Archive Result

Sound file:19940823GRLR

Speaker:Gelek Rimpoche

Location:Ann Arbor

Topic:Lam Rim

Transcriber:Jayapushpa

Date: 24th January, 2023

Actually ..if you look at the outline..prelimimary, actual practice, and completion….three.and preliminary has 6 preliminaries, and we ll completed that. I think we all completed all the 6 preliminaries. No? What was left. (Audience: We went quickly through request for teaching and dedication, already).Ya, we did that , right? Requesting the blessings actually ..that lineage prayer what we say. And also ..you traditionally here you do Lama gyelwa la, chak tsal lo. I bow down to Lama Buddha Sakyamuni and then you chant the mantra of Om mani padme hung or ..I am sorry, not om mani padme hung…Om muni muni maha muni ye soha. That is the Buddha Sakyamuni mantra. You do that and at the end of that, you can make a single pointed request such as…the request you may say, “You are the body of Four Kayas and you are the Lama, your are yidam, you are Guru,..” .all these type of thing or we use this ‘pa cho kyi da gyi lu ‘..your body and my body inseparable, your speech and my speech ...(*interruption) So, all these ultimate request (*interruption) Anyway, the request will be that. And since we’ve been saying the lineage prayer here, and I begin to realize how long this lineage chanting is taking place. And it is taking lot of time. At the same time we have shortened tremendously. But what we can do…probably what we should do …No, what I should have mentioned to you earlier, while chanting the lineage masters their names, and we made from there to here, from there to here, almost all. Except for the Kyabje Ling Rinpoche and Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, we are doing all these three separately. And the rest of them we are saying from here to there, from here to there, almost all those. But during that period while chanting is going on in tibetan, but if you could visualize yourself while chanting, the light and liquid coming from the lineage masters and even you don’t have them separately like during the Refuge, we have three, everything is single solid Buddha Sakyamuni form or Tsongkhapa form. And light and liquid coming from them, it is all from Buddha to your own spiritual master, unbroken lineage. From that light and liquid coming, purify all negativities that I and all my friends, not only people who are here, but most people who are not there… there is a large all. I mean like A L L, really means all, and everybody’s all negativities in general and particularly wherever we going to subject…wherever we going to touch. Any obstacles of developing that particular development been purified .and their blessings been obtained within you and that sort of visualization. And particularly if you wanted to do..if you have some difficulties facing in your life, which we got plenty…not fulfilling our desires or our friends..all these difficulties.and white light and liquid comes from the lineage masters, purifies all the negativities, follow by yellow lig0:ht and liquid coming from the lineage masters, fulfilling your wishes. And things like that. So you keep on thinking this has happened, this has been purified. This has been done, sort of keeping that way. It will help a lot. 0:06:41.0

