Ник Лашо — Книга 2: Ратнамала, занятие 27

[Speaker 1]
Hey. Good evening.

[Speaker 2]
Good evening, good morning. Good night. Good morrow.

There he goes. That's all right. Thank you, everybody, for being here.

Nick will be back with us in a moment, I'm sure. There's Geshu Michael. Never far.

Thanks so much for being here. Thank you to the live interpreters for being here, especially. Thank you, everyone, for attending.

Hi, Geshu Michael. Good evening to you.

[Speaker 1]
Hi.

[Speaker 2]
Hi, everybody. Yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, we have Nick this evening.

We decided that I would host on Monday nights, but Nick is here, so it's a little bit artificial to have to look at my face for a moment. But it's nice for me to see you and say hello. Somebody get the phone.

Otherwise, Nick, without further ado.

[Speaker 1]
Can you guys see my screen?

[Speaker 2]
Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Unfortunately, yes. It's time for a quiz. Hi, Geshu.

Good to see you. It's snack time. Nap time?

Snack time. Ah, yes. I'm very grateful for snacks, actually.

Thank you to GCI Global for sponsoring snacks for you and the rest of the crew at the tower there. Hey, Nick, did you fix the medicine cabinet that you busted with your head? What are you talking about?

My head did no damage to it. The damage was only to my face. By the way, we've got important people here for Halloween.

We've got Adam. We've got Ava. So, Nick, if you want to call on somebody, don't forget Adam.

It's beautiful. I love listening to Adam read that language because he pronounces it so perfectly. All right.

Let's do a quiz and see how it goes. I tried to make this quiz really easy because it's been a long time since we've looked at my text, and it was mostly easy material. And historically, I always make them hard by accident, so I'm trying to make it more interactive.

So let's see. But I don't expect anybody to remember where we're at in the text because it was a month ago. Let's see what happens.

Ari Nagarjuna mentions that we will eliminate karma. Oh, I'm doing this in a Jeopardy style. So if you know what that is, it means you answer my answer with a question.

You have to say what is or something to get the answer right. You don't have to, though. Ari Nagarjuna mentions that we will eliminate karma and rebirths.

If we can just eliminate this first. What is wrong? He stopped eating cinnamon rolls.

He's tricky. No. Close.

Did you say something, word, somebody? I said, what is wrong here? It's more specific than that.

It's just what we've been talking about a lot in this book. It's where we're at and what we've been talking about. Only I knew.

If you did, you would. That's for sure. Is it right?

No, it's not that specific. No, it is. That's not it.

What's the propensity to grasp to a meat? Thank you. What is the tenant?

And she even I knew you'd get it. I knew you'd say it in Jeopardy format. I'm so proud.

So that's the Tibetan for that.

[Speaker 2]
Jonathan.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. Narns in close up. Was that was that better?

Who said the Tibetan there? I was Rebecca. Oh, nice.

Excellent work. You could name a shark. Yes.

Every once in a while, the sun shines. Even on a dog's bum. I'm European now.

I say bum. He then advises us not to not think in this particular way. A way that he says the world deems correct.

What does Nagari? Aria Nagar? Aria Nagarjuna accused the world of deeming correct.

Anyone putting themselves? Good guess. That is a very good guess.

And it's not correct in this case. If you keep guessing, you'll get it, though.

[Speaker 3]
He didn't ask it in a name. He didn't say it in the form of a question, though.

[Speaker 1]
That's a good point. That's a very good point. Captain.

So I'll give you a hint. It has its typical description of the Middle Way philosophy. Or what wouldn't be the Middle Way?

Not coming from you. No. What would it be if things existed permanently or didn't exist at all?

Good job. My gosh. Yes.

Nice. She's on a roll, everybody. Watch out.

Tibetan for existence. No. I think Rebecca.

Say what you said, Rebecca.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah. Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Good job. It's just exist or not. Yeah.

Thank you. Nice job. Yeah.

Next verse of the root text. Share shares this benefit of realizing emptiness. What's the benefit of realizing emptiness?

It's just a benefit. It's what we're talking about right now. It's just one of the cool things.

Not seeing the world backwards. That's a great guess. But it isn't what we're talking about here.

What is freedom? Also a great guess, but not what we're talking about here. It's freedom from something.

Freedom from. What is freedom from extreme views? No, these are all great guesses.

It is one of the four famous freedom protections. Let's say.

[Speaker 2]
Freedom from the wrong view.

[Speaker 1]
It's not. Forget the word freedom. Okay.

One of the benefits of realizing emptiness is that you won't be. When you hear a teaching on emptiness, you won't be. Yeah.

Yay. You won't be scared. Yes.

Yeah. What is remaining free of fear? Tibetan.

Tibetan for remaining free of fear. That's pretty good. Yeah.

Remain. Yeah. He uses a.

He's saying it a particular way here. I'm not even a hundred percent sure why. I think we're going to get to it.

But he's saying. And he says it a few times. So.

[Speaker 3]
Good job.

[Speaker 1]
Especially. Good job. Good job.

Everybody. All right. I did send her the quiz, but I don't think she read it ahead of time.

I think she just has incredible notes and knows stuff really well. Okay. Welcome.

Thank you. All right. Let's share the screen.

Here we go. Oh, quick announcement. After this class, we will have the usual 15 minute discussion.

So please, if you see something that you think it would be fun to discuss for a few minutes regarding practical applications of this material, please post it in the chat. After that, we'll have 15 minutes from the Peachtree World News. And then after that, we're going to have a question and answer session with Mr. Ben Kramer. So every month we'll have a mixed nuts Q and A for you to bring and ask your tough questions. And this fine evening, you have the pleasure of the incredible Dr. Ben Kramer to answer your hardest questions on this material. And he's an excellent doctor, not a doctor, but he plays one on mixed nuts TV.

[Speaker 3]
Don't ask me your medical related questions.

[Speaker 1]
And, but he's quite good at the middle way. So at least talking about it for sure. Okay.

All right. Here we go. We're going to start.

All right. Let's start with the text here. Can you read the first one, Nick?

And then after that, you can pick on other people. By the way, if you want to know how Ava got so tall, it's because she's climbing high mountains with her father. Okay.

I climb mountains and it never made me tall. Well, you got it. Okay.

So . . .

DANG NYID THEY DAG DANG DAG GYI WEI YOD GAG PA YIN LA DE GYU YIG PA GYE ZHING DAR THAR PA DOK NE HUNG PO CHUNG ZE KYANG ME NA DE NYID YIG PA YIN NE YIN NO ZHEN NA Okay, what does the ZHEN NA tell us, Nick? Well, someone might ask, or you may wonder. He's posing a question.

Yeah, so that's a sign. When it says, if somebody says, it means the whole sentence before that is a dumb idea. All right, and then he says, you didn't drupa that seeing emptiness is not a chakpe ne, double negative.

It's not proven, or you have not proved, that seeing emptiness is not a point of fear. I'm trying to figure out what he means by chakpe ne. It's a place where you wouldn't be afraid.

Something to get scared about, okay? You said, Nagarjuna, you don't have to be scared about seeing emptiness. And then this other guy comes and says, well, you sure better be scared about seeing emptiness.

