← Amy Miller

How to be Happy

Amy Miller · 6 September 2008 · 5 h 35 min · Tse Chen Ling via Internet Archive

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  • 6:05

    As a city center, it's a little more challenging to meditate because of the busy corner. But still, I'd like to just bring ourselves here into the space. I wanted to mention my name is Amy. I've been a nun for a little more than eight years and I was traveling in Nepal in Asia for six months when I came in contact with a course like this and it really resonated with me and I really liked it.

  • 12:31

    You do not need to have a judgment. About it, you are not the only one in the room who cannot meditate. That is not true. Meditation in this sense, in this meditation, is basically about becoming aware when your mind is wandering and bringing it back to the breath.

  • 24:00

    So you're countering delusion. You can counter delusion in your mind when you get in your car and drive down the street, when you're pushing your supermarket into the market, buying groceries, when you're crossing the street, when you're taking public transportation. All these things have to be integrated. This is what lends to the happiness. I can't force it on you I can't say this is how it is for you because everybody's experience is different what I love about this tradition is it's about your experience it's about how you want to come to happiness that, so I actually wanted to say as well

  • 1:15:11

    Contributing to our happiness and avoid negative imprints. So you look at the mental suffering, understanding the mental suffering, understand as well when you suffer mentally, can I get a sense to realize instead of the dwelling and obsession in it, so that it sometimes becomes more negative for me, I'm always like this, you know people like that. Today was horrible and tomorrow is horrible and you get a little depressed or frustration with a certain system within which you're working.

  • 4:28:23

    So when you're working to get enlightened, and I know that's a concept that's kind of out there. However, what it means is you're going to have two main approaches and one is skillful means, which is your method. It's basically one wing of the bird. Skillful means being the method is about compassion. And the other side is emptiness, is having the right view of how I want to use the skillful means. So compassion is also put together with another word, bodhicitta.

0:00 Hi. Now, are some of you here the whole day or just the morning or all day? All day. Okay, wonderful. Okay, very good. We had a kind of, we were just joking this morning because when they contacted me to teach the course, they were running out of time. I think it was a little bit last minute, so they didn't have a chance to check with me. Usually you check with the teacher what they want to teach. Report an error

0:31 And then the woman just said, well, I picked How to Be Happy. And I'm really glad you turned up because it's a title that's been used and overused and it's kind of the one they throw in when, you know. So then I said I wanted to make something more exciting. So we were laughing and then this morning I guess they looked in the room and there was one person because I just said it's not going to draw very many people and it's not, you know. Report an error

0:55 So then we saw one person, you were sitting here and she said, there's only one person. And I don't mind teaching one person at all and you can make it really individual for what the person wants to do. So we were laughing because I had said, they kept saying, really sorry we didn't check with you. So how to be happy is a very wide spectrum. So I made a really nice course that I like to teach and mainly because there aren't so many people we can really gear it to what works best for you. Report an error

1:26 So that's really nice about these courses. So I hope it's useful for you. That's my feeling. So why don't we start with just an introduction of I'd love to know who you are and things like that. And if you want to move around or sit more circular, that's fine too. If you're fine where you are, that's okay. But if you just want to start, introduce yourself. Report an error

1:47 Maybe just say a line of what brought you here or if you've been practicing before or anything like that. Report an error

2:00 This is a wonderful refuge. I do like to come here. Report an error

2:12 My name is Chris, and I was studying at the Sitchin Ling in Marin, in San Isamu, and felt so privileged to learn from Benro, Regina Griffin, in Marin, and we did that for a while. And then we haven't had any Dharma there for quite some time, and so I've been practicing Shambhala. Okay. Report an error

2:43 Okay. Because they're still doing Zen and Samo. I just taught there the other night. Did you? Because I keep looking at the website to check. And then it says, what does it say on the website? It says no further information on this venue. So I keep thinking after she was done. Report an error

3:05 It's called Machik Labdrom. They've renamed it. And it's an active study group with Emily. There's a teacher who's here. She teaches there. And Venerable Manlam teaches there weekly. Yeah, that one. Yeah, they're still going. Hi, come on in. It's Tuesday evenings and I think they've got some other nights and things like that. So they're still going, yeah. Report an error

3:34 Yeah, you can check it out. It's really nice for people out there. It's great. There's something also in Puerto Madera as well. There's something everywhere now. You'd be surprised. Georgia. It's unbelievable. There's lots of centers. So thank you. Thank you. That's great. Thanks for coming. Report an error

3:58 You just moved to San Francisco? Yeah. Report an error

4:03 Did I meet you before somewhere? Yeah. In India. I thought I met you before. Actually, I've met you before. And you all look somewhat, you look familiar as well. Report an error

4:20 Yes, yes, great. Report an error

4:31 Great. Great, so you just moved here. Just like I did after I first went to India and Nepal and then I moved here for a while. Great, well thanks for coming. Report an error

4:55 Great, thank you. Report an error

5:01 Great, Report an error

5:10 great. My name is Terry. I forgot to record the sound. I know, but... Report an error

5:14 And we were just saying like a sentence of why, maybe what brought you here to the class or anything of your Dharma background. Report an error

5:26 Great, great, welcome, welcome, thank you. And then, do you both live in the city? Where do you live? Mountain View. And you're north of San Francisco. and yeah, New York High School, great. Report an error

5:44 What I'd like to do is just start with a little meditation. And if you're new to this, it sounds like a lot of you have been around before. And it's fine if you are newer to this. But it's nice. We'll try to have a little bit of meditation in between some of the talking and there'll be breaks. And we'll break for lunch around 12.30. Report an error

6:05 As a city center, it's a little more challenging to meditate because of the busy corner. But still, I'd like to just bring ourselves here into the space. I wanted to mention my name is Amy. I've been a nun for a little more than eight years and I was traveling in Nepal in Asia for six months when I came in contact with a course like this and it really resonated with me and I really liked it. Report an error

6:33 And so slowly, that was about 21 years ago, and then slowly I studied and did some retreats and things like that. It's just really... How can I say, a gradual progression of things like that. So I was based in California for 17 years and I left about four years ago and was mostly teaching and studying and traveling in India and Nepal and things like that. Report an error

7:00 And I'm going to relocate later this month to northern Vermont where I'll be running a center there that's part of the organization. So I'm then teaching a bit from there. Report an error

7:14 So when you're meditating, the main thing to remember, a lot of you are familiar with meditation posture. The main thing you want to do is to make sure your spine is as extended as possible. So we know the spine is not straight, but it will appear that your back is straight because this creates a very open flow of energy through your system. Report an error

7:35 It's perfectly fine to sit in a chair to meditate and it's best if you do to have your feet straight down instead of crossed. For people with back problems, you can meditate lying down. My problem is I fall asleep. But whatever's comfortable for you, and it's good to experiment with heights of cushions and square, round cushions, whatever works so that you can find eventually that your knees don't hurt as much, that your legs don't fall asleep, things like that. Report an error

8:07 So it takes a little while. The more you do sit, though, the more your body will get into the position and the back gets very strong. Report an error

8:16 we usually sit with our, lotus position for the legs, that's really difficult for a lot of people. Through a lot of yoga, you can get yourself into the full lotus position, which does create... Shantideva, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Lama Zopa Rinpoche. With your knees in front and your legs behind you, some people sit like that if they're comfortable. And if you need to shift positions, it's perfectly fine. Report an error

8:55 So that's how the legs are. We usually put our palms in our lap face up with the right palm on the left and the thumbs lightly touching. And hold those just at a level slightly below the navel. Again, this is all a reminder of the subtle energy system in the body. Report an error

9:16 Like that. And then the thumbs touching creates a nice even flow, like a circular flow through our body. And this is basically a posture that the posture I'm describing is a posture that happens to be effective for people who want to meditate. So that's why it's used. But once again, there are different traditions that practice different ways and it's good to find what is comfortable for you. Report an error

9:43 So we would sit like that. There's a little bit of space between the arms and the torso. Shoulders and neck are very relaxed. Report an error

9:53 face is relaxed. head is slightly tipped forward. your head is up, you get a lot of mental distraction. if your head is very far forward, you tend to get drowsy and go to sleep. Report an error

10:10 is a very relaxed, posture. Report an error

10:16 eyes can be slightly opened lightly closed. Closed and they're focused at a space in front of you on the floor or just the tip of your nose. Report an error

10:40 Mouth, lips, teeth, jaw, very relaxed. Some people curl their tongue to touch the upper palate of their mouth because it cuts down on the production of saliva. So therefore you are swallowing less. This Report an error

11:02 is what we call the seven point varichana posture. Report an error

11:07 Varachana or Vairachana is an aspect of the Buddha. Report an error

11:15 Let's just bring our awareness now to our breath, just a normal natural breath. You Report an error

11:36 can focus on the air moving in and out of your nostrils or the rising and falling of your abdomen, whichever is more comfortable. And Report an error

· · ·

12:21 when the distractions arise, pulling your concentration from the breath, just become aware your mind is wandering. You do not need to have a judgment. About it, you Report an error

12:42 are not the only one in the room who cannot meditate. That is not true. Meditation in this sense, in this meditation, is basically about becoming aware when your mind is wandering and bringing it back to the breath. Most Report an error

· · ·

15:38 important things we do in this tradition is to set our motivation. Take Report an error

15:48 a moment to reflect on your purpose for being here right now and wanting to be happy ourselves. It's perfectly fine. See if you can expand that to also include other beings that through your happiness and learning some techniques that may lend your happiness, can you then share your happiness with others as much as possible. Report an error

16:17 Or whatever other purpose you are here for, if it's possible to expand beyond yourself, turning that focus towards your ability to be able to help others. Report an error

16:33 That would be what we call a Mahāyāna motivation, a greater vehicle motivation of wanting to reach a place of full enlightenment, become a fully awakened being, a Buddha, means fully awakened one. But the reason is so we have an unlimited ability to be a benefit to others. Just see how that sits with your motivation. Report an error

17:03 So Report an error

· · ·

18:30 may this time together be beneficial as much as possible. Report an error

18:37 So relax, you can open your eyes. It's Report an error

18:47 2.13 according to this clock. So what I'd like to do is I'd love to use this book. I would recommend How to Practice by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. And it's a beautiful practice book from His Holiness that takes us through something called the Three Higher Trainings. So the Three Higher Trainings in this tradition are the basis is morality. Report an error

19:17 So we're going to talk about morality, because when you hear about morality, I had a lot of aversion, you know, what does that mean? Morality, people making rules about how I'm supposed to be. But I'm going to explain about, it's also called ethical conduct. Why does that lend to our happiness? Okay, and based on that, then you build concentration. Report an error

19:38 That's about meditative stabilization. And then the reason that by having good conduct, And basically conducting yourselves in a positive way, you do get happier from it. And I think most of you know that living in society that you see if you're yelling at somebody, it doesn't contribute to your happiness. Report an error

19:58 So how do I prevent myself from yelling at somebody? What happens when I get angry that lends to my yelling at somebody? How can I prevent my getting angry? And where do delusions like anger and confusion and attachment come from? Because if I understand where they come from, then I can understand how to basically go to battle with them. So when I say go to battle, I'm only using words like that because one of the greatest things that lends to our happiness that we'll talk about is something called bodhicitta. Report an error

20:33 Some of you are familiar with this term. Bodhicitta is a Sanskrit term that means the enlightened attitude. So bodhi is enlightenment. Report an error

20:44 Chitta is mine. So the enlightened. What this enlightened attitude is about is the basis of Mahāyāna Buddhism, of Tibetan Buddhism, cherishing others more than myself. Report an error

20:59 So in a sense to follow that path, which a lot of people that come to the center are on, you become in a sense, you want to carry yourself around as a bodhisattva warrior. So everything you do comes from there. So for me, for you to be happy, for you to lend to your happiness, It doesn't become a separate thing of well now I'm at this Buddhist center so now I'm practicing Dharma. You know how people go to church on Sunday and they feel really good on Sunday and then on Monday they're cheating somebody out of money at their business. Report an error

21:33 It doesn't really work that way and I'm not just using that as an example. People in all kinds of religions do that. So it's a matter of when you're in the supermarket you have to also be practicing Dharma there. You have to be a spiritual person there. So first of all let's talk about what is it to be a spiritual person. Report an error

21:51 For you, what is it to be a spiritual person? Any ideas of what that... Report an error

22:11 Right. Report an error

22:32 So practicing Dharma, which I'm equating right now with being a spiritual person, what are you trying to pay attention to? What's the fundamental... attention, if so, you know, regarding it, you're participating in that there, you're, know, struggling. Report an error

22:41 I don't know what it might be for you. It might be individual things for all of you. Report an error

22:56 Okay. So more of an external focus. And when you're saying also you're trying to be aware, it's about mindfulness, right? Your intention. Right. Yeah, yeah. But all those things. And so what we would also say is to practice Dharma and be a spiritual person. One of the main parts about it is that what I'm doing is I'm focused on, and I want to be aware and I want to focus on the outside world, basically about how to counter my delusions when they arise in the mind. Report an error

23:34 So what they say actually in Tibetan Buddhism is if you're really practicing Dharma, it's about countering delusion. So some people say, well, practicing Dharma to me is that I have an altar and I light a candle every day, you know, or I'm a vegetarian. People have these ideas and all those things are fantastic. But if you're really practicing Dharma, if you're not countering delusion in your mind, you're missing the point. Report an error

24:00 So you're countering delusion. You can counter delusion in your mind when you get in your car and drive down the street, when you're pushing your supermarket into the market, buying groceries, when you're crossing the street, when you're taking public transportation. Report an error

24:15 All these things have to be integrated. This is what lends to the happiness. Report an error

24:32 I can't force it on you I can't say this is how it is for you because everybody's experience is different what I love about this tradition is it's about your experience it's about how you want to come to happiness that, so I actually wanted to say as well How impressed I am that you came based on how to be, I mean, how to be happy is a fantastic, people want to be happy. So I'm really glad people did come because I was just feeling like, oh, that title's been around for so long. Report an error

24:57 So I'm glad that you did come to say, okay, we still want to know about it. You know, it's not too old for us. We're still energized here. But that's the point is it really comes from your experience. So this first thing is about countering delusion. So this is what we'll look at and I found this book so useful because His Holiness talks about A little bit also of his own experiences, which I love when he starts to talk about his own meditation and he might say at one point, I can't remember if it was in this book or another book as well, that he'll say in 1965, you know, then I had a little deepening of something in one of my meditations. Report an error

25:35 But what he has is the sections are all laid out that go through, in a sense, the lamrim, and lamrim means stages of the path. Lama's path and rim are steps or stages. So it's basically the steps on the path to enlightenment. That's what the topics that make up what are called the three higher trainings. Morality, concentration, and I didn't mention the last one yet is wisdom. Report an error

26:05 Wisdom is what counters confusion. We have basic confusion every day in our everyday lives. I recently came back from... India in July, and I've been staying with my family outside Philadelphia on the East Coast. And I grew up there, and they've lived in the same house for 50 years. So that area is familiar to me, but I haven't lived there in over 30 years. So when I drive there, I don't actually know some of the areas unless I'm right around the house, and so I get lost a couple of times. Report an error

26:40 So there's basic confusion on that level. There's another deeper confusion. On a level that we do not understand reality as it really is. So we'll discuss that as well. Because that's what really ultimately lends to your happiness. So I love this book because His Holiness presents each topic and at the end of each section he has a summary of this is how you have to practice. Report an error

27:04 So it's just great. It's very fun. So what he does is one of the things he starts with that I wanted to look at is Report an error

27:15 he talks about the three higher trainings. The reason you need this fundamental morality, this basis of ethical conduct, is again, if you are scattered in thinking that, and I'll just give some examples, and I'm not really judging all these things, but some people, you know, there's clinical evidence that cigarette smoking is bad for your health. Report an error

27:35 Okay, that seems to be a fact now. Okay, so if you go around and really promote this and think it's a really good thing, cigarette smoking, and give out cigarettes to kids and get them to start smoking and get addicted. It's not a really good pattern for good health. It's not going to promote good health for them. So it's things like that and there's a lot of conduct that we do throughout the day that we are confused and we think it's a good thing. Report an error

27:58 So once you start to get clear on what's really the best way to conduct myself, I start proceeding in that way, making patterns. Report an error

28:08 This is all about familiarizing yourself. Gom in Tibetan is meditation. It's a word for meditation. So this room would be called a gompa, a meditation hall, meditation room. But literally, from my understanding, gom is, and feel free, Losang or anyone, please correct me if I say something that is incorrect, is gom means to habituate. Report an error

28:38 It means familiarize. And what we're familiarizing ourselves with is Virtuous mind states, trying to familiarize our mind with virtue. And what happens is sometimes we don't actually know the virtue. So I'll give you an example. For years, a lot before I met the Dharma, I thought that when you had a problem with your phone bill, it was okay to call them up, phone them up, and sometimes the people on the phone didn't seem to really know what they were talking about. Report an error

29:08 This was even before the automated systems where it took you five minutes to even reach a live person. You could get a live person sooner. Sometimes you had to hold. But I thought the way to get my phone bill resolved and to get my service corrected was to yell at telecommunication companies on the phone because that seemed to be the way I got results. Report an error

29:29 First I would talk with them and talk with them and then it wouldn't happen and no, we're not going to do it and then I would start raising my voice. I had a pattern because it seemed like I would get a positive result because I didn't have any understanding of karma. Report an error

29:44 So I was mistaken. If I got a positive result what looked like yelling at the phone company, that actually, you don't get a positive result from a negative activity. Report an error

29:55 And it could be this life, it could be past lives. But as a result I was mistaken and so I kept making this familiar pattern of it was okay to raise my voice in situations. And what happens when you do raise your voice is people get intimidated and they close down and sometimes they would hang up on me. Report an error

30:30 People get freaked out. They don't want to talk to somebody angry and yelling on the phone. So what it does is it alienates you from other people. And you know people that are angry, right? And a lot of times they're very lonely people and people don't want to spend a lot of time around them. Report an error

30:46 So just basic good ethical conduct is this basis and then on that the mind has a much stabler place to meditate from. So then you build on that concentration by developing meditative stabilization in these ways because your mind is more peaceful. Because you know you're living a little bit according to good nature in a sense, to what's called your Buddha nature. Report an error

31:14 Okay, so every being that has a mind, that has a consciousness, is someone we would call sentient. When you hear sentient or sentient beings, okay, sentient means they have a mind, they have a consciousness. And every being that has a consciousness, and this goes down to single-celled organisms, are said in this tradition to have consciousness. Report an error

31:38 They have Buddha nature. And what Buddha nature is, is it's a potential, it's a seed of all of your goodness, all of the good qualities. Report an error

31:50 It's a seed of infinite love, compassion. Loving kindness, things like that. So every one of us has that. We all have something in common. So it also helps when you have adversity to someone. I should have realized that people, now I realize this, people in the telecommunication companies, if I have a problem, I'm speaking with somebody who has Buddha nature. They're just like me. Report an error

32:15 And just like me, we all want the same thing. We all want to be happy and we don't want to suffer. I mean, is there anyone here that doesn't want that? Report an error

32:27 I mean, everybody wants that. I know that people have different ideas of what happiness means to them and what suffering means. But fundamentally, everybody wants to be happy and they don't want to suffer. So the more I realize that now when I have a problem with something, let's say something breaks in the house or, you know, something, I bought something in the store, it doesn't work and I bring it back to somebody, some salesperson, I realize it's the same, you know, there's a brother-sisterhood with all these beings. Report an error

32:56 There's a connectedness with everybody. This lends to my happiness because now we're in this together and I need them, I rely on them to help me. And they rely on me to come to the store to buy something, to purchase something. That's how everything works in the world. So the more things are interconnected like that and the more we're aware of that, the happier we're going to be. Report an error

