Details
How Does Buddhism Transform Us? 1b
Teachers:
Collection:
- Foundations of Buddhism
Location:
- Gomde Germany-Austria
Excerpt
Khenpo Karma Gyurmey explores self-awareness and mindfulness as tools for transforming emotional patterns and fostering compassion. Ethical discipline and meditation are highlighted as key practices for aligning with the Dharma and nurturing inner clarity.
Description
Khenpo Karma Gyurmey builds on the principles introduced in the first session, focusing on the significance of self-awareness and mindfulness in transforming habitual patterns. It introduces contemplative techniques to nurture compassion and reduce negative emotional states like anger and attachment. Ethical discipline is emphasized as a foundation for developing mental clarity and aligning with the principles of the Dharma. Through meditation and reflection, participants are encouraged to strengthen their understanding of impermanence and interconnectedness. The session provides actionable steps for integrating these insights into daily life.
Related Course Info
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How Does Buddhism Transform Us?
Our esteemed scholar-practitioner, Khenpo Karma Gyurmey, describes how each of us fully possesses the potential for realization, but that we are obscured by afflictive emotions and cognitive obscurations.
This short course is an excellent introduction to the basic concepts of Buddhism. Khenpo presents an overview of the spiritual path, and how to apply the remedies to our problems.
Video
Audio
56:07
So the problem is that our direct
perception is quite innocent.
It doesn't make much story.
But our conceptual mind
is very difficult because it
makes a lot of stories
and he creates the pattern.
That's the biggest problem.
Which means that after my eye consciousness sees some phenomena, then immediately my mental consciousness will recognize this, oh, this is water. There's no doubt at all that this is water. Then immediately after, when I see water, I will make two kind, three kind of judgment. Like, dislike and neutral. So whether you like or whether you dislike or whether you neutral, and this will create so called the three kinds of pattern in our mind.
Attachment, anger and ignorant.
So when we talk about this, our negative aspects of mind, we talk about lots of different kind of disturbing emotions, but it always comes down to this three kind. Attachment, aversion and ignorant. So you can always put in these three kind of cases, whatever kind of negative emotions. So that means each time you have conceptual mind, it is kind of contributing your negative patterns. And this is what we call the emotional... So when I believe that this is water, there, and this is what we call the cognitive obscurations, because it's a duality. And this is completely based on duality. And of course, Am I seeing, am I judging the water according to what it is? Or am I judging the water according to what it appears to me? Now when I say, oh, it's water, I think that this is the reality of this phenomena, but actually it's not. This is my judgment of my perception. So for example, let's say if there's a fish sitting here, and when the fish sees that, he won't see it's water, or maybe the sun. So from the Buddhist point of view, what you see is not what it is, because who you are. Does it make sense? So we believe that if there's a fish, if there's a dog, if there's a, I don't know, god, if you look at this glass of water, we won't see the same thing. We will see completely different things, the same object. So it's not because there's different objects, it's just because we have different receptors. We are different. So we have different habitual patterns, and the ability to understand what object it is. And because of that, in Buddhism, if you change your mind, everything can be changed.
That's why you meditate.
You don't have to go and kill all the enemies. If you meditate, then all the enemies can be eliminated without killing them.
And you don't have to, how to say?
So through that logic or reason, how everything depends on the persons who perceived it. Because of that, if you meditate and if you change, and if you reduce the negative aspects of your mind, then everything can be a positive. We can react positively.
So cognitive obscuration will come first, thinking that, oh, this is water. Of course, we can talk what is this at many different levels. For example, let's say, if you ask me, what is this, oh, it's water, and we drink it, and we make food, and we wash clothes. This is one way to understand it. But if you look at, even from the little bit, our own kind of understanding of what is this, well, it's not really exactly what it appears to our, you can explain theoretically. It's like combinations of oxygens and hydrogens, and actually, there's more space than there's more, it seems. For example, if you say, this is table, and then it seems like very solid. But then if you logically explain it, it says there's more space than the solid. These kind of things, we can understand it. So even, it's so obvious that things are not, really it is not what it appears to us. So there are so many causes, conditions, how we judge what it is and what it is not. So what I'm trying to say was that everything comes down to the mind. It's not really what it is, it's about who is looking at that phenomena and making judgment. So because of that, it is possible that if you change your mind, if you reduce your negative aspects of mind, and then if you increase the quality aspects of your mind, since they are opposite and two opposite things don't stay together.
So for example, if you have compassion to one person, it's difficult to get angry to this person because the compassion and anger doesn't stay same. Similarly, if you are attached to something, it's difficult to get aggression because our mind, fortunately, doesn't work two opposite things at the same. So when you create this positive pattern of mind in yourself, negative pattern of mind automatically decreases.
So if you understand a little bit of that logic, and then all these Vajrayana aspects of visualizing and all these make a little bit sense. Otherwise, it might seem like just we are playing a mental game.
So now,
when we say I want to be happy, I'm suffering, we point out, you know, me. And many times, we don't really think too much about me or I, or sometimes we think too much about me and I. And when you don't think at all, or when you think too much then our mind becomes a little bit imbalance.
And generally speaking, it's very obvious that we have this physical, so-called I, me, you know, physical happiness, physical suffering, and then we have this mental suffering, mental happiness, I and me.
And since you point, this is me, and it's important to take care, right? And we do take care of our physical world, physical me is quite okay. We have toothbrush, brush, we have many different kinds of shampoos, we have so many kinds of... we have insurance, medicine, everything. But unfortunately, there's not much you can do to your mind, unfortunately. Actually, the mind is the main source of our happiness and suffering, but then there's no structure and process, or much you cannot do, there's not much. So, why we meditate, why we take spiritual path? In common sense, we have to take care of ourselves, isn't it? Since. And then, when you say, I take care of, it doesn't... it's not only we are talking about our physical world, we also have to take care of our mind.
And when you practice Dharma, actually, in very simple words, it's just you are taking care of your mind, that's it, with the proper process.
And so, if you think, why I should practice Dharma? And the question is, well, you have mind, unfortunately or fortunately, whether you like it or not, and you cannot just let it be wild, because it's not healthy. And as, like, you take care of your body, you go to gym, whatever whatever you do in daily life, you have to take care of your mind. It's simple. And to do that, you have to meditate, you have to follow the discipline, everything to take care of our mind. It's not easy. If taking care of body is easy, then taking care of mind is even much, much more difficult, then taking care of mind is much, much more difficult.
And also, working now, the thing is that,
if you want to take care of your mind, it is very important to know that how mind works. Of course, we cannot know everything, but there's certain kind of rules how mind works, right? Maybe different beings have different mindset, we work differently, but as a human being, we have more or less the same human pattern, so to speak. And of course, this, our reactions are influenced by our background, culture, many things, but somehow our mind reacts more or less the same way. Yeah? It's not completely different.
Maybe... So...
Okay, I think I will stop here today, and I will continue tomorrow. Is it?
We have one and a half hour, yeah? And only one and a half, one and fifteen minutes are gone. Okay. So I will talk about mind a little bit tomorrow. And maybe if you have any questions, you can discuss. So today what I was trying to say was that.
it's important to understand and recognize our own potential, and then knowing what is the process to develop that potential. And once you don't know that, life becomes very confusing. And once you know that, life becomes much, much more clear and easier. So I'm trying to say a very common way how Dharma can be the, how to say,
the methods to understand or to recognize that potential and develop that potential. Yeah?
Yeah, so please, if you have any questions, we can discuss for a few minutes and then...
Yes? What are the causes of suffering and the causes of happiness?
Maybe I will give you very short. You have to study like this Four Noble Truths, probably maybe you have heard it, yeah? And it mentioned quite clearly, so Four Noble Truths are Truth of Suffering, and Truth of Origin, which means truth of that cause of the suffering. And then we call Truth of Path, which is the cause of happiness. And the fourth one is called Truth of Cessation, which means the Buddhahood or enlightenment or happiness. So you have this very so-called Four Noble Truth, which is the first teachings of Buddha, as well as the very basic foundation of Buddhism. So you have suffering, cause of suffering, and happiness and cause of happiness. And there are many, many books you can read. But now, I will tell you very in short way.
There was once a person, and he asked Buddha, I think Dharmapada, Buddha, I really want to be happy. Can you just give me a short, pith instruction. And Buddha said, sure. Buddha never said, I don't know. So he said something.
See, you, I, you say, I want to be happy. So quite simple. Just take out the I. That's called ego. That's why we're talking about this.
cognitive obscuration. You just take out the I. Put it away. And then second, want. It's called desire. Obscuration of cognitive. So you just take out the cognitive obscuration, and the emotional obscuration, and whatever that is happiness.
Yeah?
So of course we can talk it philosophically, but when you say, I want to be happy, don't think too much about I, I want. Yeah? Just let go I and want, and happiness will come by itself. And when you push too much, I want to be happy, the more you press, the happiness will go more further.
Unfortunately, many times that we do. You want the happiness, but you push too much this I and want.
And it is like, you know, when you wanted to hold the sand in your hand, you should be loosed. More you try to hold it strongly, more it goes away.
So that's why exactly what I was trying to say is that we are not going at the right way, although what we want and Buddha want is exactly the same thing. Unfortunately. We are very confused, what is happiness and what is cause of happiness. And many things, many times we think that actually the suffering is happiness. According to Buddhism, if you study the Four Noble Truths, we have three kinds of suffering. Suffering of suffering, which means, oh, I have a headache, or a little problem that we know. And second thing is what we call the suffering of change. We really believe that it's a happiness.
And then the third is called the suffering of all posabilities, much, much subtler. That means the moment you are born, you are almost ingrained with the hope and fear. You are never, never free from that. And this is exactly like the engines that drive us in our life. But the problem is that hope and fear is energy, but sometimes it becomes too much. It becomes a problem. As long as you know how to use them, it works as energy. But when it overflows, then it becomes a problem. And many times, we use it too much. It's like electricity, yeah? When the electricity is a certain kind of level, we can use them. But when it's too much, then the problem explodes. Many, many mental problems such as anxiety, depression are exactly the result of that.
Over, how to say, explosion of hope and fear, and our mind cannot take it. It's like when you use the voltage here, too high and then it explodes, something like that. So, I would say that more ego, I, and more one disturbing emotion, there will be more disturbances. Internally, actionally, resultly. But more you have less ego, I, less want, I think it will bring more happiness, temporarily and ultimately.
About your glass of water? Yes. If it depends who looks at it, so there is no objective reality? It's just an illusion. So it's also an illusion that you sit here and how can I decide what kind, I mean, why is it important to take good actions or bad actions if nothing is real? Yeah, yeah. I was expecting this as question. Even I didn't start the emptiness aspect.
See.
Now, it's like this.
Emptiness.
Illusion is not reality, but it is an illusion. Yeah. It's like this. Let's say if you are a physics or chemist teacher, and then you look at this, glass of water, and theoretically, you know exactly what it is. But it doesn't really mean that the physicist will never drink water. He will definitely use it as water. So consciously, you can theoretically, you can explain what is this. But it doesn't mean that water will disappear. It will be there as long as you change your subconscious mind.
So now, when we say if everything is illusions, we are not talking about that they don't exist. We are just saying that they are not the reality that we perceive is not what it is. It is what it appears to us. But we are not talking about it doesn't exist. But is there something? Yes.
That's why emptiness is not an emptiness.
When you study the Heart Sutra, we talk a lot about that. Form is emptiness. That's why Buddha actually said that form is emptiness. He said that. But then, immediately he knew that when he said that, that means it's non-existing. And then he said emptiness is a form.
