Archive Result

.2110Sound file Tale : 19950101GRAR8FP06

Speaker: Gelek Rimpoche

Location: Ann Arbor

Topic: Experience of the Buddha Shakyamuni

Transcriber: Steve Kelly

Date Finished 11.22.2017

Saved as ODF

Rimpoche: Okay so basically we talked about love and compassion thing. When you’re meditating, since I’m going to talk about the meditation a number of people have overwhelmingly asked me to talk about meditation.

Mediation

Yes I will do that but what I would really like to give you is the material for meditation. The material for meditation and then you can do meditation by yourself at your own home or near your own altar in near your own sacred place wherever.

I believe since yesterday whatever I’ve been telling you and giving you is the material for meditation.

You can pick up each one of them separately and meditate and think about it. I’ll share with you a story later and it is very important. Thinking about this love and compassion and talking about the love and compassion and think about this.

Love and compassion is an extremely important thing but at the same time if you are not in touch with it, if you are out of touch then it becomes something very strange. It loses the value of the love and compassion. 000203

I did not realize that for a long time. Whenever I talk to people, the moment I use the word love and compassion everybody seems to acknowledge. So I keep on thinking that I have come across with a convincing message.

There was a very interesting incident that took place on February 28 two years ago. This is 1995, so 1994, 1993 yes, two years ago on February 28.

Allen Ginsberg came to Ann Arbor and he came to do a benefit for Jewel Heart he read his poetry he did this “if you don’t know how to meditate you sit you down and all this like that. So he wrote a book of poetry called “How”. He read his poetry in from of 4000 people may be more than 4000. It was filled up completely.

What he does is all of a sudden he calls me on the stage. He does that very often. Anyway we do have some ongoing dialogue on stage. So he calls me up and asks a very strange question. He asks questions whatever it may be whatever comes up in his head.

So I answered as I had, so whatever. At that time he asked the some question but I forgot the question. He asked the question and invited a question from the audience. There were a couple of questions so I got mixed up. The answer I give was on love and compassion and this was the principal of love and compassion and I looked around at the front row, there were a couple of rows you could see.

Love/compassion as a buzzword

People are going like that so he says okay. And then Alan turned to me and said Rimpoche. I said what. He said this is a buzzword, buzzword. I didn’t even know what buzzword means. I didn’t even hear it properly. I thought he said bourgeois or something. (Audience laughs)

I couldn’t get it. But on the other hand I’m on the spotlight and these 4000 people are watching. So I didn’t know what to do. So I sort of smiled a little bit and sort of acted like a monkey and went out that way. I managed to get away. Then afterward I asked Alan what does bourgeois mean? He said what? Then basically he said bourgeois means French something in French.

I said no the word you said on the stage. Allen said yes yes I thought you didn’t get it. I didn’t say bourgeois, I said buzzword. And I said what does that mean? And he said oh it came out in the 1960s. It is a long story how the word came up. But the bottom line he said means it’s sort of out of touch. It means it’s overused and it doesn’t really convey the message.

That is the bottom line that he told me that buzzword means. And I keep on thinking about it for a while and I thought when I have time to sit on the throne. We all have a throne in our bathroom.000623

So I sat on the throne and thought about that and when you are taking a shower you can also think a lot about those sort of things. It’s sort of a meditation. That’s what I mean, meditation doesn’t really have to be in a sacred place, it can be anywhere you know. So then it brought me an awareness of that word. At first I didn’t get it, I said “love and compassion, that doesn’t have any meaning?”

What is he talking about? That was my reaction. What are you talking about? Then I thought about it awhile. I like to watch television a lot and I kept on turning the television around and Pat Robertson comes on and talks about love and compassion. Oh yes, there you go.

Then I begin to realize the word is completely overused by the extreme right like Pat Robertson to the extreme left like Ramdass. Not necessarily bad but such extremes from that angle to this angle. Everybody use that word love and compassion. Everybody. Then I began to notice there’s a construction company called the compassion construction company.