So, now, we have to change the outline from the preliminary to actual. Would you like to..no, Dr K. Thank you. I am sorry, Steve Kronenberg. (*Interruption) Okay, so the ‘preliminary’ to ‘actual’. so the actual practice has ‘root of all development , guru devotional practice’ and what happen? (*interruption) Anyway, ‘root of all development, guru devotional practice’ and the…’actual training of mind’. Would you like to write ‘root of all ..guru devotion..’. ‘guru’(Rimpoche laughs) Alright, anyway, so I would like you to..while he is going to write this..I would like you to refer to the root text now. We haven’t refer to the root text until today. We’ve been going on the preliminaries. So, the root text you have here…I don’t think everybody has the root text. Those who do not have root text, would you like to pick up , it is there. (*interruption) is anybody needed the root text here? (*interruption) Alright, I am sorry, can you share with each other nearby? So that’s what it is. So, okay, if you look now here..my English is bad, please forgive me. But if you look at here, the first in the “Lines of Experience’, that is the title of the book, and then 1,..’I prostrate to Buddha..’ this whole this thing..it is actually in that prayer, when you read, ‘puntsok ge lek che wai..../” This is the translation of that. So, that I explained the other day, so I am not going to explain it.Should I explain it? Maybe, maybe. ‘Phun tsog ge lek che wai trun pey ku’. In English it is upside down, so I have a problem. In tibetan ‘I prostrate before you ‘..it comes the last line. And in English, it comes the first line It goes upside down so.. ‘Phun tsog ge lek che wai trn pey ku’..I am going to do according to tibetan, that’s I know. ‘Your enlightened body is born out of ten and millions of positive virtues and the perfect accomplishments’. That comes the first in tibetan. What does that mean? When you become a buddha, when you… remember each and everyone of us we can become a buddha, and we will become a buddha. Sounds strange,..(Laughs) but that it is. I am sorry,really. You may not call it ‘buddha’ or you may call something else, whatever it is , but actually when you become fully enlightened , that is the real thing. You know when we say ‘buddha’, you don’t have to look a strange look of historical Buddha. And so, “Am I going to be like that?’So, not that way. The person when you become fully enlightened, we from my heart, or from my practise tradition, we refer that as ‘buddha’ whether there is extra hair on head,or not, when you are fully enlightened. So, the body what you get? The fully enlightened body is not an ordinary body at all. That body is the result of tremendous positive karma. Actually what we do today? We do lots of hard work. We build up lots of positive karma; we try to purify negativities. Every body say, ‘I will like to do the right thing’. Nobody would like to say “ I would like to do the wrong thing” unless you are wrong person. If you are wrong person we say, “I would like to do the wrong one because I am the wrong person” (Rimpoche laughs). just joking. But everybody say ,”I would like to do the right thing” What does you mean by ‘right thing”? Actually means ‘I cut out negative , I would like to build the positive’So what will happen to all these positive that you have collected, accumulated? What will happen ? Every part of your body , every part of your mind, every part of your own activities, will become those positive things will become that. So, that’s why the body of the Buddha, when you praise Buddha, the body of the Buddha is the accumulation of ..whatever they say…(Laughs)..millions of positive virtues and perfect accomplishments’. That’s what they referring to that. Actually you have a thing called ‘mandala’, right? Everybody knows that; evey body heard because nowadays we make big shows out of mandala, right? Sonam and Kelsang came and made sand mandala and we look at it and we say, “Ah, how beautiful’. And there’s a book been produced and you see picture of mandala, and we say, ‘This is mandala’ We can see the thangka, and we say, ‘mandala, mandala, mandala’. We sort of saw diagram thing sort of thing. And people say, “What is mandala?’ And people who doesn't know anything says, “It is some thing to do with tibetan Buddhism or tantric, or Vajrayana.That is the answer. Some people who knows little more than that, “This is a diagram of some enlightened beings , yidams or deities environment or house or palace’, you said. What else can you say, right? 0:15:41.2

Actually what happens is when you become fully enlightened, not only you produce your body out of that, you will also produce your environment. And that comes the perfect faultless environment comes out of that. And that is your own environment, produced by the positive works that we do, the positive accumulations that we do.So, for example, when you produce your own mandala, your own mandala will have four doors. That mis the four directions. Every direction has a place to get in,the door maybe shut or open, but it has to be door. So, like the mandala has four doors, right? Four doors, right? So where these four doors come from? Did somebody built up? No, nobody build up, nor carpenters build up there, mandala doors. Nobody. No masons, no carpenters, nor electronic produced either. Neither it is electronic produced. Nor is a computer game either. So where do the doors come from? Like in mediating mindfulness. Remember we have Four Mindfulness… the body mindfulness, the feeling mindfulness and mind mindfulness and (Audience: external ..) External phenomena mindfulness. And these four mindfulness whatever we meditating, that will become the four doors. So if you have mindful doors, better than security ..the alarm which rings in police station which after they may not come after 15 minutes, or something. It is better than that. Likewise like this, Four Mindfulness mediation mediated the virtues, the positive karma that we accumulated becomes the four doors of your environment. Likewise, each and every thing in your own environment becomes the result of your own positive karma. Therefore even your body, the body most important thing with you, is the result of very good karma that we have collected. Those things become that. And that’s why pure body is not the body that we have. It is the result of Second Noble Truth and it is the actual example pin point of the First Noble Truth,. No. At that time it is the Third Noble Truth becomes your body and the cause of your body becomes the Fourth Noble Truth. The change was made. At this moment we have the First Noble Truth body and the cause by Second Noble Truth. At that time it changes to Third and the Fourth. So that is how what happens. That’s what it meant…’.born out of millions of tens of millions of positive virtues and perfect accomplishments’. ‘Your enlightened ‘ …what is it? Is that ‘enlightened’, right? ‘Your enlightened speech grants the wishes of limitless beings’ Thar ye dro wai re wa kong wey sung. Ya, that’s right. So your speech can fulfill the wishes of millions of people. That’s what you are praising Buddha, right? It is the quality of Buddha that we are talking . But what’s happening is that quality we can get it. We cannot forget. You are praising there but we are reminding ourselves. Remember I always told you when we are bowing down, that means not only we just bowing down, we are demanding the quality what they have. We are admiring and also express, “I like to have it”. The quality is the speech quality to be bale to fulfill the wishes of all beings.Why it is so simple? Why the wishes of all beings? Every body wants to be happy; nobody wants to be suffering. There will be nobody who “I like to suffer” unless you recognize pain as pleasure, then that is different. You may go to very very far away, real extreme to get pain ,if you think pain is pleasure. People do that, right? We talked long time ago, so I am not going to repeat here.(Laughs) I am not going to repeat here. Unless that everybody would like to have happy, pleasure and joy. And where is coming from? It is coming from the positive karma. The cause of all joy is positive karma.No negative karma can give you joy. So it has to be positive karma. Where are we going to get the positive karma? By doing the..by doing a perfect work. By doing the positive accomplishments makes the positive karma, right? So the Buddha with experience of developing Himself, he be able to share his won development through speech. And that is communication, expressing His own development. You can even..you know people express your own message through various ways …through art, through music, through performance..that is art , and through speech. No matter whatever you do, the best way to communicate is through conversation, one to one, you talk to each other. You ask questions, you answer, you share, you raises doubt. And that is the best way to communicating. Right or wrong? And there is a electronically you can communicate now. You can make lots of pictures and you can show them. Even then the conversation is still better than that. There is an edge over that. I mean the picture is great to convey message, no doubt. The television thing nowadays you know, like 5 seconds ow whatever it is, will make big difference in the American politics , as well as, you know the economic and politics, it makes difference by 5 seconds of television projection , which is not great.