And now he's going to prove his idea. How is he going to prove it? Well, when you talk about dok ne, you are kakpa, the object you are kakpa, say you are, Nick, the object you are kakpa is dark and dark you are.

The object that you are denying when you're talking about emptiness is self, and is me and mine. Yeah, you say it's not scary if Michael disappears, and Michael's stuff disappears. Isn't that scary?

Who's talking? The other guy. This other, yeah, this kachik.

You said we didn't have to be scared about seeing emptiness. And then you said, when you see emptiness, me disappears and mine disappears. It sounds pretty scary to me.

That's what he's saying, okay? They would duplicate. I think jikpa were okay by that view.

This is good. That cause is going to bring up some fear that's going to make you scared. Yeah.

And by the way, there's two jikpas. One jikpa means to be destroyed. One jikpa is to be scared.

There's a difference in the spelling. Doesn't destroyed have a sa? No.

Scared has a sa. It's been misspelled here. Somebody has misspelled it.

Okay? It's jiks. Like jiksme.

Like jikme. Yeah, yeah, duh. Of course.

Like jigsimple. Okay? So somebody has miscarred the, somebody's misspelled it.

One of the mixed nuts cool things is we fixed the spelling of the ancient books. Okay? Jikpa.

So listen, anybody would get scared if they and theirs disappeared. Everybody would get scared, right? Yeah.

Nicholas. If there's not even a little tiny bit of any of your parts left when you achieve freedom, isn't that something that would make you quite scared? Yeah.

And in the recent retreat we had at Diamond Mountain, we talked about how to, we talked about an option for transcending buddha. Body and mind. Yeah, just body and mind.

Okay? So look, if when you achieve nirvana, your body and mind disappears, whoa, dang you jikpe ne yin. That's a pretty darn scary thing.

Yeah, that's a goddamn scary thing. Okay. By the way, did he spell it right the second time?

[Speaker 3]
Yeah, he sure did.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, he spelled it right the second time. By the way, it's not necessarily the case that Gyatsobje misspelled something, but the carver might have misspelled it. Nick, you want to do one more paragraph that you pronounce?

And then, by the way, what's the bold letters, Nick? That's the root text. That's where he's mentioning Nagarjuna's words, Arya Nagarjuna's words.

Yeah, from which book? From Ratnamala. From our root text here.

Which means? It means String of Jewels. Somebody translates a book and they call it, this is the Ratnamala of the Abhidharmakosha.

And you're like, can you translate something? Yeah, okay, yeah, String of Jewels. All right, please read and translate.

We'll translate. Let's read first. Okay, good.

This is our answer to the other guy. What did the other guy say? He said, of course it's scary.

Don't tell me it's not scary to see emptiness. You disappear. Everything that's yours disappears.

Don't tell me it's not scary. And we say, said you, you who follow the scriptural basket of the listeners, if you follow... Yeah, which means, you lower school dudes, especially you Abhidharma dudes, okay?

You say that when a person reaches nyang de, without pungpo, nirvana where you have no more parts left, no more body and mind. What is nirvana with nothing left over according to the lower schools? That your parts are, that you have no more body and mind, that you blink out of existence.

Your body and mind disappears. Some people are on Nepal time. Okay, just kidding.

Nice to have you here. So he says, why is he talking about that? Nick, I'll repeat what you just said.

Well, according to you guys, according to you lower schools, when a person achieves nirvana with nothing left over, pungpo me, there's no more parts, no more body or mind. You're the guys who are selling a nirvana where people disappear. Now that's scary.

Don't tell me my nirvana is scary. Your nirvana is scary. Okay, by the way, this whole negotiation fight with the lower schools, he's always doing that.

He's like, don't count me. I'm scary. You're scary.

Okay. Why wouldn't you be afraid? Of course you're scared, if that's the case.

Yeah, yeah. You're the guys who should get scared, because you're the guys who say people disappear when they reach nirvana. We don't say that, by the way, in the higher schools.

de la min jik na kam de lhag me kyi ne kam na, nyo mong sum po de me par shepa ba kyi ni chi te And even if we say that lhag me ne kam, at the point of lhag me nirvana, at the point when you achieve nirvana with nothing left, with no remainder, with nothing left over, you lose nyo mong sum. You learn the three types of negative emotions. Which three he's referring to, we don't know.

It could be the three animals in the middle of the wheel, but I have a feeling it's a different one. But he doesn't say, me par shepa, kyi chi te jikpa chen na. Why wouldn't...

Yeah, you're the guys who should be scared. Guys who should be scared. Therefore, you should not...

Therefore, it's mirik to trakpa. It doesn't make sense to be terrified about emptiness. Yeah, you don't have to be scared about emptiness, because emptiness for us means you're empty of your three negative emotions.

That's not like your body disappears, or your rear end disappears, something important. You're just losing your negative emotions. Now, that's not so scary.

That would be pleasant. That's... Who's talking?

Nagarjuna. Yeah, when we talk about getting rid of something in nirvana, we're talking about getting rid of your negativities, and that would be a pleasure. That wouldn't be scary.

Okay, got it? Yeah, and can I ask you a quick question before we move to the next one? Why does he say kamdhir twice?

Or, like, he says kamdhir, and then he says nekap na. Like, is he just repeating himself, or is he... Hang on, just...

kamdhir phagme kyi nekap na. End of the third line, yeah. kamdhir phagme nekap na.

Yeah, he's just talking about in this context, we're talking about the occasion. Okay? So it's kind of repeat, repetitive.

Okay. Well, so kap here means... the first kap means context, and the second kap means at that point in your mental development.

Okay? Got it. I understand that.

Okay, thank you. Sorry. And then he has mentioned three mental functions recently in the text, and I'm not sure if those are the three he's talking about.

Losing when you reach nirvana. But it's tempting to discuss the question. Ngarmzin, holding to me, holding to a self-existent me.

And tokpa and chepa, vittarka and... vichara and vittarka. Vittarka and vichara, what's that?

We had it in the Yogasutra. Noting and examining, when you're in the grocery store and you hear Jimi Hendrix, and one of them was when you notice that Jimi Hendrix is playing, and examining is when you really get focused on the baseline. Would it...

is there any... is there any possibility that these are the three that he's talking about? It doesn't seem likely, but...

It does not seem likely. We don't normally say that noting and examining, just two kinds of attention, are negative emotions. But in the context of seeing emptiness directly, he might be talking about them.

Okay? So I'll just throw it out there. All right, Mr. Nick. Now you got this handsome Colorado guy here. Let's get... let's get this guy reading.

I mean... Yeah, up here, young man. Especially if he's eating snacks.

He's got to earn those. We've got two ties next week. At the same time.

And Ava has to tie them up. All right. Nipa Lasu.

Welcome, you guys. Adam comes here only on Halloween to get free candy. Welcome him.

Nipa Lasu. Good. Okay.

In a Tibetan book, they'll say, here's part two. And it has, you know... and then we don't know what part two is.

We don't remember. It was like six months ago. So grandpa, before he...

when he prepares a class, I always go and get the part two. So here's the part two. Can you read this one, Adam?

