Живой ламрим: как жизнь Кхена Ринпоче отразила учение о ступенях пути (2005, Аризона), занятие 7

[Говорящий 1]
So I'll tell you a little Rinpoche story, then we'll start. We finished how to think about your Lama, and then we finished how to behave towards your Lama. Then we...

What did we do after that? Yeah, was it? Yeah.

How to get the most mileage out of what you got. Then refuge. Yeah.

Oh, death of impermanence? Yeah, what happens if you lose it. And then refuge.

And then what? Oh, and then the three lower realms, yeah. And then refuge, I think.

But anyway, the last part of the gyepu jungu, dang tumu wei lam, the path shared with the lesser capacity. And that's a good place to end up in the second term, because then we'll do the, you know, we'll have a nice offset for the third term. What was that?

What's the last one? Karma, okay. Why does karma come there?

It's really in the context of death. You see, like, if you're not careful, you can plant the wrong seeds, you know? And that's where you're going to end up, because that's gyepu jungu's theme, right?

Like, how am I going to stay out of the lower realms? So, really, the reason the discussion of karma comes here is in the whole context of, if I died tonight, what would happen to me, right? So, it's like developing awareness of mental seeds, bhakchaks, samskaras, how you plant them.

And really the main theme, I think, is that they're so subtle, and they're going to determine every detail of the rest of your life. So, to avoid even small negative seeds, like poison, and then to seek out even small good seeds, because of how powerful they can be. So, that's really what you have to learn to develop, especially during the day.

You're driving around, you're in Buri, you're talking to somebody, and you just got to have this awareness that everything I do now is going to create my future, you know? Exactly, 100%. So, it's this awareness.

Keep this high level of awareness. So, how did Rinpoche do this? When I first got there, we actually came about at the same time to Raksha Gambling.

He got there maybe a week ahead of me or something. And it was a real mess. There was construction garbage everywhere.

They had built the temple, and then they just left it there, the garbage. The whole yard that you know now, and the garden, and the lawn, it was all just piles of construction garbage, like big cement blocks, hunks of cement and lumber. And we started cleaning, and it took like years.

We took out stumps by hand. You know, they had just cut the trees and left the stumps there. So, he'd sent me out with a shovel.

It took like two years to do one stump. And, you know, chop away on it. And then slowly he began to plant things.

And I remember we went to, there's a town called Farmingdale, which is a really corny town, and it's just what it sounds like. Like, Lakewood's one way, Freehold's the other way on the big highway. But if you go east, there's just countryside, and there's this weird little town called Farmingdale.

And it's a farmingdale, and it's a really funny little town. But on the way, out in the middle of nowhere, there's this little, what do you call that, where they sell garden things? Nursery.

Nursery, yeah. And they didn't have the lake there then. They built the lake later.

It was just empty. Yeah. It was near there.

Later they filled it up and made this huge lake. But, so there's this nursery out in the middle of nowhere, and Rubenchik drags me in there. He used to drag me to nurseries.

And I'm sitting there. Yeah, I don't like plants. And I don't have patience for plants.

We tried to grow plants in three-year retreat. Like, not one of them grew. And the minute one grew, the grasshoppers, like, spread, ate it in one day.

Whole thing stripped it in one day. And then rabbits would come in. Or it would just never grow.

And this week, we just did our first flower. It's in the llama house. You should see it.

It's in the kitchen. Somebody should take a picture. We had help.

We had divine guidance. But anyway, so he would, like, spend hours and hours dragging me to nurseries. And I couldn't stand it.

Then he'd get these little sprouts. Zinnias and marigold were his thing, see? And then bring them back to the temple.

And they're like this tall. And then you water them for a while and then you plant them. And then you've got to water them, like, twice a day.

Like, I'm out there twice a day with this hose, you know, for an hour. And I'd have to translate this logic text. We got a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities or something.

And then I'd have to work on this Madhyamika text and I'd have to memorize my stuff for the monastery. And then later I had to go to work. And he's got me out there for an hour with a hose, you know, like, pointed at these plants.

Don't do it that way, you know. You'll ruin the roots, you know. Don't put too much.

They'll rot, you know. You didn't put enough water today. What's wrong with you?

You know, like, you couldn't do it right. Like, no matter what you do, you're doing it wrong. And I always stay, just stay there with a hose for an hour watering these stupid little plants, you know.

