49 лет после прямого видения пустоты: личные размышления Геше Майкла Роуча (2024, Мексика), занятие 1

[Speaker 1]
Alright, some of you know today is a special day for me. July 28th is a special day for me.

[Speaker 2]
49 years ago, when I was 22, I saw emptiness directly.

[Speaker 1]
And I had an experience of bodhichitta, and I didn't tell anybody for many years, but when you see emptiness directly, you are struggling to think of something in the world which is similar.

[Speaker 2]
And the closest thing in the normal world is a diamond, for many reasons. So that's why I joined the diamond business, and I worked because I wanted to touch diamonds every day.

[Speaker 1]
And I went to 30 jewelry stores in my small town area in New Jersey, where I was staying in a monastery, and nobody would hire me. It's like trying to join the mafia, because you can steal a million dollars in two minutes. Then I got very good luck, and I found a new company was starting in New York, and I worked there for 19 years, just because I wanted to touch diamonds every day.

Then by accident it became successful, but it wasn't the purpose to make money. I just wanted to touch the diamonds every day. So today is a special day for me, and as I get more grandpa and more grandpa, I decided to tell people.

If they don't believe it's okay, but if you do believe it's okay, it's very good for you. So, I had an idea for this class. So every year I have to write a new DCI level, and every year we teach 140,000 people DCI.

And every year I have to write three or four hundred page manual. So this year I wanted to focus on the good night club, good night book club. It's a funny thing happened in Arizona.

[Speaker 2]
I call it good night book club.

[Speaker 1]
Then everybody says Geshe-la started good night book club. Then Juan has his new show, he's in a rush. He don't say good night book club, he say good night club.

Then when he's really busy, he says Geshe-la's night club. Then everyone thinks I'm dancing or something. Anyway, the new DCI level for this year, it will focus a lot about this idea to put away your cell phone, put away your computer for eight hours.

It's very very powerful to kick out your cell phone for the whole night. It makes you very clear minded. It's better than meditation.

So, in this new DCI level, we have to suggest some books, paper books, that people can read when they go to bed. Then there's a lot of, there are some countries in the world where you're not allowed to publish books. So, my books are very popular in those countries.

There's one legal book in China, the Diamond Cutter business book, and it's sold like millions of copies.

[Speaker 2]
In Russia, it's a number two best-selling foreign book, but I don't have any way to tell those people about all my books, but we are allowed to publish the DCI manual.

[Speaker 1]
So, I thought to put a little piece of every book in the manual. There's a hundred and twenty books. So, I'm putting, I'm preparing like a chocolate sampler of all those books, maybe 20 pages, 30 pages from each book.

Then it's good because I have to clean up all of my books.

[Speaker 2]
So, this week I was cleaning up a book called The Garden. First picture, yeah.

[Speaker 1]
This was kind of the first book I wrote, and there's a, it's a story, it's not, it's fiction, but it's true, mostly. So, I had a, this morning I thought I would like to read you a chapter about seeing emptiness directly, okay? So, I had an idea just to have fun, and I won't read, I'll just read easy way, like comfortable way, and she doesn't even know I'm going to do it.

So, a lot of pressure for her, but I'll go slow, and I'll speak in normal English, not bookingly, and it's like a vacation for you guys. You just relax, your abuelo is telling you a story, but don't forget it in your life. Then I don't know if we're going to have time.

[Speaker 2]
If we can't finish, I'll finish this afternoon, okay?

[Speaker 1]
If we finish early we can start the photographs earlier, okay? Deal? Okay?

Okay, here we go. And to punish you in the evening, I'm going to teach you directly from the angel-devil text, which is very confusing. So, morning is a good time for spiritual things, and evening is a good time for what confuses.

Okay, so here we go, and I'm just going to paraphrase it. So, I was a quiet bookworm, I just like to read books, but in the garden I had studied with Shantideva. So, a little bit I became a warrior.

Warrior in this book means sattva, the Sanskrit is sattva, and bodhisattva means enlightened warrior. So, I was a warrior, but the battlefield was my normal home.

[Speaker 2]
This guy is renting a small room in a small monastery, and he's working in a library, and so he's starting to see his whole little world in a special way.

