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19970930GRAABWL25

A of Side tape forty-nine of 09/30/97

The word Bodhisattva refers to someone who is committed to becoming an enlightened being. That is not literally the meaning of the word or the technical definition, but it is somebody who is committed to attain enlightenment, not necessarily for his own sake but for the benefit of all beings. When you are committed in that way, then how you function, that is the Bodhisattva way of life. Fortunately or unfortunately it is presented to us in book form. I wish it was not in book form but in the format to practice rather than information. But in any case, this is the only choice left with us. That is why we are reading the Bodhisattvacharyavatara.

Right now we have reached to the dedication. Why is dedication important? Can you make it without dedication? These are the questions coming up in my head. We really have to think whether dedication is necessary. It is almost the same question as ‘Is a bell necessary on the bike?’ I think that is mainly a European expression. You need the bell so that you can ring it in order to warn people to get out of your way.

So is dedication necessary on the path? Yes, we do need it, because we lose a lot otherwise. It is the safe-guard, the safety net. It is the insurance. We know how difficult it is without insurance. It is also important to recognize what kind of insurance is needed. I am not sure whether you really want the HMO or not [laughs - this is referring to private health insurance]. The HMO has a lot of restrictions. Insurance is necessary and helpful. Similarly dedication is like an insurance company. With dedication you don’t need a separate flood - and earthquake insurance. It very generally covers everything. There is nothing which is not covered. So there is no technical fall - back. There are also several options. For example you can choose the option of total enlightenment or you can settle for less. The premium is the same. There is no increment premium. So dedication is like an insurance.

Without dedication we would lose a lot of our hard - earned positive karma. We lose that to anger and hatred. I need to explain this. We have worked hard, tried to do the best we could. We tried to apply all the possible ways and means to spend our time as positively as possible.

Look at your daily life. Look at your experience of today. Review what you have done from the since you have got up in the morning until now. You are going to find that there have not been so many big negativities. We did not cheat anybody, we did not kill anybody, we did not lie to anybody. We might have messed up a couple of lives here and there [laughs], but nothing serious. Don’t misunderstand. Messing somebody’s life up is bad. But it is not like killing somebody. When you look at how many positive things you did, there is also not that much. You might have said a few prayers here and there, you may have done your commitments. But you have not done something really great. Mostly it is neutral, quite natural. As human beings we have a natural balancing nature. But then we also have terrible neuroses. There is a really big struggle going on in ourselves between good and bad. That is why we don’t have very strong negative and positive things. So if you watch it, about ninety per cent of our time is spent in a neutral state, neither positive nor negative - unless you get angry all the time. Now how can we make these ninety per cent positive? That is very important. It is one of the most important ways of functioning in our lives. Liberation and success in the spiritual path does not depend on whether you become a monk or nun. You can definitely be successful in your spiritual practice in your own home. You don’t have to be Asian, Tibetan or Chinese. Every American is eligible to become a fully enlightened being. But it depends on how we function. There is no reservation for anybody, not for Tibetans and not for Indians. It is open to all. It is simply a matter of how we handle it. If we handle it properly, we can achieve it.

One of the best ways is using these ninety per cent of neutral states of mind and make them positive. It is very simple. It just depends on how we set up our motivation. There are two important activities, the beginning activities and the activities at the end. In the beginning is the motivation. Do not underestimate the power of motivation. This is very important. If you wake up in the morning and appreciate that you are alive and commit yourself not to waste time in general and particularly today, and then commit yourself to make the day as positive and helpful as much as possible and then dedicate that, then due to the power of the motivation, everything you do during that day becomes positive, because it is influenced by that positive motivation - unless you are a slaughterer in which case you would have to change your job. When things are not by nature non-virtuous, they can be changed into positivity, like for example, sleep, regret and understanding. All these are changeable because the mind before that made a difference.

I am not just saying that. Look at the people who taken vows, like the monks and nuns who take celibacy vows and so on. Why are they considered to be more important? I don’t know whether anybody has said that they are more important, but they consider themselves definitely as more important, whether in the eastern or western traditions. They all have the pride of beings monks or nuns - with the exception of Mother Theresa and a few others. Actually the vows are a commitment not to engage in certain negativities. For example you have the vow of not killing. Both, eastern and western traditions have that vow, right? Now, if I just sit here without killing anybody, do I get the positive karma of not killing? No, I don’t, if there is no opportunity to kill. You know what I mean? You only get the virtue of not killing when there is an opportunity to do so and you decide that this is the wrong thing to do and you are not going to do it. Then you give up and by that you get the solid karma of not killing. Otherwise, simply not killing does not give you the solid karma of not giving.

