← Venerable Palmo

Discovering Buddhism - How To Meditate (9 April 2015)

Venerable Palmo · 9 April 2015 · 1 h 58 min · Tse Chen Ling via Internet Archive

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  • 1:44

    So the first thing when we start is that we want to be sure to motivate because that determines whether our practice is going to be virtuous or non-virtuous or just neutral. And so you can kind of make up your own motivations, but basically we can think that we do these... Practices, attend the classes, listening to the teachings so that we can learn techniques that we can put into use to transform our minds.

  • 8:43

    Just see the open spaciousness of your mind like the sky. And see the clouds and know that they're just passing through the clouds of thoughts, emotions, feelings, and try to not to follow them or not to push them away, but just to understand that they're rising and they'll fall again and try to focus on the mind. One of the ways that they do it, they explain it like a fishbowl.

  • 36:01

    So basically what that is, is that we see something as pleasant and we want it. And when we get it, we don't want to be separated from it. And somehow or another, we always think that it's going to really make us happy. And it only works for a little while. It doesn't last.

  • 46:25

    Of the delusions is the meditation on emptiness. Okay, and so we need some understanding of emptiness. And this does come up in other classes too, but basically you can just begin to start to investigate the I, you know, and who's this I that's experiencing attachment? They're like, just sit, sit and kind of ask yourself, who is it? Where is it?

  • 1:29:04

    So antidotes to aversion. You know, the more mindfulness that we develop, the easier it is to see when that irritation starts to come up. And there's always thoughts behind all of the emotions. In spite of the fact that it seems like emotions just pop up on their own, there's always thoughts behind them.

0:00 If you have any frustrations you can. Report an error

0:04 Om Namo Manjushriya Namo Shriya Namo Uttama Shriya Soha, Om Namo Manjushriya Namo Shriya Namo Uttama Shriya Soha. On the moment you shake, namas, see you. Namak, uta, namas, to ye, so hard. Report an error

0:54 So we'll Report an error

1:01 begin the same as though we were doing a practice. Get yourselves comfortable on your cushions. We did the prostrations. Get yourself adjusted. I need to get myself adjusted. All the material and the knees and all that kind of stuff. And Report an error

1:30 of course get my beverage adjusted. did. Report an error

1:44 So the first thing when we start is that we want to be sure to motivate because that determines whether our practice is going to be virtuous or non-virtuous or just neutral. Report an error

2:03 And so you can kind of make up your own motivations, but basically we can think that we do these... Practices, attend the classes, listening to the teachings so that we can learn techniques that we can put into use to transform our minds. And the reason we want to transform our minds is so that we can achieve a happy state and eliminate the suffering that we work so hard right now to try to eliminate. Report an error

2:44 But in the past we... Done it in all the wrong ways by looking outside of ourselves. So by taking this class and engaging in these meditations, we begin to turn around our way of thinking so that we can actually diminish our suffering by looking inside. Report an error

3:07 And just like us, everyone else that we know, all of our friends, family, all the people on the street, people all around the world, all the animals. Nafish, everybody is in some state of suffering. Report an error

3:26 So if we learn how to stop our own suffering by looking inward, then we can help others to do the same. So with that motivation also, we can get age in these classes. And we stay committed to this altruistic motivation to the very end until we are perfectly awakened. Report an error

3:57 That we become Buddhas ourselves. And this is the way that we can help the most, that we can benefit the most beings. And so we engage in these practices in order to plant the seeds for that full awakening. Report an error

4:17 So what I thought we can do, because in the prayer book, what we've been reading actually is a good one when you're at home, but there's also a refuge in bodhicitta. On page seven in the white books, that's really more important for when we do classes. And it's on the bottom of the left-hand column on page seven. Report an error

4:46 Unfortunately, the seven limb prayer doesn't follow it, but the seven limb prayer is on the, oh, we can do it on page, the one opposite, Sunday morning service prayers. Actually we could use that, we won't have to flip. We'll just skip the four immeasurables and we'll do the refuge and bodhicitta in English three times and then we'll skip to the seven limb prayer and we'll do that once. Report an error

5:21 So I go for refuge until I'm enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Assembly. By the merits I create through listening to the Dharma, may I become a Buddha in order to benefit all sentient beings. I go for refuge until I'm enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Assembly. May I become a Buddha in order to benefit all sentient beings. Report an error

5:46 I go for refuge until I'm enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Assembly. May I become a Buddha in order to benefit all sentient beings. Reverently, I prostrate with my body, speech and mind. I present clouds of every type of offering, actual and imagined. I reveal my negative actions accumulated since beginningless time and rejoice in the merit of all holy and ordinary beings. Report an error

6:18 Please remain until the end of cyclic existence and turn the wheel of Dharma for living beings. I dedicate my own merits and those of all others to the great enlightenment. Report an error

6:34 See, the pages stopped getting numbered after page 7 or 8. But anyway, so I hope everybody was able to find it. Report an error

6:48 So we'll start with the meditation. It'll be a short one because this is a really long class. I'm not sure that I'll be able to go over all of it. And whatever I don't do this time, we'll do next time. Because it's on some of the main... Afflictions and problems and then on the antidotes to them. Report an error

7:23 So I'll put a short one, we'll make it five minutes. And so for everybody that's been doing the nine round breathing, we'll do the nine round breathing first and then followed by the meditation that we did on the clear light nature of the mind. Just looking at the open spaciousness of your mind. For those of you that aren't familiar with the nine round breathing, you can just imagine breathing in three times. You breathe in through the left nostril and out through the right nostril three times and then you reverse it. Report an error

8:02 You breathe in through the right nostril and out through the left nostril three times and then in through both nostrils and then out and it comes out, goes up kind of like in a crook shape and kind of comes out through. Through where your third eye would be, through the forehead. So you can block your nostrils or not. Report an error

8:27 So you can do that on your own. I'll set the timer. It'll be very short meditation, like I said, five minutes. And so when you finish, then take a few breaths and then go into the meditation that we were doing for homework on the clear light nature of mind. Just see the open spaciousness of your mind like the sky. Report an error

8:50 And see the clouds and know that they're just passing through the clouds of thoughts, emotions, feelings, and try to not to follow them or not to push them away, but just to understand that they're rising and they'll fall again and try to focus on the mind. One of the ways that they do it, they explain it like a fishbowl. Report an error

9:21 And you've got a big fish tank with lots of fish. And usually when we look at a fish tank, we watch the fish. The fish are like the thoughts and the emotions and everything just going through. And the water is like the open spaciousness of our mind, which allows everything to move around and go in and out. Report an error

9:44 So what we're going to do, instead of looking at the fish, we're going to look at the water. Report an error

9:52 So that's another way to visualize it, whatever way that works. So we'll just do that for a very short time. Report an error

10:11 Okay, so you can begin. The bell's going to ring, but you can start anyway. Report an error

· · ·

15:44 Check in with everybody. Are there any questions, comments, statements? How did the meditation go? Did it go? Report an error

16:23 Yeah, yeah. We get caught by the... Good feelings just as much as we get caught by the bad feelings. In fact, even more so because we want the good feelings. Report an error

16:37 In the practice, in concentration, we need to learn to let everything just go and actually really focus on the object. So the spaciousness, the empty spaciousness, that big... so we, know, so it's, yeah. Report an error

16:57 Open, clear space is our main focus. There'll be beautiful butterflies that go through and there may be some really ugly birds, I don't know, or ugly something that go through. Report an error

17:13 But it's interesting to watch all those things, isn't it? Yeah. Report an error

17:21 Well, I mean, actually, when we do get to deeper levels of concentration, they say that feeling is amazing, you know, that it lends itself to you wanting to rush back to sit down on the cushion and do some more. Report an error