In my opinion it does does, I don’t think it is great. You don’t get deep knowledge at all. You don’t understand. You have superficial information, superficial knowledge, then experts sit there and they will think, “how to manipulate that picture. How best way people to think”..it is total manipulation, I am sorry. It is0:24:01.9

So, the best of getting the information and saying, you talk through , you share the things. Right. And one of the great teachers , called Khunu Lama Rimpoche,who died like now, 15 years ago. He is from the Indian border and studied in Tibet and then remained in India like Indian sadhus, you know, in that area. And he wrote..nyi ma wa …ka ya sen?” He said the moon is very bright and the sun is very bright, electricity is very bright. However those brightness cannot clear the darkness of the ignorance within one’s mind, which can come through one after another repeated conversations, like what…I forgot..like running electricity through wire or something. He gave that example, and it is true. The really thing is…the real communication is through talking. I mean through conversation. That is best way. That’s why Tsongkhapa even look in all the Buddha’s activities and Tsongkhapa did not praise Buddha for his magical powers…the magical exercise, magical example. Who does great, wonderful but not a big deal. But he praised de ba ..kun la sung la cho ying…?” All the activities, the best activity is the speech because through which you can communicate, you can really…Might not be the best..might not be enough. But the best what we have is through a conversation, through talking, right? And people when you want to convince somebody , everybody will look for time to talk to the person, so that you can convince, right? And that is what it is. That’s why ‘wishing fulfilling for the speech’. When you praise the speech of the Buddha, doesn’t say it is beautiful, ; it doesn’t say it is nice to the ear; it doesn’t say it gives me pleasure; but it does say ‘fulfill the wishes of others”. Which means the message the Buddha give is based on His experience. The experience what He had can share through communication, through speech. That’s what it meant. 0:27:06.5

