BDW 5 «Мост 5: Пустота в повседневности», занятие 7

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Welcome back. Welcome back everyone. Welcome to Geshe Michael Roach class 7. As we continue through the day, we are grateful for another opportunity to receive teachings together with openness, attention and heart.

(0:34 - 1:46)
Thank you for being here with us at ACI Five Houses. Let's begin class 7. Okay, thank you guys. All right, here we go.

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We're going to start with a picture of a blue book you guys, right? Wow, you're so cool. All right. So, this is a book that I wrote during my three-year retreat.

(2:06 - 2:31)
I wrote several books during retreat, and I like this one. I think it's a nice book. And it's a commentary to the Yoga Sutra, okay? But it's a nice story, an adventure story about a young lady, many years ago, many centuries ago, okay? Yeah, Kachin [?], no, Friday.

(2:32 - 2:43)
Basang. By the way, my teacher's name when he was born was Basang. And Basang means Venus, the planet Venus.

(2:45 - 3:10)
And it also means Friday. So, that's the same in English, like Saturday is the day of Saturn, for example. So, his name was ... If you don't know what to call your kid, you name them Friday, if they're born on Friday, okay? Then later you send them to the monastery and they get a proper name.

(3:13 - 3:32)
So, his name was Basang. So, I used that name for the lady in this book, for the star in the book, okay? And I picked the best parts of the Yoga Sutra and I put them in there. I like what the Yoga Sutra says about the next perfection.

(3:32 - 3:49)
We finished the perfection of giving. Now we're studying the perfection of ethical life, you know, how to live an ethical life. Mainly, how to keep the ten vows, ten commitments, right? Not to hurt people.

(3:50 - 4:10)
But then later, if you want to be advanced, you can do Bodhisattva vows and then you can do Diamond Way vows. By the way, people ask me, what's going to happen after empowerment in October? So, we're working really hard on the empowerment. It's really sexy, I have to say.

(4:10 - 4:31)
Don't tell Buddha. But, I finished 1042 sections and it's very, very beautiful and I'm working on it every day as hard as I can. And I think I can finish in one or two more days.

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And then Tim will start to translate it into different languages. My idea is to share it with the students before the empowerment and teach it to the students before the empowerment. So, if we do a five-day empowerment, the first two days I would like to explain what's going to happen.

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All the empowerments I ever went to, I didn't know what was going on. At all. And then suddenly they say, okay, we're finished.

(5:04 - 5:12)
And I'm like, what? I don't know what just happened. It's all in a foreign language. I don't know what's going on.

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I always said in the monastery, when I have my own students, I will make sure they know what's going on. So, I'll teach you about the empowerment first and then we'll do the empowerment. But after that I would like to do some deep dive into your vows.

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You know, the vows you have to keep. My idea is you take the empowerment, then that allows you to, it allows me to teach you the vows. And my idea is if you don't like the vows, you can quit.

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You can, what do you call it? Quit the job. You know, that was a fun empowerment, but I don't want to keep those vows. In my opinion, you should have the right to read the contract before you sign it.

(6:05 - 6:22)
So, I will give you empowerment if you like, and I will teach you the vows in detail. In good detail. And then, then you can decide whether to follow this path or not follow this path.

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And either way, I still love you and I will still help you and I will still be your teacher. Okay? I don't care. Okay? Mazong [?]? Alright. 

Okay. So anyway, about vows, about making a promise or making a commitment, I think it's important to know all the details of the vow. And I love the part in the Yoga Sutra.

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It says, ,BRAG MA BYA RGYAS PA RI DGRA BHA'I YIN MA, ,JAG TU DE ZHIG RGA LA SA MA YANG NA PA'I PHYIN NA, ,SAL BA DPA'O MA MA HA'O RAG TUM, Uh-huh. This means, I'll say it in English. These forms of self-control are mighty codes of conduct meant for people at every stage of their personal development.

(7:13 - 7:36)
The vows, the ten, especially the ten commitments of Buddhists, they go beyond differences in race or social status. Doesn't matter what country you're born in, doesn't matter you're rich or you're poor, your color, your language, your family background, doesn't matter. They are the wisdom which has no borders in this world.

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You don't have to go to customs to get these vows. Okay? They go beyond what is modern or old. They are timeless.

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They are important 2,000 years ago and they are important today and they did not change. They don't have to change. They are beautiful things.

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They go beyond creeds and convictions. That's very interesting. I grew up Christian and I was happy, really happy.

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I had a beautiful church and I had a beautiful experience. A lot of people say they had a bad experience or something. I met the most amazing priests and we had the most amazing teachings and we had the most amazing church.

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It's the morality, the idea about not hurting other people. It's exactly the same. It's not different.

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Every country, every religion that I know about, they all teach you to be nice to other people, help other people, don't lie, don't cheat them, don't steal other people's partner. Things like that. These are very beautiful and they help everybody.

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I wanted to say my thing about the vows, about morality, about the second perfection of the six perfections. For many years when I was growing up, it felt like don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. Everything is don't do this, don't do this, and it feels uncomfortable.

