Archive Result

20120826GRAATB34

00:00

Good morning to you and I will continue to talk from what we talked last week. We talked about the development of the five paths within the Mahayana. As I said earlier: the names of the paths or stages are the same names on the Theravada level or Mahayana level: path of accumulation, path of action, path of seeing, path of seeing, path of meditation and path of no more learning. But the meaning is different.

Having said that, talking about accumulation, action, seeing, and meditation, what are we talking about? There are two most important points: the point of love/compassion and the point of wisdom. These are the major paths in Mahayana. Sometimes the tradition itself talks about method and wisdom. That is very commonly used in Tibetan and I believe also in Sanskrit. “Method” is referring to the love/compassion aspects. Whenever we talk about wisdom, it is about the understanding of reality, the understanding of dependent origination. These two combined together – there are extremely important reasons. If you don’t know this you have to figure it out and then you will know. That’s what we are talking about.

The question really rises: what is the individual supposed to do? We already described how one becomes a bodhisattva. It is a major commitment that you are not only going to help yourself but also help others. Maybe I should say it the other way around. You are not going to help others only, but also yourself. Without uplifting yourself, helping others becomes a little difficult. If you don’t know what you are supposed to do, how can you show others what they are supposed to do? So helping yourself is the one of the most important things – equally important to helping others. So when you talk about compassion you can talk about altruism, you can talk about total altruism and sometimes that may sound like my concern is not included. But that’s not true. In the bodhimind itself one seeks the total liberation. Who is seeking that? Oneself, the individual. Why? So that you can help others. I want to be perfect, so that I can lead everyone to the perfect state.

0:05

When I say perfect, sometimes people may think about a very puritan type of purity. Maybe not. Perfection is really being totally free of all wrong doings, wrong motivation, wrong actions and wrong engagements. Whatever you do becomes right motivation, right action and everything becomes right – by the virtue of your own deeds, thoughts, and commitments. It is not that somehow you try to be very right and push yourself too much into righteousness. That could be a problem. We are talking about the automatic development. I can’t say it is effortless, because we have to put a lot of efforts in. But it is not forceful effort. The work and the things you do become a part of your chores, your life, your way of thinking, your way of living, your way of functioning. Everything you do becomes right, not too much forced to be righteously right. But it is made in such a way. That is possible. That is what perfection is all about. That’s what we are looking into. That’s why we say even at the beginning that we need accumulation of merit, purification.

Purification purifies, no doubt. But it also gets built in into the individual so that it becomes natural for that person. It becomes natural to hesitate and not engage in negativities, and natural to engage in positivity, not only positivity, but accumulating it. And as we normally say: it is important to work hard, but it is better to work smart. So this is functioning in a very smart way so that everything you do becomes very profitable within your own business of enlightenment.

That’s what you have to keep in mind when we talk about accumulation and purification. Not only that, we not only talk about purifying what we did wrong, but purification becomes part of our blood, so that when anything goes wrong we automatically regret that and won’t repeat it and perform antidote actions and very confidently move forward. That is really what purification is all about.

10:00

On the Mahayana path, of course you have to work hart. No one says you don’t have to work hard. But you work also very smart, so that everything you do becomes extremely beneficial. I should not use that word because it has been overused. But it becomes very effective and reaches very far – every action. That is the Mahayana special quality. Then even saying OM alone will reach very far. That is the Mahayana beauty. I did mention OM because my Mahayana is the Vajrayana Mahayana. That’s just to introduce this. However, the Mahayana without Vajrayana does not use OM. But the totality of Buddhism is the most important. The Theravada – the self- liberation essence and then the essence of that Mahayana, the pure sutra and the vajrayana combined together, that’s the real essence of Buddha’s teaching which helps the individual make it through the difficult transitions we are in. Even this path is known as the transcendental path.

