BDW 5 «Мост 5: Пустота в повседневности», занятие 2

(0:05 - 1:12)
Welcome back everyone. We are continuing with Geshe Michael Roach class two. Please return to a comfortable seat, minimize distractions and let's keep the same strong intention as we continue the teachings. 

All right, welcome back Geshe La. Hello. Oh, oh man, Francisco, you're going to wake up everybody.

(1:16 - 1:23)
Oh, hi people in Malaysia. Hi Jasmine. Hi Ben Kramer.

(1:28 - 2:02)
Just stick to rice, Ben. Okay, the voice of experience. Hi Jasmine, thank you. 

Ben wants to say something. Extraordinary group of people. I'm sorry. 

We can't hear you, Ben. Can't hear me still, the phones can't hear me. We love you.

(2:06 - 2:25)
Okay, well, I assume you're saying you love everybody. It's good to see everybody. And I hope I can get back home. 

Okay, all right, okay, all right. Anyway, thanks for coming you guys. Thanks for going, Ben.

(2:27 - 2:43)
Okay, and thank you Jasmine, as usual. All right, here we go. So, we are studying the Song of My Spiritual Life in preparation for an empowerment.

(2:46 - 3:21)
So, this year I plan, if my doctors are cooperating, to do two empowerments. One is later this month for a friend from Asia that I've taught for about 10 years, and they started the trouble about three years ago? I was just walking to Kyoto [?] quietly by myself at night, and somebody grabbed me and said, come to dinner. Four years ago.

(3:22 - 4:00)
And I never ever go to dinner with my students, because then I can't get any sleep. But I said, all right, and they took me upstairs to some nice place. Not fancy, but good food. 

And I remember we were sitting on the ground, and there were lots of my students there. And I started teaching them about eight or nine years ago? Ten years ago, something. Seventy years ago? Okay, so, eight or nine years, yeah.

(4:01 - 4:21)
And I was sitting across from these two little troublemaker guys, and they looked at me and they said, will you teach us Diamond Way? And I tell everybody, no. I promised a long time ago I wouldn't teach Diamond Way again. And then I looked at them, I said, yeah sure.

(4:22 - 4:38)
And then we saw Gyalpo Karshor [?]. There's an old story in Central Asia about the king who slipped and said yes, and then he had to do it. So, I felt like I have to keep that promise.

(4:39 - 4:56)
So, I've been preparing them. And then other people heard about it and said, can we also join that empowerment? And there's limited place to put people. We're doing the first empowerment this month at Dragon's Head.

(4:58 - 5:24)
There's only seating for about 130, something like that. And so, I'll be doing that, and then we'll be doing it again in October? At Dragon's Head for five houses [?]. And then there's too many people, and we'll figure it out, don't worry about it.

(5:25 - 5:33)
Talk to Tim. Okay, just talk to Tim. That's why he looks like he's going to have a breakdown.

(5:35 - 6:08)
But I'm happy to do that, and I've been working really, really hard on it. I first taught Diamond Way here, like 23 years ago? 22 years ago? And I taught a, well how many years, seven year course, six year course? Six year course. And since then, so that finished around 17 years ago.

(6:08 - 6:24)
Since then, I've continued to work hard on my own Diamond Way practice and my studies. And I thought I would like to do it all over again, a different way. So, do it a much different way.

(6:24 - 6:44)
And because I've learned a lot more, and I have read many more texts, and I've been able to study it much more deeply. So, I thought I would like to do a fresh version. And so, anyway, that'll be in October.

(6:45 - 7:28)
This class, Song of My Spiritual Life, which is also translated by the great Gibson Chung, with me, together. And we've been working, how many years, seven years or something, total? Seven? Three or four years, he's the baby translator. So, we translated this book, and it's a great book, it's unique because this is the only book in which the greatest Buddhist writer in history, I believe, Tsongkapa, describes his own life, he describes his own experience.

(7:29 - 7:43)
And he never, never does that. I can't, I don't recall, and I haven't read any other text by him where he talks about his own experience. And, okay, Gibson, recite it.

(7:45 - 8:02)
Here he goes, just yell it. LAM GYUR NGES KYANG LENG DE DAG KYI THAM BUG PA'I DGA'I [?] DE BZHIN GYANG ZHIG Yeah, that's what I said, okay. DE BZHIN GYANG ZHIG means, he says at the end of almost every verse, he says, this is the way I did it, and this is the way you should do it.

(8:02 - 8:39)
So, this is a great book, it's a very, it's an honor to study, it's an honor to teach it. And we have been working on it for, I don't know how long, a year or something? And we're reaching the part about the six perfections. So, if you are here tonight, it's sort of a very important moment in your life to hear about the six perfections from, I think, the greatest teacher of Buddhism since the Buddha, Je Tsongkapa.

(8:39 - 9:08)
So, he's going to describe the perfections, and to do that, these are bodhisattva perfections. And ever since I was in college, I heard the word bodhisattva, and also, which band for a hundred dollars? You cannot self-bet [?]. No self-betting [?].

(9:19 - 9:37)
This is a short answer, it doesn't mean that. The police. Steely Dan.

(9:37 - 9:59)
Steely Dan, bodhisattva, won't you take me by the hand? Yeah, okay, well, so we'll do, we'll do retraining [?] later. Yeah, anyway, I heard this name in the song, and it was like the best guitar work I ever heard. I remember listening to it in San Diego, and I was like, wow.