Things like that then it comes up like businesses named the compassion business, and compassion import and all sorts of things. I really begin to realize then what Alan really meant by buzzword for love and compassion. It is a buzzword. So it is absolutely true that the individual must take care that love compassion not become a buzzword to that individual.

Do not let love/compassion become a buzzword in your life

If you do so, if you did that if it becomes a buzzword, then one of the most important tools that you have to make yourself better is becoming less powerful and you reduce the power so it becomes meaningless.

Then it is a very sad thing and so one must touched by compassion and love. You must be touched and you have to feel it. Without the feeling if you go that way, it becomes out of touch. Out of touch really doesn’t work.

That was the same thought that came in my head during the last presidential election which was now three years ago right? We have this interesting discussion, whether you are in touch or out of touch.

Being out of touch

And Bush doesn’t seem to know how much a carton of a milk costs or what is the price of meat in the supermarket. On the other hand, Clinton has everything on the tip of his tongue. 001019

He know what costs this much and that much. And the people begin to say yes he’s in touch and Bush is out of touch. Remember that? And then to add on that he went to the supermarket with together with television cameras and he was shocked when the checkout counter - he’s probably never been to a supermarket for 20 or 30 years or something.

So being out of touch is really the worst thing those things were from the same period and those things came up in my head. So I just wanted to share that with you because the last election was only three years ago. Though people’s memories are short lived but still we remember that.

So if that’s not good for political purposes it’s certainly not good for spiritual purposes. So if you’re out of touch it doesn’t work. With love and compassion you must have feelings attached. You have to feel the pain that people go through but you have to have the pain yourself but the understanding and really knowing how the people really feel it.

Tibetan example of compassion

The Tibetan tradition will teach you an example of compassion. This example will draw in the feelings of compassion and show you how much you feel. Let say you are in the street and a dog has been run over by a car. The lower part of the body has been damaged and the upper part of the body has nothing damaged. So all the lower body has been smashed totally with a lot of pain yet still the dog knows it is in the middle-of-the-road so it tries to move away like the upper body pushes and try to drag the lower body. It is that sort of thing that they give you as an example 001225

What do you see? People will say oh, oh and all this you see it. you normally talk about it and you go like that. That is the feeling that you get. It means touched with the suffering of the human beings - including ourselves. Never think of looking just to the other side.

You must have compassion for yourself

Think about yourself and your past difficult experiences, your past and having compassion to yourself is very good and very important. People always intend to exclude yourself as though you are not in the group. You are excluded from compassion and everybody else need compassion over there.

So when you have compassion over there, love over there, hatred over there. and everything is over there - it is out of touch. So it is out of touch because you have to include yourself too.

But having compassion to yourself is not self pitying. 001347

There are always gaps and there is a difference between self-pity where you feel pity of yourself and having compassion for yourself. These are two different things. Pitying yourself self-pity has no goal. It makes you become hopeless and helpless. It is not really a goal. Compassion has a goal. The goal is separation from the pain remember I told you this aspect of it. Compassion for yourself is separating yourself from the pain. If you have an emotional problem have compassion for yourself and work for the separation of yourself from emotional pain. That will be a compassionate act.

Look to see how you can separate yourself from you own pain

If you have whatever, whatever problems you have. So use yourself as an object of meditation as an object of compassion and try to work for separation from the pain because you don’t want that with you.

Not necessarily physical pain, mental pain and emotional pain - all of them. If you do that, you are in touch with it.

If you exclude yourself, then everything is “they” whoever “they” may be or “those” people all those. Compassion to those, love for those, hatred for those, that doesn’t work. You must be included.

If you don’t have compassion toward yourself, you don’t know how to have compassion for others

Then if you go for “shopping” you’ll know how much a piece of meat costs, how much a bag of potatoes costs, and how much a carton of milk costs. If you don’t have compassion toward yourself, you don’t know how to have compassion for others. So that is out of touch.

It’s not that we are free of pain we all have a tremendous amount of pain with us. That is not hopeless or helpless. You have a tremendous way of how to get out of that, a tremendous way! Really, as a matter of fact, there are more ways of getting out than ever before in the United States at least.