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I don't, my friends know, I don't like to be told don't do this by anybody. I'm like, as soon as you tell me don't do this, I will do it. Because I just don't like people telling me what to do.

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It felt uncomfortable for me. All these vows, don't do this, don't do that, don't do that. Something happened in my life, I think it was ACI actually.

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You cannot go in ACI to East Pakistan and then go to Mexico and then go to Israel and then go to Russia or Ukraine, and then you can't go telling people don't do this, don't do that. Nobody likes it. At some point in my life I realized that I can keep the morality better if you tell me something positive.

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Don't tell me don't do something. Don't tell me mom don't eat the cake. Tell me to eat the donut.

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Then I don't have to eat the cake. Tell me something positive, something I can do which is joyful. I'd like to teach it that way, the second perfection.

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I don't like to tell people no killing, no killing. I mean, who's going to kill anybody anyway? I like to say help poor people, feed poor people, help sick people, go to visit cancer [?]. Do something happy and positive to help other people.

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What's the second vow? Don't steal. I've got to walk around, can I take this cookie or not? How many cookies we got for all the students? I don't like to think like that. I like it if you say get a lot of cookies and give everybody cookies.

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I like that one. I like something positive. I think these vows, the more you study them, the ten commitments, the ten Buddhist commitments, you can call them Buddhist, doesn't matter.

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SAR BA'O MA MAHAVIRATAM Say? SAR BA BA'O MA MAHAVIRATAM These are for the whole, everybody. Everybody will have fun. My belief as an old man, if you keep these commitments and you protect life and you share what you have and you respect other people's marriage, like that, you will just be really happy.

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You'll be, all the day you're just, and you feel, you just feel glad the whole day. I object if the morality feel like a police. I don't like it.

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I don't work with the police too good. I don't like people telling me, don't do this, don't do this. If you're saying, share what you have with other people, protect life, every chance you get, protect life, honor other people's relationship, enjoy it.

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Then I think the result, how to know if you're following the perfection, the second perfection, you just will feel happy all the time. I guarantee. These are not, somebody asked a French monk, I won't say his name because I'm jealous of him, Matthew, what's his name? Ricard.

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He said, there was a TV interview, nobody asked me for a TV interview, and they asked him, how many vows a monk has? 253 vows. The TV person said, oh, you must feel like you live in a jail. You have all these rules.

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You cannot do so many things. It must feel like a jail. He goes, no, no, you don't understand.

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I feel like I'm in a big building and I can fly from the window if I have a vow. Every vow is like wings of a bird and I feel like I can fly. I'm like, damn, it's so beautiful.

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That's what the vows are for. Something joyful, something happy. If you're keeping them well, they keep you out of trouble, trust me.

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Everybody thinks, the ten is okay. I'm sorry, nine is okay. That one, I don't like it so much.

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Many, many people ask me, can I take a lifetime layman's vow? I said, yeah, I can do. Oh, except Geshe La, I like to have some wine for dinner. Then I'm like, so you don't want a lifetime layman's vow? No, I want them, I just don't want the alcohol one.

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Can I take it without the alcohol one? And I'm like, no. So, I mean, take them and enjoy. They all are beautiful.

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Even the one you don't like. Even the one you don't like is beautiful. And if you keep it, you will be much happier.

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It's so easy, it's so much easier not to drink. For example, and you know when you're young, you're 18 years old and you're like, oh man, Geshe La, I'd like to have some wine sometimes, something like that. I can smoke some marijuana or something.

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What's the problem? From 73 years old, I give you advice. Just let it go. You don't need it.

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You just don't need it. And you will be much happier without it. Trust me.

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You will be much happier. These vows are cool. These vows are smart.

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The more you keep them, the happier. You will be very happy and very free. You feel very free.

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The more rules, the more freedom. It's strange, right? But I really, and you just feel happy all day long because you don't hurt anybody. You're not hurting anybody.

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Cool? They're not for anybody else really. They're to make you happy and they will make you happy. Just trust it.

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If every religion in history says the same thing, maybe it's a good idea. Okay. All right.

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Second one. Next picture. Okay.

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This is called a Chihuahua. This is a Mexican dog, I guess. I don't know.

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When we made our first ACI center in New York City, we didn't have any money. We were in an area called Hell's Kitchen. It's like hell.

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There's people walking around with guns. It was a very difficult place. A very, very difficult place.

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Then one lady agreed to live in the center and she said, I will live there if I can keep my dogs. We're like, okay. By the way, that was Lama Palma.

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If I can keep my dogs, I will keep the center. Then we're like, what's the dog? There's one little dog Chihuahua. I thought this was just a little dog.

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Probably it's okay. It barked 24 hours a day. You know Venerable Puntsok? Some people know Puntsok.

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He works for Nancy Karen. He's a beautiful, he was a beautiful monk. From Haiti.

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He became a monk. I remember we were, my teacher agreed to make him a monk. But we don't have robes for him.

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He said, don't worry Geshe La, I know how to use a sewing machine. I'm pretty good with a sewing machine. I'm like, okay.

