BDW 4 «Алмаз в Киото», занятие 3

(0:37 - 0:57)
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, dear friends. Thank you so much for joining us and we are ready to continue with our next session. And class number two with Geshe Michael Roach is about to start.

(0:57 - 1:29)
My name is Tatiana Geronina, I am an ACI volunteer from Belarus and today I will be your host. So before we start, please check your Zoom interpretation channel, choose the language you prefer. And let us take a moment to settle in, to set our intention, to set our motivation, to feel it deep in our hearts.

(1:29 - 1:46)
And let us make it as big and as strong as it is possible. So welcome teacher Geshe Michael Roach. You sure that light is okay? Let's try.

(1:54 - 2:20)
Okay, thank you for the welcome. And we are going to do the angel-devil text, right? First, the devil debates with the angel, and we will continue with that. And then we will take a break and a photo I think, right? Group photo? Jasmine? Group photo? After this class, yeah.

(2:20 - 2:59)
And then we will start Song of My Spiritual Life, Choney Lama's book [?], okay? So, you guys, yeah, I am going to read something. I am on verse 374 you guys, but you can just show the picture of the person writing. I think so. 

You ready? Yeah, maybe. Purple haze [?]. Yeah, I thought so.

(3:14 - 3:24)
It's already too much light on the top of my head. Now extra. Is that okay? Not really.

(3:26 - 3:32)
It's okay. I guess I'll hide. It doesn't work.

(3:34 - 3:46)
Okay, now I can, that thing is shining in my eyes. Actually, it should go closer. Angle-wise.

(3:47 - 3:58)
Okay, let's try there. Go back. Middle way, middle way.

(4:04 - 4:19)
So, I am back in the first place. Alright, it just feels far away. Alright, here we go.

(4:23 - 4:54)
In the book, the author says, cause and effect, the way things work, the way things start and stop, and everything of the like, is perfectly unmistaken and never deceptive. And I wanted to connect this verse to what we talked about the first day, about seed pictures. And I like this kind of new word for me.

(4:56 - 5:30)
Just before you touch the diamond world, just before you see emptiness directly, probably I'd say always two to four hours before that, you see dependent origination, or you can say dependent events, okay? You always see it directly. And that's very, very rare. And if you ever see how your mind is making pictures, what kind of picture? Chocolate sauce pictures.

(5:31 - 6:01)
If you ever see it, then you're going to touch emptiness on the same day, okay? It's really cool. So, he's talking about that. And by the way, this devil debates an angel text, just to remind you from 14 years ago, it started, the book is about Mahamudra, okay? Mahamudra has many, many meanings.

(6:01 - 6:48)
And in this case, it means a meditation on your own mind, okay? The object that you take for, by the way, I'm going to try to talk with gaps, okay? The object that you take for your meditation is your own mind, okay? And here, he's finally talking about how we make pictures. And those pictures come out of seeds in your mind, okay? Those seeds are always planted by being good or being bad to other people, okay? And there's also neutral seeds, if you want to be technical, okay? So, it's very interesting. We were talking about AI in the CSP classes.

(6:49 - 7:07)
We had a whole four days, I think, about AI and its potential. Jamie Plant showed me a very beautiful AI, which I hope we can talk about you showing to everybody. He's been working really hard on it.

(7:07 - 7:23)
He has designed a very effective AI for the knowledge base. But it's not public yet, but I got to see the preview, okay? And we'll talk about that. So, seeds are coming, seeds are open.

(7:23 - 7:59)
And that means that the whole universe is coming from how you treat other people, okay? And a normal AI, no matter how sophisticated it is, no matter how much money you spend on it, if the data is incomplete, if the data set is incomplete, then the AI cannot make a valid decision. You see what I mean? If the AI doesn't know about colors, then it can't design a book cover or something like that. It doesn't know enough.

(8:00 - 8:26)
It doesn't have enough information to synthesize an answer. You see what I mean? All existing AI programs, except maybe Jamie's, they don't use the fact that you are creating the world in front of you, that that world is coming out of seeds in your mind, okay? That fact is missing in all AI models so far. I think so.

(8:27 - 9:05)
So, if the AI is incomplete, then whatever solution it comes up with is going to be incomplete. AI doesn't say nowadays, if you say, should I do a kidney operation in the winter or the summer, which is better for me, you know, and then the AI will say, summer, right? I think it said summer. But it didn't ask me, have I killed animals lately? You see what I mean? It didn't ask me the most important question, because that surgery will come from seeds in my mind.

(9:05 - 9:33)
You see, every detail of that surgery will come from seeds in my mind. So, we were talking about ming-tsam, tok-pe tak-tsam, meaning, in name only. And then you hear that over and over, you know? You study Middle Way, you study emptiness, people say in name only, only names, only, you know, and it's very, very, I think, misleading.

(9:33 - 10:14)
The word imputation or label, it's very, very easy to misunderstand. The names is not the big thing, okay? Names differ from language to language, different languages use different words, that's not the main idea. The main idea is name, the word name, when we say things exist in name only, that name means pictures, that name means pictures coming out of your mind, okay? Don't think of it as words coming out of your mind, okay, got it? It's just a nickname for a picture, okay? A picture coming out of your mind.

(10:14 - 10:35)
Now he's on to a very interesting thing. He says, okay, do you understand how, I don't know, someone you don't like, you know, someone's in front of you, you don't like them. Do you understand that they are pictures coming out of your own seeds? Do you understand that? Yes, I understand that.

(10:35 - 11:11)
Do you understand that those pictures, seed pictures, are coming out of seeds in your mind? Do you understand that those seeds were planted by you being nice to other people or not being nice to other people? Do you understand that? Yes, I understand that. So you understand that your whole reality is coming from how you treat other people. Got it? And that means if you wanted to be successful in your life, if you wanted to have a nice life, then you just have to focus on one thing.

(11:12 - 11:21)
It's taking care of other people. Everything else doesn't matter. Everything is based on treating other people nice.

