Archive Result

66

20131215GRAAETB40

0:00:41.1

Good morning everybody and especially those of you in Ann Arbor. My apologies, last week I thought I will be in Ann Arbor, and many of you have come with the snow, but I am still stuck in New York and I am sorry about it. But I am very happy to talk to you from New York.

0:01:10.7

So, as you know we have been talking about Tibetan Buddhism and that mind is more important than matter or material. Then we talked about the principal mind and the secondary minds. Out of the secondary minds right now we are talking about the 10 important ones out of the 51 mental faculties. Out of the 10 we have already talked about the 5 omnipresent mental faculties. We are in the midst of talking about the 5 object-sustaining mental faculties, such as aspiration, conviction, remembrance, concentration and wisdom.

0:02:53.6

Out of these we already discussed aspiration a little bit. Actually it is wishing, wishing to achieve something, whatever you desire and you want to get. That is your wishing. Dun pa is something that you like to have. You like to get it. It is really a desire to have it. Without that there will be no interest and without that there will be no active mind and without that nothing is going to happen. You know that. So that’s why the first mental faculty, aspiration, is must.

0:04:01.7

The second is mö pa. That is also extremely important for us. Sometimes the English translations are borrowed language and sometimes they are correct. ‘Conviction’ seems to be a word used here. Here, according to Asanga, the question is raised in his teaching: what is mö pa? The reply is: a subject or object that you know and whatever and however you are used to it; however you know and are aware of it, holding it as it is. It is not going to change. Maybe I should use the Tibetan word a little bit, because there may be some people who are looking for it. In that case it says:

mö pa gang zhe na/ nye pai ngo po la/ ji tar nyie pei chin tu dzin pa te/ min tro pa li gyi ne gyen no

Whatever subject or object you have understood and have a conviction about, hold this as it is, without changing it.

A little bit of stubbornness is here, because if you keep on changing then you lose a lot of your principles. Particularly activities or the purpose of this mental faculty, whatever your conviction is, is not going to be lost. It will be holding. It is easy for me to say and easy for anybody to hold, when you talk about Buddhism. When we take refuge to Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, we talk about the qualities of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Then we have the understanding of what Buddha, Dharma and Sangha are all about. It is easy for me, particularly when I talk about Dharma.

0:08:56.0

Dharma is nothing but spiritual development. What is spiritual development here? It is interesting. Spiritual development to me at this moment is this: when we are engaged or about to engage in any negativity and suddenly we realize the disadvantages of that, let’s say it’s hatred or anger or hurting people. Sometimes our habit is such that though we don’t like it, we say that we can’t help it. So we hurt people. We know it’s not right, however, we say we can’t help it. Whether we can’t help it or not may be either true or an excuse. We are bothered a little less. That’s because we don’t have a very strong conviction of those negativities and their severe consequences. These severe consequences are not experienced by any Tom, Dick or Harry, but by yourself, whoever is really engaged in this. That person themselves will be responsible, in the sense that whatever the consequences may be, that individual has to bear them.

0:11:18.9

Nowadays, sometimes political leaders say that “I am responsible. The buck stops with me.” But there are no consequences. That is not really being responsible, but irresponsible. For a responsible person, whatever the consequences may be, that individual either physically or mentally or emotionally or financially bears the burden. That is really what it is. When that happens, then we will hesitate to engage in or entertain violence. Otherwise, when we don’t have the consequences, so much violence is happening, even in society today. That’s because there are not so many severe consequences somehow. What can you do? That’s why there is not strong enough conviction. Conviction makes you stay on your principles.

0:13:25.6

When I said it doesn’t get taken away, I mean it is not taken away by other thoughts, like in the case of refuge and particularly Dharma or Buddha. We can talk about Buddha and mention this quality and that quality and say: great. Then if somebody else comes and says, “Maybe, but it’s not exactly like that and something else is better, more effective, more real” many of us even turn to some kind of effective ghost or spirit who is quick to do something we pray for or ask for, but without real love or compassion or anything, just simply doing something effective. So sometimes people think there are more effective and better refuge objects than Buddha. That individual person doesn’t have mö pa or conviction strong enough.

0:15:10.3

Similarly, we hold as principle that good brings good results and bad deeds bring bad results. We hold this very strongly. However, if our mind is shaky and if our mind is not properly functioning, then we lose this conviction and even your understanding that negative deeds bring negative results and that positive deeds bring positive results will also be shaken. You don’t know yet and you are not so sure, you are not convinced. This particular mental faculty is important in any field and subject you engage, whether it is business or politics, and it is very important for a spiritual basis. It is almost the root of all virtue.