The difference between people who have taken vows and those who have not lies there. The people with vows also just sit there without killing. But because they have the commitment of not killing, they get the positive karma. Because of the mental power of commitment, just sitting there without killing becomes the positive karma of not killing. They have that mind power in form of a vow. The rituals of taking the vows in the first place might have helped, but mainly it is the mental commitment.

Likewise, if every morning when getting up, for the next twenty-four hours you commit yourself to be helpful, not kill anybody, be dedicated and whatever positive actions you can think of, then every day, even while you are waiting for somebody’s phone call, or doing the laundry, vacuuming the floor, etc, all of that can become positive. It is in your hands. It is simply the application of mind power in the form of motivation in the morning.

Then, at the end of the day you dedicate. The motivation and the dedication - that is the nice zingerman semolina - breads which make the sandwich work. You sandwich your whole day in between these two semolina rolls of motivation and dedication. Then you can put roast beef or chicken salad in between.

My subject of tonight is the dedication, the other half of the semolina bread sandwich. If you don’t have that part of the sandwich, then all the other ingredients of the sandwich are going to fall down. If you turn it round without the other piece of bread, it is hard to eat and you are going to make a mess all over the place. Likewise, these two, motivation and dedication, ensure that you keep the whole thing together and make the best use of it.

If you don’t insure, then when you get angry or develop hatred, one minute of anger can consume hundreds of aeons of positive karma. It is extremely expensive. It works equally for the positive and the negative. Remember, earlier on I talked to you about purification. Purification has the power to wipe out all the negativities that you have done. Hatred, on the other side, has all the power to wipe out your positive karma. It is equally powerful. It is like when you play chess. It is like a queen who can go in any direction and take away anything. Both sides have one. There is a queen on either side. If you don’t recognize the power of the queen on the other side while she takes all your pawns one after another, she will eventually come and kill you. So you have to know about the queen and take the necessary precautions. Likewise, in the spiritual path, you have to understand who has what powers on the positive and negative sides. It is like playing a chess game. The most important thing here is the most powerful force. Anger and purification - I am not sure whether they are like queens or castles, but they are definitely more powerful than a bishop or horse which can only go diagonally or in L - shape movements. They go straight. And they are very powerful tools on both sides. Once you have those powerful tools you ensure that each pawn is being safeguarded but another figure. In exactly the same way you ensure that the positive karma will not be destroyed by anger. You therefore adopt the insurance policy of dedication.

A few years ago when I talked about karma, Greg Holden made this fridge magnet saying KARMIC INSURANCE. That is another insurance company. This one here, the dedication, will ensure that your positive karmas don’t get wasted. It is like O. J. Simpson’s retirement fund. He is getting more than enough money to live on. No matter how much money he may have to pay to others, nobody can touch that money. He can get millions from that fund and neither the Goldman family nor the Brown family can touch that, although he owes them thirty or forty million dollars. It is pension money and nobody can touch it. This is ensured by law. Here you do the same thing.

We drive ourselves hard, try to make every possible gain we can during our life, day by day. We put all our awareness to use and any time we have an opportunity we try to create as much positive karma as possible. If we lost all these savings, [it would be very sad] If you save all your money and keep it in a cash register and if somebody comes and steals that, then all the efforts you have made are wasted. In the end you get nothing.

Similarly, in Tibet, there is a certain bear - like animal called tremo. He goes and catches smaller animals like raccoons and ground hogs. He goes near their holes and tries to catch one of them as it comes out. He hits it once and puts it under his butt. But when he gets up to catch the next one, the one he has put under there escapes. So in the end, [no matter how many he catches], he gets only one. If we function in that manner we only get the benefit of the last effort we could put in. That leaves us very poor in our spiritual fund. So safeguarding is very important.