[Speaker 1]
Before I met all of these masters in the garden, I felt like my life was living in a shopping mall, and I'm just going from store to store to get things, you know? But after they taught me about bodhisattva, even though I was still a small person in the world, I felt like I was a knight in shining armor, and when I met people, I feel like they are all my children, and every time I meet somebody I try to be nice to them, and I will say some nice thing to them, but, and if they are ready

[Speaker 2]
I will tell them something about emptiness or something like that, and so I was more and more happy every day.

[Speaker 1]
But I also knew that I wasn't finished with my education, and I felt like a horse who comes closer and closer to the water, and I wanted to find perfection, and I wanted to help my mother who died, and I wanted to meet Vajrayogini again. In this book she's called the golden one.

[Speaker 2]
By the way, after I wrote the book, I taught it in Mongolia, and there was a very famous tanka painter in that audience, and he painted that tanka on the left side, and if

[Speaker 1]
you know diamond way practice, the fire coming out of the monk's heart, it has four parts, and it's a CHI'O NAS SDUG PAR LAS PAR NA RGA'A BA, SDUG PAR NAS SNYING RGA LAS PAR NA CHOG PA, SNYING RGA NAS DE BA NAS PAR NA KHYAD DKA'A, DE BA NAS SNOB PAS RTEN LAS PAR NA SRENG GI GYI YOD ZHIG BSKYED PA'I, DE BA NAS SDOM PA NI YIN PA'I, everything is in the numbers. So, very famous diamond way. So, the whole painting has special meaning.

So, I was hoping to go back to the garden and meet her again, and there is a garden. So, maybe it takes too long. The date was 28th of July, the book says, and it was summertime in the garden, and I came there late at night, and this garden is in Arizona in the desert, it's very hot, and there's a beautiful tree there.

[Speaker 2]
It's a carob tree.

[Speaker 1]
It has a long seed, and you can make chocolate from the seeds. Yeah, not cacao, it's similar.

[Speaker 2]
It makes a huge beautiful tree, lives for many years.

[Speaker 1]
The seed always grows the same size in the whole world. If you plant carob tree in Arizona, or you plant it in Mexico City, or you plant it in Spain, it doesn't matter, the seed will be exactly the same size. And from that carob, word comes carot, the word carot, like one carot, diamond, two carot, diamond, three carot, diamond.

Because in the ancient times, they will use carob seed to weigh the diamonds. So, by accident, it's a diamond tree. In the picture, you can see, on the left, up on the left.

Okay, I sat down and started to meditate in the garden, and in the garden I learned to meditate from some of the Buddhist saints. So, in that story, each chapter, a different Buddhist saint comes to teach the young man. Is that book in Mexico?

I don't know. Yeah? Okay, alright.

I know it's in Spain, I don't know if it's in Mexico. Okay, then I sensed somebody was coming into the garden. There's a gate to the garden, and there's a rose garden there.

Red, red roses. And then I saw it's not Vajrayogini, it's, I call her the golden one in the book, yeah, okay. Then I saw it's a monk, and you know, a very beautiful monk.

And then I realized the last master to visit me in the garden is the Buddha himself. He was not tall, but medium. A little bit, not, a little bit thin, and very shy, and he always moves very gracefully.

And impossible to guess his age, but maybe 27, 28 years old. And his whole expression is very simple. I mistyped something, I have to fix it.

And very modest, no pride, but super intelligent face. And his skin is different from human skin, and it has a kind of light, soft light, not like, not like those lights. And he has bare feet, he's not wearing any shoes.

And then I thought, uncontrollably I have to sit, and he's like, sit, sit down, sit down. And I sit down on the grass in front of the, there's a stone bench, or a wooden bench, and he sat on the bench, and he looks shy like a young girl, like a young lady. He's kind of, he looks kind of shy.

After a while he reached his hand out to me, then I saw he has a red rose in his hand, and he didn't say anything, and he's just like, look at it, you know. And he didn't say anything, so I just look at the rose in his hand.

[Speaker 2]
Then I was too shy to look at his face, I just look at the rose.

[Speaker 1]
Then he suddenly he took the rose back, and he touched my chin, you know, like looking my eyes, and then he said one word, Rose. And then he closed my eyes with his hand, but he keeps the fingers there. Then when he touched my eyes, I meditate on the rose, the rose picture.

Then he opened my eyes again, and he's still holding the rose, and he said, do not think rose. Then when somebody tells you not to think about something, so I try not to think about rose, and I try not to have the picture of his hand with the rose. Then he opened his hand again, he said open your eyes, and then just for a second I don't see a rose.

