Details
The Four Seals of the Dharma 1b
Teachers:
Collection:
- Foundations of Buddhism
Location:
- Gomde Germany-Austria
Translator:
- Catherine Dalton
Length:
- Full Length Session
Features:
- Subtitles ,
- Transcripts
Excerpt
This session emphasizes the integration of faith and reason in Buddhist practice, with special attention to the transformative power of realizing impermanence. Through contemplation and meditation on impermanence, practitioners reduce attachment, cultivate compassion, and move toward direct realization of emptiness and the nature of selflessness.
Description
Rinpoche explores the distinction between faith-based and reason-based approaches to religion, with Buddhism uniquely integrating both. While religious faith is often criticized as “blind” or “stupid,” Buddhism promotes reasoned investigation, particularly into the Four Seals of Dharma, encouraging practitioners to understand impermanence through logic, experience, and the pith instructions of the Buddha. A major theme of the session is the transformative power of recognizing impermanence, as attachment to impermanent things is seen as the root cause of suffering. By contemplating impermanence, practitioners reduce attachment, develop compassion, and become open to the deeper realization of emptiness and selflessness, which form the core of authentic Dharma practice.
Related Course Info
-
The Four Seals of Dharma
Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche guides us through the essential points of the Four Seals of Dharma:
- All Conditioned Things are Impermanent.
- All Defiled Things are Suffering
- All Phenomena Are Empty and Devoid of Self
- Nirvana is Peace
Video
Audio
01:11:08
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You
don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing,
because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine.
Catherine is laughing,
then you think I should laugh.
You don't know
why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We
are the imitators of science.
We try our best to
show that I'm a scientist.
I'm not a religion believer.
I'm not believing in superstition.
I'm very healthy, very
smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What
kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? All the Students: Yes! Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear. There are many different religions in the world, but we can say that religion in general is religious systems in general and religious people in general are faith-based, right? We are adherents of faith. And faith means belief, actually. Belief in what? Well, most religions believe that the world was created by someone, something, and that there are teachings, the path is taught by the one who created the world or who teaches that religion, and if we don't follow what they taught, the path that they taught, then we will go to the lower realms, and if we do follow what they taught, then we will go to heaven, and so on. It's like that. That's generally what religious traditions teach. And within Buddhism also, there are two ways of approaching Buddhism. One is to be a faith-based practitioner, and actually all Buddhists fit within that category. We are all adherents of faith. But within Buddhism, there's also another sort of subsidiary category of Buddhist practice, or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an adherent of reason, a reason-based person. And this is because in Buddhism we are taught that we are meant to examine and investigate, right? And this type of examination and investigation and teaching is something that can take months and months, years and years, and those who approach the Dharma in this way are called followers of faith. Translator to Lama in room: This one is in German, but that's okay. Thank you. This one is in Spanish, but I know Spanish. It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig... no problem. We have all the languages. So those of us who approach Buddhism in this way were called followers of reason, followers of reason. And what did you hear? No problem. In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know. No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature, We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus. Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And pacifically discussion with scientists is very interesting and what they showing me through this Translator : Microscope So, very unusual things there, very unusual things. One insect with two head, they can play here and there. Just unbelievable things.
We call the worlds of three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence it's the realm of possibility. So there is a lot of things out there, there are possible and they showed me lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realms of possibility.
That can make life longer.
Might be need to use many machines,
make life longer.
Very good experience, very good experience. They showing me their lab... Translator: The Lab, laboratory.
Okay.
Lama: Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right? We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? All the Students: Yes! Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear. There are many different religions in the world, but we can say that religion in general is religious systems in general and religious people in general are faith-based, right? We are adherents of faith. And faith means belief, actually. Belief in what? Well, most religions believe that the world was created by someone, something, and that there are teachings, the path is taught by the one who created the world or who teaches that religion, and if we don't follow what they taught, the path that they taught, then we will go to the lower realms, and if we do follow what they taught, then we will go to heaven, and so on. It's like that. That's generally what religious traditions teach. And within Buddhism also, there are two ways of approaching Buddhism. One is to be a faith-based practitioner, and actually all Buddhists fit within that category. We are all adherents of faith. But within Buddhism, there's also another sort of subsidiary category of Buddhist practice, or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an adherent of reason, a reason-based person. And this is because in Buddhism we are taught that we are meant to examine and investigate, right? And this type of examination and investigation and teaching is something that can take months and months, years and years, and those who approach the Dharma in this way are called followers of faith. Translator to Lama in room: This one is in German, but that's okay. Thank you. This one is in Spanish, but I know Spanish. It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig... no problem. We have all the languages. So those of us who approach Buddhism in this way were called followers of reason, followers of reason. And what did you hear? No problem. In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know. No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature, We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus. Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And pacifically discussion with scientists is very interesting and what they showing me through this Translator : Microscope So, very unusual things there, very unusual things. One insect with two head, they can play here and there. Just unbelievable things.
We call the worlds of three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence it's the realm of possibility. So there is a lot of things out there, there are possible and they showed me lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realms of possibility.
That can make life longer.
Might be need to use many machines,
make life longer.
Very good experience, very good experience. They showing me their lab... Translator: The Lab, laboratory.