Yes. Yeah. Yeah, we're gonna tenpa, that the meaning of tarpa is to sepa, all dancing.

What's that? A demonstration that freedom is the elimination of all grasping to things as if they were real. Yeah.

And we're not talking about your fingers disappearing, your nose disappears. You know, that would be scary. We're talking about...

what we're saying is when you achieve nirvana, all your habit of believing that things are coming from their own side and not from your own seeds will disappear. That's nirvana for us. All right.

So we're going to discuss that concept in three parts. What's the concept? When you achieve nirvana, the point is not that your body and your mind disappear.

The point is that you stop seeing things as coming from their own side, completely, with all seeds for that. That's the higher description of nirvana. You can achieve nirvana at three o'clock in the afternoon in the village of Oak Creek, Arizona.

And at 3.30 you don't look any different than you did this morning. It's as something in your mind disappears. It's not that your body turns into pizza or something like that.

Okay? It's a mental thing. And other people can't tell unless it's him.

Okay, all right. NGON MED RANG BZHIN GYI SGRUB PA THAR PA MI STE It's incorrect. Good.

To say that, THAR PA... To say that liberation is establishing that the non-existent things exist through some nature of their own? Yeah, you can start like that way.

We don't know what he's referring to yet, but we can start that way. It probably means, by the way, Nick, things that are not functional. Don't go anywhere.

No, no, stay right here. So, generally, things that don't perform a function, it's not correct to say that... It's not correct to say that the fact that things that don't perform a function have no nature of their own is nirvana.

Okay, we're going to get there. Don't worry about it. THAR PA NGON PO MI STE It's incorrect to say that SGRUB PA is a NGON PO.

That liberation is a thing, is a functioning thing? Yeah, it's incorrect to say that nirvana is a changing thing. That's pretty heavy.

And it's incorrect to say that nirvana does anything. Okay, that's heavy. Okay, and then finally, after we...

after we deny two kinds of nirvana, two wrong kinds of nirvana, then the third step is... Look, you're done. Is it the actual meaning?

Yeah, I'll tell you what nirvana really is. So, first I'm going to tell you one kind of wrong nirvana. Then I'm going to reject the second kind of wrong nirvana.

And then I'm going to give you the right kind of nirvana. Hopefully we'll get there today, but I doubt it. This is probably a stupid question, Geshe-la, but like...

because I guess NGOS KYI DON always means the actual meaning. But isn't it weird that he said it that way, NGOS KYI DON, right after he used NGOS to mean something else? I think he's...

Yeah, you're sensitive to the fact he's being cute. He's being cute. Because here, the word for changing thing, changing thing, is also the word for actual.

So, the first two categories here are nirvana is not a changing thing in the way you think it is. But then the third one, he uses the same word. But in the third one it means...

I'll tell you what it really is. But in Tibetan it's the same word, NGOS, which means actual. Or it means functioning thing.

Or it means generally anything, bhava in Sanskrit. Yeah, that's a good point. We're going to skip the root text because we can go faster.

We're going to get it anyway in the text. Can I get Mr. Handsome Colorado to read some more, Nick? I would be thrilled.

Okay. SDUG BSNGAL SRED PA'I THAR PA RANG BZHIN GYI SGRUB PA'I KHO BA CHAGS MI JIGS SOGS GZHAN NA Give me a prenasal here. Oh, MI JIGS SOGS GZHAN NA.

Yeah, open vowel, MI, and then a prenasal, MI JIGS. Okay, good. Here's the other guy's answering, okay?

He's going to say, I'm not scared of nirvana, okay? You say I'm scared of nirvana. I'm not scared of nirvana.

We said, if anybody should be scared of nirvana, it's you. Because you're the guys who say we disappear when we reach nirvana. You guys should be scared of nirvana.

And he says, well, that's true, but... Luckily, the nirvana where you stop your suffering, RANG BZHIN GYI SGRUB PA'I Does so exist from its own side. It's real.

It's a real thing. So we're not scared. It's real.

We're fine with it. It's a real thing. Got it?

We're asking the guy, do you disappear? Yes. Does your mind and body disappear?

Yes. But are you scared? No.

Why? It's totally real from its own side. Why should we be scared?

Okay, got it? He's totally ass backwards, we say in English. He's always backwards, okay?

Like some of my students. Okay. Adam's going to read this last piece here.

NI KHAG NA PHUNG PO MED PAR NGOS PA'I PHYIR RO Good, nice. So I'm going to do the second part first, Nick. BDAG DANG PHUNG PO RANG BZHIN GYI SGRUB PA SEL BA This SEL BA is a verb.

We are... We're clearing away or dispelling the idea that self or the parts of the self could exist through some nature of their own. Yeah.

And then he refers to the other guy as GYUL GOS. Okay, GYUL GOS. I have never seen it in 50 years of reading scripture.

It's an ancient Sanskrit, translation of Sanskrit, which means you dudes. You dudes. Okay.

Hey Hasso, I see you. I got your new computer here. So you talk to Seiji.

He's got it. All right. Okay, GYUL GOS.

I looked it up. It just means you dudes. And by the way, there is no Sanskrit for GYUL GOS in the text.

Our translator, the Tibetan translator has added it because there wasn't any U in the root text. There is no U in this root text. Okay.

In the Sanskrit root text here, there's no U. GYUL GOS is a weird word and it's been added by a translator a thousand years ago. Okay.

But we'll do it. It's cute. It's a cute word.

Hey, GYUL GOS. Yes, GYUL GOS. Okay.

So anyway, GYUL GOS. You guys. CHI MI DGA' BA.

Why wouldn't you be happy? Yeah, why do you have a problem with it? The only thing that we are removing in nirvana is the impression that things are coming from their own side.

What's the problem? Why is that so hard for you guys? Why are you upset about it?

The only thing we're... We're not removing your fingers, your toes, your mind, like you are. We're just removing the idea that you could come from your own side.

What's your problem with that? CHI MI DGA' BA means, why are you so upset? And then he says, DGA' BA would be great.

It would make sense for you to be happy. Yeah. Why are you upset?

You should be happy. Why? We just got rid of something that wasn't there.

A you that could come from your side. Why do you have a problem with that? You should be happy.

A messed up you that was never there, we have canceled. You should be, ah, thank you. Okay, it caused me so much trouble my whole life.

And now you canceled it. You should be thanking us. All right.

THAR PA'I GNAS SKABS NA PHUNG PO MED PA'I DUS PA'I NCHE Well, aren't you the guys who say PHUNG PO MED at THAR PA? You guys think that there's no more body and mind left upon achieving liberation. Yeah, listen, I just saved you from your...

I just saved you from this radical absence. What? When you reach nirvana, you disappear.

Your body and mind disappear. Where are you after that? That's scary.

Your idea is scary. All I want to get rid of is thinking of yourself as coming from your own side. That's a pleasure to get rid of.

Okay? It's a pleasure to get rid of the wrong idea that you don't come from seeds. And that's a lot more fun than this stupid idea of nirvana that you guys have, which is that your body and your mind disappear.

Okay, got it? You should be happy. I'm helping you guys out.

Okay? All right. Nick, I'm kicking out.