(11:21 - 11:36)
And then you plant seeds and then those seeds open, they become luminous pictures in the back of your head. Again, it's just a tactile misapprehension. It feels like it's the back of your head.

(11:36 - 11:48)
It's not really, okay? A seed doesn't have any location. A seed doesn't have any width or length. A seed is a possibility.

(11:49 - 11:59)
It doesn't have any physical existence. You see what I mean? And so it doesn't have a location. When I say seed in your mind, the seed could be in the bathroom, underwater.

(12:00 - 12:09)
Understand? It doesn't matter where it is. It doesn't have a place, okay? Seeds open. Pictures come out of those seeds.

(12:10 - 12:26)
They are luminous. They are shining, okay? They have some quality where they are shining. When you see them for the first time, you will say, oh Geshe Michael was right.

(12:27 - 12:39)
Geshe Michael knew what he was talking about. Then those luminous pictures feel like they're coming out of here. Ajna chakra location for you YSI guys.

(12:40 - 12:53)
It feels like the pictures are coming out from here. And then they go to the silver circle and the black straight. I'm not even going to call it stick because stick is not a shape.

(12:54 - 13:10)
The straight black and the round silver. Out there is only straight black and round circle. And then a picture of a pot comes out of your mind and it lands like chocolate sauce on the pieces.

(13:10 - 13:27)
The pieces are like... They told me, Geshe La, don't raise your hands like that. I said, why? They said, your belly button sticks out. Then I said, how do they can see that? Anyway, okay, it's sarcasm.

(13:29 - 13:39)
Now, today we have a new challenge, okay? Today we have a new question. Now I know why you're laughing. Okay.

(13:40 - 14:16)
Now today we have a new interesting challenge and we're going to talk about cause and effect, okay? Look, Geshe La, I understand how the... I understand how the pen as a stationary thing, if the pen doesn't move, say it's a pen, okay? If the pen doesn't move, I understand my seeds are opening. I understand pictures are coming out. I understand they chocolate sauce on this silver straight.

(14:17 - 14:36)
I understand that, okay? Now we're going to go... Today we're going to go deeper, okay? We're going to go one more step, okay? And that's the question of... You guys got a real pen? This is not a real pen. That's a real pen. Just... Okay.

(14:39 - 14:45)
Thank you, Geshe. By the way, thank you for the whole program. Yeah.

(14:46 - 15:12)
Today we're going to talk about how can things happen through seeds, okay? The other day, two days ago, we decided that the pen is just chocolate sauce on the pieces of the pen, okay? The chocolate sauce came. Chocolate sauce came from seeds in my mind. When you teach it, you should never say came from seeds in my mind.

(15:12 - 15:54)
You should say came from seeds in my mind in which I planted by being good or not nice to other people. And you got to think that. Every time you teach emptiness, every time you teach the reality of things around you, if you don't go to treating other people nice or treating other people bad, then you don't really understand what you're talking about, okay? If you hear someone talk about emptiness and the conversation doesn't reach being nice to other people, taking care of other people, that person doesn't understand emptiness, okay? It's very interesting.

(15:55 - 16:32)
Cool? Okay, so now today we got to go deeper. Geshe La, I understand the pen is pieces and I understand there's pictures coming out of seeds which I planted by being nice to Ezra. If somebody uses this pen to write a check for mom and dad for a thousand dollars, then that seed must have been planted by helping someone else.

(16:32 - 16:54)
If someone uses the same pen to say Ezra has to do homework every day ten thousand times, then that pen was created by a bad seed. Okay? So, everything's possible, good seed or bad seed. Now today, he starts.

(16:54 - 17:05)
Who is he? First Panchen Lama, Lobsang Chokyi Gyaltsen. He starts the conversation by saying, okay, we all understand the pen. We figured out the pen two days ago.

(17:05 - 17:24)
Okay? Then we had a break for Bodhisattva vows. And then we came back for the pen again. Okay? How does the pen write? Okay? How do things move? How does cause and effect work? Okay, got it? All right.

(17:24 - 18:12)
So, okay, I understand the pen, Geshe La, but if the pen is the cause of the writing, if the pen causes the writing, then how does cause and effect work? How is cause and effect created? From? Seeds in my mind, which I planted by being... Never say seeds without saying which I planted by being nice or not nice to other people. Sooner or later it will plant a seed for people to remember. Okay? So, anyway, today we're going to talk about, I think it's a cool subject, the first Panchen Lama says, now let's take it to cause and effect.

(18:13 - 18:31)
Okay? How do things work in the real world? I understand the pen comes from seed pictures, right? Seed pictures. Nowadays I like to call the ice cream and the chocolate sauce together a composite. Okay? It means seed pictures pile up.

(18:32 - 18:48)
Okay? They come out one by one. You see what I mean? Picture for the base of the pen, picture for the top of the pen, they come out one by one and they accrete, they accumulate. Okay? You don't make all your pictures at the same millisecond.

(18:49 - 19:09)
One sixty-fourth of a, one sixty-fifth of a second, they are accumulating. Okay? They're like, here's the top, here's the middle, here's the bottom, and they, the ice cream balls are coming out like boo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo, and then the chocolate sauce goes bzzzzt. And then it's a pen.

(19:09 - 19:22)
Okay? Got it? It's a composite. It's a collection of parts which become one object. Okay? Now we gotta talk about function over time.

(19:23 - 20:10)
Okay? How do pictures come out of my mind to make the pen what? Right. Okay, how does the pen write and how is that coming out of pictures in my mind? That's where he's at. He says we can finally comprehend the way that cause and effect and the way things work is born. 

We can discuss how pens write things. That's why I have a picture here of a guy writing or a lady writing. I don't know, but there's a secret message here. 

For a hundred dollars he buy Where is Mr. Ibai? Let's go man. I means one, bai means hundred, okay? He changed his name. Legally, he changed his name.

(20:12 - 20:50)
Ibai. Rob at Ibaity [?]. Haggabite [?]? So, my mental seeds project this pen and the mental seeds project the letters on the paper and also my mental seeds projected the relationship between the pen and the letters written on the paper.