You are transiting from negativities, from ego and its influence. I use the word “ego”, but remember, I am thinking “ego” as in what’s traditionally called ignorance. It is not the term “ego” provided by the psychologists that helps to build self-esteem. I am not thinking that ego. I am thinking about the ego that is manipulation, confusion and fear combined together. That confused state of self-grasping and self-cherishing, that ego is what I am thinking about. I have to clarify that, because the word ego can mean anything. So this is the target of our practice, the target of refuting, not obtaining. It is that confused, self-cherishing ego that thinks that the self is most important and that everybody is meant to be serving the self. That attitude we have is really the negativity we are talking about, the thing we have to denounce, refute and purify.

Sometimes you may ask, “Why should I purify? I have not killed anyone and not lied to anyone. I have not cheated anybody. I am not an evil person. Why do I have to purify?” May you are right. We can be very proud not be such an evil person. We are very proud that we are not the devil, honestly. But we do have a problem within us and that is our ego and our self-centered self-cherishing.

0:15

These are the two most important targets we have to purify. That’s what we refer to. It is not just about if we have lied and need to make up. Sure, that’s a wrong thing. You may have used a used car salesman’s lie, which is wrong, but not that bad. You might have lost your temper somewhere. Yeah, that’s bad, but not that bad. It happens. I always say, “We are Buddhists, we are not Buddhas yet.” So it does happen. Is that something good? No. Is it something to be proud of? No. But it’s not that bad. What’s really bad is the ego-controlling and that self-cherishing that is controlling us. With that you try to hide behind everybody else. The example given is very simple. You are sitting in a room full of people. Somebody walks through the door and starts shooting. So you will be hiding behind everybody else. Everybody else is exposed in front of you. That’s what self-cherishing does. The self will not take any blame and everything is an excuse, like it’s somebody else and we nicely justify everything by saying “under certain circumstances….” Maybe it is true, but even then, it is a good excuse. The fault really is within ourselves. And that is not our self, but our ego-grasping and self-cherishing. These are the two negative points that go against our wisdom and against our love-compassion. So by avoiding these two anti-love/compassion and anti-wisdom attitudes, one reveals the wisdom, and one reveals the compassion and the love within oneself. So it happens by clearing the opposite of it.

It is almost like we have been completely overpowered. I do remember some time ago Baba Ram Das was talking with me. He was talking about peeling the orange skin and getting to the pure orange. Here is it like that: we do have a nice orange, but it does have a skin. The skin we have is the two colored orange skins, one is ego-grasping, the other is self-cherishing. These really need to be peeled off and by peeling them off the orange comes out. It is almost the wonderful person is within each and every one of us. But what we really see is the nice-looking, juicy skinned orange or mandarine or tangerine. Where I come from, when I was a kid, we got the tangerines. When I got over here that’s the name I learnt. But in Tibet we got the big tangerines, not the small ones, beautiful sweet ones, mostly from Sikkim and Bhutan. Really wonderful. They were not like the hard orange-skinned ones that you cannot each even after peeling. Even after peeling so many layers of skin are still stuck on the orange, and then even when you get to the orange it doesn’t taste to nice, but is dry. I am not talking about such an orange. I am talking about the oranges I have in mind that you used to get in Bhutan and Sikkim. I hope they are still getting them.

0:21

So the nice person, the individual, after removing the obstacles or negativities, is really revealed. I will not say that’s the true nature, but I will say it is the really wonderful being, the person that appears. To link that, having that wonderful person with compassion/love and wisdom, we need to peel.

When Baba Ram Das was talking about peeling the orange, my interpretation was the peeling off of self-cherishing and ego-grasping. That is the actual work you do at the level of the path of accumulation. That’s one thing you do. In order to be able to do that, we engage in various things. The major purpose is accumulation and purification, no doubt. But how do we do it? How do we help and serve people? Buddha introduced six perfections for developing oneself and four perfections for serving others.