By the way, Ava agreed to splitter candy with me tonight, because I have to go on a little trip. So, I'm expecting. Nick, I'll tell you...

Yeah? Did we do the first part of that paragraph? Oh, we did not.

Good point. Here it is. We have a request from one of our interpreters that we slow down a little bit.

Okay, okay. Let's get it started. Yeah.

Let's go to the middle of the second line, Nick. Okay. Okay.

Dark, dark, dark. Okay. When you reach liberation, you gawk all the dark.

When you reach liberation, you deny all self. Yeah, I'm going to cancel this idea I had, which today it doesn't look so good. You say when you reach nirvana, you cancel all of me.

Okay. But actually, what we say, you're just cancelling your self-existence. We're not cancelling Nick.

And yeah, and then the first line is clear. It's just that, look, there's no self-nature to the person. And that's the nature of nirvana.

Okay. And the person's body and mind don't exist from their own side. That's all.

We're cancelling the idea that your body and mind could be coming from anywhere else than how you treat other people. If you believe there's a single detail of your life, your body, your mind, or your world, that's not coming from how you treat other people. Okay.

If you can cancel all that wrong idea, that's nirvana. Then you reach nirvana. If you can finally admit that all the problems in the world are coming from you, and not from the rest of us.

Just kidding. That joke... Is that thing, drawa, there from the root text, is he saying we're claiming the same thing, like we just mean something different?

When you say jimigawa? No, he says dendra... Sorry, tathag kakpa dendra du la.

It's like the beginning of the third line. The dendra. Oh, oh, oh, yeah.

tathag kakpa dendra du la. Yeah, we're just saying, me pe khyel te tharpa dak thadak kakpa dendra du la. Dendra du la means, it being the case that you have agreed that nirvana is the stopping of all self, the self itself.

It being the case that you think that nirvana is the stopping of yourself, of every form of yourself, then why aren't you comfortable with something less than that? I just got you out of cancelling your body and mind. I'm just saying get rid of your negativities.

That should make you happy. You don't have to disappear when you reach nirvana. You should be happy.

I'm letting you keep the rest of your mind. Just get rid of the negative part. Okay, got it?

chi mi ga gawa rik means the same formula he had above. chi mi ga means, why aren't you celebrating? You should be.

Why? I just saved you from cancelling yourself. All you have to cancel is the idea that you don't come from seeds.

That's the thing you have to cancel. But you don't have to cancel your body. You can keep your body.

You can keep your mind. In fact, you have to keep it. And once you do cancel all those things, it'll be a Buddhist body and mind.

Not bad. You don't have to disappear. You have to go to paradise.

I'm sorry. That's what we're saying. We're like, you should be celebrating.

Why you got a problem with this? Okay, got it? By the way, we are at the juncture.

$100. $100 question. You ready?

We used up all the money in Diamond Mountains. Rob's like, Geshe-la, you used up all the money. I'm kidding.

We'll figure it out. Now I forgot the question. When Arya Nagarjuna says, look, we're not canceling you.

And we're not saying your mind doesn't exist and your body doesn't exist. We're saying that when you reach nirvana, you're canceling wrong ideas about where things come from. The wrong idea that things aren't coming from how you treat other people.

Then what's really happening? Well, historically, Nagarjuna has one foot in one era and one foot in a different era. He's straddling.

It's like, you ever go to Mexico and put one foot in the United States and put one foot in New Mexico and see if it does anything in between? And it doesn't. Sometimes I'm like, it feels normal.

It feels like two countries are... Anyway, what great historical event does Arya Nagarjuna straddle one foot on one side, one foot on the other side in this book? And you guys are painful answers.

I should charge for painful answers. Great historical event, the Great Convocation. No, I mean, that was great.

[Speaker 3]
I'm seeing emptiness directly, the path of seeing.

[Speaker 1]
I can't say you're hurting me. Mahayana and Hinayana, the two divisions of Buddhism. In these words, in these pages, he's creating a new Buddhism.

And by the way, it's not a new Buddhism. He's going back to the original Buddhism. But in his time, before him, there was no Mahayana.

And then he invented Mahayana. These words that he's telling us, you are witnessing the birth of a very great baby called the Mahayana. And it survived for 2,000 years after that.

Got it? Right here. His lifetime is that event.

Yeah, his correct expression of nirvana is a great historical event in Buddhism. It's a breakthrough event in Buddhism. Okay, and here you can see it right here.

Okay, that's not nirvana, to disappear. Nirvana is where you get rid of seeing things the wrong way. Okay, got it?

[Speaker 2]
All right.

[Speaker 1]
Nicholas, who's up next? Nah, I don't know. He says part two.

Part two is tarpa ngopor mi te. What's that mean, Nick? Duh, it would be incorrect to say that liberation is a changing thing.

Yeah, nirvana is not a changing thing. It's not even a functional thing. We got to think about it.

We got to think about it. By the way, most things that don't change are absences. Okay, most things that don't change are absences.

And nirvana is an absence. Something that was there that you thought was there is not there. Therefore, nirvana itself should not be a changing thing.

And anyway, that would be uncomfortable, right? Like half the time you're in nirvana and then you skip out half the time and your mental afflictions come back. You know, that would be a lousy nirvana, right?

Okay, who's next? I got lots of victims here. How about Katie Fechenheuer?

Well, that's been a long time. I think she's out with the baby, Nick. Oh, really?

She's out with the baby. I'll tell you, I got Stanley here. I got Allison here.

I got Rob Haggerty here. I got Jigme here. What's Star Wars?

He actually put a tie on. Oh, perfect. If he's dressed for the occasion.

We cut the siren half if they don't wear a tie. Isn't that right, Nick? Yes, absolutely.

He gets a double zero. I'm working on yourself. I'm almost there.

This line? I'm squeezing rocks. Nick, translate.

So, somebody might come along and say denying the body and mind of a person that kind of liberation is so a changing thing or a functioning thing. Yeah, tarpa, liberation nirvana, which consists of kakpa da pungpo ni, or a denial of the parts of the body and mind of a person. Yeah.

No, when you stop your body and mind.

[Speaker 3]
Yeah, right.

[Speaker 1]
Nirvana. Nirvana, where you stop your body and mind, that is a changing thing. That's his position.

Who? The other guy. The other guy is always wrong.

It's just like being married. The other person's always wrong. Okay?

It's very much like a marriage. So, he says the fact that when we say nirvana is where you cancel your body and mind, that is a functional. For them, functional thing means real thing.

Real thing. You know, like this cup. It's not that they care that it's changing or not changing.

That's not the idea. That's not the point. They're like, look, it's a real thing.

You know, it's a real thing. Nirvana, arm nirvana, which consists of what? Cancel the body and mind.

Yeah. Cancel the body and mind. It's a real thing.

Who said that? The other guy. Yeah, yeah.

Well, arm nirvana is real. Why? You can cancel your body and mind.

You know, that's totally real. They say that. Here's our answer.

Standing. I think that's what Misa wants to look. Yeah, thanks.

Okay. Oh, sorry. Okay.

Okay. By the way, Nick, what's kala? Kala means in ancient Sanskrit.

Kala. However, however could it be. How on earth.