17:41 But that's not the point of it. You have to remember, we have to keep it in perspective. So the point is to learn to focus our mind so then we can turn it around and... And combine it with analysis so that we can begin to cut all of the roots of the delusions, and the biggest one being the root of ignorance, which keeps us kind of bound and stuck in suffering realms. Report an error

18:14 Even the higher suffering realms, which look like fun. But anyway, yeah, but that's good, that's good. At least it made you want to go back and do it again, right? But remember to bring back your mind to the object. Report an error

18:36 Yeah, yeah. Report an error

18:46 Anyone else? I've gotten used to meditating with my eye all the time, but this meditation is hard to do. Report an error

19:01 But I mean, you don't leave them wide open, just a slit, slits, yeah. Report an error

19:07 Sometimes, like when we were doing a lot of the concentration kind of meditation where you don't want to be distracted at all by even a blur of color, like at home I keep a kind of a real pale beige color pillowcase and I put it over, I just keep it folded under my meditation table and I put it over the top of everything so that there's just a... Report an error

19:35 Kind of almost like a blank slate. It's almost like staring at a blank wall or looking at a blank wall. So this way, even when your eyes are just a little slit, there's no distraction of even a blur of color. So that sometimes helps. Report an error

19:57 But now most of the time it's like it gets to a point where I'm not even sure if my eyes are open or closed. And then by the time, when that thought comes in, then you've already lost your object. Report an error

20:11 You know, because it's like everything kind of blacks out. And I start with my eyes open. So I'm not sure if, you know, that sense consciousness, if I've been able to allow it to just withdraw, or whether my eyes closed. And I'm not sure. Because it still feels the same. But all of a sudden I notice that, you know, it's just... Report an error

20:46 There's not even that blur of color. Report an error

20:55 They say it's good to, especially for me, with being prone to sinking, which is going into drowsiness, it's good to do it with eyes open so you get a little bit more light. Report an error

21:12 And they say in higher levels of meditation, they suggest that also, His Holiness has said that, but I'm not sure exactly why. Report an error

21:28 Anybody have any questions on the reading? Did you find this one easier or harder? Report an error

21:41 Is there any difference in... Because we switched from a grosser object, the breath, to a subtle object, which is like a concept. It's like the mind is very subtle, much more subtle. You can't even call it a... Report an error

22:08 Is that a thing? Huh? This one. Which one? This one? Yeah, Report an error

22:28 see, so everybody has different strengths. So it's good to work with what works for you. But, you know, one of the things I noticed that it's, like, much easier to just quickly attach onto a thought as it's floating through. And it's like, it's almost as though... You attach to it before you even realize it's even hardly there. And it's like the minute it kind of comes along, you go, ooh, what's that? Report an error

23:04 You know, and then you've got to look, I've got to look at it and see what it is, you know. But, yeah, it's a good practice. It's a good practice. Report an error

23:22 Anybody else? Report an error

23:27 Anyway, so... don't Report an error

23:31 Tonight I was going to talk about negative states of mind in meditation and also out of meditation. Because the negative states of mind don't confine themselves to just when we're walking around. They'll also sometimes come up in meditation too. And if they don't come up in meditation, but they come up a lot when we're walking around, when we sit down to do our meditation, we can use that state of mind. Report an error

24:01 That unpleasant state of mind as our object of meditation, we use an analytical meditation to explore it, to begin to understand it so that we can break it down and begin to get control over it. So we'll talk about that kind of thing. And these negative states of minds are like thoughts and emotions like anger, irritation. Report an error

24:29 Afflicted pride, because we call it afflicted pride because it's based on the defilements, the negativities. There's also a pride that's not afflicted pride, so we specify. Anyway, desire, jealousy, all of those kinds of things. So what we generally do is... We try to repress and ignore them a lot of times. So neither of those approaches is very constructive. And so none of these states of mind, none of these negative states of mind are inherently evil. Report an error

25:12 They're just negative. We call them negative because they cause suffering. And they come from our distorted perception of reality or how things exist. And how things exist in relationship to ourselves and all of that. And they cause us suffering, you know, now they can cause suffering sometimes if they come up in a certain way, they can cause, you know, suffering for others. Report an error

25:48 So our usual way to deal with them is to completely identify with them, you know. Oh yeah, well I'm a pretty impatient person. We are not our emotions. Report an error

26:09 We like to identify ourselves with the good ones too. But sometimes people say, well yeah, I'm a really impatient person. It's kind of like in my nature. I'm naturally impatient. I naturally respond with anger. I was trained that way. Anyway, you know, it's like, but. But, you know, so we either identify with them or, like I said before, we either repress or ignore them. Report an error

26:43 And so neither approach is constructive and neither approach helps us to eliminate them. And the whole point here is that we're going to look at these negative states of mind, these states of mind that cause our own suffering. It's a mental suffering. When you're angry, you're not happy. You're suffering. And so we're going to look at those and begin to break them down and eliminate them. Report an error

27:18 So these minds come up while we're doing all of our daily activities and in meditation both, like I said. And they're impermanent like everything else. Report an error

27:29 All they are is just some mental energy. They're not who we are. They don't need to last. Report an error

27:40 We can cause sometimes resentments. We can cause, we can hold on to those, you know, and hold them through most of our life. Some people will hold on to them all the way through and, you know, and they die holding on to this resentment. And all it does is harms them even more than it harms anyone else. Report an error

28:09 It's just a mental energy, and we can let go of these kinds of things. So in meditation is a good way to begin. We develop mindfulness or awareness, just like we did with the homework, you know, seeing all of the thoughts and emotions like clouds. This already, if we can remember that, will begin to... Report an error

28:37 Allow these to kind of come up and we won't jump on them as quickly. I mean, we can begin to see how they arise in our mind like a cloud in the sky. Report an error

28:50 And sometimes, you know, after a storm, some of those clouds look pretty solid. You know, they don't look like they're going to move. Sometimes they're wispy and they just watch them just come up and they just kind of float off and you see these little wisps of... Cloud disappearing into the sky. Well, sometimes they're like these huge clouds that don't look like they're going anywhere. But the sky is still there. Report an error

29:17 And so we learn to be able to use the positive energy that we have to kind of blow those clouds away. Report an error

29:31 Anyway, so that got a little distracted. But the thoughts rise and fall. Okay? And thoughts and emotions come and go. And when they don't go, it's usually because we're holding on to them and we're following them. And we like our stories and that kind of thing. And sometimes we don't want to let go. We tell all our friends all of the horrible things that happened to us that, you know, so-and-so did and how it's like, you know, and we hang on to it and hang on to it. Report an error

30:12 But... Actually, they can come and go, and they do if we let them. Report an error

30:23 So we learn that these emotions and negative thoughts are not who we are. So we can explore that in, it's not really who we are, we can explore that in meditation. We can become more aware of the negative states of mind. Like anger, irritation, all of those that we were talking about, desire. Because sometimes what happens, well, that comes up later. Report an error

30:58 But we become more aware of them through meditation. We become more aware of them and more aware of what comes up in our mind. Report an error

31:10 I don't know if you sometimes ever know a person that they'll always kind of like, or often, I shouldn't say always, often will kind of snap at people. Report an error

31:22 And then you say, what are you so upset about? And they go, I'm not upset. No. You know, this is like that kind of suppressing or denying or maybe even not even recognizing. So in meditation, we can become more familiar with these things. If we don't look at it, if we don't acknowledge it, if we don't work on... Report an error

31:51 I'm cleaning the dirt out, you know, we're not going to, it's not going to change anything. And the whole point to doing these meditations is to transform our minds, to change our minds. Report an error