I’m making Tibetan propaganda anyway (audience laughs). So compassion has to be in touch. Then the question arises how long does one have to meditate compassion? How long does one have to meditate love? A lot of people will tell me, well I’ve been meditating for a long time and no effect. When you are meditating 10 or 15 or 20 years and it is having no effect, it is also important to review what you meditate, how do you meditate and what is the purpose of meditation to you.

It’s also good to review and see what went wrong and where what is going wrong. 001739

It is always better to do that rather than business as usual. Business as usual will have its usual effect and therefore not so much effect on the individual. I’ll ask you this, meditation for love, what does meditation for love do – love meditation? Love meditation will give you the total protection, the way of protecting yourself is the love meditation. This is what it does. Baz won….

One of the great Tibetan teachers, Tsongkhapa, who was the founder of the Gelupa tradition that I follow lived from 1347 to 1419. Tsongkhapa wrote one of the prayers to Buddha. This prayer says Dat sung….

Meditation on compassion as protection

So without holding weapons like arrows and spears et cetera, one single person defeats millions of forces of ego. Dah sun qua ton…

Who can be a better general than you are who can defeat millions of ego force without holding a single weapon in his hands. By yourself you have single-highhandedly defeated a million forces of ego.

It’s not a good translation but the essence is there. So what Buddha did, if you know the life story of the Buddha, just before he became a Buddha got a final attack from the internal egos as well as the external egos. He got the final attack.

Okay this is interesting how many people have seen that movie called The Little Buddha? Wow a lot of people have seen it. What I liked most about that movie is the scenes in Bhutan and India. I like that the most. It’s just my opinion but I don’t think the movie is correct but the only good thing in there is the scenes in Bhutan and India. In India there is a Buddha’s life story remember that?

In that Buddha’s life story, Buddha sits under a tree and meditates and all these different hallucinated evil things come and attack Buddha. These evil things are throwing all sorts of things when they reach a certain distance from Buddha they become flowers. Remember that scene okay?

That I like the most. I need it here to use it as an example for you. That is the result of meditating love. The meditation of love makes that happen. 002144

When it is actualized, when it becomes materialized, anybody who attacks you physically, mentally and emotionally when they attack you it doesn’t affect you. You get the protection. That’s why the have the weapons being thrown at the Buddha and when they cross over a certain level, the weapons become flowers.

The shower of weapons becomes a shower of flowers. If you meditate love to that level then that is the achievement of meditation on love. When you go to see the Tibetan Lamas, they give you some kind of red thread. As part of the initiation they put red thread on your left hand or wrist. I’m sure many have you have seen this.

All of this is done in the name of Buddha Maitreya, the Buddha of love. They will give you the translation that you will be protected until Maitreya Buddha comes or something like that.

But the idea really is that your meditation on love should protect you. This thread may help you to materialize that. That is basically the reason why they give you a little red thread or a red piece of ribbon with a knot. That is the main reason.

How long to meditate on love/compassion

So your real protection is not the talisman of the red thread but it is the love meditation that the individual does. That makes the protection. So when you ask the question how long should I meditate - you meditate on love until you develop that capability.

Whether takes it takes 30 years or 100 years or 300 years or whatever it takes. You know each and every meditation must get its result. So this is the result of the meditation on love to be able to do that. When you don’t get to that level then there’s a second achievement. There is also at third achievement. The second achievement is if they try to hit you, it may not become a flower but is not going to hit you. They may throw weapons at you but it doesn’t hit you or hurt you instead it skids by you. 002448

There is a very interesting example that I have for that. I’m not sure if you were there Parma for that, on one winter retreat they had this kung fu demonstration. You were not there that year? Somebody had a kung fu demonstration. You were there right?

The Kung Fu demonstration

So what happened is one of my friends or students from Malaysia who does a lot of kung fu practice and he himself is a kung fu teacher too, a kung fu master. He himself is a kung fu master but his job is not a kung fu teacher he is a Coca-Cola executive in Malaysia.