(10:00 - 10:30)
But, so I like, I think it's interesting, I think all of us are attracted to the word bodhisattva. Somehow it feels comfortable, or it feels happy, but we don't really know what is a bodhisattva, okay? And it came to be, the word came to be used kind of freely. People say, oh, he's a real bodhisattva, why? He shared a dessert with me, you know, which I guess is the ultimate sign of a bodhisattva.

(10:31 - 11:34)
And, you know, like we say bodhisattva to describe a nice person, but what I'd like to do, we're talking today, you got that first picture you guys? I like to use this picture whenever I talk about bodhisattvas, because I think this one picture describes a bodhisattva more clearly than any other picture. You can have those nice Tibetan paintings, and everyone looks very golden and everything. But to me, this photograph is closer to what is a bodhisattva, okay? And so, when I saw emptiness myself, by the way, I didn't tell anybody for many, many years, there's a sort of a thing when you see emptiness directly, there's a kind of knowledge that you shouldn't talk about it much.

(11:34 - 11:58)
So, it's not common to talk about it. And I didn't talk about it for, I don't know, 40 years or so. And, but I, now I'm at the age where I figure if I, if the doctors make a mistake in the kidney surgery, which by the way, maybe, I don't know, it's all very top secret, even from the patient.

(11:59 - 12:10)
So, it's a very, very delicate procedure, and there's very, very many tests. I had to do 23 tests or something. They call it astronaut level testing.

(12:11 - 12:23)
So, you know, it's many, many, many tests. And so, I've been approved to have it. But it could be six months, it could be a year, I don't know.

(12:23 - 12:34)
And they do not tell you, you just keep waiting. And so anyway, I'm fine, it doesn't hurt, nothing's wrong with me. It just, you got to have it ready.

(12:35 - 12:51)
If you, if it fails, then you have to do something fast. So, anyway, so since I have that condition, I thought, well, I should tell people about it. About the bodhisattva experience and about the emptiness experience.

(12:51 - 13:19)
So, I'm talking more about it to people. And I think one of the reasons why a real Arya doesn't like to talk about it too much is that if people don't believe you, it's very bad karma for them. So, you know, I don't, I don't want to cause other people to not believe me.

(13:19 - 13:40)
But I, but also if I have friends from Vietnam or something who I care about, then I want to tell them about it. And if there's some people who don't believe me, at my age, I don't care. You know, so, you know, I'm just like, all right, if you don't believe me, I don't mind.

(13:41 - 13:48)
It's okay. And there's no way I can prove it to you. All I can say is that it did happen.

(13:49 - 13:58)
And so, I can use it to teach you. I can teach you what it's like, okay. So, we are reaching the part about bodhisattvas.

(14:00 - 14:21)
In my case, and I think it's typical, I saw, I had this pot-on-the-stove experience. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go to this class by these two great yogis called Pot-on-the-Stove. Yeah, right? So, I had that experience.

(14:21 - 14:50)
And then, within a few hours after that, anyone who really understands, anyone who sees karmic seeds opening in their mind, and sees luminous pictures coming out of their mind, would come out here. And it feels like they come from here, they don't. But they feel, they call it, what do you call it? Kinesthetic apperception in ballet.

(14:50 - 14:57)
It feels like your leg is straight, but it's not. If you could see it, you would understand. But it's behind you.

(14:57 - 15:05)
See what I mean? It's a thing in ballet. The ballet dancer will say, my leg's straight. And the teacher will say, boom, you know, it's not.

(15:05 - 15:15)
It just feels straight, okay? So, it feels like the seeds are back here. It feels like they open there. It feels like the images come here.

(15:15 - 15:26)
And it feels like they come down on the pot-on-the-stove. And that's something you can learn from those two dudes. It's not what I'm going to talk about tonight.

(15:28 - 15:52)
But, then within a few hours on the same day, that experience is called chu chok, or dharma agra, which means ultimate experience, in the normal world, before you see emptiness. And then within two hours, you will go and meditate, and you will see emptiness directly. I always make a joke.

(15:54 - 16:07)
It's my belief that you cannot die during those two hours. If you see the pot-on-the-stove, you will see emptiness on the same day. So, kind of you can run across highways and stuff.

(16:09 - 16:19)
Because there's nothing that can stop that person from seeing emptiness. Death cannot touch that person. It's funny, because after that, death can touch you.

(16:20 - 16:28)
So, just those two hours, you're like, protected somehow. So, I did see emptiness. That's another subject.

(16:29 - 16:54)
What I'd like to talk about, and I know many of you heard it from me already, and I'm sorry to repeat it, but I think it's worth it. I think if you hear it from an Arya Bodhisattva a few times, it will bring it faster for you. Okay, and you don't get a chance to hear that.

(16:55 - 17:10)
I have never met another Arya. So, I don't know. But anyway, the way it goes is, within a few hours, you go and you see emptiness.

(17:11 - 17:24)
You come down. You have a bunch of understandings. And those are called the Sixteen Aspects of the Four Arya Truths.

(17:25 - 17:34)
There's a technical explanation of them. It's been messed up over the history of Buddhism. That teaching is messed up.

(17:35 - 17:51)
It's the first teaching Lord Buddha gave, actually. But you can get it out of the text if you know what you're doing, okay? So, you know, that's another subject. We should do that someday.