I don't know if that makes any sense. If you read the Heart Sutra, there's a line saying form is emptiness, emptiness is a form. So emptiness does not really mean non-existing. It means that things are not how it appears to us.
But the biggest problem is that now we are talking in the duality states here. Duality states. And this is the biggest challenge because for example, we cannot really talk about what is emptiness, but we can talk what is not emptiness. Yeah? Unfortunately, this is the only way.
So I cannot, if you ask me, what is that something? I really don't know. But only I can tell you is, what it is we think it's not. Does it make sense? So that's why if you study a Nāgārjuna, Madhyamika's they say, OK, now I'm going to teach emptiness, but actually they don't talk about emptiness. They just talk about truly established. What is not emptiness. The whole text is about what is not emptiness.
This is the important part. Maybe I will say a little bit, a few things.
It's like this.
I am.
Because now, well in Buddhism we call that when you try to communicate, there's three kind of communication systems.
Mind communication system, where they don't use any kind of signs and the words. Unfortunately, we cannot do that because it's a very high level communication system. And second thing is, they call it the symbolic communication system. That means this is exactly all these colors, shapes, and you know. This is sometimes when you practice Vajrayana, we use that communication system, symbolic communication. They think that verbal communication is too confusing. And visual communication system is much, much better than the verbal communication system. That's why in Vajrayana you have these melodies, colors, tunes, incense, brocades.
But generally now we have to communicate through verbal communication system is our thing, our level. The problem is that the moment, the design of the intention of verbal communication is give you some kind of duality. Because when I say some words, it has to give you some thought. Otherwise it's even not a word. What's the point of that? So that means when I say this is emptiness, actually what I'm saying is this is not emptiness.
So sometimes because of that, more you try to explain emptiness, it becomes more obscure.
So what we do? We try to talk what is not emptiness.
For example, it's like this. Let's say I'm born as a colored blind.
This is not completely colored blind, but I only see a black and white. And I don't know that. And you know what is color. So now you're trying to explain to me what is blue.
And of course, you can say that this is, you know, blue is like this. Then I will look at, yeah, of course I know what is blue. But what I understand is whether it is black or white. You can explain and point at me so many blues, but it really doesn't matter. What I will understand is whether it's black or not, because I believe that there's only two colors in this world. My mind cannot see any other than that. This is exactly when we talk about emptiness, so we always have this existing, non-existing. Is, is not. There's no third thing. Now, this person has one way to convince me. Okay, so there's no way that he can show me what is blue. Yeah, it's impossible. But, he can try, one way is, let's say, he will, he can point me and this say, do you see this? Yeah, this is not blue. Okay. Then maybe he can point me something, you see that? Yes, that is not blue. So he will say this, and I don't know what is exactly blue, but I will understand that eventually what I experience is not blue. There must be something else.
So exactly, this is when we talk about this natural state of mind, natural state of phenomena, we call the beyond conceptual mind. It's very difficult to put in words, but we talk a lot, because it's not completely helpless. So what we say is, what you think emptiness is not emptiness. And that is not emptiness. So what's the point here? It means it's like this. So I don't know what is the blue, but the moment I realize that black is not blue, I'm going one step forward, to understanding the blue. And when I understand that black is not blue, then I'm going one step forward the blue. And this is exactly what we're doing when we're studying Madhyamika texts.
And it's like this. When you want to go someplace and there's so many different sideways, yeah? And let's say that you don't know how to point exactly the way, but you can cross all these sideways, you know? This is not way. This is not way. So each time you reach and understand the way you should go, you're going one step forward the reality. Unfortunately, this is the only we can do in our communication system. And this is exactly what we do.
Yeah? I think there are almost so many factors that we have quite motivated them. But can you, or it's very personal, how do you lose our track? When you become asleep of our emotions or of our way of thinking, how do you lose our track during our way to practice the Dharma?
When you practice Dharma, I usually say this. There are three things that you have to have. Knowledge, structure, and continuity.
So, of course, I'm not trying to say that you have to study every text now. You just have to know a little bit, you know, what you are doing, basic things, whatever you are doing, so you have to have some knowledge about it. Number two is that sometimes we have knowledge, especially in the West, I think, knowledge does not come as a whole package.
You have these small teachings here, small teachings there and you really don't know how to put it together. That's a big problem. Because, I mean, if you study in the monastery, you study in the Tibetan kind of culture, everything, then somehow you almost grow up in this process, yeah? So you have these ideas, more or less. But in the West, because it's very different culture, different things. So, small, small things. It's like you have so many books, and then you really don't know which shelf you should put it in and you get very confused, yeah.
So, you have knowledge. It's like this. Knowledge comes as in the small pieces of puzzles, right?
So if you just look at the one pieces of puzzle, and trying to figure out what it is, it's very difficult. Because you don't see the whole picture. So what do you do? You try to put all the puzzles together and go a little far and see what is your full picture. It takes time. It's like playing a puzzle game. Practicing Dharma is. It takes time. It's not easy. But, it is like that. So each time you get teaching, you're getting one new piece of puzzles. That's why you need a guru and teacher telling you directly this goes here, this goes there. Of course you can figure out by yourself, but it takes a long time.
So when you don't see the whole picture, as in whole system, and you just have small bits and bits there, although you have lots of information, but it doesn't really make much difference. That's one problem. Knowledge. Number two. So how do you help this system? Structure. Many times we have some knowledge, but we don't know how to put that knowledge into the structure. And of course structure you have, in the text it's mentioned you do ngöndro, this and that and everything. Many, many traditional structures, that is sutra, mantra, together. But based on that structure, you have to make your own really proper structure. Take that structure as a general model, but of course you can't do all of this because of many reasons. It's not relevant for you. You don't have that much time. Now the second thing is, you take this model as an example and you make some structure. Now many times what happens is that people, whether don't know, have knowledge, or they have some knowledge, but don't know how to make the knowledge into the structure. Or you just follow the some structure which is not relevant for you, and it becomes too much. Or you just give up thinking, Tibetan things is not for me. You never start anything.
So you have to see that, take it this general, and you have to make really practical structures. Okay, I took refuge yesterday, so what I can do from today, you know, as a Buddhist. And when you take refuge, they give you quite a good structures, what you should and what you should not do. Maybe you cannot follow all of them, but you can make something definitely you can always do. You cannot take excuses, oh it's so hard or so difficult, I cannot do. So let's say I will do this, I don't know, five minutes meditation, or I will remember three tables once a day, or I will at least reduce my anger from, you know, two levels, something, something like that. Normally we don't do that, and it becomes that just theoretical. Sometimes we become a little bit too comfortable, oh I don't like this, oh I don't like that, or you know, for example, oh I like this meditation, oh I don't like that meditation. But that's also, I used to say that Practicing Dharma is not like going to buffet, unfortunately. It's like going to hospital.
Yes, you have some choices, this doctor I trust, no, but actually you have to go through the process if you really want to heal. And Khen le Rinpoche said in his book, I really like that, he says, if you think that doing 100,000 prostations is not for me, you are the perfect vessel to do 200,000 prostations. Because you don't have that merit to understand the value of that. It's not because it's not for you. So you have to have some, create some condition for that. Instead of, oh it's not for me, I'll choose the easy one. There is no easy one.
So sometimes we become too choosy when we start Dharma. That's a big problem. And unfortunately we really don't know what we really want. Maybe it looks this way, tomorrow we like this, and the day after tomorrow it changes. And so our path becomes kind of like, when you want to cut the tree, you should hit the same place. Then it makes sense. Otherwise it really doesn't matter how much you hit, like here, then the whole day the tree will never fall down. It happens many times like that. Oh, Shamatha is so good. Oh, no, no, I don't like that. Maybe Vajrasattva is better than that. Then you do one week. Oh, no, no, no. It's too much. And then of course in the West you are kind of grown up with choosing options. I mean it's very good. But sometimes in Dharma unfortunately it doesn't really work that way. So the structure is important. And many times whether you become too easy, you never start, or you become a thing, oh, it's too difficult and you never start. But there is always a middle way you can do something. It's not like that. Of course the idea of meditation is fun, but when you do meditation it's not really fun, yeah?
Now the third one is very, very important. Because practicing Dharma is like this, yeah? It goes like this, interesting, fun, sitting under the tree, meditating, calm of mind, relaxing, music, wow, you know? But when you do, wake up at three o'clock in the morning and till the fourth session, it's not fun.
So you have to have these preparations that I will dedicate, yeah? I'm not doing this for fun. I'm doing this something for much, much bigger than that. You have to have that preparation, courage, and the passion. Because many times you start and it goes up, yeah? Difficult path. And it goes down and then it goes smooth. This path is like that. And many times we give up in this. Up one. Whether it doesn't make sense. So what I'm trying to say is that don't think too much. Just keep doing it. Continuity is important. Yeah? First you do some experiments, which one you like, but then don't change too much. Otherwise you keep changing, changing, like hitting to all the places. And some, of course you can check here where is proper way to hit. Maybe this one is proper. Some tests. And then once you got something, then you really have to hit on that. Then Again, sometimes we become too greedy when you practice Dharma. Oh, you know. Maybe you have seen some documentary, maybe you have some red books. Oh, so cool. So I will practice for one week and then I will become this and that. And then your practice getting worse and worse day by day. So not being too soon to judge. Evaluate your practice. And have to wait. Just keep doing it. Sometimes you like it, sometimes you don't like it, but just keep doing it. Because when you practice, it's like creating a pattern inside of you, yeah? That's what we call gom. Creating a pattern. So it takes time.
It's like I would say that usually it's like investing in the hydropower, not like doing the fast food business. You have to wait 10, 15 years to see the result.
So continuity is very important. I think when you have these three things, certain knowledge, structure, practical structure, relevant structure for you, and the continuity, then be patient. Then once you get confident, then it's not that difficult. And it's not always difficult. For example, when you practice shamatha at the beginning it seems like wow, it's impossible to practice. I have so much thought, yeah? And then if you give up that level, then you always stay there. Then you do, do, do. Then after a few times it kind of comes down. Then you feel like, well, there's so many thoughts, but actually it's not that bad. And then you get, it's like how to drive, yeah? There's not just knowing and not knowing. It's a long process, you know? You do it, you do it, you do it. And then in certain time you get, oh now I know, so I know how to control because I did just practice, yeah? And you also have the same feelings when you practice Dharma in general, especially when you meditate.
And of course, if you have good inspirational peoples around you, it will be very plus point, you know? If you don't, then sometimes it will... But also the very important thing is that once now many of us, emotional practitioners, okay, we come to Dharma emotionally. We practice Dharma emotionally. We have compassion emotionally, not wisdom. Okay? And it's good to start, but it's not very stable. It's very up and down. You have to have a wisdom. So it comes later. Once you start change this emotional to the wisdom, then things become much, much more settled. You know, like when you're a teenager, when you're young, not knowing what to do here and there, and then what do I want? You're a little bit confused. And once you get settled, get married, have one children, then you're kind of, okay, so whether I like it or not, I have to go through this. You don't have much choice you know, you feel like grounded. It's same in Dharma. Until getting married, our Dharma practice is a little bit emotionally reacted. Excitement, disappointment, up and down. Slowly, slowly this emotional will transform into a little bit of wisdom. Then you will be grounded and then much, much more stable. And it doesn't matter what kind of conditions are there. Confidence will arise from there.
Okay, so I will stop here. Maybe we'll just meditate for, I don't know, 10 minutes. Just do whatever you want to do, yeah?
There is some prayer for meditation, but maybe today we won't do that.
It's okay, maybe we'll do tomorrow. We have more time.
I will put it here, I think better.
so we'll do this dedication of merit.