“Your enlightened mind sees all….what is it (Audience: knowables) knowables as they are” So mind means …supposed to be all knowing, right? If enlightened beings...if you become enlightened and if you still don’t know, then there’s a problem. (Laughs) If you still don’t know, you are not enlightened. So that;s why enlightened mind should know all. That’s why is called ‘enlightened’. If you have limitations in that, you are not enlightened. That’s what it is. Another words, lots of people think or even claim, “I am enlightened”, not me, this one , but they point finger to themselves saying, “I am enlightened. We are deeply enlightened ” Show you are deeply enlightened. But if you don’t know what you have in your pocket , you don’t know what is coming to you the next hour, then it is not great enlighten at all. So, one thing you have to know. Our own mind is no mystery to ourselves . That is absolutely true. Your own mind is never mystery to you. Mind is difficult complex and limitless and all these, no doubt. They are all true. But whatever you have within your mind is not a mystery to ourselves. So, therefore what you know and what you don’t know is only you know; nobody else knows. You know that. And when you don’t know what you know, one thing you have to know is you are not enlightened. Okay? That’s what it is. (Laughs) What is it? It is true. It is true. A lot of people pretend to be “I am enlightened” Or, they believed they are enlightened. But virtually you don’t know anything..So..that is a problem. So that’s why when they praised the Buddha, “Your enlightened mind sees all knowables as they are” which has meanings, Malu she ja ji zhin zik pey thuk.Sha kyey tso ..because one of the best of the Sakya clan..so I bow to you..That’s what it is. ‘Bow” again it is in English bow , ‘bow down’, which really doesn’t mean much. In tibetan the word bow here is “ chag tsel” two word. ‘Chak’ sort of ‘pay respect to you ‘. and the word…the accompanying word ’tsel’, means ‘seek’. So I bow to you, I seeking’. what are you seeking? I am seeking nyour quality. I am not bowing down to you because you are you. But I am bowing down to you because you have those qualities. I like them and I like to have it for me and that’s why I am bowing down. It is sort of self motivated a little bit. But it doesn’t matter, it is okay. You see the quality of the other person, so you bow down. At the same time you express “I want those qualities,” Remember in the Mig tse ma…those of you who know Ganden Lha Gyema, first you say, “Oh, you are like Avalokitesvara …your Compassion is like Avalo..Your Wisdom is like that of Manjushri. Your power is like that of Vajrapani. Then you say second time, ‘Oh, ya, you are not only like Avalokitesvara, but you also has the quality of Avalokitesvara. You also have the quality of Manjushri. And the third one says, “Hey, you are Avalokitesvara; you are Manjushri; you are Vajrapani. So make me like you. Remember? Make me like you” boy you better make me like you, otherwise you going to get it” (Rimpoche laughs) So it is almost to that point. And that is how the bowing down in the tibetan tradition …tibetan buddhist tradition. Admiring the qualities and seeking it. Expression of ‘I want it ’it is not like military salute. In the military,,you have to salute officers. Right? If you don’t salute, you got court marshalled or whatever it is. So that is about it. It is different here. Okay? 0:32:17.0

So now, the second part, Maitreya, Manjushri .. and if you look in this da me ton pa de yi se kyi chok, I explained last time, so I am not going to go over that. So, the second is actually Da me ton pa de yi se kyi chok. Gyal wai dze pa kun gyi khur nam ne. Drang me zhing du trul pa nam rol was. Mi pam jam pai yang la chag tsel lo. So, it is Manjushri and what is it? Maitreya. Then the third one is Nagarjuna and Asanga and all these. So you know lineqage thatwe did the other day, so, they are there. So I am mnoit going to go. So, now, the fourth one. The fourth one is to Atisha or Dipamkara , Atisha, same thing. That also we do not need to explain. The fifth one is, for all the masters. In one of our …this book right here, when you have these things . ‘To the rest of the masters” No, I mean “To all other masters” Okay? ‘Rest” seems to be ..or maybe..I don’t know. That is translation of this. Fifth one, spiritual masters. Now, the sixth one, (*Interruption) ..Now the sixth one it says, ‘stage of the path to enlightenment have been transmitted intact by those who have followed in order, both from Nagarjuna and Asanga, ..” That part, that particular portion (*Rimpoche recited the wrongly wrote one..then ) Dzam ling ke pa yong kyi tsuk gi gyen .Nyen pai ba den dro na lhang nge wa. Lu drub thok me nyi le rim zhin du. Lek gyu jang chub lam gyi rim pa ni. Kye gu do don ma lu kong we na. Dam pa rin chen wang gu gyal po te. Zhung zang trong gi chu wo du wai chir. Pal den lek par she pey gya tso-wang yinSo these are talking the qualities of the lam Rim, the six and the seven. It is talking the qualities of the practice what we do. It is telling you, it is intact coming from Buddha and then Nagarjuna and Asanga, the most important Indian teachers and scholar. Can fulfill every desirable aims of nine kinds of beings. So these are the little traditional things..nine kinds of beings and all these. Don’t worry about it, it will come ma little later. So don’t spend our time counting what nine kinds of beings and all these.” They are a power granting king of precious instruction.Kye gu do don ma lu kong we na. Dam pa rin chen wang gu gyal po te Because it says it is like a king who can grant everything . Remember Buddhism came from 2500 years ago, it is a kingdom. At that time, the king has most power . and if the king wishes to do something, it gets it done. So, they are giving you examples like this. The practice what you do is , even is like a king. So it can fulfill your needs. Dam pa rin chen wang gu gyal po te. Zhung zang trong gi chu wo du wai chir.. I better explain this.. if I try to jump..doesn’t mean much. 0:37:04.7