0:17:09.7

I don’t remember exactly, but I think it says tsa wa mö pa thub pei sung. I can’t recollect all the words, but I think it is from Vasubandhu’s abdhidharmakosha. It means that mö pa or conviction is said to be the root of all virtues. You see how important this mental faculty is, particularly in the spiritual field, whatever you have understood, whatever your principle is. And if you are really wrong you have to accept that you are wrong. Then you have to change it. But you can’t be so easily convinced just because somebody said so. I always give the example of the flag hanging on the flag pole. If there is no wind blowing, the flag will be sitting there. If the wind starts blowing from the east to the west, the flag will swing to the extreme west, and keep on making a big noise, saying ‘bla bla bla bla.” When the wind direction changes the flag will change to the other extreme and go ‘bla bla bla bla’ over there. I am an old-fashioned person. So these are the examples of unreliable people. I am not saying a flag is not reliable. A flag is reliable. But a flag blowing to the east is not reliable because due a change in wind direction it could be blowing extreme west. It could be blowing to the extreme east or it could be blowing in the middle.

0:20:09.3

All of them are possible. That is the example for unreliability where I come from. We don’t use flags generally much as example, but prayer flags. They are also flags and they also blow here and blow there, depending from where the wind blows. Sometimes we even advise our youngsters, “Don’t behave like prayer flags.” That means to have a strong mental faculty of mö pa or conviction or whatever you may call it in English. Particularly this is really the basis for spiritual practice. Particularly if you are doing Vajrayana deity yoga practice. This is really important for this, without which I don’t see anything functioning. Otherwise your practice is completely crippled.

0:22:01.0

Shantideva said,

Ge wai chö nam tham che che/ tsa wa mö pa tu pei sung

De yi tsa wa tha to ne/ na min dre bu gom pei sung

The root of all virtues is conviction. The root of conviction is very strong knowledge of deeds and their consequences. (in reality that means karma).

When you have that, it is true. If you have certain consequences, then any individual who is doing right or wrong will have some ways of correcting. If there are no consequences, you just simply keep on doing whatever you are doing. Then it is like this Indian saying, “Aya Ram, Gyia Ram – Ram has come, Ram has gone.” So it doesn’t matter whatever it is. The day has come, the day has gone, nothing changes. That means there are no consequences. So then there is nothing to be functioning.

0:24:06.0

That much about the mental faculty of ‘conviction’. Last week I might have even used ‘belief’. Now I have to move to the third mental faculty. That is dren pa, remembrance. དྲེན་པ་ in Tibetan.

Asanga poses the question: what is remembrance? His reply is: whatever your mind has recognized and then, without forgetting, continuously holds it in its recognition. What does this mental faculty do? It gives you focus. If you are losing focus then you are losing remembrance. Sometimes we say, “I know, but I don’t remember.” To a certain extent it is true. We know it but we don’t remember. However, if you have forgotten, it means that you don’t know. Honestly. Now I don’t recall what I wanted to say. It won’t pop up in my head. Oh, there it is:

Je nai she pa ge wa o. – if you have forgotten, then it doesn’t become part of “I know” because you don’t know, you have forgotten, though in normal society people say, “I do know, but I don’t remember and I will remember later.” But when the mental faculty of remembrance is functioning, then you don’t forget. When you have forgotten, your mental faculty of remembrance is not functioning. When it is not functioning, the principal mind is not sustaining your object properly.

These are the five sustaining mental faculties. Each one of them is so important. Particularly, the remembrance is the most important point to uplift the individual’s spiritual development.

0:28:12.2

Your level of focus, the level of your understanding, the level of your insight getting better and better is an activity of this particular mental faculty. If you forget you are not improving, you are going backwards. If you forget your meditation subject, then you are not making any progress, but you are stepping backwards. This is how the mind works, right? So it is really important.

Within this particular mental faculty of remembering, there is also awareness as well as alertness. Both of them have to function well. A – if there is no awareness involved – though it is not this particular mental faculty, but it functions together. It is also dependent arising. This particular mental faculty depends on alertness or awareness, without which you will be losing your remembrance. Particularly, if you are a spiritual practitioner and if your alertness of negativities and their consequences is weakened, then it is the beginning of the side door of downfalls opening.