32:07 So through analytical meditation, we can learn to face our delusions because we're just doing it by ourselves on the cushion and it doesn't matter how. Horrible it seems. It's just a series of thoughts and energy. It's not who you are. It's not lasting. And we can analyze them to see how they're mistaken. And we can learn to apply antidotes and cultivate a more realistic view of things. Report an error

32:49 Because a lot of these delusions, anger, desire, All exaggerate either the positive qualities or the negative qualities of an object. Report an error

33:06 And so through meditation we can learn to bring it more in line with reality. Report an error

33:16 So after meditation, they call sometimes post-meditation, there may be a slight chance that we can slow down. Our reactions and begin to notice them. And, you know, you can't expect it to stop right away. But sometimes we'll notice, or maybe we'll even notice that we're upset. Where before we would be upset and just think it's all normal or not even pay attention. Report an error

33:49 And so then we also have new ways to look at all these different states of mind that come up during the day. And we can gradually... Change our experience of the people and situations that are difficult to deal with. And it's through becoming familiar with our own mind and the emotions and learning how and when and what antidotes to apply. Report an error

34:19 And at different times different things will work and different things will be more appropriate than others. But we can learn that sitting at home. Anakusha in practicing. Report an error

34:34 It's kind of like learning how to dribble the ball and shoot a basket before you go out and play the game. Report an error

34:44 And then we'll find it easier, like I said, to apply an antidote when challenges come up in our everyday life. Report an error

34:54 So none of these things happen overnight and it's not quick and easy. There's no magic wand, no magical solution. Report an error

35:07 They have these little things they call precious peels. But unfortunately, we still have to work on changing our mind. You can have a precious pill, but it still is not going to change your mind unless you work on it. Report an error

35:22 It may be precious enough to help. I don't know. We have to create the conditions for that. Anyway, so it takes a lot of patience. And, you know, this patience applies to learning to watch our mind. Learning when to apply the antidote, practicing in meditation, which is essential, so that it becomes easier. So the first one that I want to talk about, which is probably one of the harder ones, is desire attachment or desire or attachment. Report an error

36:01 So basically what that is, is that we see something as pleasant and we want it. And when we get it, we don't want to be separated from it. Report an error

36:17 And somehow or another, we always think that it's going to really make us happy. And it only works for a little while. It doesn't last. Report an error

36:30 So it brings a false view of the object. And like I said, we think that by possessing the object, having that object, whether it's a relationship or a thing, maybe it's even a nice pin or whatever it is that you want. The beautiful apple, that it's going to bring us satisfaction. And so our mind just automatically truly believes that the object is beautiful or delicious by itself out there separate from our perceptions. Report an error

37:13 I mean, I talk like that and it's because I have a habit. Of seeing that way from the past. Like you think, oh, you offer somebody something and you say, oh, this is the best carrot cake you've ever tried. Well, maybe that's the best, you know, carrot cake I ever tried, but it's not going to be the perception of everybody. Some people don't even like carrot cake, right? Report an error

37:44 But we think this deliciousness comes from the cake. If the deliciousness came from the cake, Everybody that had the cake would think it was delicious. So that just proves that there's really nothing inherently delicious or inherently yucky about the carrot cake. Report an error

38:15 So because of this misconception, we end up getting in trouble and often people will engage in negative actions in order to get what they want. Report an error

38:29 So in this culture, Attachment seems like it's a road to happiness and satisfaction. We're kind of taught to be consumers, to look outside and grab all of these things that's going to bring us happiness and satisfaction. Report an error

38:48 And in some ways we believe it. Maybe not to the extent that some do, but in some ways we still do believe it. If I have a nice refrigerator filled with delicious vegetables, what I think is delicious vegetables, then I'm going to be happy. Well, it does bring happiness, but it's a temporary happiness. Report an error

39:16 It's not the kind of happiness that we're actually looking for in these things. And it keeps us desiring and wanting more. Report an error

39:31 You know, because that does look good, you know, yeah, it's nice to have this and it's good to have that. It's like, you know, kind of part of our society and part of the way that we've been doing it, not only in this life, but lots of other lives. You know, it's really difficult to find faultless attachment or wanting things, desire. You Report an error

39:59 know, because, you know, we think that... Desire leads to dissatisfaction. So we want that and then we get it and we can be satisfied. So Venerable Rubina says, I'm going to read this quote from her. It's this constant assumption that I must get what I want every split second. Our underlying energy is desire. Report an error

40:25 It's a junkie culture. We're all addicts to some degree. It's just a matter of the degree. Report an error

40:35 Repeat that. It's a constant assumption that we must get what we want every split second. Our underlying energy is desire. It's a junkies culture. We're all addicts to some degree. It's just a matter of degree. Report an error

41:07 So we can see how attachment to drugs, alcohol or money can lead to problems rather than happiness. But it's harder to see how attachment to people and places and things cause suffering unless we look more deeply at them. Report an error

41:26 So often we confuse attachment with love. And most of the time it's kind of mixed. So attachment is a selfish concern for my needs and happiness. And love is an unselfish concern for the needs and happiness of others. Report an error

41:50 So in Buddhism we say that love is wanting others to have happiness. And so relationships that are laced with grasping neediness are filled with problems. We probably all know those. I do. I've had those grasping, needy relationships in the past and they have problems. Report an error

42:24 So, you know, in terms of relationships, often we get into a relationship because we feel inadequate and we want to feel whole. And it's not a good recipe for a successful relationship. Report an error

42:47 Whereas... Relationships based on love and genuine concern for the other's happiness becomes the grounds for growth and wisdom. Report an error

43:04 So there's a big difference. Report an error

43:10 After a few grasping, needy kind of relationships, you know, feeling like I needed this or that, I decided that it just wasn't. It wouldn't work that way. And so we make promises that we can't keep. Report an error

43:36 We go through all kinds of contortions and end up unhappy. And so the best way to stop is to look at that and to enter a relationship with open eyes and open heart. Report an error

44:03 This is not a relationships class. Report an error

44:08 So desire and attachment is hard to overcome even if we want to, you know, because it feels good usually when we get it. At first it feels good. But when the excitement and newness fades away, then the less comfortable aspects start to surface. And this could be, we're talking about... Relationships and just objects, things that we bring into our lives that we desire, cars or pens or malas or whatever it is, clothes, all the kinds of things. Report an error

44:52 So the, oh wait, forgot this one, about overcoming. So overcoming attachment basically doesn't mean we become cold and Aloof or indifferent. What it means is that we sincerely care for more and more people and the lack of that grasping neediness allows us to have a more relaxed, open mind and actually then we can enjoy life even more and enjoy what life brings. Report an error

45:29 So the antidotes, and these are some you can try for an experiment, and I can actually, we've gone over different antidotes in other classes too, and they'll keep coming up over and over. I can send you, if you don't want to make a whole list, I can send you the list of antidotes on a PDF. That would be great. You know, and this way. Report an error

45:53 You can make a few notes, but you don't have to worry if you miss a couple of words or something because there's a lot. And I'm going to try not to distract myself with too much blah blah blah blah blah and go through because... Report an error

46:08 Anyway, so the best... So these are antidotes to desire attachment. So just experiment with them and see what works. And what works one time may not work another time. So the best remedy for any... Of the delusions is the meditation on emptiness. Okay, and so we need some understanding of emptiness. And this does come up in other classes too, but basically you can just begin to start to investigate the I, you know, and who's this I that's experiencing attachment? Report an error

46:49 They're like, just sit, sit and kind of ask yourself, who is it? Where is it? Sometimes it feels like we should be able to find it somewhere, where this eye is, because it's a really strong eye. Report an error

47:09 So you can look in your body and you can look in your mind, where is this eye that wants so and so, whatever it is, this object. And you can examine the emptiness of the object. Kind of like what I was saying about the carrot cake. You know, and think, well, you know, if it really, really was this way, if they were really the most wonderful person in the entire world, everybody would agree with me. Report an error

