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Wisdom teachings NYC 05 Lam Rim Chen mo

Part III

Talk 110: 07-07-05

Welcome here. Well, this is our July session, and though we make this a session, we don’t change the subject, because we are continuously talking on the basis of the wisdom aspects of Tsongkhapa’s Lam Rim Chenmo.

Before I start anything, I would like to say we just had His Holiness’s birthday celebration, and you people have been praying here, we did the “long-life". His Holiness is 70 now, so we will be looking forward to celebrate many more birthdays for the benefit of all beings in general and particularly for all mankind, and particularly for the sake of Tibetans. So we are praying for that. At the same time, we had a terrible day today in London with four bombs exploding. All the time when we think things will get a little better, something else happens that is terrible. So we pray for those people who have been hurt, lost life or loved ones, and everybody, for them. What you really do is, for those who have departed from the human registrations, we’ll pray for their purifying all their negativities, whatever they have accumulated from the limitless of the beginning. And we dedicate for their benefit all our and everybody’s, positive karmic deeds. That is how we actually pray. And for those who are left behind, also that their lives become worthwhile, and have virtuous activities, and that they are totally able to reach enlightenment. That is how we normally pray. We pPray for those who have passed away and for those who are living.

It is interesting. Sometimes many of our culture sometimes changes everything. It is called Everything you call it “closure”, and this and that. It is for the living, rather than for the departed souls, let’s use that word anyway. wWhich is not right. It must be for both, benefiting particularly for the departed consciousness that areis not around with us. That is our major job, to be able to help them, service them, help them, contribute something. What we can contribute there now is not the dollar amount, not the check, not the time, not anything except our virtues, our good deeds, our good karma. That is the material we dedicate. Even a small amount, however small it might be, saying even “Om Mani Padme Hum”, or any one of those things, particularly, the long mantra of Avalokitesvara which we say “Namo Ratna Trayaya...” and all of those. Most importantly, we can contribute our self, our everyday life, something good we are doing for the benefit of ourselfself and others, anything good in our everyday life. That is , that are the positive karma we can contribute to the departed person. That is what the spiritual people have whichthat is different from everyday people. Everyday people they may now almost say: “whatever you do it is, it is not for the departed person, b. But for the closure of the living person.” All of those, I really question that a little bit about that.

I think we do have a method of how to contribute to the departed ones, so that is what we should do, and not . That also, not just one time, but everyday. Every day, Ssome of our life, some of our work that we do, before we go to bed we should dedicate them. That is most important. By Ddedicating your good karma for the benefit of this and that doesn’t mean you are left with nothing. The virtue, the positive karma is such that there is countless inexhaustible positive karma available. So therefore, there is no end to it. You are not going to finish it by dedicating it for one or two or three things. You can do it all the time. But always you can do that. That is thea sort of thing we can take advantage of by being spiritual practitioners. We should never forget that. Always do it.

Having said that, this is just out of nowhere, I have just mentioned it. Our main subject is the wisdom part of it.teachings we have been doing here.

Wisdom is absolutely necessary, because without wisdom, no matter how much compassion, love, and so on all of them, how much of it we may have, we will never been able to obtain enlightenment. Having said “enlightenment”, I must once again introduce it to you once again: the purpose of spiritual practitioners where I come from, inwhere the tradition ofis the Mahayana Buddhism, and especially Vajrayana Buddhism, the goal of spiritual practitioners is to obtain total enlightenment. That is our goal.

As I always insist, when you claim to be spiritual practitioners, you must have a base on which you stand. You must have ways in which that you make progresscan do. You must have a result you hope to gain. Without these three: The base on which you stand, the method you apply, the goal you hope to achieve, if you do any spiritual activitything it will not be solid. I don’t want to say that it will be show business, but I think it will havebe no solid base. The solid spiritual practitioner means that solidly you arehas to be standing solidly on the ground and that is t. The ground of the Two Truths (relative truth and absolute truth). Then the and ways and means of how you are handle ing yyour life is , conduct your life, what we call practice. A lot of people think thatto practice means that you have to sit for a couple of minutes and do all kinds of gestures and things. all kinds of things, though that does not mean practice. But eEven little animals can do that. They can sit the way we teach themtaught them to sit.

