Дебаты дьявола с ангелом, часть 2: Как медитировать и как не медитировать (2011, Феникс), занятие 1

[Говорящий 1]
First I'd like to thank you all for coming. I'm sorry it's so warm, because people tend to fall asleep after ten minutes, but we have the air conditioner cranked up as high as it will go, and, you know, we'll just keep cranking. So if you could hold your breath.

So this is a continuation of a class we started, I don't know, a month ago, two months ago? And this is a very famous book in Tibet. It's never been translated into English.

In Tibet it's called Dangzin Shangdip. And it's a debate, it's an argument, between the devil and an angel in one person's mind, okay? And it was written by His Holiness the first Panchen Lama.

In Tibet there are two most famous lamas, the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama. They sort of alternate, like on and off, because when the Panchen Lama is an adult, the Dalai Lama is a kid. So then the Panchen Lama will take care of the country for a while, and then when he passes away, the new Dalai Lama is old enough to take over.

And they like, what do you call it, alternate like that. So the first Panchen Lama was an extraordinary person. He was a great yogi, incredible yogi.

He was a great philosopher. He was a wonderful poet. He was a good dancer, sacred dance.

And he wrote beautiful texts on sacred dance. He was a pacifist. There was a civil war in Tibet one time.

The battle got close to where he was doing retreat. He broke his retreat. He walked down and he stood between the two armies and said, If you want to continue this, you're going to have to kill me first.

And he was like a very famous... He was like the Dalai Lama nowadays. As if the Dalai Lama got between the Americans and, you know, the Taliban or something, and said, If you want to keep doing this, you're going to have to kill me first.

And both sides quit. And then, I told people today, there's a... He also paid the two leaders like a million dollars each.

But that's skillful means, right? Better than killing a lot of people, right? So, anyway, he was an extraordinary man.

In a country where people lived to 40 years old, he lived to almost 100. If you look, his painting is on the front. And if you look carefully, he's sort of...

It's hard to tell how old he is, but he lived to 92 years old. And he was very active. So, he wrote this famous poem about the devil and the angel in one guy's mind.

And we're continuing with that poem. We've reached a part in the text where... Well, I'll just tell you how it's going, okay?

The argument is like this, you know? Like, for once, the devil and the angel agree about something, okay? They're discussing who's going to take over this guy's head, all right?

And an angel says, you know, look, we're incompatible. It's like that cowboy movie where one of them says, this town's ain't big enough for both of us, you know? And they're going to fight it out, you know?

So, wisdom tells the devil that he's probably going to have to leave. And then the devil is telling wisdom that... The angel is wisdom, the angel of wisdom.

So, they're starting to argue pretty heavy. And then the devil begins to describe... What I wanted to cover tonight and tomorrow was, the devil starts describing kinds of meditation which are very good for devils, all right?

Like, the devil, he starts off on this thing where he says, you know, wisdom, angel, you want to get me out of your mind, but it ain't that easy, you know? And many, many people in the past have tried, you know? Many people have given it a good shot, you know?

And they all fail, you know? And they come up and they say, I'm doing this special meditation and it's going to get me enlightened, you know? And they claim to...

What do you call it? They're like talking big, you know? And they're like, I'm going to kick the devil out of my mind.

The devil is misunderstanding, okay? The worst kind of devil in the world is not the one that tells you to have another ice cream. It's the one that tells you to misunderstand your world.

In yoga it's called avidya, right? Ignorance, all right? Not understanding what's going on in your world, all right?

I'll give you a very short example and you don't need to hear any other, okay? I mean, you can read hundreds of books about avidya, but really it boils down to one thing, okay? Think of the person in your life who bugs you the most, okay?

Who is the one person in your life that irritates you the most, okay? Anybody who doesn't have one, you can go home now, okay? Because you don't need the class, okay?

We all have somebody, somebody special, you know? Who bugs us, you know? And then we tend to feel like if they would just be a little more reasonable, you know?

Like we talk to them and we want them to be just a little more reasonable. And we figure if they would just come over to our house and we could give them some cherry pie or enchiladas or something, and, you know, say, this is why you irritate me and, you know, could you just stop it, you know? And then it doesn't...

We tend to think that if the other person wanted to stop, they could, right? We think they have... We think they have control over what they're doing to us.

And if they just saw the light, they would stop bugging us, you know what I mean? And then you can talk to them and maybe it will work and probably it won't work, right? You don't know.

Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't work, okay? The way the devil thinks, the way the devil thinks is that this person is irritating from their own side, okay? They are irritating from their side.

And if they wanted to, they could stop bugging me, okay? If they wanted to. That's the way the devil thinks.

And the devil has always thought that way, okay? How does the angel think, right? How does wisdom think about the person who irritates you the most?

So, the angel says, what is it about them that irritates you, you know? And you say, well, they're always critical of me, you know? Like, no matter what I do, they're always criticizing me.

For example, okay? Whatever it is. Toilet seat.

Either bad aim or putting it up or putting it down. There's something about them that bothers you, you see? And then the angel says, look, this is coming from a seed in your own mind, okay?

The reason you see them, doing what you see them doing, is coming from a seed which is contained within your own mind, okay? And that seed was put there last week or last month when you did exactly the same thing that bothers you about them. You see?

The people who bother us the most are the people who are the most like us. You see? And so, wisdom is saying, look, that's karma, right?

Karma means you criticized somebody at work last month. You are the witness of what you do, okay? You can say St. Peter is watching or not, it doesn't matter. You are always watching yourself. You are there, you are witnessing what you do, you see? You criticize somebody at work.

As you speak, you hear yourself speak. And then that hearing and observing yourself plants a seed in your subconscious, you see? That's karma.

That's the meaning of karma. And then that seed in your subconscious, what do you call? It festers underground, under the ground of the mind.

That seed grows and gets more powerful. It increases in power, like a apple tree seed or something like that. Then the tree comes out, and you go home, and the seed opens, and then your husband is criticizing you, or something like that, okay?

The person who bugs you the most was created by you, beyond a doubt. There's never anybody else. It's always created by you, okay?

The good news is, they are more irritating now than you were before. Because the seed is always smaller than the tree, okay? So you are correct that they are more irritating than you.

So, but unfortunately, it only takes a small irritating deed to make a very irritating person, alright? Because the seeds are smaller than trees, and that's the way it is, okay? So the angel is always whispering in the guy's ear, you know?

Once you get the... I call it a virus, right? Once you can get the angel into your mind and understand a little bit about karma, right?

Then the angel will be always whispering in your ear when you get upset, okay? Whenever you get upset, you are like, I don't know why my husband can't say one good thing about me. My lama, if you want to know, my lama didn't say one good thing about me for 25 years, okay?

And then you are like wondering, you know, why can't they just say one good thing, you know? And then the angel is in your mind saying, don't blame them. How many people have you encouraged this week, you know?

And then the angel is always... has the same story. It's your fault.

You planted the seed. You were unkind to somebody last week. You criticized somebody at work, a little bit.

And now you get to have a husband who criticizes you for three hours a day. Basically all your time at home, okay? So, the angel is whispering in your ear and saying, you created this, you know, and you can fix it, right?

If you stop being critical of people at work, when you come home, your husband will stop, you know? So, there's all these options. You can shoot him.

You can divorce him. You can reason with him. You can argue with him.

You can do the quiet, silent treatment. You can deny him something, you know? You can try all those things.

But the thing is they don't work because they don't work all the time, okay? They don't work because they don't work all the time. If you want him to be more supportive and you don't want him to be critical of you, then you have to be less critical of people in the other parts of your life, like at your work, or with your mother, or somebody like that.

You be less critical of other people, then the special irritating person in your life will become pleasant and kind. And they will be replaced by another irritating person, okay? And then you work your way down the ladder of irritating people until the last one in your life is changed.

And then you're just surrounded by pleasant people. Alright? Got it?

And you can do it. And I've done it in certain... You know, I had a company in New York.

I had 800 employees. And one by one I worked on them. And then at the end there was like 800 happy, productive people.