But he is very good at that. One day he came to our winter retreat in Jewel Heart a function normally under the umbrella of Jewel Heart Organization. So we do have two retreats in the year one in the summer and one in the winter. The summer retreat is normally an open retreat anybody can come. The winter retreat is a closed retreat because it is only open to the people who do the Vajrayana practice nobody else.

So there was one winter retreat two years ago maybe three years ago. It was 1991 so three years ago. So my student does a lot of kung fu demonstrations. He is a little short fellow, he is a very small Chinese and he does the fantastic kung fu things - he does that.

He always does a demonstration for the members of the Jewel Heart because he’s very good at it. So he said to us normally, I don’t do this special demonstration but today I would like to do it.

Then he said I invite anybody from the audience to get up and hit me on the head as hard as you can. I was little hesitant I was sitting on the cushion and he sat next to me down there. Then David Jacobson, who himself is a karate master volunteered. He’s karate master in Dayton Ohio, right? He volunteered, he is more than a black belt and he is a huge guy.

I was sort of scared I didn’t know what was going to happen. This Kung Fu master just sat down crosslegged just like that on the floor and then he said okay are you ready? And he said yes in this fellow is going like this going to hit the Kung Fu master with all his force. I said don’t hit him hard (Rimpoche laughs)

They both stopped and then began again. David went with all his force again and pounded like this hitting on the Kung Fu master’s head like that. But this much before he touched the head his hand skidded and went this way. But I heard the sound of “Bung” I don’t know where or what was hit. 002858

But his hand went to this side and had sort of gone beyond this guy’s shoulder instead of hitting him on his head, it went like this. Then David described it saying “it’s like I put my foot on one of those rocks in the river which have a lot of moss or something and I skidded away. I touched some kind of funny thing and it went like that.

The three levels of protection of love

That’s what he said. It was a scary thing but it demonstrated the second quality of achievement of love. Because even if a person comes with all force to hit you, it doesn’t become a flower but it doesn’t hit it. Instead it sort of slides that way.

That is the second level of achievement of meditation on love. He is maybe using Chi Gung or Kung Fu or whatever it is but what I mean is that sort of achievement you get. This is the second category which is when people come with all the force to attack you but it doesn’t really get to you. Somehow something goes wrong with that. That is the second level achievement. The third level achievement is this, even though they hit you, you don’t get wounded.

So even if you don’t achieve changing weapons into flowers but you can have the hope of achieving the second category and even if you don’t achieve the second category, you can definitely achieve the third category and not be wounded.

So these are the result of meditation on love and just simply the word love/compassion is not enough. When I say in touch, I mean you are in touch with your feelings and your meditation is touched with your feelings and the result is you get it. When you do all three of them together then you’re in touch, if not you are out of touch.

Then you become a Bush rather than Clinton (Rimpoche laughs) okay? So that is the result of meditation on love and compassion. So what I did today is I tried to reintroduce you to what is love what is compassion. I also introduced you to the focus of the mind. I did some mind first right?

I did the mind first I did the monkey trick first. And then when you recognize what the monkey is doing, when you really know, then you begin to gradually train the monkey and tell the monkey not to do this. Instead do this, do this, do this. At first, the monkey may not listen but gradually you be able to do it.

When you come to control the monkey and it is control, if you have control issue you should have it over the monkey. So when you are able to control the monkey then you ask the monkey to focus on the sentient beings. 003256

Traditional teachings on loving all sentient beings

Or actually truly speaking, the traditional teachings will tell you focus on all sentient beings. So what they tell you is close your eyes and focus that you yourself are the leader of all sentient beings at that you are focusing on behalf of them.

Then you send your love to them and compassion to them and wishing them to be happy and enjoyment and all this. We do that. It’s a good thing to do, better than nothing else. But you have a problem. The problem really is when you meditate in that way you are actually building your ego simultaneously.

You may be building love and compassion but you are equally building your ego too. This is because you are the big director over there, directing all sentient beings who are nameless helpless dots. You know when you think of all sentient beings, how can you think of a million faces right?

They become a little bit of white stuff or whatever but then after that it’s a big sea of dots. And you’re the big guy in there the big person in there. So the nameless faceless person meditation is a problem. The problem is the nameless faceless person will listen to you whatever you told them but you don’t deal with the nameless faceless people.

