«Дар освобождения», курс 43 «Современный бодхисаттва», занятие 6

[Говорящий 1]
We're in the middle of the perfection of giving, and the perfection of giving is important for Diamond Way, especially for your Diamond Way vows. In the Diamond Way vows, you're supposed to do four kinds of giving, and that's related to one of the five Buddha families, named Ratnakara, which is south, and generally connected to a yellow color. There are four kinds of giving there, and they're supposed to be put in here just to put a seed in your mind.

Later, when you take your Diamond Way vows, you make a commitment to these four kinds of giving, so you might as well get ready anyway. First one is easy, material things, giving away money, giving away coffee, stuff like that. The second kind of giving that you commit to is called protection, and the names are secret.

The names of the four kinds of giving are hidden, so in that case, protection means equanimity, and it doesn't mean protecting people. It means treating people equally. I think in my life, it's not so much people of different races, or people of different genders, or people of different countries.

I think I have trouble treating people of different political parties the same. But I mean, this is the kind of equanimity, like treat everyone the same. I mean, I think we all have different prejudices, and it's important to know that you have prejudices, but I think the one to watch out for, in my case, or maybe many Dharma people, is prejudice against people with different viewpoints.

If you're going to follow Diamond Way, if you're going to keep the vows of Ratnakara, part of that is to be accepting of people with different viewpoints. Equanimity. Third kind of giving for Ratnakara is Dharma, giving Dharma.

And again, it can just be in a conversation, on a bus or something, like that. And then, in the vows of Ratnakara, you're supposed to give love. The fourth kind of giving is love.

But it covers not getting angry, and it covers speaking sweetly with truth, speaking to people with truth. Those are all kinds of love. So those are the different kinds of giving.

When you talk about perfection of giving, there's a different level when you reach Diamond Way. And it's mostly to do with Buddha Ratnakara, the Southern Buddha. So you'll learn more about it later.

I'm just planting a seed. Four kinds of giving, and they are not what they sound like. Let's go back to the text.

GZHAN YANG MTSON RANG SDUG BSNGAL BA'I TSOS NAS SDUG PA means help people in the prisons. We had a really good prison project here, and we used to go to the prisons a lot. There's a prison north of Tucson.

We used to have a center in Phoenix, so it was easy to go to the prison. Now to go to the prison from where we live, it's an eight-hour trip. We kind of don't do it as much as we used to, but we still have teachers teaching in the prison.

He makes a special point that people in the prison are especially suffering, people who are staying in prison. And America has this problem worse than other countries. We have a very large, I think we have the largest prison population in the world.

And so Arizona is one of the places where they build the prisons because the land is cheap. We have prisons and semiconductor plants because the land is cheap and the labor is cheap. So he's saying it's a special good karma to get involved with prisons.

And we did for many years. I think we kind of slacked off. The person in charge got cancer and passed away, Jeff, Eddie.

So we haven't done much, but it's a special good karma. My personal experience in the prisons was people are very, very grateful. People are very kind.

The prison directors love our group because the fighting in the prison went down. I'll show you some cool pictures tomorrow, maybe. And we had a very, and some of our graduates from the prisons have very nice businesses now, like in Scottsdale.

Like one is a beauty salon and stuff like that. It's going quite well. PHYUD KHYER BDE LAS SDON PA LTA BU He's talking about protecting people from danger.

In Tibet it would have been people carried away by a river or something like that. I think in the modern world, I think car accidents or things like that. If you see a car accident, if nobody else is stopping, right?

Sometimes the police get irritated if you stop. But if you're the first person there, you stop and you get out and you help them. I had a fun experience in Ireland.

I flew into the airport in Shannon and I had to drive to Galway and I rented a car. It's a challenge because they drive on the wrong side of the road and sometimes you forget. But there was a car in front of me and in Ireland all the fields were cleared by making walls.

So there's stones in the fields. They didn't have any place to put them. So they made walls everywhere out of stones.

So every road has stone walls next to it. I'm following this car and it starts hitting the stone wall and finally it crashed and I ran over there. I stopped, I ran over there and it's four Catholic nuns in the car.

I said, you guys okay? They're like, we need to go to the hospital. I'm like, okay.

I put them in my car. I thought it was so funny because they don't know that a Buddhist monk is driving them to the hospital. But if you're the first person, stop and help people.

That's part of giving. That's a kind of perfection of giving. Giving protection.

That's part of ratnakara. Once you commit to diamond way, once you take your diamond way vows, one of the greatest gifts is protection. Or helping people who are in trouble.

YAR GUNG GI BDUS SU, BUD SOGS TSA DANG NAS BSKYAB PA There's a tradition in Buddhism, Varshana, the summer retreat of the monks and nuns. It's supposed to be two, three months in the summer. We will stay in retreat mostly.

That one big reason is that there's more insects in the summer. You will kill them if you're walking around. So there's a tradition of the monks and nuns to do a summer retreat and don't walk around on the grass a lot.

So he's talking here about actually protecting insects from hot and cold. Or if you see some insects drowning or like that. He said, look, what's the big thing?

You can save an insect with one motion of your hand. You just reach in the water and take them out of the water. He said, don't be lazy and don't think their life is not important.

Their life is as important to them as your life is important to you. So if you have a chance to save an insect, do it. He's not talking about you have to sit at the side of the lake and save bugs all day.

But if you see a bug who's trying to get out, just reach in and help him out. Help him get out. Help bugs when you can.