Cooperative, happy people. All of them, 800 people. So, in your life you can clean out your storehouse of irritating people, one by one, by doing the opposite.

You see, whatever they're doing that bugs you, you find out where you're doing it somewhere else. Maybe you're doing it at work, or I don't know. You find it and you stop.

That's the shut-off valve. You stop criticizing people at work, and then suddenly your husband is saying nice things to you all the time, okay? And I just told you the secret of life.

Whether you do it is your problem. Okay? No, I mean really.

That's all you need. That's the angel whispering. And then the devil has all these excuses, you know?

I believe that it's true. It sounds very reasonable. It sounds very possible.

Like, in different... When I feel differently, this person seems really nice, and then I get in a bad day, and I have some coffee, and then they seem like a creep, you know? And, you know, then the devil's like, but it doesn't apply...

I understand that that could apply to most people, but not the person who bugs me. They're different, you know? Like, the devil wants to convince you that the person who bugs you is somehow different.

And all the people at work who like them are deluded. And you have to convince them. And you do.

You go on these little campaigns to convince everybody how evil this person is. You see what I mean? So, the devil wants to believe that, okay?

Now, at this point, I just reviewed the whole last couple months, okay? Now, we reached a point in the text where... How does it go?

Oh, the devil says, oh, another person is claiming he's going to kick me out of their mind. Oh, please. You know, like...

I get this every once in a while, you know? People... People become aware of my presence, right?

Like, that in itself is rare, okay? Someone's aware they have a devil in their mind, okay? What's the devil telling you?

Your husband's a creep, and he's unfixable, you know? And he just doesn't want to be pleasant, you see? Like, the devil's telling you everything except that it's coming from you, right?

The devil... The last thing the devil wants is that you start to believe it's coming from you. So, the devil is bragging to wisdom, the angel, in the text where we are now.

The devil is bragging, you know, like, come on, 99% of people never find out I'm running their mind, you know? And then like 1%, they figure out they have a bad attitude in their head, that they're blaming everything on other people, but I take care of them, you know? Then the angel says, well, how do you take care of them?

And the devil says, I get them to meditate. And then the angel says, I don't understand. And the devil says, we got so many meditations that don't help you at all, you know?

And when you start doing them, then... In every person I got to do these four or five kinds of meditation, I've never seen you in their mind, you know? You never ruined my performance in their mind.

Like, you never got in their head. They spent years wasted on these dumb meditations. And all I do is just encourage them to keep doing them, you know?

And then the angel says, well, you know, the angel tricks the devil, right? He says, gee, I wonder what kind of meditations those could be, you know? And the devil's like, I can tell you, you know?

And the devil starts going off on the different kinds of meditations. So what I thought these two days was that first we could, on the first night, we'll cover how not to meditate, okay? We'll cover the devil's meditations.

And then the second night we'll cover the kinds of meditations that could get rid of the devil. The devil is causing you all your suffering. The devil causes you all your trouble, you see?

If the angel had sway over your mind, you would slowly make your world a perfect place and you would be happy. All the people who bug you would become your friends, right? And in all the situations that bother you would be healed.

You would make money as much as you want. If you understand how karma works, you can have as much money as you want. I made a quarter billion dollar company in my free time in Manhattan, okay?

Just with karmic seeds. So, boop, boop. You know?

No hard work. You see? You can do stuff like that, you know?

You can have a beautiful, beautiful partner. You can keep a beautiful partner. You can get along with a beautiful partner who you keep.

And everything... Your health can be... Your body can be young, you know?

You can do things if you understand seeds, if you understand karmic seeds, okay? So, we'll cover that the second night, you know? Like, what are some really cool meditations you can do that actually help your life and make your life highly...

successful beyond your dreams. Like, you can't imagine... You can't say you can get everything you want because you don't even know enough to want.

You can't imagine the cool things that you could do until you can do them. You see? Your vision right now is limited.

And if you learn higher kinds of meditation, then you can design... You get better at designing cool stuff, all right? For your life.

You just design your life and then all this cool stuff happens, okay? Really cool. We were in Paris, I mean, what?

Last week. Week before? I don't remember.

We were just having fun, you know? And that's what we do, you know? Like, we gave a performance, you know?

We heard there was a jazz festival. We invited ourselves. And then we just went, you know?

And like that, your whole life can be... I never imagined going to Paris to play in a jazz festival. No, I wasn't invited.

But, you know, it was cool. And it was just fun, you know? Your whole life can be like really fun and really happy.

And your life doesn't have to be stressful and credit cards and partners who are cranky. It doesn't have to be like... Everything can be like extremely happy, you know?

You just got to know, come tomorrow, that's the meditation tomorrow, okay? Tonight I'll teach you in meditation how to be unhappy, okay? Like, it's good to know how to meditate wrong because then you won't do it, okay?

So, I'm going to give you the first one, okay? It's very famous. It's called, what's it called?

Let me get it straight. Je-su-mi-chu. Say, Je-su.

Je-su. Mi-chu. I make people say the Tibetan because three lifetimes from now I might find someone I can teach Tibetan to.

Say, Je-su. Mi-chu. Dun.

Dun. Mi-su. Mi-su.

So-ma. So-ma. Ma-chu.

So, these are... It's called dusum... What's it called?

Dusum gyutao. It means, stop your mind from traveling in the three times, okay? This is the first kind of wrong meditation that I'd like to teach you, okay?

This is called stopping the mind from traveling in the past, the future, and the present, okay? And we'll talk about it. What I thought we could do is, there's a good version of it and there's a bad version of it.

So I thought I would teach you the good version of it and then we'll talk about how to do it wrong. Okay? Now I'm playing what?

The devil. Okay? Now, I'm gonna teach you the meditation the way it should be done, and then I'm gonna ruin it for you.

Okay? All right? So, sit up straight.

Okay? Put your legs in a position that won't bother you for ten minutes, where you won't have to move. Okay?

You don't get any points for having them in a full lotus because nobody's watching you. So just get really comfortable in a position that you won't have to move for ten minutes. When you move, you bother other people.

They could be on the verge of attaining nirvana, and then you moved. Okay? Okay?

So, get in a position where you won't have to move. Park your body. That's the point.

The body is to be parked, and you're meant to go somewhere else. Okay? You can do chin mudra if you like.

Chin mudra is good in a hot room, and the Tibetan system is good in a cold room. Close your eyes. Try not to move at all.

Okay? It'll just be five or ten minutes. Slowly become aware of your breath.

Watch your breath. Now try to focus more closely on your breath. Loosen your face.

Loosen your forehead. Loosen your lips, sides of your mouth. Loosen your eyelids.

Make them less tight. Try to lengthen your breath. Make your breath longer, and more relaxed.

Keep your face relaxed. Keep your face loose. Don't scowl.

Now I'd like to switch your focus. Switch your focus from your breath, and try to focus on your thoughts. Try to be aware of the thoughts passing through your mind.

Don't try to stop them, just watch them. Watch your thoughts as if they were someone else's. Just watch your thoughts.

I'm going to ask you now to pinpoint one thought that seems to be pretty strong in your mind. Maybe it's an issue in your life, or somewhere you have to go tomorrow, or something that happened yesterday. I'd like you to pinpoint one theme that seems to be coming up in your thoughts.

Watch your thoughts. See if you can pick out a theme. Then slowly come back to this room, and release your meditation, and slowly open your eyes.

Bring to mind the thought that was the strongest in your mind. Think about it for a second, okay? I'd like you to...

I was thinking about some plans I have tomorrow and the next day. So I'd like you to think about the thought that kept coming up in your mind the most. Now I'd like you to divide that thought.

Is it a thought about the past? You know, like, I can't believe my boyfriend did that to me last month, just before we broke up. Or is it a thought about the future?

Like mine was about tomorrow and the next day. I was thinking, oh, you know, what I'm going to do. Or is it a thought about the present?

Oh, the room is kind of hot. I wonder what kind of refreshments they have. Okay?

All right? Think for a minute. Okay, we're going to have a vote.

All right? So think for a minute. Is it past?