Why this is called ‘wish fulfilling’? and why it is called ‘like a king’ Like traditionally king is the owner of everything;king owns everything. Right? During the kingdom’s period, I mean 2500 years ago, when it is kingdom, the king is all Lord of everything. King owns everything. The rest of them called ‘subject of king”So if the king wants to give something, he or she can give, not others. And when they want to kick somebody out, he can do, she can do, no others. The king has ultimate power. Right, in olden times. Likewise the practice what you have can develop..can deliver ultimate development what you wanted. Meaning this practice can lead you from today’s level where we are, to absolute top level can be developed through this practice. And that’s why they called it ‘they have the power like a king who can deliver whatever the desire you want to. Zhung zang trong gi chu wo du wai chir. Pal den lek par she pey gya tso-wang yin. The other one is saying, no matter whatever practice you may see everywhere different things, different people has different practice. Every little practice you get it in the spiritual path if you look today. There is a million of different spiritual path. Everybody has something nor another called the ‘spiritual path’; everybody has , right? Different paths. Or some people will tell you what? Do nothing and sit idle . Or some people will tell work hard and do this and that. That’s millions of different spiritual paths., right. Or, some people will tell you “Just feel it” Some people will tell you, “Do this, do this..” All these are different spiritual paths. What does Buddhism have? Different than that. Particularly this Lam Rim has different than that. All these different practices , they have one little goal, and one little weigh. One little goal and one little weigh, (*interruption) Okay. So, any practice you do, it is capable of fulfilling that little goal and they have the complete path of to fulfill that little goal, no matter what it might be. But the difference here is this one is not focused to one little goal. This one is focused to ultimate whatever you can reach ultimate level. The ultimate level which we called it ‘buddha level’, It is capable of delivering that. So therefore it is capable of delivering any other small little thing wherever they are. So, Zhung zang trong gi chu wo du wai chir. Pal den lek par she pey gya tso-wang yin.The thousand different practices, all their essence of delivering is in here. There is nothing which you cannot pick up from here . That’s why it is called ‘essence of it’.0:41:12.0

I must tell you a little story here.When Atisha started writing this earlier, a little shorter practice. And earlier Indian and the Tibetan scholars said all the volumes of the Buddha’s Canons and commentaries…there are hundred of different volumes, they said, all the volumes started shaking. And why the volumes is shaking? They say they lost their hearts . So the essence… you know like the Asian says the life is in the heart. And so all your like knowledge, you say is it is in the brain. And in the tradition it is in the heart. So the consciousness, the soul remain in the heart. They say all the essence of the heart been taken away out of all the volumes and made small little thing to be able to practise. That’s what it is, in none way. In another way, if you have understanding of the path, our base on this little teaching, when you look to any other books, any other teachings, any other practice, it will open up to you. Because it is like a key opening all different doorways. This goes both ways, ‘they collect the streams of thousands of excellent classics, .”That’s why it goes both ways. Understood or not understood? Anyway, that’s what is.0:42:59.3

Now the next one is , talks about it , the qualities. Ten pa tham che gal me tok pa dang. Sung rab ma lu dam par char pa dang. Gyal wey gong pa de lak nye pa dang. Nye cho chen poi yang sa le kyang sung.Four important qualities. Out of these you can know, you will know all the spiritual paths are not contradicting each other. So you can see through this. By learning this all the spiritual practices do not contradict each other. Sometimes it looks like contradicting. Some people will tell you cannot eat meat, some people will tell you must eat meat. It looks like contradicting , right? But each one of them has its reasons. That is just giving you an example. Right? Some people say you cannot have desire; desire is bad. Some people say it is okay, you should have desire. If you don’t have desire, it is bad. So, this looks like contradicting. So, by knowing the Lam Rim, not a problem. Problem you can solve. You can find all the spiritual paths are not contradicting..all correct spiritual paths are not contradicting each other. You will know. Ten pa tham che gal me tok pa dang. Sung rab ma lu dam par char pa dang.All the teachings of the Buddha, no matter what it is, sometimes in Tantra and the Sutra, looks different. So, whatever the different level the teachings may come, it meant for one individual to obtain enlightenment. There is nothing you can throw it out in the spiritual path. That is you will know. Ten pa tham che gal me tok pa dang. Sung rab ma lu dam par char pa dang.