Especially roaches. All right. BU SOGS TSAR DAG LA SKYAB PA SOGS KYANG MIN JIG PA BYIN PA See MIN JIG PA is again, he's secretly referring to your secret vows inside of a lam rim.

He's secretly referring to your secret vows because giving freedom from fear is one of the four secret vows of giving. So he says here MIN JIG PA BYIN PA, which means, and by the way, this lam rim is full of tantra and it's disguised as an elementary book. It's kind of, I think it's cool.

MIN JIG PA'I BYIN PA ZHES RGYAL RIM PO MI DGOS When we talk about giving protection from fear, it doesn't have to be from a distance. LUS KYI ZHIG TSUN CHE LA'ANG BYIN DU YOD If you have a bug on your body who's enjoying your blood, that's also a kind of giving. There's a teacher who you know who said they like to feed the mosquitoes.

I personally can't do it. And by the way, it's dangerous in Arizona. They have special diseases and stuff, so you don't have to do that.

Anyway, when you have a chance to save any creature, save it. Do something. Don't be lazy.

You might be that bug next time. It's like, remember that. Here's a nice thing that Maitri taught me, my other grandchild.

You can buy this on Amazon. It's cheap, and it's cheaply made also. Seiji and Maitri and Noor turned me on to it.

It's a bug catcher. We use jars, we catch bugs in jars, like flies. I've been catching flies for, I don't know, 30 years.

I'd catch them and I'd take them outside. Then they said, give this a try Geshe-la, because the jar is kind of, it's a lot of work. My record, by the way, is 20 flies in one day.

My record in one jar is three. But this is a vacuum thing. If you see a spider or you see a fly, it has a battery and you just turn it on and it sucks the insect, but it doesn't hurt them.

It has a special net and it'll suck the insect up. Then you take them outside and you just turn it off and they fly away. I think it's a wonderful thing and I really like it.

It sounds like a vacuum cleaner, and it's much faster than a jar. It also works better. Sometimes with a jar you kill the fly by accident, but this one works really well.

It's fun, you feel like you're on a safari to get the wild lion. So I recommend. Maitri turned me on to it.

SOGS CHAGS GZHUGS KHYER BA DON PA LTA BUR NI LHA PA DGOS TZAM LAS MI DGOS PAS CHA LA BA YOD Yeah, just a single motion with your hand can save an insect. Then go for it. It's saving someone's life.

LO SBYONG GYIS MNYAM LEN SKABS When you're doing LO SBYONG, STONG LEN, when you're doing STONG LEN, STONG BA'I DMIGS PA RNAMS KYANG, BYIN PA'I MNYAM LEN When you're doing STONG LEN and you are giving someone on your breath, you are giving them your happiness. That's also the perfection of giving. So just doing STONG LEN in your imagination is the perfection of giving.

You don't have to give a hundred dollars or a thousand dollars. You can just give your breath on your breath and that is the perfection of giving. I like this picture of meditation.

DE DE I like to, so I worked in Manhattan for almost 20 years and I used to go up on top of a building or something like that and meditate. It's very, very sweet. During your lunch break and stuff like that, you can go do STONG LEN.

You can eat your sandwich and do STONG LEN on top of some building somewhere. It's a very beautiful practice. The best secret practice when you're working in Manhattan is talking to the Buddha from the bathroom.

I'll teach you my secret meditation, Mr. Bin. You go to the, so it's hard to get time to meditate when you're working in a very busy office. I was working in a crazy busy office and there's no time to do TUN DRUG or there's no time to do your prayers six times a day.

So I used to go to the toilet and close the door, the stall, and sit down on top of the toilet seat and I just sit there for five minutes and I think everybody thought I had some stomach problem or something and I will do my TUN DRUG. I will do my prayers. I just sit there and do my prayers.

It's kind of stinky, but it's okay. You can get privacy. No one's going to bother you.

I used to sit there and do my prayers and then one day I decided I will talk to my future Buddha. I said, hey Mike. He's like, why?

By the way, he never answered. But I'm like, I know you can see me. Your future Buddha can see you, right?

Teresa, future Buddha can watch Teresa now in the bathroom, sitting on the toilet. So I would talk to him and say, hi, I hope it didn't take too long to become Buddha. If you have any advice for me, I'm open.

Because Buddha can see past, present, and future, right? So supposed to be your future Vivian Buddha can see you now. And you can talk to her.

And I think it's very healthy. I mean, they might take you to the mental hospital, but you can talk to Vivian Buddha and say, how you doing? Am I getting closer?

How's my practice? And I think it's very helpful. I think it's a nice practice.

So just don't talk too loud in the toilet. I used to use the office for a lot of practice. I got a lot of practice done there.

RDZO BA NI RDZIN PA'I BAR CHEN GZHI'I CHUN GZHUS LAS Then he's going to quote Bodhisattva Chaya Avatara, which is Entering the Deeds of the Bodhisattvas. And we're studying this famous, famous book. It was written about 1,300 years ago.

It's the ultimate book about Bodhisattva activity. It's by Shantideva, Master Shantideva. Seiji is translating it.

If you're interested in Sanskrit, we're studying the Sanskrit also. So if you'd like to try to learn Sanskrit, I'm teaching Sanskrit during the class. So it's a Shenzang Tower class.

RDZO BA NI RDZIN PA'I BAR CHEN GZHI'I CHUN GZHUS LAS He's going to quote Bodhisattva Chaya Avatara, which is Learning to Act Like a Bodhisattva. And there's an interesting discussion in Shantideva's book. And here's the discussion.