33:21 So what happens sometimes is city people... For years I lived in cities. I lived in San Francisco for several years. And I lived on East Coast cities for several years and other cities. And city people have a little less sense, and not necessarily, a little less sense sometimes of the community. Report an error

33:40 There's too many people. So sometimes we live in spaces we need to go away. I'm in my room. I'm in my house. I'm in my flat. This is what I'm doing. And so some years ago, Seichen Ling, this center was located in Noe Valley. And I lived there for three years. And there was a tremendous storm and I had just left the center to move to Boulder Creek near Santa Cruz and I was running Vajrapani Institute. Report an error

34:06 And in that time there was a tremendous storm in the city and 1,000 trees went down in the city overnight from the storm. It was a big windstorm. So what happened is the PG &E, the electric company, had to go out because some of them went over power lines. So the tree guys wouldn't come until the power was stopped for them to cut the tree up. Report an error

34:26 But the thing is in the city there's only so many tree guys, tree people, tree removal, because how many trees are down in the city at any time? So everybody was waiting and people were blocked into their driveways because a tree had gone down across their driveway and actually at Seichenling unfortunately one tree went down in the neighbor's engine of their car next door. Report an error

34:47 And it was quite dramatic and in Golden Gate Park there were tons of trees down everywhere, blocking paths and roads and things like that. So people had to wait. And what happened in Boulder Creek where I was, which was a rural place in a redwood forest, when trees go down and you're driving home and you're blocked, all of a sudden a neighbor comes out with a chainsaw and says, or you go and you walk to the neighbor's house and you say, oh, can you help me with this tree? Report an error

35:13 And the neighbor then will say, wait, let me go get the other neighbor. And they come out with a chainsaw and suddenly all three of us are in there together moving the limbs and working together. So it all works like that. I just heard... This morning on the phone I was talking to my parents and it was a really sweet thing. They live in a suburban area, so it's not a city area, it's not a country area, but one of the neighbors came and he a little bit takes care of them because my parents are old now and he's my age and he came to their house to clean out their rain gutters without saying anything to them. Report an error

35:46 It was just really sweet. And my father came out and he's like, what are you doing? He's like, well I'm cleaning out your rain gutters. And he's like, because... You know, I was so appreciative because you fixed my radio the other day, because my father fixes electronics equipment. So my dad had done something for him, and my dad didn't want to be paid for it, you know, he's a friend. Report an error

36:04 So the guy came back and said, well, great, I'm going to clean out his rain gutters. And then in the meantime, when this happened, my parents' next-door neighbor came over and he had a broken, his dryer had broken. And again, because my dad's handy, my dad advised him and said, you need this part, and he was great, and he got the part and he fixed the driver, and then he gave my dad some food. Report an error

36:23 This is what makes the world go round in a positive way. So there's many ways you can think in your communities, how am I interrelated to people? Report an error

36:38 How am I interrelated to them and how can I contribute to that that makes me happier? Now this isn't just about making ourselves happier, but initially it has to start here. Because if you are not happy, you're not going to contribute to others' happiness. We know miserable people, right? I need to free myself from this suffering. Report an error

37:25 So then we've got this meditative stabilization once I'm realizing how to conduct myself, how to have this ethical behavior. Then I can build on that peace of mind, I can build meditative stabilization. Why do I want to build meditative stabilization and have very, very good concentration in meditation? Because I use it to apply it to the nature of reality, emptiness, how things really exist. Report an error

37:56 Okay, and this would be in a meditative way. Once I understand intellectually the nature of reality and how things exist, then I use my meditative stabilization, meditate on that, until I have what's called a direct perception of emptiness. Okay, and then everything changes. So those are some, Holiness starts off with these fundamentals of the three, what I call the three higher trainings. Report an error

38:23 But he goes into, the next thing he goes into is suffering. And this isn't something that we're... That thrilled to think about as our suffering, but it happens to be the first teaching the Buddha ever gave. The first teaching the Buddha gave, most of you are familiar, the Four Noble Truths is what it's called. Report an error

38:43 The first truth is suffering exists. The second is there's a cause to the suffering. It's one thing to understand suffering exists. Where did it come from? Cause of suffering. The third is that there is an end to the suffering. That's hopeful. I'm not stuck with the suffering. And the fourth noble truth is there's a path to the end. There's actually a process that's laid out of how do I end the suffering. So what His Holiness says as an example, and these are all practical applications for you. Report an error

39:18 Initially, to lend to your happiness is examine your motivation. So here's the first thing you can do. I highly recommend this. I mean, how many of you honestly have somewhat of a consistent practice every day? Some kind of sitting or something you do. A little bit you do, because some people don't know. I know it's very hard to get started like that. So here's something you can do if you're interested in this. It's very easy. When you wake up in the morning and you're really lying there just opening your eyes and realizing you're awake, and maybe your alarm goes off and that wakes you up, but there's always a couple... Report an error

39:53 Do some of you get out of bed right away? A lot of people don't, right? There's a couple minutes you can lie there, right? Even if you do get out of bed, but a lot of times there's a couple minutes... And you're wishing the alarm didn't go off and you're lying there. Okay. Set your motivation for the day. You don't need to be on any esoteric level of Buddhism and have studied for 18 years, nothing. Report an error

40:18 You lie there and you wake up. You are alive. This is one of my early reflections. I am alive today. I've woken up. I get another day. Death is coming. I don't know when it's coming. It is definitely coming. But right now, I'm alive. Fantastic. Report an error

40:37 Okay, how do I want the day to go? Because there's many different ways the day can go. And a lot of times we feel victim, right? This happened to me today. Or, you know, I got a fender bender on the way to work. Or the muni was totally packed this morning. And I left a little later and it was really packed and it was just jammed with people and it was really hot in there. Report an error

40:59 And so we feel like it's happening to us. But it's my attitude. Okay, so I'd like to have a really good attitude today so that... Possibly I could affect the day in a positive way. How would I like the day to go? I would like to make meaning of my life today. This could be my last day. So I would like to make meaning of my life today and I would like to try to promote in myself as much positive behavior as possible today. Report an error

41:28 That's my motivation for the day. Like going to work, whatever you're doing today, you have a day off, whatever it is, that's what I'm doing. And that takes about... What was that, 30 seconds? And so with that motivation I'm now going to wake up, get up and do all my morning things and do my day. Because that's one thing that really helps is check your motivation. You can try it, you can practice for the next week, just see does that do anything for you. Report an error

41:56 Another thing that I really like, that I really find helps people is at the end of the day you check in with yourself again. It's hard if you lie down in bed and do it because you'll fall asleep. So if there's a way that you can sit. Sit upright or wherever you are and just think, okay, that's right, today when I got up I had this motivation. Because usually throughout the whole day we forget. Report an error

42:20 But I remembered, I was back in this vision, that's right, I set this motivation. And how did it go today? So reflect, honestly. First look at the good stuff. I was a little bit more spacious with that guy at work. There's this person at work I don't like, and today I had a little bit more patience for them. Report an error

42:40 That's really good. And then you take a moment to rejoice that that was a really good thing to do. We don't rejoice enough, really, at our good stuff. As soon as you make a mistake, I don't know how many of you fall into this, as soon as you make a mistake, do you ever obsess about it again and you revisit it and they said this about me and they said that and I can't believe I did that, I was so stupid. Report an error

43:03 But then you do something well and people say that project at work, fantastic, or it was a great thing that you did for your mother. You go, yeah, okay. We never want to say, yeah, that was good. That was a nice thing I did. Not in an egomaniacal way. In something that's touching reality. Yes, I'm a good person. I have Buddha nature. I'm not a Buddha yet, but I have Buddha nature. I have a potential that I'm trying to uncover. Report an error

43:31 So this rejoicing really helps cut those patterns of I'm not good enough, I never do anything right. All the mistakes. We always make mistakes. We're humans. That's okay. So see if you have the rejoicing. You're reflecting. How did the day go today? Report an error

43:51 I set this motivation. What did I do along those lines? Fantastic. And then you look at what messed up. Sometimes we make a mistake and something really went wrong. Oh, I lost my patience with that person. I yelled at that guy or I didn't call my friend back because I can't stand talking to her. Whatever the things are, I didn't help that woman at the store, the supermarket. There's so many things that happen. I didn't give up my seat for the person with all the packages on the bus today. Report an error

44:21 Whatever it is. And you say, all right, I didn't do that. It didn't go very well. That wasn't my intention, but I was just thinking of myself. And then what you do before you sleep is, okay, my determination then is the next time I'm on the bus and I see the person, I'm going to give up my seat. I determine I will do that. And the next time I see the person at work, I will watch my breathing and try to breathe a little bit more deeply, because when you see people you don't like, the breathing gets really shallow, you get stressed. Report an error

44:55 Anytime you meet with conflict and aversion, and when that happens, the heart goes... I don't mean the organ of the heart, the heart-mind experience. We'll talk about that in a minute. This gets very tight in here. We know that feeling. And then what happens is I'm not thinking very spaciously. Report an error

45:15 Okay, so that's when I mess up. That's when I react to the person at work. So the next time I see them, I'm going to try to count to five and not react so much to what they're saying, but I'm just going to keep focus on my breathing if I find they're really irritating me so that I will not react in a negative way. Report an error

45:32 If I can catch my mind, I won't react like that. And then you say, and with that determination to do that, I now have to sleep. I need to rest my body, my mind, my spirit. I have to do that so that I can be healthy tomorrow, so that I can have a more positive motivation and be able, if I can, to help more beings I encounter as much as I can. Report an error

45:58 And with that motivation to help others, I will practice the yoga of sleeping. And then, you're out. But then your sleep is virtuous. Sleeping without a motivation? Nothing. Ordinary activity. The more virtue I can imprint, so the more, if you have a motivation, even going to the bathroom can be a virtuous activity. Report an error

46:20 It's true. So first reflect on your motivation. And so what happens is if you try this, and you have to leave yourself notes, because in the beginning we never remember. Okay, so I'm a bit, do you know those post-it notes, the sticky notes? I'm an addict at post-its. I leave them all over to remind me about things. Leave yourself notes in whatever way. Report an error

46:43 I have people that had students that have post-its on their dashboard of their car because they commute to work driving. So that reminds them. How do they want to drive? They want to drive with a good motivation. Leave them on your refrigerator or in your bathroom, on the bathroom mirror. Because you might have forgotten by the time you get out of bed. Report an error

47:03 And then there it is, motivate. Or did you do your motivation? Or rejoice. Whatever your note is, it's your own special note. You leave your own notes and your own words of what makes sense to you. There used to be a thing in California some years, people were into these things called affirmations. Do you remember that? Affirmations, like you'd... Report an error

47:22 Wake up in the morning and it never resonated much with me, but people would wake up and I love myself. I am a good person. And they would say these things over and over. And why? Because it leaves an imprint. So you might as well leave a positive imprint. So the first thing is to check this motivation and get a motivation going. Report an error

47:42 And then what happens is you might also have post-its at your office. I don't know, what kind of work do people do? Do you Report an error

47:55 work in an office during the day? In a day job, right? In a day job? What kind of work do you do, Chris? Report an error

48:19 That's great. And are you mostly circulating on floors with physicians? Do you work in a lecture setting or an office? some ago they invited a team into the hospital settings to bring to teacher positions that wellness and so it's been to bring that into Report an error

48:26 I was at Located Internal Medicine. Report an error

48:36 you know, it's a lot of teaching about that a human being who comes into your office is not just, know, parts or that sickness. It's a whole human being. And so there's been a huge movement. And we've succeeded, actually, because the hospital has Tai Chi and Qigong. Report an error

49:01 Great. That's great. Some people have asked me about... Teaching meditation in corporations and in hospitals and, you know, because these are areas that need it. I mean, hospitals obviously for well-being and corporations because people get so stressed and they've lost perspective and there's corporations that are starting, have been starting to do that. Report an error

49:25 that of aquatic analgesics. pain. And so from there, you know, we have to use a medical model just to get in. And then from there they can understand that it's helpful for other diseases like diabetes and then stress management, depression. Right. And do you work in an office predominantly? I have a private practice and I also work intensively. Right. Now I'm just thinking of where you leave your notes. Report an error

49:55 You have a day job and where you could put your, you know, like where it helps you. Sometimes you can have your own little secret note that means something to you or, you know. I mean, if it works for you. I know Yale University is part of a, I just saw this online, a study with substance abusers and things, and they're starting to do that, to use meditation in that. Report an error

50:21 And I was quite impressed with, there are all these materials online you can download for free to be part of this program to train, to work with substance abusers with meditation. Yeah, it was quite interesting. So there's more and more common mainstream. mainstream getting into it when the Buddhist centers have been doing it for 30 years, you know, already in this country, 35 years or so and kind of, you just moved here, but what kind of work have you been doing or have you been So you've got a place where you're going to study or a desk or something like that or even on your books and notebooks because sometimes I have things I'm carrying around and I stick a note there. Report an error

50:59 Some people have planners. I'm still old-fashioned because I don't have the electronic kind. So some people have notes there that they'll open it up and it'll say something like that. What kind of work? Oh, fantastic. So you have some kind of office you check into and things like that or lockers and things you put, you can keep things in it. Report an error

51:23 And what kind of? At Kaiser. Right, Report an error

51:39 right. Report an error

51:45 Right. Report an error

51:51 -hmm. Report an error

52:03 Right, Report an error

52:08 right, right. Report an error

52:12 That's a really big frustration with people I know in the medical field because I have several friends that are doctors and that seems to be their greatest challenge. And, you know, they had an idea when they got into medicine of how they wanted to help people and then because of the financial restraints. Report an error

52:30 From the insurance companies, they've been really limited and they're really battling against that one. Two of them have left the personal care now and they're doing other jobs in medicine because it wasn't what they wanted to do. I really admire what you're doing to try to get that to somehow make the system work a little better. There's a doctor I've gone to in the Santa Cruz area that because of his frustration and he also, I guess, He started his own health center in a simple house. He bought a house and then made it with massage therapists and there's an acupuncture that works there and there's a social worker that works there. Report an error

53:12 So they do counseling and all kinds of different therapies and then he's an MD who treats people there. But he only deals with maybe Blue Cross, I think is the only insurance he takes because he didn't want to get... Report an error

53:27 sometimes spend an hour with you in there, which is, you know, because I've seen other friends where it's like 15 to 20 minute increments for a GP. he'll be in there for an hour if that's important. Talking about other, like not even talking about your illness, it's like, what happened at your job, you know, last month, last year, and so it's interesting. So it'd be great if you, it's difficult to do that, but if somehow that could be introduced in ways to. Report an error

53:55 Because it seems like it's starting to really degenerate in this country, the medical system, for some people. I think not for the wealthy, but for some people they're kind of falling through the cracks. Yeah, I think, you know, clearly that's a challenge. But I think that what I have found, whether it's in that setting or just even in my personal life, is that when I'm not centered or present, you know, because, I mean, let's just be able to talk about patient care. Report an error

54:25 for a moment. Patients will work, my experience, they'll work very, very hard to be seen by you and to be heard. and that'll take... Thank you for your time. found that as I have sort of shifted my attitude Report an error

54:59 takes far effort. now, you know, when I greet a patient, and this one, you know, every 30 minutes, I make it really clear when I'm greeting somebody to really look at them. Report an error

55:20 I mean, there's nothing like meeting a clinician who just calls your name and then off to the room to to go. go and the person is just like not Report an error

55:29 it'll just take so much time and I have found that in my personal life if I meet with a friend or my family and I'm just not present people in the family do all sorts of things to be heard and understood and seen and have a moment and it just takes one more almost that suffering effort Mm-hmm. Report an error

55:58 I also think on another level, not to diverge too much, but in whatever you're doing and all of you are in areas where you're encountering a lot of people that are not Buddhists and are not spiritual people and are not interested and they might even find it a little bit weird. So you get a little quiet about it, which is normal. Report an error

56:33 with somebody so building mindfulness we you hear this word mindfulness all the time building mindfulness is making the mind full and what i'm making the mind full of is positive Report an error

56:47 conducts positive attributes so that positive is about also being present you know you're with somebody and you're and they know when you're with them or they know when you know this really drives me crazy lately when people are on these electronic devices and they're talking talking to to you you. They're not really with me. They're busy with something here. Report an error

57:07 And I'm like, you're not done, just tell me when you're done. Because it helps for really communication because they're not going to hear everything you're saying and they miss something and then later, you know. So I think it's really helpful and the thing I was going to add was bringing in the motivation. If you start in the morning and at night and get used to these little bookends around your day, that's the way I see it, and you start to get really good with it, meaning you're doing it every day, because initially you won't do it every day, you'll forget. Report an error

57:41 So don't worry if you forget a day and you miss a day, just start the next day. or you miss two days Everything for me about my practice is always begin again, begin again. There's a new fresh, you know, every day my mind's different. Do you ever notice that? You wake up every day and it's a different experience. It's your same mind with all your stuff, but it's a totally different thing all day, every day. Report an error

58:03 And then through the day it changes. You might wake up in a really bad mood and then two hours later, okay, I feel a little better now. You know, where everything was going really well this morning, and then I had lunch, and then suddenly the whole afternoon, it just, nothing, everything I was supposed to do, it didn't work. This happens all the time. Report an error

58:23 If you check in with your mind, though, more often, and keep checking the motivation, it could totally sustain you, because it's all about your attitude, whether you're going to have a good day today or a bad day is under your control. It's not about other people doing it to you and you miss the bus and there was a minor car accident and your colleague is upset with you because of this decision that you made. Report an error

58:47 It's all a matter of how you're going to approach that with your mind. So once you get better about, if you like to do a morning motivation and evening check-in with yourself, you might get patterned to check-in through the day with your motivation. And that's what really starts transforming your mind and you'll be much happier doing it. Report an error

59:07 You know, it could be every two hours. Some people keep little books and little notes, notebooks to check in. How did it go? Because usually by the end of the day you can't remember half of what happened. Anyway. But if you can remember through the day, and that's why I was saying stick a note somewhere that you'll remember what's happening. And Lo Tsong, I'm sorry I didn't ask you. Report an error

59:25 Are you a working monk or what kind of other working? Oh, very nice. And do you live in the city? In Berkeley. Right. Oh, very nice. That's excellent. So you're probably pretty mindful through the day, I would imagine, in that field. That's great. So that would be one thing, is check this motivation to get going. Report an error

59:50 And I like here, His Holiness also mentions specifically having a non-violent, non-abusive motivation for the day. Even going into language like that, because look at the world, it's full of conflict, isn't it? It's full of things like that. Okay. Oh, the other thing I wanted to ask you. Does anyone need a stretch break or want to just take a quick break? How's everybody doing? A little bit of stretch? Let's take a stretch. If you need to go to the bathroom, please do. Report an error

1:00:32 to get a cup of Report an error

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1:01:44 nothing other than this one. Well, that one's the one for you, isn't it? Yeah. Is that the other one? not. It's the other one. Yeah, it's the other one. Yeah. is what I'm going to do. I'm going to start working on it. Report an error

1:01:58 Yeah, it's a bit warm. Thank you. Report an error

1:02:24 Thank you very much. Is your room, like, scorching here? There's the one upstairs where the sun gets warm. There's the one upstairs where the trim is warm. Oh, okay. It wasn't on. Okay. should I shut my windows upstairs? it on all the way up? It is. Report an error

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1:03:30 I just wanted to... Yeah, Report an error

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1:04:45 I'd like to pretty soon, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just a quick break. There Report an error

1:05:13 we go. It's... Oh, Report an error

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1:06:09 we got the air on. That's good. Report an error

1:06:15 Ah, sure. Yeah, sure. It might just lead a little less distraction. It's funny because you never really needed... It's so rare you need air conditioning in San Francisco. I didn't even know they have it in this house. Somebody else wanted it on. And it's funny, air conditioning in San Francisco. Report an error