Gyal wey gong pa de lak nye pa dang, the third quality is you can really understand true message of the Buddha. This is like a key to open the true message of the Buddha. That is Gyal wey gong pa de lak nye pa dang. The fourth is the most important one,Nye cho chen poi yang sa le kyang So that protect the individual from the faults. (*interruption) I try to jump. It should be in the ‘7’ somewhere. (Audience: Yes) (Audience: ..protects you as well from the abyss of “the great mistake”). Yep, ..’Buddha intended and protects you as well from the ..” What is this word? Abyss? (Audience: Abyss) Abyss of “the great mistake”. So, what is “the abyss of great mistake’? I don’t even know this word ‘abyss’ anyway. So, “the great mistake” here is our actions that are (*interruption)..our actions that are influenced by our anger, attachment, hatred and particularly ignorance. Any actions that we act by the power of ignorance or anger or attachment , it is “the great mistake”. People kill people with (* error in recording..)0:47:12.3

…in our area these days, not in Ann Arbor, but in United States. People shoot for nothing, for nothing, you know. That is different. But,otherwise, sometimes people kill people because they have a problem and the other person is totally influenced by its anger. And that’s why they kill each other. The mistake is go to the anger . Nowadays we see people killing for money, people killing for sake of killing, or even without thinking like 13, 14 year old kid killing somebody else. I mean it is beyond limit , but within the limit, with reasonable understanding and if you look at it why somebody kill somebody, because it is anger. It is anger or hatred, that’s why they did, right? That’s why it is referred them as …what is the word, ‘abyss’ or something, of “great mistake”. Ya, “the great mistake”, that’s what it is. So they are our habitual patterns. We do this habitually. We have been doing this for millions of years. It is nothing new. If we do not know how to do this, it will surprise. If you do know how to do this, nothing to be surprise because we have been doing this for millions of years. Anything negative, we know it, we are expert. I always say this. You know, in the television you have interesting program and they say, kids not allowed to look or do something, particularly ‘playboy’ or something; all these things. And you will also try to see the kids will not look that program or if there is a ‘Playboy’ magazine, you hide them or don’t let the kid see it, or something of that type; everybody does. And most surprising you find it under their bed or something, or in their beds you find these magazines and all that. And it is nothing surprise. No matter how much you try to hide them, how much try to disinform them or misinform them, they know more than you do. You know why? Because habitually they know it. In the previous life we have been doing this, In the our past lives , we have been doing this, and we are doing this in our life now . If we don’t change it, we will do it in our future life also. That is what we called it, ‘habitual pattern’; habitually we do it. So, now, after learning the Lam Rim, after practising Lam Rim, that’s why supposed to be change it. And that’s why I said a number of times, I said, and I noticed people ..it makes difference in people’s lives. People’s life, it makes difference. And that’s what because of this. Because of this, we are sort of protecting ourselves from “the great mistake”. Automatically we will do it. So, we are protecting from that. This is the changing of our way of approaching. It is hanging…this will change us to share the good qualities with others rather than put out cold shoulder. And that is the quality this makes individual. Just by reading it, no. Just by listening it, no. By thinking it, by meditating it, by try to correct yourself, on the basis of information you get on this. That makes difference. That is the actual beginning of that individual guiding to a correct path. That is the actual beginning of the individual’s efforts to bring joyfulness in your life and other’s life, and thereafter. This is the beginning of individual personalized effort to bring peace. This is what it is all about it. That’s what they are talking about it. 0:52:49.1