GAL TE RDO BA'UL BOR BA RDZIN PA'I BAR CHEN GZHI'I CHUN GZHI'I CHUN GZHI'I CHUN BDAG DUNG RDOR BRTEN YOD NA NGON GAL PA JI LTAR BAR CHEN Is giving a perfection? Yes. What's the Sanskrit for perfection?

BARAM ITTA Say BARAM ITTA Paramita Americans say Paramita. BARAM ITTA So ITTA means gone. And the English word exit comes from ITTA.

Exit. So IT means to leave. And BARAM means other side of the ocean.

Like to swim from San Diego to Kyoto or something. That's called BARAM ITTA. Then he says, is giving a BARAM ITTA?

Yes, and by the way, it's not BARAM ITTA, it's BARAM ITTA AISER. BARAM ITTA AISER. Paramita Aiser.

The six perfections are not perfections. The six perfections get you to perfection. The word perfection is a famous mistake.

It's not that your giving is perfect. It's that your giving will make you perfect. So we call them BARAM ITTA, but it's really BARAM ITTA AISER.

It helps you become perfect. It's not perfection. It's not six perfections.

Who is that ding? Stop that. So he says, is giving, is DANA BARAM ITTA?

DANA BARAM ITTA. Is giving, is the perfection of giving the perfection of giving? And we say, well, yeah.

I mean, Buddha taught the perfection of giving. And then somebody says, it's not the perfection of giving. And we say, why?

And they say, there's still poor people. There's still poor people. Did Buddha live on this planet?

Yes. Did Buddha reach Buddha? I guess.

Did Buddha do the six perfections? Yes. Did Buddha perfect perfection number one?

Yes. Did Buddha perfect giving? Yes.

So why is there still poor people here? And he says, then we have to talk about what does it mean to perfect the giving. It's not that there's no more poor people.

It's that the willingness to give in the Buddha's mind is perfect. So the Buddha has the perfection of giving. Perfection of giving doesn't mean that there's no more poor people.

It doesn't mean that. It means you are willing to try. You are always willing to try.

Why is there still poor people? If Buddha is a perfect giver, why is there still poor people? That's come from their side.

That's coming from their side. Buddha cannot fix your seeds. Buddha cannot give you money seeds.

You have to give yourself money seeds. Buddha's giving is perfect, but you didn't listen. His giving is perfect, but your seeds are your seeds.

In fact, you want to hear something cool? I cannot give you anything. When grandpa gives you a hundred dollars, who gave you a hundred dollars?

You gave you a hundred dollars. Aldo must have done, I don't know. By the way, he gave it, I think he's donating it to the family of the people, of the person who passed away this week in town.

But yeah, you got to understand what is the perfection of giving. You can be perfect in your giving, and there's still poor people. You cannot really protect the insect.

If they have the seeds, you will protect them. If they don't have the seeds, when you reach in the water to save them, you kill them. You drown them.

You see what I mean? If you've tried to save bugs from water, sometimes you end up killing them. So the perfection is not that you protect their life.

The perfection is that you want to protect their life. But you got to understand that. In Buddhism, when you're trying to help people, you are limited by their seeds.

And you have to get used to that. Otherwise you will get discouraged. You will say, oh, I tried to help three people and they got angry and they told me to go to hell.

That's okay. You're still giving. Your perfection is still perfect.

You cannot control the results of your practice. You cannot. When you're trying to help other people, you cannot control what happens.

You cannot. Should you try? Yeah.

Should you do your best? Of course. Will it always come out well?

No. We had a lot of problems here in Diamond Mountain. We just spent 20 years to offer people a place to do retreat.

That's all. 20 years of extremely hard work. And some people are not happy.

Some people have a bad time. And then you're like, I'm sorry. I'm just trying to give you a place to get away from your phone.

I'm not trying to do anything wrong. I'm just trying to help you. So you can't control what happens.

Which means when you're in the bodhisattva business, you shouldn't get discouraged. Bodhisattva is hard-headed, like Mr. Bing. The head is very hard.

You try to help somebody and they're not happy, and you say, I'm sorry you're not happy, but I'll do the same thing again tomorrow. I'll keep trying to make you happy. I can't make you happy.

Nobody can make another person happy. It's not possible. You cannot.

It depends on their seeds. But your responsibility as a bodhisattva is to do your best. Try to make them happy.

Try. And that means never get discouraged. You cannot control what happens from your good deeds.

You can't control. Don't give up Diamond Mountain because somebody had a bad time here. That doesn't make sense.

In Buddhism it doesn't make sense. You do your best to help somebody. And then if their seeds are different, they will have a terrible time here.

And then you have to be patient about that. Don't make bad seeds about your bad seeds. Just say, I'm sorry you didn't enjoy Diamond Mountain.

We'll try to get you a swimming pool next year. I'm sorry you didn't like the food. I'm sorry you met a rattlesnake.

I'm sorry. We'll try to ask them not to slither your way. Like that.

You can't control everything. A bodhisattva has to have a sense of humor about their practice. Did you fuck up today?

Yes. Are you going to go home and quit? No.

I'm going to fuck up tomorrow also. That's bodhisattva, okay? Don't get so serious about everything.

You can't control the seeds that people have. And people will criticize you. You try to help them, giving away your money, giving away your time for years and years.

And then people are like, I don't like the food. I'm sorry you don't like the food. Next time we'll try to make better donuts.

Like that. When you're in the bodhisattva business, you can't listen to the customer. Don't get freaked out.

Just keep helping them. Shut up and keep helping. Bodhisattvas have to shut up and keep helping.