You remember I always talk to you about The late Geshe Lobsang Tarchin, the . Unfortunately he has passed away now, they call him Kheney Rimpoche Lobsang Tarchin,. Geshela once told me that his dog can say “Om Mani Padme Hum”. I said how? He said, “I’ll show you”. “Alright.” So he getsot one of those cream puff biscuits, and puts cream cheese on top of that and some ham or something on top and makesde it reallythis big, then he getsot the dog to come down and the dog stands up on its hind legs and then Geshe-lahe saysid “Om Mani Padme Hum, Om Mani Padme Hum” and until he would not give the biscuit, and the dog keeps on jumping and after a little while he says WowOw Wow Wow Wow. “See, he says Om Mani Padme Hum“, he said. . That is the story I just share. Many of you know Geshe Lobsang Tarchin, because hehe was is a wonderful geshe who came to America. Unfortunately he is also gone now.

The point is thing is, if youwe can’t think, and if youwe don’t have something solidly to back up – back behind the words you say, or the gestures you put in, if you don’t have it, then it is not really a big deal. A parrot can say Even the words of “Om Mani Padme Hum” can be said by a parrot. And, the sitting gestures, even a monkey can sit. I have told you , you know I always saidabout “the lizard meditation”. The lizard also knows how to sit with open eyes and open mouth and swallow up all the air coming in. That is not necessarily, well, I don’t know whether it is meditation or not. To be solidThe solidness really means to be grounded ing. Grounding is on the basis of the two truths, . [That is] why Buddha has two truths: absolute and relative truth. This is the ground on which youwe stand solidly. If you don’t, you will be flying. That is called flying. I keep on saying people are not grounded, people are not grounded... They say “what do you mean, what do you mean, Wwhat do you mean?” That is what I mean. You don’t stand on the Two Truths. Standing on the Two Truths establishes the foundation, the basis. Then what you do, you have to do something. If you can‘t do anything, then it is not right. You have to work ondo two things: Love/compassion as well as wisdom. Without love and compassion, then it won't bewill be not that great. Without wisdom, even love/compassion alone cannot do it all. do nothing – Iit can do something – but not completely. It is not capable of delivering the goods.

I very often quote Chandrakirti, the great Indian master. Chandrakirti always says

[extended Tibetan quote] Kun dzo tin nyi sho yen kar pu gye gur pa…

. When the bird would like to cross the ocean, itthe bird needs two wings.

When the individual would like to cross the ocean of samsara,

theyyou need two wings: the absolute truth wing, and relative truth wing.

In this case, the relative truth is the love/compassion aspects of it. Absolute truth is the wisdom aspects of it. Without either onewhich, you can’t fly straight. You go around like the Australian boomerang: you throw it this way, and it comes back. If that happens, it is not right. So you have to have two wings.

We did talk for a very long time about love/compassion, particularly about caring for your self. The moment we talk love and compassion, a lot of people immediately start looking out, trying to look for somebody else who is suffering there, saying “we would like to help”. Yeah, that is great, but help is help. Compassion is caring.. Compassion is not a pity feeling. No one would like to have a pity feeling. No one welcomes a pity feeling. Compassion is caring. You have to care for yourself. You have to care for all beings. Actually, without knowing how to care for yourself, you willcan never be able to care for the others. If you don’t know how to help yourself, you will never be able to help others. This has been said is from the Buddha onwards. All the, great early Indian masters, and the great Tibetan masters, constantly, continuously, one language, owith one voiceword, they spoke throughout the last 2600 years: “If you don’t know how to help yourself, how can you help others?”