(20:52 - 21:29)
Okay, I'm going to give you a clue. When I go to Taiwan, there's a guy, very big executive in DuPont Corporation, and he takes his week off for the whole year, and he comes and drives me around. One day we were driving from Taipei to Taichung, and I said, Jeffrey, your last name, what's that mean? Aiya, Zou, Zou.

(21:30 - 21:39)
Jeffrey Zou. Zhongwen de Zou, shishima. Zou.

(21:41 - 22:04)
You have a southern accent, I have a middle accent. What's it mean Vivian? Zou. What's it mean? That pen. 

Okay, don't give the money to anybody, forget it. Okay, I don't just give away money, I'm very selective. Yeah, the picture shows, let's go back to the picture.

(22:05 - 22:18)
Brian, you guys, yeah, yeah, he's riding with his left hand. You're supposed to say, oh, Geshe La purposely put left-hand person in it. Okay, understand? Aiya.

(22:19 - 22:27)
Diamond Way is sometimes called left-hand way, okay? Vama Marga, say Vama. Marga. Vama.

(22:27 - 22:43)
Marga. Vama means left hand, okay? It came into the English word feminine, okay? Feminine. Femme comes from vam, okay? And that's a deeper meaning.

(22:44 - 23:33)
Okay, anyway, now I'm going to ask a question about how the ink gets on the paper. What's the what's the seeds for cause and effect? Okay, the pen is the cause, the writing is the effect, okay? Now, YI BA'I, again. How do you say again? ZA'I ZOS, again. 

Same lady, now give the same answer. Different seeds will open. Who's writing on the paper? Who caused the cause and effect of the pen and the writing? Same.

(23:33 - 25:58)
It's me it's me that caused others ... saying again? It's my seeds that opened and created the pen, and then also created the word on the paper, while creating the writing process. Yeah, good, hundred dollars. That's very ... if you're going to study emptiness, and if you're going to understand emptiness you have to understand the emptiness of the pen and you have to understand the... and by the way, if you're in the class, please listen. 

If you're in the class, please listen, or else sit in the back. Okay? Understand? Okay? It's hard. It's hard to teach if people aren't listening. 

Okay? Got it? Alright, if you're writing on the paper, what's happening? Seeds are coming out and creating a pen. Seeds are coming out and creating writing and it looks like what? It looks like the pen is writing the letters, but what's really happening? Pen seeds coming out and then writing seeds are coming out on the tail of the pen seeds. Got it? Understand? Okay, so that's cause and effect. 

Can we say that cause and effect is coming from seeds? Good. Now, question for you. Hmm... How do you tell if the writing came from a good seed or a bad seed? Yeah, good. 

Yeah. If it's something that you enjoy, if it's something sweet, then it's coming from a good seed. Okay? If it says, Geshe Michael is handsome even when he raises his hands, then... then... then it must be a good seed. 

Got it? If it makes you unhappy, if it's not pleasant, then it's coming from a bad seed. Right? Okay. So, if the writing is something that makes you happy, that must have been a good seed creating the pen and then creating the writing.

(25:59 - 26:12)
Is the pen creating the writing? No. That's a very interesting question. Okay? And until the day you understand that you can't really practice Buddhism successfully.

(26:13 - 26:28)
Okay? The pen is not making the writing. Your seeds are making a pen and then your seeds are making a writing and your seeds are connecting the two things. Okay? Got it? You don't need a pen to write and you can have a pen that doesn't write.

(26:30 - 28:19)
Understand? Okay. That's very delicate. All right? So, cause and effect... cause and effect is also coming from seeds. 

Okay? And it's an illusion. Okay? The pen is not making the writing. Your seeds are making the pen and then right after that your seeds are making the writing. 

Okay? Got it? Okay. Is the pen writing? When people say no, the strategy is to draw a mustache on their face. Okay? All right. 

Okay. Good. Huh? Okay. 

All right. I'm going to go to the next verse. Okay? He says in verse 375, emptiness acts to eliminate the ability that nothing could exist. 

Okay? You can't say nothing exists in the world because there's emptiness. Okay? And that's difficult. That's difficult. 

Okay? He says, when I tell people the pen is not what they thought it was, they think there's nothing there. Okay? If I say the pen is not what you thought the pen was, then you say the pen is not real. Then you think that nothing's there. 

And then he says, who's he? First Panchen Lama says, if you understand emptiness, you understand that it's not true that nothing is there. It means emptiness is not the same as nothing. Okay? Emptiness is not the same as nothing.

(28:19 - 28:30)
Okay? And many, many people think that emptiness means that nothing is there. Okay? And it doesn't mean that. Okay? I'll show you a picture that I like.

(28:31 - 29:10)
Okay. Oh, okay. Right after I saw emptiness directly, in the next minute, I thought, I need something in the normal world that I can remember what I saw. 

I need something in the normal world that will remind me of what I saw. I think it's probably the first instinct of all Aryas to say, I need something in the normal world, which is not emptiness. Okay? The normal world is separate from emptiness.

(29:11 - 29:21)
I need something in my normal life that can remind me of emptiness. And then every Arya says diamond. Okay? All Aryas say diamond.

(29:22 - 29:31)
That's why diamonds keep showing up in Buddhism. Diamond way, diamond cutter, you know, diamond blah blah. Okay? Vajra diamond.

(29:32 - 30:17)
All right, that's why diamonds keep showing up. Now at that time, I didn't have any money. Okay? So, for, I mean, I bought one diamond. 

That was a famous story. I'm not going to tell you. But, I didn't have enough money to have a diamond. 

You understand? I couldn't buy a diamond to keep the diamond until I got a job in diamonds, but that was later. So, I used to buy rock candy. Okay? In English we call it rock candy and it's pure sugar and you put a stick in there and it grows a crystal.

(30:18 - 30:29)
And if you're an Arya who's desperate, use rock candy. That's what I'm saying. Okay? If you have friends who have rock candy laying around, they're suspicious.