Ou know everybody likes to say “Peace, peace, peace”…this for peace, world peace, and blah..blah…blah..We do that too. We burn incense and we called that “for world peace”. ya, we do it; it’s good (Laughs) but I don’t know whether going to bring world peace or not, who knows? But it is a good thought.(Laughs) and nice gesture. But what really brings is this one. And don’t ever forget, that “ Charity begins at home.” That is American expression. The peace begins within ourselves. We may talk million different ways, facing out “world peace, peace, peace, peace , peace,peace” It becomes pieces. (Laughs) But if you begin from your own heart, and change it, and then it becomes, really. And one person makes difference, that is how you do. When it makes difference to you , it will make difference to your companion. And that makes to another. This is a slow process. Slow process, right? And that gradually works. It doesn’t do that way. We may think we can bring the peace in the world by whatever..Gulf War or something. How? It is not possible. What did they do to Saddam Husein? Kill him off? Kill him doesn’t do any good. (Rimpoche laughs) Tell him, he wouldn’t listen. So what? The same thing with Cuba now. All these. So it has to be gradual…gradually it has to go. The changing of the mind, changing how the individual react to whatever it maybe outside, and that begins with ourselves. I mean actually if you want world peace, first you have to have your family peace. You have to know how to deal with your own spouse. Instead of hitting the frying pan on the head, for a change, might as well bring a piece of flower, or something. Instead of blaming, the other thing, sort of show little understanding. And all of them you can and you will., if you meditate according to these steps . That will change. And don’t think of changing the whole world together, big way. It is not possible, unless you ‘ve been able to produce hurricane or something. Hurricane of Love Compassion.It won’t work. Lots of people will be caught be carried away somewhere and afterwards dropped off somewhere, middle of nowhere, you know. So, it won’t work. It has to be gradual process. And that’s what it meant, “there is no instant enlightenment”. No matter whoever says what. There is NO instant enlightenment!No, no, no way! No way, true. It has to be gradually worked. Nothing is instant. Maybe you have instant coffee. It is not that good (Laughs) and it is the same thing, it doesn’t work. So, it has to gradually go. And the way they gradually go is this. There is no other way, I am sorry to say. But really there is no other way, not that I know at least. But even other ways, even other ways..you look at it, they sort of say ‘Ya, you can obtain enlightenment with no problem at all,” but then they gradually bring you back and again the same path repeat again. That’s what it is. So, these are the qualities that Lam rim has. Okay? 0:58:08.4

Sung rab kun gyi nying po du du wa. Tsul di thun re tong dang nyen pe kyang.Dam cho che dang tho pey phen yon tsok. Lab chen du bar nge pe de don sam. The eighth…”There is much merit to be gained from listening and all these..these are the normal..true propaganda of this, so let’s jump that off. 0:58:24.7