Okay.
Lama: Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right? We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
17:28
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You
don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing,
because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine.
Catherine is laughing,
then you think I should laugh.
You don't know
why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We
are the imitators of science.
We try our best to
show that I'm a scientist.
I'm not a religion believer.
I'm not believing in superstition.
I'm very healthy, very
smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What
kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? All the Students: Yes! Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear. There are many different religions in the world, but we can say that religion in general is religious systems in general and religious people in general are faith-based, right? We are adherents of faith. And faith means belief, actually. Belief in what? Well, most religions believe that the world was created by someone, something, and that there are teachings, the path is taught by the one who created the world or who teaches that religion, and if we don't follow what they taught, the path that they taught, then we will go to the lower realms, and if we do follow what they taught, then we will go to heaven, and so on. It's like that. That's generally what religious traditions teach. And within Buddhism also, there are two ways of approaching Buddhism. One is to be a faith-based practitioner, and actually all Buddhists fit within that category. We are all adherents of faith. But within Buddhism, there's also another sort of subsidiary category of Buddhist practice, or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an adherent of reason, a reason-based person. And this is because in Buddhism we are taught that we are meant to examine and investigate, right? And this type of examination and investigation and teaching is something that can take months and months, years and years, and those who approach the Dharma in this way are called followers of faith. Translator to Lama in room: This one is in German, but that's okay. Thank you. This one is in Spanish, but I know Spanish. It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig... no problem. We have all the languages. So those of us who approach Buddhism in this way were called followers of reason, followers of reason. And what did you hear? No problem. In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know. No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature, We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus. Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And pacifically discussion with scientists is very interesting and what they showing me through this Translator : Microscope So, very unusual things there, very unusual things. One insect with two head, they can play here and there. Just unbelievable things.
We call the worlds of three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence it's the realm of possibility. So there is a lot of things out there, there are possible and they showed me lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realms of possibility.
That can make life longer.
Might be need to use many machines,
make life longer.
Very good experience, very good experience. They showing me their lab... Translator: The Lab, laboratory.
Okay.
Lama: Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right? We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? All the Students: Yes! Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear. There are many different religions in the world, but we can say that religion in general is religious systems in general and religious people in general are faith-based, right? We are adherents of faith. And faith means belief, actually. Belief in what? Well, most religions believe that the world was created by someone, something, and that there are teachings, the path is taught by the one who created the world or who teaches that religion, and if we don't follow what they taught, the path that they taught, then we will go to the lower realms, and if we do follow what they taught, then we will go to heaven, and so on. It's like that. That's generally what religious traditions teach. And within Buddhism also, there are two ways of approaching Buddhism. One is to be a faith-based practitioner, and actually all Buddhists fit within that category. We are all adherents of faith. But within Buddhism, there's also another sort of subsidiary category of Buddhist practice, or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an adherent of reason, a reason-based person. And this is because in Buddhism we are taught that we are meant to examine and investigate, right? And this type of examination and investigation and teaching is something that can take months and months, years and years, and those who approach the Dharma in this way are called followers of faith. Translator to Lama in room: This one is in German, but that's okay. Thank you. This one is in Spanish, but I know Spanish. It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig... no problem. We have all the languages. So those of us who approach Buddhism in this way were called followers of reason, followers of reason. And what did you hear? No problem. In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know. No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature, We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus. Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And pacifically discussion with scientists is very interesting and what they showing me through this Translator : Microscope So, very unusual things there, very unusual things. One insect with two head, they can play here and there. Just unbelievable things.
We call the worlds of three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence it's the realm of possibility. So there is a lot of things out there, there are possible and they showed me lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realms of possibility.
That can make life longer.
Might be need to use many machines,
make life longer.
Very good experience, very good experience. They showing me their lab... Translator: The Lab, laboratory.
Okay.
Lama: Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right? We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
Video
Audio
There are many different
religions in the world,
but we can say
that religion in general
is religious systems
in general and religious
people in general
are faith-based, right?
We are adherents of faith.
And faith means belief, actually.
Belief in what?
Well, most religions believe
that the world was created by
someone, something,
and that there are teachings,
the path is taught by the one who created
the world or who teaches that religion,
and if we don't follow
what they taught, the path
that they taught, then we
will go to the lower realms,
and if we do follow what they taught,
then we will go to heaven, and so on.
It's like that. That's generally
what religious traditions teach.
And within Buddhism also, there are
two ways of approaching Buddhism.
One is to be a
faith-based practitioner,
and actually all Buddhists
fit within that category.
We are all adherents of faith.
But within Buddhism,
there's also another
sort of subsidiary category
of Buddhist practice,
or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an
adherent of reason, a reason-based person.
And this is because in
Buddhism we are taught that
we are meant to examine
and investigate, right?
And this type of examination
and investigation and
teaching is something that
can take months and months,
years and years, and
those who approach
the Dharma in this way are
called followers of faith.
Translator to Lama in room:
This one is in German, but that's okay.
Thank you. This one is in
Spanish, but I know Spanish.
It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig...
no problem. We have all the languages.
So those of us who
approach Buddhism in this way
were called followers of
reason, followers of reason.
And what did you hear? No problem.