(17:52 - 18:06)
But you have like basically sixteen different amazing insights. Like, you see your own death, okay? And all people have to die. Normal people have to die.

(18:06 - 18:17)
All of us have to die. We will all die, unless something very special happens. And we have died countless times.

(18:18 - 18:25)
We know, deep down, we know what's coming. We've done it many, many, many, countless times. And we're all afraid of it.

(18:25 - 18:33)
I know some people commit suicide. My brother committed suicide. But I think it was because he was so frightened.

(18:34 - 18:43)
So, I believe that everyone fears death. And I believe it's intelligent to fear death. I believe death is a terrible thing.

(18:43 - 19:01)
And so, in Arya, when they come down, they can see their death directly. They see the day of their death. They see, I like to say, gravity will win.

(19:03 - 19:12)
My grandson is trying to learn to walk. And I saw him the other day. He found a bookshelf.

(19:12 - 19:21)
And he was climbing, getting up to a standing position. And then he plopped down on his butt again. But he's getting close.

(19:21 - 19:26)
You can see. So, there's a period. He's one year old, I think.

(19:27 - 19:37)
There's a period between one and 74. There's a period when you are allowed to stand and walk around. And then you return to the earth.

(19:37 - 19:45)
You return to where you were, which is flat. And an Arya sees that directly. No one else sees that directly.

(19:45 - 19:50)
You believe you're going to die. You feel you're going to die. You have not seen it.

(19:51 - 20:04)
But an Arya sees it, and they're sure. And they see what's coming after that. And I don't believe there's more than a handful of people who have seen what's going to happen after they die.

(20:05 - 20:17)
And that sounds a little bit sad or something like that. But actually, it's quite encouraging. Because you know where you're going.

(20:17 - 20:29)
And you know what's going to happen. And so the fear that all beings have, even animals, the fear that we have, an Arya doesn't have that fear that way. They know what's coming.

(20:30 - 20:42)
And it's a pretty good death. And the rebirth is very sweet and delicious. So they are, it's just like going to bed for the night and getting up in the morning.

(20:42 - 21:13)
You know what I mean? They're not like, it's unpleasant, but they're not scared of it, you see. So anyway, after you see those things, then you sit down and meditate again. Chronologically speaking, I believe, there's still, and when you see emptiness directly, there is prana or chi has entered the central channel totally for the first time.

(21:14 - 21:34)
Except for, they say, orgasm or death. So briefly, when you have an orgasm, or briefly when you die, the prana enters your central channel with close to full force. But I believe that when you see emptiness directly, it enters full force.

(21:35 - 22:21)
It leaves the side channels and enters the central channel. And I believe that what happens chronologically speaking, you know, YSI [?] speaking, is that some amount of the prana stays in the central channel until you go to bed, okay? And it's by the next morning, by the time you wake up the next morning, it's back to normal, okay? So for that short time, in my case, maybe 10 hours or something, you have the prana in your central channel. And then you get super, you get unusual powers for those 10 hours.

(22:21 - 22:40)
Like you can read other people's minds. And then the next morning, you cannot. So anyway, maybe 20 minutes after you come down, in my case, I was in the temple.

(22:40 - 22:47)
I was in the Mongolian temple. I still know where I was sitting. And I moved, I did some prostrations.

(22:48 - 22:59)
That's another story. And then I sat down on the nearby, maybe 10 feet away or something. And I started meditating again.

(23:00 - 23:10)
And I had this really cool experience. And I was deep in meditation. I wasn't, I was out of emptiness.

(23:10 - 23:21)
I was not seeing emptiness again. I believe a lot of the prana was already gone from my central channel. But I was going into a deep meditation.

(23:22 - 23:37)
And I'll describe it to you. And I know I described it before, but I think you should hear it. And if you hear it a few times, maybe it will help you to do it, okay? So then I was meditating.

(23:37 - 23:47)
And my mom appeared in front of me. I was still aware that I was sitting on the floor. Like I was still aware that I was meditating.

(23:48 - 24:00)
But she was in front of me, not full size. But I could see her face clearly. And she felt human.

(24:00 - 24:09)
She felt warm. And we were pretty close. And then she looked a little bit worried, but not like crazy.

(24:09 - 24:31)
She wasn't like pulling her hair out, you know? She just looked like, you know, some worry, you know? And I'm like, you know, I wanted to help her. And then I thought, then you communicate to this other person, but without words. You don't speak.

(24:32 - 24:46)
You speak in your mind and they hear it in their mind. And so I'm like, mom, I know you have trouble. I know you are, you can say suffering, but that sounds like a Buddhist book or something.

(24:47 - 24:53)
She was unsettled. She was disquiet. She was worried about life.

(24:54 - 25:02)
And she wasn't like, you know, screaming or anything. She was just worried about life. And I'm like, mom, don't worry.

(25:02 - 25:19)
You know, today I had this experience and I'm close. And when I get to be a Buddha, which is soon, within seven lifetimes. And to you it sounds like a long time, but for an Arya you're like, wow.

(25:20 - 25:31)
You know, zillion, zillion, zillion, zillion, zillion, and now there's seven more. Wow, that's easy. Like, those seven lifetimes are a cinch.

(25:31 - 25:42)
Cinch? Do you still have problems? Yes. Does the cafe still lose a lot of money? Unbelievable. And I still have worries, you know.

(25:42 - 25:56)
But not like I know what's going to happen. So it's not a big deal. I don't get sad or like that for very long.