Maybe people will thank you, and maybe they will curse you. But what else are you going to do? Are you going to quit?

Are you going to watch Netflix? I mean, it's good. I like Netflix.

I like Korean soap operas. But I get bored after like an hour. I'm like, that's all I can watch.

And then you got to go back to being a bodhisattva. That's the best business. All right.

SEMS CAN UR BA'A PHOR BA TZAM ZHIG MIN CING You cannot measure Lord Buddha's success by the economic level of the country. You cannot. That's not connected.

That depends on the seeds of the people who live in that country. It's not Lord Buddha. You cannot judge Lord Buddha.

You cannot judge the bodhisattvas by what's the economy right now. That's crazy. They didn't create the economy.

You created the economy. They're just trying to help you figure out how to change it. ZER NA MED PA TZAM NYAN RANG BDAG CHENG NA'ANG YOD PAS DER NAS TZAM ZHIG MIN PAR If the judge of the success of Buddhist practice is that the world changes for other people who don't practice, then that's crazy.

Even non-bodhisattvas practice giving. ZER NA MED PA means they don't hold back their giving who are not bodhisattvas. Buddhists who are not bodhisattvas are still generous, but you cannot judge them by the economy of the world around them.

That depends on the people who are there in that world. I had a friend, a Christian friend, I think I told you this story. I was doing a three-week retreat in Flagstaff.

I have a Christian friend. We grew up together since we were in third grade. We were eight years old when we met each other.

We were both around 60. I invited him to come up and just hang out with me for a day or two. He came up from Phoenix and he came to Flagstaff.

We had interesting conversations. He's a very good Christian. I used to go to his church for fun because they had better Bible study than my church.

When I was a kid, when I was a little kid, I'd sneak out and go to Bible study at his church. Then he said, we had long conversations. He said, it kind of disturbs me, your bodhisattva thing.

I said, why? He said, well, so in theory, a bodhisattva could just collect good seeds and live in a bubble. They will live in a beautiful bubble.

Their life will be very happy, very beautiful, and then all the people around them are suffering. So in your religion, you say that bodhisattvas collect good seeds, and then that bodhisattva is living in a Buddha paradise in Flagstaff. Then all the other people in Flagstaff are having snow and stuff.

He said, I don't like the idea. I said, well, what's your idea? Then you know, you get into weird stuff like there's somebody making you suffer.

Someone built you. Someone created you. Then someone caused you to get cancer also.

I'm saying like, is that a better bubble than my bubble? He's like, hmm, I don't know. So anyway, I think we are in a bubble and I don't think you can get out of that.

That's the way it is. You can reach outside your bubble. You can give the gift of the Dharma.

You can teach people to plant better seeds, but you cannot control their bubble. See what I mean? Say again?

Yeah, their bubble comes from you. Yeah, it does. Leftover stinginess.

Not wanting to share your bubble's pleasures. Okay. DRIN GZHUGS LAS RDOG PA THAMS CAD DE BYAS TE SKYE BA KUN NA DANG SEMS KYIS BYAS PA'I BAR DO GYUR GSUNGS TE DE STE DE NAS SEMS NYID RDOG The perfection of giving is a mental practice.

It's not a physical practice. The willingness to give what you have is the perfection of giving. Circumstances, the seeds of the other person may prevent them from receiving your generosity.

But your willingness to give is the perfection of giving. In other words, it's not the success of the gift. It's the willingness to give is the perfection of giving.

You cannot predict what... You give Aldo a thousand dollars and he goes and buys nuclear parts and blows up Buenos Aires instead of teaching everybody. I mean, I don't know what he's going to...

We don't know. You just have to do the best you can and be generous and help people. You can't predict what they're going to do with it.

It doesn't work like that. ZHES GSUNGS PA LTAR PHAN YON DANG NYES DMIGS BSAM PA'I SGO NAS RANG GIS LUS DANG LONGS SPYOD RGYAS SA RNAMS SEMS ZHES RNAMS MED PAR GNYIS GNAS STANGS NAS BDE BA DANG BYAS PA GZHAN LA STONG BA'I LO'I GOMS PA YONGS SU RDZOGS PA LA BYIN PA'I BAR CAN DU GSUNGS PAS STONG GSUM PA'I BAR BYAS PA Get your STONG GSUM PA'I BAR. STONG GSUM PA'I BAR means increase your willingness to share and that's the perfection of giving.

You cannot control what the world is doing. You cannot control what people do with what you give them. You just have to keep giving.

By the way, give wisely. I mean, there's a big thing about not giving weapons to people, not giving drugs to people, not giving people things that will hurt them. And you have to do your best to not hurt.

I know rich parents who hurt their kids by giving them too much and those kids become useless and they can't do anything. So it's not the amount that you give, it's the wisdom. Use the wisdom when you give.

,GZHAN LA LTAR, ,GCOD DGOS GSUM LTA BU'I UR BA'I LONG BA NA, ,DE MA LTAR STONG POS MNYAMS PA'I LO THAG BCOS PA ZHIG DGOS, He says, again, he's talking to a lot of monks and he says, ,GCOD DGOS GSUM GCOD DGOS GSUM means the three parts of a Buddhist monk's robe. The skirt, the top, and the second top. And he says, if some poor person comes up to you and says, I need some cloth, then you have to be ready to give.

The readiness to give is the perfection of giving. Should a monk give their robes to another person? And they say, no, you should not.

I mean, I've done it if someone was really cold and we were hiking someplace and I've given them my shelterware. But then generally, generally you shouldn't give away your robes. But you should be willing to give away.