In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing, because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine. Catherine is laughing, then you think I should laugh. You don't know why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We are the imitators of science. We try our best to show that I'm a scientist. I'm not a religion believer. I'm not believing in superstition. I'm very healthy, very smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear.
And I am supposed to be for three days in retreat, but I broke. One day I broke. I went to see the guest house. Then I thought nobody will see (me) , but I saw one gentleman. Now, his name is... name is Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Man. Where is he? Where is he? Shanti Man. Yeah, that guy. The German, German. He's German. And we're giving his name Shanti Man. Why?
Our students, they keep asking, please give name. Name of that guest house. So I told them, choose one nice flower name. Now, again they're asking, give the name, so I know they're not choosing the name. So I need to say something. I look around, I feel very Shanti. So I say Shanti, Shanti guest house.
How many of you stay there? Shanti, Shanti guest house? Oh, that's very good. Enjoying?
Then when I went there, then one empty room, nice room. There's nothing there. I said, this is for sauna. Then outside there's one wooden house. I said, what for this? They said, oh, we don't know. I said, coffee. Coffee house. Why? Wood, nice wood. And there's beautiful scenery. Coffee, cake, chocolate, and some nice bread. Maybe something to sip also, but very limited.
Then another idea, I said, oh, from there here, not far,
but just come here, just go there, not so far. So what? Bicycle. Then bicycle to go here. This is my idea.
I'm not only for Dharma.
Some month before, not like that. No, they really make beautiful. They paint, curtains, bed, pillar, make me very happy. But I broke my retreat.
Retreat means, you shouldn't go, yeah? I thought, I must go. I don't want to disturb. When all of you are there, I don't want to disturb. Before that, I want to see, how the really good place. This is Yang Yang. Yang Yang Yang.
Wisdom and method. We need this both. Oh, sorry, now...
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know.
No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature,
We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus.
Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And specifically the discussion with science is very interesting. And what they're showing me through this. Translator: Microscope. So, very unusual things there. Very unusual things.
One... one insect, two heads. They can play here, there, there. That's just unbelievable things.
We call the world of, the three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence, it's the realm of possibility. So there's a lot of things out there that are possible and they showed me a lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realm of possibility.
They can make life longer. Might be need to use many machines, but make life longer.
And, yeah, very good experience, very good experience. They're showing me the lab, lab? The lab, labratory.
Okay.
Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right?
We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing, because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine. Catherine is laughing, then you think I should laugh. You don't know why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We are the imitators of science. We try our best to show that I'm a scientist. I'm not a religion believer. I'm not believing in superstition. I'm very healthy, very smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear.
And I am supposed to be for three days in retreat, but I broke. One day I broke. I went to see the guest house. Then I thought nobody will see (me) , but I saw one gentleman. Now, his name is... name is Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Man. Where is he? Where is he? Shanti Man. Yeah, that guy. The German, German. He's German. And we're giving his name Shanti Man. Why?
Our students, they keep asking, please give name. Name of that guest house. So I told them, choose one nice flower name. Now, again they're asking, give the name, so I know they're not choosing the name. So I need to say something. I look around, I feel very Shanti. So I say Shanti, Shanti guest house.
How many of you stay there? Shanti, Shanti guest house? Oh, that's very good. Enjoying?
Then when I went there, then one empty room, nice room. There's nothing there. I said, this is for sauna. Then outside there's one wooden house. I said, what for this? They said, oh, we don't know. I said, coffee. Coffee house. Why? Wood, nice wood. And there's beautiful scenery. Coffee, cake, chocolate, and some nice bread. Maybe something to sip also, but very limited.
Then another idea, I said, oh, from there here, not far,
but just come here, just go there, not so far. So what? Bicycle. Then bicycle to go here. This is my idea.
I'm not only for Dharma.
Some month before, not like that. No, they really make beautiful. They paint, curtains, bed, pillar, make me very happy. But I broke my retreat.
Retreat means, you shouldn't go, yeah? I thought, I must go. I don't want to disturb. When all of you are there, I don't want to disturb. Before that, I want to see, how the really good place. This is Yang Yang. Yang Yang Yang.
Wisdom and method. We need this both. Oh, sorry, now...
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know.
No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature,
We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus.
Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And specifically the discussion with science is very interesting. And what they're showing me through this. Translator: Microscope. So, very unusual things there. Very unusual things.
One... one insect, two heads. They can play here, there, there. That's just unbelievable things.
We call the world of, the three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence, it's the realm of possibility. So there's a lot of things out there that are possible and they showed me a lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realm of possibility.
They can make life longer. Might be need to use many machines, but make life longer.
And, yeah, very good experience, very good experience. They're showing me the lab, lab? The lab, labratory.
Okay.
Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right?
We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
17:23
There are many different
religions in the world,
but we can say
that religion in general
is religious systems
in general and religious
people in general
are faith-based, right?
We are adherents of faith.
And faith means belief, actually.
Belief in what?
Well, most religions believe
that the world was created by
someone, something,
and that there are teachings,
the path is taught by the one who created
the world or who teaches that religion,
and if we don't follow
what they taught, the path
that they taught, then we
will go to the lower realms,
and if we do follow what they taught,
then we will go to heaven, and so on.