Okay. Kala yin means how on earth could it be what you're saying. Okay.

Kala means how on earth. I can't believe you say that. I can't believe you say that.

What? That nyang ngen la'i derpa. Nirvana.

Going beyond grief. Nirvana. Blowing out grief.

Nir. Van. Okay.

Literal meaning. Derpa. Why shouldn't you do it with kala?

How can you guys say that? Reaching nirvana exists by nature. It's a natural thing.

Has its self-existence. What's that mean? All the time.

Comes from its own side. A pen which comes from its own side. Just keep remembering that.

Then we're like, how can you guys say that nirvana comes from its own side? What's wrong with you guys? Kala yin de means I can't believe you say that.

Who's talking? I can't believe you dudes would say that. You know, it's unbelievable.

What? That nirvana somehow comes from its own side, independent of my seeds. I can't believe you.

By the way, we're not talking changing or unchanging. We're just saying I can't believe you would say that. Yin ba yin de.

Kala on earth, which is to say, and then our author, Gyaltsabje, uses a, what do you call that? A positive.

[Speaker 3]
A positive.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, which is mayapada. The other author is saying, kala yin means how can you say He's translating it. He's giving a commentary.

Oh, oh, you guys don't know what kala yin means? Kala yin means how could you say that? Then he clarifies it.

He says, ma hi ma da. What's wrong with you guys? He's writing a commentary on the root text.

The root text is in the dark black. The root text says kala yin. It means thou sayeth.

It's ancient language. He says, oh, you guys don't know what it means? It means mayapada.

You're so wrong. You're so wrong. You got it?

He's making a commentary on an ancient word. ngopo me pa lar je gyur pa yinpa minpay chen. Even the me pa of ngopo.

The absence of functioning thing. Yeah, or the absence of reality. The absence of reality itself.

It's not rang shing gi drub pa. It doesn't exist from its own side. Yeah, yeah.

Very difficult idea. Very difficult idea. The fact that the pen is not coming from its own side, doesn't come from its own side.

The fact that the pen doesn't come from its own side, doesn't come from its own side. Okay? When you cancel the idea of a pen coming from its own side, that's nirvana.

And that doesn't come from its own side. Got it? Cool?

Sexy. I'm just going to quote a famous book that you guys may have heard at a nice retreat center last week. Nick, we've got Stanley.

We've still got Stanley here. Yeah, let's hear some more. Stanley, your pronunciation sounds great.

Okay. That's the best way to give somebody bad luck. Yeah.

Now I don't know how to say the first one. By the way, when it's a G by itself, with no head letter, it does not exist in English. Ani, what are you doing?

We don't have it in English. Okay? But this is one of the most famous verses from Tsawa Shirom.

Wisdom. Yeah, and the short name in Tibetan is sashe. Sashe, say sashe.

Which means root wise. Root wise. Root wise.

Text on wisdom. Hey, sashe. Root wise.

They took the S off the end of she. They made it... It's such a common book.

It's the most famous book on emptiness ever written. You studied it all last week. You were so lucky.

And in the tradition, we don't call it Tsawa Shirom. Okay, parabdhu chenpo'i mengang tsawan. We don't call it that.

We call it sashe. Okay, which means root wise. Root wise.

And here's what root wise says. It says if something were a little bit not empty and something were a little bit, right? If there was a single atom of not emptiness.

gyal te tok ten jung se yu. If there was a single atom of anything in the universe that was not empty. Got it?

First line. Second line. tokpa jung se yu bar gyur.

It's a little bit empty. There has a little bit of emptiness. Then you can...

Then it's possible to have an atom of emptiness. I'll say the two lines together. I'll say the two lines together.

If there's anything in the world that's... If there's a single atom of not emptiness in the world, then it's possible to have an atom of emptiness. That's what it says.

Don't blame me. Okay, I'll get it. Yeah, gyal te.

Okay, gyal te means... tong min means not empty. jung se yu.

If there's... If there exists in the universe one atom of something which is not empty, or not emptiness, tongpa jung se yu bar gyur. Then you can have an atom of emptiness.

Yes. jung se means like even the tiniest tiny bit. Okay, I'll say it again.

If there's a... If there's anything in the world that's not... If there's a single atom anywhere of anything not empty, then you can have atoms of things that aren't.

Okay, that... Just relax and let's see where it's going. Okay?

The fact that you don't buy it makes me think that you're listening, which is good. Okay, if you're going, oh, that doesn't make sense, then that means you actually thought about it, which is refreshing. Okay.

mi tong chu se yu mir la. No, if it's not something which is a little bit... which is not empty, if it's not a single atom of non-emptiness...

Yeah, if you couldn't find a single atom of something that was not empty, tongpa yu bar ga la gyur, then how could emptiness exist? If there's nothing that's not emptiness, how could emptiness exist? Okay.

If there's little stuff that's not emptiness, then emptiness has room to be. And if there's not any place... If there's not any place where there's not a little bit of emptiness, then I don't see how you could have emptiness.

He's talking about the emptiness of emptiness. It's very... It's very beautiful.

Okay. shepa taro. gyel te tong min chung se yu.

Yeah. If there's... If people could have room...

If you want to make it easy... If there's people who... If there's people around who think that things are not empty, then we can talk about emptiness.

And if there's nobody around who thinks that things are not empty, then we couldn't talk about emptiness. Because emptiness is the absence of something you thought was there. If nobody thinks something is there, how could you talk about it not being there?

Got it? It's cool. If there was nobody in the world who didn't understand emptiness, how could you talk about emptiness?

Because emptiness means something you thought was there that wasn't there is not there. If there's nobody who thought it wasn't there... Sorry.

If nobody thought it was there, how could you talk about it not being there? Got it? If there's no human people, how to establish wisdom?

If nobody misunderstands emptiness, it's difficult to talk about emptiness. That's cool. Maybe there's a lot of people.

That's very cool. Why does that... Why does that leave...

How does that derive from the last statement he said? He said nirvana itself doesn't exist from its own side. That was his last thing.

He said nirvana itself doesn't exist from its own side. If no one thought it did, it wouldn't be empty of those ideas. It's very...

It's very beautiful. You want to pick on somebody else, Nick? We got victims, or maybe you got victims online.

Well, we only have two minutes left, so let's have Xiaoping. Oh, suffering. You didn't achieve nirvana.

Now, three words. NGOS KYI BDUN NGOS KYI BDUN means... Okay, I'll just tell you what it really is.

NGOS KYI BDUN means we talked about two wrong ideas. Let's talk about the correct idea. It's easier.

Hey, it's only one sentence. Let's do it.

[Speaker 3]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, and Nick, you owe me ten dollars for my correction here. Okay. BZANG was really apostrophe D-Z-I-N-P-A.

Okay. You see? The carving is unbelievable.

Whoa. Because there's a ZIN right before that. So is it ZIN ZINPA?

Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, no, it's not. He carved ZIN ZINPA.

I see. It's an unbelievable carving, Aaron. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, ZINPA ZINPA.

It took a lot of work to fix it, okay? But you guys don't care.

[Speaker 3]
I just want...

[Speaker 1]
No, I appreciate this one. I would have been blessed. Let's talk about LOD PA MED PA means things that are normal stuff and these high absences.