Like, I'm praying that they'll die or something. And, you know, and then the first year they come out and the sidewalk wasn't even finished. You know, it was just dirt.

And then these dumb little marigolds come out, this little thing like this. And they're like this tall, you know. And he's all excited.

Oh, they're so beautiful, you know. And I'm like, I hope they die soon. Marigolds last a long time.

Like, even in the cold weather, they just keep going, you know. Like, through the fall, they don't go away. And so I'm out there watering, you know.

And they got about this high, and, you know, he was really happy. And then, all this time I'm trying to learn Tibetan. Like, I'm struggling to learn.

I want to learn Tibetan. I want to translate stuff. I want to publish books, you know.

I want to be a translator. I want to see my stuff. The first time a book came, I was like, wow, you know.

I just sat there for like an hour looking at this book, you know. Because I love books. And I love the stuff.

And I love translation. And I have an ego about it, too, you know. So anyway, we, so the first day we're sitting there, it's Art, me, and Rinpoche lived together for a couple years at the beginning.

And then he sent Art away to Wisconsin to get a PhD. He didn't want to go, but he obeyed Rinpoche. So, so we're sitting around the table.

Art's already super fluent. Rinpoche is talking in Tibetan, and they're just ignoring me all the time. You know, and I'm like, I'm here.

I want to learn something, too, you know. And he said, cook the toast. You make the breakfast.

You know, I'm like, well, could I? No, just go make the breakfast. You know, and then I'm like, okay, I make it real fast.

I come back. And I'm like, will you talk to me, too, Rinpoche? This toast is terrible, you know.

This is all burnt. Or this isn't cooked enough, you know. Get this out of here.

Take this back. Art's like, this is terrible toast. What's wrong with you, you know.

And I'm running back and doing the toast again, and they get to have another conversation about some deep philosophical thing. And then I ran back, and then I'm like, you know, trying to follow. No one's saying anything to me.

I want to learn Tibetan so bad. And I just know how to say little dumb stuff. Like, as much time as, I spent six months in India before I met Rinpoche.

And then all I knew how to say was like, he told me later, he said, when you got here the first day, you remember what you said? And I said, I don't know, I think I asked you to teach me or something. And I offered you some momos that I made, you know.

And he said, momos, those were so terrible, you know. I took those rocks, I threw them out in the garbage, you know. And then, and you said to me, you said three words, I want Buddha, you know.

couldn't even say Buddhahood, you know. And, so I'm like, well, help me, you know. And so I made breakfast, still they're ignoring me, right.

So then, Rinpoche, he tells me, you have to teach me English, we have to speak English. I said, that's the last thing I want to do, you know, I want to learn Tibetan, you know. So then they're ignoring me and every time he talks to me he's like talking to me in English, you know.

So, so I got this idea, there was a Tibetan mirror, right, out of Kalampong. Is it a mirror? And then it was changed later to Rangwan Thakbar, which means Tibetan Independence Newspaper, but it was GL Tarchen and it's not the same Tarchen, but, there was this Tibetan newspaper being published in India, in Darjeeling.

So I got a subscription and it would come and it would be like six months late. Like, it'd be after the news, it'd be six months on, the news would be six months. So I came to breakfast with the newspaper, you know, and they're like talking in Tibetan and he's expecting me to speak in English, so I just open the newspaper and I start reading the newspaper and ignoring both of them, you know.

And, every once in a while I say, what's this word, wetkin, wetkin? He says, there's no word in Tibetan, wetkin. Yeah, here's just the, the poop in the wetkin.

And, he looks at it and he says, it's the pulp in the Vatican, you know, and, because they're called pop in the wetkin. And then, so I got some Tibetan out of him, you know, and, but I just ignore them, you know, and have the newspaper. I was like determined to learn some Tibetan, you know.

So, then I said, Rinpoche, can I work on a translation, you know, can we translate something? He says, yeah, I'm translating something with art. It's called, it's a letter to a friend shifting suradhaka in Sanskrit.

You can work on that. I say, yeah, what can I do? He says, you go in the temple and type it while Art and I are working on it.

I'm teaching art in the, in the house. You can go in the temple and type it, you know. And I'm like, but can I listen?

Can I come in the class? No, no, no, it has to be typed. You go to the temple and type.