Okay, no. 9, ..not 9, is it 9? The no. 9, De ne di chir le tsok ji nye pey. Ten drel lek par drik pey tsa wa ni. Lam ton she nyen dam pa be pa yi. Sam dang jor we tsul zhin ten pa ru. Thong ne sok gyi chir yang mi tong war. Kar zhin drub pey cho sam nye par che. “From now on, it says at the end, I, the yogi,,have practiced just that.If you would also seek liberation, please cultivate yourself in the same way.” During the teachings we say this. If you are reading, practising yourself, you don’t say this.You change. You change here to “the great masters have practised just that, if I would also seek liberation , I should cultivate in the same way.Sort of change the word, when you say yourself. Anyway, subject of this no.9…is guru devotional practice. And in the tradition of this teaching the guru devotional practice is called “the root of all development” . And before I go in to the guru devotional practise, I have to make three outlines. The quality of guru or rather what you say, ‘criteria of to be a guru’. The criteria of disciple, or relationship between the two. So, root of all development…qualification of master, right. Thank you, right. That is good English. The qualification of master and the…And what is…and that is very important. Okay. Everybody can say “I am guru”, and if you have a little pony tail, you do not become a guru. Or, if you shave your head, does not become guru either. Or, if you have a nice what you call it?…You know this (?) …has so many photographs and statements. (Audience: portfolio) Huh? (Audience: Advertising their portfolio) Ya, portfolio, that’s right. Portfolio or (Audience: (voices) resume) Resume, ya. Portfolio,there you go. It doesn’t become a guru. So, what are the…it is very important. By, the way, what is ‘guru’ mean? What does ‘lama’ means? These are ‘guru’,’lama’ is the same thing. ‘Lama; in tibetan language, and ‘guru’ in Sanskrit. And if you really boil down to on the basis of the Indo European language, …boil down to, if you translate the ‘guru’ at the end will become ‘heavy’. heavy, heavy. Doesn’t mean fat.. (Rimpoche laughs) It is heavy. Heavy in what? Heavy ..you know heavy. Heavy in the sense…what does that mean? Heavy in qualities. There is a lot of weight, lots of qualities. That make sense? That really means ..the lama means lama mepa. The word ‘lama’ really means ‘lama mepa’, somebody who is knows better than you. That’s really what it is. There is no one better than you. It is called ‘lama’. Nowadays it becomes a name, lama this, lama there, lama that, lama that..took as personal name now. But traditionally lama and guru is same thing. If you translate ‘guru’, it will become ‘heavy’ means quality. If you translate ‘lama’ means ‘no one is better than you’. In what? In qualities. So that is really what the word ‘guru’ , word ‘lama’ really means ‘very good quality person’.You are loaded with qualities. That’s what really is. That ‘heavy ‘ business comes down to ‘loaded with qualities’.That does really guru mean. So, what kind of quality? Now the question comes, ‘What kind of qualities?’ then, whether you are qualified to be guru or not, what kind of qualities the person should have it. So, okay, now different viewpoints will come. According to Hinayana, there are two qualities. Two qualities. Quality of stable..(Audience: stability) Stability or is it stable quality? And knowledge. According to Hinayana two qualities. The person must be stable. That doesn’t mean you’ve been crazy, doesn’t mean that. Let me explain it later, and knowledgeable. What does ‘stable’ mean here. Those who took vows, they have not been breaking their vows , more than 10 years, is called ‘stable’. That’s right, more than 10 years. Then they give 50% discount. (laughs) that’s different, okay. And knowledgeable. ‘Knowledgeable’ is rich on the subject on whatever they going to share it. ‘Rich’ in the sense doesn’t mean you have collected a lot of information, like professors do, like I am doing, bring in this book looking here, bring in that book looking here. So, that is collecting of information. That won’t do. The knowledge here is the…not only the …the knowledge must be connected with quality. The information that share must be coming from the heart and experience of the person, rather than information pouring out of books.If the information collected out of the book, and pouring out, it is dry. It is dry information. It is ?, yes, That alone will not do. All these information has to backed up by the personal experience of that person. And if you have that, you have the quality of knowledge. That is Hinayana level. 1:08:26.0

The mahayana goes beyond that. To be able to qualify as a master, or guru or lama, one must have 10 qualities. 10 qualities. I will not be able to count the 10, because I don’t have them (Rimpoche laughs) So, I consult some books and bring the information next week. The time tells me it is 9.15, I am really . The main reason is I have to stop here. Actually those of you who have the Lama Chopa book, particularly the commentary of the Lama Chopa, by the Dalai Lama. It is called ‘Bliss and Void’ or what is it? De tong yer me.. huh? (Audience: Union..) Union of bliss and emptiness. And if you look in there, they will ..they should count all these qualities. Mahayana has 10 qualities. And all these 10 qualities of the Mahayana, is counted as 1 quality in Vajrayana, plus 9 more. So the Vajrayana master has to qualify all these. Mahayana 10, all of them counted as 1 plus 9 more in Vajrayana. So these are the qualities of the person.So,whether you checked , whether it is fit to be guru or not, guru or not lama, is on those basis you have to check. These we share here. Normally…or anyway, doesn’t matter. And that is on the basis you can make your own decision. You don’t have to rely on the decision on the advertisements, or recommendations, or portfolio. That is not the way. The way and how, you check the person is by knowing the qualities of the individual. The criteria of the ? and the recommended discount is 50%. So whatever you want to give according, see it and that’s how you do it. We will have the rest of the guru qualities , he next week. That means you have basis to make judgement. Otherwise you don’t have judgement. Somebody else says ,”This is great” and you think this is great. Somebody says it is horrible,”Oooh,..did I make mistake? What did I do? Oooh oooh oooh” So you have to work like flag. You know the flag we put up? The wind blows from the left, from west towards east, the flag will always go flah..flah..flah..to the east, right? And sometimes the wind would change and then the flag will go flah..flah..flah.. to the west. So, intelligent people should not be that way. Should be able to stand in the middle ,make your own judgement. In order to make the judgement you do need basis of information. On what basis you can make the judgement. And these are…I am going to present those things. So then you make your judgement. Anyway, thank you so much. I am sorry it is late . I am not going to give you room for questioning, and Kathy has announcements. (*annoucements)and MigTze Ma1:20:24.0