1:06:37 So another thing in looking at your happiness is you've got this motivation you might try to get going. The other thing is looking at suffering in your own life. So people say, well, I know I suffer and this is how it is, but to really look at it, to really look at the suffering. Okay, look at how you suffer. Okay, we've got physical and mental pain. Okay, so that's one thing. Report an error

1:07:06 Physical pain is a little bit more, I'd say it's easier to focus on it. And when you have a really bad headache or you have migraines and you're dealing with people, I think in the medical fields you're dealing with people in pain all the time. I'm talking about your pain now. So physical pain we see. Yeah, come on in. It's okay. Report an error

1:07:34 Okay, so we've got physical and mental pain. Look at that. And the thing is... That's okay. No worries. Mental pain... a very different deal. Report an error

1:07:50 You okay? You got it? That's okay. Report an error

1:08:02 to grab it for you there? That's okay. Report an error

1:08:19 The next Report an error

1:08:25 thing I was talking about is looking at your suffering, looking at how you suffer. Physical pain we mentioned, you stub your toe, you break your leg, you have cancer. Migraine headaches, we understand that and you really look at it. You understand how you suffer from that. You need to start to understand how you really suffer from it. Report an error

1:08:55 Mental pain is more subtle. That's difficult to look at that. So what happens with mental pain and one example, and we probably all know people like this, but I have a very old close friend who now lives in Burbank, California. I've known her since we were six. She came from the East Coast as well. Report an error

1:09:19 She's suffering unbelievably mentally, I think, and partly it's from having a very controlling partner and they have two little girls now and the guy, her husband, is about to declare bankruptcy for a second time and has just never been able to manage taking care of them and supporting them and she has an idea about how she wants to be supported and how she wanted to live her life. Report an error

1:09:45 And she's now close to 50, and it's just a disaster. The whole thing's been really, really sad. So for years I've been talking with her on the phone, and she has all these ideas about her happiness. And to me it seems like, do you know that expression, pie in the sky? Like it's like a fantasy. I just can't imagine how she really thinks this is going to happen. Report an error

1:10:09 So there's so much mental torment, because she kind of puts an idea out there, She never gets it. She's grasping at these little clouds that go by and then she'll say, oh, I don't understand what happened. And her husband has these delusions of some kind of business that he's in and he does these deals and then the people don't give him the money. Report an error

1:10:29 And this has been going on for years. I'm like, how many years do you keep courting fantasy? So you can look at what kind of fantasy projections you put out there. Some of them are extremely subtle. And so one of the big ways we do these fantasy projections is in our relationships. So I don't know how many of you have had this. You see the object of attraction. Report an error

1:10:51 There they are. And it could be a very attractive man or woman. And suddenly all the little holes in me have this fixation. Report an error

1:11:02 Here's something that all that's out there, if you really want to look at it, if you want to take emptiness for instance, this view of reality, is that... There's basically sensory data out there. So I give you an example. Here comes this woman, and there's this person that looks, there's flesh, and there's a head, and there's a torso, and there's arms and legs, like that. Report an error

1:11:26 And then what happens is, based on my karmic seeds, okay, karma, are you all familiar somewhat with karma? Karma is what goes around, comes around, okay? But the law of cause and effect, okay, meaning... Everything I think with my mind, everything I say with my speech and everything I do with my body definitely has a result in the future. Report an error

1:11:51 I'm creating imprints in my consciousness that will ripen in the future. If I plant a good imprint, that ripens in happiness. Negative imprint ripens in my suffering. So you say, what's a good imprint? A good imprint would be buying someone flowers with... Really the intent that I really want them to be happy. They're not buying flowers so that they'll think I'm a great person. Buying flowers because they just want to give you flowers because I heard you like flowers and you're happy. Report an error

1:12:25 Taking somebody out to dinner because you just really want to treat them to dinner and they enjoy. Buying somebody a present just out of helping somebody, volunteering with something that you're doing. Helping somebody learn to read, giving food to the homeless, working in an AIDS hospice. There's so many different ways that are positive imprints that you're making. Saying nice things to people sincerely. Not killing, not stealing, not lying, not gossiping. Report an error

1:12:55 Some of the basic stuff, most of the stuff we know. And when we participate in positive conduct, you're planting a positive seed for your future happiness. And when you steal, and stealing, this is how stealing goes. In this room, we are probably not going to steal a car. Very doubtful anyone in here would do that. I don't know if any of you in your workplaces have those luscious supply cabinets of things. Report an error

1:13:26 And I don't know in the medical industry what things that you suddenly are taking home. They're for work. You're supposed to use them at work. But I used to get into our office supply cabinet at one of the offices I worked in. Scissors, staplers, staples, paperclips. Legal pads, pens, they're for my office, but I used to take them home. That's stealing. That's a form of stealing. Making long-distance phone calls on your company's bill and not paying for it is stealing. Report an error

1:13:58 When you go to a restaurant, have you ever been served an entree or you're served something and the wait person made a mistake in the bill to your advantage, but you ate the food and you don't say anything to them. You notice it on the bill and you don't say anything. That's stealing. Report an error

1:14:15 So that's where we get in trouble, are those little things. Not that we're going to steal a car and things like that. So killing with us as well goes down to the insect level. That's a hard one for people. But for Buddhists, our main premise is not harming others, so we would avoid killing insects. So when you kill an insect in our tradition, again, you're planning future suffering for yourself. Report an error

1:14:42 Unfortunately, karma doesn't work where when your foot is coming down on the ant or the little insect that you're crushing and all your limbs start bursting apart. It doesn't work like that. It doesn't ripen instantly. It could ripen in this lifetime. It could ripen in a future lifetime. But that's on a very brief level how karma works. Report an error

1:15:02 And it's quite difficult to fully understand karma until you're a highly realized being. But what we try to do is make positive imprints. Report an error

1:15:11 Contributing to our happiness and avoid negative imprints. So you look at the mental suffering, understanding the mental suffering, Report an error

1:15:24 understand as well when you suffer mentally, can I get a sense to realize instead of the dwelling and obsession in it, so that it sometimes becomes more negative for me, I'm always like this, you know people like that. Today was horrible and tomorrow is horrible and you get a little depressed or frustration with a certain system within which you're working. Report an error

1:15:46 The other thing in this sense is when you're looking at the suffering, it's temporary. It will not always be that way. Whatever frustration you're battling with now will not always be that way. That for me helps me to loosen up the suffering. I acknowledge that I'm suffering. This is what it's like. Even in our Buddhist organization, it's not a perfect organization because it's run by humans who are not enlightened yet. Report an error

1:16:15 They have great intention. But sometimes I get frustrated. You know, I'll say, why did they do this? Why did they set it up like that? That's not really helpful. But it's temporary. It's always changing. The system's always changing. I know sometimes not changing for the better, but it's not always stuck that way. One example is when the Berlin Wall came down and when that type of what they labeled communist in that part of the world in Eastern Europe ended in that form. Report an error

1:16:48 That seemed impossible in my lifetime. I grew up in the 60s and the Cold War was huge at that point. So the fact that that would ever end and that the USSR would say we're not managing it right now, we're going to separate all these satellites and let them go off and make their own governments, I couldn't believe that was ever going to happen. Report an error

1:17:08 So things like that happen. We're hoping there might be a big change in the government. This November, the administration running this country in hopefully early next year. I'd like to think so. So look at your suffering. We have to get real about our suffering. How are we suffering? Report an error

1:17:35 Yeah, absolutely. Let me just go one more thing. Reflect how you are caught. This is part of looking at the suffering. Reflect on how you are caught in a pervasive process of conditioning. That rather than being under your control is under the influence of karma and afflictive emotions. And what that means is that if you begin to get a sense of karma that maybe these activities do lend to my suffering and these activities contribute to my happiness, all I can really start to control is from this moment onward. Report an error

1:18:14 There's a lot of things I created, let's say just first in this life, and I don't remember all of them, but there's... There's things that happen. And then if you believe in reincarnation, which we have a fundamental teaching in Buddhism about that, there's past lives. But even if you don't believe in that in this life, there's a lot of activities I created before I knew any better. And you know that as children. There's stuff you do until you're taught. Report an error

1:18:40 You don't know. And you just do things. And sometimes as we become adults in our ignorance, we just do that because we don't know proper conduct. For a long time I killed insects. Nobody... Report an error

1:18:54 it was negative is not necessarily just from somebody telling me, don't kill insects. That system never worked for me. I always had to experiment myself. So when I heard this in Buddhism, said, well, I'll try it for a week. I was living in India. You know how many insects in India? Unbelievable. I said, for a week I will just try to, and I, you know, I had a cup. Report an error

1:19:17 And there were spiders in my room and I got the cup and I had a card and I took them outside and I have to say it made me happier. Because you see the spiders scamper off and I thought, well, hey, you know, that's my life. Somebody came down and put their foot on me. Like, why is a spider, I know it looks like it's a lower life form and you would say that possibly of a lower brain, lower, smaller brain and lower neurological activity, it seems. Report an error

1:19:46 I'm not valuing that my life is so much greater. I maybe have the potential to do more with my life than the spider, possibly. I can't say for sure. But when I saw it go, when I saw the flies, I would liberate. Instead of swatting them on the window, it's disgusting, isn't it? You know, the body smashed on the window and you're like, hmm. It's a little bit disgusting, even if you're into killing insects, you know. Report an error

1:20:07 So then I would get the cup and then you see the fly, you know, their name, fly. That's their purpose for being is they fly. And you'd see it, you know, and I'd have this little like, freedom. So does that make sense though about just looking, so I tried it for a week and I actually felt a lot better and then I just kept doing it. Report an error

1:20:29 And now, well now it's been many, many, many years, but now what's interesting is the imprint it's made for me is somebody one time was sitting across the table from me and there was an ant on the table, I didn't see it. But all of a sudden, at the last minute, she said, oh, there's an ant, and she just smashed it. And I was so alarmed. I was so kind of freaked out of like, ah! I mean, I don't get that when I read the newspaper and read about the war in Iraq and how many people got bombed. Report an error

1:20:54 I don't freak out because I engage in reality. But I'm so adverse to killing insects now that, you know, so I'm really into kind of saving, helping liberate life and things like that. So those things become startling, and what happens is just there must be an imprint in me now, too. I do find it does lend to my happiness. Report an error

1:21:30 You were talking about mental suffering. Report an error

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1:22:22 Right. I think there's a few things going on with different mental experiences we have as internal mental experiences. If you begin to get an understanding of karma, you've created the situation for whatever we have. We all have different situations in us. Some people are very, very angry people. Anger to me is like a mental illness, like one of the most serious kinds. Report an error

1:22:48 So we've got that operating and some people might be bipolar. Report an error

1:23:06 you. It's just acknowledging, okay, there's no one outside of me to blame. I do know people with different mental illnesses or things, and they like to blame other people and not take responsibility. Report an error

1:23:22 But I'm just looking at one way to look at it. And then what we would say is if you realize that there's, first of all, it is temporary. It will not go on for all time. And it may be this life. Maybe this life, this is how it is. But if you think that there might be another life to go through, that's not going to continue on. But what you can do in this life, on one level, on a medical level, is people take medication. Report an error

1:23:46 And sometimes medication is really helpful. There is, I know people that have had tremendous help from certain medication. I'm not a real advocate for over-medicating and I know reasons why they don't like to be on the medication. You know, I've heard, I have several friends that are bipolar so I understand that but if there's, and there's some people that have worked with balancing their medication with spiritual practices that they have found really helpful, particularly meditation, that they found it really lends to balancing their illness, particularly with bipolar illness. Report an error

1:24:17 And the other thing is doing purification practices which bring you back to the spiritual side that help you start purifying whatever karma creates that and I have known people with very serious illnesses, chronic diseases and cancer that have gone into remission from the cancer based on their doing effective purification. Report an error

1:24:36 So those are ways I think internally that you can totally... I wonder if I could ever get off the medication one day and bring my mind into a more stable place and some people found some spiritual practices really helpful. Report an error

1:25:05 That's great. Yeah, that's fantastic. I would just say keep on. If you like Buddhism, there might be other spiritualities you find work for you. But if you like Buddhism, to keep learning more and more about meditation, I would also recommend this book called How to Meditate for Anyone. I use it all the time, actually. Not all the time, but I use it in a lot of courses. It's a basic approach in how to learn how to meditate in this tradition. Report an error

1:25:32 There's other meditation books as well. From other teachers and other traditions. I happen to like that one because Venerable Sange Khadra is a friend of mine. Kathleen McDonald is her English name and I think that's where they have her as the author of the book. But she takes you from the posture to the motivation to obstacles you get into and then she actually has meditations. And what you do is you don't have to memorize it all but you open to a page like this. Report an error

1:25:59 It'll say the meditation. It gives you like a one page introduction. Let's say meditation on love. It'll give you an introduction of why is that important and what is love and then there's the actual practice. So then she goes through how you meditate on love and what you do is you read a sentence and then just stop and sit with the sentence. Report an error

1:26:22 Think, reflect on the sentence, sit in the proper posture of the sentence and then when you feel you've done enough of that, go to the next sentence. Then what does it say? And then you keep doing it and let's say you might take a meditation in the book. And do it every day for a week. By the next week you may not need the book. You may know exactly what you want to do in the meditation. You can change meditations a little bit, but that gets you more into meditation and it's a fantastic book. Report an error

1:26:48 It's very easy to follow and I'd recommend that. Just for starters, yeah, we can talk about other things too. Okay, so realizing that this suffering is coming from past karma and it's coming from something else called afflictive emotions. Okay, so here's what His Holiness says then. Report an error

1:27:10 So now you've had a little look at, I want to be happy, but now I'm realizing that I suffer. I don't always seem to be suffering, sometimes I'm quite happy, but occasionally I'm not that happy. And what I look at is, so what's happened? What's happened suddenly that I had this great day, it's Saturday, and I came to this course and everything was fine, I felt really good in the morning and I was glad to have a day off and this is what I chose to do on this day and I'm happy about that. Report an error

1:27:39 And then we went along and then it was 12.30 and it was time for lunch and then I didn't like the lunch that they served. This is what happened. Suddenly something, there was an obstacle. Or when I left the course in the afternoon and I had my evening activity and then suddenly I wasn't happy with something. Report an error

1:27:58 This happens all the time, right? You're going along in your day and then, you know, what are some of your situations you encounter? Somebody said something about somebody you work with. Who said that? Somebody you work with. Right, Report an error

1:28:16 good problem. Report an error

1:28:48 Yeah, absolutely, this goes on. problem, And you're the only one in the room that has that problem, I'm sure, right? Report an error

1:28:43 -hmm okay Report an error

1:28:51 This goes on. Right. And another nod over here. And I'm sure all the rest of us have encountered. There's something like that. Something's not working. Right. Report an error

1:29:12 Right. So part of what goes on, there's so many ways to look at this. This is a fantastic problem to deal with. So the first thing is I have to take care of my own mind here. Okay. My own mind right now. And actually I didn't even finish the thing about. ass about that And you can tell. Report an error

1:29:29 Romantic relationships. We'll go back into that later if we have time. But I have to look at my mind and my mind right now is saying this person is incompetent and I'm irritated because it's affecting my job and the job's affecting people's lives, people that come in for care. That's serious. The medical profession can be quite serious at times. We used to joke at the center I was running in Boulder Creek and some people took it so seriously, the work, which was good to a degree, but... Report an error

1:29:58 would really start stressing about something. so my thing, and because you're a surgeon, and then I would say, well, we're not doing brain surgery here. Like, nobody's really going to die because the propane this month cost this much more. I mean, it was a drag, or because the insurance doubled, but fortunately, but in the medical profession, it's pretty serious. So, because people do die because of mistakes and incompetency. Report an error

1:30:20 So I'd start to look at my mind. Okay, this is what, in training, I'm learning to do. Initially Initially, what what happens... happens is Our normal response to things like this is it's your fault. You're incompetent. That guy, unbelievable, the way he cared for the patient. It's unbelievable. So what happens is we're always blaming outwards. If this is in your field of vision and this is in your world and in your reality and you're bumping up against it, the first thing I have to do is take responsibility. Report an error

1:30:47 This is a result of my karma. This is a result of my karma. That's not an easy one to look at. I made the incompetent person. Yeah, you made the incompetent person. You don't make that reality and you don't make the person. But if I'm having a problem with this person, it's because of a negative imprint I've made in my mind. Report an error

1:31:07 Anytime you suffer, okay, you're the one who created that. It's not anybody out there that suffers that created that suffering for you. The Iraq war, if it disturbs you and things like that, I take responsibility that I've created a situation that there is war in my reality on this planet that I live on. Report an error

1:31:28 I take the responsibility. So what that's doing is it's diffusing a little bit of your irritation inside. And what you want to do is calm yourself totally. So it doesn't mean the incompetency will go away necessarily. Sometimes it does. But it's about you preventing an angry reaction to this person. Sometimes you won't even say anything to them, but inside you're going to be frustrated. Okay, and that's going to bother you. So first I have the karmic responsibility. Report an error

1:31:56 The second thing you say then at that point is, okay, I accept the responsibility, I still don't like this and it has to change. Is there anything you can do about it? If there is, your responsibility is you have to do it. In a compassionate way, in a skillful way. So you're not going to take it on in an angry, violent way. Report an error

1:32:18 It has to be a very compassionate, skillful way. You're going to manage it. There's ways we write letters. letters boss, you talk to their superiors, you write a letter to the head of the company. Sometimes we do things like that. Sometimes that's difficult because then you get labeled a troublemaker or it happens to be your boss. So then the other question is, if there's nothing you can do about it, sometimes you weigh and then you realize there's nothing I can do about it. Report an error

1:32:48 And some of the nothing might be that there's many times you weigh, I'm not willing to take this risk. I was in Dharamsala in March when the protests started. In Tibet, and it's a really, I don't know, it's an issue really close to my heart because I know a lot of Tibetans and I've been to Tibet a couple of times and it's really awful what's happening there right now. Report an error

1:33:38 So I'm in Dharamsala and I wanted to go to the protest marches and then some Westerners got arrested and two of them were sent out of the country and one they stamped in their passport they couldn't come back for the life of that passport and one I think had something where they couldn't come back ever. Report an error

1:33:56 know how they would enforce that, but they have a computer log of it. And so then I had friends that warned me because I used to do political work in Washington, D.C., and they said, don't go down there because you'll get thrown out, and it's not going to really help people if you have to leave the country. Report an error

1:34:13 You'd be better here in the country. And it was really horrible for me. You know, I really wanted to do something. So they were hunger strikers as well. And then what I ended up doing was take Taking photos, I went down and I was allowed to take photos of the protests and the hunger strikers and then I wrote to some news agencies here and one of them was published with photos and that was a way to just keep it in the news. Report an error

1:34:36 That was all I felt like I could really do. That's all I could do. And at that point, and I bought some water for the hunger strikers and gave them money and, you know, so I felt totally helpless and I went to a teaching right around them with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. It was a small teaching and His Holiness said, I feel so helpless. I mean, these are His people and here's this powerful world figure who I believe is a Buddha and He said, there's nothing I can do, I feel totally helpless. Report an error

1:35:07 So it doesn't take away necessarily the pain and the suffering, but it's a little bit more of an acknowledgement of I've reflected on what I can do and I'm going to do it and this is what I'm going to do. You feel a bit empowered and you try. And sometimes it doesn't work at all, at least, but that's all I could do and I did it. And now I have to let it go, that there's nothing more I can do. So then I pray. Report an error

1:35:30 Then I make my prayers every night to dedicate for this or for that, which I feel has some help as well. I would continue to do, we have purification practices in our tradition. And you can learn them, there's instruction on them, there's a variety of different kinds of practices. Report an error