It's like that. That's generally
what religious traditions teach.
And within Buddhism also, there are
two ways of approaching Buddhism.
One is to be a
faith-based practitioner,
and actually all Buddhists
fit within that category.
We are all adherents of faith.
But within Buddhism,
there's also another
sort of subsidiary category
of Buddhist practice,
or approach to Buddhism, which is to be an
adherent of reason, a reason-based person.
And this is because in
Buddhism we are taught that
we are meant to examine
and investigate, right?
And this type of examination
and investigation and
teaching is something that
can take months and months,
years and years, and
those who approach
the Dharma in this way are
called followers of faith.
Translator to Lama in room:
This one is in German, but that's okay.
Thank you. This one is in
Spanish, but I know Spanish.
It's okay, it's okay. It also has poyig...
no problem. We have all the languages.
So those of us who
approach Buddhism in this way
were called followers of
reason, followers of reason.
And what did you hear? No problem.
In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing, because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine. Catherine is laughing, then you think I should laugh. You don't know why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We are the imitators of science. We try our best to show that I'm a scientist. I'm not a religion believer. I'm not believing in superstition. I'm very healthy, very smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear.
And I am supposed to be for three days in retreat, but I broke. One day I broke. I went to see the guest house. Then I thought nobody will see (me) , but I saw one gentleman. Now, his name is... name is Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Man. Where is he? Where is he? Shanti Man. Yeah, that guy. The German, German. He's German. And we're giving his name Shanti Man. Why?
Our students, they keep asking, please give name. Name of that guest house. So I told them, choose one nice flower name. Now, again they're asking, give the name, so I know they're not choosing the name. So I need to say something. I look around, I feel very Shanti. So I say Shanti, Shanti guest house.
How many of you stay there? Shanti, Shanti guest house? Oh, that's very good. Enjoying?
Then when I went there, then one empty room, nice room. There's nothing there. I said, this is for sauna. Then outside there's one wooden house. I said, what for this? They said, oh, we don't know. I said, coffee. Coffee house. Why? Wood, nice wood. And there's beautiful scenery. Coffee, cake, chocolate, and some nice bread. Maybe something to sip also, but very limited.
Then another idea, I said, oh, from there here, not far,
but just come here, just go there, not so far. So what? Bicycle. Then bicycle to go here. This is my idea.
I'm not only for Dharma.
Some month before, not like that. No, they really make beautiful. They paint, curtains, bed, pillar, make me very happy. But I broke my retreat.
Retreat means, you shouldn't go, yeah? I thought, I must go. I don't want to disturb. When all of you are there, I don't want to disturb. Before that, I want to see, how the really good place. This is Yang Yang. Yang Yang Yang.
Wisdom and method. We need this both. Oh, sorry, now...
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know.
No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature,
We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus.
Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And specifically the discussion with science is very interesting. And what they're showing me through this. Translator: Microscope. So, very unusual things there. Very unusual things.
One... one insect, two heads. They can play here, there, there. That's just unbelievable things.
We call the world of, the three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence, it's the realm of possibility. So there's a lot of things out there that are possible and they showed me a lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realm of possibility.
They can make life longer. Might be need to use many machines, but make life longer.
And, yeah, very good experience, very good experience. They're showing me the lab, lab? The lab, labratory.
Okay.
Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right?
We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
In the world, it's actually important to learn, right? And in the Buddhist context, we talk about different types of reason, right? Followers of the intellect or wisdom, reason. And there are different types of wisdom. There is worldly wisdom, there is transcendent wisdom, there is great wisdom. And as Buddhist practitioners, we need to and we do learn about transcendent wisdom and great wisdom. This is something that we can learn about and come to know about. So as Buddhist practitioners, we can be, many of us are followers of wisdom or reasoning. But also, again, in general, religion, people who follow religion are faith-based. We follow faith. We adhere to faith. And sometimes people say about religion that that kind of belief and that kind of faith is blind faith. Actually, the word in Tibetan that we translate as blind faith literally means stupid faith. So they say people who believe those things are blind. They're stupid, right? They say there's God or they say there's heaven, they say there's hell. They made it all up. I don't see God. I don't see heaven. I don't see hell. I neither see it with my eyes. I neither hear it with my ears. I can't touch it with my hand. It's just made up. It's not there. It's not real. That's what people say. And someone who believes that is blind. They have blind faith. They have stupid faith. They're blind or they're stupid. That's what people say about religion. A lot of people say that in the world, right? And then as a result of hearing that again and again, religious people start to lose their faith in their religions. They start to think, oh, yeah, is it really true, you know? And lose faith and trust in religion, actually. And on one hand, okay, yeah, you know, they say, you know, if you say that there's God, for example, or creator, like where? We don't see the creator. Where is that creator? What does that creator look like? And so on. But on the other hand, we have to say that religion, actually, religions give people something really good to rely upon, something beneficial to rely upon, something that helps. Now, whether religions in general teach and whether other religions teach about cultivating a love and compassion which is utterly unbiased, I don't know. But we do find that in Buddhism. We do find the instruction to cultivate love and compassion which is utterly unbiased. That's taught very clearly in the Buddhist tradition, and in particular in the Mahayana, right? That idea of utterly unbiased compassion is something that sometimes doesn't fit into some people's minds. And in the general vehicle of Buddhism, that kind of teaching is not emphasized because it requires a particular type of intelligence, a type of wisdom, a type of mindset which is very open-minded and very sharp, to really have that kind of capacity for unbiased love and compassion. And even greater open-mindedness and intelligence is required, or wisdom is required to accept that everything that appears and exists is great purity and equality, that kind of view.