Why does dedication ensure your positive karma? Because karma is definite. Remember, there are four basic characteristics of karma: it is definite, it is fast growing, one does not meet with results for which one has not created the cause, and one is bound to meet with the karma one has created, no matter how long it may take. So because karma is definite, you dedicate it for a certain purpose. Unless and until that certain purpose has materialized, it cannot get wasted. This is the nature of karma. It is a really natural insurance. It is based on the natural karmic function. Karma is definite. That is why we dedicate it. When it is dedicated, it is ear-marked, so somebody else cannot come and take it.

Now the question is what should we dedicate our good karma to? Everybody will give you different suggestions. Here we say, ‘We dedicate all our virtues for the teachings of Losang Drakpa to shine forever.’ Most noticeably, the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, the travel companions and guides, wherever they dedicate their merits, I dedicate them to that. That is the recommended way to do. There are zillions of reasons.

Just one example. If you have a small bottle of water and you want to save that water, by itself it would soon evaporate. Even if you put it in the fridge, it would soon become rotten. It would be useless. Anyway, what use is a tiny, little bottle of water? On the other hand, if you take that water and mix it with a huge collection of water you will find that it is now mixed with the bigger amount of water and until that bigger amount is finished yours is also continuously working.

In the Bodhisattvacharyavatara it is said,

If you put a drop of water into the ocean, then until the ocean is completely dried up, your drop of water is also not going to finish. Likewise, if you dedicate your positive karma for enlightenment, it will not be exhausted or mismanaged or lost until you obtained enlightenment.

It is one of the best insurances. In the Liberation in the Palms of your Hands there is an interesting story. Two travellers meet on the road to Lhasa. One is a little wealthier, the other is poor. Since old Tibet did not have any hotels or motels, travellers had to take all their food and blankets and so forth with them. So they walked together. The rich guy cooked his own food and so did the poor guy. They were going to the same place. The wealthy guy had pure white barley flower, while the poor guy only had pea flower. That is grounded peas together with their skin. So in that tsampa there were a lot of black spots. The amount of the poor guy’s food was also less. However, he was much wittier than the rich guy. He thought, ‘My tsampa may not be enough, but if I mix mine with his, then until his is finished, mine won’t be finished either.’ So he talked to him, ‘Hey, friend. Look, we are walking together to the same place. I carry my bag, you carry yours. I cook my own food and you cook yours. You have a lot more to carry than I do. Why don’t we mix our tsampa flour together until we get to Lhasa?. I will carry it for you.’ That was the selling point he used. The rich guy thought, ‘That could be good. He carries all the tsampa and then we cook together. He is going to do a lot more work than I do.’ So he agreed. They mixed the tsampa together.

As long as there was enough tsampa, nobody worried about it. But when it started to get less and less, the rich guy began to think, ‘Are we going to have enough to last us? I had a lot and he had very little. So I am the loser here. I should tell him that he should have some restrictions.’ He hesitated a few days but then he could not help it. He asked the poor guy, ‘Hey, don’t you think your portion of the tsampa is finished now? When we mixed them together, I had a huge amount compared to yours.’ The poor guy said, ‘Yes, that is true. Mine could be finished now. Lets have a look.’ When they looked in the bag, the poor guy said, ‘Oh, do you see? There is some black spots here and some there. So mine is not finished yet.’ So the rich guy could not do anything about that. Until all the tsampa was completely finished, the black spots would not finish either.

In just the same way we can mix our little bit of positive karma with the ocean - like accumulation of merit of the enlightened beings. Why not? If we could deposit our little bit of savings with the account of Rockefeller, why not? But they will not let you. They will impose restrictions. The enlightened beings however, don’t have any restrictions. They are open to helping us. They want us to join them. That is why we can put our dedication together with theirs and until their positive karma finishes, ours will also be there. Through such a great way of ensuring that our positive karma will last we can achieve anything we want. The recommended goal is enlightenment. But you can dedicate anything you want. It is yours. How you use it is up to you. No one has any right to make restrictions. They simply make the suggestion to dedicate it that way. If you accept that it is good, if not that is fine too. Do whatever you want to do.

The books will give you a lot of recommendations. So far, in order to relieve the sufferings of all sentient beings, we have invited the Supreme Field of Merit, we have given them offerings, we have purified our negativities, we rejoiced. In this way we have done whatever the best we could and have thus accumulated a little bit of good karma. Now the question comes what you want to do with this. If you have saved a bit of money you will start to wonder how to safeguard that. If you don’t have any, you don’t have to worry about it. Just like that, we now have a little bit of positive karma. So we have to make sure that it is managed well and does not go to waste. It did not come about without any effort. It is hard-earned positive karma. We need to look after it and take care of it. We have to make sure it gives you the best yield possible.