(25:57 - 26:01)
And I'm like, okay. So I said, mom, you know, don't worry. I'm on my way.

(26:01 - 26:06)
I'll be there within seven lives. I see it. And then I'll take care of you.

(26:07 - 26:15)
Wherever you are, you don't have to worry. You know, this is all going, communication is going on mentally. I'm like, I'm not talking.

(26:15 - 26:23)
And she's like, ah. We call it ug yung in Tibetan. Release your breath.

(26:23 - 26:29)
You know, you're like, whew. You know, she's like, ah. And I'm like, yeah.

(26:30 - 26:39)
And then she starts to fade away. And then my dad came, you know. My dad died a long time before that.

(26:40 - 26:49)
And I'm like, dad, you look a little worried, you know. And he's like, you know. And I'm like, don't worry, you know.

(26:49 - 26:57)
Today I saw emptiness. And I'm going to get enlightened within seven lifetimes. I am the next Buddha.

(26:58 - 27:03)
And I'm like, don't worry. I'm going to take care of everything. I'll take care of you.

(27:04 - 27:12)
And he's like, he got all happy, you know. Then he fade away. Then my brothers came one by one.

(27:12 - 27:22)
And then my relatives came one by one. People I know, people at school, you know. Kids I used to know and grandparents.

(27:24 - 27:32)
One by one. They come one by one. And then you start to see the neighbors one by one.

(27:33 - 27:43)
You know, like, yeah, I'm sorry I broke your window with the baseball. But, you know, I'm going to take care of you also. And they all happy.

(27:44 - 27:53)
And then they fade away one by one. And then you start to see other people in town that you don't know. You see them one by one.

(27:54 - 28:03)
And then you see people in other cities of your country. And then you see people in other countries. And I'm talking one by one.

(28:03 - 28:10)
Eight billion people, one by one. And they come up. And you're like, damn, man, you look a little stressed.

(28:10 - 28:15)
And they're like, yeah, I have to die. And you're like, don't sweat it, man. I'm going to be there.

(28:16 - 28:21)
I'm almost there, you know. I'll take care of everything. And they're like, ook, you [?].

(28:22 - 28:37)
And then you go on to the next one. The cool thing after that, you start to go through all the animals on the planet. So with me, it started with my childhood dog whose name was George.

(28:38 - 28:45)
And we were really close. He was the psychiatrist of our family. And he lived a long time.

(28:46 - 28:53)
And he would always listen to the problems. And I'm like, George, don't worry. I'm going to be a Buddha.

(28:53 - 28:57)
I'm going to take care of you, you know. Everything's fine. You don't have to worry about anything.

(28:57 - 29:06)
I'm on my way. Then you go through all the other dogs in the neighborhood. Then you go through all the mice.

(29:06 - 29:15)
And then you go through all the birds. And you go through all the fish in the ocean, one by one. I looked it up on Google, which always tells the truth.

(29:16 - 29:25)
And it's like a hundred billion fish or something like that. You meet them one by one. And they can understand you.

(29:25 - 29:29)
You're talking to them. They're like, boop, boop. And you're like, boop, boop, boop.

(29:30 - 29:41)
And they're like, oh, boop, boop. And it's really fun. Then you do all the insects, you know, one by one.

(29:42 - 29:58)
And what do you call single-celled animals in your bloodstream? Amoebas and stuff. And then the reason I use this photograph is that you, then you start other planets. You start with the humans on other planets.

(29:58 - 30:11)
And you meet them one by one. And they say there's no end to the universe. In Buddhism, we say there's no border of the universe.

(30:12 - 30:27)
But for an Arya or a Buddha, it is possible to meet everyone and finish them. So you meet every living thing in the universe one by one. And you assure them that you're on the way and that you'll take care of them.

(30:28 - 30:40)
They come up one by one. And it's not rushed, okay? It's not like trying to get through a bunch of interviewees at your office. You know, you're like, yeah, okay, everything okay? Are you cool? And they're like, yeah.

(30:40 - 30:52)
And you're like, okay, I got another person here. And you go through all these people. So what I like to say is you do planet walking.

(30:52 - 31:00)
You walk from planet to planet. You don't have this sensation of walking. You do not.

(31:00 - 31:10)
I'm just saying you do travel every planet. And you do meet every being on every planet. And all you do is the same thing.

(31:10 - 31:17)
With each person, you say, you know, I'm on my way. You don't have to be so stressed out. It's going to be soon.

(31:18 - 31:23)
I'll be there. I'll be there. You don't have to worry.

(31:23 - 31:29)
You don't have to look like that. You don't have to be so sad. There's hope.

(31:30 - 31:39)
And that is bodhichitta. And you can read about it in the book. You can talk about it a lot.

(31:40 - 32:18)
You can talk about bodhisattvas. A person who has had that experience is a true bodhisattva, okay? You can also, if you have bodhichitta, the wish to become enlightened, technically you're a bodhisattva. And that's fine, but I would say that experience, to have that experience directly where you communicate with each being in the universe, that makes you a bodhisattva, okay? And then that's all.

(32:18 - 32:44)
That's bodhichitta, okay? That citta means a wish to be a buddha. And so that person who had that experience, due, I think, to the excess prana in your channels still at that time, you have that experience. Then you come back to the, in my case, the temple where I was staying, where I was sitting.