47:46 And everybody would see it the same way. So, since that's not true, then... It must be empty. When we say inherent existence, it means solid, permanent, and existing just like the way it is. And things just aren't like that. Report an error

48:16 If it was so inherently wonderful, why wouldn't everybody see it that way? And Report an error

48:27 then you look at how your mind tries to exaggerate the qualities of an object. Report an error

48:45 Just experiment with whatever you know about emptiness, you know, that everybody doesn't view it the same way. Look at how you might add extra qualities or how you selectively pick which qualities that you want to see. Report an error

49:11 So then another one is to meditate on death. And the end is certain. When... When life ends is uncertain, but eventually everything ends. Your life will end. You're separated from everything, your loved ones, your possessions, even your body. So we're born, we come into the world alone, we leave it alone. Report an error

49:40 And so if we look at how attachment only makes death more difficult and... Looking how it's inevitable, we just need to be honest with ourselves and we have to see that it really doesn't help us in any way. Report an error

50:02 We're not talking about meditating on death in order to get all depressed and miserable, but we're looking at it to see how our attachment to our body, how our attachment to our possessions, Report an error

50:22 Keeps our mind disturbed in a way when we think of having to separate forever completely from these things. So if we can enjoy all the things we have and be totally happy to completely separate from them at any moment, then our pleasure with those things is there. Wow. Like a point. Just right there. Otherwise, We're worried. We're worried about losing them. When are they going to go away? What's going to happen? Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear. Right? Does that make sense? Report an error

51:05 So at the time of death, that's kind of what happens. And the grasping and the, you know, wanting to try to hang on to things often will throw us into, like, you know, a predator realm or some suffering realm. Report an error

51:25 Anyway. So, you know, you can also see that, you know, it's harder to let go when we have all that attachment. So then you can meditate on the faults of attachment. So basically the faults of attachment, and you can probably think of more yourself, but they exaggerate the qualities of the object and they gloss over or hide the faults. Report an error

51:59 And so it's kind of like a fantasy mind, right, that's really not able to see things clearly. And we can't make, you know, intelligent judgments because we're looking through our little rose-colored glasses and we're not really seeing things as they are. Report an error

52:21 You know, you can see what happens when your mind is obsessed with something. Report an error

52:29 It's not a peaceful mind. There's really no satisfaction with attachment. And it's not a clear state of mind. And it actually is a mind that just leads to unhappiness. Report an error

52:50 And at some point, like I said, we're going to have to separate from the object. Now that might be separate by way of death or by some other means. Like we may have a very special cup or dish that, you know, maybe it's a beautiful crystal bowl that was grandma's that you got as a special gift and you decided that it looked a little dirty and you wanted to clean it and it fell on the floor and shattered into a billion pieces. Report an error

53:29 You know, somehow or another these things will come to an end. You know, somebody will come and steal it. They'll steal your things. They'll break. So at some point we're going to separate from these objects. And it's a fault of attachment because when that separation happens, we're miserable. Report an error

54:02 So another one is to meditate on impermanence. And this is like what we were saying before. All things come to an end. And all of the contaminated pleasure that you experience is impermanent. And the only pleasure, the only happiness that's permanent is the uncontaminated pleasure that comes from transforming our minds. Report an error

54:29 That one we can keep when we transform our mind. I mean, like, look at the Dalai Lama. I mean, he'll experience sadness through the people that he's speaking with and talking to. But his mind is peaceful. And by far, he's like really happy. In spite of the fact that his country was ravaged, thousands and thousands of his, of the monks were killed, he had to escape over the Himalayas, you know, under the cover of night in order to get out alive himself, you know, and all that kind of stuff. Report an error

55:12 He's still really happy, Report an error

55:18 you know, and Lama Zopa too, you can see. Geshe-la, he's like a rock. Nothing phases him. He doesn't get upset. He doesn't really show extremes of emotion in either direction. He's just right there. It's kind of like Chodron Rinpoche. Right there. Doesn't go over here and over there like we do. So they're not five forward. Report an error

55:47 Yeah, something like that. But, you know, they have their mind under control. Right now, our mind just kind of throws us here and there. Report an error

56:03 Let's see, that wasn't exactly impermanence. Report an error

56:09 No wonder it takes me so long. Anyway, all things come to an end. And, okay, and in. You know, we get bits of satisfaction and then the dissatisfaction always reappears. So we can analyze this thing. And Lama Eshi says, there's no problem with happiness. Just be happy if you have something and happy if you don't. Report an error

56:39 So we're not, you know, letting go of attachment or anything doesn't mean letting go of our happiness. It just means letting go of our misery. Report an error

56:50 So you can also meditate on the ugly aspects of a body. So sometimes if you're really attached to a person or when you see that you can let go of the objects around you, you can even let go of the people in your life, but you feel really attached to your body. You're not ready to let go of that. Report an error

57:18 You can meditate on the ugliness of it to make it like, okay, we're just carrying around a bag of garbage, really. If you took all the parts out and you put a little part here, it's like really a dirty little bag of garbage. Report an error

57:35 Why would we be so upset about letting go of it? Report an error

57:44 So it works really good to analyze that if you're really attached to a person. Not to make them ugly in your mind, but just to reduce the attachment. And for yourself, too. You kind of visualize, maybe you peel the skin off. You can put it over there. And then you can visualize all the flesh and the bones and the blood vessels and the pus and the blood and all the yucky substances that come out. Report an error

58:23 The body's really dirty. I mean, every direction there's some ugly thing coming out. If we didn't wash it all the time, we wouldn't even be able to sit in the room together. Right? I was like, well, you know, just like I said, I'm just carrying around like a little bag of trash. You know, and we treasure this. Report an error

58:46 And it is a really nice instrument to use, but we don't want to be so attached that it's going to cause problems. Report an error

59:00 So does that make sense? Yeah. Report an error

59:11 Well, but the difference is like this we're trying to counteract attachment to the body. I mean, having a body is great, but being overly attached to your body causes suffering. Report an error

59:29 So what we want to do is we want to reduce the suffering. It doesn't mean that we don't want the things anymore. It means we can have an open, free, spacious mind to enjoy them and to even have more pleasure from them. Report an error

59:50 Does that make sense? I think it makes sense when it Report an error

1:00:00 becomes a serious problem because all of a sudden, or even if you break a bond, all of a sudden you're like, I don't know how to live my life. I'm miserable because I don't know what to do now that I have one life. or, nobody. that, yeah. See, people that overcome attachment to their body are the ones that you see on the specials that are doing amazing things and they say, well, you know, it was a leg, it was three legs, two legs. Report an error

1:00:30 Wow. Two legs, one arm. But, you know, I saw one, he was a scientist, you know, and he was like, He got paralyzed recently and everything from the neck down was paralyzed and he couldn't work. But he figured out, because his brain was still good, he said, boy, that was really, he says, I'm so happy and grateful that my brain is still working. Report an error

1:01:00 And he has this thing he can use to blow on so he can type and he's still doing his scientific research on the computer and working. But, and his outlook is totally, you know, I mean, he's got a great frame of mind and totally, you know, so if you had a lot of attachment to your body, functioning the way it's supposed to be, you know, being able to walk and doing all that, you'd be miserable. Report an error

1:01:31 You wouldn't be able to live that way. Report an error

1:01:39 Yeah, well. Is that Stephen Hawking talking about? Oh, well, no, no. This is just somebody else that I can't remember. I saw him on PBS. I like to watch. I flip over PBS and they have all these stories about people. But Stephen Hawking, too. I mean, there's a lot of examples. Report an error

1:02:04 So it's important to remember that any of the antidotes that we might want to use... You know? Report an error

1:02:10 Is to reduce attachment and to increase love. That means opening our hearts more. Report an error