You deal with individuals with a name and a face, who have feelings and thoughts who get the hurt who feel love and joy and all these feelings. You deal with that. When you deal with them they react with you differently. They don’t follow exactly what you tell them to do.

They say no no I like to do it this way. Then you get shocked, wait, you’re not supposed to tell me that, you’re supposed to follow exactly what I told you to do. That’s a problem.

Begin compassion with people you love the most

That also is not the only problem. It’s also problem of being out of touch. So the love compassion you must begin with the individual with the name with the face. Begin with the persons that you love most, the persons that you care for most, person or one or more persons whatever.

So people that you care the most. You have their names, you have their face. You feel their feelings and then you can wish to make them happy. Then you can wish to separate them from their pain, with their name with their face.

Begin in the home. Again we have the good old American saying that charity begins at home right? Good, I get mixed up whether it’s in the backyard or something (audience laughs). So charity begins at home. So the love compassion begins with your companion, with your friends, with your family. It begins with your family and friends and then extend it to others.

It is always the way to start unless you are a great beings then start with the enemy. If you’re not a great being don’t start with the enemy, it is safer to start with the family. The love compassion caring and when you do that that will change your attitude. It will change your attitude it will change your way of dealing with the other person.

You have one more extra conversation to make with your companion. You have one more thing to care about with your companion. Your way of dealing with your companion is different. Otherwise you know sometimes we have a problem. I think two or three days ago, I was shopping in the shopping mall.

I was trying to look for a tie. There was a couple with some grown-up kids. The guy is looking at some ties and wife came up and said I don’t like that tie. He was sitting there and he said “then don’t look at me”! (Rimpoche laughs) 003825

Then the grown up kid says, “hey you two”. (Rimpoche laughs) So that is the problem. So anyway she grabbed him and took him somewhere else I don’t know what happened there. And that attitude will change, if you care and you care a lot, you care and you are reminded.

It’s not that you don’t care, you really do care, but somehow you’re overwhelmed by sort of day after day, month after month, year after year, looking at the same old face and the same old attitude that irritates you all the time so these things happen.

But the attitude will change because you care about the feelings of the other person. Your care that you could hurt the other person because of this feeling and then you’ll be extra sensitive and that will be different.

That is what meditation on love compassion supposed to do in your own family with your own children with your own companion with your own parents.

I know that is an irritating point mostly, anyway. So that’s what love compassion meditation should do. If you meditate on that then that will influence the way and how you live, the way and how you function. When you do that it makes a difference in your life.

The purpose of meditation is to make a difference in your life

The whole purpose of the meditation is making a difference to your life. Anyway I wanted to talk about too many topics because then you are going to forget. These are the right efforts. The right mindfulness, right mindfulness I have to talk to you because I’m going to talk to you about mindfulness and concentration together if you don’t mind.

Mindfulness - basically Buddha taught that there are four different type of mindfulness. The mindfulness of the body, the mindfulness of feelings, the mindfulness of the mind and the mindfulness of every existence, the mindfulness of the environment, the mindfulness of the plants, the mindfulness of…. you have to know the ecological effects that you get to the individual. It is really fantastic. Buddha keep on saying that some 2500 years ago. The mindfulness of phenomenon they called it. The phenomena around you which is the environment in which you live.

This is the air that you breathe the water that we drink, the oxygen from the trees and the ground on which you build. 004202

All of those you have to be aware and mindful of their condition, their situation, their existence. It is the mindfulness of the things around you the mindfulness of phenomena, the mindfulness of body. Incidentally I can tell you a very funny story here.

The power of love meditation to avert bloodshed

A friend of mine who was great Tibetan well not really Tibetan, he is Ladaky, he is from Ladak. He is a Ladaky Lama and the head Lama of Ladak whose name is His Holiness Kushapakula. He just came to visit Jewel Heart in Ann Arbor and Chicago and Cleveland and he went to New York with me and he sort of met the people in Jewel Heart and various places. We had meetings and he had teachings and then finally he also did a teaching to the Vajrayana group. Within Jewel Heart we have a senior group called the Vajrayana group.