Is it present? Or was it future? See, was it a worry from the past?

Was it an expectation of the future? Or was it a present concern? Ready?

Got it? Okay. Everybody who was thinking about something in the past, raise their hand.

Okay. Not so many. Future.

Next week, what you got to do. Okay. Okay, present.

Oh, man. Pretty good. Okay.

Good. Okay, we're going to do it one more time. All right?

So let's try again. We're going to observe what kind of thoughts are coming up the most. Okay?

Just to observe your mind is a wonderful beginning of meditation. Okay? Learn to watch your own mind.

So we're going to take some slow breaths. We're going to observe the breaths. Then we're going to switch over to our mind and just observe what kind of thoughts are coming up the most.

Okay, ready? Sit up straight. Please put your mind on your breath.

Place your concentration on your breath. Don't go off of your breath. If you think of something else, bring your mind back to your breath.

Now I'd like you to step back from your mind. Step back. Become the witness of your mind.

Observe your mind. Try to listen to your thoughts and observe your thoughts. And again, let's see which thought is the strongest.

Which thought do you keep returning to? It could be some important meeting you have. It could be something someone said to you three days ago.

It could be some thoughts about this evening. So I won't say anything for a few minutes. You'll have all kinds of random thoughts.

Try to pick out the one which seems to be coming the most. Come back to your breath. Watch your breath.

Then come back to this room. And relax and open your eyes. Okay, take a moment to think about what was the theme in your mind.

What thought was the theme? And then take a moment to decide is it past, present or future? Were you thinking of something that someone did to you last week?

Or were you thinking about something you had to do tomorrow? Or when you got home tonight? Or were you thinking about this room or something going on now?

Got it? Okay, we'll vote. How many people passed?

I want to know the biggest theme. The biggest theme. There's always one that's...

You can raise your hand in two of them. Alright, are you ready? Who votes for past?

Somebody heard them last week, they're still thinking about it. Okay, future. What you're doing tomorrow.

Higher, I got a few. Okay, good. Present.

How many present in this room? Thoughts were present about this room? That's pretty good.

Okay, good. Alright. So in this ancient meditation system, which those of you who know, it was followed a lot by the Nyingmapa.

Nyingmapa means... It's one of the traditions of ancient Tibet. It's not the Dalai Lama's tradition, it was a different tradition.

Nyingmapa means the ancient ones. And they started around the 9th century. Okay, so that's about 600 years before the first Dalai Lama.

So these are the ancient ones. And they followed this instruction a lot. They followed this kind of meditation a lot.

So they were... Je Mi Chö means... I think it's in the reading.

Let me see. Verse 94 on page 5. I'll read it to you in Tibetan, which is good luck, okay?

kye chig nga me je mi chö kye chig chi me dun mi su tatar shepa soma la chö le me par gompa di Okay, this is describing this kind of meditation that we're talking about, okay? kye chig nga me je mi chö means try to focus your mind in a place where you are not pursuing the past. Je chöpa is a rare word that means...

It's an ancient word for what you would do if someone attacked you and then you ran after them. Okay? They're saying like, don't pursue the past.

Okay? Don't pursue what your boyfriend said to you last week. Okay?

In the meditation, attempt not to chase the past. Don't revisit the past. Je mi chö.

Je? Mi chö. Okay.

Je means afterwards, right? Mi means not. Chö means to cut.

Like dorje chöpa means? Diamond cutter. Jing kang jing.

Okay? Je mi chö means don't pursue the past in a meditative state, in this particular meditative practice. Don't review some incident that happened last week.

Okay? That will ruin your meditation. That's the first enemy of this meditation.

Somebody said something to me last week. You know? At least don't go to the past.

Okay? At least put a firewall behind you and don't let the meditation wander into what happened last week. Okay?

I like to think of it... I don't know. I spent like 15 years commuting to Manhattan through the Lincoln Tunnel.

It's a two-hour trip. Okay? Each way.

And I think of it like being in the Lincoln Tunnel, three lanes. Let's say it's two lanes, but let's say it's three lanes. Okay?

So like you have a car behind you, you have a car in front of you, you have a car on your right, you have a car on your left. You're like positioned. You are centered between four cars.

Got it? You are centered. And in this meditation the goal is to center your mind.

Okay? The goal is to center your mind between four opposing forces. You are attempting to center the mind between four opposing forces.

Okay? The first opposing force, I like to visualize it behind me. It's the car behind me.

I don't want to think about the driver behind me. I have to put my mind in my car or I'll get in an accident. Okay?

So, je mi chö means don't think about the guy behind you. Don't put your mind in that car, keep your mind in your car. Got it?

Je mi chö means don't think about something somebody did last week. At least don't think about the past. So, here we go.

We're going to see if you can je mi chö. Got it? I don't want you to think about the car behind you.

My first meditation teacher was Goenka. The Dalai Lama invited Goenka to come and teach us to meditate for ten days, in India, in 1900. 1973 or something, four.

At that time His Holiness lived in a little house and you could go up and bang on his door and ask him questions. Now there's like 24 Indians with machine guns. But, anyway.

So, we're going to see if you can je mi chö. Don't think about the past. Okay?

Try to bring your mind. Okay? We're going to go into meditation.

We're going to start with the usual preliminary is to watch the breath. And then we're going to attempt not to put your mind in the car behind. At least don't think about the past.

Why I brought up Goenka? He got up. And all the monks came from the Dalai Lama's personal monastery, Namgyal.

And there were like a couple hundred of us. And Goenka got up, you know, this great meditation master from Burma, that the Dalai Lama asked us to teach us. And then he got up and the first thing he said was, We are going to be together for ten days.

Don't think about monkeys. They were all like... Then whole ten days, you're just thinking about monkeys.

You know? Why did he tell us not to think about monkeys? Okay.

Okay. Okay, so I'm going to ask you to be very honest with yourself, okay? We're going to meditate.

We're going to watch our breath. And then I'm going to say, watch your own thoughts. And then I want you to put a firewall behind you.

Even feel a physical wall behind you, like an invisible force field. And the past is finished. The past is out of the picture.

If you start to have a thought about your ex-wife, or your ex-boyfriend, or your boss who hurt you, who fired you last week, or something. Everything in the past is now... What do you call it?

Forbidden territory. Okay? You cannot go to the past.

Personally, I would think very strongly about the cherry pie we're going to get after the talk. Then you won't think about the past, okay? Okay?

So, I'm asking you not to think about the past. And I'm going to ask for a show of hands afterwards of how many people slipped into the past, okay? Probably everyone's going to be there.

But we'll try hard together, okay? Sit up straight. We always start a meditation by focusing on your breath.

This is an ancient tradition. It's called Ujjumuk. It puts your mind into neutral.

Watch your breath. Try to place your mind on your breath and don't think about other things. Relax your face.

Smile a little bit. It's not so hard. Just watch your breath.

You have nothing else to do. You think about a monkey? Come back to your breath.

Keep your mind on your breath. Now we're going to step back from your mind and start watching your thoughts. You are not allowed to think of something that happened before tonight.

You must think of the present or you can think of the future. But you're not allowed to think of anything in the past. If you catch yourself thinking about the past, force your mind into the present or the future.

Okay, here we go. Be honest and watch your mind carefully. Watch your mind carefully.

Slowly come back to this room. And open your eyes. People talk about meditating for an hour.

People go on retreats. They meditate all day. Forget it.

To really keep your mind out of the past, it's a struggle, right? It's very difficult. It's extremely difficult.

You can't maintain that for an hour or half an hour. You have to start with five or ten minutes. Then break, relax.

Read a manga. Manga, right? Read a Japanese comic book or something uplifting.

And then go back, you see? But don't sit there and try to meditate for half an hour. You can't do it.

It's exhausting. If you're really honest with yourself and you're really careful with your mind, five minutes is good to start. Maybe later ten.

In Tibet, big tradition was twelve minutes. They said, do twenty sessions of twelve minutes. Something like that, okay?

Alright, you ready for the embarrassing vote? I will be the most honest person to begin with. Fifty percent in the past.