1:35:47 Help you to open up your mind a bit to how things actually exist and then that actually create changes in your external reality as well, honestly. So one example is I used to live in Washington DC, which is for me one of the most violent cities in this country. And I got into Buddhism, I did all these practices and I was affected by the violence. Report an error

1:36:14 and I felt afraid from it, and I had some friends, one friend was murdered in Washington, D.C., and I, were many incidences like that around me, I was worried about it, and then I did these practices. Shantideva, His Holiness the Dalai Lama They had a horrible time with somebody they worked with, where their boss was just a complete jerk and treated them really abusively. And they tried to work in the system and tried to, you know, they filed a report, a complaint against them, and other people did as well. Report an error

1:36:58 Because another thing you can do is get co-workers. Together, a group is much more powerful than one person saying, this person doesn't know what they're doing, they don't know how to practice medicine, and here's what happened. If you get a group of people, we've done that before as well, and that was much more effective. But what happens is I find you have to do the internal work and the external work. Report an error

1:37:21 So the external is write your letters and organize people. Can you directly talk to the person first? That would be one of the most helpful ways. Before you get all the other people involved, just directly, and not make it so much that you're doing this to me and I hate you, but I'm really struggling right now. Report an error

1:37:40 You know, when I saw you talk to that patient, when you told, this is what I heard you say to them, and as a result of that, this is what happened. You know, and they had this, and this was a problem, and this was a mistake, and then I had to go in, or I'm not able to do this because you already said this. So, I'm trying to figure this out, can you help me? Report an error

1:38:02 Because then it's kind of both of you, and sometimes a person isn't aware, or sometimes they've heard this from five other co-workers, and suddenly... You're the sixth one and a little light goes on for them and they're like, well, maybe I need to pay attention to this. Sometimes it's done really compassionately and occasionally I would say if you really have to check your motivation and that you are not doing this out of anger, sometimes saying things a little bit more strongly gets people's attention. Report an error

1:38:31 So I'm not one into threats with people, but occasionally you might say, look, I don't want to really have to report this. However, you know, that's why I'm coming to you first. Please, can you help me? So there's different ways. Mostly if it's done with the right tone, the person doesn't get as defensive as that they're feeling attacked like that. Report an error

1:38:53 But what's happened for people is when the internal work gets done through doing a purification practice, I found, oddly enough, that somebody came to a class with this horrible boss they had for, I don't know, like six years, I think. And it was really awful. They were in a class for about five years with me in Santa Cruz and they were really intent on doing this purification practice. They got really into it. Every night they did it for a few years and then the boss got transferred. Report an error

1:39:19 The guy got transferred. It was amazing. He's like, you won't believe this, but, you know, and then they got a really nice boss. Sometimes what happens is people say, because it's your mind, people say, well, you know, I'm going to get a new job and I'm going over to this other. clinic to get a job in this lab or this hospital because this isn't working. These people really don't care about patient care and so I'm going to go over here and you go over there and the same situation is happening. Report an error

1:39:48 Then you have to kind of, what happens is you can't escape your mind. It's a hard one for us to understand, especially when we're newer, that I'm creating this external reality. Yes, we are creating, that's what Buddhism says, is you're creating the external reality. Report an error

1:40:06 However, the external reality can be changed, definitely. So those are some ways to deal with the problems. This afternoon we're going to go into a little bit of where does the suffering come from then? What is afflictive emotion? How does that operate? That'll get you a little bit more into that as well. How does delusion arise? But is that helpful? Does that seem a doable thing? Report an error

1:40:30 We heard at our center in Boulder Creek, we lived... I think it was a mile and a half down a dirt gravel road and part of that road was our responsibility to maintain and part of it was the county. And the county did a horrible job on the road and I was the director for eight years. I was constantly on the phone, phoning them, writing letters, meeting with them to try to improve their service to their part of the road. Report an error

1:41:01 And we did our part. We maintained ours with grading and putting in new culverts. And putting more rock on the road at different times. So then we heard from a teacher, that was all the external work I did, we had members writing letters about the danger of the road and how they didn't want to sue the county and that got some responses, but in any event we did all this external work. Report an error

1:41:23 And then a teacher told us that the cause of a rough road, if it bothered you, was harsh speech. So yelling at people, talking about people behind their back. And saying, you know, not nice things to people. So we heard that and in our community there were 15 people living, eight staff people, eight of the staff working daily with each other. Report an error

1:41:48 And there was a lot of that going on, a lot of gossip about people, a lot of rumors and talking about this person behind their back and saying not nice things to them. So we did, I know this sounds a bit extreme, we did four years of group counseling work to learn how to communicate effectively. effectively each other we We met every four to six weeks with a Buddhist therapist and whoever moved into the community was welcome to come to these meetings. Report an error

1:42:17 It was very hard work and we did this work very consistently until we got very good about not allowing other people. If you came to my office and started talking about someone behind their back, I had permission to say, if it's not constructive, I don't feel comfortable right now. You know, with what you're saying and is there some way I can help you with this person. So everybody had permission to call each other on their stuff if it wasn't a positive thing. Report an error

1:42:43 And we got really, really clean with our speech. We were really fantastic communication and it was a very harmonious community. And so I got a phone call one day. This was in like the third year of this work. And I get a phone call from the guy, a guy from the county I'd never spoken to, I'd never heard his name. Report an error

1:43:01 totally different department. And he said, I just wanted to let you know that I have been looking at road surfaces for a long time and experimenting and creating new road surfaces for dirt gravel roads. I narrowed it down to your road and another road that was in Los Gatos. he said, but I've selected your road because I got a special grant from this other bureau of somebody. Report an error

1:43:24 And I've decided I'm going to do the experiment on your road, and I got a grant for a quarter of a million dollars. that had, you know, totally... Separate from us. I mean all the fundraising I had done and he's just coming in with his own money and his own steamroller and it was unbelievable. He totally transformed the road. So then I was suddenly a big believer in the internal work that there must be something to it. So you have to check that out for yourself and the problem for us, particularly for Americans or people in this culture is it's a long haul. Report an error

1:43:56 It's a lot of effort you have to make. And people want... The result like that. You know, we meditate for a week and we expect that we're suddenly going to be peaceful. So if you have 30 or 40 years of a certain imprint of doing things a certain way, you're not going to undo it in two weeks. You have to really make effort at it. And it's interesting because as Americans also, we are very, very good at making effort. Report an error

1:44:21 We work, I think we're some of the hardest workers I've seen in the world from all my time living in other places. However, what we make effort at is not necessarily really positive things. So we make a lot of effort. What I notice around me is there's a lot of effort at our technology, shopping for the right technology, researching it and then spending our time playing on it and a lot of time goes into that. Report an error

1:44:48 We might spend a lot of time on the road. We might spend a lot of time at other activities that aren't necessarily contributing to our health and happiness. So it's something you have to look at, are there ways I can redefine my priorities in life, what's important to me, and start borrowing and trying, instead of the three hours a week I spend doing this, can I take an hour from that and put it over here and make some time to meditate or make some time to read this book on Buddhism or things like that. Report an error

1:45:19 There's time in your life to do it, but we end up, we're patterned to do it already in these activities in a certain way. Does that make sense? Is it helpful? Is it helpful? Do you have any questions before we break for lunch based on anything I said or other questions? Report an error

1:45:45 One last thing I wanted to say about also the incompetency at work. I sometimes ask myself when I see a lot of mistakes in somebody else, you know, have I ever done that? You know, often I'm not that I'm doing it intentionally and that I'm not caring about patients, but occasionally I might have been in a space where... Report an error

1:46:06 I've done the same thing and I made a mistake or I didn't have time for a patient. And another thing that there's something called narrative therapy that asks you what your story is. And some of you are probably quite familiar with this. So one of the things that happens is we have our interpretation of reality and we're very clear that that's the absolute truth. Report an error

1:46:33 And yet you never know really, first of all, what's going on in somebody's mind. And what really did happen. My father used to joke, he jokes that there are, what, three sides to every story. You know, anyway, yours, mine and the truth. And so one of the things that happened to me once at the center where I worked was we had a cook who was my neighbor, a very close friend of mine, and he was a big guy and he had a lot of health problems. Report an error

1:47:00 But one day, and he intimidated a lot of people in the kitchen because he sometimes was very sarcastic. And he used that as a kind of defense. Report an error

1:47:09 So one morning I walked into the kitchen that I would go through to go to my office and I saw him and I said good morning and I was in my nice little space and he very kind of rudely said something like something kind of rude back and didn't really acknowledge my greeting and it really put me off and I quickly got out of the kitchen and wanted to get away from him and went up and started working in my office. Report an error

1:47:37 And what happened as I was working is I was so annoyed with him because of this response that I started this story about my interpretation of what had just happened, that he's always like this and he can be really mean to people and he's holding the center hostage with his anger and he's so sarcastic and now with his anger he's cooking lunch for the retreaters and they're going to be eating this angry energy. Report an error

1:48:02 And I can't stand that he always does this and he's always blaming me for everything and I don't even know what I did now, but I'm sure there's another thing that... Anyway, this whole drama starts going on in my head. And I wouldn't do it the whole time I'd be working and then I would come back to like, you know, I'm going to have to go down at lunch and deal with him and I can't stand it again. This was going on. Report an error

1:48:23 My story was going on. We have this going on a lot, right? So at about 11.30, lunch I guess was at noon, at 11.30... Another staff member comes into my office and says, did you hear what happened to Jim this morning? And Jim's the cook. And I didn't want to hear about Jim. I was like, what? All I knew is now I'm really angry at Jim. From this little interaction, small interaction, I knew what was going on. Report an error

1:48:49 And then they said, well, and they said, you know, he had another attack physically in his health that was like the thing that hospitalized him the month before. He was terribly afraid. He was going to go back in the hospital. He didn't know if that was the problem, but he had this pain again in his stomach. Completely freaked out. Ends up having a really, really big fight with his partner that morning because she's accusing him that he's not taking care of himself. Report an error

1:49:15 They have a really big fight and she storms out and they can't find one of their cats. That's his morning. And he still shows up for work, comes down because it was too late to get anybody else to cover for him. And there he is, out of his responsibility, cooking for the retreaters. Report an error

1:49:33 So now I have a very, very different experience at gym. And all of a sudden my heart, I have all this compassion, oh my gosh, he's my friend and I just want to help him. So you have to ask yourself, is my story accurate? When you get a story going, you may have some very clear answers that yeah, other people have the same experience with these people and they're incompetent. Report an error

1:49:56 But sometimes I find that my story is actually incorrect. And as long as I haven't had a direct of emptiness, meaning understanding the true nature of reality, story is actually always mistaken on some level. I found that liberating, a lot of times the stories go, and sometimes I'll just say to myself, well... Report an error

1:50:18 of that is valid, but it's not totally correct. And I really don't know what's in the other person's mind until I'm clairvoyant. don't know the whole story. Report an error

1:50:28 Lama Tsongkhapa, Shantideva, His Holiness the Dalai Lama Maybe what's gone on with them before with this patient and also what's going on with the caregiver's mind and what's happened to them that day and why they happen to be a bit shorter. Report an error

1:50:46 So see if you can step back a bit, get a little bit more perspective on it. Because sometimes I've checked with co-workers. Are you getting this feeling that this person's not really doing their job? Report an error

1:50:58 Is it me or are they, you know, you've probably already done that, you probably know that. Report an error

1:51:20 you'd like to go in so I know what I'd like to cover but much rather make it personal for you because it'll be much more useful for you so we're gonna what time were we supposed to meet back do we know what Report an error

1:51:33 Is an hour good for lunch? Because they serve lunch here for everyone, is that right? Okay. Is an hour about maybe, why don't 1.30? And that will give us at least two and a half more hours or so. And we'll have some breaks and things. Okay. Enjoy. You're welcome. Report an error

1:52:03 The practice of Tonglen. Yeah. Yeah, I'd like to do that today. That's a really powerful practice. So we're going to try to do that a little bit later. Report an error

1:52:14 Yeah. Sure. Yeah, that's a great one. Report an error

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2:57:17 You know, Demalo Terimpache is around this weekend down there. Yeah, it's amazing who's around. Everybody's here. Please come in. Report an error

2:57:32 Sure, that's great. Well, Report an error

2:57:41 it's nice to see you again, Emma. It's interesting, I've met a few people now in the States that I met in India that have come, settled in different places where I've been teaching and they're like, I saw you in India. Yeah, it's been nice. Report an error

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2:58:27 Yeah, there's about 500 people in the world and they all keep bumping into each other, right? Isn't it like that? Oh Report an error

2:58:52 yes, yes. Yeah, feel free to move around if you're more comfortable that way. Report an error

2:59:18 Yeah, now it's cool. It's hot upstairs, but it's cool down here. Report an error

· · ·

2:59:51 Thank you. Report an error

3:00:02 Can't do any harm. People are struggling how to figure it out. None of us really know. Report an error

3:00:13 It's a funny country, America. I find it a really odd country right now having lived in different places. You're a little brainwashed when you're born here that it's the best. At least that's how I was raised coming out of the 50s and I was raised in the 60s. But yeah, then you see other countries and you're like, you know, we don't do it here that well at all and it's difficult. Report an error

3:00:37 I mean, the one thing I want to overtake for granted is our freedom. Not everybody here has it based on the color of your skin or your economic status and things, but there's so much freedom in the country, really have a lot of freedom. So that's one thing I really appreciate about America is that there's a lot of problems right now in the country and somebody's going to do this instead of... Report an error

3:01:01 For what we need here, it would be nice if it can change, you know, if there's a focused change. Report an error

3:01:18 That's true. Yeah, that's very true. So we just hope and pray, you know, because it's really suffering, right, a lot now. Report an error

3:01:31 Yeah, so many small minds. You know, the East Coast is really different because the mind's a lot smaller back there. You know, it's amazing what these people telling me a story, these neighbors and my parents the other day about this guy didn't realize he was working with a lesbian. And it totally shocked me. He works for the FBI. And then I guess he said something and then she said, well, no, I'm a lesbian. And it just floored him. Report an error

3:01:54 And then to discuss with the neighbors, these two couples, of how homophobic they were, it was amazing. You know, you just aren't going to find much in a city like this because there's so many gays and lesbians. And I hadn't been around that in years. So he was just like, can you believe she was a lesbian? Report an error

3:02:12 And they had kids. And he's like, and they had kids. And then one of them had this one woman and one of the couples had this sweeping thing that how could they have kids? And people think that way. And so as a result, there's probably a lot of people that are going to be very afraid, not afraid, but do not have any interest to vote for a president who's half black, who's half African American. Report an error

3:02:41 You know, that race card's going to be such a big one, and I'm really hoping people are going to, the intelligent people are going to kind of wake up, because, yeah, I think we really need some help right now. And he's certainly not the perfect person, but better than what could be, so more of the same kind of system. You know, it's interesting. Report an error

3:03:00 There's all this talk about the Sarah Palin, you know, this vice presidential candidate. There's all this talk, and, you know, she very well could end up being president, and that's very frightening. She's a really frightening woman. Nothing against her. I bet I'd really like her if I sat down with her, but her policies are, I don't know, more frightening than Bush's. Report an error

3:03:23 What she really believes in. So it's like, wow, and she could very well be president with a 72-year-old. Oh, absolutely. She's ready to sell it all off. It's amazing. So it's just interesting. Will you be in America? Report an error

3:03:46 Yes. Yes, I will be. Yeah, I shouldn't really announce this. I'm trying to vote in three states, actually. Report an error

3:03:56 I'm sending a statement. I know it's illegal, but I believe the last election was fixed. I mean, two of the states are going to vote for Obama. Report an error

3:04:09 That's already done, but the main state I am registered to vote in now is Pennsylvania, and that's the one I really want to vote in. I'm going to do absentee ballot. There you go. Report an error

3:04:17 but I that's a pivotal Report an error

3:04:22 did get registered to vote there. I'm trying, I will vote tomorrow, Monday I'm going to try to register to vote in California because I have a California driver's license. And then when I go to Vermont, I'm going to see what they'll let me do there. But I'm not as worried about Vermont because Vermont will vote for Obama without a doubt. Report an error

3:04:41 So that's not such a big deal. And I think they only have one electoral vote. And he's got it already, I think. So that was like my little statement of how to, you know, I feel like if the system doesn't work and since it doesn't work, I'm just going to try to vote early and vote often. You know, that's my motto. Well, Report an error

3:05:04 if you turn me in, I won't get away with it. No, I think, I don't know, I actually don't know if my registering, I found out I think there's no federal election computer. Meaning if I register in a state, Report an error

3:05:19 computer bank that said she's already registered in Pennsylvania, meaning the last place I register will cancel out any future, previous registration. I heard there was no bank like that. Again, I don't know for sure, but somebody worked for some election board. So Pennsylvania, I did some kind of mail-in They didn't need proof, but somehow I have an address, and I'm registered. Report an error

3:05:43 I just got something back that said I was registered, and I'm going to... I guess I have to do something to get my absentee ballot, but you download it again. You download the ballot and you mail it in. So it's kind of odd. Some of them say you need proof in person of a utility bill and a driver's license. Report an error

3:06:00 And in California, I could go to the election board and just say, because I have a driver's license for California. So I don't know. I mean, it's interesting for me because I find it an interesting thing of how do they check them? Because I'm a bit transient. That's why I can do it. Other people don't have addresses, so that's probably why they wouldn't do it. But I don't think there's really any way to stop that from happening. Report an error

3:06:30 Yes, during that cycle. Mostly if you have addresses, and I guess this registration in Pennsylvania has to be mailed, it was mailed to an address, and then I would have it come and show up with that to vote. And then they're like, oh, okay, because I've got an address. So I don't know. They say sometimes they need a social security number. Report an error

3:06:51 Which I have and I write that down. But utility bills, if you have to show proof of that or a driver's license, I could understand. But absentee ballots, I don't know what you show. You just mail in this thing. So then there's no... You have to have a live address. That's the thing. I have an address in Pennsylvania and I've been living there and I get mail there and I can prove that. Report an error

3:07:11 I have a piece of mail from there that shows that I... So I don't know. I'm doing it more of an experiment to see if you could do it. Report an error

3:07:20 But it's kind of interesting, but I wish I could vote in more pivotal states. And that's probably why people don't do it, is because they don't have other addresses. But it would be an interesting experiment if you had friends in several states and you could use their addresses to register. Anyway, it's my own little personal statement. I don't want to bore you anymore with this. Sorry, it's a bit boring. I'd rather talk about how you can end your suffering and become happy. Report an error

3:07:47 Because politics doesn't make you happy. Trust me, I worked in it for many years and it is not the answer, as we see. But just because it used to be very political, it's a way that I find it's not really the answer, but I found ways that if you're interested, I still go to protests and write letters and things. Report an error

3:08:07 And sometimes I feel like that's necessary, particularly with the Tibetan thing. When people are really being abused, like Darfur and other genocides, then if you feel like you do something, whether it's Report an error

3:08:19 whatever your cause is. So I still kind of do things like that from my background. sometimes I find that a bit helpful if they're looking for it. If there's an issue that comes up, the way Congress works it is they count how many letters they receive, pro and con, to see sometimes how people are going to vote. So sometimes those letters, people say, oh, I wrote my congressman and congressperson that doesn't do anything. Report an error

3:08:43 actually they count how many and then... Based on that, and so if there really is a big influx on one side, I think it makes a difference like that. But one thing I wanted to say about happiness is what's difficult is, I mentioned this a little bit this morning, what's difficult is there isn't kind of a pill I can give you. Report an error

3:09:03 And the happy pill, you know, there isn't one technique that you do and like, okay, great, and a week later I'll be happy. It just doesn't work that way. So that's what's hardest for Americans is that... It takes a lot of effort and one time I was at a teaching with His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Los Angeles and they had write-in questions. Report an error