Page number 18.
künsang dorjé chang chen men ché né drinchen tsawai lama yenché kyi drowai dön du mönlam gang tapa dedak thamché deng dir drupar shok May all the aspirations for the benefit of beings from Samantabhadra and great Vajradhara down until our kind root guru, be accomplished this very day.
Next verse. sönam diyi thamché sikpa nyi thopné nyepai dranam phamjé né kyega nachi balap trukpa yi sipai tsolé drowa drölwar shok By this merit, may I attain omniscience. Having defeated the enemy, misdeeds, may I free all beings from the ocean of existence, with it's stormy waves of birth, old age, sickness and death.
jangchup semchok rinpoché ma kyepa nam kyé gyurchik kyepa nyampa mepa yang gongné gongdu phelwar shok May the supreme and precious mind of enlightenment, awaken in those where it has not yet arisen. Where it has arisen, may it never decrease, but continue to flourish forevermore. Okay, so we'll do. So, our tradition, when you start the teachings or puja, and teacher will sit first and then you sit after that. But when you stand up, you can stand up before the teacher. You don't have to wait for me.
Which means that after my eye consciousness sees some phenomena, then immediately my mental consciousness will recognize this, oh, this is water. There's no doubt at all that this is water. Then immediately after, when I see water, I will make two kind, three kind of judgment. Like, dislike and neutral. So whether you like or whether you dislike or whether you neutral, and this will create so called the three kinds of pattern in our mind.
Attachment, anger and ignorant.
So when we talk about this, our negative aspects of mind, we talk about lots of different kind of disturbing emotions, but it always comes down to this three kind. Attachment, aversion and ignorant. So you can always put in these three kind of cases, whatever kind of negative emotions. So that means each time you have conceptual mind, it is kind of contributing your negative patterns. And this is what we call the emotional... So when I believe that this is water, there, and this is what we call the cognitive obscurations, because it's a duality. And this is completely based on duality. And of course, Am I seeing, am I judging the water according to what it is? Or am I judging the water according to what it appears to me? Now when I say, oh, it's water, I think that this is the reality of this phenomena, but actually it's not. This is my judgment of my perception. So for example, let's say if there's a fish sitting here, and when the fish sees that, he won't see it's water, or maybe the sun. So from the Buddhist point of view, what you see is not what it is, because who you are. Does it make sense? So we believe that if there's a fish, if there's a dog, if there's a, I don't know, god, if you look at this glass of water, we won't see the same thing. We will see completely different things, the same object. So it's not because there's different objects, it's just because we have different receptors. We are different. So we have different habitual patterns, and the ability to understand what object it is. And because of that, in Buddhism, if you change your mind, everything can be changed.
That's why you meditate.
You don't have to go and kill all the enemies. If you meditate, then all the enemies can be eliminated without killing them.
And you don't have to, how to say?
So through that logic or reason, how everything depends on the persons who perceived it. Because of that, if you meditate and if you change, and if you reduce the negative aspects of your mind, then everything can be a positive. We can react positively.
So cognitive obscuration will come first, thinking that, oh, this is water. Of course, we can talk what is this at many different levels. For example, let's say, if you ask me, what is this, oh, it's water, and we drink it, and we make food, and we wash clothes. This is one way to understand it. But if you look at, even from the little bit, our own kind of understanding of what is this, well, it's not really exactly what it appears to our, you can explain theoretically. It's like combinations of oxygens and hydrogens, and actually, there's more space than there's more, it seems. For example, if you say, this is table, and then it seems like very solid. But then if you logically explain it, it says there's more space than the solid. These kind of things, we can understand it. So even, it's so obvious that things are not, really it is not what it appears to us. So there are so many causes, conditions, how we judge what it is and what it is not. So what I'm trying to say was that everything comes down to the mind. It's not really what it is, it's about who is looking at that phenomena and making judgment. So because of that, it is possible that if you change your mind, if you reduce your negative aspects of mind, and then if you increase the quality aspects of your mind, since they are opposite and two opposite things don't stay together.
So for example, if you have compassion to one person, it's difficult to get angry to this person because the compassion and anger doesn't stay same. Similarly, if you are attached to something, it's difficult to get aggression because our mind, fortunately, doesn't work two opposite things at the same. So when you create this positive pattern of mind in yourself, negative pattern of mind automatically decreases.
So if you understand a little bit of that logic, and then all these Vajrayana aspects of visualizing and all these make a little bit sense. Otherwise, it might seem like just we are playing a mental game.
So now,
when we say I want to be happy, I'm suffering, we point out, you know, me. And many times, we don't really think too much about me or I, or sometimes we think too much about me and I. And when you don't think at all, or when you think too much then our mind becomes a little bit imbalance.
And generally speaking, it's very obvious that we have this physical, so-called I, me, you know, physical happiness, physical suffering, and then we have this mental suffering, mental happiness, I and me.
And since you point, this is me, and it's important to take care, right? And we do take care of our physical world, physical me is quite okay. We have toothbrush, brush, we have many different kinds of shampoos, we have so many kinds of... we have insurance, medicine, everything. But unfortunately, there's not much you can do to your mind, unfortunately. Actually, the mind is the main source of our happiness and suffering, but then there's no structure and process, or much you cannot do, there's not much. So, why we meditate, why we take spiritual path? In common sense, we have to take care of ourselves, isn't it? Since. And then, when you say, I take care of, it doesn't... it's not only we are talking about our physical world, we also have to take care of our mind.
And when you practice Dharma, actually, in very simple words, it's just you are taking care of your mind, that's it, with the proper process.
And so, if you think, why I should practice Dharma? And the question is, well, you have mind, unfortunately or fortunately, whether you like it or not, and you cannot just let it be wild, because it's not healthy. And as, like, you take care of your body, you go to gym, whatever whatever you do in daily life, you have to take care of your mind. It's simple. And to do that, you have to meditate, you have to follow the discipline, everything to take care of our mind. It's not easy. If taking care of body is easy, then taking care of mind is even much, much more difficult, then taking care of mind is much, much more difficult.
And also, working now, the thing is that,
if you want to take care of your mind, it is very important to know that how mind works. Of course, we cannot know everything, but there's certain kind of rules how mind works, right? Maybe different beings have different mindset, we work differently, but as a human being, we have more or less the same human pattern, so to speak. And of course, this, our reactions are influenced by our background, culture, many things, but somehow our mind reacts more or less the same way. Yeah? It's not completely different.
Maybe... So...
Okay, I think I will stop here today, and I will continue tomorrow. Is it?
We have one and a half hour, yeah? And only one and a half, one and fifteen minutes are gone. Okay. So I will talk about mind a little bit tomorrow. And maybe if you have any questions, you can discuss. So today what I was trying to say was that.
it's important to understand and recognize our own potential, and then knowing what is the process to develop that potential. And once you don't know that, life becomes very confusing. And once you know that, life becomes much, much more clear and easier. So I'm trying to say a very common way how Dharma can be the, how to say,
the methods to understand or to recognize that potential and develop that potential. Yeah?
Yeah, so please, if you have any questions, we can discuss for a few minutes and then...
Yes? What are the causes of suffering and the causes of happiness?
Maybe I will give you very short. You have to study like this Four Noble Truths, probably maybe you have heard it, yeah? And it mentioned quite clearly, so Four Noble Truths are Truth of Suffering, and Truth of Origin, which means truth of that cause of the suffering. And then we call Truth of Path, which is the cause of happiness. And the fourth one is called Truth of Cessation, which means the Buddhahood or enlightenment or happiness. So you have this very so-called Four Noble Truth, which is the first teachings of Buddha, as well as the very basic foundation of Buddhism. So you have suffering, cause of suffering, and happiness and cause of happiness. And there are many, many books you can read. But now, I will tell you very in short way.
There was once a person, and he asked Buddha, I think Dharmapada, Buddha, I really want to be happy. Can you just give me a short, pith instruction. And Buddha said, sure. Buddha never said, I don't know. So he said something.
See, you, I, you say, I want to be happy. So quite simple. Just take out the I. That's called ego. That's why we're talking about this.
cognitive obscuration. You just take out the I. Put it away. And then second, want. It's called desire. Obscuration of cognitive. So you just take out the cognitive obscuration, and the emotional obscuration, and whatever that is happiness.
Yeah?
So of course we can talk it philosophically, but when you say, I want to be happy, don't think too much about I, I want. Yeah? Just let go I and want, and happiness will come by itself. And when you push too much, I want to be happy, the more you press, the happiness will go more further.
Unfortunately, many times that we do. You want the happiness, but you push too much this I and want.
And it is like, you know, when you wanted to hold the sand in your hand, you should be loosed. More you try to hold it strongly, more it goes away.
So that's why exactly what I was trying to say is that we are not going at the right way, although what we want and Buddha want is exactly the same thing. Unfortunately. We are very confused, what is happiness and what is cause of happiness. And many things, many times we think that actually the suffering is happiness. According to Buddhism, if you study the Four Noble Truths, we have three kinds of suffering. Suffering of suffering, which means, oh, I have a headache, or a little problem that we know. And second thing is what we call the suffering of change. We really believe that it's a happiness.
And then the third is called the suffering of all posabilities, much, much subtler. That means the moment you are born, you are almost ingrained with the hope and fear. You are never, never free from that. And this is exactly like the engines that drive us in our life. But the problem is that hope and fear is energy, but sometimes it becomes too much. It becomes a problem. As long as you know how to use them, it works as energy. But when it overflows, then it becomes a problem. And many times, we use it too much. It's like electricity, yeah? When the electricity is a certain kind of level, we can use them. But when it's too much, then the problem explodes. Many, many mental problems such as anxiety, depression are exactly the result of that.
Over, how to say, explosion of hope and fear, and our mind cannot take it. It's like when you use the voltage here, too high and then it explodes, something like that. So, I would say that more ego, I, and more one disturbing emotion, there will be more disturbances. Internally, actionally, resultly. But more you have less ego, I, less want, I think it will bring more happiness, temporarily and ultimately.
About your glass of water? Yes. If it depends who looks at it, so there is no objective reality? It's just an illusion. So it's also an illusion that you sit here and how can I decide what kind, I mean, why is it important to take good actions or bad actions if nothing is real? Yeah, yeah. I was expecting this as question. Even I didn't start the emptiness aspect.
See.
Now, it's like this.
Emptiness.
Illusion is not reality, but it is an illusion. Yeah. It's like this. Let's say if you are a physics or chemist teacher, and then you look at this, glass of water, and theoretically, you know exactly what it is. But it doesn't really mean that the physicist will never drink water. He will definitely use it as water. So consciously, you can theoretically, you can explain what is this. But it doesn't mean that water will disappear. It will be there as long as you change your subconscious mind.
So now, when we say if everything is illusions, we are not talking about that they don't exist. We are just saying that they are not the reality that we perceive is not what it is. It is what it appears to us. But we are not talking about it doesn't exist. But is there something? Yes.
That's why emptiness is not an emptiness.
When you study the Heart Sutra, we talk a lot about that. Form is emptiness. That's why Buddha actually said that form is emptiness. He said that. But then, immediately he knew that when he said that, that means it's non-existing. And then he said emptiness is a form.
I don't know if that makes any sense. If you read the Heart Sutra, there's a line saying form is emptiness, emptiness is a form. So emptiness does not really mean non-existing. It means that things are not how it appears to us.
But the biggest problem is that now we are talking in the duality states here. Duality states. And this is the biggest challenge because for example, we cannot really talk about what is emptiness, but we can talk what is not emptiness. Yeah? Unfortunately, this is the only way.