(32:44 - 33:00)
And I was alone in the temple. They had a nice carpet because me and my teacher sweated [?] and put it there. And it was a nice place to, right? He made it this multicolored red, green, yellow.

(33:00 - 33:13)
I said, Rinpoche, why this color? He says, you can spill butter lamp oil on it and nobody will know. I'm like, okay. But it was comfortable.

(33:14 - 33:26)
I think it's probably still there. So anyway, by the way, if you can go there, it's in New Jersey. It's like two hours from New York.

(33:27 - 33:32)
And you should go. If you can get a chance, you should go. Because it is a holy place.

(33:33 - 33:43)
In this country, it's probably the most important place. There's nothing else to do there, trust me. Central Jersey.

(33:43 - 34:11)
But to stand there is a very important blessing, okay? And so anyway, I came back. And that's real bodhichitta. It is, of course, helps it happen if you study the text, if you learn all the details, if you go through the Lamrim teaching on bodhichitta, okay? That's obviously important.

(34:11 - 34:28)
It obviously affected me. It caused my experience. So I would say you can still read Gibson's book, and it will still help you, okay? All right? That's my bodhisattva advertisement.

(34:29 - 34:55)
Okay, next picture. This book that Gibson finished, in which Gibson and Rob are teaching here, it's a very unusual book. Technically speaking, as a scholar of Buddhism, it's a unique book.

(34:58 - 35:16)
So Tsongkapa wrote some of the greatest books on emptiness ever written. In fact, my next project is to finish his most important book on emptiness, which is called Gongpa Rabsel, Illumination of the True Thought. The translation's done.

(35:16 - 35:25)
It's 1,200 pages. It'll be four volumes, maybe? It's done. I just have to, me and Anatole have to clean it up.

(35:28 - 36:18)
So there are great books on emptiness, and that's probably one of the greatest. But the other half of the Korin [?] dependent events, okay? We can slowly transition out of origination [?]. Why events? Because it has to include the occurrence of unchanging things, which can still go out of existence, but they don't stop, okay? It's very rare to have someone write a book only about that, okay? One such book is Lord Buddha's Sutra on the Twelve Links, The Wheel of Life.

(36:21 - 37:00)
We are working on a translation, a new translation, the translation of a great commentary by Vasubandhu from 2,000 years ago with Sugeng Shi. That's going to take another, I don't know, I think we could do the first volume pretty soon. But you will not find books about how things happen as opposed to books about how they don't happen, okay? Books about how things don't happen are emptiness books.

(37:01 - 37:15)
Books about how things do happen are dependent event books. And the dependent event books are much rarer, much, much rarer. It's sexy to talk about emptiness.

(37:16 - 37:28)
It's a little dry to talk about dependent events. It even sounds dry. So there's not many books about it, but this is one, okay? This is one.

(37:31 - 38:03)
Why are we talking about it? Why did Geshe La bring it up here? Emptiness books teach you to see emptiness, right? Books about dependence teach you about love. Okay, got it? It's very interesting. You can technically, according to Tsongkapa himself, you can master emptiness and hate other people.

(38:04 - 38:27)
You see what I mean? If you're a theoretical physicist or something, you could understand emptiness. The principles of emptiness you could understand and still not like other people. You see what I mean? But the teachings on dependence, they teach you how things happen rather than how things don't happen.

(38:28 - 39:20)
So these are really important books that will help you develop love for other people, okay? A book about emptiness may not necessarily teach you to develop love for other people, but dependence, understanding seeds in the mind, understanding how the pot on the stove can happen, understanding that pictures come out of seeds in your mind and create the pot on the stove, means it is impossible not to understand that you must serve other people. Got it? If you see the pot on the stove for the first time in your life, you see how you must serve other people and you have no choice. There's no possible choice.

(39:21 - 40:11)
Every seed that ever opened in your mind was put there by serving other people, okay? It's unbelievable. You see what I mean? So if you understand where things are coming from rather than where they are not coming from, if you understand Gibson's new book, right, as part of your study of his first book, it's easier to be a bodhisattva, okay? If you understand where things are coming from, it's much easier to be a bodhisattva, okay? If you have that experience, before you see emptiness, if you experience dependence directly, you see that you have to be a bodhisattva. There's no choice.

(40:12 - 40:27)
Everything in your life came from how you treated other people. Then suddenly you become very interested in other people. For the first time, you're like, now I have to take care of other people.

(40:27 - 40:37)
No choice. Got it? You understand? If you understand dependence, you realize you must serve other people. That's all you have to do.

(40:38 - 40:46)
You don't have to worry about you. You see what I mean? You cannot take care of yourself without taking care of other people. There's no such thing.

(40:47 - 41:03)
It's not possible. If you want a cup of tea, nice pu-erh tea. Where does it come from? Sichuan? Yunnan? Someone gave me some coffee and said it's from Yunnan.

(41:03 - 41:13)
I said, I doubt it. Then later today, they asked me, how was it, Geshe La? I said, god, it was good. It tasted just like some kind of South America.

(41:13 - 41:19)
Then we looked at the package. It said Brazil. Brazil, right? Yeah.

(41:20 - 41:25)
I said, yeah, I know coffee. Okay, anyway. But... Sorry.

(41:30 - 41:42)
If we serve other people, Yunnan will produce coffee. Okay. You cannot even get a cup of coffee without taking care of somebody else.