So he did a teaching and he is also a lifelong politician. He’s an incarnate Lama of Tibet and he is the head Lama of Ladak. A lot of people know Ladak right? Ladak is a big place, bigger than Texas in the Himalayas between Pakistan and India. It is between Indian Kashmiri and Pakistan Kashmiri. It is in the middle of the Kashmiri issue. So he was recognized as an incarnate Lama just like any other incarnate Lama and was sent to Tibet for training. He had done his exams. He had thoroughly passed his Geshe with the top top ranking in the exam, in the year of the present Dalai Lama’s enthronement. And like four years later I was born (Rimpoche laughs).

It was somewhere around 1942 or 1943 he passed his exam so he was old he was in his 80s. So he came at this time. When he was returned to Ladak, he became a politician because the people of Ladak were completely under a difficult…. 004453

He told the story. To make the story short he is presently the Indian ambassador to Mongolia. He is India’s ambassador to Mongolia. Basically, India has system that all the ambassadors, would change within two years. So he had been the ambassador for six years. That was the maximum amount allowed that one could be the ambassador at one post in one place under Indian law.

So the story, that I would I like to share with you is he happens to be very effective for Mongolia. Extremely helpful to Mongolia particularly during the transition. He told me very very interesting story. When came as the first Indian ambassador it was communist period.

So he said he had a rule that he cannot go out further than 20 miles from the compound of the Indian Embassy. He cannot go 20 miles beyond that. So every time he had to go out of the 20 mile are, he had to call the foreign office then they would send him a guide and a translator.

So he can only go out of that area with the guide and the translator. He cannot go without a translator sent by them. So he said a couple of months later he been there he said of number of Mongolians came to see him because he was an incarnate Lama and very well known too. So they came to see him. When they came to see him, every time someone came to see him, he had to get permission from the foreign office to be able to this.

After a little while there were so many of them he couldn’t get permission. Then he asked to have a bulk permission of how many people he can see. So there were like 10 people he can see in a working day. So there was a waiting list and things like that. Anyway he said the Soviet Union collapsed and the students started leading demonstrations against the government and like any other thing in East India it was exactly the same thing that happened in Mongolia - except the bloodshed. 004747

So he said there was a group of students who went on a hunger strike and group of students who were going around burning things and do things that are a little bit wild thing and you know how wild the Mongolians can become because they are the Genghis Khan people. So you really have no question.

Then he said eight of them came to see him one day and they said we are representing the change in the society so we would like to see you. His Holiness Kushapakula said no you can’t see me because I am the Indian ambassador and I am not supposed to interfere in your internal affairs.

The students said no we are not seeing you as the Indian ambassador, instead we are seeing you as Rimpoche and as a Buddhist teacher and we would like to get advice from you. So then His Holiness Kushapakula called the foreign office they said yes you can see the students but tell us exactly what they say, tell us exactly what they say. So then they came. He said as a Buddhist teacher I can only tell you that you should never indulge in violence. Be totally in the principle of nonviolence. But that doesn’t mean you have to compromise your principles. You stick to your principles, the method of achieving your principles and use only nonviolence. That is how you should do it.

There were 15 or 20 students and they asked him a little more this red thread so he gave them a bunch of red thread. They went back and he said he forgot to call the foreign office. So he called the day after or something. Later when he turned on the television it said that the students were there with the red threads in their hands and they’re giving it to the people on the hunger strike. Everybody were wearing red threads, praying and doing prostrations and all this. Then the television people went up to the students and said what you doing? 005020

They said well we went and saw a Lama who is the Indian ambassador on the television (Rimpoche laughs) and he said what did he advise you to do? So the students said as an ambassador to India he is not involved but as an incarnate Lama he advised us to totally indulge in nonviolence and don’t ever surrender your principles, don’t ever change your principles, don’t compromise your principles but strictly follow non-violence and then the government will have to negotiate with you. 005102

Then negotiate that is what he advised. They said that on television. So then they immediately called the foreign office in some ministers home. They were scared about what they’re going to say. They said yes we know, its on television anyway, they know.