3:09:25 You wrote your question down and they passed them in and so the interpreter opened one up and then the question was, what is the easiest way to get enlightened? And His Holiness started crying and then a little bit wrathfully said, you Americans, you always want it so easy. And it was really kind of shocking for me because... Report an error

3:09:48 realized how much I've always over, you know, looking for the easy way out and what's the easy way. And many, many of my friends and people that come to the centers that. So I kind of do encourage you to to, again, once again, you know, look at your priorities to try to set a thing. If you're having struggles at work and you're having frustrations in your fields or just in your lives, there's constant things that go on in life that cause causes a certain certain. Report an error

3:10:16 problems and The main thing, the key to my happiness is how will I approach this problem when it comes up. And I think our normal coping mechanisms have been to blame others, it's not my fault, not taking responsibility, trying to make things go away in a different way than they actually go away. So I do find Buddhism is a little bit more based in reality like that. So some other things I wanted to talk about in this reflection on suffering. Report an error

3:10:47 And then we're going to move on is one Report an error

3:10:54 of the main things, there's a great teaching on patience. And patience in Tibetan actually means forbearance. They don't really use the word patience, they use forbearance. And they get the word barren because it's actually bearing up and being able to tolerate adverse conditions. So I found that different than just when we say patience. Report an error

3:11:16 And when you're thinking of patients, sometimes you're thinking of, let's say, waiting in a doctor's office or something, waiting in line at the bank. And that's a different kind of patience, but when you have adverse conditions, meaning you got into a car accident, you find out that your father is dying, something happens to your child, suddenly you're having huge financial problems and you're not able to pay the bills and you're afraid you're going to lose your job. Report an error

3:11:42 Anything like that. Those things is what's your attitude about it. His Holiness talks about adopting as positive an attitude realistically as possible. It's not about Buddhists. Buddhists are always happy and positive. Somebody said that once in one of the courses. I was just teaching. I think it was in Colorado. Report an error

3:12:02 A woman said in the back of the class, she said, this woman that I work with didn't want to come because she says Buddhists are just happy all the time. Report an error

3:12:12 And then I said, oh, she should have come here and met us. It's not like that at all, but there is a way of adopting a more positive approach because when you're just negative and critical, you understand how that functions in the situation. You've seen people get out of their car when they have little fender benders and they get out and they start screaming at the other person. Or you'll see people that, I was just talking to Venerable Rubina and she, oh, actually I wanted to mention, this will be my commercial. Report an error

3:12:42 Happiness and its Causes, which is actually perfect for healthcare practitioners. She's putting this conference on and it's hosted by the Liberation Prison Project and Seichenling Center. I won't say a lot about it, but I just thought if you're interested in how to be happy, this is an interesting conference the end of November in San Francisco. They did two of them already, I think in Sydney, Australia, and apparently they were hugely successful. Report an error

3:13:11 And Australians are kind of cool because they're very open to different spiritualities and they're quite positive about things like that. And apparently it went very well, but what they are trying to do is create this conference. The brochures are also out on the front desk. You can pick up and take them with you. But it's also to raise money for the Liberation Prison Project and Seichen Ling. Report an error

3:13:33 But it's a great way to do it and they have some really great speakers that will explore on a deeper level some of the things I'm talking about here. And these are real experts and PhDs and people like that. So Venerable Rubina and I were just talking about it. We were talking about the conference and she has some financial concerns, obviously. Report an error

3:13:51 And I am going to a new center in Vermont. It's not a new center, but it really doesn't have any money. And I kind of thought, what's the worst thing that can happen? So for me, about dealing with adverse problems is putting it in perspective, right? So I looked at Rubina and she started to say this thing about the money and she said how somebody else was worried and both of us looked at each other and I said well the worst thing that can happen is that you die and your mind isn't prepared. Report an error

3:14:17 Like is it the money? So when you put that in perspective suddenly your money issues become a little bit less because as Buddhists we're often reflecting on death and impermanence and I don't mean to make it sound morbid but for me it actually enriches my day to wake up and think. Yes, I get another day. I'm excited to get another day, but this could be my last day. Because one day it will be my last day, and if I've practiced it, it won't come as much of a shock for me when I find out I'm in some other kind of space of mind. Report an error

3:14:50 So is there a way to put it more in perspective when you're having a bad day and when some really adverse circumstance comes to you to say, okay, realistically, what's happening here? So one other thing I was going to say, looking at... Moving on to look at how does the problem, how does the adverse situation start and how does it stop? Report an error

3:15:19 If we want to be happy, some people say, why are we talking about suffering? We have to understand our suffering before you can begin to understand somebody else's suffering and generate compassion. Compassion is wanting to free others from suffering. So part of our happiness... What happens is we need to understand realistically what happens when the suffering starts for me, what's going on. Report an error

3:15:49 One of the fundamental things, the areas that we get hooked in, is something called self-cherishing. So what that means is my suffering basically comes from not having a correct view of the way things exist and because I have a mistaken view of how things exist, I then think I'm more important in the space than anyone else. Report an error

3:16:09 So let me just talk about emptiness for a minute. So emptiness, when I say something is empty, what I actually mean is it lacks or it is absent of having inherent nature. And I'll use these words as synonyms. Inherent nature is the same as intrinsic nature. It's the same as something having a character and a nature from its own side. Report an error

3:16:39 And it is the same as something being solidly, concretely. existing. Okay, so I'm going to take this for example. Okay, what is this? It's a cup. It's a cup of water, right? It's a cup. Report an error

3:16:59 So right now we have a conventional agreement about this. This is a cup. And so as soon as I picked it up and I said what is this, people said cup. Okay? So what that means is on a conventional level, the cup exists in a certain way. Okay, one way that it exists is it exists... Independence on other things. It exists, first of all, it exists depending on causes and conditions that make it a cup. Report an error

3:17:28 What I mean by that is, someone, people drink things. People drink liquids. Okay? And probably in ancient days there were no things like this that people drank out of their hands. They put their hands under this. You still see this in certain areas where people don't have many cups and utensils. But then there was an idea that it would be nice to have some kind of vessel to drink from. And we could collect water in things and we could drink from them like that. Report an error

3:17:55 So people had an idea to make a cup. People were drinking. There was lots of liquids. There was an abundance of stuff that we wanted to actually put it in a holder, some kind of container. There's also a cause and condition of somebody, let's say, who made this particular cup, had an idea that wanted to have a factory and manufacture cups like this so they could make money. Report an error

3:18:16 It's another cause of the cup coming into existence. another condition. could also get into, well, and then there must have been a plastic factory. That's one way the cup exists. Report an error

3:18:46 wasn't that I just said cup, snapped my fingers, and a cup existed like this, a plastic green cup. That's not the way it comes. But that's the way we think that things exist. Solidly existing vase, solidly existing flower, solidly existing alarm clock, solidly existing microphone. That's the way we view everything. And that's a mistake that creates suffering. Okay, so we'll go a little further. Here's another way the cup exists. Report an error

3:19:13 Second way it exists. It exists depending on its parts. Okay, what are the parts of the cup? Anybody? Plastic? The material of the cup, that's it. Okay, and there's parts of the plastic, right? Okay, so a physicist knows there's a molecular structure of the cup that's moving in a certain way that makes the cup be the cup, makes it function like a cup. Report an error

3:19:39 Another part of the cup is the bottom of the cup. This, what do you call that? Report an error

3:19:48 Top of the cup. This is the side of the cup. Okay, these are all parts of the cup. Report an error

3:19:58 The inside of the cup. And the cup also functions because it holds water. So it exists, we would say, depending on its parts. Report an error

3:20:11 The third way the cup exists is, this is according to the highest school, this is the hardest one to understand, is that what happens is the mind takes in information about the cup. There is what I would call a phenomenon out there, a thing. There's a thing out there. Report an error

3:20:31 And right now my brain activity is functioning. There's sensory data that it's moving. So there's an eye consciousness here. Report an error

3:20:41 And I said eye consciousness, not eye. There's an organ in the eye, but the eye consciousness is what motivates the organ of the eye and allows it to function, to see, to take in data of light, color, shape, form, things like that. And this is run by the brain. And I'm talking about on a physical level. I'm not talking about mind consciousness. One thing I wanted to explain, I forgot to explain this morning, is just to interject a minute. Report an error

3:21:13 In the Tibetan system, you learn a lot about language, about cultures anyway, separate from the Tibetan system, etymologically, what makes up a culture. So for instance, we know in North America, Eskimos... who live in Alaska, supposedly have about 11 different words for snow. We've heard this through our training, our education. And so that tells you a lot about their culture. Report an error

3:21:38 Well, I guess they live in the snow if they have 11 different words for it. So Tibetan Buddhism has many, many different words for mind. It tells you a lot about the system. The mind is said to be located here at the heart. Not at the organ, the heart, but in a subtle energy system. So often there's a mind-heart experience, and that's what they talk about. Consciousness is equated to mind. It's the same. Sometimes they use those terms slightly differently, but now I'm talking about it as the same. Report an error

3:22:07 So mind-heart experience here. So I'm not talking about the brain and organ. The brain has neurological activity that helps the eye to see, helps the optic nerve and all the things going on in the eye. It helps the ear to do its thing. Okay, so let's go back. We have a thing. Here. And then what happens is my eye sees green, it sees a color, it sees a shape, it sees an object. Report an error

3:22:33 And then what happens is based on the karmic seeds I have planted in my consciousness, it interprets reality. It interprets this thing. Okay, and why is that? Because if I took this cup, based on being a human being with my karmic makeup, as well as all of you, there's a convention here. And if I hold this up, everyone says there's a cup there. Because the human experience, when it sees something like this, the eye consciousness, the karmic seeds planted in a human continuum of mind, in a human makeup, label this cup. Report an error

3:23:09 And what is this? What we would say in the highest school of Buddhism is this is a base. All that is there is a base. Not a cup, a base. And based on my karmic seeds, the propensities and potentials, That I've planted in my mind from past activities of my body, speech and mind. That creates a result for me to then put a mental label on the cup. Report an error

3:23:35 I'm sorry, a mental label on the base. And the mental label is, so let me say it again, there's a base here. And what I would call the base here, what I'm going to define the base as, is a plastic, cylindrical, round object with a bottom that holds water. Report an error

3:24:07 No, the shape also would be able to be a base for something else as well. Report an error

3:24:17 Yes, the shape exists, serves as a base. Report an error

3:24:22 That's right. But basically there has to be a conventional reality that we would agree on. So that's why you wouldn't call this a hat. I know I could tip it over and put it on my head and it might function as that. But basically the human condition and the karmic seeds that we have wouldn't call this a hat. A hat would be a different thing. So there has to be a conventional basis for something that everyone agrees with. Report an error

3:24:44 And I know it is different culture by culture. That is different. But in our culture right now, this would be a cup. What I want you to do right now is look at it as a cup. Report an error

3:24:56 Get really clear. There's a cup there. Report an error

3:25:07 Okay, now what I want you to do is I want you to look at it from its base. I want you to look at it as a plastic tubular structure with a bottom that holds water. Report an error

3:25:29 Okay, now I want you to look at the cup. Report an error

3:25:39 So I just want to ask, between the first cup... And the second time we looked at the cup, which was the third time, any change in your feeling about the cup? This is not easy. And what I'm talking about is, was there anything a little looser about your fixity on the cup being a cup the last time around? Report an error

3:26:05 It's a little bit subtle. It is very subtle. But rather than the subtly existing cup for all time, and what happens is, so once again, this is a base. This is according to the high school. How does the cup exist? It exists as a mental label. The mind imputes, the mind calls this cup. The high school says, this is a bit radical, so buckle your seatbelts. Report an error

3:26:31 The high school says, there is no cup there. There is no cup there. What is there is a base that is labeled by the mind, cup. Report an error

3:26:41 But there is no cup there. Why is there no cup there? If I throw this on the floor and one of the cats from upstairs comes in, it's a toy to bat around on the floor. Report an error

3:26:53 So what happens is we get into trouble because everything we interpret we see as solidly existing from its own side. And the only way things can exist is in dependence on other things, depending on other things. That's called dependent arising, sometimes called dependent origination. And what that means is the only way for this vase to exist, oh it's very heavy, is that it depends on its parts. Report an error

3:27:22 It depends on causes and conditions that made it a vase. And then my consciousness interprets the data that I see. And on that base of this glass structure that's holding flowers, I label vase. Report an error

3:27:36 And then a vase comes into being. So what happens is, the reason this is important, and this is very profound, so a lot of people don't get it the first time or the fifth time or the tenth time. This is a source of all of our suffering and our unhappiness, is that we have a mistaken understanding of how things exist. Report an error

3:27:56 So to come at it in a different way, it's basically saying that things do not exist the way they appear. So there was a film that came out a few years ago called The Matrix. Did some people see this film? The first film of The Matrix was that a man in the story thought he was a computer programmer. Report an error

3:28:24 This was his reality, very real to him, right? It was very real. He was a computer programmer. He had a flat... Report an error

3:28:33 out, actually, is that he was basically like an embryo a city of human embryos that were being fed, were plugged in to this sophisticated computer keeping, and from that energy they were keeping the computer alive. And the computer was basically imprinting their mind, telling the guy who was a computer programmer keep it functioning. So, So his appearance again, I'm a computer programmer, this is reality. This is how we go about space. The film's not exactly about emptiness, but it's quite close when you see that reality. Report an error

3:29:08 And yet the reality was something completely different. So another thing that I don't think people so much in this generation do it anymore, but when I was growing up, when I was a teenager and in college, people used to take LSD, used to take acid, and used to... Report an error

3:29:31 you hallucinate. Do people still do that? Probably not so much anymore. think so. Nobody wants to admit that they do it. Okay. I don't do it anymore. But what would happen is I mean these things are not really healthy for you but it was all about experimentation, you know, in those days. Recreational things and people do other drugs now actually I've heard. Report an error

3:29:55 But what acid was called, it was called a mind-expanding drug in those days. And what it did was, if you took it, sometimes, for instance, that door behind there, which looks to me like a really solid wooden door, you might be looking at the door, and then what would happen sometimes with a mind-expanding drug is the door would melt like a candle, wax, and there would be no door there. Report an error

3:30:20 And you would say, how is that possible? So sometimes in emptiness, It's slightly like that. It just loosens up your grip that there is an absence of a solidly existing cup there for all time. The reason it's important is, I'll give you an example. If somebody scratches your car, you get out of your car, this is a more mundane level, you get out of your car with a huge investment in you scratched my car. Report an error

3:30:46 Without emptiness, there's a lot of territorialness and possession. My car. I know your name is on the title of the car. Okay, but more and more with emptiness I get into a feeling that there's nothing that's really mine. The more I insert mine on things, the more I suffer. Because cars get scratched, cars get dented, we lose things, people steal things from us. So emptiness tends to loosen up my attachment to all these things, particularly other people, which is my greatest attachment. Report an error

3:31:19 You know, so you understand the way the car exists. The car is metal and fiberglass and glass. And vinyl and some steel and plastic and rubber and that's what a car is made up of basically and some fabric and maybe leather and there's your car. Report an error

3:31:39 So if you understand the way your car actually exists and isn't it great that I have a job and I can afford to have a car now and the car is useful for me to use and I like it to get around and like that and I use the car for a while and the car is temporary. Report an error

3:31:57 An impermanent phenomenon, meaning one day the car is going to start disintegrating and breaking down, and eventually one day I won't want the car anymore, and I will get rid of it. So if you embrace your car with that and take ownership of this car like that, it's a much more realistic approach when your car gets scratched or when it gets dented, because that's kind of its nature. Report an error

3:32:19 In something called saṃsāra, saṃsāra is a Sanskrit term, That means to cycle, to turn. The Tibetan word is korwa. So what are we turning around? We're turning around this cycle of birth, old age, sickness and death. Report an error

3:32:41 And that whole situation is suffering. So saṃsāra's nature is suffering. And what that means is if you have a car in saṃsāra, which is this existence we live in, it will get scratched and it will get dented. And one day it will break down. And one day your fascination of it You Report an error

3:33:02 meet an object of attraction and there they are and suddenly you check it out more and more, their eyes and their hair and their body. be gone and you will no longer want it. Report an error

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3:33:32 And then they say something and then you're like, hmm, they sound intelligent. And more and more and suddenly this thing starts happening. I like them. I want to be around them. I want them to notice me. I want to go out with them. I want them to know my name. And it becomes a bit obsessive, right? You go on and maybe you meet somebody and then you get together with them. Report an error

3:33:52 And then what happens is, are we really seeing them clearly? There's a fantasy going on, fantasy projection, and you have just vomited this thing all over them. You can't see them clearly because you vomited your fantasy projection onto them. And they are the most beautiful, the most wonderful. Lama Yeshe used to do this with his rosary, his mala. This is a mala. And he would say, he would use flowers. And you see your object of infatuation, beauty, and yours is the most beautiful flower. Report an error

3:34:24 You're the most wonderful flower, the most incredible, like you've just choked the life out of... You know, how many of you have been in relationships like that, where you're, you Report an error

3:34:37 know you like me, but are you really seeing me? I sometimes used to be with people and I remember this guy said to me once, I don't know, we were together maybe three months or something, and he said, but I thought you wanted to go do this this weekend. This is where we get into problems in relationships, expectation. I thought you wanted to do this and I thought you were like this. And I said, I never said that. Report an error

3:35:02 What is that? That's not me. But he had this fantasy. Everything else was going along okay, so he's just going to create what he wants, but he's not seeing me. I never said I like these things. Where did you get that idea? So this happens a lot. We have expectations and we miscommunicate. We're over here. Report an error

3:35:22 This person goes this way. So what's really there? and I become a bit overly obsessed with it, I then over embellish the qualities of what's there, seeing it clearly. then problem arises. Report an error

3:35:54 What happens, I always found it interesting, is when you decide finally to introduce your Adonis or Adonis set to your friends, you know that moment when you're going to introduce them to one of your friends or bring them to a party and it's all very little scary, you know, the finally. Report an error

3:36:10 And you bring them to this party and it was always amazing to me because I'd march somebody in and then maybe the next day I'd say to one of my friends, you know, what do you think? What did you think? You know? Well, and they'd say like, he's okay. Report an error

3:36:33 I was like, but he's the most gorgeous, incredible, intelligent, perfect. He's all right. Because he's empty of any inherent perfectly intelligent, beautiful. That's my interpretation. That's why everybody has a different interpretation. That's why George Bush is not a bad guy. His policies and things, we don't have to agree with that. Report an error

3:36:56 Has he made mistakes? Of course. As a human being, he deserves equal respect and equal regard like everybody else. Why? Because he has Buddha nature. Why? Because he wants to be happy and he doesn't want to suffer. Just like me. And just like you. And just like you. So this is about creating connections with people because that's what makes harmony in the world. That's what makes us happy. So can you see reality for what it is by understanding how it really exists? Report an error

3:37:27 When you have aversion, well it's one thing to go back to relationship. There's nothing wrong with relationship. You meet somebody, You know, I'd like to spend some time with somebody. I'd like to have a companion. I'd like somebody to do things with sometimes. It's fun. Maybe you want to have a family like that. Report an error

3:37:46 It's great, but can you have the relationship based in reality? Maybe we'll be together for a while and we'll support each other and contribute in good ways to each other. It might not last. Okay. I would like it to last. And I'd like to get married or have kids with this person. But one day you're going to be separated anyway when you die. So can you get into the relationship a little bit more realistically? It doesn't mean you introduce the person, I know you're going to die one day but it wouldn't be really fun. Report an error

3:38:15 No, that's ridiculous. But in your mind, but we don't. We totally jump in this infatuation. And then six months later you're disappointed. And I love that phase after the honeymoon. People often come to these classes and then people are disappointed because the socks smell. And her breath smells. And she has these terrible habits. And she snores or he snores. And this is reality. The Hollywood endings of the movies, that's not reality. Report an error