People do have a problem. They all like to help, but they don’t know what to do. That is because theyyou don’t know what to do for themselvesyourself. Helping yourself isbecomes first and foremost. The good old American saying: “charity begins at home” is. That is exactly where spiritual practice begins: with helping yourself. You must be able to help yourself. If you cannot, you can’t help others. ThatHelping yourself begins with knowing your own situation:. Understanding your own situation, where you are, what you are, what is happening with youme, whether you are I am happy or not happy, suffering or not. Whether I am suffering or not suffering. When you look into the Buddha’s teaching of the Four Noble Truths, it is exactly the First Noble Truth. I, it is just our life, the Truth of Suffering. The Truth of Suffering is everywhere. The bombings thatWhatever happened in London today areis the Truth of Suffering. I keep on repeatedly saying, what happened in Thethe t Tsunami in Asia last year was nothing more than the First Noble Truth. That is the reality. That is what we have. That is where we are. Our life, throughout, is tortured by so many things, so many things. lLosses, illnesses, sadness, sorrows, and pains - , physical, mental, emotional. And, [we are] continuously making sure it continuesthat will continue, by engaging inusing negative emotions such as hatred, anger, jealousy, and so forthall of those. That is what we do, that is what we have. That is our situation.

Truly speaking, we don’t have to find the object of compassion. The object of compassion is always within our self. Always. Always with us. Always. Today we are happy. Great. Tomorrow we are sad. It cChanges. Change. It is true reality. That is why it is called the nature of sSamsara. Samsara is suffering. People are happy today and , good company. Ttomorrow, something goes wrong. Then there are sSeparations. Today everybody is happy, alive. Tomorrow someone is gone. That is reality. That is suffering. You don’t have to go intotake a depression because ofon that, but it is reality, you have to understand.

Every time, when we look at each others' faces, each one of us, looking at our face, we see nothing but the pains and sufferings that we went through. Sometimes we consider it is great that a person went through a lot of struggles. Struggles or not struggles, it is pains and sufferings we went through. The sufferings that we went through. It is always there, constant, continuous. Knowing that. Recognizeing that and then ask yourself, . Realizing that, and then saying: “Who can help?" and " How can we help?” is our main question. Being a spiritual person means thinking “how can we help?” And actually and “who can help?” The Buddha gives us the answer: “No one except yourself.” No one can help except our self. You can pray. It doesn’t guarantee the answers. Right? Or wrong? You can pray, but it doesn’t guarantee you get anthe answers. That is the pain we go through. If we can’t help our self, no one can help.

The way and how we help is by actually we have to developing compassion to ourselves. Honestly. The traditional teachings will call it tell you renunciation. , and this and that. The three most important points are : point of renunciation, point of compassion, and point of wisdom. But truly, to renounce or not renounce, whatever you may call it, it may be, it means recognizing our self and your difficulties, and determining that you are going to help yourself, that is what it is. When tThings come in between you can takeing refuge. , and this and that, Iif there is no time, or if there is no chance, then you take refuge, but t and so on. The reality is that helping your self is the most important.

Then the questions arises: “How can I help myself?” The answer is:The two answers: Through lLove/compassion and wisdom. That is really the two answers. So you don’t really have to asksay “how can I help?” I havemake thata joke with Ram Das all the time. He wrote thate book called “How can I help?” I said to him, "Bbecause you did not help yourself, so you have to write a book called “How can I help?” I am making jokinges. I mean Ram Das is a great man. I am not looking down on him. He is a great man, a good friend of mine, really a great person. Wonderful person, I have the highest respect and . But the title “How can I help?” is a very effective title. But it is also effective for me to sayin saying, “if you don’t help yourself, how can you help others?” So that is why you have to write a book saying: “How can I help you?” That is a joke. But Tthe reality is: helping ourselves, having compassion to yourself is first. You may not be able to develop bodhimind for yourself, but you can definitely develop caring and compassion for yourself., caring, compassion. Remember, if you don’t help, nobody else can help you. That is the reality.