So, I'm like in the, in the gonjor, the front of, what do you call it? The entryway to the temple. And I'm just like typing on this old IBM typewriter and, and I type the whole manuscript, you know.

So, I come back, like, it took me like six or eight months. And I come back, here's the manuscript, it's all cleaned up, it's done. Can I sit in the class now?

Can I learn Tibetan, you know? He says, I don't like this manuscript. This is no good.

You have to do it over, you know. I want everything done over again. This is really bad.

And he sent me back to do it again, you know. So, so I'm like, but Rinpoche, I want to learn something, you know. No, no, you go to the temple, you know.

And he still got me watering his stupid plants, you know. And then, second year, what he does the first year, this is like 1975, and he's got, he collects, he says, he goes out in the late fall and he says, we're going to pick marigolds, you know, zinnias. And I'm like, great, you know.

You know, I'll die, you know. And then he says, you know, you have to look for the best one. Like, we're going to go through all of them.

And there wasn't very, they weren't very high, but there was a lot of them. And he says, you got to go through each one and get the best, like, five. So, like, we're like on our hands and knees crawling through the garden looking for the best.

What's the best marigold? Like, the fullest one, the biggest one, the one with the best color. Not that one.

This one, you know. and, so I'm like crawling around and picking. And then he wraps them up in a cloth and then he takes them up the stairs and then he sets them out to dry.

And then, I don't know, like three weeks later, he's like, we got to pick the seeds. You know, I thought I was done. The watering's done.

It's snowing. We picked the marigolds. They're all dead now.

And he's like, we got to pick seeds now, you know. And I'm like, I don't want to pick seeds. I want to translate something.

And he's like, no, no, no. Here. And he's like picking the best seeds out of the marigolds.

He's like, here, you rip them open like this and then you look and they look like needles, right? That's how big they are. Take this one out and this one's not so good and this one's good and this one's not so good.

And I'm like, he's driving me crazy with this seed thing, you know, and this marigold thing. Still growing, you know. Then, in the late winter, we had to like pre-plant them.

What do you call it?

[Говорящий 2]
Egeminate them.

[Говорящий 1]
Egeminate them. Yeah. Indoors, right?

So they're still wasting my time. And by this time, I'm like done with the second manuscript of Nagarjuna's letter, right? And like I presented it with a flourish to them.

They get to talk. They're sitting there talking some new subject that I don't get to learn, you know. And then he's like, he's like, I don't like it.

I want it printed. You know, at Rinpoche we don't have any money. You know, we don't have any money.

We're totally broke. Totally, totally broke, you know. Yeah, but I want it printed, you know.

So, so we go to a flea market and there's this old mimeograph machine. Yeah, yeah. And then, and we buy it and we get back and then, then he says, you make this manuscript, you make a book on the mimeograph machine and then you bind it, you know.

And I said, I don't know how to bind a book. And he says, learn. Go learn.

So I go to a bookbinder and I learn how to bind books by hand, right. And then we set up in the basement. Basement's half full of water.

There's like always an inch of water in the basement. You stay in the basement. Art and I are working on a new manuscript.

And you type this thing and the mimeograph machine will be there and the typewriter you can put there and then I want it bound after that. And we didn't have money for the binding tools so I had to make them. So I'm sitting down there with a block of iron and a hacksaw making the tools for binding the books, you know.

And like cutting the screws and stuff like that out of big sheets of brass. And I'm like making these tools. And he's like, okay, let me see how far you got.

And I'm typing it on, if you don't know a mimeograph machine, it's three sheets of plastic. They're legal size. You put them in the typewriter.

You type. If you make one mistake, you can try to put a plastic glue on it and then retype it, but it won't come out. And then you have to just throw it out and then you have to start over again.

And then, you know, I'm typing for like four or five more months. And I got pretty good. I got it out.

And then I have to, we're printing 50 of these, you know, and choo-ka-choo-ka-choo. And then he's like, what's this big blob on the paper? I can't read that.

And I said, that was a mistake. I didn't want to have to type over the whole page. Lazy!

Type the whole page over again, you know. And then if there's one word changed, you have to go type all the pages till the end of the chapter over again. You see what I mean?

And he's like changing stuff. Art's like changing stuff. They're on to some new book again.