3:38:45 It doesn't happen like that. We've been brainwashed by that. And people want that. You don't waltz off into the sunset. It just rarely happens like that. Sometimes you walk off into the sunset but somebody has arthritic knees and somebody has a bad back and somebody's lactose intolerant. That's how you waltz off into the sunset. That's reality. That's okay. Report an error

3:39:05 But just see it for what it is rather than perfect, perfect, perfect. You know, when you're a Buddha, you're perfect. And then nothing bothers you anymore. It's perfect. But we have all these tapes that are supposed to be like this and people get so disappointed. So the same thing with aversion. When you don't like someone, it's the same thing. Report an error

3:39:25 What you're now doing is you're underestimating what's really there. So we do this with George Bush. I don't actually know how you all vote. Usually in this area there's a lot of liberals. When I teach on the East Coast, it's very different. I don't use George Bush as an example because a lot of people there voted for him. Twice. Hard as that may be to imagine. Report an error

3:39:47 But it's true. It's amazing. I teach sometimes in Lake County, Florida, Central Florida. There's Buddhists there. They also have the highest Ku Klux Klan membership in the country. And there's Buddhists there that meet. Report an error

3:40:05 Somebody asked me that. Somebody just asked me. I don't know if we got any Klan members that came. A hundred people came one day to one of the teachings. I doubt there were any Klan members there. I couldn't imagine. But you don't know. You really don't know. And some people are interested and curious, but it's not a place where I would make George Bush jokes because three quarters of them voted for him. I'm convinced. Report an error

3:40:26 So the thing is, when you take an object like that, it's easy to say I hate George Bush, but every time you say I hate, you create conflict in the world. So it's one thing to say I'm really challenged by his policies and I'd like to really vote for somebody else and hope that things could change for some things that I would like to see. Report an error

3:40:45 It doesn't mean my things that I'd like to see are best, but that's what I'd like to see. That's what I feel might be more helpful for people, but I'm not sure. But that's basically what I would do. But to say I hate George Bush, sometimes what I do is George Bush is not inherently good or bad, meaning concretely, independently. Report an error

3:41:06 Solidly good or bad. And why? Because some people don't like him. And then I think of George Bush's mother. She loves him. She thinks he's great and how wonderful that her son became president and she probably, you know, on Labor Day hung out with him and had a barbecue on the ranch and everything was great and she's probably really glad he's finishing his term and then he'll have more free time. Report an error

3:41:30 But then it suddenly makes him a real person for me and it creates a little bit less in me. You know, fuel, negative energy, like that. So this is all about, being happy is about something His Holiness the Dalai Lama calls inner disarmament. That's where it has to start. So we can go and protest for nuclear disarmament and for peace and for ending the Iraq war. Report an error

3:41:57 That's fantastic. But also inside, if you're still really angry, you have to work in there to diffuse it from there. So a number of people I meet... Over the years, want to, this might sound a bit cliche, but want to change the world, right? You have this idea and it becomes a little bit more difficult globally now to do it as individuals. Report an error

3:42:21 You know, we think, how can I really do anything? But you are part of the world. So if you bring about some change in here, you're part of the world that changes the world. And I've noticed what it does is it starts changing your community. You know, how you choose to deal with the person at work who you feel is incompetent. Report an error

3:42:39 You know, what your response will be is an example to everybody around you. Everyone else is an example. So if you want to come in raging and angry and hostile to this person all the time, that's what other people see. Some people might like that and want to get behind that and act like that as well, but it's not going to create that person to be a better person in their workspace. It's not going to create peace in your workspace and harmony. Report an error

3:43:03 So what I found, it's interesting because I, you know, for years, like, I used to have a situation in my 20s with my mother. You know, how many people would like to change their mother, right, or their father? You know, we have these people in our lives that might be a housemate or might be a partner. And if I could just change them, everything would be okay. Report an error

3:43:25 You can't change them, though. But what you can do is I changed some things about my behavior. This was in my late 20s and early 30s. And as a result of that, my mother shifted. Because the responses she used to get from me in treating me a certain way weren't there anymore. So she suddenly couldn't access the kind of spiteful 14-year-old that I would turn into when she would do a certain behavior. Report an error

3:43:51 So then what happened is she was a little bit like, huh, okay, I'm not getting the normal reaction. So then as a result she couldn't keep... So then she became, okay, how do respectful adults deal with each other? And that's how it became. So you can do that with anybody in your life. It doesn't happen easily, but it's totally possible to do it. And that's what's kind of exciting. Because in Tibetan Buddhism, you are at the controls. Report an error

3:44:18 It's up to you if you're going to have a good day, if you're going to have a bad day. Your car gets hit, how you respond, it's totally in your power. It's not about the other person. They could be yelling and screaming at you. And we have this example when I was in Florida teaching a year ago. This was last year. The woman who was driving me around at one point had a little... Report an error

3:44:39 Shantideva, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Brush by me and why did you pass me? Couldn't you see I was pulling over to get into the space? And he just right away launched a verbal attack at us. And she stayed, we decided, I could see we were looking at each other, we were going to stay really calm. Because what happens is you start to argue back and then the fuel goes. Report an error

3:45:24 And then they yell back at you and then you yell at them and then your voice gets louder and then you have to get louder back at them. So I could see and she was really great. I personally stayed out of it because I realized you don't need a third person, but I thought if they needed somebody. So I just stayed calm. I wasn't going to start arguing back at him. I saw it and you were wrong. Report an error

3:45:41 So she stayed really calm and she just kept her voice down and then she explained what she did. She explained why she did what she did, why she pulled up. And then he just said his thing again, irritatedly. And then she just said again, she goes, okay, well, that's okay, no problem. And then she decided, she said, I want to just... Report an error

3:46:01 Get a police officer here because I know we don't agree and that's okay. We'll sort it out. So then in this whole process it took a while and then the cop came and they were really nice and it's always funny when I'm there because then the cop was like, are you a Buddhist nun? And then they start talking about Buddhism. But anyway, so the cop came and it took a little time and then what happened is it's also about what we want to do in the world is create relationships. Report an error

3:46:27 This lends to your happiness. Why is that? Because you are much more likely to do things for your friends and family. And people that view you that way are much more likely to help you and come and make pleasurable things for you, always. Report an error

3:46:45 So in the meantime while we're waiting for the cop, we're standing around closely and I went over to him. I also know that older people now are afraid about their driving. They don't drive well. They don't see that well and they're very afraid that they will lose their independence and not be able to drive anymore and not be able to get their license. So I know this man was probably a little bit younger than my father. Report an error

3:47:07 So then I went over and I said, I said, oh, do you live around here? Just making small talk with him, you know, to try to relax him. And I said, do you live around here? And then he said, I live, and he named a town. And then I said, oh, I said, she's from the same town. I said, oh, she's from the same town. I said, oh, that's interesting. And I said, I just met somebody the other day from there. And then I said, do you live down here all year round? Report an error

3:47:34 Because a lot of people in Florida don't. They're there for the winter. So we started to have a conversation and then she came over and joined in the conversation with us. And so somehow by the time the cop arrived, this was before the cop came, I could see he was already... calmer. And then the cop came and they exchanged information. The insurance companies were going to deal with it anyway. But by the end, everything was okay between all of us. And he actually said, I'm really sorry. Report an error

3:48:02 Because at first, didn't want to say that. And he said, I'm really sorry. It's a matter of can I kind of make friends with you in the meantime and find some kind of common link because if your friend hits you Report an error

3:48:22 Okay, well, let me look at the car. Well, it's just a scratch. You're probably not going to report it. You're not going to call a cop. It's not a big deal. Or maybe the friend will say, well, yeah, okay, I'll give you money. Find out how much it costs and we'll split it. There's many, many different things you do when the person is in the category of friend as opposed to stranger or enemy. Report an error

3:48:45 Okay? So it's your attitude again. You want to spend the time to create relationships. We don't make time in our world for stuff like that. Report an error

3:48:54 You know, in the cities it's difficult. It's faster paced. People are moving faster. So I noticed when I lived here, in the city, and let's say I went to the post office, I was in a restaurant, I was in a grocery store, you don't even make eye contact with the people behind the counters. There's no, there's none of this personal, you know, occasionally, more in San Francisco, people say, hi, how are you? But a lot of times, yeah, great, okay, great, give me my bag. Report an error

3:49:21 You know, you're not even, there's no time, so. It's worth the time. It's worth spending time on things like that. Yes? There Report an error

3:49:41 are a number of us here. Report an error

3:49:48 Do you all work together, the three of you? No. Oh, you're saying at your place. Oh, no, this is personal. Okay, right. And I know that it's become somebody in the family. Report an error

3:50:08 I mean, the aversion is really high. And so I Report an error

3:50:24 really appreciate what you said about the aversion. Thank you so Report an error

3:50:42 much for having Report an error

3:50:53 me. many of us energy now and I can't say has ever been about Report an error

3:51:12 mean, when you said, okay, in culture, we will attribute base that attribution to cut. -hmm Report an error

3:51:35 and stuff that when they do it and everybody goes can collectively agree yes that was really like right inappropriate i mean just inappropriate can't even believe it so then it sets up this aversion and now it's where um Report an error

3:51:58 Like for me, my struggle is that I feel stuck. Because I do not want to, I want to, and even my spiritual pain is that I want to be whatever civil it is, you know, civil. But I know in my heart that for me it's, I am completely disengaging from you because you absolutely turn me on. I don't want anything to do with you. And even experiencing that disengagement, even though many of us will conclude that this behavior is just... Report an error

3:52:33 It's very painful and I know I'm going to be around this person again. Has anyone ever directly talked to the person to address the situation with them? Is that not possible? Report an error

3:52:55 For some reason, I'll just be honest, this person is just so damn manipulative because my brain is just so linear in that sort of way. Report an error

3:53:07 This person is just going to run circles around me, so I don't really feel that that's going to be good. If there's no way to do that, because one way you could also do it as a group, to sit down with the person if they're disturbing so many people like that in a family setting. There have been people, I mean there's things called interventions more with substance abusers, but manipulators, it's the same situation, that they're harming themselves and others. Report an error

3:53:31 However, that's not always possible with... Family situations and things, but it's possible to do something like that because once they see it's affecting all these people, now they may not care and they may say, well, this is how I am, okay. Okay, but that's just one way first, I would say, if there's a way to do that. If that's not possible, then you take it back to your own practice, of course. Report an error

3:53:53 I mean, you have to take it back to your own practice anyway. And this is where I think my confusion is because I remember in one class there was a teacher here that Report an error

3:54:05 anybody can do anything. The Report an error

3:54:13 teacher ended up, it was okay to be a teacher. Well, Report an error

3:54:33 see, there's a level when you realize there are certain social, I would say, in the name of social injustice, when you know something's really wrong. You know, you see somebody beating somebody. I mean, if we go through what I would call the ten virtues and non-virtues, this is basic ethical conduct. Report an error

3:54:21 like, know that the aversion has been if I try to be I think is I can Report an error

3:54:51 And three relate to your body, four relate to your speech and three relate to your mind. So I mentioned some of them. Killing, stealing, adultery, lying, harsh speech, divisive speech, gossip, covetousness, ill will and holding wrong views about things. So without going into a lot of details in them, some of them, you know, it's just basic. This is like a basic ten commandments of Buddhism. Report an error

3:55:19 But it's also an ethical code that if you see a kid beating their child, if you see a person beating their child badly, there's certain things you have a responsibility to act. So let's say you've got a manipulator here, really intense manipulation going on, and everyone's acknowledged that, that it's very inappropriate. You get a sign it's really inappropriate and it's not okay. Report an error

3:55:41 So you might say, but I don't have a direct perception of emptiness and I'm not really sure and I'm delusional myself. However, there are certain things where it's good to respond and do something, but not negatively. So what you could do in that sense, because I have done this with a massive manipulator that I've known for a long time in the family that disturbed a lot of people, was I got to a point where there's a first level of I take responsibility, I created karma. Report an error

3:56:10 To be in the face of this, to have this in my face. Okay, you know, so now what do I do with it? I don't want to create any more karma, which means I don't want to tangle negatively with the manipulator anymore. I have to try to really, I might still have made mistakes and still done it once in a while and yelled at them or walked off angrily or something, but more and more I realize I can't do this anymore. Report an error

3:56:32 Then when I'm in front of them, well there was a period at one point where I chose not to be around them very much. So there is a stage in your evolution, excuse me, in your spiritual development where it's okay to choose to be away from the object. And I'll bring this up with aversion and attachment. If you find you are so phenomenally attached to somebody or something, it's better sometimes and you're working with it to take yourself away from the object. Report an error

3:57:00 And even on mundane levels, I had a sweater I was so attached to. I was obsessed and I was traveling in India and then it was the whole thing if my sweater got stolen and if my sweater got stolen and my sweater and I gave it away finally. It was just too much. It was ridiculous. It was an object that was made of like synthetic fibers and in a certain style and it was black. I mean, come on. What are we talking about? Report an error

3:57:22 But we get this a lot with people. So the same, so you know some people let's say in new relationships and I used to do this in a new relationship when you're kind of falling into obsession and you're all, you just want to see them every moment. I would have breaks. I thought, this is not balanced. So I would, you know, suddenly you're going along for a few days and then I'd say, nope, you know, I need tomorrow, I need to do my own thing and I'm going to be home by myself. Report an error

3:57:47 Just to give yourself perspective. So in the face of aversion, it's similar. There's sometimes I realize I'm going to get angry, I'm going to walk into another room now. You know, they're here in the house, we're having a party or they're coming over and I'm just going to limit the time. And so there was somebody... Report an error

3:58:03 In my life, quite close, where when they got into that mode and they were doing their thing, and I could feel myself getting angry, like, oh, what's happening? You know, I'm getting angry. My blood pressure, I can feel it. You know the whole response that's going on. And you're going to respond probably in the normal way you always respond. Report an error

3:58:21 I can't say it would be negative or not, but the way the manipulator is used to everyone responding. Either it alienates people, people walk away, or people start fighting with them. I don't know. Report an error

3:58:33 You shut down probably and go away, yeah. Report an error

3:58:57 Paralyzed from it, yeah. But sometimes I've said to the person when I see it's affecting a lot of people in the room negatively or I see there's a fight starting because of their behavior, occasionally if I've been in the room and I feel myself getting agitated, I might just say directly to them, I mean depending on the relationship, but if they're very close to me, and I just Report an error

3:58:50 it just gets friggin' nutty, and I don't know what to do, so then I'm like parallel. Report an error

3:59:15 I might just say, you know, I'm not really comfortable with what you're talking about right now, so I wonder if we could talk about something else, or I'm just going to go upstairs right now. Report an error

3:59:27 Because sometimes that makes a dent in the behavior. If it doesn't, and it may not at all, but there's ways to just let them know how they're making you feel. Because nobody's probably ever told them that, because it's probably so outrageous that everybody's alienated. Shut down from it and can't believe. And they'll say, well, Uncle Harry's always like that. That's just how he is. Okay, and he might never change. So one of the things I realized then in dealing with my disturbance, because it's about calming your disturbance so you can be happy, is I realized that this person is operating out of complete confusion, right? Report an error

4:00:03 They're probably pretty confused. That's why people act that way. So they operate from some level of delusion and so do I. I operate from some level of delusion. How is it that I think I might have a right to judge where they're coming from? But actually they're operating from a lot of delusion. I can have compassion for that. Because I know when I get confused and I do things and say things that are not helpful, so it generates a little bit more compassion, which is what, it's going to open up the heart-mind space, which is what you want. Report an error

4:00:34 You want to open it up so you can actually send that person loving kindness. So what I mean by that is... You're not feeling in that space when they're there. But you're going to just start a little bit loosening this up that things are also impermanent. And that person one day is going to pass away. You don't wish death on them, but everything's changing and molting. I know, sometimes we get into that space. Report an error

4:01:00 But the thing is, we're bumping up against people because it's our work that we need to do. Like that. So that's the thing, is try to open the space. And then what I'll do is it helps me generate more compassion. Report an error

4:01:14 Understanding I behave like that sometimes, you know, this person, these kind of things. And then the last thing I was going to say is sending them loving kindness. We're going to do a meditation later called Tong Lin, giving and taking. And this is what you can also do in the face of any kinds of, whether it's attachment, adversity, where I'm just feeling I'm not happy right now. Report an error

4:01:37 What's happening here? How do I send somebody loving kindness? How do I move that out? How do I wish? Can I wish to take their suffering on myself? What would that experience be like to remove them from their manipulation, remove the manipulation from them? They are not their manipulation, is another way to look at it. I really get it. That's helpful, yeah. Report an error

4:02:02 The thing was, I just realized how much violence is being created. There's no way I can possibly take care of myself unless I develop that. Right, right. I got it. Okay. Great, because there's many other things we could go on that vein. I want to take a quick break, but one thing I wanted to say is, taking this a bit further, if you're looking underneath what makes me suffer, it comes from what we would call afflictive emotions and past negative karma. Report an error

4:02:32 Afflictive emotions are also called mental disturbance. In Sanskrit it's called klesha, kleshas. Afflictive emotions are the main ones come from something called the three poisons, ignorance or confusion. And fundamental ignorance is I'm not having a direct perception of emptiness and I'm misinterpreting what I see, what the appearance is. Report an error

4:02:59 The second one is anger or hatred. And the third is attachment, desire. Those are called the three poisons and they are also three of the six root delusions. So why they call it mental affliction or root afflictions, root delusions, is they disturb. It's an affliction. It afflicts the natural state of your mind, which is clear luminosity that knows things. That's the natural state of your mind. Report an error

4:03:33 So the other three root delusions are pride. Once again we have ignorance, anger, attachment, pride, doubt and wrong view. Report an error

4:03:57 So pride and doubt we also understand. Pride is an inflated notion of myself, manifest in many different ways. Doubt. Doubt is not discernment. So when I mentioned in the beginning I'm just giving you information, it's for you to really investigate thoroughly what I'm saying and it's very helpful to be discerning and say I'm not really sure about reincarnation. Report an error

4:04:21 That doesn't make sense to me. But I'm going to check it out thoroughly. So it's one thing if you do doubt something in that way, but you thoroughly check it out to the end, you'll be much stronger in your practice of any spirituality. But doubt is just a little bit like a poisonous worm that goes from not sure, and then once you start to have confusion about something and you're not sure, everything starts manifesting back to you like that. Report an error

4:04:46 The teacher said that, I don't really think they know what they're talking about. Oh, and now you see she fumbled that word, so she really doesn't know what she's saying. And now I question the next thing that she said or the next thing that he said or things like that. So that's where doubt, you're not thoroughly investigating based in reality, based on scriptural backup or what this book said or what another teacher said and backing up. Report an error

4:05:10 You're just kind of blindly focused in a critical way on things. So wrong view is related to that. The ultimate wrong view, again, is not understanding emptiness. But other wrong views are, if you thought, when I mentioned death and impermanence, that we are all going to die one day, wrong view would say, I don't believe that, I think it's garbage. Report an error

4:05:34 That would be holding a wrong view, thinking you are going to live forever in this body would be holding a wrong view, not believing in karma, things like that. Now some of the stuff, you don't have to accept this right away if you're interested in this path, but again you check out. What I did in my first course was there were a lot of things I didn't understand and there were some things I didn't like. Report an error

4:05:56 So it's discerning to put it to the side for now and take this, I heard about this part of the philosophy, I really like that, that makes sense. And then later you can revisit the things that you didn't really agree with in the beginning or didn't understand. Report an error

4:06:14 So what happens in these delusions is they're disturbed states of mind. They come from past negative karma and there's antidotes to all of them. So this is why we're not happy, is suddenly I have an underestimation of something I see and then anger comes out. I have an over embellishment of something I see, attachment. Report an error