[Speaker 2]
I see little corners of the rose, but not the whole rose.

[Speaker 1]
I just see a corner of the rose or something. Then that's only like a split second, I look at the rose in his hand, I see a few pieces, because he told me don't think about rose. Then for like three seconds, I can see the pieces of the rose, but not the rose.

It's hard to explain, but what I saw for a few seconds is only shapes and colors, no rose. So there's a red color, corner of the rose, there's a green stick, just green line, but no rose. Then suddenly my mind, make a perfect rose.

But for just a second, I could see the pieces without the rose. Then he's like, okay. Then he says, let's do again, again.

Then he let me see the rose.

[Speaker 2]
Look at the rose.

[Speaker 1]
Then he closed my eyes again. Then he said, rose. One word, rose.

Then I start to get a picture of rose. Then he pushed my eyes open again. Look, but don't look at rose.

Just look at, then I see just pieces, little red sharp, for just a moment, I can see the pieces without the rose. What's happening there? When a seed opens in your mind, there are some pieces in the world, red color, little corners.

Then your eyes, they cannot see rose. They can see the color, and they can see the shape, but the eye cannot decide what is this thing. The eye and the brain is separate.

The eye cannot see rose. I think the brain and the eye, they have telephone connection. And the eye says, hey, we got something out here.

By the way, the brain cannot see the outside objects directly. The brain depends on the sense organs.

[Speaker 2]
What, what we got? What's out there?

[Speaker 1]
Then the eye says, oh, we got red, red. What else you got? Little triangles.

You see, the eye cannot decide what is this thing. Scientists says the color and the shape hit the cells at the back of the eye, and then they take the shape and the color, but they cannot decide what is the thing.

[Speaker 2]
Then eyeball says to brain, we got red.

[Speaker 1]
We got corners. Then brain is like, hmm, we're in a garden. I think it's a rose.

And then the brain sends a picture to the eyes. You see?

[Speaker 2]
And then the eyes put the picture on the pieces. And that's a rose, you see? That picture is coming out of your seeds.

[Speaker 1]
And the only way to put the seeds in your mind is to share a rose with another person. The good things in your life, you can only see the good things in your life which you gave to other people before. When you share something beautiful with somebody, you plant a seed for a rose.

Then the eye was coming.

[Speaker 2]
Then he touched his finger to the ground.

[Speaker 1]
We have two kinds of ants in Arizona. One is the red ant. They're pretty big.

And they are very nasty. And we dance around, my wife and I, when they bite us, and then we're like ... Then there's little black ants, and they are very peaceful, they don't bite.

When I took my cafe manager examination and course from the government in my state, they said, you are required to kill the roaches in your cafe. But the black ant, they are super clean. It doesn't matter, they can walk everywhere.

They actually clean up. Anyway, Buddha touched the ground, then he put the ant on the rose.

[Speaker 2]
Black ant. They are curious and friendly.

[Speaker 1]
Then he runs to the edge of the rose. Then he's like, ah! He don't want to fall off.

Then he runs to the other side. It's like a mountain for him. Then Gautama put the rose back on the ground and the ant went home I guess.

Then he took the rose in his hand again and he put it to his own face. He's looking at it like this. I couldn't see the rose, but I could see his eyes.

He's like super peaceful, super happy. Then I'm thinking, he must see something different than what I see. Then he said, listen, when you first open your eyes, you saw the pieces of the rose, just the colors and the shapes.

Then your mind, your seeds, a new picture came out and made a rose. But the ant, he look at the same pieces and he sees, ah! Mountain!

For him it's very frightening. Then Buddha said, when I look at the same colors and the same shapes, I see all of eternity.

[Speaker 2]
I see the mind of every being in the universe and I love them at that moment.

[Speaker 1]
Then he like quieted and he closed his eyes. Then he reached out the rose again to me and he asked me a question.

[Speaker 2]
Who's correct? What is this thing?

[Speaker 1]
Is it a rose? Is it the lord of death? Is it all the people in the universe in perfect love?

Then because I'm sitting close to Buddha, I understood everything quickly. And I realized in his hand is all three things.

[Speaker 2]
There's a rose, there's a mountain, and there's the universe of all people, in his hand.

[Speaker 1]
And because I'm sitting close to him, I understand very clearly, there's nothing in his hand.

[Speaker 2]
If you have a seed, you will see a rose. If you have a black ant seed, you will see a mountain.