How many other people in the past? Come on. Raise them high.

Be proud. I mean, did you have a single thought about the past? Huh?

I'm changing the deal. I'm a... I was a diamond dealer.

Okay. I mean, significant thought about the past. Be honest.

I mean... Past means anything that happened before this present moment. No, you don't have to...

Anything up to before you got to the yoga studio. How's that? Let's vote.

Come on, be honest. Come on. I don't believe all you guys.

[Говорящий 2]
Okay.

[Говорящий 1]
Alright, so that's Jamie Chit. It's hard. I don't believe you actually.

I'm not sure you were watching your mind closely. Practice, okay? Yeah?

Yeah? Breath is okay. Breath is present.

We'll talk about it. Breath is present but not significant. As a meditation object, you see?

Breath is present, but it's not going to uplift your soul. There are higher objects. But we always start with the breath to calm the mind down.

Just to get... It's considered a... It was a warm-up in ancient times, like doing Surya Namaskar or, you know, or stretching before a race.

And then somebody never got the rest of the instructions. And then they started stretching before the race for the whole race, you know? No, really, it was always only meant to be ten breaths, twenty breaths, and then put your mind on the object.

Then move... When you have a car, especially a 1980 Volvo, you got to... You can't just jam it from first into reverse.

You see? If you want to go in reverse, you have to double-clutch, put both hands on the jamming bed, into neutral, okay? You can't go from first to reverse directly.

You have to go to neutral, or you just mess up what's left of the car. And the mind is the same. You can't jump from talking to the person next to you in the class and then suddenly meditating deeply.

It doesn't work. You always have to go to neutral. Neutral means watching the breath.

Watching the breath was only meant to be to get the mind to neutral. And then you move it to something more powerful. Okay.

So anyway, I'd like to do it again. Now we're going to do... What's it called?

Say, dunmitsu. So dun... Those of you who care, I mean, I don't know.

These instructions are two and a half thousand years old. Over the centuries, they have been misspelled countless times, okay? Those of you who care, the Tibetanist mao da ship gi dun na dun means forward, in front.

Rad da da ship gi dun na dun is just a misspelling. Sa da da da ship gi dun na dun is a possibility, but it's wrong. And then ao da ship gi dun na dun is completely wrong.

So anyway, you see them all. Over the centuries, you can see many. We have a project we've been doing for 24 years.

We teach Tibetan refugees to type in their ancient books because all their libraries were burned when their country was lost. 5,000 libraries were burned down. Most of the books were lost.

So we have a project. We teach refugees to type in their ancient books. But then you can search them on a laptop.

So I have a million pages on my laptop, and I can search what did dunmitsu mean for 25 centuries. You see? And it's cool.

You can surf through the centuries and see how it changed. So dun means forward. Dunsuwa means to...

Suwa means to greet somebody. And dunsuwa means to advance to a person who is coming to your house and greet. You know how you walk out the front door and you greet them on the front step and you bring them into your house.

So dunsuwa... Dunmitsu means don't advance through the front door to greet the future into your mind. Okay?

Don't advance to the future and invite it into your head. It means that. So we put the firewall before behind, right?

You're all very experienced meditators now, and you're not going to think about anything that happened before you came to the yoga studio. All right? Okay?

You've got an invisible barrier behind you, the car behind you. You're not going to put your mind behind. Okay?

Now I want you to do a second step. Dunmitsu. Don't put your mind on anything that's going to happen after tonight.

You got to do both at the same time. It's like chewing gum and rubbing your belly. It's going to be...

It's going to be harder. Okay? So now you've got two firewalls.

You've got an invisible wall in front of you. You are not going... This is my lama, right?

He said, you are not going to think about the future. Okay? I told somebody today, he got in a car accident, one of his vocal cords got paralyzed.

They thought he just sounded like Darth Vader all the time. You know? He said, you will not think about the future.

Okay? So there's an invisible wall in front of you. You're not going to think about what you've got to do tomorrow.

You're not going to think about what's in your refrigerator at home. That was mean, right? You're not going to think about monkeys or anything.

You're going to put an invisible plate of glass. It's like when they tell you to do a... When Anton tells you to do...

Chirkanasana, and there's a plate of glass in front of you and a plate of glass behind you. Got it? So there's a plate of glass in front of you and there's a plate of glass behind you.

There's a car in front of you and there's a car behind you. You can't speed to work and you can't go home. You're just carried in the traffic through Lincoln Tunnel.

Fifteen years. So there's an invisible wall in front of you and you're not going to think about anything past tonight. Anything past this room.

Time-wise, you are not going to think about. Okay? And you're not going to think about anything that happened before you got here.

You're going to attempt to be in the present. Okay? It's tough.

And be honest, okay? Be more honest. I was trying to be honest, but if you want, I'll say I didn't think about the past.

Okay. Alright. So here we go.

Straighten up. Hands in Chin Mudra. Which is good if the room is hot.

It dissipates heat from the sides of your body. Close your eyelids gently. Come to your breath.

Loosen your mouth. You might even try a little smile. It helps a lot.

Breathe deeply. Relax. Just watch your breath.

Nothing important to do. Don't try to control it. Don't think about anything else.

Relax. You're here. You're safe.

You're with us. Just breathe. Watch your breath.

Just watch your breath. Put the car in neutral. Watch your breath.

Slowly step back from the mind. Step behind the mind. And watch the mind thinking.

Watch your own mind thinking. Step back and watch your own mind. Watch the thoughts.

Slowly place that invisible wall behind you and an invisible wall in front of you. Don't allow your mind to think of anything that's going to happen after tonight. And don't allow your mind to think of anything that happened before tonight.

When your mind tries to think about something tomorrow, force it back into this room. Continue to watch your thoughts. Don't just have the thoughts, but step back and watch the thoughts.

Stop any thoughts about something past. Stop any thoughts that are coming about things after tonight. Relax.

Come back briefly to your breath. A couple of deep breaths. Watch a couple of deep breaths.

Then come back to the present moment and open your eyes. How many people slipped to the past, briefly, even briefly? That's honest, okay.

And slipped to the future briefly. Yeah, nice. See, that's good.

That's good. Yeah. That means you're really watching your mind.

Okay? So what I thought we would do is take a break, but I just want to summarize where we are. We have more to go tonight, and we have more to go tomorrow.

We did je mi chu, and we did dun mi su. We created an invisible wall behind us, and we refused to let our mind... Okay, so it slipped to the past, but we didn't like...

What do you call it? What do you call it? No, it's like...

Dwell is good, but I was thinking of a funnier one. Slobber around in the past. You know, like...

There's a word like that. Wallow. That was it.

Don't wallow in the... Good, great. Don't wallow in the past.

Okay? So maybe we all slipped back briefly to the past, but we didn't wallow in the past. Most meditators wallow in the past or future.

Okay? Most people who try to meditate without training, they wallow in the past. You know, they get on to some...

I just went to a place, Diamond Mountain, they're all doing a three-year retreat. I counseled most of the retreatants, and they're struggling not to wallow in the past. You know, like...

It was so good at Starbucks. And you know, I used to dream about Starbucks in my three-year retreat. Constantly.

Okay, so you don't wallow in the past, and you're not going to... What is it when you... You ready?

Call that... Illicit enjoyment of the future. What do you call that?

Like... It's like fantasize. It's like you get lost in the future, your plans and...

It's like a daydream. But it should sound like... What do you call it when you eat chocolate that you're not supposed to eat, that it's too...

It's an indulgence. Who said that? Yeah, don't indulge in the future, and don't wallow in the past.

Okay? Okay? So now you've got the feeling at least of what that would be like.

You're not wallowing... You might slip back to a thought of what happened yesterday, or earlier today, but you're going to shoot yourself right back up to the present moment, right? And then you're not going to indulge in the future, right?

In the text, there's many commentaries. They're beautiful. If you want to read them, I have a pile, okay?

But they say, don't... Mostly in the past, you have worries. You see?

Memories, sad memories. Things you didn't work out. Disappointment is the main theme of the past.