You see the difference? Are you willing to give me your robes? Yes.

Is it appropriate for me to give you my robes? No. ,MNYAMS PA'I LO THAG BCOS PA ZHIG DGOS ZHING, ,DE YANG GOMS PA LA RAG LAS PHYIR, ,CHUNG RIM LAS BYANG STE, ,CHUNG RIM LAS BYANG STE means start small, give away easy things.

They say give away vegetables. In my case, it's not difficult. Last night I was giving away so many vegetables.

They always came back on the plane. I don't know. So they say start with small things.

Just learn to give people small things and then you can build up from there. ,CHUNG RIM LAS BYANG means start with small things. If you start with small things, ,LTAR LUS KYANG STONG NUS PA, in the end you'll be able to give up your body if you have to.

Start with small things. Give away small things all day. In a while you'll be able to give away your body.

,NUS PA TZAM DU MA GOMS KYI PAR, ,STONG SEMS SPEL BA YIN NO, You can increase your generosity by giving things away from small things. Start with small things. Constant small things.

Next picture. I think it's a dead guy. Yeah, here we go.

It's hard to find a picture of a dead person online. There's some kind of weird... People don't like it.

People don't want to put it online. ,BAL LUS KYANG RANG NYID ZHI BA'I SKABS, ,NOR MDZAD RNAMS GCIG KYANG KHYER DU MED PA, We all have to die. We will all die.

You can't keep... Everything you have, you will leave. Everything.

I have this really nice diamond ring in my bag and I carry it around. Last night somebody's telling me about their 10 year old. And I'm like, I should just give him the diamond ring.

So I gave him the diamond ring last night. And I said, you know, and then I started to regret it. And I was like, maybe my wife will be upset.

But then I thought, you know, I'm going to leave it behind me. If I keep it, I still can't keep it. It's still going to be in the bag when I die.

Rob's going to have to clean it out. Probably Rob will get it. And you know, someone's going to get it.

I might as well get the credit. I might as well give it away before I die. So I don't know, when I see stuff like that still in my bag, I'm like, well, I might as well give it to somebody.

Who knows? We might get in a car crash on the way home. We don't know.

So, might as well give it to somebody before it's too late. RANG NI ZHI BA'I SKABS When you die, BLOR TE RNAMS You can't take anything with you. You might as well give it now.

You have something nice, give it to somebody. Get some mileage out of it. Do something nice before it's too late.

Then somebody else is going to give it away for you.

[Говорящий 2]
Okay.

[Говорящий 1]
And by the way, you feel free when you give your stuff away. I don't have anything. And all the good stuff's gone, except the bass guitar band.

You know, just give it. Give it while you can. Have fun while you can, because later, what?

Somebody else... By the way, it's irritating for other people to have to clean out your stuff. I don't know why Geshe-la didn't give this away.

Now I have to clean it out. It's irritating for other people. Trust me.

LUS CHOS SU SGRO BA SOGS MI RTAG PA'I TSUL BSAM STE SNYING RTAG PA NAS GZHAN LA NGOS NA DANG BRAL GYI STONG BA SOGS NYON BAR GYUR If you get in the habit of traveling light through life, you're much happier. Much, much happier. Strip yourself down to the things you really need.

Okay, I got three shirts. I got a pair of shoes. I got underwear to change every day until I can get to a washing machine.

Just strip it down to what you really need and then give the rest away. You feel light. You feel happy.

NGOS NA, SDIG STONG BA SOGS NYON BAR GYUR ZHIG BYIN PA'I NYAMS LEN It'll be easy for you to give. NGON KYANG DE TZAM GYI CHO PA MIN BYIN PA DNGOS SO'ANG GANG THUB DANG DGOS Never be satisfied with your giving. Keep giving.

Keep giving. DE NA SBYONGS PA'I LONG BA GSOS NA GANG THUB BYIN If somebody asks you for something, give. Give.

Keep giving. All right. Now he has some advices about giving.

Some, what do you call it? Small print in the contract. YANG SBYING RGYUD ZAD MED BZHIN DU LOGS SO'I GRUB NAS LTER BA MI RUNG If you don't have anything to give away and you're tempted to make some money dishonestly, he says, forget it.

Just don't give anything away. Don't think, oh, I'm a bodhisattva, I have to make more donation to the Latin America tour. Maybe I can just cheat on my taxes a little bit.

He says that's not perfection in giving. It doesn't count as generosity to get something dishonestly and then give it away. That's a wrong approach.

Better not to give anything. SO'I GRUB NAS LTER BA MI RUNG PHYIR BAR PHYIN DANG PO GSUNGS KYIS NI KHYEN PA'I LAG LEN NAS TSOR BA YIN PAS Again, his audience was both monks and lay people. By the way, he got in trouble in his time by teaching lay people.

He was criticized very... You can still read the books. The people are dead.

God knows where they are. But he was criticized heavily for teaching lay people. And he says, BAR PHYIN DANG PO GSUNGS KYIS NI KHYEN PA'I LAG LEN NAS TSOR BA YIN The first three perfections are especially appropriate for lay people who are not monks or nuns.

Why? Giving is easy, right? Monks and nuns are not supposed to have stuff.

What's the second one? Yeah, ethics. I guess lay people are doing more business, doing more family stuff.

They have more chances to be ethical. Third one? Patience.

Yeah. There's a joke in Seiji's text, KHYIM CHEN KHYIM CHUNG but I don't know. To not live a monastic life takes a lot more patience.