(41:42 - 41:58)
Okay? If you see karmic seeds opening in your mind, for the first time, by the way, they go at 64 per... 65, I keep saying. Milliseconds. It's impossible to track.

(41:58 - 42:11)
You can't see it. The movie's playing too fast. You cannot watch Korean soap opera and see the separate frames coming up because everybody's moving and the king is deciding.

(42:11 - 42:15)
Anyway. You got to watch that one. The King's Affection.

(42:15 - 42:22)
Okay. I mean, when you're tired from your meditation. But anyway.

(42:23 - 42:43)
You cannot get anything ever for yourself without giving it to someone else first. And when you see the pot on the stove, you understand that. So it's natural for a person who understands dependence to seek to be a bodhisattva.

(42:43 - 42:50)
It's a natural transition. Got it? Because you can't get anything any other way anyway. Okay.

(42:51 - 43:05)
And you got to understand that. It's not like you have to sacrifice what you want and share your stuff with other people. That's a dangerous misunderstanding.

(43:07 - 43:17)
If you want anything at all, you must give it to someone else first. That's just the way everything works. Okay.

(43:17 - 43:27)
And when you see the seeds open in your mind, you will understand that. And then you're kind of automatically thrown into being a bodhisattva. Got it? Okay.

(43:27 - 43:42)
Got it? Nod. Otherwise, I think you're asleep. I told you the story of a certain student whose name I will not mention who has mastered the art of sleeping in the class with their eyes open.

(43:48 - 44:03)
What's the advanced version? And they're asleep the whole time. Tim, six? Six what? 6.30. Okay, good. I still have some time.

(44:04 - 44:30)
All right. Next. So, what would your life look like if you had seen emptiness directly and you saw seeds opening in your mind? It doesn't sound as sexy to watch seeds open in your mind compared to watching emptiness.

(44:31 - 44:34)
But I'd say it's equal. Okay. It's about equal.

(44:35 - 44:51)
The implications of it are so exciting. Oh, now I can make anything happen. Once I see directly that nothing doesn't come from seeds, then all I have to do is take care of other people and I will get everything I want.

(44:51 - 45:00)
And I never wanted money in my life. I was brought up in the hippie days. We were advanced beings.

(45:01 - 45:07)
We didn't need money. We didn't want money. We wanted peace and we didn't want people to kill each other.

(45:07 - 45:22)
You know, some of us went to jail and we just wanted to live in a peaceful world. We didn't care about money and we thought people who were worried about money were kind of weird. And we said, you know, you can make enough.

(45:22 - 45:28)
You can eat. You can work in 7-Eleven and still eat, you know, if you steal the food. No.

(45:30 - 45:44)
Just kidding. But I'm saying we grew up in a and that was our kind of an enlightened time. And we didn't think it was important to make money and none of us were trying to make money.

(45:45 - 46:00)
But if you understand dependence and if you practice the perfections, you can you can run but you cannot hide. That's an American expression. You can run but you cannot hide.

(46:00 - 46:09)
The money will follow you. The money will chase you, you know. And then that problem becomes how to give it away, you know.

(46:09 - 46:21)
And I'm in that situation. I mean, I'm not I have things happen in my life. Things happen where I lose things or something like that.

(46:21 - 46:33)
But in general money comes without effort and I can't stop it. It just comes more and more. It's crazy.

(46:34 - 46:44)
I opened my bag yesterday. I was leaving home. I thought I should leave some cash for my wife and there's like five thousand bucks more.

(46:45 - 46:57)
And I'm like, where'd that come from? You ruskies [?]. It's good. And I'm like, someone just slip it into the bag, you know.

(46:58 - 47:06)
And and it happens with much, much larger sums of money. Hundreds of times larger than that. And I don't know.

(47:08 - 47:17)
It's not my goal to get rich. I understand that a lot of money can be a problem. I've seen many rich people who ruined their life.

(47:18 - 47:28)
But if I had money I could I could do a lot of good things. Someone came to me during the break. I'm from Ukraine, you know.

(47:28 - 47:44)
You gave some money to our project to to teach yoga to people with, what do you call that? Trauma. War trauma. Years ago I gave this money in and they show up today.

(47:44 - 48:14)
I never met them. And they're running this program. what I'm saying is if you understand seeds, if you understand the pot on the stove, if you come to Gibson's class with Mr. Haggerty and if you understand it you could have as much money as you want and then you just kind of give it away.

(48:15 - 48:33)
And that's so much fun. You can't imagine how much fun that is, you know. It's a deeply happy life to keep giving away money and keep having more money come because you when you understand money you get more.

(48:34 - 48:43)
Okay. When you understand a seed it works better. When you don't understand a seed it doesn't work better.

(48:44 - 48:59)
When you misunderstand a bad seed you feed it. Okay. If you hurt someone and you don't understand about seeds that misunderstanding the bad seed makes the bad seed stronger like fertilizer.

(48:59 - 49:10)
Okay. This is the time of year, spring early spring. All of us gardeners, right? Anatole and I [?] should have been helping me with that other guy, the real worker.

(49:10 - 49:26)
He's good now. We fed my roses last week, you know and it's complicated. How many different things? Like 10 different things, right? They like Starbucks coffee grounds.

(49:27 - 49:36)
They like magnesium sulfate. Makes the colors grow better. Bone meal, you know.