Okay? Some people are thinking about in high school when they... they were the star of the class.

You know, that was the last time they were the star. Now you meet them and they're like, did I tell you about my high school, you know? And you're like, yeah, yeah, you told me.

You know? Most people are... are having a worry about the past.

They're reliving something unpleasant in the past. 90%. 10% are hung up on when they got the...

the junior varsity trophy in high school. You know what I mean like that? That's the past.

The future is mostly expectation. Right? You're thinking something might happen.

You're hoping something might happen. Sometimes you're a little worried about the future. Like, there's some anxiety about the future and then there's some expectation.

And so, what we'll do after the break, we'll put up barriers against the cars on either side. Okay? So now we got a barrier in the back about wallowing in the past.

And we got a barrier in the front about indulging in the future. Then we're going to... we're going to put up a shield against expectations on the right.

And on the left, we're going to put up a shield against... what do you call it? Worries.

Okay? So we're going to... after the break we're going to put up a wall against expectations and then we're going to put up a wall against worries.

And can we center in the present? You see? The idea is centering process.

We're going to cut off the sides and we're going to cut off the front and the back and you're going to be in the present moment. Okay? You're going to be here in the present moment.

And that is something that the angel is going to attack. The angel is going to attack and he's going to say, it's not enough. It's a tool, but it's not an end.

To be in the present moment is crucial. We must learn to be in the present moment. But then what do you do with that?

You see? Where do you go with that? Is it enough just to be in the present moment until you get to the present moment in the hospital and the present moment of your death?

You know? I mean... You see?

You got to use the present moment to do something big. But you need the present moment. First you learn to be in the present moment, then you do something bigger with it.

Got it? The angel is criticizing the devil for being in the present moment and not doing something bigger. Because you can be in the present moment all the way up to the time you die and then your present moments are done.

Okay? Like you got to do something about that process of death and aging and the suffering of the world. It's not enough to be totally conscious and people in Afghanistan are getting blown up.

You got to use the total consciousness to help the people in Afghanistan. Got it? It's not enough to be totally present.

You got to use it for something. Got it? So first we got to learn to be present, centered.

And then we got to learn, can we do something about Afghanistan or can we do something to help other people with that centeredness? And you can. It's a very powerful tool to help people.

So we got to go one more step. All right? Am I supposed to make any announcements?

What am I supposed to say? Yeah, we don't know that. Is it for a ceremony?

Oh, okay. So, our monastery ceremony is now in India because it can't be in Tibet because you're not allowed to have it in Tibet. And we rebuilt our monastery.

There's 3,000 monks in Sero now, Tibetan monks. Used to be one white guy, but he moved back to America. But anyway, we send some young people there every year to create more teachers for the future.

So we're planning like 20 years ahead. And we send young students there to learn from the monks. Then we pay their airfare.

So Rebecca, every event like this, she runs a bake sale. So I'm just asking you to eat as much as you can because then we can afford to fly more people over. Okay?

All right? So please do that. Also, there's a retreat, a 10-day retreat starting August 12th to the 21st in Prescott, Arizona.

We'll be doing more of this, but it will be much, much deeper. Okay? And you're welcome to come.

Okay? There's still some places. It's like in a Boy Scout camp and it's kind of rustic, which means lousy, right?

But it's kind of nice. I like it. The place is beautiful.

It's all pines. And the meditation is great. The meditation is very deep.

You go there for 10 days, you come out, and you know meditation. Yeah. So I don't charge people normally for stuff.

I just... We have to pay the camp for your house and for your bunk bed that's too short. And especially for your...

And for your food. And they cook nice food. I can't...

They won't pay for that. We have to pay them. It's a children's camp for children with cancer.

And they let us use it for 10 days twice a year. And then we kind of overpay them a little to help the camp. So talk to Rebecca if you're interested in going to that.

Anything... By the way, if anyone has a program going on anywhere in the world and you'd like me to announce it, say, in the break tomorrow, or anytime I'm teaching in Phoenix. We're trying to do these once a month in Phoenix.

I'd be happy to announce. If you're doing a yoga training or you're doing some kind of concert or whatever, I'd be very pleased to announce it. In fact, if you come up and give me during the break, I'll announce it after the break.

Okay? If you have anything. Okay?

So have a nice break and we'll see you in like... Can we say 8.40 or something like that? If you have a personal thing and you want to come up and say hi or you want to ask about your husband but you don't want to do it in public, I'm sitting here and I'm happy to talk to you.

Okay? All right. Have a nice refreshment.

Okay?

[Говорящий 2]
So, just wanted to let you know that tomorrow we have this space available for meditation and yoga in the morning. The offerings are free. So you're welcome to come.

We'll have a 10 o'clock meditation and also an 11 o'clock Lady Naguma class till 12.15. And then... I'm sorry? Oh, Rebecca is teaching meditation and I'm teaching yoga.

Okay. And then 5 o'clock, we have these study groups. I'm calling this study chat group.

You can get together, have some lunch or dinner, cheat on your homeworks. There's a homework for this class. If you want credit for this course, there'll be two homeworks, is it?

Two homeworks. So it'll be one for tonight's class and one for tomorrow night's class. And we have some lovely senior teachers that will be there to guide you to finish the homeworks and offer option for dialogue.

So, and that's it. And then tomorrow night's lecture is at 7 to 9.30 with Geshe Michael. And then on this sheet, you can go out in the front and then there's a sheet like this and it'll tell you where the class is.

The classes will be here, meditation and yoga, and then the study groups will be at Paradise Cafe, which is a couple miles south of here. The directions are on here. Okay.

Thank you.

[Говорящий 1]
Okay. Hola. Okay.

Is everybody comfortable? You guys can move up a couple feet. Are you all right?

You guys... You can move up and then people in the back will have a little more room maybe. So people did give me a few things to announce.

If you want me to announce any... Like if you have a yoga class or you're doing music or anything, I'm happy to announce it. I like to see people who get certified or people who do these courses.

By the way, the homework is meant to help you learn the material better. And then you would get like a certificate to teach this class. You see what I mean?

For a two-day. It's like a two-day class. And then...

So tomorrow you would work with some people and do the homework together. And it's all free. And you're welcome to steal the homework and use it.

And I don't care. Nothing is copyrighted. And then after you'll get the master for the homework and you can teach it to other people.

And I would be pleased if you taught it to other people. Okay? So...

Tomorrow if you have time... What time is it? Five o'clock?

At the local Paradise Cafe. On Scottsdale? Just south of here.

Right? Two miles south of here. Okay?

And she also buys you a free Caesar salad. Just kidding. Can the teaching assistants stand up just so people know who they are?

Hi. Those are the Moors. They're from Colorado.

They're in charge of our correspondence courses for 15 years, including... They've sent thousands of free courses to prisoners around the world. They're really cool.

Jeff's in charge of our prison program locally with Christine Walsh. And he's a good yoga teacher. And he's a teacher.

Who's the other one? Darcy. Oh, Darcy.

Yeah. Darcy's been teaching for 15 years. And he's really a master of the Buddhist part.

Okay. So there's a homework and there's an answer key that you get after you finish it. And then there'll be a homework after tomorrow night that you can send in or you can meet somebody and drop it off or like that.

And then we would... I would like it if you taught this class. And I would like it if you continued with the rest.

This course will take about a year to finish. This course about the angel and the devil. We're doing an ongoing course which will take 10 years to finish, which is the whole steps to enlightenment.

And that will keep coming back to Phoenix like every other month I'm doing that. So you're welcome to do that. There's a recording of the teachings on that steps to enlightenment course, of the teachings we've given so far.

And the recording is free if you want. It's a CD. Lama Aura is in charge of that.

You got to show the baby because it helps me. So Aura and Bella are in charge of that program. And they make CDs and you can get one and you can sort of catch up to where we are in the whole course.

And if you want to leave some donation for the coyotes' expenses, I call little kids coyotes, okay? Because of what they do in my classes. I got yelled at for somebody in Vancouver recently for calling them coyotes, but I still think they sound like coyotes.