You're going to be around more irritating people. I almost said asshole, but I didn't. You run into more irritating people a little bit outside of a monastery.

But there's plenty inside the monastery. RGYUN SOGS CHOS GSUM DE DAG PHYAL MO BYAS DE BA SHES PA'I KHYIM PA RNAMS LA RUNG BA This is a quotation from Entering the Middle Way which is Chandrakirti's great classic on emptiness, which I'll teach you after we finish this, after December I think, I hope. And he says, Chandrakirti, Master Chandrakirti says, the first three perfections are really especially good for lay people.

STONG DU MI RUNG BA'ANG LUS LTA BU NI STONG SEMS PA' BA TZAM LAS DA LTA MA KHON PA LUS LTA BA MI BYA There are certain gifts you shouldn't make until you're at the right level. There are certain gifts you should not make until you're at the right level. The gift of your body is one of them.

To give up your life to another person to lose your body to another... It doesn't mean body parts. That's fine.

As long as you don't die. But to die for somebody else, we're not at that level. We're not strong enough.

So don't give more than you're able to. Don't give up your body yet. You still need it.

There will come a day when it might be okay, but we're not there yet. Every time the Lama says you're not there yet, people say, I am. But you're not.

He says STONG DU MI RUNG BA'ANG It would be inappropriate to give up your body at this point, at this level. STONG SEMS PA' BA TZAM LAS DA LTA MA KHON PA LUS LTA BA MI BYA He says you are not allowed to give up your body. You have to take care of your body.

Right now you have to take care of your body. You have a responsibility to take good care of your body. Eat well, exercise well, take care of your body.

Once you're in the bodhisattva business, your body is already other people's body. So you don't have the right to hurt it. You don't have the right to overfeed it.

You don't have the right to under-exercise it. That body is not yours. You already dedicated it to other people.

You have a moral responsibility to stay healthy. BDAG BAR MI BYA ZHING PHYIS NAS CHUN DRUL LAS GSOS PA LTAR MTSON MA BDAG BAR TZAM LAS RGA BA MED PAR BYUNG TSE STONG CHOG When the day comes that giving up your body would be as easy as giving up your salads, you can... He says, then you can do it.

We're not ready yet. By the way, people who try to do stuff like that, they're just showing off. Frankly, they're just showing off.

They want people to notice that they're willing to cut their finger off or something. Buddha said, keep your fingers. You need them.

Take good care of your fingers. Don't show off by doing some big bodhisattva thing. That's just showing off.

We had a guy... The nice thing about having a grandpa teach you, I got lots of stories. We studied Milarepa's life in New Jersey when I was living in the Mongolian temple.

There was a young man. We studied Milarepa's life. Milarepa went off into the forest, meditated.

This young man, he immediately gave all his stuff away and moved across the street into this little tiny patch of forest. He said, I'm going to live like Milarepa. As soon as there was a cold day, he was back.

It was so funny. Forget that kind of thing. I stayed in a cave once.

I was going to meditate in a cave and at night there were like a thousand spiders. I was like, I think I'll go to Diamond Mountain and stay in one of those retreat cabins that has a door. He's going to talk about things that are not appropriate to give away.

,RDZIN DU MI RUNG BA NI, ,RDZIN PA PO RAB CHUNG KYIS, ,RANG GI CHOS DGOS RNAMS SUNGS SOGS RDZIN PA, It's not appropriate for a monk or a nun to give away their robes. I mean, unless someone were dying of cold or something like that. Can I announce that other thing, Jinglei?

[Говорящий 2]
Tomorrow.

[Говорящий 1]
Is today or tomorrow? Today. What time?

Is it announceable? Victim? Okay, I don't care.

545, there will be an ordination here. Okay. You'll find out who it is when you come.

But if you're interested to see the ordination of a novice nun, you're welcome to come. Janice is going to take ordination. I have an opinion, which is, if people ask me to give them ordination, then here's my opinion.

I think an ordained person should stand out not from their haircut and not from their clothes. I think they should be more moral than other people. They should have a higher degree of integrity.

I mean, in my opinion, you should be able to say this person is a monk or this person is a nun not because of their haircut and not because of the clothes, but because they are more kind and they are more ethical. They refuse to be unethical. I think you should be able to identify a monk or a nun by their ethics and their behavior.

I think even the robes and the haircut are distracting. I think in the modern world, in the old days it meant you're not supposed to have sex with them, basically. If you see a person with this haircut and this clothes on, you're not supposed to have sex with them.

I understand that. But in the modern world, I think it's distracting when a person is wearing robes or their haircut is different. I think fewer people will talk to them.

I've seen that. I've seen Western monks and nuns and they just look weird and nobody wants to talk to them and then they can't teach people. I strongly feel that if you're asking me to ordain a person, you've got to stick with my opinion.

If not, if you don't want to, then ask someone else to ordain you traditional ordination, get a haircut, wear robes, nobody will talk to you. Your parents won't talk to you. I mean, that's okay.

If you want to do that, that's okay. If you want to get ordained from grandpa, then I'm not selling robes and I'm not selling haircuts. I'm selling behavior, moral, super moral behavior.

I think a monk or a nun should stand out by their behavior not by their appearance. To me that's real ordination. That's the kind of ordination I'm offering.

RANG GIS CHOS DGOS RNAMS SU'I BYIN PA Anyway, it's inappropriate for an ordained person to give away their robes. Obviously, if someone was freezing to death, you should give them your robes in ten seconds. That's fine.