(49:37 - 49:56)
They like all this weird stuff, okay? And if you understand it this is the time of year when you feed the roses. And then you just lay you just relax during the summer and they grow and they're stunning. They're stunning.

(49:56 - 50:28)
If you take care of them now when everything's cold and dark and unhappy everything's dead and you prepare for the summer now then in the summer it's stunning. You know my house, right? It's just sitting in among this jungle of flowers and it's so beautiful, okay? Your life is like that, okay? Just plant at the right time. Put the fertilizer at the right time.

(50:28 - 50:36)
Give to other people as much as you can. Don't be irresponsible, okay? You have to feed your kids. You know, you have to pay your rent.

(50:36 - 50:53)
If you don't pay your rent you won't have a chance to be a bodhisattva at that house. You'll have to go somewhere else. It's your responsibility as a bodhisattva to take care of your basic needs.

(50:53 - 51:11)
Without, you don't need someone told me they'll buy me any car I want. Two people told me that and I'm like, I'll take a Porsche what's that called? Cayenne, I'll take a Porsche Cayenne. I once rode in one.

(51:11 - 51:27)
This is a Porsche SUV. I rode in Shenzhen, I rode in one. What's that area called? Yeah, yeah I was there.

(51:27 - 51:40)
I got to ride in the car for 10 seconds but I never forgot it. Somebody said, you know, if you, I'll buy you any car you want, you know. So I said, okay, I'll do it.

(51:41 - 51:55)
And usually I say no but I said, my car's getting kind of old. I said, okay, I'll take it. And I said, well, a Cayenne is 200 something? 150,000.

(51:56 - 52:06)
Then they sent the money then I bought three cars. I gave away two and I kept one. I mean, I gave away the old one.

(52:06 - 52:18)
I bought two new ones and I gave those away. And I'm turning over the money, you see. I'm preparing for my next car, you see.

(52:18 - 52:32)
Then I'm going to ask for a Rolls Royce or something. Okay, but what I mean is if you keep giving every time you get something then give to three, four people. Give it away to other people.

(52:34 - 52:45)
And then this happens, okay. And I'm not bragging about it and I do have bad days. My cafe is losing a healthy amount of money.

(52:46 - 52:59)
But in general, I never wanted money but it comes by itself. I don't ask, I don't seek it. It comes and then I recycle it.

(53:01 - 53:17)
In the meantime, that's a very, very happy life to keep giving to other people. My cook, no, sorry. The cook and the receptionist at the cafe, they lost their rent.

(53:18 - 53:31)
They lost their house. I'm like, don't worry, I'll buy a newer [?] for you. And I think we're closing the deal tomorrow, right? I think.

(53:31 - 53:48)
And we're still doing inspections for roaches and stuff before the roaches [?]. But I'm just saying if you can do something like that, it's so fun and it's so happy. I'm not giving it to them, okay.

(53:48 - 53:55)
I'm just letting them stay there, okay. But to be able to do that is nice, okay. Just to, right.

(53:55 - 54:09)
And what I'm saying is, if you understand how the seeds work and you're a bodhisattva about it, by the way, you don't have to see emptiness to act like a bodhisattva. You just have to know the principle. You will get what you give.

(54:10 - 54:19)
And there's no exceptions. That rule has no exceptions. On the one hand, you will never get anything if you don't follow the rule.

(54:19 - 54:29)
On the other hand, that money will chase you down the street if you give to other people. They will chase you. You can't escape.

(54:29 - 54:35)
You can run, but you cannot hide. That's an American expression. Okay.

(54:38 - 54:46)
And it's fun, okay. All right. Next picture.

(54:46 - 54:52)
I got six minutes. Okay. Yeah.

(54:55 - 55:21)
So, after I saw emptiness, when you calm down, within a few minutes, you think to yourself, how can I remember what happened to me? For the rest of my life, how can I remember what happened to me? And then you say, what's the closest thing in the normal world to emptiness? And the answer is always the same. It's a diamond. Okay.

(55:21 - 55:29)
Diamond is the closest normal object in the world to emptiness. Okay. Is it close? Not at all.

(55:30 - 55:35)
Is it closest? Yes. Okay. And that's a funny thing, you know.

(55:36 - 55:49)
I was gonna, I started a diamond company secretly while I was working in the other company, which is illegal. I mean, it was against the rules. And I failed a lie detector test about it.

(55:50 - 56:04)
So, that was the end of the company. But I was gonna call it Near Diamond because diamonds are close, but not the best. You see? Then I decided to put my wife's name on it.

(56:05 - 56:12)
Her maiden name is Hancock. So, I guess you own the house [?] before that. Hancock, yeah.

(56:13 - 56:21)
Anyway. So, diamonds are important for a person who has seen emptiness. And I knew at that time I had to work in the diamond business.

(56:22 - 56:37)
And I had to touch them as often as I could. So, you know, that's why I went and helped to start a diamond business, diamond jewelry business. And I didn't know anything about diamonds.

(56:37 - 56:52)
It's very similar to trying to join the mafia. You know? Like, I got thrown out of 30 stores before I was, before I found someone to work with. And so, it was very hard.

(56:52 - 57:07)
But for a person who has seen emptiness, diamonds are very important. I'm sure that's why the Diamond Way is called the Diamond Way. And I'm sure that's why the Diamond Cutter Sutra is called the Diamond Cutter Sutra.