In a situationAnd situations like today, to us, with this wonderful human life, with a wonderful mind capacity, with the unlimited capacity that we have withinof our mind, if we you cannot utilize this, when can we help ourselves? For us, there is no situation better than today to help ourselves. That is because of this human life we have. And the condition we are in today. In today’s societycondition, we are open minded, a, At least those of you here and those of you who are listening on the internet, you do have open minds. You are not blinded by certain extreme ideas or thoughts. You are open, and you have the opportunity. The opportunity we have today is not there all the time. If you lived iEven if you look in the United States, if it were before the 1960’s, youwe would not have beenbe that open. You would not be open that much. Because, It is only what had happened in the 1960’s that , people like Ram Das, Timothy O'Leary , and the beatnik poets created , all that openness has come in ourthe society. So, today, you can talk about it, we can talk about it. we can talk and think. It is such a great opportunity. You can think about it. You can entertain the idea of reincarnation. You can entertain the idea of karma. You can entertain the wisdom. You can entertain compassion. Compassion is not just “love your neighbors”, or “if you are hit on the right cheek, turn the left one”. It is much more than that. It is tThe compassion that cares; it is the compassion that feels the pain and the joy of the people and yourself; the compassion that is the willingness to go all-out to help, to serve all living beings, including yourself; the compassion that is longing towards total enlightenment to serve all living beings. These are the kinds of compassions which are more than “love your neighbors”, or “turn your right cheek and then turn the left one and then walk away”. So these are the compassions we are talking about. These compassions are great. They serve the individual. They serve society. They serve all mankind, and they serve all living beings.

And yYet this compassion, the ultimate unlimited, unconditioned compassion, which is really called bodhimind – no – that alone cannot achieve the goal. I’ll give you thea reason why. Love/compassion is so great, wonderful, but it is not the direct opposite of ignorance. If is not the direct opposite of ignorance, Iit can take you away from the ignorance and its effects, however, it does not directly contradict ignorance.

I used the traditional terminology purposely. Ignorance is “wrong knowing” things. Today we call it ego. Ego, the ignorance: a wrongly-knowing, confused, fear-dominated, stateus of mind. It is tTrying to control everything, t. Trying to turn the individual into the porcupine state, t. Trying to sell and buy all these preemptive words, such as “preemptive”. Remember? You hear it all the time. Unfortunately, today’s bombing incident in London really makes it worse now. It is really unfortunate. It is nNot only the loss of life and all that pain, but the terrible warthis will give, it is additional longevity to this terrible for this war. , that is really what it is. Very unfortunate. All of them are the ego-influenced effects. It is , fear-dominated thinking. No one, even in this administration, the Bush administration, even in this administration, no matter whatever it might be, I cannot say. If they do not have to fight a war, they don’t need to. really wants to fight a war. They don’t want to. No one really wants to hurt anyone. Honestly speaking. No matter how bad the Bush administration might be, w. But who will volunteer to lose their life? Yes, they made a wrong calculation, no doubt about it. But Ttoday, you know, it is quite clear. But it is the fear that drives you. It is ego that drives you, the fear, confusion, combined together, which traditionally is called they call “ignorance”.

So Tsongkhapa has written a praised the Buddha, there is a very famous praise of Buddha. It is called “Praising Buddha because of the interdependent system.”

In that praise the first few verses say: one verse, I just remember, it says [Tibetan phrase] Jig lten golpa chin nye pa.

Reverence to the Guru, Manjugosha!

I bow to that perfect Buddha, Supreme Philosopher,

who taught us relativity, free of destruction, creation,

nihilism, absolutism, coming, going, unity, and plurality;

the calm beyond all fabrications, the bliss supreme!

I bow to Him, whose insight and speech

make him unexcelled as Sage and Teacher;

The Victor, who realized ultimate truth,

then taught us it as relativity!

Misknowledge itself is the very root

of all the troubles in this fleeting world;

who understood that and reversed it

taught universal relativity.

Thus how could it be possible

that the geniuses would not understand

this very path of relativity

as the vital essence of Your teaching?

The real source of all the bad things, all the sad things, all the sufferings of pains in the word is that very ignorance: ego. That is truly what it is. From the bigger point of view it affects : in the societies, nations, the world. From In the smaller point of view if viewit affects each : individuals. Each and every individual, Eeven the family quarrelsing are is nothing but ego-created. “I am better than you, you are not better than me.” “I know better than you, you don’t know better than me.” “I bring more money, you have to do exactly what I tellold you to do.” “You don’t bring in enough.” It is the ego that makes this. Love/compassion helps. But it does not directly defuse that ego, for which you need the wisdom. That is the reason why you need the second wing.