I have experience.
Why are you laughing? You don't know what I'm saying.
Because you're laughing, because imitating, imitating to ...
Catherine. Catherine is laughing, then you think I should laugh. You don't know why you're laughing.
We like to imitate. We are the imitators of science. We try our best to show that I'm a scientist. I'm not a religion believer. I'm not believing in superstition. I'm very healthy, very smart. I'm a scientist.
So, now we know, careful! What kind of direction are we following?
Okay.
I hope all of you enjoy here. Enjoying? Rooms are good? Food is good? Oh, I'm very happy. Here, one thing. Welcoming. Here, our... who live here, who work here, they really want to make everybody comfortable. Come, comfortable. During (being) here, not only teaching. Here, you feel healing, healing. Less stress, less worry. Feel more calm, more kind. So that is it. I am now introducing one program. It's calm, kind, and clear, clear.
And I am supposed to be for three days in retreat, but I broke. One day I broke. I went to see the guest house. Then I thought nobody will see (me) , but I saw one gentleman. Now, his name is... name is Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Man. Where is he? Where is he? Shanti Man. Yeah, that guy. The German, German. He's German. And we're giving his name Shanti Man. Why?
Our students, they keep asking, please give name. Name of that guest house. So I told them, choose one nice flower name. Now, again they're asking, give the name, so I know they're not choosing the name. So I need to say something. I look around, I feel very Shanti. So I say Shanti, Shanti guest house.
How many of you stay there? Shanti, Shanti guest house? Oh, that's very good. Enjoying?
Then when I went there, then one empty room, nice room. There's nothing there. I said, this is for sauna. Then outside there's one wooden house. I said, what for this? They said, oh, we don't know. I said, coffee. Coffee house. Why? Wood, nice wood. And there's beautiful scenery. Coffee, cake, chocolate, and some nice bread. Maybe something to sip also, but very limited.
Then another idea, I said, oh, from there here, not far,
but just come here, just go there, not so far. So what? Bicycle. Then bicycle to go here. This is my idea.
I'm not only for Dharma.
Some month before, not like that. No, they really make beautiful. They paint, curtains, bed, pillar, make me very happy. But I broke my retreat.
Retreat means, you shouldn't go, yeah? I thought, I must go. I don't want to disturb. When all of you are there, I don't want to disturb. Before that, I want to see, how the really good place. This is Yang Yang. Yang Yang Yang.
Wisdom and method. We need this both. Oh, sorry, now...
In general though, when people criticize religion saying it is blind or stupid to believe in karmic cause and effect, it's blind or stupid actually to believe in past and future lives, that's not true. That is smart to believe in that. It is much more blind and stupid to be a nihilist. Much more, actually. And that's real stupidity. If you check, real blindness, real stupidity is to be completely to be a nihilist. In general, Buddhist practice and Dharma practice, we can see that the faith and trust in religions in the world is on the decline. And on the one hand, that's, you can say the fault of, that's because of science, as science has kind of taken its hold on the world. Belief or trust in religions is on the decline. On the one hand, it's not their fault, right? Because they're just investigating and not finding something with their analysis and then, you know, that's their job. That's what they do, investigate and analyze. But if we really think about it, religion, having trust and faith and belief in religion is something really valuable. It's something really important and it's really powerful in this world. It's really powerful. So much of the happiness in this world is because of religions. It's because of having trust and faith and belief in religions. It makes people be better people. Of course there are cases of there being war, right? And fighting between religious traditions. Of course that happens and that's a real mistake. It's a real fault and a mistake when that happens and it does happen. But in general, just imagine the world without any religion. What would it be like? Religions help people. They make the world a better place if we really check. And so we can say that Buddhism is both a faith-based tradition. We do adhere to faith, but it also is a knowledge-based tradition. We engage in investigation and examination and the cultivation of wisdom. In general, as we mentioned, the Buddhist teachings can be summarized in the statement that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? All defiled phenomena are suffering. All phenomena are empty and lack self. And Nirvana is peace. The subject, if you consider the subject Nirvana, it is liberation and peace because, it is a lasting state of liberation and happiness due to being free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. It's a lasting happiness that is free from the disturbing waves of the afflictive emotions. And we might think about these points and then think to ourselves, well okay, all conditioned things are impermanent, but what's the point of knowing that? If I know about impermanence, if I acknowledge impermanence, how does that help? How is that transformative actually? Why does it help? Well we have to have an answer for that. And there is an answer for that and I will tell you either today or maybe tomorrow, because if I say a lot you'll get bored. I have experience with that.
Relying upon the authentic words of the Buddha as well as upon authentic or valid reasoning, then I have pointed out the fact that all conditioned things are impermanent, right? And due to this, I think you've gotten past your doubts about that. The question, are conditioned things impermanent or not, right? You're free from those doubts at this point, no?