So I cannot, if you ask me, what is that something? I really don't know. But only I can tell you is, what it is we think it's not. Does it make sense? So that's why if you study a Nāgārjuna, Madhyamika's they say, OK, now I'm going to teach emptiness, but actually they don't talk about emptiness. They just talk about truly established. What is not emptiness. The whole text is about what is not emptiness.
This is the important part. Maybe I will say a little bit, a few things.
It's like this.
I am.
Because now, well in Buddhism we call that when you try to communicate, there's three kind of communication systems.
Mind communication system, where they don't use any kind of signs and the words. Unfortunately, we cannot do that because it's a very high level communication system. And second thing is, they call it the symbolic communication system. That means this is exactly all these colors, shapes, and you know. This is sometimes when you practice Vajrayana, we use that communication system, symbolic communication. They think that verbal communication is too confusing. And visual communication system is much, much better than the verbal communication system. That's why in Vajrayana you have these melodies, colors, tunes, incense, brocades.
But generally now we have to communicate through verbal communication system is our thing, our level. The problem is that the moment, the design of the intention of verbal communication is give you some kind of duality. Because when I say some words, it has to give you some thought. Otherwise it's even not a word. What's the point of that? So that means when I say this is emptiness, actually what I'm saying is this is not emptiness.
So sometimes because of that, more you try to explain emptiness, it becomes more obscure.
So what we do? We try to talk what is not emptiness.
For example, it's like this. Let's say I'm born as a colored blind.
This is not completely colored blind, but I only see a black and white. And I don't know that. And you know what is color. So now you're trying to explain to me what is blue.
And of course, you can say that this is, you know, blue is like this. Then I will look at, yeah, of course I know what is blue. But what I understand is whether it is black or white. You can explain and point at me so many blues, but it really doesn't matter. What I will understand is whether it's black or not, because I believe that there's only two colors in this world. My mind cannot see any other than that. This is exactly when we talk about emptiness, so we always have this existing, non-existing. Is, is not. There's no third thing. Now, this person has one way to convince me. Okay, so there's no way that he can show me what is blue. Yeah, it's impossible. But, he can try, one way is, let's say, he will, he can point me and this say, do you see this? Yeah, this is not blue. Okay. Then maybe he can point me something, you see that? Yes, that is not blue. So he will say this, and I don't know what is exactly blue, but I will understand that eventually what I experience is not blue. There must be something else.
So exactly, this is when we talk about this natural state of mind, natural state of phenomena, we call the beyond conceptual mind. It's very difficult to put in words, but we talk a lot, because it's not completely helpless. So what we say is, what you think emptiness is not emptiness. And that is not emptiness. So what's the point here? It means it's like this. So I don't know what is the blue, but the moment I realize that black is not blue, I'm going one step forward, to understanding the blue. And when I understand that black is not blue, then I'm going one step forward the blue. And this is exactly what we're doing when we're studying Madhyamika texts.
And it's like this. When you want to go someplace and there's so many different sideways, yeah? And let's say that you don't know how to point exactly the way, but you can cross all these sideways, you know? This is not way. This is not way. So each time you reach and understand the way you should go, you're going one step forward the reality. Unfortunately, this is the only we can do in our communication system. And this is exactly what we do.
Yeah? I think there are almost so many factors that we have quite motivated them. But can you, or it's very personal, how do you lose our track? When you become asleep of our emotions or of our way of thinking, how do you lose our track during our way to practice the Dharma?
When you practice Dharma, I usually say this. There are three things that you have to have. Knowledge, structure, and continuity.
So, of course, I'm not trying to say that you have to study every text now. You just have to know a little bit, you know, what you are doing, basic things, whatever you are doing, so you have to have some knowledge about it. Number two is that sometimes we have knowledge, especially in the West, I think, knowledge does not come as a whole package.
You have these small teachings here, small teachings there and you really don't know how to put it together. That's a big problem. Because, I mean, if you study in the monastery, you study in the Tibetan kind of culture, everything, then somehow you almost grow up in this process, yeah? So you have these ideas, more or less. But in the West, because it's very different culture, different things. So, small, small things. It's like you have so many books, and then you really don't know which shelf you should put it in and you get very confused, yeah.
So, you have knowledge. It's like this. Knowledge comes as in the small pieces of puzzles, right?
So if you just look at the one pieces of puzzle, and trying to figure out what it is, it's very difficult. Because you don't see the whole picture. So what do you do? You try to put all the puzzles together and go a little far and see what is your full picture. It takes time. It's like playing a puzzle game. Practicing Dharma is. It takes time. It's not easy. But, it is like that. So each time you get teaching, you're getting one new piece of puzzles. That's why you need a guru and teacher telling you directly this goes here, this goes there. Of course you can figure out by yourself, but it takes a long time.
So when you don't see the whole picture, as in whole system, and you just have small bits and bits there, although you have lots of information, but it doesn't really make much difference. That's one problem. Knowledge. Number two. So how do you help this system? Structure. Many times we have some knowledge, but we don't know how to put that knowledge into the structure. And of course structure you have, in the text it's mentioned you do ngöndro, this and that and everything. Many, many traditional structures, that is sutra, mantra, together. But based on that structure, you have to make your own really proper structure. Take that structure as a general model, but of course you can't do all of this because of many reasons. It's not relevant for you. You don't have that much time. Now the second thing is, you take this model as an example and you make some structure. Now many times what happens is that people, whether don't know, have knowledge, or they have some knowledge, but don't know how to make the knowledge into the structure. Or you just follow the some structure which is not relevant for you, and it becomes too much. Or you just give up thinking, Tibetan things is not for me. You never start anything.
So you have to see that, take it this general, and you have to make really practical structures. Okay, I took refuge yesterday, so what I can do from today, you know, as a Buddhist. And when you take refuge, they give you quite a good structures, what you should and what you should not do. Maybe you cannot follow all of them, but you can make something definitely you can always do. You cannot take excuses, oh it's so hard or so difficult, I cannot do. So let's say I will do this, I don't know, five minutes meditation, or I will remember three tables once a day, or I will at least reduce my anger from, you know, two levels, something, something like that. Normally we don't do that, and it becomes that just theoretical. Sometimes we become a little bit too comfortable, oh I don't like this, oh I don't like that, or you know, for example, oh I like this meditation, oh I don't like that meditation. But that's also, I used to say that Practicing Dharma is not like going to buffet, unfortunately. It's like going to hospital.
Yes, you have some choices, this doctor I trust, no, but actually you have to go through the process if you really want to heal. And Khen le Rinpoche said in his book, I really like that, he says, if you think that doing 100,000 prostations is not for me, you are the perfect vessel to do 200,000 prostations. Because you don't have that merit to understand the value of that. It's not because it's not for you. So you have to have some, create some condition for that. Instead of, oh it's not for me, I'll choose the easy one. There is no easy one.
So sometimes we become too choosy when we start Dharma. That's a big problem. And unfortunately we really don't know what we really want. Maybe it looks this way, tomorrow we like this, and the day after tomorrow it changes. And so our path becomes kind of like, when you want to cut the tree, you should hit the same place. Then it makes sense. Otherwise it really doesn't matter how much you hit, like here, then the whole day the tree will never fall down. It happens many times like that. Oh, Shamatha is so good. Oh, no, no, I don't like that. Maybe Vajrasattva is better than that. Then you do one week. Oh, no, no, no. It's too much. And then of course in the West you are kind of grown up with choosing options. I mean it's very good. But sometimes in Dharma unfortunately it doesn't really work that way. So the structure is important. And many times whether you become too easy, you never start, or you become a thing, oh, it's too difficult and you never start. But there is always a middle way you can do something. It's not like that. Of course the idea of meditation is fun, but when you do meditation it's not really fun, yeah?
Now the third one is very, very important. Because practicing Dharma is like this, yeah? It goes like this, interesting, fun, sitting under the tree, meditating, calm of mind, relaxing, music, wow, you know? But when you do, wake up at three o'clock in the morning and till the fourth session, it's not fun.
So you have to have these preparations that I will dedicate, yeah? I'm not doing this for fun. I'm doing this something for much, much bigger than that. You have to have that preparation, courage, and the passion. Because many times you start and it goes up, yeah? Difficult path. And it goes down and then it goes smooth. This path is like that. And many times we give up in this. Up one. Whether it doesn't make sense. So what I'm trying to say is that don't think too much. Just keep doing it. Continuity is important. Yeah? First you do some experiments, which one you like, but then don't change too much. Otherwise you keep changing, changing, like hitting to all the places. And some, of course you can check here where is proper way to hit. Maybe this one is proper. Some tests. And then once you got something, then you really have to hit on that. Then Again, sometimes we become too greedy when you practice Dharma. Oh, you know. Maybe you have seen some documentary, maybe you have some red books. Oh, so cool. So I will practice for one week and then I will become this and that. And then your practice getting worse and worse day by day. So not being too soon to judge. Evaluate your practice. And have to wait. Just keep doing it. Sometimes you like it, sometimes you don't like it, but just keep doing it. Because when you practice, it's like creating a pattern inside of you, yeah? That's what we call gom. Creating a pattern. So it takes time.
It's like I would say that usually it's like investing in the hydropower, not like doing the fast food business. You have to wait 10, 15 years to see the result.
So continuity is very important. I think when you have these three things, certain knowledge, structure, practical structure, relevant structure for you, and the continuity, then be patient. Then once you get confident, then it's not that difficult. And it's not always difficult. For example, when you practice shamatha at the beginning it seems like wow, it's impossible to practice. I have so much thought, yeah? And then if you give up that level, then you always stay there. Then you do, do, do. Then after a few times it kind of comes down. Then you feel like, well, there's so many thoughts, but actually it's not that bad. And then you get, it's like how to drive, yeah? There's not just knowing and not knowing. It's a long process, you know? You do it, you do it, you do it. And then in certain time you get, oh now I know, so I know how to control because I did just practice, yeah? And you also have the same feelings when you practice Dharma in general, especially when you meditate.
And of course, if you have good inspirational peoples around you, it will be very plus point, you know? If you don't, then sometimes it will... But also the very important thing is that once now many of us, emotional practitioners, okay, we come to Dharma emotionally. We practice Dharma emotionally. We have compassion emotionally, not wisdom. Okay? And it's good to start, but it's not very stable. It's very up and down. You have to have a wisdom. So it comes later. Once you start change this emotional to the wisdom, then things become much, much more settled. You know, like when you're a teenager, when you're young, not knowing what to do here and there, and then what do I want? You're a little bit confused. And once you get settled, get married, have one children, then you're kind of, okay, so whether I like it or not, I have to go through this. You don't have much choice you know, you feel like grounded. It's same in Dharma. Until getting married, our Dharma practice is a little bit emotionally reacted. Excitement, disappointment, up and down. Slowly, slowly this emotional will transform into a little bit of wisdom. Then you will be grounded and then much, much more stable. And it doesn't matter what kind of conditions are there. Confidence will arise from there.
Okay, so I will stop here. Maybe we'll just meditate for, I don't know, 10 minutes. Just do whatever you want to do, yeah?
There is some prayer for meditation, but maybe today we won't do that.
It's okay, maybe we'll do tomorrow. We have more time.
I will put it here, I think better.
so we'll do this dedication of merit.
Page number 18.
künsang dorjé chang chen men ché né drinchen tsawai lama yenché kyi drowai dön du mönlam gang tapa dedak thamché deng dir drupar shok May all the aspirations for the benefit of beings from Samantabhadra and great Vajradhara down until our kind root guru, be accomplished this very day.