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You can sew your robes, but it's going to happen next Wednesday. You have to be ready. So he worked, Tuesday night, he worked all night.

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He finished the robes. We have a momo pot [?] arrangement. Three floors, right? Remember? He did all the work on the bottom floor.

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He stayed up all night and he finished his robes. Then he put them on very carefully. He walked up the steps, you know like this, looking me in the eye.

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Pancho Villa. His name is Pancho Villa. This is the revolutionary from Mexico.

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He's sitting on the steps. When Puntsok go by, he's like, psshhh. He peed on the robes.

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Then I saw him, and I'm like, and he's like, and I didn't tell, I never told Puntsok. Somebody should tell him. It's been like 30 years now.

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I didn't tell him because I thought he won't make it to the ceremony. So he just went with a little bit of water on his... and the dog was really bad. There was another lady.

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Can I say her name? I don't know. Is it okay? Jing Mei? Amy Krantz. Okay, there was one lady who... I don't know where she is now.

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She's probably... Is she okay? It's all right to talk about a person. So anyway, so Pancho would be in the center, and one student is a particularly difficult person. I remember... Never mind.

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But whenever she came in the door, Pancho would go crazy and try to bite her. And it was very strange. And I'm like, Pancho, don't do that.

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What are you doing? And he's just like, and go crazy. And then I used to talk it over with everybody and then they say, he senses something wrong. He knows something that we don't know.

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Dogs are like that. They can... Dogs, they are super intelligent beings. And they... A dog can tell if you're a person who doesn't like dogs.

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Just looking at you. And it's very strange. And I asked her one day, how do you feel about dogs? I hate dogs.

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I'm like... And she didn't say anything. She didn't do anything. She didn't hurt him.

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But when she opened the door, he'd go... And then I feel like when a person's not keeping the morality, you can smell it. Everybody can smell it. They can be famous.

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They can be handsome or beautiful. They can be intelligent. They can be powerful person, rich person.

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But if they're doing something wrong, like they're cheating with somebody's wife or something like that, you can smell it. It's like the dog. We are all like the dog.

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And we don't know why. If you ask the person, why you don't like this person? I don't know. Something strange.

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Feel about something strange. And there are people, successful people, and I have been one, who can hide their faults very well. They are sophisticated.

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They're intelligent. They can hide what they're doing very well. They think.

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But other people can smell it. Other people around them can smell it. I say, from my old age, keep your morality.

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Keep your vows. Don't think you can hide something. You cannot.

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Everybody's like Pancho Villa. Everybody's like that dog. You think nobody knows what you did or what you're doing, but everybody knows.

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They don't know directly. They don't know on Tuesday at three o'clock you did this thing. They don't know.

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But they feel something. They always feel something. And when people are truly keeping their vows, people can also smell it.

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Say, TSUL KHRIMS KYI PHYI MA TSUL KHRIMS KYI PHYI MA The fragrance that comes off the body of a person who's keeping their vows. It's very interesting. And it's not like a flower.

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It's like a flower. It's like a flower. It's not... I don't think you can put it in a bottle.

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Or you'd have to keep your morality and then buy a bottle. But it's a... And there's also a warmth on their hands. I don't know if you noticed.

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A good monk, in the monastery we have these super duper monks, and you touch their hand, it feels like it's on fire. My teacher's hand was like that. You touch his hand, it feels... you have to let go because it's too hot.

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And I think it's something to do with their morality. And they smell nice. It's nice to be close to them.

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There's a special smell. Then when the sewer used to overflow at the Mongolian temple, and he wants me to go dig in the sewer up to my knees, he'll say, ,TSUL KHRIMS KYI PHYI MA, The smell of morality is coming out of the toilet. And I'm like, alright.

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It was a joke. That's how I learned this word. People can smell what you're doing.

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It's easier to stop doing it than to hide it. It takes less trouble. It's less trouble to be good than to try to look good.

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It's much more work to try to look good when you're not being good. Are you a terrible person? Are you going to go to hell? Of course. No, I mean, no.

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No, I mean, just clean it up. I mean, you know, there's things in my life I couldn't clean up for five years, ten years, fifteen years. But keep trying.

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Just keep trying. If you try honestly to clean up your life, you'll succeed. You will succeed.

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Don't go crazy. Nobody's perfect. If you were perfect, you would not be on this planet.

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This planet is for the imperfect people. You are born here because of the karma of not being perfect. Okay? Seriously.

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So don't feel like you're a dirty person or you're impossible. Don't feel like that. Just slowly, slowly fix it.

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Slowly, slowly fix it. Myself, if I was going to do something wrong, I would say, wait another five minutes. I'd say, no, I want to do it now.

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And say, just wait five minutes. How about four minutes? Okay, wait four minutes and then go ahead and do it. I'm like, okay.

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And you can do this. Delay. Delay for five minutes.

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You're mad at somebody. You want to say something. Then hold your mouth for five minutes.

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See if you can do it. Then tomorrow try for six minutes. It's not going to happen in one day.