As So then this “Praise” sayscontinues: Jig lten golpa chin nye pa te ye tsel wa ma rey te. Kang chik tong way den ta pa ten jen ren pel jo wa tzos. If you are an intelligent person, youone should see this and get away from it. Get away from it. In order to get away from this, Buddha, not only taught but personally learned and experienced the understanding of the interdependent system, the interdependent nature. You can hear it from the word itself: “interdependent” means “notnot an independent”. Right? So you “depend on”. Nothing is independent. Everything is dependent, d. Dependently arising. What depends on what? Everything depends on everything. Terms. Conditions.

How did I become a human being? I became a human being because my terms, my conditions weare right, b. Because I happened to be in the right place at the right time, , at the right place, where my parents were in bed together. (in other words). So my consciousness found shelter. And I have been able to maintain that shelter against all odds by the right terms and conditions. I have been able to grow up, develop my mind, develop my ability to think, to get up to thise age, whatever, because Iwe have dependently arisen. Nothing exists independently. If one thing goes wrong, we collapse. We know that. If something is wrong physically, something completely overtakes us, we collapse. If something goes wrong mentally, we know, even though physically we are right, we collapse. If something goes wrong emotionally, even if mentally and physically we are both OK, even then we collapse. So therefore we are [we say] “dependent”.

Not only are we dependent on our physical conditions, we are also dependent on environmental conditions. If you are at the wrong place at the wrong time, what happens? You get a collapse. We saw what happened on 9-11. We saw what happened with the tTsunami. We have heard what happened in London today, all of those types of things. Even Iif you happen to be at the wrong place at the wrong time and the wrong place, even in the name of spirituality with the spiritual name, things go wrong: Remember Jim Jones, Heaven’s Gate, and so on. all of those conditions.

The Buddha’s teaching of wisdom, though [it is] normally called “emptiness”, is they are not talking about emptiness. The essence of the emptiness is existence. The essence of the existence is interdependent nature. That is why [Tibetan phrase].Tsongkhapa says, Therefore,"I intelligent people realize, understand that the essence of the Buddha’s teaching is interdependent nature." If you think we are not dependent, Tthe whole world is interdependent. The whole environment is interdependent. The whole human existence is interdependent. If we think we have nothing to do with Africa, or we have nothing to do with Asia, perhaps we have nothing to do with ourselves. It will become that way, because it is actually completely interlinked.

Today’s science alsoeven comes to this conclusion. I don’t how much it is accepted, but there are scientists who will say that movement of a the butterfly in China makes a difference in the weather conditions in the United States. All kinds of different theories will come in. Actually, we have to beare very grateful to Einstein. Without Einstein, Buddhism would not have been understood at all. Can you imagine? How can we talk about interdependencet-ness if there is no Theory of Relativity?. Even if I try to say it, If I tried to explain that you would thinkyou will think, “Wwhat nonsense this guy is talking?.” Right? That would be. But luckilyit is great. Einstein happeneds to be a nice Caucasianoccasion guy. So people will accept that theory. Somebody asked me “Ddo you think Einstein understood emptiness? Do you think Einstein is one of those Bodhisattavas?” I don’t know whether he is or is not. The point is that when you are looking for the truth, whether you are looking through the spiritual path, or you through the scientific point, at the end you are going to come together. That is what is happening. That is reality today.

It is Iin the old times that we separated the spiritual and the scientific, e. Especially if you make the spiritual practice be just simply “faith based”. , yeah, then that is what happens. When it goes beyond just simple faith, when you begin to look into it, the actual reality of how we exist, why we exist, what we are, if you really begin to look, it will come to this point.

I never asksaid, ": “Wwho are we?” because people will oftennormally mix that upthem together. Who are we? Who cares? We are somebody all the time anyway. Even if we can find we are somebody, let’s say “I am Joe Blow, medical doctor of the 16th century living in Sussex England”, h How many things does that depend on? Joe Blow, the name – medical doctor, the profession – 16th century – England, the country – Sussex, the countyvillage. To identify, you have to have all those. So you put them together. So Tthat is why I don’t say “who?” What happens is you will shift the gear, the gear between the profession (the medical doctor) and the name (the Joe Blow). Who is Joe Blow? A mMedical doctor. Which doctor are you talking about? Shift the gear - Joe Blow.