[Speaker 1]
If you have Buddha seed, you will see all the people in the universe. By the way, that's a cool thing. According to Buddhism, there's no end to the universe.

If you get in a spaceship and you fly, fly, fly, you will never reach the end. There is no end. But still, if your mind is clean, you can meet everyone in the universe in 20 minutes.

[Speaker 2]
Everyone in this room can do it.

[Speaker 1]
You can meet everyone in the universe, all animals, all humans. There's no number to those, but you can meet them all in 20 minutes if you see emptiness. And that's what all these classes are for.

Alright, he closed his hand again, and he opened the hand with the flower, and he said, this time I want you to see the whole universe. And he goes like, and I'm like, and it's just, all I see is a rose. And I'm like, I'm sorry, I just see a rose.

He says, I know, because you can only see what your seeds force you to see. You look at this and you see a rose. I see all the people in the universe.

And then I close my eyes and thought about rose. I open my eyes and see rose. Then he just stopped talking.

And he crosses his legs on the bench and he starts to meditate. And then I start to meditate. Now I'll just read.

The silent guru, I lost the sounds of the garden. I lost the smell and the feel of the garden.

[Speaker 2]
I lost the feeling of sitting in the garden. Finally I lost the feeling of even thinking.

[Speaker 1]
And I lost the feeling of myself. And everything was perfectly quiet. I saw emptiness.

And it was only that and I saw it. There was nothing else. When it was over, things started to come back.

I could feel myself coming down. And then I could feel myself again. Then only after I realized, oh, I saw emptiness.

In the hour that you see emptiness, you see many other things. So there's a list in the book. So just enjoy.

I knew then that I had seen a Buddha. And I knew that Buddhas are real. I knew I will also become Buddha within seven lifetimes.

I have to die six more times.

[Speaker 2]
Something like that.

[Speaker 1]
And then because of that, I knew really there is future life. Because up till then you just heard it from your teacher. You don't know really.

[Speaker 2]
When you see emptiness, you see your future life. For the first time.

[Speaker 1]
People ask me, oh Geshe-la, we heard you have health problems. I'm like, yeah. And then they say, aren't you worried?

And I say, why? I know where I'm going. I know who will take care of me.

It's like a really cool place. So I'm like, nah, it's good. So if you see emptiness, you don't ever have to worry again even about death.

Because you can see what's, it's like you can see the restaurant. You just have to cross the street. And you're like, yeah, good.

By the way, I still take, I still eat medicine and things. Alright, I'm trying to stay for a while. Then I knew the path is correct.

When you see emptiness, something strange happens. You understand that people will not call you Michael in the future. I still didn't figure that out.

But your name changes. Maybe it's like when you get married or something. Then I knew how those seven lifetimes will be.

And I know my parents and I know who my teachers will be. And I know they will take care of me from the first day. So I don't have anything to worry about.

In the next seven lives. Now here's the interesting thing that happens when you see emptiness. I knew that what I saw was correct, true.

And I couldn't doubt it again. So a thousand people can tell you, no, you didn't see emptiness. You're crazy.

You don't know anything. Then you're like, yeah, okay, I'm crazy. Because no one can...

What you saw is true and you know it's true. It's not just that you see truth, it's that you know you saw truth. And no one ever can...

It doesn't matter what people say. The biggest person in the world can say, you didn't do it. And you're like, yeah, okay.

Another thing happens on that day. You understand all the books are correct.

[Speaker 2]
There's three hundred thousand books, Buddhist books.

[Speaker 1]
Each one is as good as the Bible. And by the way, the same content. But imagine you have three hundred thousand Bibles.

[Speaker 2]
Different Bibles.

[Speaker 1]
And they are all one hundred percent correct. And you see that. And then you become like crazy person.

We have to go to all the libraries in the world. We got to find them. We got to take pictures, record them.

Somebody say, I found the cure for AIDS. I wrote it down. It works.

There's forty million people with AIDS in the world right now.

[Speaker 2]
Most of them will die.

[Speaker 1]
Then you have the paper. You have the, what do you call it? The recipe.

Then how will you feel about that paper? You're like, you know, let's make copies. Let's make a AOL database.

Let's make sure we translate it. Like how will you feel if someone gives you the only copy? Forty million people will die if you lose it.

That's how Arya feels about the holy books.

[Speaker 2]
That's how Arya feels about these holy books.