1:02:20 In doing that, we end up increasing our enjoyment and pleasure. And we can still want things, but without attachment. So like a really good example is one that Venerable Rubina uses sometimes, or she used. And that's like you go into the restaurant, you're having dessert and... You know, your chocolate cake. And so the waiter or waitress comes out and they put down carrot cake. Report an error

1:02:54 Okay? So there's a couple ways to respond. If you have a lot of attachment, you would say, well, I didn't order carrot cake. What's wrong with you? I ordered chocolate cake. Where's the chocolate cake? I want chocolate cake, not carrot cake. You know? If you don't have attachment, you know, you can, first of all, you can respond nicely instead of beating up the poor person. Report an error

1:03:21 Maybe find out that they don't have any more chocolate cake and you say, okay, carrot cake's fine. I'll have that. But you don't get upset. You don't have these emotions come up. And so you can see attachment, like not getting what you want, is the primary cause for anger. Report an error

1:03:44 You know, unsatisfied expectations, not getting what you want, all those kinds of things. So, let's see, I think I'm going to skip the anger ones right for now and Report an error

1:04:01 go to the, we have aversion, hatred and anger, but I'm going to go skip over to make sure we have enough time to depression, which isn't a delusion, but it's something that, Is worth talking about and working on because it's something that kind of keeps when we feel depressed, you know, it's dark, it's heavy, it's unhappy. Report an error

1:04:31 It kind of keeps us, you know, from being able to move forward. Maybe it keeps us from even doing some practices or, you know, sometimes people don't even feel like getting up and going outside. So it's a really heavy state of mind, so it's worth kind of looking at. And there's different levels, too. Report an error

1:04:53 There's like really serious clinical depression, and then there's like the blues or an occasional depression or something like that that'll come up. Report an error

1:05:05 But basically, like I said, it's a dark, heavy... Unhappy is self-centered. It's a self-centered state of mind that mainly focuses on negative thoughts and emotions and lacks all positive energy. Report an error

1:05:25 So, you know, it's generally caused by a mistaken perception of reality. But this time our mind exaggerates our own personal situation and our own personality. Report an error

1:05:43 And it exaggerates the negative qualities of those and ignores the positive ones. What is that called? Oh, we're talking about depression. It's called depression. Report an error

1:06:03 So basically the depression focuses on my problems, you know, and then we blow them out of proportion and we end up feeling, often feel, you know, hopeless. good impression. Report an error

1:06:16 Helpless. We don't see any possible resolution, no way to improve things, no way out. It's like getting stuck in a hole, a really deep hole. Report an error

1:06:32 And we slip into this self-pity mind, you know, and it just causes misery and it saps all our energy. So it's really worthwhile to... Begin to notice if that even comes up and we can apply antidotes to it. We can get to a point maybe where we can't even take care of ourselves and even people don't want to be around us. Report an error

1:07:03 But this would be like a real strong depression. And there are varying degrees. And like I said, you know, it could be occasional. Sometimes we call it the blues. I got the blues. I just feel like sitting down and just... Report an error

1:07:23 Life can be difficult and we all make mistakes. We don't always have control. It seems like we don't have control over what life brings us. Sometimes there's really huge challenges and it's not always easy. If we're unable to accept these problems and deal with them skillfully, then we can become a little bit depressed by them. Report an error

1:07:50 so, often... Depression also comes from guilt or low self-esteem. Sometimes maybe something will happen. We think that it's, you know, we feel guilty about it. It could be a thing that we've done ourselves or something happens. You know, low self-esteem is just not really having the courage to be able to pull yourself up, to pat yourself on the back, to see the good qualities because you just kind of beat yourself up. Report an error

1:08:27 You think, oh, I'm not good enough, I didn't do this. Report an error

1:08:35 Sometimes it's like that. In cases of clinical depression that's chemically imbalanced, like... Well, yeah, I'm not talking about those kinds of cases. We're talking about the general, like, you know, maybe one day you're depressed or maybe a couple hours. You've got to get in a funk, the blues, the funk. Report an error

1:08:59 You know, that kind of thing. Maybe it lasts a couple days, you know, something happens, like, you know. But, you know, because there are, I mean, there are really heavy depressions, too. Report an error

1:09:13 And sometimes they do need treatment in addition to working with the mind. But often the treatments that we provide for, even for depression, are only like putting a Band-Aid on something rather than... Looking at what's causing it and resolving it. They often treat the symptoms rather than the color. Report an error

1:09:41 Yeah, exactly. Report an error

1:09:46 But anyway, so the antidotes to depression, so we analyze the, you know, we have to see where our logic has gone wrong. And so again, the meditation on emptiness is always a good one. Report an error

1:10:04 So you investigate the I that's feeling depressed. Before we investigated the I that had this strong attachment, now we're looking at this other I. Because this I keeps changing. It could be the angry I. So in this case, we look at this I that feels depressed. And we look at that kind of sense of self and how we identify with the unhappy thoughts and feelings. And then... Report an error

1:10:35 Look, what's the real nature of this I? And is this I a part of my body? You can search through and look for it. Actually, you can search through and look. Or is it a part of your mind? Report an error

1:10:55 You see if you can find the I, this really strong, solid sense of I. Because there is a subtle I. We're talking about the I that's devastated. Report an error

1:11:09 Okay, so the depressed solid eye, is it unchanging? Report an error

1:11:18 So we remember the nature of the mind, remember that, you know, the stream of consciousness is like, it's just this changing moments of awareness, changing mental moments. Sometimes we're joyful, sometimes we're angry, sometimes we're bored, sometimes depressed, positive, negative. Report an error

1:11:42 It's all the same basic clear nature. This was like our meditation that we did. All of these things arise like clouds in the sky or like the fish in the tank. But the sky or the clear water is always there. And so one of the things about depression is it feels solid. It's like this rock that doesn't move. And so... Report an error

1:12:11 Beginning to look at it as something that does move and that isn't as solid helps to begin to break it apart. Depression like this is a transient passing mental moment and it's not me. That's a good thing to remind yourself about any of these. Report an error

1:12:37 Then you can also meditate on precious human life. Remember that we have a lot of... Positive energy and a lot of positive potential. And the fact that you're even sitting there thinking about it kind of proves it. Report an error

1:12:55 And then you meditate how amazing it is that you found the Buddhist teachings and that you have some interest in it. And how you've been introduced to these methods that actually can completely transform your mind. Report an error

1:13:14 And you can also think about how incredibly powerful your mind is. is, know. When you look at other types of minds, if it was a dog mind, you wouldn't be able to analyze and change your situations. Report an error

1:13:40 But you learn to identify with the positive aspects of your mind and of your personality and kind of eliminate the negative ones. And then you can also meditate on the clarity of the mind, which is what we were talking about. It's like there's all these different emotions that go through. Depression is just one feeling. And it comes up because of a collection of misguided thoughts that all pile up together until it looks like some solid thing that we say is depression. Report an error

1:14:21 And so we have good moments, bad moments. Happy moments, sad moments. Things are constantly changing. And it's all just mental energy. And our mind is actually clear, non-material and transitory. It's just like the sky. And then we can also meditate on growing our love and compassion. Report an error

1:14:52 So depression generally is looking so inward at ourselves and feeling so much... Pity, self-pity, woe is me. Sometimes all we have to do if we start to turn around and try to look, you know, make ourselves, sometimes it's really hard to begin to try to look outward. Report an error

1:15:17 And I think that's why sometimes pets are so good. Because in a sense, they'll love you no matter how you're feeling. And they might make you at least pull yourself out long enough to take them out. Because they have to go out. Or to go and feed them or something. Enough to get you moving. Report an error