Okay, two announcements. Lama Kimberly and her partner Ted will be giving a training, teachings on the Kalachakra Tantra. The Dalai Lama is right now, this week, teaching in Washington, D.C. He's giving a very rare empowerment. If you would like to have more follow-up training on that, if you've taken it from him, August 13th to the 14th in Vancouver, I think, right? And then Ted Lafferty will be, summer backpacking retreat for personal evolution. Yogis take Black Tusk.

I guess Black Tusk is a place in British Columbia where you can backpack and get enlightened, okay? All right, if you're interested, here are the flyers. And if you want me to announce your shtick tomorrow, I'm happy.

Okay, so, I'd like to start another meditation and here's the goal, all right? It's between the two panes of glass, right? You're not going to, you're going to center yourself this way in your same lane, right?

It's this Lincoln Tunnel thing that's in my head. There's a car in front of you which represents thinking about the future and you're not going to go there. You're going to stay in your car.

And then there's a car behind you and that's thinking about your past, which is usually some creepy guy that you knew. You're not going to think about him, okay? And then, but I want you to do now two cars on the side, two shields on the side.

What do you call it? Expectations and worries. This song came in my head when I was translating the Tibetan.

The hopes and fears of all the youths are men indeed tonight. It's a little town of Bethlehem. The hopes and fears of all the youths are men.

You see? Because 90% of all your distractions during meditation are hopes or fears. You see?

Expectations are worries, right? Worries are mainly connected to the past, expectations are connected to the future. A lot of worries for a lot of us are also connected to the future, okay?

All right? So I want you to watch your mind. It's getting very claustrophobic, right?

You can't think about tomorrow. You can't think about yesterday or anything before that. But now you can't think of anything you're hoping for, and you can't worry about anything.

You just got to be here, centered here in this room, okay? No hopes, no worries, okay? No hopes, no worries, nothing happening after tonight, nothing that happened before tonight.

Okay? You're in your car. I did a three-year retreat.

I went to my Lama. You know, it was the last day. I had lived with him for 25 years.

And then I was going to go away. And I was scared. You know, I was really...

You know, I was really... I felt really bad, because he was really old by then, and I thought, well, maybe I won't see him again. So I go up and I say, Lama, you know, what's your final word?

He said... You know, I did the retreat in a yurt for three years. No talking.

And then he said, he said, keep your mind in the yurt. You know, like, don't think about Starbucks or anything. It didn't work.

But... So I'm going to... We're going to meditate.

We're going to start with the breath as usual to get the mind into neutral after all those cakes and stuff. And then we're going to block off the car in front, which is thinking about tomorrow, or past that. We're going to block off the car in back, thinking about the past.

And especially we're going to be careful about hopes and worries. Hopes and fears. Expectations and worries.

Okay? Got it? Here we go.

Sit up straight. And please bring your mind to your breath. Relax your face.

Relax your eyes. The goal now, we're going to shut off the future. We're going to block off the past.

We're going to be especially careful not to think about hopes or plans, or worries or disappointments. Stay centered between those forces. Keep your mind here, in the present.

Step back from your mind. Watch your mind. Don't allow the mind to think of past or present, or hopes or worries.

Be here now. Be contented in the present moment. Okay, step back from your mind.

Just here. Satisfied to be here, in the room. Aware of the present moment.

Aware in the present moment. No past, no future. No worries, no hopes.

Come back to your mind. In your mind. Take a few deep breaths.

Watch those breaths. And then come back to this room. Slowly open your eyes.

That's enough on that meditation tonight. Okay? We did Jamy Chö.

Don't be in the past. We did Dönme Sö. Don't live in the future.

Be in the present moment. And then we looked out for, in Tibetan, what is called rewa and jigpa. Say rewa.

Rewa. Jigpa. Jigpa.

Rewa. Rewa. Jigpa.

Jigpa. Rewa means hopes, expectations. Jigpa means worries, disappointments.

So now you're centered between four forces. Dönme Sö, in the, ahead of you, is the car of thinking about tomorrow. You're not going to think about tomorrow.

Behind you is Jamy Chö. You're not going to think about what happened yesterday or before. Over here is jigpa.

Worries, anxieties, things to worry about. Okay? Bad memories also are over here.

Jigpa. And then over here is rewa. No, no, what do you call it?

Expectations. No big plans. Just be here.

Now. There's a place for planning in your life. There's a place for being concerned about problems.

If your car is making a weird sound, you better stop. You know, there's a place for that. But in this meditation, you are cutting off those.

For the length of the meditation, you are concentrating on the present. You are centered between those four forces. Dönme Sö in the front, not thinking about the future.

Jamy Chö in the back, not worrying about the past. On the right, jigpa, jigdeo, jigme. No worries about what happened, what the boyfriend said last week or what the boyfriend might say next week.

And then over here, no rewas. You know? Maybe he'll buy you flowers, maybe he won't.

Okay? You're not going to... Expectations.

Free from those four. Centered between those four. For tonight, that's enough.

Learn... Somebody told me, and I had the same experience. I don't know about you.

It was such a relief to be put between the two panes of glass and allowed not to worry about my future and allowed not to worry about my past and just be here. And I felt this overwhelming sense of relief like somebody took a burden off of me. They said, just be here.

You know? And I didn't have to worry about being somewhere else or what I had to do or what kind of problem I had in the past. I was just here in the present moment.

Okay? That's an important skill. And free from expectations and free from worries.

Just learn to be there. In the Lincoln Tunnel, the cars are behind you, in front of you, beside you. You can't go anywhere.

Time is passing. You are... Eventually you're going to make it to Manhattan.

Sometimes I used to get on the bus. I fell asleep on the bus. I used to sleep for an hour and then do my sadhana for an hour and then, you know, my daily practices.

And then I'd be home. So, you know, I would get in the bus. It would go into the Lincoln Tunnel.

I'd fall asleep. I'd wake up and we're still in the Lincoln Tunnel an hour later with all the fumes, you know. And...

Like you're locked in. That's what I want you to be. Okay?

You're centered. You can't go anywhere. Can't go to the future.

Can't go to the past. Can't go to your worries. Cannot go to hopes.

Okay? Just there, centered. Tomorrow, we will do a deeper kind of centering.

Okay? That's not the end. We still have to do, to say Soma.

Soma. Machu. Machu.

Soma. Soma. Machu.

You know Soma. Yogis, you know Soma. Soma means, in Sanskrit, it is the ancient drink that the priests, the Vedic priests used to drink.

Some people think it was... What's that white flower that grows in Datura? That grows at that mountain?

I never tried it. But, it was an elucidant gem, and some people think it was that, but they would do their... they would go into meditation, they would take Soma before.

In Tibetan, Soma has a different meaning. Soma means untouched, original condition of your mind. Okay?

The untouched, original condition of your mind. That has... In the Buddhist tradition, your mind is billions of years old.

It has no beginning. Your mind has taken new bodies countless, billions upon billions of times. You have been everything billions of times.

You have been President of the United States billions of times. Each one of you, boy and girl, has been Miss America countless times. Okay?

That's the good news. You've also been like Bin Laden countless times. You've done every kind of terrible thing countless times.

And you've had every honor and every award countless times. And it didn't help you. Soma Machupa means take now the primordial condition of the mind and let it be and surrender into it.

Surrender into the primordial nature of the mind. The nature of the mind for time with no beginning. Find it and stay there in that nature.

Then say say dim te lu dim te You can also say lu dim de lu dim de lu Dim means struggle to locate the primordial nature of the mind. The ancient, ancient original nature of the mind. Dim means work in the meditation in the box, right?

In the box of the present. Now we're talking about the present, okay? It's not enough to cut off the future, past, hopes and fears.

No, fears and hopes. It's not enough. What about the present?

What are we gonna do in the box? You see? Dim de lu.

Dim means fight, struggle, concentrate to find the original nature of the mind. And then lu means surrender into it. Relax into the original nature of the mind in the present moment.

So we gotta do that tomorrow. It's like one of those TV shows where they say to be continued. Okay?

It's like you gotta come back tomorrow. Sorry. So we'll work on that tomorrow.