Next verse. sönam diyi thamché sikpa nyi thopné nyepai dranam phamjé né kyega nachi balap trukpa yi sipai tsolé drowa drölwar shok By this merit, may I attain omniscience. Having defeated the enemy, misdeeds, may I free all beings from the ocean of existence, with it's stormy waves of birth, old age, sickness and death.
jangchup semchok rinpoché ma kyepa nam kyé gyurchik kyepa nyampa mepa yang gongné gongdu phelwar shok May the supreme and precious mind of enlightenment, awaken in those where it has not yet arisen. Where it has arisen, may it never decrease, but continue to flourish forevermore. Okay, so we'll do. So, our tradition, when you start the teachings or puja, and teacher will sit first and then you sit after that. But when you stand up, you can stand up before the teacher. You don't have to wait for me.
19:52
So the problem is that our direct
perception is quite innocent.
It doesn't make much story.
But our conceptual mind
is very difficult because it
makes a lot of stories
and he creates the pattern.
That's the biggest problem.
Which means that after my eye consciousness sees some phenomena, then immediately my mental consciousness will recognize this, oh, this is water. There's no doubt at all that this is water. Then immediately after, when I see water, I will make two kind, three kind of judgment. Like, dislike and neutral. So whether you like or whether you dislike or whether you neutral, and this will create so called the three kinds of pattern in our mind.
Attachment, anger and ignorant.
So when we talk about this, our negative aspects of mind, we talk about lots of different kind of disturbing emotions, but it always comes down to this three kind. Attachment, aversion and ignorant. So you can always put in these three kind of cases, whatever kind of negative emotions. So that means each time you have conceptual mind, it is kind of contributing your negative patterns. And this is what we call the emotional... So when I believe that this is water, there, and this is what we call the cognitive obscurations, because it's a duality. And this is completely based on duality. And of course, Am I seeing, am I judging the water according to what it is? Or am I judging the water according to what it appears to me? Now when I say, oh, it's water, I think that this is the reality of this phenomena, but actually it's not. This is my judgment of my perception. So for example, let's say if there's a fish sitting here, and when the fish sees that, he won't see it's water, or maybe the sun. So from the Buddhist point of view, what you see is not what it is, because who you are. Does it make sense? So we believe that if there's a fish, if there's a dog, if there's a, I don't know, god, if you look at this glass of water, we won't see the same thing. We will see completely different things, the same object. So it's not because there's different objects, it's just because we have different receptors. We are different. So we have different habitual patterns, and the ability to understand what object it is. And because of that, in Buddhism, if you change your mind, everything can be changed.
That's why you meditate.
You don't have to go and kill all the enemies. If you meditate, then all the enemies can be eliminated without killing them.
And you don't have to, how to say?
So through that logic or reason, how everything depends on the persons who perceived it. Because of that, if you meditate and if you change, and if you reduce the negative aspects of your mind, then everything can be a positive. We can react positively.
So cognitive obscuration will come first, thinking that, oh, this is water. Of course, we can talk what is this at many different levels. For example, let's say, if you ask me, what is this, oh, it's water, and we drink it, and we make food, and we wash clothes. This is one way to understand it. But if you look at, even from the little bit, our own kind of understanding of what is this, well, it's not really exactly what it appears to our, you can explain theoretically. It's like combinations of oxygens and hydrogens, and actually, there's more space than there's more, it seems. For example, if you say, this is table, and then it seems like very solid. But then if you logically explain it, it says there's more space than the solid. These kind of things, we can understand it. So even, it's so obvious that things are not, really it is not what it appears to us. So there are so many causes, conditions, how we judge what it is and what it is not. So what I'm trying to say was that everything comes down to the mind. It's not really what it is, it's about who is looking at that phenomena and making judgment. So because of that, it is possible that if you change your mind, if you reduce your negative aspects of mind, and then if you increase the quality aspects of your mind, since they are opposite and two opposite things don't stay together.
So for example, if you have compassion to one person, it's difficult to get angry to this person because the compassion and anger doesn't stay same. Similarly, if you are attached to something, it's difficult to get aggression because our mind, fortunately, doesn't work two opposite things at the same. So when you create this positive pattern of mind in yourself, negative pattern of mind automatically decreases.
So if you understand a little bit of that logic, and then all these Vajrayana aspects of visualizing and all these make a little bit sense. Otherwise, it might seem like just we are playing a mental game.
So now,
when we say I want to be happy, I'm suffering, we point out, you know, me. And many times, we don't really think too much about me or I, or sometimes we think too much about me and I. And when you don't think at all, or when you think too much then our mind becomes a little bit imbalance.
And generally speaking, it's very obvious that we have this physical, so-called I, me, you know, physical happiness, physical suffering, and then we have this mental suffering, mental happiness, I and me.
And since you point, this is me, and it's important to take care, right? And we do take care of our physical world, physical me is quite okay. We have toothbrush, brush, we have many different kinds of shampoos, we have so many kinds of... we have insurance, medicine, everything. But unfortunately, there's not much you can do to your mind, unfortunately. Actually, the mind is the main source of our happiness and suffering, but then there's no structure and process, or much you cannot do, there's not much. So, why we meditate, why we take spiritual path? In common sense, we have to take care of ourselves, isn't it? Since. And then, when you say, I take care of, it doesn't... it's not only we are talking about our physical world, we also have to take care of our mind.
And when you practice Dharma, actually, in very simple words, it's just you are taking care of your mind, that's it, with the proper process.
And so, if you think, why I should practice Dharma? And the question is, well, you have mind, unfortunately or fortunately, whether you like it or not, and you cannot just let it be wild, because it's not healthy. And as, like, you take care of your body, you go to gym, whatever whatever you do in daily life, you have to take care of your mind. It's simple. And to do that, you have to meditate, you have to follow the discipline, everything to take care of our mind. It's not easy. If taking care of body is easy, then taking care of mind is even much, much more difficult, then taking care of mind is much, much more difficult.
And also, working now, the thing is that,
if you want to take care of your mind, it is very important to know that how mind works. Of course, we cannot know everything, but there's certain kind of rules how mind works, right? Maybe different beings have different mindset, we work differently, but as a human being, we have more or less the same human pattern, so to speak. And of course, this, our reactions are influenced by our background, culture, many things, but somehow our mind reacts more or less the same way. Yeah? It's not completely different.
Maybe... So...
Okay, I think I will stop here today, and I will continue tomorrow. Is it?
We have one and a half hour, yeah? And only one and a half, one and fifteen minutes are gone. Okay. So I will talk about mind a little bit tomorrow. And maybe if you have any questions, you can discuss. So today what I was trying to say was that.
it's important to understand and recognize our own potential, and then knowing what is the process to develop that potential. And once you don't know that, life becomes very confusing. And once you know that, life becomes much, much more clear and easier. So I'm trying to say a very common way how Dharma can be the, how to say,
the methods to understand or to recognize that potential and develop that potential. Yeah?
Yeah, so please, if you have any questions, we can discuss for a few minutes and then...
Yes? What are the causes of suffering and the causes of happiness?
Maybe I will give you very short. You have to study like this Four Noble Truths, probably maybe you have heard it, yeah? And it mentioned quite clearly, so Four Noble Truths are Truth of Suffering, and Truth of Origin, which means truth of that cause of the suffering. And then we call Truth of Path, which is the cause of happiness. And the fourth one is called Truth of Cessation, which means the Buddhahood or enlightenment or happiness. So you have this very so-called Four Noble Truth, which is the first teachings of Buddha, as well as the very basic foundation of Buddhism. So you have suffering, cause of suffering, and happiness and cause of happiness. And there are many, many books you can read. But now, I will tell you very in short way.
There was once a person, and he asked Buddha, I think Dharmapada, Buddha, I really want to be happy. Can you just give me a short, pith instruction. And Buddha said, sure. Buddha never said, I don't know. So he said something.
See, you, I, you say, I want to be happy. So quite simple. Just take out the I. That's called ego. That's why we're talking about this.
cognitive obscuration. You just take out the I. Put it away. And then second, want. It's called desire. Obscuration of cognitive. So you just take out the cognitive obscuration, and the emotional obscuration, and whatever that is happiness.
Yeah?
So of course we can talk it philosophically, but when you say, I want to be happy, don't think too much about I, I want. Yeah? Just let go I and want, and happiness will come by itself. And when you push too much, I want to be happy, the more you press, the happiness will go more further.
Unfortunately, many times that we do. You want the happiness, but you push too much this I and want.
And it is like, you know, when you wanted to hold the sand in your hand, you should be loosed. More you try to hold it strongly, more it goes away.
So that's why exactly what I was trying to say is that we are not going at the right way, although what we want and Buddha want is exactly the same thing. Unfortunately. We are very confused, what is happiness and what is cause of happiness. And many things, many times we think that actually the suffering is happiness. According to Buddhism, if you study the Four Noble Truths, we have three kinds of suffering. Suffering of suffering, which means, oh, I have a headache, or a little problem that we know. And second thing is what we call the suffering of change. We really believe that it's a happiness.
And then the third is called the suffering of all posabilities, much, much subtler. That means the moment you are born, you are almost ingrained with the hope and fear. You are never, never free from that. And this is exactly like the engines that drive us in our life. But the problem is that hope and fear is energy, but sometimes it becomes too much. It becomes a problem. As long as you know how to use them, it works as energy. But when it overflows, then it becomes a problem. And many times, we use it too much. It's like electricity, yeah? When the electricity is a certain kind of level, we can use them. But when it's too much, then the problem explodes. Many, many mental problems such as anxiety, depression are exactly the result of that.
Over, how to say, explosion of hope and fear, and our mind cannot take it. It's like when you use the voltage here, too high and then it explodes, something like that. So, I would say that more ego, I, and more one disturbing emotion, there will be more disturbances. Internally, actionally, resultly. But more you have less ego, I, less want, I think it will bring more happiness, temporarily and ultimately.
About your glass of water? Yes. If it depends who looks at it, so there is no objective reality? It's just an illusion. So it's also an illusion that you sit here and how can I decide what kind, I mean, why is it important to take good actions or bad actions if nothing is real? Yeah, yeah. I was expecting this as question. Even I didn't start the emptiness aspect.
See.
Now, it's like this.
Emptiness.
Illusion is not reality, but it is an illusion. Yeah. It's like this. Let's say if you are a physics or chemist teacher, and then you look at this, glass of water, and theoretically, you know exactly what it is. But it doesn't really mean that the physicist will never drink water. He will definitely use it as water. So consciously, you can theoretically, you can explain what is this. But it doesn't mean that water will disappear. It will be there as long as you change your subconscious mind.
So now, when we say if everything is illusions, we are not talking about that they don't exist. We are just saying that they are not the reality that we perceive is not what it is. It is what it appears to us. But we are not talking about it doesn't exist. But is there something? Yes.
That's why emptiness is not an emptiness.
When you study the Heart Sutra, we talk a lot about that. Form is emptiness. That's why Buddha actually said that form is emptiness. He said that. But then, immediately he knew that when he said that, that means it's non-existing. And then he said emptiness is a form.
I don't know if that makes any sense. If you read the Heart Sutra, there's a line saying form is emptiness, emptiness is a form. So emptiness does not really mean non-existing. It means that things are not how it appears to us.
But the biggest problem is that now we are talking in the duality states here. Duality states. And this is the biggest challenge because for example, we cannot really talk about what is emptiness, but we can talk what is not emptiness. Yeah? Unfortunately, this is the only way.
So I cannot, if you ask me, what is that something? I really don't know. But only I can tell you is, what it is we think it's not. Does it make sense? So that's why if you study a Nāgārjuna, Madhyamika's they say, OK, now I'm going to teach emptiness, but actually they don't talk about emptiness. They just talk about truly established. What is not emptiness. The whole text is about what is not emptiness.