(30:30 - 31:05)
Okay? All right? So, I'm just saying, if you, if you don't work in a company where there's diamonds all over the table, you know, but you want to remember or you want something to remind you, then get a diamond if you can afford it. If you can't afford a diamond, get rock candy. Get some rock candy. 

Seriously. Okay? Much cheaper. I could tell you to buy a diamond meditation ring from Rosa van Grieken's— Can you stand up? Company who makes all those things.

(31:11 - 31:59)
And the money goes to save the books from Dunhuang. But I'm not advertising today. Okay? I'm just saying, if you can get a diamond and keep a diamond with you, if you take DCI level 7, you get a free diamond. 

Okay? And there's a rumor that Geshe La is going to try to teach if he's— can— if the doctor doesn't stop him to teach—can I say that? DCI level 7, touch the diamond world, in Xi'an, China. Okay? There's a big rumor like that. Okay? There's a rumor.

(32:01 - 34:32)
Okay? Then tell Seiji it was your idea. Okay? Why is that important to the Ben and Kendra family? What's in Xi'an, China? Xuanzang's tower is there. Okay? The— the eastern Xuanzang tower is there. 

Okay? The eastern Xuanzang tower is there. The western Xuanzang tower is online somewhere. Okay? By the way, while you're there visiting for the program, you can go visit the shrine that was built to house the tongue of Acharya Kumarajiva. 

Okay? Who did the first translations of the Diamond Cutter and the Heart Sutra in China. Okay? And that shrine is quite close to Xuanzang's tower. Okay? You can drive there. 

Right, Rob? He got—he got a special blessing on the way. Okay? Understand? Why is his tongue there, Ibai? Why is Kumarajiva's tongue preserved outside of Xi'an, in a shrine? Because he's a very deep practitioner, after his cremation, only his tongue will left behind. Okay, good. 

Ibai. Okay. The full—the full story is that Kumarajiva, he announced, after I die, burn my body, if only the tongue remains, you will know that I never made a mistake in all of my translations.

(34:33 - 35:38)
Okay, that's pretty bold, right, Ben? You know, he said, if I never made a mistake in my scriptural translations, then after they cremate my body, my tongue should remain unburned. And they say it did. Okay? I've been there. 

You don't get to see the tongue, you just see the shrine. Okay? Okay, why are we talking about that? We are talking about going to Xi'an. Why are we talking about going to Xi'an? We're talking about diamonds. 

Why are we talking about diamonds? You can go to hear the diamond—you can hear the whole DCI course about how to touch the diamond world if you have time to go to Xi'an and if my kidney cooperates, okay? Okay, now there's a big question here. We just talked about the emptiness of cause and effect, okay? What was the cause? Pen. What was the effect? Writing on the paper, okay? And we talked about how they are still coming from seeds.

(35:38 - 35:47)
They are still coming from seeds. The writing is not coming from the pen. You got to get used to that, okay? Now we go to another question.

(35:48 - 36:03)
Somebody comes up to First Panchen Lama and says, I think emptiness means nothing exists. Okay, I think emptiness means nothing exists. Okay, got it? What do you think? And he says, wrong.

(36:04 - 37:49)
Okay, he says completely wrong. All right, and that's why I put the diamonds up. They're supposed to remind you emptiness doesn't mean that nothing exists, okay? And there's very many hundreds of years, many many people misunderstood emptiness and they say, for example, you should sit in front of a wall and you should stare at the wall, or you should close your eyes, and you should try to think about nothing, and you should empty your mind. 

And that's completely 100% ridiculous, okay? It has nothing to do with emptiness. The proof is, if you do it for 20 years, nothing will happen. You just get more stupid, okay? Nothing will happen in your life, okay? If you really understand emptiness, your life should be successful. 

Your life should be super successful. Every part of your life should be successful. Okay, got it? So he says, emptiness doesn't mean nothing exists. 

Okay, got it? What's the difference with the pen? If you're talking about a pen, what's the difference? What's the emptiness of the pen? There's no pen in my hand, which does not come from, and I don't want to hear seed. I want to hear seed which was planted by being nice or not being nice to other people, okay? Got it? I never want to hear you say, it's empty because it comes from its seeds. Okay, I want you to say, it's empty because it comes from its seeds because you're being nice to other people.

(37:50 - 38:01)
Okay, all right? The universe is coming from ethics. Okay, and that's why AI is beautiful. AI is great.

(38:01 - 38:58)
I use it for a lot of stuff, but in the end the database is incomplete right now, so far, except for Jamie's. We got to talk about how to show it to people. Okay, so emptiness doesn't mean what? Nothing's there. 

It doesn't mean that, okay? If you, again, I repeat, if you understand emptiness, you should be very successful. And if you don't understand emptiness, if you think it means nothing, you should be a deadhead. Okay, that's the person who meditated on nothing. 

Seriously, and there are, in history, there have been Buddhist groups that meditate on nothing. And then they're like, okay, then they die. The Lord of Death comes, it's time to die.

(39:00 - 39:06)
You don't exist. Yeah, that's what you think. Okay, all right.

(39:07 - 40:50)
Okay, next picture. Um, this is what I like. I'm always searching for a picture of Middle Way, the Middle Way. 

Okay, the Madhyamaka, Madhyama, Madhyamaka. Okay, I'm always looking for pictures of of Middle Way. Okay, and here at this moment the First Panchen Lama's poetry goes to Middle Way. 

Okay, he starts talking about Middle Way. All right. And because he's on, he's been on the subject of emptiness and not existing, okay, does emptiness mean that nothing's there? Does it mean that? It doesn't mean that. 

It means there's nothing there which is not coming from seeds planted by how nice you are to other people or not. Okay, all right. He's like that. 

So he says that, by the way, he says, if you guys are interested, this is where the word Middle Way comes from. Okay, if you understand that not coming from its own side doesn't mean not existing, then you are treading the Middle Way. You have just reached the Middle Way. 