But luckily then the government decided to negotiate that night with them.

So the peaceful transition that really took place in Mongolia is unlike the transition in any other Eastern European country which is non-violence is credited to this guy - the Indian ambassador.

So today he is sort of a big guru for all the Mongolians including their President and Prime Minister and speakers and also all of the opposition political leaders and everybody. He has become everybody’s guru. 005201

Pakula Rimpoche himself is definitely a person who is very strongly oriented toward love and compassion. When you yourself have love compassion very much with you, then there is an opportunity to influence and make a difference for hundreds of thousands of people. This sort of thing is actually materializing. When you meditate love and compassion don’t think that nothing’s happening at this moment, it doesn’t work that way.

It goes a long way and affects the individual. So the mindfulness of the environment is important. The reason why I wanted to share the Pakula story is not only the Mongolian event.

Missionaries and environmental disaster

A lot of people invited him here and that after the Mongolian event. The day after that he was invited by Prince Philip to visit London with the Archbishop of Canterbury and a group of the leaders to give his opinion on the environment. So he said I’m not talking in public I’m talking in (private?) and this is appropriate for me to bring.

Pakula said one of the major disasters to the environment is not only the industrialization but all of your missionaries of the Catholic tradition. All of your missionaries are the environmental disaster!

Nobody asked Pakula any questions and then at the end of his talk he the Archbishop and got up and said, you said the missionaries are the disaster for the environment - how come? Give me some explanation, I fail to understand, I don’t get the picture.

So Pakula said well I’m a Tibetan and a follower of Tibetan Buddhism and I’m Ladakie. Also I coming from Mongolia now and traditionally in these places the people believe there’s a strong environmental contact between the human body and the environment outside.

There is contact between the human spirit and the spirit that remains in the mountains, the rocks, and the trees. And we acknowledge them. They acknowledge us. We don’t mess with them. 005522

Then he said you missionaries have come out in Ladak and he was saying this in the 80s, he said your missionaries say oh this is superstitious don’t worry about it. So these missionaries keep on saying that anything that deals with the environment, the mountains, the rocks, the rivers and the trees are all superstition. So as a result of that, Pakula said your educated people will come up and they cut the trees down they cut the mountains down. So this is the fault of your missionaries (Rimpoche laughs) that’s may be a stupid statement or whatever it is. But if you overlook the connection between the environment and the spirit within that and the individuals then you really are inviting disaster too.

Be mindful of your environment

That’s why Buddha has, as one of the mindfulness, is the mindfulness and the awareness of phenomena around you which includes the environment. It’s very very important. At least now, these days, we know at least now we know. 20 or 30 or years ago we didn’t know now we know. So the mindfulness is not only the mindfulness inside but also outside.

The mindfulness of the body - that is the awareness of what the body needs. It is the needs of the body, the sensations of the body the needs of the body that includes your health care.

I’d rather stick with holistic points that’s why I said brown rice here yesterday, the brown rice and green grass and all this that’s my sort of joke with the friends who are vegetarians. Its a joke but in reality its great. A joke is a joke.

So the awareness of the body means the needs of the body this is the food that you should be having and what you should not be having. Of course it is the advantage of the richest nation in the world to have all kinds of rich food you know the cakes and chocolates and ice creams and all these.

Of course you deserve to have it however it can also get you terrible consequences in your body. So be aware of that, awareness, be mindful of the body. The body sensation and feelings within the body, don’t ignore them.

Even if you cannot keep your mind straight, keep your mind straight by focusing on the feelings of the body. The bridge in between the body and the mind is extremely important - it’s there. That is the mindfulness of the body I have to run.

The mindfulness of the feelings, there are certain feelings that you feel. Physical feelings, mental feelings, emotional feelings don’t ignore them watch them, observe them, listen to them, get their messages make necessary corrections. That is the mindfulness of feelings.

The mindfulness of the mind is extremely important. We create a lot of the negativities by not paying attention, by not being aware. We get into a problem - you get into car crash by not paying attention, by not focusing.