(57:08 - 57:23)
Even though there's not diamond, there's no diamond ever mentioned in the Diamond Cutter Sutra at all. The word isn't in the whole sutra. Why they call it the Diamond Cutter Sutra? Not the Diamond Sutra, by the way.

(57:25 - 57:28)
Okay. Vajracchedika. Cutter diamond.

(57:29 - 57:50)
Because diamond is close, but not the best. Okay? By the way, we're gonna have a program. We were, Rob, Rob and I, Rob Haggerty and I spent three months working on my schedule for 2026.

(57:51 - 58:03)
And it was very, very, very difficult. It's 500 days of work to schedule for this year. It's impossible to get less than 500 days of work.

(58:04 - 58:12)
So, we counted everything. We both had a breakdown. And, you know.

(58:13 - 58:23)
But we did decide to go to Singapore. And we decided to go to Malaysia for DCI. And, that's, those are both DCI programs.

(58:24 - 58:35)
Right? Oh, sorry, Malaysia is Faihan [?]. Sorry. Reason I mention it is, before that, we will have a DCI program in Xi'an, China.

(58:36 - 58:43)
Xi'an is kind of in the middle of the country. It's not a major city. It's a, it's a small city in China, like 10 million.

(58:44 - 59:06)
And, really, and they say, oh, why are you going to a small city? And, Xi'an is important because it was the capital of the Tang Dynasty. In those days, it was called Chang'an. And, 1400 years ago, it was the greatest empire in the world.

(59:08 - 59:26)
And, at that, in that year of Tang Taizong, in, during his time, London had 50,000 people. Xi'an had, Chang'an had, within the city walls, a million. It's 20 times larger.

(59:27 - 59:40)
The empire was 20 times larger than the British empire. So, anyway, we're going to go there. And we're going to have a program there because, for one thing, Xuanzang's tower is there.

(59:41 - 1:00:00)
The, the tower that the emperor gave to this great translation team, all these nerds like Gibson, and then the teacher was called Xuanzang. He walked for 17 years through India. He came home with, I don't know, a thousand books.

(1:00:01 - 1:00:21)
And those are the basis of ancient Chinese classical wisdom. And, so we're going to go there because the tower is still there. And, I think it's a blessing to have, to have a program, even in a small city of 10 million, where the tower is located there.

(1:00:21 - 1:00:40)
And also there's the shrine of Kumarajiva, who was an earlier translator. He translated the, some of the first sutras, Heart Sutra, Diamond Cutter Sutra. And Khotan, I think, Khotanese, I'm not sure.

(1:00:42 - 1:00:50)
West, West, West China at that time. They spoke some Indian languages there. And so he knew Sanskrit.

(1:00:51 - 1:01:15)
Then he was stolen by the Chinese emperor. That's another story. But he's, he, he once claimed when he was alive that if he had never spoken, if he had never said a mistaken word in his translations, then when they burn, when they cremated his body, his tongue should not burn.

(1:01:17 - 1:01:27)
So they did, when he passed away, they did burn his body. And his tongue was sitting there at the end. And they put it in a shrine, and you can go see the shrine.

(1:01:29 - 1:01:41)
And I, I love that place. It's a quiet little shrine kind of close to some mountains, and it's very beautiful. So anyway, that's also Xi'an.

(1:01:42 - 1:02:16)
So if you have time, since we're on the subject of diamonds, we're going to be going there. We're going to teach the Diamond Cutter Sutra there. Diamond Cutter DCI course, Course 7, which is a practical guide to emptiness, okay? When I teach DCI, and when I teach to my DCI students, and my DCI teachers and organizers, I never teach from a Buddhist book.

(1:02:16 - 1:02:28)
I teach them how to use it in their real life. So it's a whole different thing. And I've been very careful for 17 years to follow this method with them.

(1:02:29 - 1:02:36)
And they are doing great. They are doing amazing. So you know, if you'd like to come.

(1:02:37 - 1:02:41)
They did a cool thing. Jasmine's on. I know Jasmine's listening.

(1:02:42 - 1:02:49)
No pressure. But she came to me last week. She was here.

(1:02:50 - 1:03:12)
And she said, Geshe La, my students took some of my hair, and there's a laboratory that turns it into diamonds, real diamonds. And do you want to do it, Geshe La? And that's what happened to my hair. So I got a haircut with her [?].

(1:03:13 - 1:03:45)
And so I'm going to try to give away those diamonds at Xi'an, okay? So that's an extra extra incentive, okay? And we'll talk more about it in Xi'an. If you'd like to come, you're welcome to come, okay? I think there will be online in Asia, at least, if you want to listen to it online, okay? All right. Now you have to experience dinner directly, I hope.

(1:03:46 - 1:03:52)
And it will fill the emptiness. Okay. Don't forget to share.

(1:03:53 - 1:04:00)
Okay. All right. Ming Tian Jian.

(1:04:01 - 1:04:08)
See you tomorrow morning. No, afternoon, right? Okay. Anything else? Yeah, just a few announcements.

(1:04:08 - 1:04:26)
Thank you. Thank you, dear teacher. Thank you, Geshe La.

(1:04:27 - 1:04:58)
And thanks to everyone for joining. Later this evening, we have meditation one, rubric rest [?], from 8 and 30 till 9 and 15 p.m. Followed by tea and teaching class one, from 9 and 30 till 10 and 30 p.m. Please check the schedule and rejoin when you can. Thank you and goodbye.