Okay. And it's very, very famous. All right. 

Nagarjuna yesterday wrote our ceremony for Bodhisattva Vows. And thank you for doing that, Jasmine. Thank you for organizing it.

(40:50 - 41:05)
My wife wrote me a nice text. She said, I'm glad you did something spiritual. I'm like, yeah, it was. 

And I felt much better afterwards. I'm like, that's nice. Okay, so, okay.

(41:07 - 42:13)
Those two rails on the... Okay, so we have this new property, Dragon's Head. It's one million square meters. And there's a beautiful, huge, beautiful building there that the owner built because they are a painter and they wanted glass. 

The whole side of the wall is glass. It's three stories high. And it's stunning. 

It's really beautiful. And the people who sold the property said, do you want us to tear down the building? We're like, nah. It's like the most beautiful building, okay. 

And then, but there's one problem with this building. You have to cross a small Arizona stream to reach the building. You need a car that can go over a stream, okay? And in Arizona, a big river is like one foot deep, you know, half meter.

(42:14 - 42:29)
But when it rains a lot, when there's heavy rains, like recently, that water got three meters deep. And somebody lost their car down there. Somebody drove into it and the car was covered and disappeared.

(42:30 - 42:50)
Okay, luckily they weren't in the car at that moment, okay? So, I told the kids, there's a hill behind the building. You should cut a road down the hill, you know. And we did that at Diamond Mountain, right? We cut many roads.

(42:51 - 43:42)
We call cutting a road. And you just get a big delinquent guy called clump [?], clump? With a, well, clumpish person, okay? Who has a big tractor. And you tell him, dig a road, you know. 

And they dig it in like a day or something, okay? And so, we dug a road at Diamond Mountain to go back to Earl's and John's cabin, which is in the back. We put the troublemakers in the back for the three-year retreat. And then some Chinese guy drove up there. 

He almost fell off the mountain. And I think one wheel was off the off the road. Right, Stanley? Am I right? Something like that.

(43:43 - 43:48)
Okay. That's called not driving on the middle way. Okay.

(43:49 - 44:30)
So, I just want to give you an example. In your visualization, there's a Chinese guy in an American car. It's not a Xiaomi, okay? And one, then that's not, that's the opposite of middle way, okay? He fell off the edge, okay? So, middle way has two edges, okay? Here, there's two rails to stop you from falling off, okay? Why we didn't put rails at Diamond Mountain? They're super expensive, okay? So, you know, we decided, should we have a cafeteria or should we have rails? And we all voted for the cafeteria.

(44:31 - 44:55)
Okay. All right. So, when you think of middle way, think of this bridge, okay? There's the bridge, and then there's fences, there's rails on either side of the bridge, and that's middle way, okay? Then our author says, those two edges, those two rails are existing and not existing.

(44:56 - 45:15)
Those two rails are existing and not existing. You don't want to fall off the edge of the table that says the pen is there. And you don't want to fall off the edge of the table that says the pen is not there.

(45:18 - 45:28)
So, what am I supposed to say Geshe La? That's like the perfect thing to tell your husband. Don't say things aren't, and don't say things are. Everything else you can say.

(45:30 - 45:59)
I'm just giving suggestions for harmony in the family. Don't say anything is, and don't say anything isn't. Everything else you can talk, okay? We get that kind of advice, right? In a family situation. 

Okay. I got $200 here, okay? We got $200 here. You ready Ibai? Mr. Ibai.

(46:02 - 46:19)
He says don't fall off the edge that says existing, and don't fall off the edge which says not existing. That's $200. That's two different answers, okay? Nobody can have the $200 together.

(46:21 - 46:31)
Okay, first question. He says don't say things exist. He says don't say things exist, you will fall off.

(46:31 - 46:44)
When you say things exist, you fell off. And by the way, that fall is more dangerous than falling off in your car. Falling off in your car can kill your body for one life.

(46:45 - 47:01)
Falling off this exist or not exist can kill your body for many lives, okay? It's very serious. It's easier to fall off a road than fall off a pen [?]. Okay, it's less dangerous.

(47:02 - 47:56)
All right. Okay, so here we go. When he says, basically he's saying don't say things exist. 

Don't say things exist. What does he mean? $100. Oh, okay. 

Yeah, don't say things exist towards you. Okay, good. From their own side. 

Okay, $100. Nice. Don't fall off. 

Don't fall off exist, okay? Now, don't fall off. Don't exist. $100. 

This is easier. Easier. Don't say things don't exist in other ways than by coming from your own seeds that you planted by being kind to others.

(47:57 - 47:59)
Wait, wait, wait. Now stop. Stop.

(48:02 - 48:13)
Sometimes I ask for a $100 answer. Sometimes I get a $200 answer. Okay.

(48:16 - 48:29)
Okay. If the answer is better than I expected, I always pay extra. Okay. 

All right. Okay. What am I really doing? Taking care of my income.

(48:31 - 48:37)
You think I'm a nice guy. I'm just increasing my income. Okay.

(48:39 - 48:45)
Because it came from seeds by being generous to other people. Okay, good. All right.

(48:47 - 49:20)
Then I call it lousy corresponding meditations [?]. Lousy corresponding meditations [?]. If you think he means nothing exists, or you think he means something exists from its own side, and you meditate on either one of those, we all meditate on the second one, then you fell off the cliff. 

You fell off the road. Got it? Okay. All right. 

It's complicated. It feels complicated, but it's not. How much stuff is coming at you? Zero.

(49:21 - 49:50)
Let's do a famous Geshe Michael exercise, okay? Now listen. In this lineage, in this tradition, if you sit in a class, if you put your pigu on the chair, okay, then that means you signed a contract to teach it to somebody else. Okay, understand? If your pigu is in a chair right now, you signed the contract with your pigu.

(49:51 - 49:59)
Okay, what's the contract? Pigu means butt in Chinese language. Okay. I don't know why I learn only the bad words.

(50:01 - 50:58)
Okay. What's the agreement you made by sitting here? Yeah, you agreed to teach. Okay. 