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It doesn't work like that. Okay? Life doesn't work like that. Clean it up slowly.

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It only took me 72 and a half years, so don't worry. All right? Next picture. When do I have to stop, Tim? 6.30? Okay, good.

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I had something cool happen to me this year. I go to the eye doctor every six months or something. It's a good idea.

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Or every year. I don't care how old you are. Go once a year or something like that.

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In case something's going on. I go every year for years. I like the guy.

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He's in Flagstaff. His name's Krishoda [?]. He's a wonderful guy.

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He and his wife are both optometrists. He checked my eyes and he said, you have cataracts. Cataract is when the lens goes white.

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The skin color changes to white. Then you can't see so clearly. He said, you're getting cataracts.

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I said, no, I'm fine. I can read anything. He said, sit down, Michael.

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All my doctors are friends of mine. We like to joke. One of them, the kidney doctor, what's her name? Dr. Ang Chen.

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She told me some bad news about my kidney. Then I was joking. She said, do you meditate? I'm like, no one ever smiled when they heard this news before.

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Anyway, he said, in six months you're going to come back and tell me your eyes are not clear because it's coming. I said, yeah, okay, thanks a lot, bye. Six months later, exactly.

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I realized I can't read so well. Then I said, oh my God, he's correct. The first doctor in history who's correct.

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Just kidding. I went back and I said, you're right. I have something going on.

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He checked and he said, well, now you have cataracts. In Arizona, because the sun is so bright, it changes the skin of the eye. The skin of the front of the eye becomes yellow.

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You don't know because you're like that all the time. Things are getting yellow, but you don't know they're getting yellow. You see what I mean? It's kind of funny.

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Then finally it gets too thick and you can't see very clearly. He said, no problem, you can get an operation. I lived with a blind monk who had a bad cataract operation.

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I'm like, I can use glasses, it's okay. He said, no, no, things have changed. We don't cut you up anymore.

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We use a laser and it takes 15 minutes. I'm like, you're going to use a laser on the front of my eye? He's like, yeah. I'm like, nah.

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Then I talked to Jigme, she had it done already. She's like, go ahead Geshe Michael, it's okay. I searched around.

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I found the best one I could find. It's not in Arizona. It's in California.

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I met this good doctor, lady. Anyway, I went to her. She said, yeah, you could go a little while, you don't have to do it right away.

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I said, well, I have to have a kidney transplant. I think I better get all the operations done first. She's like, okay, let's do it.

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Then I said, also I have to go to Kyoto for a month. She says, wait a minute, you want me to do one eye and then wait a month and then come back? I'm like, yeah, I have to go. My students will kill me.

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She said, do you know what it's like to walk around with one new eye and one old eye? You're going to walk funny and you're going to get headaches every day. I said, I don't care, I got to go. They won't do them at the same time in case something, mistake.

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We did it in early December. The reason I tell you, one reason I tell you is that probably you will have to do it in your life when you get to 70 or something, if you get to 70. It will come.

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It will probably come. Then I wanted to say, don't worry about it, just do it. She was a very cool lady, very fun.

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She'd get you down on the table and she'd tape your head to the table. I'm like, what? She got this super strong tape. She says, I don't want you to move.

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I'm like, what? Then she gave me some drugs and I was like, this is fun. Khe fun [?], khe fun [?]? Khe fun [?]. It's similar to ketamine, but it's a drug.

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They keep the person calm, so they don't move. Then you watch her cut your eye. From the inside, you watch her cut your eye.

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They put a new lens. They put in a new lens. Bausch and Lomb, if you know, we used their instruments in gemology.

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They're very great German lens makers. You could watch them put it in. Then you just go home.

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Everything's fine. For one month in Kyoto, where was it? Xiamen [?]. Xiamen [?] or something.

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I was traveling. One eye, brilliant colors. Brilliant, brilliant colors, like I'm 10 years old.

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The blues are super blue and the reds are super red. The whites are like snow, glistening. I'm like, wow.

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Then this eye, everything's yellow. Then I got headaches and all this stuff. I have to be smiling in the class.

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Then the second eye got done at the end of December. It's incredible. I asked her, I asked her, can you do preemptive? Can you get it when you're 30 or 40? She said, yeah.

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Why not? I said, well, how often do I have to change it? She said, you will die before I have to change it. One reason I'm telling you is that you should know about it. It's pretty new and it works good.

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It's amazing. It's just amazing. I gave my wife all my glasses.

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I just gave them all away. You see, I don't use them anymore. It's wonderful.

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If you have a chance, do it. I would wait till you're 50 or 60. Why I'm talking about that, they say if you keep your vows, your eyes improve like cataract surgery.

(33:38 - 33:50)
You can see emptiness much faster. It's like getting cataract surgery. Keeping those ten little silly things changes your eyes.

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I compare it to the cataract surgery. You don't know what it feels like after 50 years to see white, to see real white. I was just walking around like a kid.

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I told my wife, look at that blue. She's like, what? I'm like, God, look at that blue. If you keep your morality, you can see emptiness much, much easier.