If you’re are all focused you are not going to hit the car not at all. 005950

Car crash from lack of attention

You get in a crash because you’re not paying attention, some kind of attraction takes you away, you know. A friend of mine in Chicago had a brand-new Volvo. There was another guy, an Asian guy who also had a new van on the road. He just drove into her and totaled her brand-new Volvo. He is a nice guy, he came out and said I’m so sorry I was watching the train and I didn’t see you.

But not luckily nothing happened to both of the persons but the cars were gone. But he was not paying attention and he was looking at the train going away and ran over the Volvo. So that is a gross example.

But actually if you don’t have mindfulness, if you do anything like drive a car without mindfulness, where are you going to land? If you have awareness particularly if your driving your own monkey and you are not aware of what you’re doing you’re going to crash badly.

So whenever you meditate, whatever you do, whenever you’re using your mind, be aware of mindfulness. Be really mindful if you don’t have that there will be a problem. And you don’t get mindfulness easily because we are so used to attraction and our monkey runs around.

So the body sensation like focusing on the air breathing on the nostril level or something because you keep on breathing automatically. So there will be some sensation if you keep on focusing your body sensation that will try to help the mind to keep it down. Traditionally Tibetans will give you an example of the wild elephant and this one guy who tries to hold the elephant down 010213

One little monkey tries to hold the elephant down, that is the example they give you. So the monkey holding the elephant down is not possible.

However if you can get the elephant to pay attention for a minute and then another minute and another minute. One it’s one minute second time its two minutes, third time maybe three minutes and that’s how you go.

So the way and how you have the monkey hold the elephant is if you focus on the physical sensation anything if your thinking on that it begins to give you training for your mind to be focused on one thing.

Be focusing on one thing if you lose your focus then you bring it back and put it on. Then you lose another one and then you bring it back and focus on it. If you keep on training the mind to be able to sit on the focus there is a surprise. You can really sit a long time. It doesn’t take that long a time to be able to do that. Beginning with the one minute you may start 300 times because you lose 300 times or more and you restart again 300 times in one single minute in the beginning.

It doesn’t matter don’t worry about it. Because everybody does the same thing. It’s not only you who cannot focused don’t give up. Everybody does that and if you keep on doing that, the next time or the next couple of months, you begin to realize you don’t have to do 300 times in one minute. You may be simply doing it 100 times. Then you may not be doing it at all. Finally you’ll be able to sit long enough to focus on that.

Long enough in the sense whatever the amount of time that you want to put in then you’ll be able to say I’m going to sit and focus on this for five minutes. So then you will not wake up for five minutes and you’ll be focused on that. That is the sign that you have well trained concentration. 010446

Now I don’t have much time I don’t know if I can talk on this in the afternoon or not. But if you study this meditation carefully what will happen is there are nine stages of development on this. And that’s five obstacles, nine stages of development and there are four conjunctions paths.

Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand

I can refer you to certain books that talk about the meditation that I know are in English. I strongly recommend you to look at a book called Liberation in the Palm of your Hands. It is a translation from Tibetan the author is the Pabungka.

Liberation in the palm of your hands there’s a chapter on meditation. Somebody told me last night that he did not have an opportunity or chance to read that and liberate myself through that. That was a joke. What I’m recommending is there is a chapter on meditation concentrated meditation in the last part of it.

So read that they will tell you all these five obstacles and nine stages and the six powers. So actually when you’re really meditating you have to have those. To recognize the problems five of them, then you recognize six powers that will overcome those problems at different times at different levels and in the four ways how you go and the nine different stages that you reach.

So all of them are clearly mentioned in this particular book and there’s also all these Buddhist books. I never read English so I’m not very good at it. But still what I heard is there is also a book called how to meditate by a woman named Kathleen McDowell.

This is enough. Liberation in the Palm of your Hands is a big one, Kathy McDowell is this much, okay? So I have to stop here because it is 12 noon. Do you have anything to announce or something? And today I’m sorry your lunch time was cut but you have a longer afternoon and please do come back at one o’clock. Try to do meditate whatever. Thank you (audience applauds)

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