In this lineage, in this tradition, in Buddhism, if you come to a class, if you sit in the class, it means you agree to teach another person. Okay. It means you agree to teach another person. 

So now today, this week, your life got much more difficult, because you have to teach what? Emptiness. Okay, if I told you you have to teach compassion, that's easy. Okay, but if I say you have to teach emptiness, you're like, oh my god, I have to teach somebody emptiness. 

I'm going to teach you the easiest way to teach somebody emptiness. Got it? And it's infallible. It's 100% correct.

(50:59 - 51:14)
And people will never forget it. I think so. I hope so. 

Om mani padme hum. So, okay. Here's how to do it. 

Okay. And most of you know, but I want you to make sure you know. Okay, raise your left hand.

(51:15 - 51:33)
Okay, please raise your left hand. Okay. Now find your first finger. 

One, two, this one. Point your first finger. Okay, point the first finger of your left hand. 

That's where we're learning how to teach emptiness. Okay. Cool? Yeah.

(51:34 - 52:14)
Now, point to something which is not coming from seeds which were planted by being nice or not nice. Then you got to be a, you got to be a, what do you call that? You got to be a good actor. What do you call? You got to be dramatic. 

You got to go like this. You got to get your eyes big. Okay.

(52:15 - 52:32)
And I always suggest, just before you finish, go like this. Then, then you have to be dramatic. You have to go like this.

(52:35 - 53:04)
Okay. And by the way, that is 100% majimika. That is 100% nāgārjuna. 

Okay. And if you just teach that, the person will, hopefully they'll never forget. Okay. 

Hopefully they'll never forget. Okay. You can always, when you're teaching emptiness, do that at least once during the hour. 

Okay. Do that at least once during the hour. Okay.

(53:05 - 53:09)
There should be some kind of song. We make a song. You know.

(53:12 - 53:23)
Okay. All right. Okay. 

It's a good way to, to learn. Okay. It's a, and it's, I don't know how to say it. 

It's 100% correct. Okay. It's 100% correct.

(53:24 - 53:33)
There's, they say rikpa-chen. Say rikpa-chen. Smart people prefer a thousand explanation of emptiness.

(53:34 - 53:45)
Deep people, smart people, intelligent people, when you prove emptiness to them, they're like, give me another proof. Then you give them another and say, give me another one. Give me another one.

(53:46 - 54:09)
Give me another one. Smart people want to go to translator class for the rest of all their lifetimes. To hear all those kinds of emptiness. 

Okay. They say that's how you can tell a really spiritual person in Buddhism. If they are super hungry, fei chang e. Oh, oh, oh, oh.

(54:11 - 54:34)
If they are hungry for more explanation of emptiness, then they're a real intelligent person. Okay, then that's a real intelligent person. Teach me another way to prove emptiness. 

Teach me another way. Okay, but this is the, this is the easy one and it's 100% correct. Don't forget to use your left hand because you are putting seeds in their mind for diamond way.

(54:35 - 55:00)
Okay, cool. Vama Marga. All right, and then he starts to list the greatest offerings you can make to the Buddhas. 

Okay, by the way, when do I have to stop Jasmine? What time? Punch, punch, budgie [?]. Okay. Five, 16 in, in the rest of the world.

(55:00 - 57:03)
Got it. 17. Okay, 15 minutes. 

I'll try to do Q&A for 10 minutes, okay? You know what try means. Okay. Now he says, people are always wanting to make an offering to the Buddha, you know, and you know, a lot, a lot, a lot of people when they get a problem, their relative gets cancer, you know, they lose their job, the kid doesn't want to go to college, then immediately they buy some incense and they go to the temple. 

We were in, we were in, we are still in Japan, we went to the Philosopher's Path which you should go to, and there's some temples there in which you should see. There's an exhibition of Tang Dynasty tantric art on the Philosopher's Path right now and it's extremely beautiful. It's extremely important. 

Okay, so we went there and you can see all kinds of people go there and then you see all kinds of grandmas giving coins to their kids and then there's a special grill, there's a special box that you can throw in coins, but you can't throw in fingers. Understand? And they teach the kids to throw the coins in the grill and they're having fun. And then inevitably there's some grandma with two sticks of incense and she's praying for her husband or she's praying for her friend who's sick, okay? They are making an offering to the Buddha, okay? And that's a beautiful, beautiful, very important thing. 

It's really smart to do that. And Panchen Lama says, great, go to the temple, throw some coins in the box, burn some incense, make an offering. But while you're there, here's the best offering you can make.

(57:05 - 57:12)
That's for Francisco. Yeah. Okay.

(57:13 - 58:05)
Understand? Teach people emptiness. Okay, teach people emptiness, okay? When you teach, you want to make an offering to the Buddha, I mean, you can offer a yuzu, right? Mango, whatever. But the best offering is to offer your understanding of emptiness. 

He says, you want to make an offering to the Buddhas? Offer your understanding of emptiness. Just use your finger, use your arm. And that's cool. 

You can do that in your house. You don't have to go to the temple, okay? It doesn't cost anything, right? Just, just think about emptiness and offer it to the Buddha. And if you really want to make an offering to the Buddhas, he says, left hand up, left finger ahead, this thing.

(58:05 - 58:54)
That's the highest offering you can make. I can see a whole new tradition of Buddhism where people just walk around like this. Okay? Okay? And what I mean is, in that verse, here he says, try to make this offering, excellent offering, to every Buddha in the universe. 

He says that. He says it in the verse, okay? Verse number 377. He says that's the best offering you can make. 

You want to make an offering? Okay, do some incense. It's okay. Do some fruit. 

It's good. Okay? Throw some coins in the box. That's also good.

(58:55 - 59:39)
But while you're at the temple, do this thing. In your mind, okay? If you don't want to look strange to everybody, just do it in your mind. Okay? All right. 