Why do we do that? Because we are dependent arising. We depend on all of those. Number one, we depend on the physical identity. Better than a driver’s license is . Tthe physical identity - . tThough the U.S. government may not accept the physical identity without at driver’s license. You say “I am here”. “How do you know you are here?” “I am here.” “No, you are not here.” That is emptiness for you. Honestly speaking. Did you hear me? That is your emptiness.

Why? Because there is no independent “you”. No independent “you”, Wwhoever you may be, you have to depend on identity. Physical aspects, mental aspects, emotional aspects, name, label, whatever. You are So and so, son of sSoo and so. It is a tradition in our culture. We say “Houppermansuberman's, son of Houppermanuberman’s”. Our usual mantra. I don’t know today whether it is legal or not. When I was in India, you hadve to write your name, but that was not enough, you hadve to add “son of Sso and so”. That is what it is, right? ItThat may make createmore additional dependence, you are now further make [dependent] on the father. So that is dependent arising. Dependent arising and the interdependent nature of existence is the essence of emptiness.

The teachings will say, if you look for the emptiness in zero, you are going to find zero. Remember Tsongkhapa’s Three Principals Aspects of the Path during the wisdom part, says, . When they are talking about the wisdom, they talk about [Tibetan phrase]. "Therefore, try to understand interdependent nature." He didn't say[It] never said “try to understand emptiness.” If yYou are going to look for empty, and sit there looking for empty, you are going to get empty. You can wait there for emptiness to be revealed to you until the cows come home. Right. You can sit there, it is not going to happen, according to that I know where I come from, from what I know. So, the real wisdom examines how do we exist. That is why [Tibetan Phrase]

The real essence of Buddha’s teaching is the interdependent nature. Interdependent-ness. That will cut your ego into pieces. Really, it makes the ego into pieces. When the ego is cut into pieces, you begin to function. We are completely overpowered by this ego, which is . Who is not our self. I have used various terms:All these terminologies we use: the dictator within me; I the precvious; I the Queen Ant; I the Queen Bee. All of those are referring to this guy, called ego. Cutting the ego into pieces is cutting through , truly. It is cutting through, “spiritual materialism” in terms of Trungpa Rimpoche’s language. If you cut the ego into pieces, you cut the spiritual materialism. If you don’t cut your ego, no matter what you do, you build up your ego: “I know better”; “I know this”; “I do this”; “I do this”. It happens eEven without saying “I am better than you.” It happens wWith or without any reason. That is the false pride. IT is the pPride that is like the lion who thinks “I am the king of animals.” But nNo matter how strongly the lion maycan think “I am the king of the animals”, the intelligent rabbit can take him down.

I think I shared that story during the summer retreat. Not because I am the rabbit. But all oft of us are rabbits too. Are you a rabbit? You are? See, there you are, the dangerous one. Dangerous rabbits.

[Audience:] Rabbit with horns.

[Rimpoche: ] Rabbit with horns. Yes, you are right.

[Audience:] Horny rabbit.

[Rimpoche:] Horny rabbit, OK, whatever.

So, the intelligence wins. No matter , even how small and weak the rabbit might be, itthe rabbit can lead and kill the lion. I told you the story. It is a very commonly know Buddhist tale. The rabbit tells the lion “Hey, there is another king who looks like you, if you don’t destroy him (there comes the “preemptive strike”) he is going to destroy you.” The lion says “where is it?” So he takes the lion down and shows him the lake and says “down there”. The lion looks down and sees another lion looking up, and he goes ‘Ohwee” and that one goes “ohweee” and more “ohweee” they go more “ohweeee”, then the lion jumps in. So the lion can’t get out any morejump out of it. No matter how weak the rabbit might be, it can destroy the lionthat. No matter howwho weak we might be, we can destroy our ego. That is what wisdom is all about.