(34:24 - 34:52)
It's like having a cataract operation. Also, you can brag about it to your friends, which is one of the main things I do. But if there's a way, if there's a miraculous way to see emptiness easier, if you can do something easy to see emptiness faster, then I'd say go for it.

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It's so basic that it sounds dumb. Just keep those ten. Just keep those ten.

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You can see things that other people cannot see. Okay, got it? It's eye surgery. The ten good deeds are eye surgery.

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All right, got it? That's grandpa. That's things you don't know until you're a grandpa. I'm a double grandpa.

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I got another kid coming on in two weeks, I think. We call a bun in the oven. Bread in the oven.

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She's in Tucson. I should be there anyway. Okay, next perfection.

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What is it? Don't get angry. Yeah, they can say patience. And by the way, patience is many forms.

(35:49 - 36:11)
One is, I don't know, like you have to dig a big hole or something and it doesn't go very fast. You have to translate 1,200 paragraphs of an empowerment text and you should be patient. You should just work quietly, keep going.

(36:11 - 36:31)
You should keep going. And that's one kind of patience. And then Tsongkapa says, in Gibson's other book, he says, this is the highest form of yogi who can be patient.

(36:32 - 36:44)
It's the highest. Everyone's always asking me, you know, can I do niralamba shirshasana, unsupported headstand. That's like the only thing I can do.

(36:47 - 37:03)
People say, can you do this one? Can you do this one? And Tsongkapa says, I can do better than that. I can sit with an asshole and not get angry. And he's like, those headstands with no arms, that's nothing.

(37:04 - 37:25)
But to sit with an irritating person for the whole day, I mean, you gotta be, you gotta be a genius to do that. So, he says the highest retreat is to sit next to an irritating person in the car from my house. It's eight hours to Diamond Mountain.

(37:26 - 37:33)
By the way, Rob, you're not irritating. I'm just, I'm talking about it. I'm talking about a possible situation.

(37:34 - 37:59)
If you had to sit next to an irritating person all the way for eight hours, and then that would be a difficult thing, right? And Tsongkapa says, you'd take those, by the way, this is not my yurt, but when I saw it online, it's perfect. It's exactly what my yurt looked like. And it's exactly what the mountains looked like behind it.

(38:00 - 38:09)
But, that place was so remote that we're trying to find it nowadays on a map. No, there's nothing there. No humans ever were there.

(38:10 - 38:19)
And, we're trying to visit it, but we don't know quite where it is. So, you know it feels tough. We did a tough retreat.

(38:20 - 38:25)
We did not talk. I talked once. Twice.

(38:26 - 38:35)
Three times. Twice was I got angry. One was, there was a very large snake, and I was trying to tell the other person.

(38:37 - 38:43)
So, you know, it seems difficult. It was very difficult to spend three years. We didn't have toilet.

(38:44 - 38:48)
We didn't have electricity. We didn't have heat. We didn't have air conditioning.

(38:49 - 39:04)
We had a small wood fire, but it was difficult. It was very difficult. And, he says, it's much more difficult to sit next to an irritating person than to do a three-year retreat.

(39:06 - 39:12)
Tsongkapa said that. You know, I'm like, you're right. It's very right.

(39:12 - 39:34)
To keep your patience with a truly difficult person is harder than to do a long retreat. By the way, Tim asked me to cover some topics that you could meditate on during your retreat, and I'll give it to you either today or tomorrow morning. Okay? I'll have that ready for you.

(39:35 - 39:50)
Maybe today. 6.30, Tim? Okay. Yeah, so, he says, if you have to choose between a three-year retreat and an irritating person, this one's more difficult.

(39:50 - 39:58)
Especially if you're married to them, or they're your partner or something. It's much— No, it's harder. It's more hard.

(39:58 - 40:07)
It's more difficult. Okay? It's more difficult to be patient than to sit in a yurt and meditate all day. Okay? It really is.

(40:09 - 40:21)
And by the way, it was one of the most wonderful things in my life to do that retreat. And it was unbelievable. So, this place here is very important for your life.

(40:22 - 40:37)
If you can do a one-week retreat, two-week retreat. I didn't start with three years. You know, there was a time in my life when I was doing four months of retreat a year for a long time.

(40:37 - 40:47)
Maybe for ten years or something. So, this, you know, you have to build up to it. It'd be foolish to just go into a three-year retreat.

(40:48 - 40:52)
You should do many weekends. Get used to it. And then do three days.

(40:52 - 40:55)
Then do four days. Okay? And that's fine. That's how you should do it.

(40:56 - 41:05)
Otherwise, you just waste your time. Okay? You cannot go into a one-month retreat without short retreats first. It's a waste of time.

(41:07 - 41:17)
And there's, you want to hear a famous funny story? I told you. The guy is sitting on the road in Tibet. Next to the road.

(41:17 - 41:25)
The guy is walking by. The guy is meditating. And he says, the guy is walking down the road in Tibet.

(41:25 - 41:33)
This is a famous joke in the monastery. The guy is walking down the road in Tibet. There's this other guy sitting by the side of the road in deep meditation.