RAB BYUNG LA CI GRUB KHA ZAD DANG Then he says it's inappropriate to give certain gifts to monks and nuns. For example, food afternoon. To try to make a gift of food afternoon to a monk or nun is inappropriate.

They're not supposed to take those things. In this tradition, in the tradition I was brought up in, when you become a monk or a nun, you are given a choice whether to skip your meals afternoon. I kept it for 15 years.

I didn't eat afternoon for 15 years. Then I started doing yoga and then I needed to eat in the afternoon. Because of my yoga schedule, I had to eat.

So I changed my eating habits. In this tradition, in the ancient tradition, a monk or nun should not eat afternoon. In this tradition, when you get ordained, you're given a choice.

You can keep it for one day or you can keep it for the rest of your life. It's up to you. I generally believe, and so nowadays I don't eat until noon.

I don't eat afternoon, generally, unless I have to have a business breakfast at Diamond Mountain or something. Generally, I don't eat before noon. I think that's a good, I think it's healthy.

I think it's very healthy for you. I think it helped me in my business career that I didn't eat until, I didn't eat after twelve o'clock for my whole business career. My corporate career, I didn't eat after twelve o'clock.

I think it's very helpful. I think it keeps your mind very clear. But it's up to you.

,CHEN DU MI RUNG BA NI, ,'CHI GRUB KA ZAD DANG, ,DRAM ZAD SOGS TZANG DRAG CHEN LA DGOS MTHONG, He says monks, nuns, and non-Buddhist monks and nuns, Jains for example, they're not allowed to have onion or garlic. He said, therefore it would be inappropriate to offer onion or garlic to a Jain monk or like that, Jain nun. They say that there are special animals that live in vegetables that grow under the earth.

So they don't eat radishes, they don't eat potatoes, they don't eat onion, like that. They say you will kill small creatures if you eat those things. So, to give something inappropriate to a person from another religion, that would not be correct to give them.

That's not the profession of giving. ,'CHI SNGA BA'I RIGS DER BA THO, ,'CHI SNGA BA means stinky foods. In a monastery or in a nunnery, you are living packed close together with many other people, hundreds of other people, and you're debating every day, three, four hours, and it's inappropriate to eat onions or garlic.

It's hard on everybody. ,YOD MA YIN PA THA, So, generally monks and nuns don't eat stinky foods. ,DER BA DANG, ,LEN DGAG TSUL DUS LA LEGS PA'AM DBYIN PA, Offering a scripture to someone whose intention is to criticize it is not appropriate.

Give a Diamond Cutter Sutra to someone who intends to just tear it apart. That's inappropriate. ,MCHIS BSDOD PAR BSDOD DANG GSON BYIN PA, ,MCHIS BSDOD is a difficult expression here.

,MCHIS means to die. ,BSDOD means they want to die. And it could mean to help a person who wants to harm another person.

So it's inappropriate to sell weapons. It's inappropriate to sell alcohol. It's inappropriate to give things to people that will hurt them.

And then, by extension, if a person wanted to commit suicide, you're not being a bad bodhisattva if you refuse to give them poison, or you refuse to give them a weapon. That's okay. You didn't break your bodhisattva vows.

Can you buy me a gun? I want to commit suicide. Then you say, no.

And they say, but you're a bodhisattva. Yes. You have vows to give what people ask.

Yes. So buy me a gun. No.

Okay. Like that. It doesn't mean you have to give away everything.

If it's going to hurt somebody, don't give it away. Okay. ,GNOD MEN LA SANGS PA BSTAN PA DANG, ,BSTAN PA DANG SEMS CAN LA GNOD PA BYAS NGES KYI, ,SNGAGS CAN PHYIN LAS BSTAN PA, You are definitely not allowed to share secret teachings with people who are not ready, or people who don't have appropriate initiation.

I had two nightmares this week, and I rarely, rarely, I can't remember ever having a nightmare in my life. I can't remember. I have friends who have nightmares every night.

They wake up with the same nightmare. Somebody's chasing them. I never, never have these nightmares.

But I had nightmares this week, and I was surprised. And it was, I was having nightmares about people practicing tantra inappropriately. Not following the rules for tantra, or teaching people tantra.

And I had two terrible nightmares. So I think we have to, you have to know the rules for sharing Diamond Way with people. So if you got secret teachings from Grandpa, Grandpa's policy is you have to finish the eighteen courses before you start secret teachings.

I have tried many exceptions. They all fail. I think all of them.

So, please don't give people teachings, secret teachings, until they finish the eighteen ACI courses. That's Grandpa's request. And then don't make up stuff.

Don't get stuff off the internet. The tantric courses here, the eighteen courses here, are the best in the world. And they are the best in history.

And I think they're 20,000 pages. You can spend your whole life on it. You don't need to look on the internet and get some weird thing that's not anybody's lineage, okay?

You don't need it. If you finish the 20,000 pages and you want more, let me know. Okay?

And I will check your homeworks first. And then I'll give you some more weird stuff. But don't waste your time.

That Diamond Way course is complete. And it's the most complete in the history of Buddhism in this world. And it's pure.

And it's very clean and wonderful and very, very lovely, wonderful practice. So don't waste your time. Don't give me nightmares, okay?

There were terrible nightmares of people getting lost in the hell realms. Terrible. You don't need that stuff.

If you get through the 20,000 pages and you're still not satisfied, look me up and I'll give you some more weirder stuff. But there's a lot of stuff online. It's not appropriate.

It's not Diamond Way. Every, what do you call it? Every authentic Diamond Way practice is in the 18 courses.