And he says, First Panchen Lama says, in this emptiness classic, in this important book about emptiness, he says, make that offering, okay? Give that offering to the Buddhas, okay? Having this class, coming to Five Houses, is an extremely beautiful offering to the Buddhas. That's like the offering they like the best. If you sit in this room and you get confused about emptiness, you are making huge progress.

(59:40 - 1:00:05)
You are making a true offering. Okay? Cool. I think it's cool. 

The more your forehead gets wrinkled, the better is the offering. Okay? All right. Next verse. 

Oh, Geshe La. Yeah, I'll give you 10 minutes of Q&A. I got 2.35 left.

(1:00:06 - 1:00:11)
According to that clock. I'm not watching that clock. Okay.

(1:00:12 - 1:00:56)
Next picture, you guys. Trying to understand emptiness, fighting, struggling, going to those stupid Mixed Nuts classes, listening to Ben Cramer's text. Again, it's the best offering you can make to your Lamas. 

Okay? Now, if you want to make an offering to a Buddha, go to a temple, do the finger thing. Not any other finger, this finger. Okay? But if you're interested in making an offering to your personal teachers, to the people who spent a lifetime to teach you, like my teacher did.

(1:00:57 - 1:02:17)
Spent his lifetime to teach a stupid American kid. If you want to make an offering to those teachers, same thing. Same thing. 

Okay? Just think about emptiness and say, I offer that to you. Okay? They don't need money. If they understand emptiness, they can have money anytime they want. 

Namkha Dzo. Say Namkha Dzo. Namkha means empty space. 

Dzo means treasure, kosha. Namkha Dzo means, Geshe La, we have a funding shortage. Okay? Like that. 

Okay? If you understand emptiness, you can make money. Okay? They don't need money. Lamas don't need money. 

Lamas want your finger, first finger. Okay? That's what they want from you. They don't want anything else. 

Okay? All right. Okay, so it's the best offering to your teachers. I chose teachers, picture, who look like normal people. 

And in my vision of this organization, I want this kind of emptiness teacher. I want normal business people or normal family people. I don't want you to wear a red suit or burn your head in six places or something like that.

(1:02:18 - 1:02:24)
You know, I want to see normal, nice, happy people. You don't have to wear the tie. Okay? That's a Ben Kramer thing.

(1:02:28 - 1:02:59)
But, these are Lamas. Okay? And get used to it. Okay? In your generation, you are the Lamas. 

Okay? These are Lamas. Don't think they have to come from some country or they have to wear beads around their ear or Geshe hat or something like that. Okay? Don't think like that. 

These are Lamas. Okay? The best offering to your Lamas is the first finger. Okay? Got it? Don't say the finger, I'll get in trouble.

(1:03:00 - 1:03:34)
You don't know how many people got me in trouble online. Geshe La said, give the finger to your Lama. No, it's happened to me a thousand times. 

I don't think about it anymore. Okay, last picture. These are the people who started the diamond company that I worked for. 

Okay? This is Ofer and Aya Azrielant. Aya has already passed away. And this was a CNN special about the company.

(1:03:35 - 1:03:51)
Because they were the largest, they were the fastest growing company in the history of New York. Okay? Just by percentage over time. They were the fastest growing manufacturing company in the history of New York.

(1:03:51 - 1:04:34)
That's kind of easy to say because there's no manufacturing in New York. Okay. But jewelry is a small factory. 

It doesn't take a big factory. So anyway, I spent 19 years with these guys, you know, and they taught me a lot. Okay? And we're still good friends with Ofra. 

He got stolen by Warren Buffett. When Warren Buffett bought the company, he stole the president of the company. Okay? Why I put them here So my teacher's name is Rinpoche and my boss's name is Ofra.

(1:04:34 - 1:04:46)
He's from Israel. And during the daytime, I get beat up by Ofra. And in the evening, I get beat up by Rinpoche.

(1:04:48 - 1:05:05)
So I, why, why are you riding the bus for four hours every day Geshe La? Now you know. There's no one to beat me up on the bus. You see, there's no Ofra and there's no Rinpoche.

(1:05:06 - 1:05:22)
I got, I got four hours a day on my own. You know, I can do what I want. Okay, so anyway, it used to happen a lot that Ofra would yell at me and I'd say, Rinpoche, don't say that.

(1:05:23 - 1:05:56)
And then Rinpoche would yell at me and say, Ofra, I'm so sorry. And I got confused. Deep down subconsciously, I got confused. 

Who's the Lama? Is it Ofra or is it Rinpoche, you know? And I used to make that mistake a lot, you know. Finally Ofra's like, what's this Rinpoche? Is that a Tibetan curse word or something? And I'm like, no, no, I just get confused. Who's who? Okay, and he says, make an offering, you know, make an offering to all the Buddhas there are.

(1:05:57 - 1:06:10)
Make an offering to all the Lamas there are. And then he says, in the next verse, make an offering to all the angels in the world. Make an offering to all the angels in the world.

(1:06:10 - 1:06:58)
And we're going to study that in the next class, okay? But angel means sacred Buddha, okay? Not obvious Buddha, okay? They don't have a thing up here. They're not holding an arura fruit, okay? They just look like two business people, okay? But I used to get very confused in my heart, you know, who's the Lama and who's the who's the business owner, you know? I used to get very confused which one is which, okay? Understand? He says, make an offering to them, okay? And that's a secret offering, and that's a sweet offering you can learn to make, okay? And maybe we'll talk about it in the next class. Okay.

(1:06:59 - 1:07:17)
By the way, which of the two books is the Diamond Way book? I guess I tricked you a long time ago. Fourteen years ago I tricked you, okay? Right? You thought you were starting Diamond Way. Okay.

(1:07:19 - 1:08:15)
Q&A. Q&A. YI BA'I RBA'I How am I going? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? So for the first part of the question is, I know many of us couldn't make it to the in-person event this time.

(1:08:15 - 1:08:53)
I was wondering what kind of seeds, what's the cause for that? And the second part is, since we have this wonderful opportunity, what we can do to use this precious moment to prepare, to find our personal life destinations for ourselves. And the third part is, how can we better prepare for our future lives destinations? And for more life to come in the future, right? David. Okay, and how the teachers can guide us and illuminate us on our future lives to come.