Okay? Normal stuff that's here in the world, like tea cups, and high absences of things, like emptiness. Okay?

Whether we're talking about tea cups or whether we're talking about emptiness, they don't actually do that. Neither one exists from its own side. Neither...

Cups don't exist from their own side and emptiness don't exist from its own side. Okay? Whether you're talking about normal stuff or you're talking about the highest stuff in the world, it's all the same.

They don't come from their own side. Okay, ZINPA? That's Nirvana.

And you should understand... Yeah, great. You should understand that that understanding is Nirvana.

Okay? Understanding that cups don't come from their own side and understanding that the fact that cups don't come from their own side don't come from its own side, that's Nirvana. That's real Nirvana.

Understanding the emptiness in Nirvana itself is to be in Nirvana. Okay, very cool. Yeah, cool.

Thank you for class, Geshe-la. But now, Nick, here's the interesting part. Nick is going to lead a discussion and we're going to talk about...

We're going to talk with each other. By the way, this is some of the greatest ideas of Buddhism in these pages. This is straddling the old way and the new way, the New Testament and the Old Testament.

How can you use it in your real life? Go, Nick! Grandpa's going to drink some juice.

All right, all right. Enjoy that juice. Thank you.

Thank you for an awesome class. Another amazing class. Yeah.

And this is cool. This book is kind of like early DCI, right? It's like he wrote it for a king.

So I know that he's trying to make some life tools in there relevant to somebody's modern life, somebody's life, which was modern back then. So I don't know. I'd love to hear what you guys think.

I can say stuff and I'll be happy to share some of my thoughts about what could be expanded into life tools. But I'd love to hear from you all. So please don't be shy to speak up.

You don't have to chat. You can just say it. You can interrupt me.

If anybody in this room has an idea of, did we say anything today that you could use in your normal life? Come up here and sit next to grandpa and let's hear it. It was such an amazing.

One thing that I thought was kind of cool was just sharing just his ability to teach in this way of saying, look, you guys, it's scary because you think it's like this. And then he's presenting something far more profound and showing them that it's not that if you really think about it, it's not scary at all. So he really, but they didn't.

It's like the Kachik wasn't mentioning his beliefs, but kind of Nagarjuna reaches in there and pulls, pulls out the other guy's beliefs and then presents that that's really the scary mistake or the scary idea. And I think that this kind of way of showing people things is something that we could perhaps construe into a life tool. I think there's a common misperception about nirvana in my country, in America, because we're not Buddhists.

We don't have Buddhists here. In fact, our Mongolian friends came to visit. And they said, Nick, three of our Mongolian friends came from New Jersey because we did a memorial service for one of the great Mongolian teachers there.

And they said it's so refreshing to come and meet real Buddhists. And they said it was so wonderful. After, these guys are 70, 75 years old, they said our whole life we never got to sit in a Buddhist community.

And it was so beautiful. It was so happy for us. So we live in a country where people say nirvana means nothing, cancel.

You go into some kind of drugged, even the banned nirvana, they smoke enough marijuana, and then they go into nirvana. And that's a common, common, common idea in the United States about nirvana. So for me, that someone's trying to clarify what nirvana is not, it's very refreshing for my country.

And I think maybe in Asia, people might grow up thinking that nirvana means you disappear, or something like that. I don't know. Mm-hmm.

But if you've got somebody online, go for it. Not yet. I'm waiting.

Yeah. Mariah says you shouldn't be scared to let go of your negative emotions in an attempt to hold on to a self. Say that again.

I didn't catch it. You shouldn't be scared to let go of your negative emotions in an attempt to hold on to a self. Wow.

Okay. I do think that for many people, a major change in your personalities would be frightening, right? If you told me to give up all my jealousy, I don't know what else I would do.

I might have to start watching Netflix. I thought it was interesting. The verse was really empty.

It was really empty. It was, but it was really interesting. The verse that they quoted from RootWiz about you need something, you need people to think about things incorrectly to have a chance to explain emptiness.

You need people to think of things. I think he says it like that. If you didn't have things that weren't empty, meaning people to think of it that way or this idea, then how could you have emptiness?

If you didn't have a fool running for president, you wouldn't understand what a good president was. For example, that's a great, that's a solid life tool, Geshe-la.

[Speaker 3]
I think that this is one of the ways to see all the people around us, as special beings who are teaching us emptiness this way, because most of them look like they don't understand emptiness. They look like they think that things are coming from their own sides. If this were not the case, then we would not have any chance to talk about emptiness.

[Speaker 1]
I like that. Thank you. I was kind of thinking something similar too when I heard the verse.

I like that. Whoever Sarah is here, that's right. It is like the discussion from last term about the mirror needing a face.

I was waiting for you. I was waiting for Rob to chime in on this one.

[Speaker 2]
All right.

[Speaker 1]
I've been trying to expand my mind lately to Geshe-la's calendar. Good luck. It's going to upset you.

[Speaker 3]
It's amazing because I'm using the idea of maybe if I get a third-party app that'll help me organize my mind better.

[Speaker 1]
I'm looking for outside ways to make it make more sense for me and other people, rather than the seed itself of helping somebody organize their time. The idea of canceling out this idea that things don't come from seeds, is that right? Yeah, that's what I was talking about.

Maybe this moment of refreshing, it just sort of dropped away.

[Speaker 3]
I felt like, oh, I can gain this ability to expand, to have a seed go off, to have a different type of mind. I felt like, oh, this is a great life tool for just organizing my life, essentially.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, that's all. Then did the right app appear to you when you thought that way? I thought it was more like- He decided to throw the calendar out.

That my mind would just, as I watch Geshe-la organize his world, I'm just completely blown away by the capacity of his mind. Even small, I'm like, does Seiji send you the times exactly when you should be there? His mind just knows all of the details of, at least my perception of that.

I thought, oh, is it possible that my mind could do the same? According to this, it could. Yeah, that's all.

Well, we all know Geshe-la uses a paper calendar. It's very sophisticated computer chips inside the paper. Thank you, Rob.

Thank you for sharing that. I think that's inspiring. Quick, quick, quick, quick.

She's getting lots of- I had a roommate who couldn't compute that I wanted to write something with a pen on paper one time. It blew his mind. Nick, we got two people who want to say something.

Number one, Olga.

[Speaker 3]
I want to share also something relevant to this. It's a little bit different. It's when I was thinking earlier about emptiness and what it depends on.

We were saying that emptiness also isn't self-existent. I started to think, what does it depend on actually? The idea that I came to was if we are saying emptiness is absence of self-existence, which means that if there were no concept of self-existence, we wouldn't be able to even speak about emptiness.

So, I came to the idea, to the response to my own question that what emptiness depends on. Emptiness depends on self-existence because emptiness is the absence of self-existence. If there were no such thing as self-existence or no concept of it in people's mind, then we wouldn't be able even to speak about the emptiness of it, the absence of it.

[Speaker 1]
So, then understanding depends on somebody misunderstanding first.

[Speaker 3]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Very cool. Very cool. So, that's a great idea.

Joy's got something. She's going to come up. I want to say one more thing after Joy.