This is the important part. Maybe I will say a little bit, a few things.
It's like this.
I am.
Because now, well in Buddhism we call that when you try to communicate, there's three kind of communication systems.
Mind communication system, where they don't use any kind of signs and the words. Unfortunately, we cannot do that because it's a very high level communication system. And second thing is, they call it the symbolic communication system. That means this is exactly all these colors, shapes, and you know. This is sometimes when you practice Vajrayana, we use that communication system, symbolic communication. They think that verbal communication is too confusing. And visual communication system is much, much better than the verbal communication system. That's why in Vajrayana you have these melodies, colors, tunes, incense, brocades.
But generally now we have to communicate through verbal communication system is our thing, our level. The problem is that the moment, the design of the intention of verbal communication is give you some kind of duality. Because when I say some words, it has to give you some thought. Otherwise it's even not a word. What's the point of that? So that means when I say this is emptiness, actually what I'm saying is this is not emptiness.
So sometimes because of that, more you try to explain emptiness, it becomes more obscure.
So what we do? We try to talk what is not emptiness.
For example, it's like this. Let's say I'm born as a colored blind.
This is not completely colored blind, but I only see a black and white. And I don't know that. And you know what is color. So now you're trying to explain to me what is blue.
And of course, you can say that this is, you know, blue is like this. Then I will look at, yeah, of course I know what is blue. But what I understand is whether it is black or white. You can explain and point at me so many blues, but it really doesn't matter. What I will understand is whether it's black or not, because I believe that there's only two colors in this world. My mind cannot see any other than that. This is exactly when we talk about emptiness, so we always have this existing, non-existing. Is, is not. There's no third thing. Now, this person has one way to convince me. Okay, so there's no way that he can show me what is blue. Yeah, it's impossible. But, he can try, one way is, let's say, he will, he can point me and this say, do you see this? Yeah, this is not blue. Okay. Then maybe he can point me something, you see that? Yes, that is not blue. So he will say this, and I don't know what is exactly blue, but I will understand that eventually what I experience is not blue. There must be something else.
So exactly, this is when we talk about this natural state of mind, natural state of phenomena, we call the beyond conceptual mind. It's very difficult to put in words, but we talk a lot, because it's not completely helpless. So what we say is, what you think emptiness is not emptiness. And that is not emptiness. So what's the point here? It means it's like this. So I don't know what is the blue, but the moment I realize that black is not blue, I'm going one step forward, to understanding the blue. And when I understand that black is not blue, then I'm going one step forward the blue. And this is exactly what we're doing when we're studying Madhyamika texts.
And it's like this. When you want to go someplace and there's so many different sideways, yeah? And let's say that you don't know how to point exactly the way, but you can cross all these sideways, you know? This is not way. This is not way. So each time you reach and understand the way you should go, you're going one step forward the reality. Unfortunately, this is the only we can do in our communication system. And this is exactly what we do.
Yeah? I think there are almost so many factors that we have quite motivated them. But can you, or it's very personal, how do you lose our track? When you become asleep of our emotions or of our way of thinking, how do you lose our track during our way to practice the Dharma?
When you practice Dharma, I usually say this. There are three things that you have to have. Knowledge, structure, and continuity.
So, of course, I'm not trying to say that you have to study every text now. You just have to know a little bit, you know, what you are doing, basic things, whatever you are doing, so you have to have some knowledge about it. Number two is that sometimes we have knowledge, especially in the West, I think, knowledge does not come as a whole package.
You have these small teachings here, small teachings there and you really don't know how to put it together. That's a big problem. Because, I mean, if you study in the monastery, you study in the Tibetan kind of culture, everything, then somehow you almost grow up in this process, yeah? So you have these ideas, more or less. But in the West, because it's very different culture, different things. So, small, small things. It's like you have so many books, and then you really don't know which shelf you should put it in and you get very confused, yeah.
So, you have knowledge. It's like this. Knowledge comes as in the small pieces of puzzles, right?
So if you just look at the one pieces of puzzle, and trying to figure out what it is, it's very difficult. Because you don't see the whole picture. So what do you do? You try to put all the puzzles together and go a little far and see what is your full picture. It takes time. It's like playing a puzzle game. Practicing Dharma is. It takes time. It's not easy. But, it is like that. So each time you get teaching, you're getting one new piece of puzzles. That's why you need a guru and teacher telling you directly this goes here, this goes there. Of course you can figure out by yourself, but it takes a long time.
So when you don't see the whole picture, as in whole system, and you just have small bits and bits there, although you have lots of information, but it doesn't really make much difference. That's one problem. Knowledge. Number two. So how do you help this system? Structure. Many times we have some knowledge, but we don't know how to put that knowledge into the structure. And of course structure you have, in the text it's mentioned you do ngöndro, this and that and everything. Many, many traditional structures, that is sutra, mantra, together. But based on that structure, you have to make your own really proper structure. Take that structure as a general model, but of course you can't do all of this because of many reasons. It's not relevant for you. You don't have that much time. Now the second thing is, you take this model as an example and you make some structure. Now many times what happens is that people, whether don't know, have knowledge, or they have some knowledge, but don't know how to make the knowledge into the structure. Or you just follow the some structure which is not relevant for you, and it becomes too much. Or you just give up thinking, Tibetan things is not for me. You never start anything.
So you have to see that, take it this general, and you have to make really practical structures. Okay, I took refuge yesterday, so what I can do from today, you know, as a Buddhist. And when you take refuge, they give you quite a good structures, what you should and what you should not do. Maybe you cannot follow all of them, but you can make something definitely you can always do. You cannot take excuses, oh it's so hard or so difficult, I cannot do. So let's say I will do this, I don't know, five minutes meditation, or I will remember three tables once a day, or I will at least reduce my anger from, you know, two levels, something, something like that. Normally we don't do that, and it becomes that just theoretical. Sometimes we become a little bit too comfortable, oh I don't like this, oh I don't like that, or you know, for example, oh I like this meditation, oh I don't like that meditation. But that's also, I used to say that Practicing Dharma is not like going to buffet, unfortunately. It's like going to hospital.
Yes, you have some choices, this doctor I trust, no, but actually you have to go through the process if you really want to heal. And Khen le Rinpoche said in his book, I really like that, he says, if you think that doing 100,000 prostations is not for me, you are the perfect vessel to do 200,000 prostations. Because you don't have that merit to understand the value of that. It's not because it's not for you. So you have to have some, create some condition for that. Instead of, oh it's not for me, I'll choose the easy one. There is no easy one.
So sometimes we become too choosy when we start Dharma. That's a big problem. And unfortunately we really don't know what we really want. Maybe it looks this way, tomorrow we like this, and the day after tomorrow it changes. And so our path becomes kind of like, when you want to cut the tree, you should hit the same place. Then it makes sense. Otherwise it really doesn't matter how much you hit, like here, then the whole day the tree will never fall down. It happens many times like that. Oh, Shamatha is so good. Oh, no, no, I don't like that. Maybe Vajrasattva is better than that. Then you do one week. Oh, no, no, no. It's too much. And then of course in the West you are kind of grown up with choosing options. I mean it's very good. But sometimes in Dharma unfortunately it doesn't really work that way. So the structure is important. And many times whether you become too easy, you never start, or you become a thing, oh, it's too difficult and you never start. But there is always a middle way you can do something. It's not like that. Of course the idea of meditation is fun, but when you do meditation it's not really fun, yeah?
Now the third one is very, very important. Because practicing Dharma is like this, yeah? It goes like this, interesting, fun, sitting under the tree, meditating, calm of mind, relaxing, music, wow, you know? But when you do, wake up at three o'clock in the morning and till the fourth session, it's not fun.
So you have to have these preparations that I will dedicate, yeah? I'm not doing this for fun. I'm doing this something for much, much bigger than that. You have to have that preparation, courage, and the passion. Because many times you start and it goes up, yeah? Difficult path. And it goes down and then it goes smooth. This path is like that. And many times we give up in this. Up one. Whether it doesn't make sense. So what I'm trying to say is that don't think too much. Just keep doing it. Continuity is important. Yeah? First you do some experiments, which one you like, but then don't change too much. Otherwise you keep changing, changing, like hitting to all the places. And some, of course you can check here where is proper way to hit. Maybe this one is proper. Some tests. And then once you got something, then you really have to hit on that. Then Again, sometimes we become too greedy when you practice Dharma. Oh, you know. Maybe you have seen some documentary, maybe you have some red books. Oh, so cool. So I will practice for one week and then I will become this and that. And then your practice getting worse and worse day by day. So not being too soon to judge. Evaluate your practice. And have to wait. Just keep doing it. Sometimes you like it, sometimes you don't like it, but just keep doing it. Because when you practice, it's like creating a pattern inside of you, yeah? That's what we call gom. Creating a pattern. So it takes time.
It's like I would say that usually it's like investing in the hydropower, not like doing the fast food business. You have to wait 10, 15 years to see the result.
So continuity is very important. I think when you have these three things, certain knowledge, structure, practical structure, relevant structure for you, and the continuity, then be patient. Then once you get confident, then it's not that difficult. And it's not always difficult. For example, when you practice shamatha at the beginning it seems like wow, it's impossible to practice. I have so much thought, yeah? And then if you give up that level, then you always stay there. Then you do, do, do. Then after a few times it kind of comes down. Then you feel like, well, there's so many thoughts, but actually it's not that bad. And then you get, it's like how to drive, yeah? There's not just knowing and not knowing. It's a long process, you know? You do it, you do it, you do it. And then in certain time you get, oh now I know, so I know how to control because I did just practice, yeah? And you also have the same feelings when you practice Dharma in general, especially when you meditate.
And of course, if you have good inspirational peoples around you, it will be very plus point, you know? If you don't, then sometimes it will... But also the very important thing is that once now many of us, emotional practitioners, okay, we come to Dharma emotionally. We practice Dharma emotionally. We have compassion emotionally, not wisdom. Okay? And it's good to start, but it's not very stable. It's very up and down. You have to have a wisdom. So it comes later. Once you start change this emotional to the wisdom, then things become much, much more settled. You know, like when you're a teenager, when you're young, not knowing what to do here and there, and then what do I want? You're a little bit confused. And once you get settled, get married, have one children, then you're kind of, okay, so whether I like it or not, I have to go through this. You don't have much choice you know, you feel like grounded. It's same in Dharma. Until getting married, our Dharma practice is a little bit emotionally reacted. Excitement, disappointment, up and down. Slowly, slowly this emotional will transform into a little bit of wisdom. Then you will be grounded and then much, much more stable. And it doesn't matter what kind of conditions are there. Confidence will arise from there.
Okay, so I will stop here. Maybe we'll just meditate for, I don't know, 10 minutes. Just do whatever you want to do, yeah?
There is some prayer for meditation, but maybe today we won't do that.
It's okay, maybe we'll do tomorrow. We have more time.
I will put it here, I think better.
so we'll do this dedication of merit.
Page number 18.
künsang dorjé chang chen men ché né drinchen tsawai lama yenché kyi drowai dön du mönlam gang tapa dedak thamché deng dir drupar shok May all the aspirations for the benefit of beings from Samantabhadra and great Vajradhara down until our kind root guru, be accomplished this very day.