1:15:45 So you can see how turning your attention towards someone other than yourself can begin to diminish the hold on that self-pity. Because it's all directed inward. And so you can also... Begin to see how your problems are more realistic and how your attention can move away from yourself. It gives you a more courageous heart. Report an error

1:16:15 The meditations build courage and that helps to defeat sadness and grief and depression because we have the courage to first acknowledge it, to understand that it may be transitory. That's only passing through our minds like a cloud in the sky and that it's not who we are. Report an error

1:16:46 So like when I was in India the first time, which was back in the 70s, way before I ever read a Buddhist book, I was in a situation where, and I won't go into the details of how I ended up in the situation, but I ended up in a situation where I thought that I was going to have to go right from India to live in Australia with somebody that I met there just a few days before that I absolutely, if there was, I never hated anyone, but this one person, I could look at them and I just hate bubbled out of me. Report an error

1:17:33 I was watching that. It was very interesting to me to watch that. Because, you know, anyway, I was told that I should go and live in Australia with this person, you know, and it never occurred to me not to do, I was with a guru, it never occurred to me not to do what the guru said. So, of course, the thought never entered my mind that I would do anything else. So the prospect, and then I was sent to go be by myself, and it was like also, well, with him. Report an error

1:18:06 ugh. In this big city, basically by yourself, because we didn't know anybody else. And I was sick. I had something. I don't know what it was. Like some kind of fever and all that kind of thing. And it's like, so I wasn't able to really go out and do much. And so I was like, I'd sit in the room and it's like, I'd think. Report an error

1:18:37 I'm never going to see any of my possessions. I'm never going to see my family again. I've got to go to Australia with this person that I hate and spend the rest of my life there. It was almost like a dying, except that I was still able to keep my body, which is one of my major attachments still. But it was like... Report an error

1:19:09 This went on and on for a few days and my mind went through it over and over. It's like what we do with our minds when we get into these situations and how a horrible thing everything is. And I actually, I think I really experienced depression because I was laying there one day, you know, and it was like, oh, woe is me. Report an error

1:19:37 Oh, poor me. Oh dear, I'll never see these things. I'll never blah, blah, blah. And the spontaneous thought of suicide came up in my mind. And I noticed it and I thought, oh, that's interesting. Let it go right away. That was not an option. But the thing that I was so impressed with was that it rose spontaneously on its own. Report an error

1:19:59 I wasn't thinking about it. So I thought, wow, that's really something. So then I thought about killing him. As long as I was on that train of thought. Report an error

1:20:14 So I entertained that idea a little bit longer, but realized that that wasn't going to work either. Report an error

1:20:25 It's like I just felt like a lump laying there in this room, you know, it totally, totally depressed. And it's like all of a sudden I saw my teacher sitting in a room and looking at me. And it was like he had a little bit of a smile on his face, but it wasn't like he was laughing at me. And he just said, look what you're doing to yourself. Report an error

1:20:52 And the whole thing just popped like somebody put a pin in a bubble. And this is what we do. We make up these stories with all of these thoughts and these emotions and these feelings and all this stuff. Report an error

1:21:15 We think that there's some validity to it and all we're doing is we're just making it up and whatever the consequence, if you're feeling miserable, you did it to yourself. Report an error

1:21:30 So if you can remember that. Report an error

1:21:38 So that takes care of attachment and depression, both. The hatred still came up though. But I was a happy hater. Report an error

1:21:55 Maybe I shouldn't say that, but I didn't feel bad. Report an error

1:22:03 Anyway, any questions? The reason I wanted to go through that is because we're going to do actually the meditation. dead. Report an error

1:22:14 The meditation incorporates attachment, aversion and depression, but I really want to encourage people to do the meditation on precious human rebirth because that's a really good one. We do that in several different points. We did it last class. We'll do it again in another class further on. So I wanted to make sure at least we went over the... Report an error

1:22:44 The depression, because one of the antidotes is meditating on precious human rebirth. Report an error

1:22:53 So then the other one, do people need a break? We're out of time, but does anybody need a break? Yeah, for a couple of minutes. Okay, let's do a couple of minutes of break and we'll see how much I can get through a version. Report an error

1:23:10 And sometimes it's also called hatred or anger. Is that the negative state or the name of the meditation? The negative state. Report an error

1:23:28 So aversion, okay, it can be gross, like the kind of aversion that would cause someone to harm someone else, and it could be really subtle, like the underlying ripples of impatience. That all comes under aversion or hatred. Report an error

1:23:51 And so the definition is the intention to harm sentient beings, okay, and it's, or... It could be suffering in one's own mind or it could be in relationship to phenomena. Report an error

1:24:09 So there's three objects of aversion. Others, ourselves and things. So that kind of takes up everything. Everything is a potential object. Report an error

1:24:26 And it's a distorted perception. And what it does, it exaggerates. It's just the opposite of attachment. It exaggerates the negative qualities. Report an error

1:24:36 And so we see something unpleasant. We want to push it away. We want to be separated from it. And it's a feeling that's the opposite of love and compassion. Report an error

1:24:49 So often we deal with anger by depressing the feelings and repressing them. You know, there's annoyance, resentment, all forms of anger. And, you know, even no matter how much we try to repress them or pretend like they're not there, they're always bubbling under the surface. Report an error

1:25:19 And that was one of the things about this person in India that I just loved with a passionate hate. Report an error

1:25:34 You know, he was a meditator. And so, you know, like a lot of people think, well, meditators are supposed to be calm and peaceful, you know. He was full of anger. And you'd hear these stories like he would be, you know, he'd be meditating or he'd be, you know, all this very sweet, peaceful, calm person, you know, by appearance, because it couldn't fool me, I'd pick out anger really easy. Report an error

1:26:04 because it's bad. Bounced off. But every once in a while he would just fly off the handle and beat up some poor little Indian kid, you know. Report an error

1:26:15 Yeah, yeah, no, I mean, you know, it's like whatever it was, he got upset and beat up somebody. Physically beat him up? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But not very often because he did a really good job of suppressing his anger and that's what happens. It bubbles under the surface until it erupts, you know, when we repress it. When we push it down, the harder we push it down, it's like putting that lava and stuff, you know, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing. Report an error

1:26:50 Finally, it's just going to erupt and blow the whole top of the mountain off, you know. So, not a good idea. Makes us anxious and unhappy. Report an error

1:27:02 Sometimes we repress it to a point where we don't even know that it's there until somehow it erupts through our speech or our actions, like with this guy. Report an error

1:27:15 Of course, if there was anybody in the world that could get it out, it was me. I'm really good. I know just how to poke. But anyway, so the problem with anger is that... It's often difficult to admit that we have a problem because nobody wants to feel like they're angry. So this is, you know, I don't want to be an angry person. Report an error

1:27:39 So this is where we have to remember, it's not who you are. It's just an energy. It's an emotion. It's an energy that moves through. And so the more willing we are to acknowledge it, The easier it will be to dissipate it and the easier it will be to work with it. And some people, you know, especially in the West, still think it's really beneficial or best to express it. Report an error

1:28:15 You know, sometimes it's even like, oh, well, just go in your room and beat a pillow. Yell at the wall. Yell in your car. We used to do that, you know, back in the 70s. It's not a good idea because all you're doing is practicing anger. The Buddha... It taught us that anger is never skillful. It's not skillful, it's not useful, it's not practical. Report an error

1:28:40 And to act on it and to act it out in some fashion is only like practicing it. Report an error

1:28:50 What we want to do is we want, it's like taking an aspirin for a headache. But your head's going to keep hurting until you take care of the cause of the headache. Report an error

1:29:04 So antidotes to aversion. You know, the more mindfulness that we develop, the easier it is to see when that irritation starts to come up. And there's always thoughts behind all of the emotions. In spite of the fact that it seems like emotions just pop up on their own, there's always thoughts behind them. Report an error