I will be talking to you about that the next couple of Sundays about these six perfections. The six perfections begin with generosity. That is something very important. One great thing in the west that I noticed is that generosity is definitely not only considered a virtue, but a great thing to do. People in the west have that quality. Almost all those with a good family background have that. They don’t think just of themselves alone. They think of others. That is very, very common in western families to a certain extent. A certain amount of income is used to benefit others, for charities, for donations. That’s really a great thing in our western tradition. That’s the great thing in the Judeo-Christian tradition which really taught us that very clearly. As you know, many good families have a certain percentage of their income that is totally meant for activities of generosity, donations, schools, churches, hospitals, for the needy ones. It’s a great tradition and really admirable. For Tibetans, where I come from, for Asians, there is that tradition too, no doubt. But it is more or less a give and take. People think, “If I give to so and so, I will get a better result.” To be honest, it is more business-building, more income-building. It’s generosity, no doubt, but that’s how some people do it – not all people. That’s not necessarily great, because the motivation behind that is that “I want to make more money and have more business, so therefore I want to give to so and so.”

It depends on the individual person. I have come across that a number of times. So and so says, “My business has gone much better, since I offered that to you. Since then that business is blooming and got bigger.” This is still generosity, no doubt about it, but it might not necessarily be the best generosity. The best generosity will not be looking for something in return. True generosity is looking for the need. If you just throw things at something that may or may not be generosity. Also giving by yourself is definitely far better than giving by some third person or fourth person and organized institutions. In the west we often give gifts through organized, charitable institutions. That is great, no doubt. They are better organized. But that has its result limitations. During the Buddha’s life time one of his benefactor kings wanted to make a huge amount of merit through generosity, so that he and his kingdom as well as his future life would be extremely wealthy. He asked Buddha what to do. Buddha said, “Be generous, give a lot away.”

The king told him a little later, “I am building houses in the town and I have people there that give those houses away.” Buddha said that was a mistake to give that away through organizations and by appointing people who give that away. He said, “If you want good merit Your Royal Highness yourself will go there and pick up each and every gift and give it to the poorest people, whoever comes there, your subjects and give it with total respect, put it above your head and hand it over with your own two hands. And if you cannot manage alone, let your queens and children individually give. Putting ministers in charge of the giving is not the way how generosity is done.”

0:31

That’s what happened during Buddha’s life time. So it is always better to give yourself, or your family members do it. That makes a direct effect on your karma and your perfections of generosity. That’s what is supposed to be done, rather than a very big, organized thing. When you hear this you may think it is anti-establishment or something, but I am not against any of the charitable organizations. They are very great and wonderful. Anyone of them, the Red Cross or anybody. I have nothing against them. But that’s what my tradition tells me. When you cannot manage by yourself, you may extend it. If you give by yourself and by your family, probably your record will not be good and it is not organized and maybe your tax deduction may not be that great. But if you are giving it for tax deduction, it may even be a problem. So generosity should really be sincere generosity. It should be generosity of generosity. That means to give it away without hesitation. In Buddha’s previous life times he even gave away his life. We are all aware that Buddha gave his blood to save a tiger family. He cut his own wrist to let the tiger lick it, so that it got enough strength to eat so that it could feed the tiger cubs.

That is not just one story. If you read the Jataka stories, there are so many of them. That may not be very suitable for us - to give our life to tigers or to dogs or sharks. We are not ready for this. I am not even recommending that. We should do whatever we can. Buddha recommended to learn how to give by first giving things that you don’t like. Although that is not good generosity, if you have so much stinginess and are unable to let it go, then that is a good start. If someone is stealing that’s different. But willingly not giving anything is a problem. There are people like that. They can’t even let anything go and have to collect to many things. If you stay in one area for a couple of years you know how many things you collect and accumulate. That’s because we can’t give them away. I was told there are people who collect and collect and collect and fill up everything in their house and then there is only a tiny, little passage from your door to your bed room and to your bed. Otherwise everything else is filled up with things. You can’t let it go. People have that. We all know there are number of people who do this.