Next verse. sönam diyi thamché sikpa nyi thopné nyepai dranam phamjé né kyega nachi balap trukpa yi sipai tsolé drowa drölwar shok By this merit, may I attain omniscience. Having defeated the enemy, misdeeds, may I free all beings from the ocean of existence, with it's stormy waves of birth, old age, sickness and death.
jangchup semchok rinpoché ma kyepa nam kyé gyurchik kyepa nyampa mepa yang gongné gongdu phelwar shok May the supreme and precious mind of enlightenment, awaken in those where it has not yet arisen. Where it has arisen, may it never decrease, but continue to flourish forevermore. Okay, so we'll do. So, our tradition, when you start the teachings or puja, and teacher will sit first and then you sit after that. But when you stand up, you can stand up before the teacher. You don't have to wait for me.
Which means that after my eye consciousness sees some phenomena, then immediately my mental consciousness will recognize this, oh, this is water. There's no doubt at all that this is water. Then immediately after, when I see water, I will make two kind, three kind of judgment. Like, dislike and neutral. So whether you like or whether you dislike or whether you neutral, and this will create so called the three kinds of pattern in our mind.
Attachment, anger and ignorant.
So when we talk about this, our negative aspects of mind, we talk about lots of different kind of disturbing emotions, but it always comes down to this three kind. Attachment, aversion and ignorant. So you can always put in these three kind of cases, whatever kind of negative emotions. So that means each time you have conceptual mind, it is kind of contributing your negative patterns. And this is what we call the emotional... So when I believe that this is water, there, and this is what we call the cognitive obscurations, because it's a duality. And this is completely based on duality. And of course, Am I seeing, am I judging the water according to what it is? Or am I judging the water according to what it appears to me? Now when I say, oh, it's water, I think that this is the reality of this phenomena, but actually it's not. This is my judgment of my perception. So for example, let's say if there's a fish sitting here, and when the fish sees that, he won't see it's water, or maybe the sun. So from the Buddhist point of view, what you see is not what it is, because who you are. Does it make sense? So we believe that if there's a fish, if there's a dog, if there's a, I don't know, god, if you look at this glass of water, we won't see the same thing. We will see completely different things, the same object. So it's not because there's different objects, it's just because we have different receptors. We are different. So we have different habitual patterns, and the ability to understand what object it is. And because of that, in Buddhism, if you change your mind, everything can be changed.
That's why you meditate.
You don't have to go and kill all the enemies. If you meditate, then all the enemies can be eliminated without killing them.
And you don't have to, how to say?
So through that logic or reason, how everything depends on the persons who perceived it. Because of that, if you meditate and if you change, and if you reduce the negative aspects of your mind, then everything can be a positive. We can react positively.
So cognitive obscuration will come first, thinking that, oh, this is water. Of course, we can talk what is this at many different levels. For example, let's say, if you ask me, what is this, oh, it's water, and we drink it, and we make food, and we wash clothes. This is one way to understand it. But if you look at, even from the little bit, our own kind of understanding of what is this, well, it's not really exactly what it appears to our, you can explain theoretically. It's like combinations of oxygens and hydrogens, and actually, there's more space than there's more, it seems. For example, if you say, this is table, and then it seems like very solid. But then if you logically explain it, it says there's more space than the solid. These kind of things, we can understand it. So even, it's so obvious that things are not, really it is not what it appears to us. So there are so many causes, conditions, how we judge what it is and what it is not. So what I'm trying to say was that everything comes down to the mind. It's not really what it is, it's about who is looking at that phenomena and making judgment. So because of that, it is possible that if you change your mind, if you reduce your negative aspects of mind, and then if you increase the quality aspects of your mind, since they are opposite and two opposite things don't stay together.
So for example, if you have compassion to one person, it's difficult to get angry to this person because the compassion and anger doesn't stay same. Similarly, if you are attached to something, it's difficult to get aggression because our mind, fortunately, doesn't work two opposite things at the same. So when you create this positive pattern of mind in yourself, negative pattern of mind automatically decreases.
So if you understand a little bit of that logic, and then all these Vajrayana aspects of visualizing and all these make a little bit sense. Otherwise, it might seem like just we are playing a mental game.
So now,
when we say I want to be happy, I'm suffering, we point out, you know, me. And many times, we don't really think too much about me or I, or sometimes we think too much about me and I. And when you don't think at all, or when you think too much then our mind becomes a little bit imbalance.
And generally speaking, it's very obvious that we have this physical, so-called I, me, you know, physical happiness, physical suffering, and then we have this mental suffering, mental happiness, I and me.
And since you point, this is me, and it's important to take care, right? And we do take care of our physical world, physical me is quite okay. We have toothbrush, brush, we have many different kinds of shampoos, we have so many kinds of... we have insurance, medicine, everything. But unfortunately, there's not much you can do to your mind, unfortunately. Actually, the mind is the main source of our happiness and suffering, but then there's no structure and process, or much you cannot do, there's not much. So, why we meditate, why we take spiritual path? In common sense, we have to take care of ourselves, isn't it? Since. And then, when you say, I take care of, it doesn't... it's not only we are talking about our physical world, we also have to take care of our mind.
And when you practice Dharma, actually, in very simple words, it's just you are taking care of your mind, that's it, with the proper process.
And so, if you think, why I should practice Dharma? And the question is, well, you have mind, unfortunately or fortunately, whether you like it or not, and you cannot just let it be wild, because it's not healthy. And as, like, you take care of your body, you go to gym, whatever whatever you do in daily life, you have to take care of your mind. It's simple. And to do that, you have to meditate, you have to follow the discipline, everything to take care of our mind. It's not easy. If taking care of body is easy, then taking care of mind is even much, much more difficult, then taking care of mind is much, much more difficult.
And also, working now, the thing is that,
if you want to take care of your mind, it is very important to know that how mind works. Of course, we cannot know everything, but there's certain kind of rules how mind works, right? Maybe different beings have different mindset, we work differently, but as a human being, we have more or less the same human pattern, so to speak. And of course, this, our reactions are influenced by our background, culture, many things, but somehow our mind reacts more or less the same way. Yeah? It's not completely different.
Maybe... So...
Okay, I think I will stop here today, and I will continue tomorrow. Is it?
We have one and a half hour, yeah? And only one and a half, one and fifteen minutes are gone. Okay. So I will talk about mind a little bit tomorrow. And maybe if you have any questions, you can discuss. So today what I was trying to say was that.
it's important to understand and recognize our own potential, and then knowing what is the process to develop that potential. And once you don't know that, life becomes very confusing. And once you know that, life becomes much, much more clear and easier. So I'm trying to say a very common way how Dharma can be the, how to say,
the methods to understand or to recognize that potential and develop that potential. Yeah?
Yeah, so please, if you have any questions, we can discuss for a few minutes and then...
Yes? What are the causes of suffering and the causes of happiness?
Maybe I will give you very short. You have to study like this Four Noble Truths, probably maybe you have heard it, yeah? And it mentioned quite clearly, so Four Noble Truths are Truth of Suffering, and Truth of Origin, which means truth of that cause of the suffering. And then we call Truth of Path, which is the cause of happiness. And the fourth one is called Truth of Cessation, which means the Buddhahood or enlightenment or happiness. So you have this very so-called Four Noble Truth, which is the first teachings of Buddha, as well as the very basic foundation of Buddhism. So you have suffering, cause of suffering, and happiness and cause of happiness. And there are many, many books you can read. But now, I will tell you very in short way.
There was once a person, and he asked Buddha, I think Dharmapada, Buddha, I really want to be happy. Can you just give me a short, pith instruction. And Buddha said, sure. Buddha never said, I don't know. So he said something.
See, you, I, you say, I want to be happy. So quite simple. Just take out the I. That's called ego. That's why we're talking about this.
cognitive obscuration. You just take out the I. Put it away. And then second, want. It's called desire. Obscuration of cognitive. So you just take out the cognitive obscuration, and the emotional obscuration, and whatever that is happiness.
Yeah?
So of course we can talk it philosophically, but when you say, I want to be happy, don't think too much about I, I want. Yeah? Just let go I and want, and happiness will come by itself. And when you push too much, I want to be happy, the more you press, the happiness will go more further.
Unfortunately, many times that we do. You want the happiness, but you push too much this I and want.
And it is like, you know, when you wanted to hold the sand in your hand, you should be loosed. More you try to hold it strongly, more it goes away.
So that's why exactly what I was trying to say is that we are not going at the right way, although what we want and Buddha want is exactly the same thing. Unfortunately. We are very confused, what is happiness and what is cause of happiness. And many things, many times we think that actually the suffering is happiness. According to Buddhism, if you study the Four Noble Truths, we have three kinds of suffering. Suffering of suffering, which means, oh, I have a headache, or a little problem that we know. And second thing is what we call the suffering of change. We really believe that it's a happiness.
And then the third is called the suffering of all posabilities, much, much subtler. That means the moment you are born, you are almost ingrained with the hope and fear. You are never, never free from that. And this is exactly like the engines that drive us in our life. But the problem is that hope and fear is energy, but sometimes it becomes too much. It becomes a problem. As long as you know how to use them, it works as energy. But when it overflows, then it becomes a problem. And many times, we use it too much. It's like electricity, yeah? When the electricity is a certain kind of level, we can use them. But when it's too much, then the problem explodes. Many, many mental problems such as anxiety, depression are exactly the result of that.
Over, how to say, explosion of hope and fear, and our mind cannot take it. It's like when you use the voltage here, too high and then it explodes, something like that. So, I would say that more ego, I, and more one disturbing emotion, there will be more disturbances. Internally, actionally, resultly. But more you have less ego, I, less want, I think it will bring more happiness, temporarily and ultimately.
About your glass of water? Yes. If it depends who looks at it, so there is no objective reality? It's just an illusion. So it's also an illusion that you sit here and how can I decide what kind, I mean, why is it important to take good actions or bad actions if nothing is real? Yeah, yeah. I was expecting this as question. Even I didn't start the emptiness aspect.
See.
Now, it's like this.
Emptiness.
Illusion is not reality, but it is an illusion. Yeah. It's like this. Let's say if you are a physics or chemist teacher, and then you look at this, glass of water, and theoretically, you know exactly what it is. But it doesn't really mean that the physicist will never drink water. He will definitely use it as water. So consciously, you can theoretically, you can explain what is this. But it doesn't mean that water will disappear. It will be there as long as you change your subconscious mind.
So now, when we say if everything is illusions, we are not talking about that they don't exist. We are just saying that they are not the reality that we perceive is not what it is. It is what it appears to us. But we are not talking about it doesn't exist. But is there something? Yes.
That's why emptiness is not an emptiness.
When you study the Heart Sutra, we talk a lot about that. Form is emptiness. That's why Buddha actually said that form is emptiness. He said that. But then, immediately he knew that when he said that, that means it's non-existing. And then he said emptiness is a form.
I don't know if that makes any sense. If you read the Heart Sutra, there's a line saying form is emptiness, emptiness is a form. So emptiness does not really mean non-existing. It means that things are not how it appears to us.
But the biggest problem is that now we are talking in the duality states here. Duality states. And this is the biggest challenge because for example, we cannot really talk about what is emptiness, but we can talk what is not emptiness. Yeah? Unfortunately, this is the only way.
So I cannot, if you ask me, what is that something? I really don't know. But only I can tell you is, what it is we think it's not. Does it make sense? So that's why if you study a Nāgārjuna, Madhyamika's they say, OK, now I'm going to teach emptiness, but actually they don't talk about emptiness. They just talk about truly established. What is not emptiness. The whole text is about what is not emptiness.
This is the important part. Maybe I will say a little bit, a few things.
It's like this.
I am.
Because now, well in Buddhism we call that when you try to communicate, there's three kind of communication systems.