1:29:28 There's always some kind of a thought process. We can begin to slow down the eruptions and begin to deal with them and take steps to be able to prevent us from causing harm through our body or speech. Report an error

1:29:53 Using analytical meditation, we can learn to diffuse the anger before it begins to cause problems. We can do it again, like what I said, we can do it in the privacy of our own. Rooms in our little meditation place. And so if you look at the faults of anger, that's a good meditation, you know, just looking at it. Report an error

1:30:23 Because the faults are easier to see than the faults of attachment. So they disturb our mind. So it's an unhappy state of mind. It distorts our view of things. It actually interferes with us getting the results that we want. Because it doesn't allow us the clarity of mind to make constructive decisions. And we can end up actually causing harm to others through our words and actions. Report an error

1:30:54 It harms our own health, both physically and mentally. It makes us look unattractive. You ever see anybody that's in a rage? They don't look really pretty. They're just like, you want to really kind of get away. Report an error

1:31:16 Which is sometimes smart. Anyway, and it's a completely unskillful state of mind. So if we sit there and we're like, you know, what's the point? Like, what do I actually get out of being angry? Versus the faults. And you look at all the faults and there's really not too much benefit. Report an error

1:31:41 Isn't there some kind of secondary gain from, I'm not arguing. No, that's okay. Why people... know, continue to sort of, anger for many people is an addiction. I think it's a habit. Yeah, a habit. It's actually, yeah, yeah. I mean, and, Report an error

1:32:10 yeah, Report an error

1:32:18 yeah. Yeah, righteous anger. Yeah. It still interferes with being able to think clearly and to get the end result that we really want. You can tell when you call up, you're really upset because you got something on your bill that's wrong or whatever. Report an error

1:32:40 You yell at the person on the phone or whatever is going on in the store, something's not right. It doesn't really help. And you're like, he, you know. Report an error

1:32:52 Usually if you're nice, everything resolves much more quickly and in much, much more pleasant ways. But we have a tendency to just use anger to try to force things, when often it really isn't at all necessary and it really doesn't work. Report an error

1:33:17 You can tell your mind isn't peaceful when you're doing it. It's not a peaceful mind. Report an error

1:33:26 So lots of faults. Meditation on emptiness, of course. And then same thing with attachment. You look at the object. You look at, you know, if somebody said words that caused that anger to come up in your mind. See, if you didn't have anger in your mind, no matter what happened around you, no matter what words people threw at you, anger wouldn't come up. Report an error

1:33:51 But we tend to blame someone else. But let's say that we look at the words that were sent to us and you can dissect the words or the action, you know, and do it like that. Or you can look at the other person, you know, and try to see the emptiness of that person, you know. Are they, you know, all that really bad? Do they really intend? That's more like the other one. But, you know, you just look for the person. Report an error

1:34:30 You look for this. I that's angry or victimized. You feel justifiably angry because you've been victimized. And you just look and see that nothing is really solid the way it appears. Nothing's separate. And nothing exists in the way that it seems to. And if we start to really look at these things, look for the angry person, you know, which part of your mind, what thought? Report an error

1:35:06 Looking for, you know, see if we can find it. Often you can't find it. And if you find it, then you need to dissect it further if you think you found it. Report an error

1:35:24 Because then you're just looking at another construct that you've made up. And so you need to look even further. But so then another one is cause and effect or karma. So we meditate on karma. So we know if we're experiencing suffering now, in the past we've done something in order to bring that about. It's our karma that's ripening. Report an error

1:35:56 You think about how karma works, and maybe you can, if you want to use that one and you're not really familiar, you could read some little explanation of it. We have a whole series of the DB classes on karma. Report an error

1:36:13 To go into how it works, how to purify it, all of those kinds of things. So you look at cause and effect and you can see how cause and effect works even in this life discounting karma. I mean if you're kind to people, generally people are happy and kind to you. And if you're always upset and yelling and mean and nasty. Report an error

1:36:44 Often you'll get the same thing back. Report an error

1:36:51 Something like that. And you might not get a very nice finger either. Report an error

1:37:05 But anyway, yeah, so looking at karma in whatever way that you know and try to understand and cause an effect. And so then also a meditation on compassion works. You put yourself in the other person's place and realize that they're probably confused and miserable and obviously suffering. Report an error

1:37:37 And you realize that they're just trying to be happy. And whatever that they're doing, usually maybe they're getting angry at you or saying things that are... Really mean what you consider mean and insensitive. And it's interesting because if you look at mean and insensitive, if they're saying it at you, you might think, oh, that's horrible. Report an error

1:38:04 But if they say it to your enemy, you might think, great, they're finally getting what they deserve. So the same words can have no goodness or badness even within themselves. Report an error

1:38:20 Does that make sense? It's big into a C. Report an error

1:38:26 But so, what's that have to do with compassion? Report an error

1:38:35 Anyway, they're suffering, you know, and so, you know, then it brings up anger in you. If you get angry at them, all you're doing is causing them more suffering. So if you're trying to develop compassion... The last thing you want to do is to cause them suffering. Compassion is wanting a person not to suffer. And you're actually working for the happiness of all beings. Report an error

1:39:11 So what's the point of getting angry at that person and causing more suffering for them? Does that make sense? So you can kind of sit and you can think about it. I mean, you can analyze it in the meditation and you can think about it in that way. Report an error

1:39:31 And then you can also think that whatever they're doing that's causing the anger to arise in you, if it's a negative action on their part, that they're actually causing more suffering for themselves because they're planting those karmic seeds for lots of suffering in the future. And so that's a good reason to have compassion for them. Because for you, your karma is ripening. It's finishing for you. Report an error

1:40:08 For them, they're just beginning. And it's going to be the cause for much more suffering. And so we cultivate compassion based on not wanting them to suffer anymore. Report an error

1:40:28 And then we can also, another one, is to see how kind they are. How kind they are to us. And what happens is people will show you where you have spiritual work to do. They'll show you where you are with your practice. Report an error

1:40:50 So we learn and practice Dharma in relationship to others. And they help us to see where we are. And so objects of aversion or anger or hatred... Give us a chance to look at our own minds and practice what we're learning on a practical level. Report an error

1:41:19 It's like there's lamas that would travel with really difficult staff people in order to keep their minds sharp and keep their practice going. Or there's a story of a yogi that was in retreat and he thought he was doing really great. Report an error

1:41:39 Retreat up on a mountain all by himself. And he was like, got a little bit prideful, thinking that he was doing so great, how he'd mastered all of these delusions. And he came out of the cave and something happened and he got mad at the first guy he saw. You know? So this guy really gave him a great gift. Report an error

1:42:04 First of all, probably a gift of humility, because he wasn't as great as he thought he was. It's like you get to see where you're at in your practice and what you still have left to work on. Report an error

1:42:19 And so eventually you can, you know, in your meditation you can go through all of that and then actually feel gratitude for the difficult people in your life because they really help us to develop patience. And they really are like our teachers. And they say sometimes the difficult people in your life are even kinder than some of your teachers because you're always on really good behavior around your teachers. Report an error

1:42:53 Even if they scold you, you just, oh yeah. But when you're with somebody out on the street and they scold you, it's like... What do you mean? I didn't do that. You know, it gives you a little clue. Report an error

1:43:17 So they're actually these difficult people that are very kind. And then we can meditate on death. Death could happen at any time, you know. So you just imagine what it would be like, you know, to have unresolved, well, first of all, when you're dying, unresolved anger makes a peaceful death impossible. Report an error

1:43:40 But then you can always think like, you know, if you were going to die, would you want to have these unresolved issues? Would you want that resentment, you know? And if the other person, you can imagine like if the other person, if something happened to the other person, you know, that you didn't have a chance to talk with them or resolve a conflict with them. Report an error