There's one more brief meditation that I'll just... It's on your homework, okay? The devil says, you know, if you didn't want to do a wrong-in-the-box meditation, there's another one that's just as good.

Okay? By the way, what makes it wrong to be in the present moment? Why does the devil enjoy that meditation?

It's people who didn't get to the second part. Waste their whole life being present in the moment. And it's not enough.

You see? You gotta do more than that. Because you will get old while you're in the present moment.

You see? You will get cancer. Something will happen.

Your arteries will harden, you know. In the monastery there's a joke, you know. You say, where are you headed?

You say, I'm going to my yoga class. They say, well, how many hours is it? It's two hours.

You say, okay, you're going to be two hours older when you get out. You'll be two hours closer to the day you can't do any poses at all by going to do poses. And it's true.

You see, it's not enough to be in the present moment because time is moving and your body is changing. And we have to do what we can do to change that condition. If we don't use our being in the present moment to change our human condition, then we are lost.

And you can do anything you want with your life, but it's going to end. And it won't help people. So how to use the present moment to serve people?

And how to use the present moment to overcome the larger problems of life? That's what we'll do tomorrow. Okay, so the devil is happy to see people in the box in the Lincoln Tunnel just being present and not doing the soma macho, not doing the step I'm going to teach you tomorrow.

He would love to see you do asanas for the rest of your life until you get too old to do any asanas. And then he'll dump you on the hospital bed. He wants that.

He wants you to do asanas until you're too old to do anymore. He wants you to spend your whole life just twisting your body around and then there'll come a day when you can't. And that would make him very pleased.

You see? The angel wants you to do asanas to reach a higher state of being and to reach an enlightened state of consciousness. You see?

He wants you, after you're in the box, he wants you to do something with it. And you can use asanas. In our monastery, you're not allowed to do asanas until you finish 25 years of study.

You're not allowed to do an asana. You see? And it's considered very, very holy to do an asana because you can get enlightened doing asanas, but you need training to do that.

Okay? So he, the devil wants you to do asanas just to look good or something like that. You know?

Because that'll wear out. Your body will wear out. You know?

And then the angel wants you to do asanas. They both want you to do asanas, but the angel wants you to do it so you can get enlightened and your body will change. So that we can talk about tomorrow.

Okay, there's another meditation which is easy. Okay? But there's a special way of viewing it which comes from a commentary from, I don't know, eleven hundred years ago.

It's a Kadampa commentary, a Lojong commentary. So, the next meditation that the devil advises you to do is called, say, jiyangme. Jiyangme means sit down, close your eyes, and think about nothing.

Okay? You heard that, right? People told you that was meditation.

Sit down, close your eyes, try not to think about anything. And then, my teacher, he made a joke about it. One day he asked me, what are you meditating about?

I said, I read a book. He said, oh my God. Like an English book.

And he didn't like it. Anyway, he said, okay, what did this one say? And I said, it's a book about meditation.

He said, well, what does it say? It says, don't think about anything. Just empty your mind.

If you see a thought, just let it go, you know. Bye. You know, and, you know, let it fade into the...

And he was like, this is meditation? I said, yeah. He said, what does meditation mean?

I said, it means to focus single-pointedly on a single... Single-pointedly means ekagra in Sanskrit, right? Focus on a single point.

Agra means a single object. Single-pointed mind means single-object mind. It means think about one thing only.

Okay? Like for me, it's maple-covered donuts. I have ekagra.

Okay? I just concentrate on them. I don't think about anything else.

Okay? That's single-pointed mind. Okay?

You can be a baseball player and have single... Good baseball players have single-pointed mind. Okay?

That's ekagra. So, he said, well, my Lama said to him, what's ekagra mean? I said, he said, you concentrate on a single object.

He said, well, what does concentrate mean? I said, you think really hard. And he said, so you're thinking really hard about not thinking.

I said, I guess so. He said, you are gukpa. I said, oh, Rinpoche, you know, you can't address your teacher directly.

You have to look down at the floor and you can't look at them. And then, you have to slurp. I don't know why.

You have to go... It means, it's like bowing to them. You're supposed to look at the floor and slurp, you know.

And then I said, oh, Honorable Lama, what does gukpa mean? He says, you're an idiot. You know.

So, it means, to consider meditation on trying to think about nothing to be meditation is stupid because meditation means to think very clearly about something. So, to think clearly about thinking about nothing is foolish. but, in the tradition of the Panchen Lama, whose photo, I mean, whose painting you have, in his tradition, there was a very interesting argument about why that meditation was not useful.

And it was that the goal of yoga, for example, the goal of asana, is to make an effect on the inner channels, which, and the chakras, which transforms your body into light. When your body transforms into light, you are no longer subject to aging or death. Okay?

And then you can split your body. You can, what do you call it? Avatar it.

You know. That's the original meaning of avatar, right? Avatar means you can split your body, not just once or twice, you know, you can split it into a million.

And you can serve a million people at the same time. You can appear all over the world at the same time. That's the reason to do yoga, is you no longer have a mortal body.

In the monastery, they take a knitting needle and they check you every once in a while. You know. And the purpose is to become less, what do you call it?

Meat. And more light. Because meat dies.

Okay? So anyway, the purpose of yoga is to transform the body into light. Okay?

When you transform the body into light, something also, when you open the sushumna and your central channel is open, then you, your knowledge of things becomes infinite. You know all things. Okay?

Like I'm already in Mr. Know-it-all, but other people have to catch up. In Tibetan it's called kunken. Kunken means Mr. Know-it-all. But it means you become enlightened. Kunken means enlightened. Okay?

So, so one of the commentators on this, on this verse, which is, you'll find it, it's like two verses later. The idea that meditating on nothing could be a useful meditation is mistaken because whatever you meditate on is what you will become. You see?

There's an important correlation between the meditation and the fruit of the meditation. You see what I mean? So, whatever you concentrate on, you're going to become that thing.

So, if you concentrate on thinking about nothing, it's not going to flop over into becoming omniscient. It's the opposite. You see?

Years and years of practicing about thinking about nothing is not going to result in you becoming a being of light and sending out countless avatars who know everything. Because no more than mangoes could, mango seeds could produce a banana. They're not the same thing.

In fact, they're the opposite. You see what I mean? Practicing over and over not to think about anything is not going to make you the one person in the universe who can think about everything.

Got it? Like that's just a very simple proof, okay? Not useful.

Okay, my Lama used to say, you want to do that, you want to do that meditation, then just go get a bottle of tequila. You know, drink the whole thing. You know, then you won't think about anything.

And it's easier, and it's cheaper than all those years of practice. So that was the second meditation that the devil was recommending. The devil says an interesting thing, okay?

He says, in people who did the in-the-box meditation, the centering meditation, wrong. They didn't get to the second part. They just were present.

Okay? And people who did a meditation about nothing, he says, there's a very interesting thing going on. And the angel says, what?

And he says, the devil says, I'm in those people's minds. I'm with them while they're meditating. They are meditating on the mind itself.

You see, you are watching your thoughts. The object of your meditation is your own mind, right? You are focusing on your own thoughts.

Sometimes you can focus on a... on a picture of a holy being, or you can focus on some idea, like compassion, right? In this meditation, which is called Mahamudra, and it has a corresponding yoga series, right?

There's a corresponding asanas. In this meditation, you are focused on what? Your own mind.

You are watching your own mind. In the box, you are seeing, am I thinking about the future? Am I thinking about the past?

Am I having a hope? Am I having a disappointment? You are watching your own mind, okay?

And it's a very... it's a very powerful... it is the most powerful object of meditation, is to watch your own thoughts, okay?

That's called Mahamudra, all right? And the devil says, in all the people who were doing that meditation wrong, and who were just watching their mind, and who didn't do anything with it, you see? Being present, they didn't do anything with being present.

He said, I never saw you there. Who's you? The angel.

He says, it was always very comfortable for me, because I never saw you there. In all those people's minds who I encouraged to do that be-present meditation, I never saw you there. I had a good time.