[Speaker 2]
This is a mind-blowing class today.

[Speaker 1]
There's little pieces of mind all over the floor. That's gross.

[Speaker 2]
So, if the fact that a pen which is not coming from the pen from its own side, this is the fact of this, it's not coming from its own side, then that emptiness itself is not coming from its own side, which makes me feel like in daily life, how can I use this? I realized when Geshe-la was teaching that there must be a mother of emptiness because we create this emptiness and this great potential that is existing out there for us to project things on it. But where does this emptiness, the true emptiness coming from?

So, it kind of reminds me of that really bodhicitta that I need to develop, which is the reason that I come here for Diamond Mountain for this time. This is my only goal. I want to develop this.

So, I think really this is the mother of emptiness and it allows us to have emptiness, have the potential there to give us the chance to plant seeds there.

[Speaker 3]
And if we don't have this bodhicitta at the very beginning in the whole universe, the emptiness doesn't exist. We don't have hope. So, this is my take.

[Speaker 1]
Wow, that's cool. Thank you for sharing. Yeah, please.

I got to share one thing before Peachtree. We have one great sponsor. Everybody knows who he is.

We made a special gift for the sponsor and we're going to send it in the next few days. So, I thought you won't be able to see it after that. So, I'd like to show it to you.

It was designed by Rosa Van Grieken, who's the Diamond Cutter Press boss. And here it is. Geshe-la, you're getting your exercise.

Beautiful. It's a box set of all the translations finished by the Mixed Nuts in the last seven years. It's very, very heavy.

It's 6,000 pages. I think Su Geng's book is the fattest. But it's a beautiful box set and we're going to refine it a little bit more.

We're going to send this one to our great sponsor and then we're going to refine it more and probably you'll all be able to get a copy in the next hundred years. Nick, that's all. Thank you for a nice class and thanks for being you.

Thanks for being our boss. Thank you. Thank you, Geshe-la.

And thank you everybody for sharing cool ideas. And we heard some joy what you shared about Bodhichitta and the connection to emptiness was beautiful. And Rob, I really appreciated the idea about expanding our minds.

And everybody else's ideas were really great. I don't want to pick up anymore. Olga had some great ideas.

Yeah. Olga, I really related with the stuff that you were sharing. It's time for Peachtree.

So let's listen to some world events happening and they're going to keep us posted. And then we've got Q&A here with Dr. Ben, with Mr. Ben Kramer. So thank you very much, Geshe-la.

See you soon.

[Speaker 3]
Okay. Hello, everyone. Hope you're doing very well and you are enjoying the Halloween times there in Arizona and anywhere you are.

[Speaker 1]
This is a special end of the month because of that. I remember last year you guys had a great party at the Geshe Michael was mentioning. We have a very special section with Rosa Van Grieken, which is the director, one of the directors.

We also have Jigme on stage with us today. They are both the directors of Diamond Cutter Press, and they want to share with us a little bit of what's happening and what do they do? What are the latest achievements and what's coming next?

So I welcome very much Jigme and Rosa. How are you? Where are you?

How are you doing? What's your costume going to be for Halloween?

[Speaker 3]
They should be somewhere around very, very soon.

[Speaker 2]
If they're going to Geshe Michael's chair, the video has been turned off and the audio has been turned off. Okay.

[Speaker 1]
Well, in the meantime, I'm going to share with you. This is a good time if you need to go to the bathroom because next there is going to be a Q&A with Ben Kramer. He's a great Q&A person.

A lot of questions and a lot of answers. Great debate teacher as well. And that's going to happen after the segment.

Before that, we're going to have a special guest as well with Ina and Captain Bill. They're going to share with us their new project that is about to happen. Actually, if Jigme and Rosa are not ready yet, we can go with them first.

What do you think? Ina, Ben, sorry, Bill, would you like to share with us what are you about to start? We can go with Ina.

[Speaker 2]
Hi Juan, can you hear us?

[Speaker 1]
Yes, very well. Welcome. Good to see you both.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah, good to see you. We just came back from the retreat in Diamond Mountain. It was wonderful.

Yes. And we would like to share that we are starting with Bill. As you know, he is a three-year retreatant.

He spent over three years in his retreats. And we are really passionate with these teachings, you know, fundamental teachings that start with this precious book from Trenton Tower Project. And we start to teach courses, fundamental courses, starting with course number one on the 3rd of November.

[Speaker 1]
2nd of November? 12th? 3rd.

3rd of November. OK, so you both are going to be teaching the Ancient Wisdom Foundation courses, starting with number one. That's great.

And what days are you going to be doing that, everyone?

[Speaker 2]
We will be doing it 3rd to 5th of November, like extended weekend, right? Friday to Sunday. And then 10th to 12th of November.

So if you have never been exposed to our fundamental foundational courses, you're welcome to join.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, it's really extraordinary. I think many of you probably are already familiar with the foundational courses. But if you want to understand the classes that we're attending now, the information that's in those courses is the place to start.

It's really, it's brilliant. Ina and I were going over it this afternoon. And even though we've been around it for quite a while, it's still, it's extraordinary.

It was, emptiness is a very difficult subject, and it's the standard for helping people understand it.

[Speaker 2]
And I think it's a very exciting subject for myself. I found it. And if you have done already the fundamental foundational courses, so maybe you know somebody who is interested, because we were thinking, we have a huge team of volunteers, by the way, we are so grateful to all of you.

There are probably over 100 people working to get this project running. And we were thinking we will translate like into five languages. I think now we are up to almost 10 or something.

So maybe you will find your language among the ones that we will translate into.

[Speaker 1]
And really, understanding emptiness is the key to solving all your problems. There's nothing that can't be solved with an understanding of it. I don't think that there's anything that can be solved without eventually understanding it.

[Speaker 2]
And all these classes come from these great books that we see being translated by Geshe Michael and great team of translators.

[Speaker 1]
Thank you. Thank you so much. And sending best wishes on your new endeavors.

Maybe if anybody wants to contact you, would you be able to share maybe an email on the chat or something? If anybody wants to sign up, they can give you more information. Right.

[Speaker 2]
I will provide my Telegram account and my email in the chat in five minutes, probably. And also, please be aware that you should check requirements in your country, whether you are allowed to listen to the teachings or not.

[Speaker 1]
Very well. Sending you best wishes. Big hug.

It's nice to see you again. Hope to see you sometime in person as well. Good seeing you Juan.

[Speaker 2]
Great to see you again.

[Speaker 1]
Best wishes.

[Speaker 2]
Best wishes.

[Speaker 1]
Okay, so now let's check if Rosa and Jigme are around.

[Speaker 3]
Eli and Rosa, are they?

[Speaker 2]
Hello Juan.

[Speaker 3]
Oh, how's it going?

[Speaker 2]
Good, good. Thank you for having us. Sorry, we had a little bit of an issue with my computer, so we have to switch gears.

[Speaker 1]
That's part of the fun. That's part of the excitement. Always very exciting.

Welcome. How are you both doing? What are you up to these days with Diamond Cutter Press?

We're doing really well. We're having a lot of development at Diamond Cutter Press, especially for the Diamond Cutter Classics. But we would love to give you a little bit of a presentation of what the press have been doing since it started.