Trust me, okay? There's nothing more than that. And it's a lifetime's practice.

You can practice your whole lifetime. You will not get close to the end. So you don't have to do weird stuff.

Don't give me, don't make me lose more hair. Okay, it's getting short. Short supply.

Okay. GNOD MIN LA SANGS PA BSTAN PA means to teach the deeper teachings to people who are not prepared, who have not finished their 18 courses. That's called GNOD MIN.

GNOD MIN means inappropriate people to teach. And I tried. I met people who I thought they were special and it was a disaster.

So be safe. Make sure they finish the 18 courses. If they're not willing to finish the 18 foundation courses, they're not going to succeed in the Diamond Way.

If they say it's too much work, then they're not going to succeed in Tantra anyway. So don't do it. All right.

BSTAN DANG SEMS CAN LA GNOD PA CAN GNYIS KYI BSNGAGS CAN PHYIM LAS STON PA So is it a bodhisattva activity to arrange for the release of a criminal who might hurt more people? No, they should be tried according to the laws of that country and locked up. Yeah, I'm not going to say anything else.

Okay? I mean, it's not a kindness to arrange for dangerous things. It's not a kindness.

Being a bodhisattva doesn't mean going and emptying out the prison from people who might hurt people. I mean, if we can help them, we can fix them, then okay, go to the prison, dedicate your life to go teach at the prison and do it for five, six years. Then if there's people who you think should be released, then help them.

We have done that many times. But it doesn't mean we should release everybody from the prison who might hurt people. SOGS RGYU DANG DUS DANG DNGOS PO SOGS KYI SGO NAS MI GZOGS KYI RGAGS CAN RNAMS BYIN PA MI BYA There are certain objects in life that you should not offer to people.

You know, people want to kill themselves or people want drugs or things like that. Being a bodhisattva doesn't mean you give everything. Being a bodhisattva means you take responsibility to give what's appropriate, without hesitation.

We got a few more minutes, hang in there. I know it's tiring to go for two classes like this, but just hang in there. I swore when I was cooking in class in India that I would make my students suffer worse.

And when the day came, I'm following through. BYIN PA BYAS PA BRAL BU MED DONG NYAMS PA'I LOG DANG DANG Never give something without an appreciation that you will get more back. Never give anything.

Part of a bodhisattva's generosity is the awareness that they will get a hundred times more back. And it's not wrong to think like that. It's fine.

If I give a thousand dollars, I will get a hundred thousand dollars and then I'll give a hundred thousand dollars. You see what I mean? That's fine.

That's fine. All right. SBYOR BA GCIG GI CHE We got three minutes, hang in there.

SBYOR BA GCIG GI CHE DUS SEMS CAN GZHAN MANG PO'I YAL BAR DOR NAS DE'I GCIG PA'I SKYAB PA LTA BU BRDON CHU BA This is talking about the morality of giving and making hard decisions. As a bodhisattva, you have to make some hard decisions sometimes. You have so much money.

There's many good things to give your money to. Then as a bodhisattva, the decision of who you give your money to is very much part of a bodhisattva's way of life. We are not giving your money...

I asked my teacher, there are many homeless people in New York. Should I help them out? He said, no.

He said, do your best. Make sure you're not paying for someone's alcohol or drugs and help them. But use your...

Do you want to help a children's school? Or do you want to help a homeless... You have to make decisions.

We don't have unlimited funds. We don't have... Give everybody something.

But you do have to make decisions as a bodhisattva where to put your gifts, where to put your giving. That's part of being a bodhisattva. Those hard decisions about where to donate, that's a bodhisattva's problem.

You should take those decisions with joy. You should take them decisively, like the surgeon cutting when they have to cut. You should be tough about your giving.

It's not wrong to say, I'm donating to your project and I want to see the spreadsheets afterwards. I want to see the receipts. I'm not donating to some stupid that never appears.

Like that. It's good to be tough with your giving. It's a kind of responsibility.

I will donate to your project, but I want to see the receipts. I want to see the tax payments. I want to make sure your accounting is clean.

And if it's not clean, I want my money back. And I'll give it to somebody else. Part of a bodhisattva's giving is to be responsible and to take responsibility.

I will donate to your thing, but I want to make sure you're using the money right. And that's fine. A bodhisattva is a pain in the ass to take a donation from because they want you to prove that you used it well.

And that should be like that. As a bodhisattva, you should be tough when you give your money. It's...

Last thing. We never had a major theft from my company and we were dealing with 300,000 diamonds a day. The tables were covered with diamonds, just open diamonds.

One handful is a million dollars. And we just had tables covered with diamonds. And I used to have conversations with my business partner and he said, listen Mike, you have a good heart, you trust everybody, but don't make it easy for people to steal because you'll hurt them.

There's not everybody so noble that they can just ignore a handful of diamonds. You have to have systems and you have to have cameras and you have to have security doors and you have to have armed guards and that's part of a bodhisattva. A bodhisattva has to respect other people's property and a bodhisattva has to make sure it's not easy for people to steal things because they will hurt themselves.

You see what I mean? A bodhisattva has to make sure not to hurt other people by making it easy to steal. A bodhisattva takes responsibility to protect other people from themselves.

So when you're in the bodhisattva business... I learned a lot on that day and I kept thinking about it. I said, I don't like to mistrust people.

I want to put the diamonds on the table and he said, don't do it. Somebody's not as strong as you. They're going to steal something and then you put them in trouble.

So a bodhisattva has to not make it easy for other people to hurt themselves who might not have that kind of control.