There was no conflicted... they were completely mine. Okay?

Why? Get this, okay? It's the last thing we have to talk about, okay?

Just get this, very important. The way they were thinking while they were being present, in no way did any injury to me, the devil. Okay?

The way they were thinking while they were in the present moment, did nothing to threaten my continued existence in their mind. It didn't have anything to do with me. See what I mean?

Why? What's the devil thinking? We said at the beginning of the class, that was a long time ago, I know you're not supposed to think about the past, but...

What were we saying at the beginning of the class? We were talking about a special person in your life. Who?

The person who irritates you the most in your... Come on, right? Did you forget them already?

Don't worry, they'll be there tomorrow. Okay? There's a person who most irritates you in the world, right?

And you have a certain attitude about them, which is what? They're coming from their side. They are not my fault.

Okay? They are... They are criticizing me, but it's not my fault.

It's them. Got it? Right?

Who's talking? The devil. Okay?

Why? If you believe they're coming from their side, you can never fix them. You will have irritating life in your life for the rest of your life.

Got it? Until you change your idea of how they got here, they're going to keep showing up. Okay?

The people you don't like, the people who criticize you, the people that hurt you, until you figure out that they're coming from you, you can't touch them. They'll always be there. Okay?

You can do anything. You can move to Kansas. There's people there too.

Okay? No, people are so funny, you know? They say, I'm going to change my job.

Why? I don't like it. Why?

I don't like my supervisor. Ha ha. Okay.

Let me know in six months after you get your new job. You know? No, no, no.

I meet them after six months. I say, how are you doing? They say, I hate my job.

I say, what's wrong? They say, supervisor's stupid. You know?

You take the supervisor with you when you quit and get a new job because they're coming from you. They're coming from your mind. Okay?

You got to get it. All right? So the devil loves any kind of meditation that doesn't address the question, where's all this crap coming from?

Okay? Just be present. I love it.

You see? Don't worry about where the irritating people in your life came from. Okay?

Just be present. You know? Don't understand your life.

Don't figure out where stuff is coming from. Just be present. I love it.

Okay? He wants you to meditate like that. What would wisdom say?

What would the angel say? Then you can go home. If you give me the right answer, you can go home.

What would the angel say? He'd say, think about it while you're in the box. While you're in the Lincoln Tunnel and stuck there for an hour, why not think about what?

Think about where everything's coming from because you can change everything that way. Okay? You can change everything.

Everything you don't like about your life is coming from you. Just learn how to fix it. You see?

Everything you want is attainable. You can become a billionaire in your free time. You can do anything.

You can have a perfect partner. You can fix your old partner. You can upgrade.

No, you can actually change your partner. Anything about your partner. You know, most people like their partner.

85%, 90%. There's like 10% is irritating. Then fix it.

And then they're perfect. You know? And you can fix anything about anybody.

So just, the meditation should be a meditation which threatens the continued existence of the devil in your mind. Any meditation which you spend your time to do. Okay, breath meditation, do it for five minutes, then go to the real meditation.

See? Breath meditation is just to calm your mind down. Being in the box, present moment meditation is to get here, is to get focused.

Then focus it on something. You see? Then put it on something.

On what? Anything which threatens the existence of the devil in your mind. Okay?

What's that? Figure out where stuff is coming from. Okay?

What's stuff that makes you unhappy or the stuff you don't have that you want? Work on that. I mean, learn to focus.

And then, and then, by the way, after you do that, you have to expand it to other people. I mean, you can't really be happy unless you take care of other people, right? I mean, learn...

You also can't take care of other people until what? Until you figure it out yourself. I mean, if you're not happy, you're going to go save other people?

You know? You want to be like me? That's okay.

That's okay. Okay? I mean, we all want to help the world, right?

We all want to serve other people and make them happy. But if you can't make yourself happy, then you're just fooling yourself. If you're like miserable, you say, I'm really...

How do you feel today? I'm miserable. You know?

What are you going to do tonight? I'm going to teach a meditation class. You know?

Okay? Like that. So, any meditation that you do should threaten the presence of the devil.

And again, who is the devil? The devil wants you to believe that all the bad stuff in your life is coming from somebody else and not from you. And you don't have to feel...

What do you call it? It's not like a new level of... It's not like new heights of...

It's not new heights of low self-esteem. Okay? I like that.

It's not new heights of low self-esteem. It's taking control of your life. I mean, I'm responsible for everything that happens to me.

So, it's not like some kind of guilt trip. There's no word in Tibetan or Sanskrit for guilt. There is no such word.

It doesn't exist. The idea doesn't exist. It's like, now you have control over your life.

What you want, you can plant the seed in your mind and it will manifest. And I did it. People have done it.

People in the room have done it. It's cool. It's fun.

You can plant whatever life you want. If someone teaches you how, then you just go do it and you feel happy and you're cool. The devil doesn't want you to think like that.

The devil wants you to blame other people. You know, I was born with red hair. I can't make it.

Or, you know... Or, you know... Something like that, you know.

My husband, he just... he just doesn't listen to me. If he would listen to me, I could fix him, but I can't.

He won't listen to me. Then it's all stupid. It's all koopa.

Okay? You can fix everything. Got it?

The devil wants you to waste your time in yoga and meditation that doesn't threaten his continued existence. His continued existence can only be threatened by understanding where stuff comes from. Okay?

So our job tomorrow is talk about where stuff comes from and how you can make stuff happen. And then the devil will be threatened. Okay?

We want to do the present moment meditation and then we want to turn it to something higher. But it's a tool. I was talking to somebody...

Again, that idea of relief. It's such a relief to be able to be here and not worry about what you're going to do after this class or what you did before this class. It's such a relief to have someone tell you, just be here.

Don't worry about your old boyfriend and don't worry about your next boyfriend. Just be here for tonight. Maybe you'll find your boyfriend here.

I don't know. But just focus here. Learn to be here.

Learn to put the... You know, to block all the thoughts from the past, future, hopes and worries. Right?

So practice that at home. You can practice it driving. You don't have to be in lotus position because you can't do the accelerator thing.

Okay? As you drive, as you drive home, just see if you can be totally present driving right now. Can you be driving right now?

Not thinking about getting home and not thinking about where you were ten minutes ago. Can you be in the car driving? With total focus in the driving.

And then can you do your asanas like that? Can you be in a pose and be totally in the pose? And not thinking about before the class and not thinking about after the class.

Can you be totally present in a pose? And what you'll find is you have vast new stores of energy because it so drains your energy to live in the past and the future. Okay?

You will find vast new stores of enjoyment, fun, happiness. Okay? Like, it's just cool, it's fun to be in the present.

Okay? So, try it until tomorrow. Okay?

Just try to be in the present. And then tomorrow we'll work about threatening the devil while you're in the present. First learn to be in the present and then tomorrow we'll threaten the devil with the present.

Got it? Okay, we have a custom in our monastery where we, at the end of a program or at the end of a teaching... By the way, tomorrow bring me some questions.

Okay? If you have any questions, bring them tomorrow. And we'll do some question and answer.

All right? But in my monastery we always give away the good karma at the end. Okay?

There's a prayer, there's a beautiful prayer for giving away the karma at the end. It's a very beautiful custom that we've dedicated to the happiness of all the people in this world. Okay?

And other creatures. So, Akash, you want to do? Like, Sashi and then Gewa?

Okay. If you don't know the prayer, just think about, we did a really good karma tonight. We threatened the devil.

Okay? That's a good karma. All right?

So then, just think, I give all that energy to other people. I dedicate everything from what a wonderful world up to... Now, I dedicate all that to the happiness of other people.

Ready? Here we go. Sangye Shindu Vindekam Lokum Namda Shambhagyapasho Dhyan Guru Baba Namaskar Namaskar Namaskar Dhyan Guru Baba Namaskar Namaskar Dhyan Guru Baba Namaskar Sangye Shindu Vindekam Lokum Namda Shambhagyapasho Dhyan Guru Baba Namaskar Okay.

Thank you for coming. It's very fun for me. And this is my hometown.

So, I love Phoenix.