Perfect. Can you hear the echo where you are? No, barely.

No, you sound great. No problem. Oh, okay.

Okay, so we want to share.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah, here we go. Can everyone see this?

[Speaker 3]
Good, yes. Okay, good.

[Speaker 2]
Yay. Okay, so a little bit of Diamond Cutter Press.

[Speaker 3]
It was founded in 2003, and our very first book was How Yoga Works.

[Speaker 1]
Which was published in 2004. And this book has been a hit since then.

[Speaker 2]
It's actually our best-selling book. It has sold almost a million copies just in English, and it has been translated in more than six languages.

[Speaker 1]
So this was our humble beginning for the press, this incredible book. And so, I don't know, Jigme, do you want to say anything? Because you were there in the very beginning about this.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, yeah. Geshe Michael wrote it when he was in retreat. And so it's very deep.

[Speaker 1]
It's an interesting book, but the depth of it is very good. And simultaneously, he wrote the other book, Cutting, which was a lot longer.

[Speaker 2]
And so that one we published more recently. It just came out fairly recently. Yeah.

So in the press, basically, we publish books based on Asian wisdom.

[Speaker 1]
And this Asian wisdom, we have different categories. How we share this wisdom with our readers. And one of them is yoga.

So our yoga books, you can see How Yoga Works, and then Cutting, which is the prequel to How Yoga Works. And this is part one. So stay tuned to part two.

A lot of you are familiar with it. These books are available both in print and e-book. And in addition, Cutting is also available in audiobook, which actually has been narrated by Geshe Michael.

So it's a wonderful, amazing book to have. We also have business books. Here, obviously, are Diamond Cutter.

Diamond Cutter, this is the 20th anniversary edition of Diamond Cutter. And this one has all of the original work, plus amazing testimonies by very successful people who have applied this for the past 23 years.

[Speaker 3]
We actually go in depth. Geshe Michael goes a little bit more in depth of how they applied this wisdom. And also, in these books, we integrate these amazing concepts of the pen, the two husbands in the kitchen, and the four steps.

[Speaker 1]
So it's actually even a more complete book than the original. So we're very, very proud of being publishing this book. We just released it last July.

And it's available on Amazon. We actually sold out from our own stock in the home office. But if you are still interested in buying any, you should go to Amazon.

We also, for the business books, have China Love You, which is a beautiful conversation between Geshe Michael and Dr. Wu about how we can bring these two amazing economies together.

[Speaker 3]
How can we bring China and United States to work together in harmony and prosper together?

[Speaker 1]
So it's an amazing, amazing book with incredible tips. I thought when I read China Love You, it opened a lot of ideas about the culture of China. And I thought it was probably both ways.

For people who are Chinese, it would be helpful to understand the culture of the United States.

[Speaker 2]
And understanding how other people think and what is important to them makes it a lot easier to work together. So I think it's a very important book. Yeah, it's a beautiful, beautiful book.

Yeah, so these are our business books. And then we have, what is that? Oh, there you go.

We have some retreat practice books.

[Speaker 1]
And this book is, you know, it's a beautiful book where you can take into retreat and, you know, do different practices. And it's a beautifully illustrated book by Gina, by the way, who I think you're interviewing at some point. So she worked with Geshe Michael designing this beautiful book.

So it is available in ebook at the press. And then here we have our jewel, which is the Diamond Cutter Classics.

[Speaker 2]
All these books that you see here have already been published on ebook. And two of them are available in also hardcover. So Sunlight on Suchness, which is a commentary on the Heart Sutra, and then the Sunlight on the Path to Freedom, which is a commentary on the Diamond Cutter Sutra.

Jigme, you want to tell us a little bit more? Jigme is actually one of the translators for this. And so she can tell us a little bit more.

Maybe. Yeah, they were both written by Choney Lama.

[Speaker 1]
And he's probably the best commentator on the various sutras. His work is very, he answers the questions that Westerners ask. And so he's very modern, even though he lived a long time ago.

And so the books themselves are very engrossing and engaging.

[Speaker 2]
And I think they're very important, especially for Buddhists to understand these two sutras.

[Speaker 1]
As for the others, I think you should talk about those, because actually, what are that? Okay, okay.

[Speaker 2]
So, you know, so these books cover all of the topics, important topics of the Asian wisdom. So you have emptiness meditation, which is focused in obviously meditations, but in the main subject, which is emptiness, right? One of the most valuable objects to place your mind upon.

So it's an extensive book.

[Speaker 1]
Geshe Michael calls it the ultimate book for meditation. And so it's mainly by Choney Lama. And then you also have some commentaries by Arya Nagarjuna, Master Kamalashila, Bhavanka Rinpoche and Trichandra Rinpoche.

So Mind Only, we also have Mind Only School. This is an incredible book by Jason Tapa. By the way, I should be saying who helped translated these books.

So Emptiness Meditation was by Vernable Upala. And Son Lennon Soshnes, Vernable Ellie. And so The Golden Key is by Ward Smith.

[Speaker 2]
And All the Kinds of Karma was by Dr. Wu and Geshe Michael and Yan Tan.

[Speaker 1]
And so All the Kinds of Karma is a beautiful book, also illustrated by our amazing in-house artist Gina, about how to understand the consequences to our actions. And basically, sort of like it's a beautiful, easy book of how to apply the, you know, how to sort of like correct our problems, just by understanding the consequences to our actions. It's a beautiful, beautiful book.

And then A Door to Emptiness, which is an incredible book on...

[Speaker 2]
That's Adam Wright and Pramana.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I mean, it's an incredible book. All these books are so deep and incredible, but they also, we can bring incredible practical, you know, we can make them part of our practical lives by simply understanding them because they all bring that aspect to our lives.

One thing about... That's wonderful. We will definitely would like to have you again soon because we want to hear more about what's about to come, how people can get these books.

Right now, because the time is limited in these segments, we have to go back with Ben Kramer. But I know you have many more things to say. Maybe we can schedule for next week, weekend or week or something.

We also have long shows once a month. We're going to share with the people this QR code if you're interested in the long shows of P3 World News, where people have like segments of 10, 15 minutes and talk deeply about their projects. But thank you so much for sharing with us this.

You say, just last thing, three more books are about to come, right? Very, very soon.

[Speaker 3]
And which ones are those? Oh, yeah, those.

[Speaker 2]
So we can talk about this and more. And then, you know, next time you have us in your show. Thank you so much for having us.

[Speaker 1]
No, definitely. Thank you for coming. It's a pleasure to have you here.

I'm going to share with people the QR code for next show. A long show, I mean. It is here and you can sign up for that if you're really interested.

[Speaker 3]
And then every Saturday and every Monday, we have short segments on how, here it is, short segments during the Mixed Nuts term.

[Speaker 1]
I don't know. Yeah, there you go. So you can scan the QR code.

Those are the long shows when people have big, long segments. And see you next Saturday. We go back to Ben Kramer.

Thank you. Always times flies. Best wishes.

Thank you, Juan. Thank you, Petrie World News. Thank you, Rosa Chikme, Inna, Captain Bill.