If you don't just leave it at a very coarse level of understanding, but you really give rise in your mind to the certainty that actually Condition things don't remain the same even for an instant. Not even an instant, right? If you have that kind of confidence, if that arises in your mind, then you got a really important point. You got something that's a really important thing to know.
No doubt about that, right?
But then we come to the pith instructions. So, there's the valid words of the Buddha, our own valid logic, reasoning. But then the valid pith instructions of the guru. The guru, supreme, who is the supreme guru among all gurus? Oh, it's the Buddha, right? we go back to the Buddha. And so what pith instruction did the Buddha give when it comes to impermanence? He said view all conditioned things as being like a shooting star, an optical illusion, a lamp, a light, a flickering lamp, a magical display, a dew drop, a flash of lightning, or a cloud. Look at all conditioned things as being like that. And if we do that, if we really regard all conditioned things as being something that doesn't remain the same even for a single intant. How does that help us? How does that help us right now? And how will it help us in the future? To regard things in that way.
The root of all of our suffering is our attachments. If we have very strong attachments, we have very strong suffering. If we have medium level attachments, we have medium level suffering. If we have small attachments, our suffering is also small. If we have no attachments, we don't suffer.
It is due to thinking this is going to last, that we get attached to things. That's where it comes from. This is going to last. It's permanent. It's lasting. That's where our attachment comes from.
When we think that something is going to last, this then leads us to the belief that this is, this thing is real. And that then can lead to the belief this is so clean, this thing is clean and pure. And then this can lead us to the belief, me, a self. Fixating and grasping to the self. Each of these misconceptions leads to the next. And when we have that kind of thing, what happens is that our five sense gateways experience objects and engage in those objects, right? And because of that attachment, this is what pushes us to engage, constantly engage in objects. The mind never has the chance to just rest for even an instant, because we're always physically, verbally and mentally busy pursuing objects, thinking happiness is over there. That smell, that taste, that sound, that texture, what it looks like, that object that I see constantly, we want it, we need it, we desire it, we crave it. Right? We're attached, constantly engaging in those objects and wanting them. We have so much hope and so much fear. I hope I get it. I'm afraid I won't get it. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid it will break. I'm afraid it will just disappear. We always have hopes and fears one after another, right? Our mind is so busy with those things. Or it can be that our experience is like that, right?
All conditioned things are impermanent and that means as many things as we accumulate, no matter how many, no matter how big, no matter how big the amount, it's eventually going to run out. It's eventually going to run out. The end is always that it will run out in the end. And there is actually no thing that we could accumulate that won't eventually be exhausted right now. Whether that's money, whether that's riches, wealth, fame, renown, happiness, family, friends, those who are close to us, our wealth, even our body, right? No matter what we have, no matter what we accumulate, it doesn't matter. Eventually it's going to run out. It's going to run out. Its nature is to run out, to be exhausted, to disappear, to be gone, to be finished. It's the nature of those things.
So we can think to ourselves, we should think to ourselves, that whatever I accumulate and gather, eventually it's going to run out. That's true, that's a fact. And the benefit of thinking about this, and we should think about it again and again. No matter what I accumulate, no matter how much, it's going to run out. Whatever I gather will eventually be exhausted because there is no thing that I can accumulate that won't eventually run out. It just won't, it's just like that. If we think about that again and again, there is a lot of benefit to doing so. What are the benefits? The benefit is that our attachment to the sense pleasures, to wealth and enjoyments is reduced. And when our attachment to those things is reduced, then the degree to which our attachments are reduced, to that same degree our mind is able to be more at ease, more peaceful, more loving, more wise. The more attached we are, the more confused we are, the more deluded we are, the more blind we are. And that doesn't create any space for ease and for love and for wisdom.
No matter what we build, it will all fall down. No matter what we make, no matter what we build, no matter what it is, anything that we build up, no matter how solid, no matter how strong, it's going to fall down. And it doesn't require something to destroy it. That's not required. Eventually, in time, it will just fall down of its own accord. That's going to happen no matter what we build up, right? Doesn't have to be an outer condition. Just naturally, eventually, it's going to fall down. It's true. This is just true. Whatever we build up, it will fall down. That's its nature. Its nature is to fall down. Its nature is to collapse. Its nature is to, in the end, be gone. Whatever we build, no matter what it is, it always eventually will fall down.
We think that when we build something really strong and really solid it's going to just remain. It's not. It won't. It can't.
When we meet, eventually we will part ways. All meetings end in parting ways. So like all of us here, we've met today. We're all here. And after some days, gradually, we'll all go our separate ways. We will part. All meetings end in parting ways. And within this category, if you don't want to die, then don't take birth. Because all birth ends in death. Birth ends in death. If we're born, once we've been born, there is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in death.