(41:34 - 41:54)
And the guy is looking at him and saying, God, that guy can meditate on the side of a busy road. That's, that guy is amazing, you know. Then he goes over and he whispers to him, you know, Hey, what? How are you meditating next to the road all day? So busy, cars, everything.

(41:55 - 42:02)
Yeah, I'm doing it. What are you meditating about? Patience. I'm meditating on patience.

(42:03 - 42:10)
Huh. You look like an asshole. What? And he got angry and jumped on him.

(42:13 - 42:21)
Understand? That's an old monastery joke. Don't tell these bad jokes unless you know the student well. Okay.

(42:22 - 42:37)
Then there's a famous line here called LANG ROL GYI DRA Say LANG ROL. DRA LANG ROL DRA I think it's URD PA RGA [?]. It's a snake.

(42:37 - 42:47)
It's called the creature that goes on its palm. The creature that travels on its palm. LAG means palm of the hand.

(42:49 - 43:02)
Nickname for a snake, poetic name for a snake is hand traveler? Palm traveler. Because they travel on their stomach, you know. And then the DRA is Garuda.

(43:03 - 43:19)
DRA KHYUNG Say DRA KHYUNG It's a Garuda bird, like a mystical bird. Like a phoenix, similar to a phoenix. And in the traditional stories, the eagle, the Garuda will eat the snake.

(43:20 - 43:27)
Okay? And I was in three-year retreat, I saw many strange things. We were in a very wild place. No human ever lived there.

(43:28 - 43:35)
And there were animals there you won't believe. I could tell you, I wrote a book about it. But I never published it.

(43:36 - 43:51)
Because halfway through the retreat the animals start talking to each other. And I wrote down the story and then I never published it. But I will someday, okay? I just need to not go to board meetings all the time.

(43:56 - 44:07)
Anyway, we saw an eagle come down and grab a rattlesnake. These are big rattlesnakes. And flew off and ate it in the sky.

(44:07 - 44:15)
We were watching it. These are highly poisonous snakes. And they just grab them and go fly off.

(44:16 - 44:31)
And it was amazing. It was just amazing. And then there was a people south of California near Baja, now Jalisco, right? In Jalisco.

(44:31 - 44:48)
Near Guadalajara, what do you call that? Vallarta? And there used to be a tribe of people there. And they have a shaman, like Huichol [?], a magic guy. And he got a message from God.

(44:49 - 44:59)
And the message is you people have to leave this place immediately. The whole population has to leave immediately. The whole race of people have to leave immediately.

(45:00 - 45:07)
And go walk to the east. Just walk to the east. And there's something waiting for you.

(45:08 - 45:24)
And then they're like, whoa, what are we supposed to do? Keep walking until you see an eagle eating a snake in the sky. And then stop and build a city. And so they walked halfway across Mexico, more than halfway.

(45:25 - 45:38)
And they saw the eagle eating the snake and they built Mexico City. And a very terrible place. There were nine lakes or seven lakes? I don't know.

(45:38 - 45:52)
It used to be too many lakes. Volcanoes. Where's that place? Where? What's that place, all the volcanoes? Anyway, it's dangerous.

(45:52 - 46:00)
Lots of earthquakes. And lots of weird stuff going on. But they saw the eagle, they decide.

(46:00 - 46:16)
Why are you talking about the eagle, Geshe La? They say anger is like a snake. And they say the patience of a strong person is like the eagle, like the Garuda. And it can destroy the snake.

(46:17 - 46:27)
They can eat the snake. So there's a skill of riding your anger. There's a skill of you don't fight your anger.

(46:27 - 46:43)
You jump on the tiger and you ride it. And that's a very beautiful skill. And the way the way to do it is the pot on the stove.

(46:44 - 46:58)
You want to ride a tiger? You want to eat the snake? Pick up the poison snake. Then you got to understand the pot on the stove. That's all.

(46:59 - 47:07)
Geshe La, can you explain it? No. That's up to you. Ask Gibson or Rob.

(47:08 - 47:18)
Right? Okay. But you can use anger. You can ride on the tiger and you can fight it that way.

(47:19 - 47:24)
And it's very beautiful. And it's in this. It's in this one.

(47:25 - 47:42)
I used to recently, I was... What do you call? A couple of years ago, someone came to me and said, we make films for Netflix and we want to make a movie about you. I'm like, oh well. Okay.

(47:44 - 47:52)
And so they're almost finished. Halfway through the movie, I changed the movie. I said, I want to teach about death.

(47:53 - 48:03)
I want to teach people to learn how to die. I don't want them to see how famous is Geshe Michael. I want to make a movie about Geshe Michael dying and teach people how to die.

(48:04 - 48:09)
And so we changed it. We changed the movie. And it's beautiful.

(48:09 - 48:17)
It's almost finished. Then I got another letter from, an email from HBO. This is like very famous.

(48:18 - 48:27)
They say, we want to make a movie about how terrible you acted at Diamond Mountain. And I'm like, what? I wasn't even here. I was in Argentina.