We ourselves may not be one. But still it is very difficult to let it go. We think, “This may be useful for me.” But when and how many times? Maybe once in ten years. You just can’t let it go. That’s not the value of the thing. It is sticky stuff. That stickiness doesn’t let it go. If you have a lot of use for something and you need it every other week, other month, or even two, three times a year, of course you can keep it. But “maybe I need it once a year or once in ten years” is not that great. But of course we keep Christmas decorations, because we need them once a year. I don’t mean to throw those out. So letting it go is very important. If you can’t let it go you will have a lot of problems. Many things stick to us. In Tibetan “sticky” means the opposite. A sticky person is one who steals things. They have glue on their fingers and if they touch somebody else’s property it sticks to them. Here I am using it the opposite way. You can’t let it go. You really need to let things go.

So the best way is to learn it the easy way. Give away the vegetables that are getting yellow in your fridge. Give away the butter that is becoming blue in your fridge. When I talk about blue butter and yellow vegetables, many people don’t like it. But that is the easy way to give. Learn that way and then give better things. Then give tonight’s dinner away. That is the easy way to learn. Then give more difficult ones, more precious ones. Then you can even give parts of your body, like your eye balls. Many bodhisattvas have done that. It is very common. There are lots of stories about it.

0:40

That’s the truth. Even if you have to cut your flesh from your body you shouldn’t have any hesitation – that much generosity, that much willingness to give. We can’t do that right now. I am not saying we should do it now. But we can pray that we may be able to do that. We can pray and hope to be able to do that. Generosity is a gradual development. So then you do it gradually yourself. Also you shouldn’t give the wrong thing. It should have its own morality. You don’t want to give wrong things. For example, don’t give me sugar, because I am a brutal diabetic. If you give me sugar I will enjoy and eat it, but that’s not a good gift. It has no morality of generosity. You giving something to somebody that harms them.

If you give drugs to a person who is addicted to drugs it’s morally wrong. But if that person would die without that, if you are saving the life of the person who has such strong withdrawal symptoms, then drugs should be given to save their life. That becomes the wisdom of generosity. That wisdom should know what to give and what not. Generally you don’t give drugs to addicts. However, if their life depends on it and they would otherwise die, I should have enough wisdom to give them the drugs.

So generosity alone has all the six perfections. There should be patience. You don’t just give and throw things, saying, “Take it or not.” That is not the way of generosity. There should be respect and patience. Maybe you are giving to the poorest of the poor, the dirtiest of the dirty, but you must have respect. After all, that’s another human being. Even if you don’t have that much respect from the individual point of view, but from the humanitarian point of view we must respect that person. As a Mahayana practitioner, as a bodhisattva, as a person who is practicing generosity, one must have patience to be able to wait for that person and have respect. You are not feeding some hungry dog!

You also need enthusiasm. Whatever you give, be happy to give, be very enthusiastic, making sure that whatever you give is going to be useful and helpful to that person. You must be excited to give. You can’t be two-minded, thinking, “Should I or should I not? Well I would like to, but not today, because I like to sleep” or something. That is not right. When a person needs it, when it’s that time, give very enthusiastically, because that will be useful and helpful and if you will be excited to give they will be excited to receive.

Not only that, you also have to focus and concentrate. If you are unable to focus on what you give it’s not that great. Probably then you will give the wrong thing. So you probably give a piece of meat to a vegetarian. That’s not right. It is unfocused. You are not thinking and focusing. So many things can go wrong. So make sure you are focused so that you give the right thing to the right person so that is useful and helpful.

If you give to a person who has not idea about Chinese porcelain art a 17th cup, which is very expensive, that person will have no idea what to do with it. Probably they will drink water from it and break it. So then it is all wasted. If you don’t focus that can happen. If that happens it is a loss, a loss to the art community in the world and useful to that person who has no idea what it is.

0:48

Not only focus, you also need wisdom. I did mention wisdom a little earlier. So you have all combined together. So that’s generosity. Most importantly to remember is that you should be able to give everything you have, whatever they demand. One should be able to share and give, but making sure that you give useful things to the right person, with the six perfections together. If you do that your generosity will be great generosity. Generosity is the cause to become perfect and to have endless, inexhaustible wealth.

Thank you. 0:49:36