1:44:16 If you think that whatever words come out of your mouth could be very well the last words that you ever say, which could be absolutely true at any moment, which is really the way it is. I mean, we don't know. You know, it helps to counteract the anger. We're angry and, you know, at least... If we can, the first step is to try to at least observe it, acknowledge it, try to diminish it, and try not to have it bubble out of us through speech or actions. Report an error

1:45:07 Sometimes an action could be slamming the door. I had a friend that would take a whole stack of plates and just throw them on the floor. you know? It wasn't too much of a friend. They broke a lot of dishes. But, you know, I always think about, like, you know, like, you know, like this, like even that plane that left or like for the World Trade Center. Report an error

1:45:38 People left their houses in the morning, like, you know, one family or one couple could have, you know. Told each other they loved each other and I'll see you later. And they could have left with a loving heart. Another one, I mean, could you imagine walking out of the door or maybe you were left at home and you were really upset with the person that was leaving for work and you said some horrible things to them, you know, figuring that they're going to come back and you can get it all resolved. Report an error

1:46:13 Or maybe you were just still upset and you didn't even think about a resolution. And they just never came back again. How horrible that is. So we never know exactly what's going to happen. So learning to control those kinds of things is really important. So anger's energy is really powerful. And so it takes a lot of time and patience to learn how to get it under control. And there's a whole bunch of meditations in... Report an error

1:46:49 Oops, where's the... Oh, it's in my... And how to meditate. But, you know, patience is something that we have to learn. And it takes a lot of practice. So I had, you know, it was really interesting because I was writing all of this stuff on the computer. And then I took a break and I opened up my email. And I looked and the first... Report an error

1:47:20 There was something that someone posted somewhere and I clicked on it and it's a quote from the Dalai Lama and it says, a true hero is someone who conquers their own anger and hatred. Report an error

1:47:38 I thought, oh, that's really good. Boy, that just fits right exactly with what I was doing. I was just writing about it. And so then I went to the next one, another one, and I clicked on it. And it was another one from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. And this one says, patience guards against losing our presence of mind so we can remain undisturbed even when the situation is really difficult. Report an error

1:48:10 And so I thought, wow, that's really neat. So I looked it up. And so there's even more to it than just that. But that's what they had. That's what I saw online. And I thought, oh, they're both perfect. Report an error

1:48:23 So in addition to the patient that guards about patience, it says it gives us a certain amount of inner peace which allows us some self-control so that we can choose to respond to situations in an appropriate manner rather than being driven by our own disturbing emotions. So this is our goal in looking at... Report an error

1:48:52 Anger and doing the meditations and working with our minds. Since it is a strong emotion, it's often most easy to work on it at home in our own meditations. You can bring back an incident and apply one of the antidotes and kind of dissect it and look at it. Report an error

1:49:20 I used to do that when I was working with the people that work because it was like... They'd annoy me. And they wouldn't always seem to do, you know, like sometimes they wouldn't want to cooperate, at least what I thought was cooperating. You know, they just, I always kind of wished that they were a little bit different and I would get a little bit annoyed because it didn't match my picture of how it should be, which I don't know if you can relate to that or not. Report an error

1:49:58 So I'd do my little meditation at home and then I'd go through and especially this one about showing you where you're at and I'd think, wow, yeah, this is really good. Report an error

1:50:13 Then you imagine, what if they were exactly like I wanted them to be? And everything was all rosy and perfect all the time. Report an error

1:50:27 Actually, what I came up with was that would be horrible, you know, because no matter how good it sounded to start with, if you really look at it, you would have no way to know whether you're making any progress at all if you don't have that little irritation, that little person that helps to poke, that knows exactly where to push, to make, to help the little remains of anger. Report an error

1:50:56 Or big remains come up. Anyway, so that's a quick one on the anger and patience. Report an error

1:51:11 So I'll just send this out to everybody so you have all of the different details of it. And so let's see, do you have the homeworks? Okay, the homework is going to be... Report an error

1:51:31 A meditation on the delusions. And then we also have a reading too that's being passed out. Let's see. Report an error

1:51:58 You know what we should do? Maybe everybody, if we can put a piece of paper on the back table, if everybody write down your name who's here, because I'm not sure. I don't know all the names of everybody yet. I want to make sure I don't miss sending something to someone that's not here. The actual reading homework is to start to read Kathleen McDonald's How to Meditate and at least try to read the first two chapters and then if there's any questions you can bring it to class. Report an error

1:52:34 Next time. Huh? Oh, it's okay. If you're deeper than that, that's fine. No problem. But, you know, if people haven't really looked at it too much yet, try to read at least the first two chapters. And then there's a handout that you got on meditation. Let's see. Those we can probably pass around a stapler. Report an error

1:52:58 You can staple the meditation one because that's just a reading. I didn't staple the... little deeper than that, huh? Report an error

1:53:05 The readings on meditation, which is this one. Report an error

1:53:12 Let's see, it should be page 39 to 43. Everybody got all the pages? Yeah, you can staple that. The homework for the meditation I didn't staple because I find it easier to have the pages loose on my table so they're easy to flip. So I just left them unstable. Report an error

1:53:39 But basically I said to choose one of the delusions work for two or three days and then switch to another one. If you can, you can split your time if you have enough time and take one of the delusions. And I kind of did a summary here. This is a summary. Report an error

1:54:04 And work with it a little bit and then maybe end with a bit of Precious Human Rebirth because that's a good one. And that's one that really they had it on a list and I have to check because I don't find that list online anymore of meditations that they want people to practice with during the certain DB courses. Report an error

1:54:27 But Precious Human Rebirth is one of them. And it's a really key one because it helps us to... To keep motivated along with a number of other things, but particularly the fact that we've won the lottery and we're not going to just throw all the money down the drain. Report an error

1:54:50 So you can read through it first and then you can pick one of the emotions. If you have a particular upset that you want to work on, you can work on one thing all week. And then kind of mix in at the end a little bit of pressure human rebirth. So you can do it that way too. You don't need to switch between things. Report an error

1:55:26 So that was kind of quick because there was so much to cover. I'm sorry. Report an error

1:55:35 One of these times we'll actually get to do a meditation at the end. Report an error

1:55:42 Yeah, yeah. But it's nice to be able to do it at the end too. But anyway, so when you're reading or going through these things, if there's questions or things that sound a little different or funny or you just want to talk about at the beginning a little bit, just make a little note. I brought both of the text, the required reading and the meditation, how to meditate book. Report an error

1:56:15 So this way we can look exactly at that. The context of what the question might be, where it's coming from. So we'll dedicate whatever merit that we've created tonight in this class, Report an error

1:56:36 contemplating all of the antidotes that it causes or produces the results that we want in our life, which is to be able to... Know when and where and how to apply these so that we can gain control over our minds and so that we can Report an error

1:56:58 purify all of our negativities, so that we can increase our love, compassion, wisdom, so that we can really become a benefit to others and that we can go all the way to enlightenment so that we can have all of the tools. All of the knowledge, all of the wisdom, every skill that we need in order to bring all other beings to enlightenment. So on page six of the white book, we'll just do the first two verses, the dedication verses. Report an error

1:57:39 Through the merits of these virtuous actions, may I quickly attain the state of Agura Buddha and lead all living beings without exception into that enlightened state. May the supreme jewel bodhicitta that has not arisen arise and grow and may that which has arisen not diminish but increase more and more. Report an error

1:58:00 Okay, well thank you. So just put your name down on the list so I make sure that... Report an error

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Talk by Venerable Palmo, recorded 9 April 2015. Original at Tse Chen Ling Center for Tibetan Buddhist Studies via Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/DB_VP_HowToMeditate_20150319. Licensed CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. 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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