0:31:07.9

You know this mental faculty called ‘forgetting’. That door really opens if your remembrance is a little sluggish. So it is really important. In short, whether it is the stages of development or path of development – those of you who are not familiar, when I say ‘stages’ I am talking about the Buddhist path and the 10 stages. Each stage of those is also within the 5 different ways or paths or points of meditative states. That is very technical information inside the practice. In short, all the paths as well as stages and any qualities for improving the individual, whether it is vajrayana or non-vajrayana, any special development of concentration or meditative equipoise, is totally dependent on this.

0:33:39.3

So this is a very important point. Then what is it? Shantideva said,

“It is easy for me to lose everything, even my life, but it is not easy for me to lose mind. Those of you who like to protect your mind, do need both, remembrance and alertness.”

He says that even for the sake of life you should protect that with folded hands I beseech you.

Ch5, 23

SEMS BSRUNG 'DOD PA RNAMS LA NI

DRAN PA DANG NI SHES BZHIN DAG

THAMS CAD 'BAD PAS SRUNGS SHIG CES

BDAG NI DE LTAR THAL MO SBYOR

O you who wish to guard your minds,

I beseech you with folded hand:

Always exert yourself to guard

Mindfulness and alertness!

So Shantideva beseeches us to protect these mental faculties as even more important than our life. Here you see again, how important each one of these five mental faculties is, particularly the first three. If you have all three functioning, your mind doesn’t really have much of a problem. There is nothing you cannot handle. You can definitely manage and handle it.

0:36:27.6

But if you lose that particular mental faculty, then everything will become a little difficult. So you know how important these are. So whatever we have been talking to you about the mind and mental faculties, sometimes people may think that this is a separate mind, but no, they are aspects of mind. Mind is complicated, very complicated. It is much complicated and sophisticated than any machine.

0:37:45.8

The human body structure, the mechanical system of the human body is so sophisticated and refined that anything that we have duplicated and reproduced cannot rival this naturally-made human machine. So far this has not happened. There may be a time where we will be able to, because people’s knowledge and wisdom has no limit. The sky is the limit. There will be tremendous improvement all the time. The more know-how we have, the more sophisticated we become. I think we will be able to reproduce almost the same as the human mechanism, almost exactly. We will be able to do it. But so far we could not. That shows how difficult and sophisticated it is.

0:39:42.1

Now we are talking about the mind. That is a hundred and thousand times more sophisticated and more complicated than the physical mechanical system, much more. Also, it is more important. The physical things can be replaced. Mind things are very difficult to replace. It is only time that will heal it. It is not just taking out one mind and replace it by something else. That’s what we do with the physical body. You take out one organ and put another one in and it functions. But with mind you can’t do that. Mind is so much interlinked. If one of those things has something wrong it affects everything else. It is much more sophisticated than the human physical mechanical system.

0:41:36.1

Here when we are talking about the 51 mental faculties functioning in the mind, we are talking about a little drop of water out of the ocean, honestly. Yet, though it may be just a drop, it is a very important drop. It makes a lot of difference to the individual life – our life, our focus, our concentration, our happiness, our joy. It makes a huge difference. That’s why the mind is much more important than matter or anything physical. Particularly mental harmony, mental joy, the happiness of the individual. The body sometimes contributes to and affects the mind’s joy as well as suffering. But the major focus is the mind itself. The major activities are carried by the mind.

0:43:30.9

This is something wonderful and we have it. It is something that even multi-trillion dollars cannot buy. That is our wealth. That is our asset. That is our legacy. And we need to take care of it. We really need to take care of it. The individual as well as the collective human beings and their future depends on it. Unfortunately not so many people pay much attention to this. But those of us who know something we are very fortunate to have some kind of access to that and we need to make use of it.

0:44:49.3

I think that’s what I like to say today. And hopefully, and I am quite sure, I am supposed to be in Ann Arbor live next Sunday. You all can see me, but I can’t see all of you. So hopefully I will be able to see people in Ann Arbor next Sunday. So I talk to all of you next Sunday.

0:45:30.5

After that we will be taking a few Sundays off before the New Year and also after New Year. We will be beginning on whatever Sunday after January 15th. Maybe the 20th or whatever the Sunday is. In between they are going to put up some old talk for those who would like to revisit or something. Other than that see you next Sunday and thank you so much.

0:46:22.8