If someone is born, then not dying is not a possibility. Once we've been born, death is for sure. If there had been maybe one or two who had been born and who didn't die, we might have some kind of hope. Maybe I can be part of that group. But it's never happened. And there isn't such a group. And so there's no doubt. There's just no doubt about it. Once we have been born, we will die. There is no birth that does not end in death. All birth ends in dying. So impermanence is something that in general we ought to contemplate. And from among the general topics that we could contemplate when it comes to impermanence, one is that whatever we gather and accumulate, eventually it will run out. Another is that whatever we build, eventually it will fall down. Another is that every time there is a meeting, it ends in parting ways. But especially important for us to contemplate is that birth ends in death. All birth ends in death. For a Dharma practitioner, this is really important. In general to remember impermanence, again and again and again to remember impermanence. But in particular to remember the specific form of impermanence which is death, my death. That for a Dharma practitioner is so important to think about again and again. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. To be really clear about the fact of impermanence. Because, actually, being clear about the fact of impermanence transforms our mind. And when it makes a big transformation in our mind, then we become a good practitioner, the best kind of practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence brings about a medium level of transformation in our experience, then we become a mediocre practitioner. And if contemplating impermanence, we do it a little bit and it brings about some small level of change in our mind, then we are kind of a practitioner. If we never think about impermanence, we are not a practitioner actually. That is really the difference between a Dharma practitioner and someone who is not a practitioner. We can define a Dharma practitioner as someone who thinks about impermanence again and again. And someone who is not a Dharma practitioner as someone who never thinks about impermanence. It's actually good. It's good to set the definition like that.
The very best notion that we could keep in mind is that of impermanence. For Dharma practitioners, that's really the best thought to keep in mind. Because that is what inspires us to practice. That's what makes us engage in practice. That's what allows us to accomplish our Dharma practice authentically. That is what allows us to develop the strength of the qualities of abandonment and realization that arise in our mind through Dharma practice. What is the root of all of that? What is it that really inspires our mind to practice the Dharma? It's impermanence and the sense of weariness with samsara that comes about through contemplating impermanence. So inspire your mind with impermanence and a sense of weariness with samsara. The Buddha gave a pith instruction. He said the best notion to keep in mind is that of impermanence. The Buddha himself said that. There's a lot of thoughts, a lot of notions that we could keep in our mind, right? But, to remember the fact of impermanence is the most supreme one. So we have to really apply that instruction to our mind, that instruction that the Buddha gave us. To allow, to make it possible for that to appear again and again in our mind. That fact, the fact of impermanence again and again and again. What's the function of that? What does it do? What it does is, that thinking of impermanence, the confidence in impermanence, and the sense of weariness that we have with samsara when we contemplate that, that inspires us to practice. The outer world that is like a vessel around us, it's impermanent. All of the beings, all of us who live within this world, we're impermanent, right? And all wealth and enjoyments and possessions and all of that, all of that is impermanent. And when we can remember this impermanence, really bring it to mind, then our attachment to the world, to sentient beings and all of the pleasures within that, that attachment decreases actually. So, remember, know that the world and everything within it is impermanent and reduce the ties of your attachment. That's how I practice.
The degree to which we are able to reduce our attachments, to that very same degree, both our body and our mind are able to remain at ease. And, if we just look around actually at people in the world around us, we can see very clearly that both those who have a lot and those who have very little, they all experience suffering, they all suffer. And if we wonder why is that, we can see that the reason for that suffering is attachment. And so when we see, when we look around and we see people and we see that it is their strong attachments, they have so much attachment and that causes them to have so much suffering. When we see that, what happens is that we feel very naturally a sense of compassion, a sense of compassion wells up so naturally in us. It's uncontrived actually, it's unfabricated compassion, it also doesn't involve any effort, we don't have to bring it about, it's just naturally there, the kind of compassion that we feel when we see that people suffer so much because of their strong attachments. And when we have that kind of compassion, then whatever kind of practice we are doing, whether it's shamatha, whether it's vipassana or the generation stage or the perfection stage, any kind of practice we do, we are able to practice really authentically when we do so out of that kind of compassion. And so that's why it is said that the contemplation of impermanence is an inspiration for Dharma practice. So please keep that in your heart and I'll leave it here for today. Thinking of impermanence will help immediately. We become grounded, we become mature,
We become grounded, mature, more smart, more wiser. Seeing long vision and there's no space to be (on a) trip. Trip. What does it mean to trip in American English?
Yeah, but what does it mean to be on a trip? To be tripping? You know in English he's tripping? Yeah, yeah. No space to trip. German word is trip.
I think German also say trip? How to say? Hause? Hausche. Nice! Hausche. Hausche. Okay. Hausche.
Raus. Raus. Raus. You're right. No, no raus.
Who not think impermanence? Raus. Ahhhh!
Otherwise we will joke each other trip, trip. But who is in trip? We say not mature, mature. We don't know who is not mature. We might say we are not grounded. It makes you grounded and not in trip. And more mature and more wiser. Wiser.
Just gone. Otherwise...
Okay, thank you. We stop here.
Yeah, impermanently.
What? Student: Never stop teaching us, please!
Believe me, if I say 24 hours, okay enough.
Thank you, thank you. Nice, nice. This year I'm traveling here and there and what I see, those of the past, who listen to Dharma teachings and even new, some are completely new, and they feel they're very... ... clicked, clicked, clicked.
Translator: The teaching clicks! Click, is very, very positive, positive. And specifically the discussion with science is very interesting. And what they're showing me through this. Translator: Microscope. So, very unusual things there. Very unusual things.