(48:28 - 48:33)
And something bad happened here. We had a problem with a student. One student passed away.

(48:33 - 48:41)
And it was in all the newspapers and all the thing. So, that movie also coming out. I think they're competing.

(48:43 - 48:47)
Okay. One movie about how bad I am. One movie about how great I am.

(48:47 - 48:55)
I like the first one. Okay. About what I would meditate about.

(48:55 - 49:01)
Okay. And I have it here. It's the SS 12.1 [?]. Okay.

(49:03 - 49:10)
This is right after I saw emptiness. Okay. I think I was 22 or 23, something like that.

(49:10 - 49:20)
And my teacher never take a break. Never. And one day he said, let's take a break.

(49:20 - 49:33)
And I'm like, are you feel okay? And he's like, let's go to a park. Let's take all the students to a park. And I'm like, why? And he says, I want to play baseball.

(49:34 - 49:45)
He saw baseball on the TV and he said he wants to play baseball. So, we had a wonderful time. We went to a park in Lakewood.

(49:45 - 50:02)
If you know Lakewood. What are you doing? And we divided into two teams, vegetarian and non-vegetarian. At that time I was vegetarian, my teacher was not vegetarian.

(50:02 - 50:14)
And so we said, we challenged the meat eaters. We will show you vegetarians are stronger. And we had a very cool baseball game.

(50:14 - 50:22)
And he was the umpire. He was the judge. And we had a big fight and the vegetarians won.

(50:23 - 50:37)
Okay. And so he said, see, you can be stronger with vegetarians. So anyway, that was right after I saw emptiness.

(50:38 - 50:51)
And this is a joyful effort, right? This is the fourth perfection. And it's the next one. And if I show it to you, it's this picture.

(50:53 - 51:08)
If I show you what it feels like, it's this picture. And you just feel so happy that you beat the meat eaters. You know what I mean? It's like, wow, you know, cool, you know.

(51:08 - 51:28)
So there's six perfections, right? How do you go like that, right? Yeah. Chinese go like that. Americans go... So you got the last two hang together, right? Deep meditation and wisdom.

(51:29 - 51:37)
Shamatha and Vipashyana basically. Deep meditation and then understanding emptiness. These five and six obviously go together.

(51:38 - 51:45)
You need the platform. You need the base, foundation of deep meditation. Then you can meditate on emptiness.

(51:45 - 51:58)
And we're going to cover it later. Then you have the first three perfections, we just finished them, right? What are they, number one? Eww [?], giving. Charities for corporations [?].

(51:59 - 52:10)
Giving, then... Yeah, ethical life and patience. Grab the anger, eat it up. Okay, so there's three.

(52:10 - 52:16)
Those three hang together. These two hang together. And there's one between them.

(52:17 - 52:26)
And it's called tsondru. In Sanskrit it's virya. Which virtue comes from strength, strong.

(52:27 - 52:34)
But it means have a good time. Doing good stuff. Have a good time.

(52:34 - 52:40)
Don't do it like this. What are you doing? Oh, I'm keeping my morality. It's so boring.

(52:42 - 52:51)
I wish I could have some fun. By the way, morality should be super fun. If it's not fun, you're doing it wrong.

(52:52 - 53:01)
Trust me. So anyway, they say the first three perfections go together. And the last two perfections go together.

(53:02 - 53:09)
But working hard with joy. Joy is in between. And it goes both ways.

(53:09 - 53:21)
It supports both. Number four supports meditation and emptiness. And number four supports giving ethical life and patience.

(53:22 - 53:34)
Now, my suggestion for your retreat, four-day retreat, go through the six perfections. Meditate on the six perfections. Use the book.

(53:35 - 53:43)
Sit with the book. Tsongkapa's Song of My Spiritual Life. And go through the book.

(53:43 - 53:51)
Follow the book during your meditation. So, read a little bit of the book. If it's me, I'll divide the six perfections.

(53:51 - 54:01)
I'll divide how many sessions you have. And divide it before you start. I'm going to meditate about giving for the first two sessions.

(54:02 - 54:19)
Then the next three sessions I'm going to work on ethics. And then my request, work through the six perfections during your meditations, in your retreat. But the koan.

(54:19 - 54:34)
What's koan? It's a riddle. It's a Japanese Buddhist thing. They give you a riddle like, I don't know, what's the largest pencil in the world? Pennsylvania.

(54:39 - 55:02)
You're from Pennsylvania. You didn't even know that? No, I mean, koan means, in Japanese Buddhism, your teacher will give you a riddle. They'll say, okay, think about this for four days, right? There's a joke in the monastery.

(55:03 - 55:19)
If you want to ruin someone's retreat, tell them not to think about the pencil joke. And they will think about it a whole day. Anyway, I want you to go through the six perfections.

(55:19 - 55:47)
Half the time is for the first three. Half the time is for the last two. But the koan, where you will find wisdom, where you will change your life, is every day, all day, I want you to ask, what is joyful effort? How can I do joyful effort? How can I learn joyful effort in this retreat? In these four days, Geshe La gave me homework.