And then he's got me out watering the flowers again, you know. And I'm out there watering. And this year they grow about this big because he has selected the best seeds, you know.

It's very interesting. So it's like that big. So he's got me doing that.

And then I finally finished Art's book, you know, and we send it. He gave away the copyright to the Tibetan government to the library. And they've been printing it ever since and making money off it.

And it's a great book. We should study it someday. So then I'm like, Rinpoche, can I study?

Will you teach me something to translate now? He says, yeah, yeah, we got this other book me and Steve Foster are working on. And I want you to type that one too.

And half of it's in Tibetan, so you have to type half of it in Tibetan. I said, there's no Tibetan typewriter. Oh, they just came out with one in India.

We have to get one, you know. So, like, we bought this Tibetan typewriter from, I think it's from Kalimpong. It's a hand typewriter, right?

It's just got like 400 keys. And you go like, chuk, and then it makes ka, and then you go over here, kuk, and then it's ratak. You know, and then when you look around there's three Shepkes, right?

And, wait a minute, I can't remember. And so we're like, he said, you learned to use it, you know, it came. And they dropped it in the plane and like three keys were broken.

so then there I had to go like, chuk, you know, and, and, you know, who's going to fix, I took it to the guy that fixed it. He's like, no, get it out of here, you know. And so I'm sitting there all day long, you know, chuk, chuk, chuk, you know, chuk, and it was all this stupid mimeograph stuff again.

So if you make a mistake there, it's like another thousand hours to do the next page, you know. And then he's like, we finished that book, Carmen, chuk, chuk, chuk, chuk, chuk, finish that book, get it out, print it, send it to the publisher, came back. We started MSDP then.

And then he still got me out there with the plants, right? So this next year, we go through that whole thing again. And now the plants are like up to here.

It's really interesting. Like it's starting to interest me a little bit. But I'm out there watering, you know.

And then I'm still trying to get him to teach me. He won't teach me any Tibetan. I have to speak English to him all the time.

And this goes on for 15, 20 years, you know. And it's very frustrating, you know. But every year the plants are getting higher.

It's very interesting. It's very interesting. He's taking the best seeds out every year of these like 50-cent zinnias and marigolds.

And then it's getting pretty high, you know. And we kept going. We kept working on it.

Then I remember too, can I translate a book now? No, I got an idea. You can help all the beginning students do a book.

You know, I'm like, no, I want to do a book. He's like, no, no, I got this thing, Kingwood Adhyāna and the Wheel of Life. It's an explanation of the Sīpe Khorlo, the Wheel of Life.

So he's like, here's Chögyam Trungpa's brother, Ulamja. You call him Pete. I don't know how you get Pete out of Ulamja.

But anyway. And then there's Mark Shirelli. He's a mailman.

And a couple of other people. Some of the kids. He's like, oh, you work on this book.

And then, I want you to work with the kids in the community. The comic kids. So I have the comic kids there once a week or twice a week.

And they did a book. And they got a grant from the National Endowment. So we're doing a book, three books for them.

We finish Ulamja's book. And I have to clean this all up. This is this Mongolian guy who speaks comic and Russian, but doesn't know any English.

And French. French, comic, and Russian. And his English is not so good.

He learned his English in Vietnam as a soldier. When he got to the U.S., they drafted him in like six weeks and sent him to Vietnam. So he's like, I have to rewrite everything.

Then I have to type everything. By now we have like a dot matrix printer. So Rinpoche says, I want a dot matrix thing.

I want the letters like that. He saw some tie or something. He says, make that in Tibetan.

So we're up all night projecting Kanye on the wall. The letters are this big. I told you, we have this lady making the dots.

Gina Torricelli. It took her like a year. And each letter is made up of like 400 dots.

So somebody has to sit there and graph the dots out on the wall. And then you tell the computer, hit space one, column one. Hit space two, column two.

Hit space three, column three, but not that space. And then she got this whole thing done. And she was so broke, she was living out of her car by now with her kid.

And we're like going like that. And I'm like, Rinpoche, when can I do a book? When are you going to let me do a book?

I got all these things I want to translate. He says, no, no, you got to finish this book for those people, like the kids. And then you got, oh, I'm just bored.

And then I got another idea. And I'm like, then Rinpoche wants to put out a book. And I'm like, so anyway, we keep going like that.