One... one insect, two heads. They can play here, there, there. That's just unbelievable things.
We call the world of, the three realms of samsara, the three realms of existence, it's the realm of possibility. So there's a lot of things out there that are possible and they showed me a lot of weird stuff. I saw a lot of really strange things. It's the realm of possibility.
They can make life longer. Might be need to use many machines, but make life longer.
And, yeah, very good experience, very good experience. They're showing me the lab, lab? The lab, labratory.
Okay.
Dedication, page number 20. Sorry, sorry.
The virtue that comes from Dharma teaching and listening to the Dharma is really the supreme form of virtue. The merit that comes from the listening to Dharma teachings and giving Dharma teachings, it's a supreme form of merit. And that's because when the Dharma is taught and when we listen to the Dharma being taught, this clears away the darkness of ignorance and creates the circumstances for the illumination of wisdom, wakefulness to unfold. And so it's sometimes said that learning and reflecting is like the lamp. It's like a lamp that dispels the darkness of ignorance. So I'm really happy that you're listening so well.
Buddhist practice, practice is not just about reciting this and reciting that, or thinking about this and thinking about that, meditating on this and that actually. Our practice is something that we do with our mind and what we do with the mind in order to practice is that we maintain mindfulness and conscientiousness and carefulness. We always maintain that. And mindfulness about what? What are we meant to be mindful and careful and conscientious about? We should keep in mind the fact of impermanence, right?
We should inspire our mind with the thought of impermanence and a sense of weariness with the phenomena of samsara. We should suffuse our mind or moisten it with love and compassion. And we should keep in mind the genuine authentic view. So the genuine or the authentic view has, we can say there's two ways to connect with that. One is the actual thing, the real genuine view and the other one is something that's similar to it, something that's like it. The real view is that all phenomena, to realize, directly experience all phenomena as empty and free from a self, to directly realize that all phenomena are empty and yet they appear. They appear and have no true existence. But something similar to that is to just think that, oh, all of these things appear but they're not truly existent, they're not truly real. And that's not a direct experience of the view, right? It's a thought thinking that these things are like that. But it's helpful actually, it's good to do that. And you can think to yourself, all of these things appear to me but they're not truly real, they're not truly established, it's just like the reflection of the moon in water. It's not there, there's no moon in there, but I see something. There is a reflection, something appears. And so, if we can keep in mind those three perspectives. The first perspective is to inspire ourselves with the thought of impermanence, the fact of impermanence. The second is to moisten our mind always with love and compassion. And the third is to bring to mind all of these things appear, but they're not truly real. Bringing that to mind again and again, that makes our Dharma practice genuine, authentic, correct practice. And what that does is it reduces our negative emotions in general as well as whatever specific negative emotion we might be involved in. It causes proliferation and unfolding of love and compassion. And what that does is that it creates a circumstances for us to actually experience the genuine authentic view, to experience it, the real thing. And if we think to ourselves again and again, that all phenomena appear but they're not real, these things create the circumstances for the actual experience of the fact that all phenomena are empty and that there is no self. These instructions are easy to understand, right? And they're also easy to apply. So, please keep them in your heart.
If we remember impermanence again and again and again, then our fixation to things as being lasting and real will be reduced. And when our fixation to things as being lasting and real is reduced, then love and compassion unfold in our hearts. And when love and compassion unfold in our hearts, we become capable of seeing, of directly experiencing the authentic genuine view. Each one of these aspects of practice assists and benefits the other. And so all of them are really important. Make sense? Yes? No? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.
All conditioned things are impermanent. And it is so important that we understand their impermanence, that we know how it is that all things are impermanent. And in order to be able to really understand the impermanent nature of all of these conditioned things, we have to meditate on impermanence. When we meditate on impermanence, it brings about a really positive transformation in our mind. It really changes our mind for the better. And so we say often, right, samsara is, you know, the phenomena of samsara, the things of samsara aren't truly meaningful. What does that mean actually? It's because they're impermanent, right? It's because they're not going to last. And we think that they're going to last and therefore we place some value in samsara. We think that's something really meaningful. Because we think those things are going to last but they're not going to last. Actually they are impermanent and so that's what the dharma does. It points out that fact to us, the fact that these things are not going to last. And there's a prayer, a supplication, right? Grant your blessings that I may remember impermanence. Grant your blessings, bless me, that I may take impermanence to heart. That's part of the prayer and the supplication that we make. And I've heard actually some students say to the teacher, I've heard this actually, students saying, you know, my guru, please bless me. Guru, please bless me that I can take impermanence seriously. Please bless me that I can feel weary with the phenomena of samsara, that I can feel weariness about samsara. Bless me, that I can feel like this. I've heard that actually. That's really important. That's really important. There was a tradition in the past of doing that. It doesn't happen so much anymore. I don't hear it so much these days. I think that tradition is kind of vanishing somehow. But now everybody wants to debate about impermanence, right? Is it, are things impermanent, or are they permanent? Is this permanent? How is it? Right? People teach about it. They debate about it. They discuss it. But not that many people pray like that. Really pray. Really supplicate. Please bless me. Bless me, that I can take impermanence seriously. Take it to heart.
Thank you. See you tomorrow.