4:06:37 I have an over embellishment of myself, pride. Things like that. That's how they work, is the mind is out of balance. The mind is not in its true, clear, open, spacious nature. There are combinations of these root delusions that molt into different forms and create many what are called non-virtuous mental factors. Report an error

4:07:00 Okay, so if you take, I think, two parts attachment and one part anger, you get jealousy. Report an error

4:07:08 And there's things like belligerence, spite, haughtiness, which is part of pride, pride and anger, and some of them are... Three parts, you know, confusion and anger and ignorance and attachment and they all create different non-virtuous mental states. So the reason we sometimes look at those is we just want to recognize them in ourselves when they arise to know which antidote to apply. Report an error

4:07:35 Okay, so if I have a lot of pride, and I notice that we all have ones that are operating more strongly than other ones. If I have a lot of pride, really helpful meditations are recognizing that I'm going to die one day. It helps to cut pride. It brings me down a little bit. There's only so many years I have left. I've wasted a lot of time. There's a lot of things I want to still do. Report an error

4:07:59 If you find you're really angry, you're an angry person, there's ways of introducing love, thinking, I really wish other beings would be happy. You get very disturbed by something. Love is actually wanting others to be happy. That's what real love is, not attached love. Attach love is I love you if, I love you but, I love you when. It's all about me, attachment. And love is I want others to be happy. Report an error

4:08:32 It's a complete antidote to anger. So if I feel suddenly this person, you're getting angry, I feel it, my whole body, physiological changes from anger, look at them. And can you find a space in your mind really wishing them happiness? Because if they were happy, they wouldn't be manipulating anymore. It wouldn't be happening. If George Bush were really happy, he wouldn't have gone to war in Iraq. Report an error

4:09:01 I don't think so. Report an error

4:09:05 And you see him. Sometimes I see pictures of him, photos of him. And he doesn't look very happy. I mean, think of this poor guy. I mean, he created it. Of course he did. But wearing this burden on his shoulders, out of his confusion, confused. Confusion is where it got him. And he doesn't look very happy. Report an error

4:09:25 Looks really worn, actually. Lowest popularity rating in recent history of any president. You know, that's a heavy one to bear. That his party, you know, they just had a Republican National Convention, right? His party just keeps distancing themselves from him. That's a shame. That would be really hard, you know, to have to leave a legacy like that after eight years and knowing that they don't want you to appear and they don't want you to do this and they don't want to be associated with you and they don't really want you to go out and, you know, campaign for me. Report an error

4:09:56 I'd be really embarrassed if I were him, among other things. But do I wish him happiness? Absolutely I wish him happiness. Report an error

4:10:05 I can wish him happiness. And you can visualize, and we'll do this in the Tonglen meditation, visualizing sending light to people, visualizing their suffering coming from them. We'll talk about that a little bit later. Any questions? Report an error

4:10:24 So why don't we take a short stretch break, or get a drink, or go to the bathroom. And let's meet back at, how about 10 minutes? And let Report an error

4:10:39 me ask you also, do you have any particular things I'm not addressing that you want to hear about or anything you really came here that you must hear today or anything that comes to mind? Report an error

4:10:52 Or you can think about it and let me know, please, because I'd really like to make it more useful if it's possible. What Report an error

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4:26:06 I wanted to talk about is, before we do some Tonglen meditation, is practical, Ways to apply some of what we're talking about a little bit is what actually happens when I'm in the store, on the bus, driving, things like that. How does that work to contribute to happiness? The best thing would be to see if these are things that you can actually apply in your own life. Report an error

4:26:35 We had a few classes this week and I was teaching in some other places. Where I really ask people that you have to do this the next time you go to the supermarket, so you can try this when you go to the markets. Where do you go here to the markets? What are your supermarkets you go to? In the city they're smaller, right? Smaller shops. But you don't all live in the city, so where do you go? Report an error

4:27:00 Yeah, Safeway. Yeah, Rainbow is like the best health food store I've ever been to in my life. Rainbow, that's a big store. Safeway. Report an error

4:27:11 Where do you go in... Over the bridge? Report an error

4:27:17 Where do you guys go? Trader Joe's. Right. Now, do you have cars? Do you all? You don't have a car? Yeah, I didn't have a car when I lived here in the beginning. You don't have a license yet, right? Because where are you from? Yeah, from Hong Kong, right. And then, right, that's right, you were living in different places. Yeah, because usually in Europe they get their licenses a bit later anyway. Report an error

4:27:46 And some cities, people in New York, a lot of people don't even drive. And you drive where you are. Do you drive to work? And how many do you drive to work? The train. Do you drive to work? Yeah, okay, so you're in public transportation. So one of the things I was thinking is in order to promote your happiness is the main thing we want to do is if we get a sense of how things actually exist, the one thing we want to do is put it in a context of what I would call skillful means. Report an error

4:28:23 So when you're working to get enlightened, and I know that's a concept that's kind of out there. However, what it means is you're going to have two main approaches and one is skillful means, which is your method. It's basically one wing of the bird. Skillful means being the method is about compassion. And the other side is emptiness, is having the right view of how I want to use the skillful means. So compassion is also put together with another word, bodhicitta. Report an error

4:28:53 Bodhicitta is a Sanskrit word I mentioned that means the enlightened attitude about cherishing others more than yourself. Report an error

4:29:00 And those who are on this path to develop bodhicitta, which is again one of the fundamental things you need to become a Buddha, is those on the path are called bodhisattvas. Bodhisattvas are basically Buddhist saints and they're people that are spending as much time as they can or just working in their everyday thoughts and life to want to promote the idea and want to live by the idea of cherishing others more than yourself. Report an error

4:29:26 Okay, so when we're going shopping, food shopping, What I like to do is try to make every approach to my life like I am a bodhisattva warrior. Okay, this is the path I'm on. I might as well not just go down the street in my ordinary form. Why? It's boring, okay? It's not that I'm so boring, but I'd rather be a bodhisattva warrior, focused on others. You'll find you're a lot happier. Report an error

4:29:50 You just don't if you really take the focus on others. However, I'm not saying don't live practically. When I walk down this street here to go down to Haight Street, There are some public housing projects right there. And the neighborhood gets a little funny, particularly at night. And there's a lot of people hanging out now because school just started and the weather's a little bit mild. Report an error

4:30:10 And they're on the street. And sometimes I have to kind of a little bit take care to just keep my awareness to make sure somebody doesn't grab my bag and things like that. It's just natural. So there are places and areas where you need to protect yourself and know that this isn't... Bodhisattva warriors just don't go without their wisdom. Report an error

4:30:29 Okay, because you need both wings of the bird in order to fly to enlightenment. So when you go to the store as a bodhisattva warrior though, if you're driving to the store, I know you don't all drive to the store here if you live in the city, but there's a whole issue around parking. It's particularly parking in the city. So even setting aside the grocery store, when you're parking, there's a way to go about getting a parking space as a bodhisattva warrior versus, you know, You see somebody and you're going to race over to the space and it's difficult in the city because it's limited where you're parking and it's hard to get spots. Report an error

4:31:05 But if you have a more spacious attitude, the whole thing of parking, if somebody gets another space, gets a space before you, okay. If you're not driving from the spacious heart-mind experience, you're going to be a bit irritated when they get the space rather than, well that's great that they got the space because I know how happy I am when I get a space. Report an error

4:31:23 So you can kind of like offer it to them in your mind. And it's more virtuous for you. Again, this is about loosening this up in here, this tight, constricted place often of what we call self-cherishing, just thinking about myself. Report an error

4:31:40 So how do you get on Muni? You know, I used to take Muni when I lived here. You can get in racing for the seat that everyone else is racing for, racing to get in the car. You can be a little bit more spacious. You can't be too spacious in the city, in a sense, I mean, unless you're really enlightened. Report an error

4:31:57 Because you need to get to work. You can't just let everybody go in front of you and everybody go for the next. No, at times you go in, but again, it's your attitude. Is the attitude jamming other people or is the attitude, you know, sorry I bumped into you, but, you know. And here it's quite nice. When people do bump into each other, it's a bit, people smile and, okay, sorry. In New York it's a little bit more hostile, a little bit more tension sometimes with people. Report an error

4:32:22 I notice that in Philadelphia. That, but not necessarily. necessarily. And I see how disarming it is for others when I really smile. Somebody bumped into me yesterday, I forget where I was, I think it was a young guy, and was just like, you know how your elbow catches somebody or something. And then he said, oh. Report an error

4:32:54 And then he goes, oh. That's okay. You know, there's no problem. So it also depends on what other people come up against, you know, when they're crossing into your space and things. Report an error

4:33:08 So if you go to the supermarket, when you go, this can be your exercise the next time you go, is remember, make a post-it note. Leave yourself a reminder somewhere. Refrigerator, on the bags you take to the grocery store, in your planner, whatever it is, leave a note. I'm a bodhisattva warrior in the store. So what you do is you go into the store. There's a little bit more spaciousness in your mind as you're going down the aisles. Some of the supermarkets in the city are smaller than suburban supermarkets. Report an error

4:33:39 The aisles are narrower. It's just natural space. The land costs more money, but some of them are not. The whole foods are not, some of those. But you're going through it. Do you ever see people, they get congested in the aisle? That happens a lot in the city, in these areas. So, you know, are you the most important one in the aisle? Report an error

4:33:58 So there's ways you move out of the way. Like I said, in this area, people are generally pretty compassionate about it. But some people aren't. They get a little, you know, so you can just, okay, let the other person go. There's a great mind training verse that says, offer the victory to others. It's a huge expanse of nature of the mind. Report an error

4:34:19 We talked about mind expanding drugs. Dharma is the best mind expanding thing there is. And you can sustain it. That's what's exciting. So you're going down the aisle. You have to remember I'm a bodhisattva warrior. So again, allowing other people, maybe other people need help. You always have a little bit of an eye out because bodhisattva is their whole thing is their entire being is out looking at others, viewing others, not thinking of themselves, looking at others. Report an error

4:34:48 So you're a little bit, there might be somebody who needs some help in the aisles. Sometimes there's old people in the stores. They're not moving as well. They can't reach something. There's many opportunities to serve others. This is what lends to your happiness. But you have to check it out. Check out the next time you suffer or have a problem. Are you thinking about yourself or are you thinking about others? Report an error

4:35:11 You have to be honest with yourself. Can I transform this quickly by putting the focus and the emphasis on the other person? Does that transform my attitude a little bit? Report an error

4:35:22 Again, you have to see this for yourself. Research it yourself. So just the other day I had this funny thing in the store. Report an error

4:35:32 I was in a big supermarket near my parents. Coming up the aisle is a guy with his young son and then I see him stop and he's like searching this one. He's looking and I'm looking the other way and then I finally get my thing and I go by him and he says, excuse me, and he looks really perplexed and he's looking in a little bit of a hurry and he's standing in front of all the pickles. Report an error

4:35:57 You know, there's too many choices anyway in our supermarkets, right? He's looking at all the pickles and he says, Do you know where, and I see him looking and looking, and he says, do you know where the pickled beets are? Pickled beets, you know, there he is in front of all the pickles. I could see he got partially near it, but pickled beets to me aren't near pickles, but okay. Report an error

4:36:17 So then I thought, pickled beets, I'm like, where are pickled beets? All I could come up with is it would probably be in canned vegetables. And fortunately canned vegetables was in the same aisle, just behind, the other side. So I said, I think it's... I think it's canned vegetables, I said to him. I think I'd find that in canned vegetables. And he turned around and I said, look, here's canned vegetables. And then we both quickly scanned and there it was, pickled beets. Report an error

4:36:40 And he said, oh my God. And he grabbed it and he was so happy. And I could see the kid was a little stressed. And so he said, oh thank you. And he said, thank you so much. And he said, my wife thanks you. Obviously it was something, he was sent to the store, she's busy cooking, you could just see the scenario. Report an error

4:36:58 You know, you come home from the store, people that don't shop much, and he'd get home and his wife would say, you didn't get the right stuff. You can just see the scenario. So there's always people like that in the store. There's people like that everywhere around you that need directions when you're walking down the street, people on muni. I always loved that when I first moved here. Report an error

4:37:16 And I was on the bus and I didn't know where I was going and I'd ask about a stop. And, you know, four people would jump up. Oh, I'll show you where to go. I'll show you which stop. You know, so nice of people to help. So many ways. So then you have all your cart now. Let's say you get a cart. You have a bigger order and you get a cart. Report an error

4:37:38 And you've got your cart. And you're done shopping. Now what do you do? You're a Bodhisattva warrior. What do you do? Yeah? What were you going to say? Yeah. You're going to go pay for it, right? You're going to go check out. Okay. So what do you do when you're looking to check out? What do you do? Shortest line, right? That's okay. That's all right. No problem. Report an error

4:38:00 You look for the shortest line. You get in the shortest line. There's your line, but they're not ready. You can't unload yet. The person in front of you is not done. Then what do you do? You're waiting. What do you do when you're waiting? Be honest. What do you do when you're waiting? You look at the tabloids. Right. Of course. Report an error

4:38:20 You look at the tabloids. The other day in a supermarket, a place I don't usually go in suburban Philadelphia, but I ended up going by this shop, big supermarket. Report an error

4:38:32 They have installed little mini TVs at each cashier now that face the customer. It was too much for me because I came back in the country in July and the supermarkets already are a bit of a culture shock. The toothpaste aisle always gets me. I just need toothpaste. Sometimes in India you go to the counter, they only have one tube. It's not even a choice. Report an error

4:38:54 It's like, you want toothpaste? This is the only one we have. That's it. One tube left. There it is. So here, this whole toothpaste aisle, I had a meltdown the other day with the orange juice, the orange juice area, right? My mother wrote on the list. We had in the house, I was shopping for, I was living with two teenagers, there were six of us in the house because my sister came in to visit with her kids. So I kept saying, just write it on the list. Report an error

4:39:20 And I said, be specific, tell me what you want. Anyway, my mother wrote orange juice. I know what kind of, I know she means a big carton of orange juice. That was fine. I knew the size. So I go to the orange juice area. It was too much. It was overload for me. I couldn't, they have orange juice in India. Report an error

4:39:37 They have Tropicana orange juice. It's just, it's in one small, anyway, there I was and I, I mean, it was pulp, no pulp, low pulp, you know, with vitamin A and D, with extra calcium, with home style, home style with pulp. I mean, it was too much. It was really too much. So I had a little meltdown there in the orange juice aisle. Why can't they just have orange juice? Do we need all these choices? But there it was. Report an error

4:40:07 So now they have to have these TVs bombarding you with... I'm not going back to that supermarket, obviously. It wasn't one moment I could just have a little... So you're waiting in line, but you're a Bodhisattva warrior. I hate to break it to you, Bodhisattva warriors, don't usually read the tabloids, okay? Because what they do when they're waiting in line... Report an error

4:40:27 This is really easy. When they're waiting in line and you're not quite ready to empty your stuff yet because the person in front of you isn't gone, is what Bodhisattva Warriors do is they're just scanning a little bit. You can still read a little bit of the tablets, but you're scanning for the person who's looking for the shortest line that's got one can of mayonnaise because that's the person you're going to let go in front of you. Report an error

4:40:48 Because you know what it's like when you've just got eggs. You ran in to get eggs and there's all these people with all their diapers and their, you know. And you just want to check your eggs out. That's it. And even the 15, no more than 15, the express line is still backed up with people. You just want somebody to let you in. Report an error

4:41:06 So you're going to let that person in. So that's your job. Now you don't have to hold the line up because, wait, I haven't let anyone in yet. No, you proceed. You have to do your life. And sometimes you're in a hurry and you can't do that. That's okay. But again, it's a constant way to practice to let... Report an error

4:41:24 To think about other people. So if you're ever driving, I know you don't drive yet, you may drive one day. Driving is a great place to practice because Californians drive a lot. People even in the city have cars because they go outside the city. It's very interesting the territorialness we get when we get behind the wheel of a car. Report an error

4:41:43 And I lived with this really sweet nun who founded this center. I used to live in Noé Valley and she was really a very, she's a very sweet, compassionate being. And she's usually very focused on others until she gets behind the wheel of a car. I never saw anything like it the first time I drove with her. I kept looking at her like, who are you? Report an error

4:42:07 She was like a maniac. Get out of my way. Move over. I never saw this aspect of her. And some people get like that behind the car. Suddenly they're like driving a tank and they think they're... It's the strangest thing. And people have this thing and they'll say, you know, he was in my lane. And then I think, well, I didn't see your name on the lane. Did you build it? Did you build the road? Report an error

4:42:30 You own the road. That's your road? And people say, well, you know, it wasn't. So the thing is, if you let people in, sometimes people make mistakes driving, right? I've done it many times. And I find out I'm in the wrong lane. I'm like, to be over there. And then you turn and nobody wants to let you in. So you know what it's like when somebody lets you in. Report an error

4:42:51 Let them in. The guy's even got the signal on. You're going to let them in. If it was your friend, you'd let them in in a second, right? If a person turns around and you know them, you'd be like, oh yeah, sure. But enemy and stranger, no. And then we have judgments. What kind of car do you drive? Report an error

4:43:13 A little SUV, right? What do you drive? Come on, you can tell us. Okay, but not a huge car. It's probably not a big car. And you drive? Report an error

4:43:30 So what happens for me sometimes, this is my delusion, I have many. I pulled up the other day to a red light in my parents' car and next to me, you know, you just happen to sometimes you look and there's a guy in a Gigantor SUV, you know, miles long, goes out the back into Kentucky or something. And I immediately have a judgment about them, you know, gas guzzling, voting for McCain. Report an error

4:43:58 Yeah. You know, Hunter. Hunter, probably. I've got the guy nailed, right? And I find out later, because my brother does ambulance work and this guy was, that he's an emergency worker. That's why he has the SUV and in the back of it is oxygen and all kinds of emergency supplies that he goes to people's homes to, I mean, it's a whole, he's like, you know, he rescues and it's not an ambulance but it's like a special rescue thing for other, like, What do they call it? Emergency situations, evacuations. But again, my judgment, I think I know this person and I think I know their mind. Report an error

4:44:36 You don't know at all what their story is. So it's a good place to watch your mind when you're on the road, what you think about people, how your mind is dividing and conquering. That's what we like to do is separate when actually we don't know really what people's experience are. And it can be very stressful for people on the freeways in California. Report an error

4:44:55 So why not make it a little bit more peaceful in my car so I can contribute maybe a little bit more peace on the road. Sometimes slowing down a couple miles an hour more slowly, I'm a little bit more able to see how I'm driving, focus on driving compassionately. Seeing ahead of me somebody's got their signal on and nobody's letting them in. Okay, I'll let them in. I can see. But if I'm driving too fast, I'm not able to notice as much. My reaction time isn't going to be as good. Report an error

4:45:23 That's as many opportunities on the road. To practice patience and to be kind to people and things like that. Some people drive like jerks, I know that. And that's annoying. I don't have to engage in that with them. I just prefer them, let them go, let them get out of the way. Pass me, go ahead, pass me. Go. Let them, you know, I don't need to worry about that. What I have to worry about is me and my mind in this car and being responsible in my car, driving nicely for people, trying not to cut people off, trying to, like that. Report an error

4:45:53 So there's many ways you can do that. What who camp out in the fast like, I'm okay with the leading people, and it's those people who are far left who are going 60 miles an hour. Yeah, Americans need. Americans need to learn how to drive. We were never taught very well because that passing lane, nobody gets it anywhere in the country. I've seen it everywhere. I've seen it everywhere. Report an error

4:46:16 There's nobody that seems to really understand that. Like in Europe, you wouldn't dare get in that lane. wouldn't dare at all. I mean, they get you off the free, off the road from it. Everybody knows it's a passing lane. That's the only time you're in that lane is when you're passing. They're quite, it's just unfortunate. Report an error