And by now these plants are like up to your chest. The same ones, you see? The same marigolds are like up to your chest.

And it's like unbelievable. Then this weird thing happens. I get to go to the monastery.

I start debating. And then suddenly my Tibetan just changes. Everything just changes.

I go back, I look at all the old stuff I did. I throw it in the garbage. And then now I understand everything.

And I can just translate anything, like a newspaper. It looks just like a newspaper to me. And then by now the marigolds are up to your head, up to the top of your head.

Have you seen there? It's unbelievable. These marigolds, I've never seen that anywhere.

Over 20 years time he has selected the best seeds. And now it's up to my head, these marigolds. It's like unbelievable.

And you have to tie them with a big rope or else they'll fall on people. And it's weird. And then we're sitting there and I get this call from Doubleday.

And they said, Could you do a couple of books for us? And I'm like, I got to ask Rinpoche. Now you can do a book.

It's like 20 years later. And they said, We'll give you $50,000 up front. You don't have to pay me anything.

I'll pay you. No. I said that.

And they said, No, no. We'll give you $50,000. Just take it.

And then we did the diamond cutter and the garden. And then something happened. Some seed ripened.

Then I'm up there finally. He's got Doma, right? His little dog Doma.

And he's got this backscratcher. Tibetans got to have a backscratcher. Bamboo backscratcher, right?

And then he's got his little cup of milk, right? And he sets the milk down on the floor. And he says, Okay, Doma.

And he's got this backscratcher here. And he's like, Okay, Doma. Come to the milk.

And she comes to the milk and says, No, no, no. And he whacks her. And he says, Go around.

He goes like this. And she doesn't get it for three weeks or something. But he just keeps...

He whacks her once in a while. And then she gets it. One day she does it.

And she comes around the bowl and approaches it. She does a left turn around the bowl before she drinks it. And then he's like, Good, you got it.

And I'm watching all this while I'm watching the Yankees. Because I used to come home fried. And he'd have the Yankees on.

And I'd watch the Yankees. And I'd watch him work with Doma. And then he's like, Doma, sit up.

And Doma's like that. And then he got that stick. And she's like, What do you want me to do?

And finally, he gets her up on her haunches like that. He gets her to get up on her haunches. And then she can have the milk.

So I'm like watching this. And something's dawning on me. And then he's like, weeks later, months later, he's like, Okay, now, Doma, put your paws like this.

And he's got her up on her haunches, like this. And she would go like this. Because she couldn't keep her balance very well.

And dogs' backs are not made to sit up. And then he'd say, Okay, go like this, go like this. And now she kind of knows the stick and what he does.

And she's like, she's like this, you know. And then he's got her doing like a prostration move. And then she can have the milk.

And then finally he's like, Doma, om, om, om, you know. And she's like, she's like this, you know. And then she goes, om, om, om, you know.

And then he says, he says, look, it's not her fault. She's got these big canine teeth, you know. And she can't make a real M.

So we're going to let that one go. And she's like, om, om. And then like after a year, he's like, Okay, Doma, go, you know.

And she like circles the ball left ways. And she gets up and she's like, om, ma, buy my home, you know. And now she's got the whole thing.

Like the whole six-month-old. And then suddenly this explosion goes off in my mind. He's been doing this to me.

Like 20 years, he's been doing this to me, you know. And the whole seed thing, the whole miracle thing, he's been doing it in my mind, you know. Like he set up the Doubleday thing 20 years before, you know.

Like, no, you can't work on your own book. You have to work on other people's books, you know, for 20 years. And all the books he put out with my name and his name, it's just like, it's like that, you know.

It's like he's just setting it up, you see. And he got this patience with this dog for like, it took like three, four years every night to get her to do this. And then just you're sitting there and then suddenly it dawns on you, you know, he's been doing this to me, you know.

And for 20 years of patience with somebody. And you're fighting him, right? Like you got the newspaper up in his face, you know.

And you're fighting him. And he doesn't say anything, you know. He just says, okay, you go out and you do that, you know.

And you go out and stand there. Oh, and then you get the flower thing, you know. So he had this intense awareness of seeds, right?

And the power of seeds and how you can make someone's wishes come true by helping them collect the right seeds. Even if they're fighting you, you know. Even if they're fighting you and they don't trust you, you know.

So, it's really cool. That's the seed thing.