(55:47 - 56:14)
What? What the hell is joyful effort? And how can you use it with these three and these two? Like that? Come up with some application of joyful effort and try to feel joyful effort. Joyful effort is like, SIN NAMS [?] raising money! I can get my money! Yay! You know, like that. And you feel excited all day.

(56:15 - 56:33)
You feel happy. You feel just super happy all day to do cool stuff. Cool stuff. 

Do good things for people. And I want you to try to feel it. So what you can do is meditate about nice things you might do when you get home.

(56:35 - 56:41)
After retreat, nice things you can do. Make a list. You don't have to do all of them, okay? There'll be a hundred, you'll do three of them.

(56:42 - 56:46)
That's okay. Make a list of nice things you can do for people. Keep a journal.

(56:47 - 56:59)
Make a list of some sweet things you can do for other people. But get into it. Try to feel that excitement about these plans.

(56:59 - 57:06)
90% of plans don't happen. It's okay, don't worry about it. No, don't worry about it.

(57:06 - 57:13)
10% is worth it. If you do 10% of it, it's worth it. Make some cool plans for your life.

(57:14 - 57:32)
What we teach in Innovation Retreat, Stanley's group, I used retreat for my whole corporate career. 19 years in the diamond business, I used retreat constantly for new ideas. I believe that's why we became number one in the world.

(57:33 - 57:43)
I believe that's ... We started with nothing. We started with a $50,000 loan. At the end, we were the largest jewelry company in the world.

(57:46 - 57:55)
I say it's because of retreat. It's because I learned how to do retreat. Work hard in retreat.

(57:55 - 58:09)
Don't sit there and look at the calendar. Like, how many more days I got before I can get out of here? It's not like a jail, okay? You're so lucky to have the time. Someone feeding you.

(58:10 - 58:16)
Someone taking care of you. Someone built you a cabin. Let's give a hand to all the people who built that cabin.

(58:17 - 59:02)
Stand up. Me, me, me. By the way, you know the deal.

(59:03 - 59:14)
The deal was you build your own cabin, you pay for your own cabin, and we'll pay for the food. We'll figure out the food. The food was a million and a half dollars.

(59:16 - 59:21)
Singapore was one of the greatest helps. We should give them a hand. Give them a hand.

(59:42 - 59:51)
The deal was if you build a cabin, you have to give it away at the end. You have to give it to Diamond Mountain for free. They all did that.

(59:52 - 1:00:04)
When you sit in those cabins, they died to make those cabins. The last cabin was approved the day before we started retreat. I think the last two or three cabins.

(1:00:05 - 1:00:18)
We were lucky because we had a fag guy for the inspector. The last cabin was the one up on the hill. He's like, and then he looked up there.

(1:00:18 - 1:00:28)
We said, we got one more. He says, it looks okay. Okay.

(1:00:30 - 1:00:34)
Enjoy the cabins. They have a good karma in them. Those people gave them.

(1:00:35 - 1:00:43)
They were not rich people. They did the work themselves. It's a blessing to be in the cabins.

(1:00:45 - 1:00:50)
Your assignment is to find joyful effort. Find joyful effort. Find it.

(1:00:51 - 1:00:59)
Find the feeling. That's the assignment. If you don't walk out with a smile, you failed the test.

(1:01:00 - 1:01:27)
What? Why? If you speak so fast, I don't understand at all. Please, maybe there will be an interpreter. That would be better.

(1:01:29 - 1:02:07)
Please. So, she wanted to take the moment and to have this opportunity when we have lots of online and offline participants. About the idea she got like three months ago when she was planting the trees with the other volunteers.

(1:02:24 - 1:03:03)
So, her idea is to write a book about Diamond Mountain and each of us can share their story how they get to Diamond Mountain. It's enough for me, Gail, Jigme, Tsunami [?], Sarani [?], Connie, JB, everyone who took part, who had a three-year retreat. Because there are a lot of questions that we would like to have answers to.

(1:03:15 - 1:03:37)
Kelsey, Connie, JB, Jigme, everyone. Because we have so many questions between what was in the beginning and now and we want to cover them. And it would be for the past generations, for the generations that will follow us, and it will be the story of Diamond Mountain.

(1:03:37 - 1:04:19)
And the proceeds for the sale of this book will always go to Diamond Mountain. Okay, we'll try. So, it's for you to understand it.

(1:04:19 - 1:04:27)
We need you, we need your experience and we need to please share with us that. We ask you for that. Okay, thank you.

(1:04:32 - 1:05:45)
Tim, anything? Ready? Got anything? Thank you, thank you everyone for joining Geshe Michael Roach Class 7. Oh, I'm sorry. General channel, sorry. Thank you, thank you everyone for joining Geshe Michael Roach Class 7. We hope this session brought more depth, clarity and inspiration for your retreat experience and daily practice.

(1:05:46 - 1:06:05)
Thank you for being part of this gathering at ACI Five Houses. Thank you, goodbye. ACI Five Houses www.acifivehouses.org