(1:08:53 - 1:09:05)
It's called Lamrim. It takes 14 years to answer this question. Bob, the first part of the question was? Many of us couldn't come to the in-person side.

(1:09:05 - 1:09:31)
Yeah, right. Let's talk about that to start. Yeah, what's the seeds? So, when you try to do something good, okay? When you try to do something good, then it damages the bad seeds in your mind, okay? When you try to come to a class, when you try to come to a program, you will get some sudden obstacles.

(1:09:31 - 1:10:24)
You know, the plane won't go, there'll be some problem with the visas or something like that. Something will happen, okay? When you do something very sweet and great and pure, it triggers, it burns up your bad seeds, okay? And we talked about it in the confession, the four parts confession, okay? Like if you're supposed to get in a, by the way, I taught it, the four part cleaning your bad deeds, right? And I taught it many years ago. And in the class, I said when you clean your bad deeds, they don't disappear necessarily.

(1:10:24 - 1:10:49)
They open at a lower level, okay? They open at a lower level. So, the famous example is maybe you hurt somebody badly on purpose, then if you use the four antidote powers, okay? You can stop those bad seeds. How do you stop them? You trigger them to open in a small way.

(1:10:50 - 1:11:11)
Got it? Okay? Like you have a seed in your mind that you're supposed to die. You're supposed to be in a bad car accident. And then instead of, but if you do the four powers, if you clean it with the four powers, then the famous example in the diamond cutter is you will get a bad headache for a day or something like that.

(1:11:11 - 1:11:24)
And I'll tell you a cute story, because Grandpa likes stories. You think Grandpa's getting old and wants to tell stories. John and I figured out that stories are the only thing people remember.

(1:11:24 - 1:11:39)
I'm not kidding. That's why people who wrote New Testaments and stuff told a lot of stories. And they still repeat those stories, right? So, anyway, this lady has got a tape recording in my class.

(1:11:39 - 1:12:07)
She's riding down Highway 101? Down the... Highway 1 down the California coast in her Volkswagen van, like a good hippie. And she's listening to that to that class on her recorder, tape recorder. And then I got to the four powers and she tried the four powers while she was driving.

(1:12:07 - 1:12:25)
Then her car burst into flames. And she had to pull over to the side of the road and the whole engine exploded and started burning. And she jumped out of the car, listening.

(1:12:26 - 1:12:48)
She jumped out of the car and the car burned up, okay? And then she wrote me and told me the story. Why? She said, can you replace the tape for free? Because it wasn't my fault, it was the four powers talk. Then I'm like, okay, anyway, it's free.

(1:12:50 - 1:13:17)
So, when you're going to do something important, when you're burning up bad seeds, when you're burning up bad seeds, then some small bad things will happen, okay? Some small bad things will happen. And in the ancient books they say, you should be proud, you know? How's your day going? I'm so happy. What happened? My car burned up.

(1:13:17 - 1:13:40)
Wow! Do you know how many bad seeds I finished? You know, and so, a real Buddhist is happy when they're doing something good and then there's some bad obstacle, okay? You should be happy, okay? Now, your other questions. I'm going to go on strike. Band karo in Hindi.

(1:13:42 - 1:13:47)
You're trying to get four questions for one question. That's illegal. Okay, other question.

(1:13:49 - 1:13:53)
Quick, quick, quick. Picture, now. Geshe La, thank you very much for your teaching.

(1:13:53 - 1:14:08)
In the previous teaching you mentioned that Gautama Siddhartha is just a... Wait, I'm going fast, but you can go slow. Okay, all right. So, Gautama Siddhartha is just a nirmakaya in this world and pretend to go through 12 steps to get enlightened.

(1:14:09 - 1:14:21)
And my question is, what are these 12 steps? And the most important part is it reminds us to think about you. And could you please elaborate more on this part? Thank you very much. I'm sorry, I didn't catch the whole question.

(1:14:22 - 1:14:44)
So, in your previous teaching, you mentioned that Gautama Siddhartha is only a nirmakaya that show, appear in this world that got enlightened through the 12 steps. In fact, it's already there, enlightened somewhere and just ascending nirmakaya. So, my question has two parts.

(1:14:45 - 1:14:56)
First is, what are these 12 steps? And second is, remind us about you. And could you please elaborate more on you part? Thank you very much. Say the first part of the question again.

(1:14:56 - 1:15:03)
False step? The 12 Deeds of the Buddha. The 12 Great Deeds of the Buddha. Okay, good.

(1:15:04 - 1:15:17)
Thank you. I can say, in the same way that I can say I did touch emptiness once, okay, in my life, directly, okay. I can say that.

(1:15:18 - 1:15:26)
And I can say for sure that I'm not a Buddha, okay. I don't experience myself as a Buddha. If you do, God bless.

(1:15:27 - 1:15:38)
And that's proper and that's nice. But me personally, I need seven more lifetimes. I need seven more lifetimes.

(1:15:38 - 1:15:49)
I'm a Lendumbawa, okay. I'm a certain category of Arya and we need seven more lifetimes. That's why people say, I hope you don't, I hope your health is good.

(1:15:49 - 1:16:00)
And I'm like, I hope it's not good. I'm in a rush, you know. So, I have to die seven more times, okay.

(1:16:03 - 1:16:10)
So, it's okay. You ready? Okay, let's do it. Thank you, Geshe La.

(1:16:15 - 1:16:22)
工作人员赶快上来搬桌子 So, everybody just sit here. Don't need to move. Don't need to move.

(1:16:22 - 1:17:01)
We will take a big group photo with Geshe La. So, Thank you, dear teacher, dear Geshe Michael for the amazing class, for these deep teachings on emptiness which you give in such a fun and enjoyable way. And now we are going to have a short break and we are to be back in 26 minutes.

(1:17:01 - 1:17:03)
So, see you. Have a nice time.