The first one here is the general dedication.

Verse seven

Thus by the virtue collected

Through all that I have done,

May the pain of every living creature

Be completely cleared away.

In general, we can either dedicate the merit to total enlightenment or we can dedicate it to the elimination of the suffering of all living creatures that ever existed. How do you feel about that? You may think, ‘It is probably a good idea, but why should I care for all of them? Especially when the word ‘creatures’ is used here, you notice that all the cockroaches and dinosaurs and snakes and so on are included.

In the beginning let us just think of all humanity or even of our own immediate family, our children, parents, our own companions. We start with those that we care about and extend that to the whole sangha followership that you care about. Then you include all the citizens of Ann Arbor. Then extend that to Michigan and then to the United States. That is better than immediately trying to think of all living creatures. We don’t even know who they are.

For trained Bodhisattvas who are used to it, the words all living beings works like magic. But from our own angle, the perspective of all living beings is a little too big. It may even turn us off. If I am the usual American person I will ask, ‘What is in it for me?’ That is our usual cultural heritage which we cherish and always follow. So let us think first about the people that we care about, like for example our family members.

end of side A of tape forty-nine

side B of tape forty-nine of 09/30/97

You first start with those and your lovers and so on. You gradually extend it. You need living beings with faces and names on an equal human level. You work on a level where they contribute and you contribute. Love and compassion on this level is a totally equal contribution from both sides. If you have one fantastic idea of wanting to benefit all living beings, what is going to happen? Probably nothing. You have to see that it is your responsibility to contribute. You have to put your wooden nickel in. We have to put it in with love, with a feeling for real people. That is how it works. So this dedication for clearing the pains from every living being starts with your own living and dead family members, parents, children, lovers, etc. In that way you look and then you have feelings for these persons and then you act. As a matter of fact you really do contribute that way. That is how we go. Then we go on to all friends, then to all citizens, then to all citizens of this world. Then we go on to include other beings like dogs, cats, monkeys, elephants and maybe even cockroaches and finally all living beings. That is how we train our minds. We pick up from the easy point and go from there.

You may think, ‘I am dedicating for all living beings’. But you may do it only very superficially. That does not work. On the other hand, your own spouse may start to cry one day and accuse you, ’You don’t care for me!’ That is a bit of a joke but also serious. We know it from our children. They say that, ‘You don’t care for me, Mum!’, ‘You don’t care for me, Dad!’

Sometimes you have these very high, abstract ideas. Everybody is a living being, everybody has senses, everybody thinks, ‘I am more intelligent, I am wittier than So and So.’ Really, most of the people think that way. You presume that you are the most intelligent person and know everything. The next guy thinks, “I am the most intelligent person. Let him think what he wants. I will catch him later if necessary.’ That is how things move. In true reality human intelligence and our way of functioning is such that we know each other’s functioning very well. That is what we human beings are like within ourselves. Believe me, we know each other quite well. I am sorry, this just came out.

So when you do your dedication or motivation for the removing of suffering and pain, don’t go to the big, abstract idea and then try to fit your own situation also into that. That is too late then. You start from your own situation, with things right under your own nose, right in your own face. Then extend it further and further. Finally, there will come a time when you really care for everybody, so much so that you are really totally dedicated and will be a really wonderful public servant. You will be rendering a very good public service. The politicians are supposed to do that. Anyway. Maybe we should send a couple of copies of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara to our local senators and whoever needs it. Send it to our congressman. That is a joke. But that is how compassion functions. Your fuel that drives you is not jealousy, not partisan politics, but the cause of the people, their well - being. When you have that, you really become a great public servant. Are politicians public servants or only the bureaucrats?

Aud1: Politicians should be too.

R: But do they consider themselves as that?

In verse six the line the virtue collected through all that I have done is referring to the positive karma we have built through meditation, practice, the kindness and compassion that we have shown to people, the purification we have done, the accumulation of merit we have done. Then the next line is may the pain of every living creature be completely cleared away. All the good karma that you have created, you want to use that to relieve the suffering of all beings, the sufferings of samsara in general and particularly the suffering of lower realms. When somebody you know is sick you can dedicate all your positive merit so that the illnesses your friend is going through may be cured. You dedicate that the pain of every living being may be cleared without so much as a left over imprint. That is how you can clearly dedicate. Once you have dedicated something it belongs into that category.