4:46:32 Americans somehow, so my niece and nephews, who are all just driving now, tell them that. Like, I was with my niece, and she's sitting in the lane, and I said, this is a passing lane. I said, you shouldn't be in this lane unless you're going to pass. But they see it because other people do it, so then people think it's okay to do. I would just say, I just tell people. Report an error

4:46:51 But otherwise there's nothing you really can do, right? You can follow them. Occasionally what I did was sometimes I flash lights at night at people to move over and they see you and they do move over. They understand. And so that's one way you can do it is if you don't want to go around them and if you are in a hurry and need to get there faster, if they're really blocking it up, it is. Report an error

4:47:10 I know somebody in Boulder Creek is a mountain road. It's a small, just two lane mountain road. And what happens is they have turn-offs, meaning that if you want to be a tourist and really take your time and look at all the things along the way, that's fine, but then they have a thing where you get off the side and let the whole traffic go by you, and it's a law in California. Report an error

4:47:30 I think if there's five people behind you, you have to turn off and let them go, if there's a turn-off like that, if it's possible. So apparently somebody came from our center, visiting from New York, and they had New York license plates. They had driven. And they didn't know this. So they were driving and they were holding up a whole line of traffic and driving really slowly and they got to a red light and the guy behind them got out and came up and said there's turn offs and told them. Report an error

4:47:56 And said there's turn offs and you need to turn off and let everybody go. And they had no idea and then they were like sorry we didn't know and then they saw the next sign and they pulled over and let everybody go. So there's ways nicely you can say as opposed to like move over asshole or what people say. So that's the thing if you have a chance. Report an error

4:48:15 chance if there's an opportunity usually there isn't and then if it's night a couple times I have flashed my lights at people and other times I just wait and find a space and go around them and it's a shame because that's that's a difficult Have you Report an error

4:48:31 ever experienced where you've done that for somebody? if let's say you take a super... Report an error

4:48:44 Not that you want them to turn around and look back and say what a great person they are. It's not about that ego stuff. But there's some recognition of kindness that has occurred. But they don't. So they just kind of take what you're going to give them as though, I mean, I don't know what they're thinking, but almost as though they're entitled or, of course, you know, and there's no acknowledgement whatsoever. Report an error

4:49:08 Right. Like you do that while you're driving. You let people in. it's kind of nice, you know, not that I need to be stroked, but it's kind of nice for somebody to go, you know, thanks, you know, like, you know, because, like, I'll wave profusely. I'll roll down my thing and go, oh, my God, thank you so much. Report an error

4:49:21 And there are just some people that will just, well, they'll just take it. They don't want to even acknowledge you. And I'm just wondering if you've experienced that. Yeah. Yeah, bodhisattva warriors don't look for the acknowledgement at all. It's all about the other person. So if they're happy to go in front of you, they let go. It's a little bit of, it's generosity. Report an error

4:49:40 Okay, it's a practice of generosity and true generosity isn't looking for any acknowledgement from your own side like that. So it's a tricky one because we kind of want that. Report an error

4:49:55 I mean, it's great when people give this recognition, because it's like, hey, you know, we're brothers and sisters in all this, all right? Right. You know? And when there's none of that, you just kind of feel like disconnected. Thank you for listening. and you want to be thanked and I noticed that in myself a lot just because that's how I was raised but in certain parts of Europe like in Italy they don't thank a lot they don't do that it's just not part of their culture and I don't know if you found that when you were living in Italy or just not that kind of thing and so when I was there we some centers in Italy and very strong ones and I love going there and I have a lot of friends there. And one of them, I kept thanking the director and I kept saying, thanks so much for that. And it was just typical American courtesy. Report an error

4:50:45 Like something I say, oh, thanks so much. And he finally said, would you stop thanking me? He's like, we just don't do that here. And it's really awkward. And he was really kind of annoyed by it. So it just depends on, like, we like that and we need that. But if you're really, truly just giving to somebody else, you don't look for it and you don't need it. It's really about the other person being happy. Report an error

4:51:04 They got in front of me and they're happy and it works for them? Great, I'm served by that. Now it's nice in our culture because I do that with people because that's how our culture is. But in Italy now when I go there I don't thank all the time because they find it really strange. Report an error

4:51:21 Yes, or you make a huge drama of it. And in England they're very polite and they do that a lot and there's a lot of other, how can I say, other politenesses that I find in England are too much. They're always apologizing. You know, I mean, there was a guy who went on one of our pilgrimages from England who's a very sweet guy. He got really sick in India and it happens. He got really sick and like threw up on the bus and threw up all over himself. Report an error

4:51:47 And I had to help him, you know, get the clothes out and change. And he just kept saying, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so the guy was sick. It wasn't his fault. And after like the first 16 I'm sorry's, I was really over the top with I'm sorry. It's like, you know, because that's not something that. Report an error

4:52:03 We would do so much. So there's each culture I've noticed just living around the world. There's different things and I know we're a very much please and thank you culture that that's something that's a courtesy here that I would do for people. I would wave, I would flash my lights when I pass them. You know, people do that at night, blink the lights. But an actual true bodhisattva warrior wouldn't be looking for any acknowledgement and wouldn't need it and wouldn't suffer because of it because the whole purpose is to benefit that somebody else got what they needed. Report an error

4:52:32 So it takes a while to get your mind into that place though. It's not an easy thing. Because I think it's really nice to try to follow a bit of the customs of where you are and try to get into what, because that's the way people conduct themselves there. So I don't personally want to come off as being impolite. And it takes you a while in some really foreign cultures to learn. For instance, in some cultures where burping is okay when you eat. Report an error

4:52:56 And in America you'd never do that. It's totally rude. And like in our cultures, and I find this is an odd one, but with Westerners, and this is not pervasive at all by Westerners, but I've definitely been around Westerners that fart in public. And I'm repulsed by it. And if you're with Tibetans and Sherpas, never, ever would you hear them do that. Ever. And they understand that Westerners do it and they find us revolting because we do that. Report an error

4:53:25 So it's just interesting cultures of how things you get used to that... You'd think I'd never do things like that. It's just something to get used to. Let's do some Tonglen meditation and I want to explain this first. Report an error

4:53:40 This is a meditation called giving and taking. This is an incredible way when you feel helpless and also when you don't feel helpless but you want to help yourself and you want to help somebody else. Report an error

4:53:55 The essence of it is you want to take on the suffering of others. want to give them all your happiness and all your virtue. Report an error

4:54:05 reason we start with taking is people need to be relieved of their suffering before they can experience happiness. they have too much suffering, won't be able to understand happiness. Report an error

4:54:17 what we do also is, if we take it in, you want to, in a sense, they say, eventually mount it on the breath. Every inhalation, you're taking. Every exhalation, you're giving. Report an error

4:54:30 Okay, so you can get to a point if you practice and practice and practice and even for years, you can get to the point where even your motion that you're moving through space because you're always breathing, the tonglin is going on. It's an incredibly virtuous mind state for you to develop. And if you are in a sense when you, a lot of people do this when they start to get older, but some people do it when they're younger, is to think about death, that one day they're going to die and how do they want. Report an error

4:54:59 Their death to go and they'd like to prepare themselves more so they're not afraid at the time and they don't have regrets. So some people aren't going to be able to spend their lives in a lot of spiritual practice and they're not going to be that familiar with that many higher level practices that may be beneficial at the time of death. Report an error

4:55:16 But if you know Tong Lin, it's a really simple thing to do at the time of death. And if at the time of death you are thinking of others and just have the wish in your mind, I wish they would be free of suffering. I would love to give them all my happiness, all my virtues, all the love I've ever experienced. It's an incredibly virtuous mind state. Report an error

4:55:38 So basically it would just lend to your having a more peaceful death. If you believe in reincarnation it would help you certainly for any future lives or the next rebirth like that. Report an error

4:55:52 So sit comfortably. And Report an error

4:56:00 what's very powerful is a lot of times we start with the wish. To free all other beings from suffering and give them all our happiness, but you can't really start with all other beings until you start and do a bit of tonglin with yourself. So we're going to do a little bit of this just with ourselves. So just relax and sit comfortably and Report an error

4:56:37 let's bring our concentration right now to our breath, just a normal natural breath. Report an error

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4:58:13 Visualize in the very center of your heart as you're sitting here is Report an error

4:58:22 a constricted knot. It represents all of your self-cherishing, a very tight place in the center of your core. It is all your selfishness. And Report an error

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4:59:32 imagine now in the space just in front of you is an exact duplicate of yourself seated across from you, facing you. So as best as you can, sometimes it's hard to visualize, just visualize this image of yourself in front of you. Report an error

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5:01:05 Look at this person who is you. Imagine the ways you suffer. Think about how you suffer and also think about your future suffering. Now Report an error

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5:03:18 you sitting here on the cushion. Imagine taking on all of the suffering you experience. As you inhale, it enters you through your right nostril, leaving your visualization through the left nostril. And you can imagine different colored light leaving. Report an error

5:03:45 You can imagine the suffering in the form of poisonous insects and snakes, animals that kill you. You can imagine the suffering as environmental toxins, pesticides, poisons in the air, in the water, on the earth. You can imagine also this leaving your visualization through the left nostril as words such as war, poverty, famine. Report an error

5:04:23 disease things like that and again these enter you sitting here in the kitchen every time you inhale through your right nostril goes immediately to the self-cherishing knot at your core instantly destroying it you're Report an error

5:04:49 filled with a deep sense of peace and freedom and happiness and then out your left nostril as you exhale you offer to your visualization of yourself all of that goodness all the happiness Report an error

5:05:09 loving-kindness. it enters your visualization of yourself. the right nostril, bringing a deep sense of peace. So just do this meditation of Tonglin as best as you can. Your Report an error

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5:09:47 visualization of yourself completely released of all the suffering. Even if you don't believe all the suffering is gone, imagine it's certainly minimized. Report an error

5:10:06 Replica of yourself slowly dissolves into light. Report an error

5:10:14 And this light absorbs to you. Imagine Report an error

5:10:25 your self-cherishing is greatly decreased, that Report an error

5:10:39 you are filled with a very deep sense of peace and happiness. Please Report an error

5:11:07 relax. To Report an error

5:11:26 take this meditation further, it can take a while sometimes, but you build up where you would visualize a loved one across from you. So suddenly you have an other, and then you could take a stranger. Someone you maybe pass in the store, a neighbor you don't really know, you can do Tonglen with them, you imagine their suffering, then you do the visualization, then you take an enemy and then you can put that whole group together and do all of them together and then you just keep expanding until you can think of all living beings. Report an error

5:12:05 You can have your, you can take your family, you can do different things, you can say all the men in the world. I do Tonglen and you can do Tonglen with them. All the women in the world, all the people in the northern hemisphere, all the people in the southern hemisphere, there's many ways to do it. So if you're reading the newspaper or you hear on the news some horrible thing in Iraq or Afghanistan or other places in the world, in Darfur and Middle East, you can just imagine these beings there, imagine their suffering, unbelievable suffering of bombs, being shot at, not having enough food. Report an error

5:12:48 Giving them all your happiness. It's very powerful for you. it relieve the suffering for them? Probably not at our level. you going to take on somebody's cancer? No, not at our level. But it's a very powerful exercise of exercising your mind think of others. Think about alleviating others' suffering. Report an error

5:13:08 What would that be like? What would it be like to give others happiness? So it's really planting those virtuous seeds in you that lends to your happiness. If you're by somebody's hospital bed, where we often feel really helpless, somebody's dying, or somebody's just really ill, particularly caregivers, it's a fantastic way. Report an error

5:13:29 Nobody needs to know you're doing Tonglen. You see somebody in a lot of pain, and you can just visualize you breathe in, take in all their suffering, give them happiness. It sometimes creates a little peaceful environment in the room. I've noticed that with people. Nobody needs to know that you're doing anything at all. So just a few tools and things. Report an error

5:13:53 Any questions? Anything even about the meditation? Report an error

5:14:06 this thing where with like family members or close friends or someone I'm dating, they're, I'm very sensitive to their moods, and like if they're unhappy, then I kind of take on their unhappiness, and then I find myself doing things to try and make them happy. Report an error

5:14:25 to not, I don't know, I guess I shouldn't be not sensitive to it, but I wish that I could still be content with myself even though it's there and I'm happy and I don't feel like I have to take on it there. Report an error

5:14:36 Women are great accommodators. That's what we do. It's actually a great trait that we have. However, sometimes we end up, I find, neglecting our own things that would help us. If you really do it with a great wish to help them, it's really nice. That can be helpful. But sometimes I found, I have been around a lot of moody people, and what I find is it does help not to contribute, not to get into the mood with them. Report an error

5:15:04 And what I've noticed is that if the rest of us, or if it's just me, just continue on to what we're doing, sometimes it'll pull them out of it as well, rather than me being, oh, what's wrong? Because I've noticed that myself when I was the director of this center. As the director you're a little bit more of a focal point sometimes. People want to know how's the boss today and I never really liked that role very much. Report an error

5:15:31 But I would come down from our cabins to our main building and then if I was a little down one day... Everybody wants to fix it. Oh, what's wrong? Oh, I'm sure if you just... And sometimes people are just like that. And so I found I'd say to them, no, tomorrow it'll be different. It's temporary. So sometimes rather than accentuating the mood, oh, what's wrong? Okay, well, maybe we'll... I would just a little bit say, is everything okay? Report an error

5:15:57 To make sure they are okay. Is there anything you want to talk about? And try to find out if they don't want to say anything. Then I would just go on and act. Lama Tsongkhapa, Shantideva, His Holiness the Dalai Lama I'm not talking about bipolar situation, I'm talking about just people who have these mood things and we have a few of them in our family. And my sister will say, one of the teenagers gets that way. Report an error

5:16:41 And you can see it's just self-serving on their part too, they're sitting in their mind. And so one of the teenagers would get into this space and then my sister would say, this is when they were a little younger, and she's like, well Mr. Grumpy's not invited because that was a thing they used as kids. Report an error

5:16:56 And she said, well, I'm sorry, but Mr. Grumpy's not invited today, so if you're going to be that way, then I'm going to be the person who stays home with you, and you're really not going to like that very much. And then all of a sudden, my nephew just snapped out of it and was like, okay. Because that can be a bit self-serving, too. It's hard to know when it's a more serious depression versus just a mood and versus somebody who's manipulating. Report an error

5:17:20 Like that. I just find if it's a pattern, like the first time I might just try to accommodate and then if I find it's continual and they're always like this, you know, you just try to help as much as you can and then sometimes there's nothing you can do. Like that. Report an error

5:17:36 Right. Report an error

5:17:43 wish that I weren't aware. Right. It's better to be sensitive. I think it's better to be sensitive. And there's a difference between just moodiness and somebody manipulating versus serious depression. That's serious and that's really an illness that needs attention and needs to be helped. But there's ways to help, again, with medicine versus also... I used to be prone to depression, so I found what happens, it's like a sitting in the mind. Report an error

5:18:09 It's an actual illness, but it's... It's my mind would just be obsessed with it. I don't feel good. I don't feel good. I don't feel good. You know, it's a tape you get. So what would catapult me out of it is if I had to do something for somebody else. And it would come in weird ways, sometimes spontaneously. I came home from work one day and my neighbor, who was an old woman who lived upstairs, showed up right at the bottom of the steps at the same time with packages. Report an error

5:18:33 So what are you going to do? I had to carry them up. I didn't even think though. I just said, oh, here, I'll help you. So when I got to the top and saw how happy she was, I think she gave me a flower or something at the end. It was hard for me to stay like, oh, I feel... So that's one of the tricks is if you can get... Report an error

5:18:51 Sometimes if people are perpetually depressed or chronically depressed, sometimes I've encouraged people to get into volunteer work because they really see the benefit of if it's with people, how happy they're making people or even if they're with pets in some animal shelter, they see the difference and it's hard to kind of stay... Report an error

5:19:11 But some of them need medication. Sometimes medication with the other therapy and things can be really helpful, because therapy can be very helpful for that. And dharma is great for things like that. Because you start to look at the nature of your mind, because when I'd gotten depressed again once with the dharma, I could look at it, and it didn't stay around very long, because I was like, okay, I can see how my mind works in this, and this is because I'm thinking about myself here, and this is because I didn't get this. Report an error

5:19:40 And it was really interesting because then I could just watch my mind and see how it arose. And then there's karmic situations that create it. So sometimes I'm not in control of it because the karma was already created. But then I can do purification practices. So it's a difficult one. I think it's better to be sensitive and be able to accommodate than being an insensitive person that doesn't. Report an error

5:20:02 But there is a limit. Bodhisattvas are not codependents. That's a key part. And the difference is wisdom. Report an error

5:20:13 times when you might act like a doormat, but you're realizing with some wisdom that this is helpful to the person. So you don't just blindly go out there and buy the alcoholic a beer because you know that otherwise they'll be miserable and they won't let me. No, that's, you know, using your skillful means is saying, no, I'm not going to do that, but I'm here for you. here right now. I'm not going to abandon you and that. Report an error

5:20:36 So there is a fine line between that where people get into codependent and and they're they're always... always doing for people and they're always the one that's there kind of picking up the pieces and that's not always beneficial if there's not really the wisdom. Anything else? right now is that as humans we're limited, we don't really the best thing to do for somebody, as long as we're limited. And when you're a Buddha, you're unlimited. Report an error

5:20:59 You know exactly what is the best thing to do. Report an error

5:21:09 What I'd like to do then in conclusion is to dedicate all the positive energy that we've created from spending this time together today and I thank you very much for coming and taking this time out of your day. Report an error

5:21:24 Fantastic way to spend the day. I'd like to dedicate to there being some positive benefit for you and for others but may it help you, may some of the techniques, may you be able to use them. Report an error

5:21:39 To open your heart and mind, to be able to grow loving kindness, wisdom and compassion in yourself may contribute to your future happiness and may be able to use that experience to be able to be a benefit to all of the beings as much as possible. Thank Report an error

5:22:12 you very much. Thank you so much for coming. I really enjoyed meeting you, seeing all of you. And I hope, is it useful, some things that... A little bit useful? I hope so. I hope so. Great. I know there's not one just trick, but it's nice to think about these things for a while. There's a lot of other things we could have said as well that we could have gone into different angles, but only so much time. Thank you, Rach. Report an error

5:22:39 I hope you come back and maybe one day come to Vermont. I also recommend, you know, some people are newer. I forgot to mention this. This practice booklet is in the bookstore, Shakyamuni Buddha Practice Booklet. The reason I mention it, it's a very simple booklet that has motivations, prayers and it's something to help people get into beginning practice in this tradition. Report an error

5:23:05 It's not for everybody, but if you're interested, you see how thin, it's very thin. You don't have to do the whole book, but you can certainly start to learn from either asking another teacher here or other teachers or checking into more courses. What do these prayers mean? What are they about? You might find things you like. Some of it is self-explanatory. And you might find things where one day you sit down and you do this prayer, you like this, one day this one. Report an error

5:23:33 You don't have to do the whole thing all at once, but it's got some nice meditations in there. So that's something I was just going to point out, this little practice book that I found can be pretty helpful and you can use it with meditation. Report an error

5:23:49 Thank you very much. Enjoy the rest of your day and your evening and your weekend. Hope to see you all again. Report an error

5:24:29 you want us to stack the cushions? Report an error

5:24:52 welcome to hang out longer if you'd like to. Report an error

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Talk by Amy Miller, recorded 6 September 2008. Original at Tse Chen Ling Center for Tibetan Buddhist Studies via Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/AM_Happiness_20080906. Licensed CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 US. Transcript generated automatically and may contain errors; the audio is the authoritative version.

Recorded at Tse Chen Ling Center, San Francisco, and archived by the center on Internet Archive. More from Tse Chen Ling

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