Mind communication system, where they don't use any kind of signs and the words. Unfortunately, we cannot do that because it's a very high level communication system. And second thing is, they call it the symbolic communication system. That means this is exactly all these colors, shapes, and you know. This is sometimes when you practice Vajrayana, we use that communication system, symbolic communication. They think that verbal communication is too confusing. And visual communication system is much, much better than the verbal communication system. That's why in Vajrayana you have these melodies, colors, tunes, incense, brocades.
But generally now we have to communicate through verbal communication system is our thing, our level. The problem is that the moment, the design of the intention of verbal communication is give you some kind of duality. Because when I say some words, it has to give you some thought. Otherwise it's even not a word. What's the point of that? So that means when I say this is emptiness, actually what I'm saying is this is not emptiness.
So sometimes because of that, more you try to explain emptiness, it becomes more obscure.
So what we do? We try to talk what is not emptiness.
For example, it's like this. Let's say I'm born as a colored blind.
This is not completely colored blind, but I only see a black and white. And I don't know that. And you know what is color. So now you're trying to explain to me what is blue.
And of course, you can say that this is, you know, blue is like this. Then I will look at, yeah, of course I know what is blue. But what I understand is whether it is black or white. You can explain and point at me so many blues, but it really doesn't matter. What I will understand is whether it's black or not, because I believe that there's only two colors in this world. My mind cannot see any other than that. This is exactly when we talk about emptiness, so we always have this existing, non-existing. Is, is not. There's no third thing. Now, this person has one way to convince me. Okay, so there's no way that he can show me what is blue. Yeah, it's impossible. But, he can try, one way is, let's say, he will, he can point me and this say, do you see this? Yeah, this is not blue. Okay. Then maybe he can point me something, you see that? Yes, that is not blue. So he will say this, and I don't know what is exactly blue, but I will understand that eventually what I experience is not blue. There must be something else.
So exactly, this is when we talk about this natural state of mind, natural state of phenomena, we call the beyond conceptual mind. It's very difficult to put in words, but we talk a lot, because it's not completely helpless. So what we say is, what you think emptiness is not emptiness. And that is not emptiness. So what's the point here? It means it's like this. So I don't know what is the blue, but the moment I realize that black is not blue, I'm going one step forward, to understanding the blue. And when I understand that black is not blue, then I'm going one step forward the blue. And this is exactly what we're doing when we're studying Madhyamika texts.
And it's like this. When you want to go someplace and there's so many different sideways, yeah? And let's say that you don't know how to point exactly the way, but you can cross all these sideways, you know? This is not way. This is not way. So each time you reach and understand the way you should go, you're going one step forward the reality. Unfortunately, this is the only we can do in our communication system. And this is exactly what we do.
Yeah? I think there are almost so many factors that we have quite motivated them. But can you, or it's very personal, how do you lose our track? When you become asleep of our emotions or of our way of thinking, how do you lose our track during our way to practice the Dharma?
When you practice Dharma, I usually say this. There are three things that you have to have. Knowledge, structure, and continuity.
So, of course, I'm not trying to say that you have to study every text now. You just have to know a little bit, you know, what you are doing, basic things, whatever you are doing, so you have to have some knowledge about it. Number two is that sometimes we have knowledge, especially in the West, I think, knowledge does not come as a whole package.
You have these small teachings here, small teachings there and you really don't know how to put it together. That's a big problem. Because, I mean, if you study in the monastery, you study in the Tibetan kind of culture, everything, then somehow you almost grow up in this process, yeah? So you have these ideas, more or less. But in the West, because it's very different culture, different things. So, small, small things. It's like you have so many books, and then you really don't know which shelf you should put it in and you get very confused, yeah.
So, you have knowledge. It's like this. Knowledge comes as in the small pieces of puzzles, right?
So if you just look at the one pieces of puzzle, and trying to figure out what it is, it's very difficult. Because you don't see the whole picture. So what do you do? You try to put all the puzzles together and go a little far and see what is your full picture. It takes time. It's like playing a puzzle game. Practicing Dharma is. It takes time. It's not easy. But, it is like that. So each time you get teaching, you're getting one new piece of puzzles. That's why you need a guru and teacher telling you directly this goes here, this goes there. Of course you can figure out by yourself, but it takes a long time.
So when you don't see the whole picture, as in whole system, and you just have small bits and bits there, although you have lots of information, but it doesn't really make much difference. That's one problem. Knowledge. Number two. So how do you help this system? Structure. Many times we have some knowledge, but we don't know how to put that knowledge into the structure. And of course structure you have, in the text it's mentioned you do ngöndro, this and that and everything. Many, many traditional structures, that is sutra, mantra, together. But based on that structure, you have to make your own really proper structure. Take that structure as a general model, but of course you can't do all of this because of many reasons. It's not relevant for you. You don't have that much time. Now the second thing is, you take this model as an example and you make some structure. Now many times what happens is that people, whether don't know, have knowledge, or they have some knowledge, but don't know how to make the knowledge into the structure. Or you just follow the some structure which is not relevant for you, and it becomes too much. Or you just give up thinking, Tibetan things is not for me. You never start anything.
So you have to see that, take it this general, and you have to make really practical structures. Okay, I took refuge yesterday, so what I can do from today, you know, as a Buddhist. And when you take refuge, they give you quite a good structures, what you should and what you should not do. Maybe you cannot follow all of them, but you can make something definitely you can always do. You cannot take excuses, oh it's so hard or so difficult, I cannot do. So let's say I will do this, I don't know, five minutes meditation, or I will remember three tables once a day, or I will at least reduce my anger from, you know, two levels, something, something like that. Normally we don't do that, and it becomes that just theoretical. Sometimes we become a little bit too comfortable, oh I don't like this, oh I don't like that, or you know, for example, oh I like this meditation, oh I don't like that meditation. But that's also, I used to say that Practicing Dharma is not like going to buffet, unfortunately. It's like going to hospital.
Yes, you have some choices, this doctor I trust, no, but actually you have to go through the process if you really want to heal. And Khen le Rinpoche said in his book, I really like that, he says, if you think that doing 100,000 prostations is not for me, you are the perfect vessel to do 200,000 prostations. Because you don't have that merit to understand the value of that. It's not because it's not for you. So you have to have some, create some condition for that. Instead of, oh it's not for me, I'll choose the easy one. There is no easy one.
So sometimes we become too choosy when we start Dharma. That's a big problem. And unfortunately we really don't know what we really want. Maybe it looks this way, tomorrow we like this, and the day after tomorrow it changes. And so our path becomes kind of like, when you want to cut the tree, you should hit the same place. Then it makes sense. Otherwise it really doesn't matter how much you hit, like here, then the whole day the tree will never fall down. It happens many times like that. Oh, Shamatha is so good. Oh, no, no, I don't like that. Maybe Vajrasattva is better than that. Then you do one week. Oh, no, no, no. It's too much. And then of course in the West you are kind of grown up with choosing options. I mean it's very good. But sometimes in Dharma unfortunately it doesn't really work that way. So the structure is important. And many times whether you become too easy, you never start, or you become a thing, oh, it's too difficult and you never start. But there is always a middle way you can do something. It's not like that. Of course the idea of meditation is fun, but when you do meditation it's not really fun, yeah?
Now the third one is very, very important. Because practicing Dharma is like this, yeah? It goes like this, interesting, fun, sitting under the tree, meditating, calm of mind, relaxing, music, wow, you know? But when you do, wake up at three o'clock in the morning and till the fourth session, it's not fun.
So you have to have these preparations that I will dedicate, yeah? I'm not doing this for fun. I'm doing this something for much, much bigger than that. You have to have that preparation, courage, and the passion. Because many times you start and it goes up, yeah? Difficult path. And it goes down and then it goes smooth. This path is like that. And many times we give up in this. Up one. Whether it doesn't make sense. So what I'm trying to say is that don't think too much. Just keep doing it. Continuity is important. Yeah? First you do some experiments, which one you like, but then don't change too much. Otherwise you keep changing, changing, like hitting to all the places. And some, of course you can check here where is proper way to hit. Maybe this one is proper. Some tests. And then once you got something, then you really have to hit on that. Then Again, sometimes we become too greedy when you practice Dharma. Oh, you know. Maybe you have seen some documentary, maybe you have some red books. Oh, so cool. So I will practice for one week and then I will become this and that. And then your practice getting worse and worse day by day. So not being too soon to judge. Evaluate your practice. And have to wait. Just keep doing it. Sometimes you like it, sometimes you don't like it, but just keep doing it. Because when you practice, it's like creating a pattern inside of you, yeah? That's what we call gom. Creating a pattern. So it takes time.
It's like I would say that usually it's like investing in the hydropower, not like doing the fast food business. You have to wait 10, 15 years to see the result.
So continuity is very important. I think when you have these three things, certain knowledge, structure, practical structure, relevant structure for you, and the continuity, then be patient. Then once you get confident, then it's not that difficult. And it's not always difficult. For example, when you practice shamatha at the beginning it seems like wow, it's impossible to practice. I have so much thought, yeah? And then if you give up that level, then you always stay there. Then you do, do, do. Then after a few times it kind of comes down. Then you feel like, well, there's so many thoughts, but actually it's not that bad. And then you get, it's like how to drive, yeah? There's not just knowing and not knowing. It's a long process, you know? You do it, you do it, you do it. And then in certain time you get, oh now I know, so I know how to control because I did just practice, yeah? And you also have the same feelings when you practice Dharma in general, especially when you meditate.
And of course, if you have good inspirational peoples around you, it will be very plus point, you know? If you don't, then sometimes it will... But also the very important thing is that once now many of us, emotional practitioners, okay, we come to Dharma emotionally. We practice Dharma emotionally. We have compassion emotionally, not wisdom. Okay? And it's good to start, but it's not very stable. It's very up and down. You have to have a wisdom. So it comes later. Once you start change this emotional to the wisdom, then things become much, much more settled. You know, like when you're a teenager, when you're young, not knowing what to do here and there, and then what do I want? You're a little bit confused. And once you get settled, get married, have one children, then you're kind of, okay, so whether I like it or not, I have to go through this. You don't have much choice you know, you feel like grounded. It's same in Dharma. Until getting married, our Dharma practice is a little bit emotionally reacted. Excitement, disappointment, up and down. Slowly, slowly this emotional will transform into a little bit of wisdom. Then you will be grounded and then much, much more stable. And it doesn't matter what kind of conditions are there. Confidence will arise from there.
Okay, so I will stop here. Maybe we'll just meditate for, I don't know, 10 minutes. Just do whatever you want to do, yeah?
There is some prayer for meditation, but maybe today we won't do that.
It's okay, maybe we'll do tomorrow. We have more time.
I will put it here, I think better.
so we'll do this dedication of merit.
Page number 18.
künsang dorjé chang chen men ché né drinchen tsawai lama yenché kyi drowai dön du mönlam gang tapa dedak thamché deng dir drupar shok May all the aspirations for the benefit of beings from Samantabhadra and great Vajradhara down until our kind root guru, be accomplished this very day.
Next verse. sönam diyi thamché sikpa nyi thopné nyepai dranam phamjé né kyega nachi balap trukpa yi sipai tsolé drowa drölwar shok By this merit, may I attain omniscience. Having defeated the enemy, misdeeds, may I free all beings from the ocean of existence, with it's stormy waves of birth, old age, sickness and death.
jangchup semchok rinpoché ma kyepa nam kyé gyurchik kyepa nyampa mepa yang gongné gongdu phelwar shok May the supreme and precious mind of enlightenment, awaken in those where it has not yet arisen. Where it has arisen, may it never decrease, but continue to flourish forevermore. Okay, so we'll do. So, our tradition, when you start the teachings or puja, and teacher will sit first and then you sit after that. But when you stand up, you can stand up before the teacher. You don't have to wait for me.