I just wanted to establish that ground with you. The wisdom we are going to talk about is the wisdom of emptiness, which is interdependent-ness, not empty-empty. That is why it is called “empti-ness”. If it is empty-empty, you could just say “empty”, and not need to say “ness”. Or you may say “nothing”. The idea is quite simple. I must give you that idea as well. Why do you say interdependent-ness? By looking at interdependent-ness there is no solid thing there. We have toWhen you destroy the solid-ness of what we think is “me – the most important one”, “me that I must protect from all kinds of hatred, obsession, all addictions”, because and all this, that that very me has really made us hide all our negative emotions. It says, "in order to protect “me”. Then that creates, then I have “my”. My retinue, my friend, my this, my head, my hand, my thought, my name, my this, my that, my leg, my tongue, whatever. So, anything coming near “me and my” must be “theirs. That side. The Republicans. What happened to the Libertarians, anyway?

[Audience:] There are still some left in New York.

[Rimpoche: ] You think so?

[Audience:] They sometimes take ads in the paper”

That is where the division comes in. That is why you have all these emotions build up. That is why we createmake this porcupine- style of self, because of the hatred, because of the obsessions. That creates negative karma. That creates the continuation of suffering and pains. That is why we need to take out the root out where it is all coming from. It is not enough to cut the branches and leaves and flowers of the tree. In order to stop not grow the poisonous tree from growing, you must root it out. Rooting it out is the rooting out of that ego. That is why Trungpa Rimpoche calls it cutting through spiritual materialism. We all have spiritual materialism. No matter how great a spiritual person you might be, you will never want to give it up. The earlier teachers used to say even a totally dedicated person who truly renounced everything, who has gone into the mountains, who is trying to meditate in the caves, will also sometimes hope that “people down in the valley will know I am still here and I hope they will look up tofor me, I hope they will like me”. , and they think that.

That is why there is one of those great stories, about a person who went to a teacher and said: “I’d like to meditate”. The teacher said “Oh yes, you would like to meditate, what would you like to meditate on?” He says: “I’d like to meditate, and I’d like to destroy my anger.” He said “Oh, very good, then you’d like to meditate on patience. Yes, very, very good. Go up behind my house, go up to the mountain, you’ll find a cave, and do meditate on that.” So the guy goes, and is sitting there meditating. Then this teacher got another visitor, and he said: “Would you do me a favor?” He said: “yes, what can I do for you?” He said: “would you please go up on the mountaintop, there is somebody somewhere sitting and meditating in a cave, on patience. Go and insult him as much as you can, and then come back.” So this guy goes up, and sees the meditator there, sitting in meditation ng with a big holy looking, and he says to him,id “what do you think you are you doing?” “I am meditating.” “You? Meditating? My foot. You and meditating? You?” The meditator He said, “Wwhat is wrong with me?. How dare you to say that to me?” AndSo he started chasing the guy, throwing stones down the hills. So eEven up in the mountain cave, where nobody is there, these negative emotions come up. there.

If you destroy the source of the negative emotions, whether you go up on the mountaintop, or staybe in downtown Manhattan, it doesn’t matter. [Tibetan phrase] The great Marpa Lotsawa, the founder of the Kagyu tradition remained in the family as what is , what they traditionally called a “householder”. He was a, the farmer who greows the food, who cultivateds the land and collecteds the crops, and drankinks chang, and ateeats meat. [Though doing] that, He [he] also obtained total enlightenment and became the founder of the Kagyu tradition.

So it does not matter if you sit in a cave or sit in the city. It doesn’t matter whether you shave your hair or grow your hair and become a hippie. It doesn’t matter. It does matter what you do with your ego. When you challenge that, cut it into pieces, your liberation is in your own hands. That is what we intend to do with this rest of the year and the next year. We tTry to do the wisdom in that way. When you are reading the book on the wisdom, it is hard, and boring. But why do why we work through indulge through the hardship and boredomness and boring-ness? Because it will give usyou will make a breakthrough. Thank you, I have nothing more to say.

I will be here for three more Thursdays. I am not going to entertain any questions today, but next week I will entertain.

07/11/2005

© 2005, Gehlek Rimpoche, All Rights ReservedAnnouncement about a concert in New York, at 4:30 PM on Saturday the 30th. Two lamas, Losang Samden and Tenzin Tserig [sp?] are going to have a traditional Tibetan concert.

Thank you so much, let’s call it a day, and we do the dedication, with a couple of nice Migtsemas. Three.