Naturally, when you say that you own this and So and So owns that, where do you draw the line? If you dedicate something to somebody else, from that day on that somebody else owns that thing that you have dedicated.

In the Vinaya, the teachings on the rules of ordination, it is defined what constitutes stealing. It tells you under what circumstances it is stealing, how much you have to steal and what kinds of things you have to steal and what mental attitude you have to have, what kind of motivation, action and conclusion are needed [to make a negative karma complete]. This is described in great detail in the Vinaya. One of the points raised in there is the dedication. It says, ‘The moment you have dedicated something it no longer belongs to you, but to somebody else. If you misuse that, you are stealing.’

The question of stealing is very important. Not only stealing; there is an absolutely clear-cut definition of every single thing in the Vinaya. For example you want to steal a shirt. You see that shirt hanging somewhere, you like it, you walk past, pick it up, walk home without anybody chasing you and you say, ‘Ha, I got the shirt’. Now, but lets say, by mistake you have grabbed two shirts at the same time. In that case you definitely have the perfect negative karma of stealing one shirt and a half-broken negative karma of stealing the second shirt. The positive and the negative is so clear-cut. I am quite sure there is no tradition that explains things like stealing in such detail and clarity. If you don’t pay import duty on something which you are not supposed to bring into the country, do you get the karma of stealing for that? Sure you do. No question. You simply cheated the customs officer at the airport, so not only do you have the karma of stealing but also the karma of cheating the customs officer.

When the preparation, the action and the final conclusion of a negative action are complete, you have a complete, strong karma. When that is not complete, the karma is weaker. That goes for positive and negative, both. So when you have dedicated something, it no longer belongs to you, because you have dedicated it. When we dedicate our positive karma to total enlightenment, then our karma belongs to total enlightenment and we have no way of making use of that, nor can somebody else take it away from us. It is insured. Do you get the picture now?

Verse eight

May I be the doctor and the medicine

And may I be the nurse

For all sick beings in the world

Until everyone is healed.

There are a lot of detailed explanations on this. People get sick not only from the usual mental and physical illnesses. We live in the degenerate age. The life span is getting shorter. The environment is unclean, there a lot of toxins. I should really not brush it off quickly, but explain it in more detail. Illnesses of course do refer also to physical and mental illnesses. But on top of that we also have spiritual illnesses. Anger, attachment, hatred, and so on, are diseases which weaken our spiritual life. These diseases kill our spiritual life, destroy our spiritual path.

Likewise, the environmental conditions. There are toxic contaminations of the elements, the earth, the water, the air a nd even the fire. The raging fires in Indonesia this summer are a clear example. People burn down the original forest so that they can quickly grow palm oil plantations, make palm oil and sell it. Through that they create a very unhealthy environment, not only in Indonesia itself, but also in Malaysia and Singapore as well. Friends from Malaysia called me yesterday and said, ‘You may have to cancel your visit to Malaysia. We cannot even see the sun during the day.’ And this is two countries away from the fires. They said, ‘All the foreign embassies have moved their staff away, because it is getting difficult to breathe.’ It is also difficult to see. A plane with two hundred forty people in it has crashed because of that and two ships have collided in the straits of Malacca in thick fog.

This is environmental degradation; it is sickness, it is illness. We should dedicate our positive karma to remove these. We say,

May I be the nurse to cure them, until they are totally healed. May I be the doctor to guide them, to show them the way. May I be the medicine, let them take me, eat me, digest me and through that overcome their illnesses.

That is how you dedicate. It is not enough to say, ‘I like you, so I will help you.’ This is nice and kind, but it is not proper dedication. Are there any questions?

Aud1: If somebody does something positive without having a vow, is there a difference?

R: Vows have their own value, no question. But just the power of motivation has very strong power and is able to carry you from the neutral mind state of the daily chores to positive mind states. If you are doing your laundry, you can think that this is purification. If you vacuum the floor it is a good way of purifying negativities. Remember the story of the arhat Small Road. That works, definitely. If you are waiting for somebody in the parking lot, instead of becoming frustrated you use that to train yourself to be patient for the benefit of all beings. If you wait for somebody else to call you on the phone, that is the same thing. Somebody told me once, ‘We need bus stop Buddhism’. Here you have it. This is Bus Stop Buddhism.

