is to never give up. Okay? So, and I, it took me years to fix that problem, but I did.

And never give up. Okay? Just be very, very, you know, have that devotion, love them and long to be with them and you will be because that's the seed.

Okay? Cool? You can, and by the way, nothing's impossible with seeds.

You can make it happen. Okay?

[Speaker 2]
All right, we'll take this as the last question for this morning. Geshe-la, I have a strong problem with jealousy.

[Speaker 1]
Wait, stop there. I'm not the person to answer this question.

[Speaker 2]
And as you've said Geshe-la, you have this problem too.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, okay, okay.

[Speaker 2]
This mental affliction seems to be, is really bad for developing bodhichitta and gets in the way. What advices from your experience can we do karmically to change that, to reduce the impact of jealousy in our life?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good question. I'll give you an example. I'm sorry if I told this story before.

I'm sure I did. so I was in my monastery, Serame, which is the best monastery in the universe. I used to debate and it was so hard to learn.

It took me years and years before I could debate. I just jackass persisted. I sat there like an idiot year after year and tried to understand what someone's saying.

Because they talk very fast. They talk in a mixture of ancient language and modern colloquial. It's almost impossible to understand a single sentence.

I said, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this thing. I sat there year after year after year and finally I could do it.

I was so proud of myself. No foreigner ever survived more than a week while I was there for 25 years. No foreigner ever survived for more than a week or two.

I was the one. Then finally I was debating at the sister college, which is called Serre Jey. This Tibetan goes, God, your debate is incredible.

I'm like, yeah. He said, you're almost as good as that other foreigner. I'm like, what?

He said, you're almost as good as that other foreigner. I'm like, what other foreigner? He says, we have a foreigner here in our college.

Yeah, his name is George Dreyfus. He's a Swiss. He was the real first Geshe from the first non-Tibetan Geshe.

I was the second, but I was the first American. Anyway, they're like, you're almost, you're very similar. He's way beyond you.

I'm like, damn. I remember I went home to my little room and I'm like, who is this guy? I hate this guy already.

What's he doing to be better than me after all these years? That's disgusting. I remember he bothered me for days.

The cool thing is, if you have a heart Lama, that you planted the seeds to be near them all the time, you can go ask them what to do about George Dreyfus. I went to my Lama. I said, I have a confession.

By the way, a confession to your Lama is the sweetest thing you can do. They love it. I confessed.

I said, look, I'm insanely jealous. I never met this guy, but I already hate him. What should I do?

He said, yeah, go make friends with him. I'm like, no, no, don't tell me that. Anything else.

Make me walk to Bombay with thorns on my feet or something. Don't make me become friends with this guy. I hate him.

He said, go knock on his door and get to know him. I was like, oh. So, I went to his door, in the other monastery, the sister monastery.

I knock on the door. He's a very happy, nice person. He's like, what can I do for you?

He's got this Swiss accent. I'm like, my name's Mike. He says, oh, I heard about you in the other monastery.

He said, yeah. I said, well, I thought since we're the only two foreigners, let's be friends. He says, I would love to be your friend.

So, we became good friends. I remember the first conversation we ever had. We were sitting at his tiny room.

He lived in a tiny, tiny room full of cockroaches. This is India. They kept falling from the ceiling.

So, we'd be talking about some Tsongkapa book and they'd go boom. And then boom. That was our first meeting.

So, we became really good friends. So, what's the moral of the story? When you're jealous of somebody, it's because they are like you.

When you're jealous of somebody, it's because you are similar. So, you have a choice. You can hate them or you can become friends.

And because you're jealous of them, because they are similar to you, but maybe a little better, you're going to enrich each other. You see what I mean? People that you're jealous, when you're jealous of someone, it's usually because you are similar or you have similar goals.

We both wanted to be a Geshe, for example. So, if you drop the jealousy and team up with each other, you just met one of your best friends in your life. It becomes one of the best friends.

Because you're similar. That's why you're jealous. So, that's my advice.

Go get to know them. Introduce yourself. It's even fun to say, I was really jealous of you.

I hated you for six months before I met you. And then that's all out of the, the air is cleared and then you become great friends. So, that's my suggestion.