[Speaker 1]
Then I had an experience of loving every living being. A light came out of my chest. A pillar of light, like it's not, it doesn't look like a Coca-Cola straw.

It looks like a rocket ship. Later I learned it's called prana. It came out no color.

It touched every living being. And I spoke to each living being in the universe. It's a very fun twenty minutes.

First you meet your mom. I don't care if she's alive or she's not alive, doesn't matter. My mom was dead by that time.

But she come to me and she looks great. But she looks a little bit worried. And I understand why she is worried.

She has to die. The people around her have to die.

[Speaker 2]
Then I'm like, don't worry mom.

[Speaker 1]
Seven more lifetimes. And I'm going to be there. And you just hang on.

And I'm coming as fast as I can. And you don't have to worry. Just relax.

Then she's like, relax. Then my father come. Like that, one by one, my brothers.

Same mini conversation. You look a little bit worried. Yeah, if you have to die you would look worried also.

Then, don't worry, I'm going to take care of everything. I know what to do. You don't have to die.

Then, oh wow, thank you. Then one by one, my aunts, who I met like two times. Then all my school teachers, sixth grade, fifth grade.

The worst one also came. Worst school teacher.

[Speaker 2]
Worst teacher also.

[Speaker 1]
Her name, okay, honestly, is Mrs. Budd. The worst. Then I'm like, don't worry, I'll take care of you.

Then people I don't know. In my city. Then people in all the cities.

[Speaker 2]
Then people in other countries. One by one.

[Speaker 1]
Don't worry, I'll take care of you.

[Speaker 2]
Okay, thank you.

[Speaker 1]
Then start animals. So I had a dog when I was a kid. His name is George, okay?

[Speaker 2]
His name is Jorge. The one with the long ears.

[Speaker 1]
And George comes. I'm like ... He's like ...

I'm like ... He's like ... Then cats, fish, birds, all of them, one by one.

Not one chicken representative, each chicken. One by one. I'm like, I'll take care of you.

Then did something unbelievable, okay? Start the humans on the next planet. So I don't know where's that planet.

I don't know, I cannot point to the place. Then the whole thing starts over again.

[Speaker 2]
You cover all the humans, animals, insects.

[Speaker 1]
Personal interview, each one. Then after twenty minutes you finish.

[Speaker 2]
Every living being in the universe.

[Speaker 1]
And I don't know, either I'm a big liar or it's something amazing. Either I'm a big liar or this is something unbelievable.

[Speaker 2]
But it's true. Really it's true.

[Speaker 1]
As I sit here it's true. And then finishes. And that's a bodhisattva.

That's a real bodhisattva. It's not just that you're nice to people or something like that. And that's real bodhichitta.

[Speaker 2]
That's real bodhichitta.

[Speaker 1]
You see your death. Every human being secretly they think, all those stupid guys who are dying, I'm not like them. Deep inside every human being thinks, God, those old people, so stupid to get old, so stupid to die, I'm not going to do that.

[Speaker 2]
But an Arya sees their death and they believe it.

[Speaker 1]
The earth's gravity is stronger than you.

[Speaker 2]
It's a battle.

[Speaker 1]
When you were two years old, Kiri, you learn to fight gravity, you learn to walk. But in the end gravity wins. For everybody.

And you lay down on the earth and you die. Interesting thing. Okay, I'm almost finished, don't worry.

When the Arya comes down out of seeing emptiness directly, they cannot see it again. They can't just say, oh, I want to see it again for ten more minutes. The karma is so expensive, you burn your karma credit card for your whole life in twenty minutes.

Then you start to see things like you see the pen the old way.

[Speaker 2]
You don't see it the new way.

[Speaker 1]
You cannot see that it's coming from you. You cannot see. Some part of you still make mistakes.

[Speaker 2]
Even the Arya.

[Speaker 1]
What's the difference? The Arya is wrong, but he knows he's wrong.

[Speaker 2]
But cannot stop it. You Latin America tour teachers, as you teach the pen, you are always seeing the pen wrong.

[Speaker 1]
I'm sorry, but even an Arya, when they teach the pen at that moment, they cannot see the emptiness of the pen.

[Speaker 2]
That's all.

[Speaker 1]
On this special day, let's do one minute meditation. That we talked about these things. Make a prayer that someday they will happen to you.

If they didn't happen to you already, I don't know. Just one minute, make a prayer. Then we can do sign books and photos, and then sign books and take photos.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you.