Aud2: Can you explain how I can develop equanimity for myself, not looking after myself too much and not too little?. And can you explain how to get rid of the ego grasping that upsets that equanimity?

R: I think if I want to answer that properly, we have to dedicate a whole Tuesday evening for that. First you have equanimity. What is equanimity to you?

Aud2: Sharing love and compassion equally.

R: You always think of sharing. Equal share, right? Is it possible? What you have to do is get two apples and weigh them. If one is a little heavier, eat a little bit from it. Weigh them again. Now the other one could be heavier. Eat some from that. That is how you do the equanimity sharing. Make it equal - and make sure that it does not remain equal so that you can have both apples. Don’t you think so? [laughs] I think we are talking about equanimity on different levels. Equanimity is definitely not luke-warm. It does not mean not caring or putting off. Equanimity is very much about caring. As you have said, ‘sharing love and compassion.’ But also, equanimity means balancing between two things. It is not talking about equality of positive and negative. It is the equality of how you care for yourself and how you care for others. That is taking care of the ego - grasping point that you have raised. You acknowledge, ‘I am important. Likewise, he and she is also important. As I am myself the center of my universe, he and she is also the center of his and her universe. As much as I want joy, he and she also want joy. As much I don’t want misery and suffering, they also don’t want it. So we are equal on the level of what we want and what we have. None is superior to the other.

This is not great equanimity at all - not even close to it. But we begin from there and make a move.

Aud3: Once you told the story of a fly floating around a stupa on a piece of dung in the rain. This was supposed to have been the base of good karma that allowed this fly to become a monk in a later life. How could that be when this fly had no intention of doing anything positive?

R: Good point. But we do create positive and negative karma without intention all the time. We kill a number of ants under the wheels of our cars without any intention of killing. We do. That fortunate fly happened to have attachment to the smell of the cow - dung which was carried by a little current around a stupa. Through that the fly generated some kind of karmic seed. The example is actually trying to tell us that every living being has a wonderful, pure nature within them. It is a seed which enables us to become Buddhas. Some of these seeds may be so subtle that those who have attained the level of arhats are not even aware of. But Buddha is. aware of it.

We do a lot of things, helping and harming, without intention. Do we let that go? People sometimes say, ‘He hurt me, but he did not mean it. I should just forget about it.’ In other cases we say, ‘It was not him, but she is behind it. He is so weak and hopeless, he did it.’ Whether he is hopeless or weak, with or without intention, that person did it. That is the point. People get hurt, whether it has been done intentionally or unintentionally.

Aud4: You said that anger can destroy a lot of positive karma. When I am angry I am unable to do positive things which I could otherwise have done. Is that what you are referring to?

R: I am not so much referring to temper tantrums or irritation. I am referring to real anger. You really want to hurt the person, get back at them. It is not the small temper tantrums which we all go through all the time. I am talking about the real mean feeling that wants to hurt another person - not necessarily kill them - but bring some pain to that person’s awareness. It could be physically, mentally or emotionally. We want to make that person cry or make them feel that as they have done something bad to us now they are going to get it! That sort of feeling, that sort of hatred is what I am talking about, not so much the type of anger where your partner does not keep a date with you and you go to their place and bang angrily at their door.

Aud5: When you are the object of such anger, at what point do you cross the line and defend yourself?

R: Very good question. You have to defend yourself all the time. You don’t want to be other people’s doormat, you don’t want to be taken advantage of. You can do that without getting angry. You keep your principles intact. You know what you will do and what you will not do. It is absolutely clear - cut. To defend yourself you don’t have to get angry.

One thing about dedication. We said that once a positive action is dedicated it is impossible to destroy it before it has achieved its purpose. This works both ways, for the positive things and the negative things. If there is such a thing as a devil, he dedicates all his energy to harm beings. That is therefore also very hard to wipe out. It pops up everywhere. The positive and the negative functions both the same way. It is not that the positive is powerful and the negative is weaker. We would like to project it that way, but it functions equally. We say that ultimately truth will prevail. Lets hope so.

Lets close shop now - with a nice, little dedication.

end of side B of tape forty-nine