The Four Dharmas of Gampopa

THE FOUR DHARMAS OF

G~OPA

Ch6gyam Trungpa, Rinpoche

Published by Vajradhatu Publications 1345 Spruce Street Boulder, Colorado 80302

This material is available in a limited publi~ation of 400 copies only, and no general publication is made or intended. Common law copyright is reserved by Chtlgyam Trungpa, Rinpoche. No part of this material may be· reproduced or published in any form, nor may this material be distributed to persons other· than those who have been authorized by Chtlgyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, or the Vajradhatu Education Office to receive it.

·THE FOUR DHARMAS OF GAMPOPA

A seminar given at Karme-Choling, July

by

CHtlGYAM TRUNGPA, RINPOCHE

i975.

CONTENTS Page Talk One:

FOLLOWING THE DHARMA

1

First dharma: follo:wing the dharma. Sense of separation from teachings. Surrendering, dissolving the-journey. Truth based on our living situation, what we are willing to face. Talk Two:

AGGRESSION

13

Difference between commitment to dharma and becoming completely identified with it. Separation from dharma springing from immense aggression. First step: knowing oneself, understanding nature of one's own aggression. Humor, realizing joke is on you, basis of following one's mind according to the-dharma. Talk Three:

SUCCESS ON THE PATH

24

Second dharma: success on the path. Renunciation:with true understanding of suffering, te~chings become confirmation, spokesman for you. To actualize unity between you and dharma requires discipline. Meditation practice. Losing your arrogance, chauvinism. Boredom and resentment. 'Relating with emotions. Talk Four:

TRANSCENDING CONFUSION Third dharma: clarifying confusion. Confusion as the desire for greater happiness. Search for freedom vs. search for happiness. Unconditional, ~11-pervasive freedom which transcends both pleasure and pain. Seeing clearly as final step towards transcendence. Relation between clear seeing and pain. ·

34

Page Talk Five:

DISCIPLINE

47

Confidence and loneliness. Threefold discipline: (1) austerity (2) absorption (3) knowledge. Austerity as being immovable in one's sanity, being open to oneself and others. Absorption as complete state of nonaggression which allows reminders of all kinds to present themselves. Knowledge as seeing through emoiions and preconcepti0ns. Discipline as the actual mechanism of transcending confusion. Talk Six:

WISDOM Fourth dharma: confusion being transformed into wisdom. Threefold wisdom: (1) as a product of learning and collection of experiences (2) genuine insight (3) final wisdom, the product of unlearning. Three levels of uitimate wisdom: (1) spontaneous/ calculating mind (2) manifestation in world as gentleness and nonaggression (3) clear seeing. Panic as open-minded leap vs. petty territoriality. Emotions as part of clarity.

5·6

TALK 1#1

"FOLLOWING THE DHARMA"

Welcome, everY.body. We're going to discuss following the buddhist path from the point of view of personal surrendering. This idea is not particularly new--and not particularly archaic either, for that matter. It is the usual ongoing process constantly happening with anybody who follows the tradition, discipline. We are not talking of dogma, bu~ of how a person can take a journey along. the path, on the path, and at the same time how the traveler·can become no traveler. At the beginning of your journey you have a very solid, individualistic style, based on passions and aggressions, all. kinds of neuroses of ego. But ~s you walk along the path, you become smaller and s~aller. You dissolve into the path and you become part of the pat~ rather than a traveler on it. That. is the point we are raising here--how to understand the possibility :t.h~t onc·e you· have reached some enlightened stat~, ... you cin't watch your own burial. It's impossible. To a lot of people that may be disappointing because they would like proof; they would like to attend the graduation ceremony; they would like to have credentials to reinforce their existence. But sQmehow such a concept does not apply anymore . .. 1 -

The main working basis. of the buddhist path is the shedding of ego. When we talk about ego, we are talking purely of ego-centered ego, ego as territoriality--defending your own territory or trying to conquer further territories. We are not talking in terms of attaining a blissful euphoric state, some kind of re-affirmation of yourself which makes you look good and feel good, a revelation from above, or anything like that. We are talking about dissolving the journey. That's the main point. The four dharmas of Gampopa are an important theme throughout the buddhist tradition, and particularly in the Kagyu, or contemplative1 tradition of Tibetan buddhism. The first of the four dharmas of Gampopa is following one's mind according to the dharma; the second is the dharma practice becoming the pat~;· the third.is tha; following the path, confusion is transcended; and the last one is that confusion is also transformed into wisdom. Today, I would like to discuss the first one--one's mind following the dharma. When we discuss ourselves and qur spiritual journey, we tend to have the attitude that the dharma, or the teaching, is separate from us. Our usual understanding is that we are joining a church or becoming a follower of something or other, somebody or other, that we are becoming a.member of a club. It's like joining a political party. We join a party, we learn to speak its language, we learn its particular slogans. But that approach is a misunderstanding of spiritual discipline. If we try to join s~me spiritual· club and follow the appropriate regulations and rules, that automatically·makes our ego bigger. Dogma has its own credentials, it already has its own power. S~in following dogma, we are merging our little egos into bigger egos, and there is a danger of becoming Hitler, Mussolini, or Mao Tse Tung, for that matter. So following the dharma is not signing your name on the dotted line and bec6~ing pa~t of a movement-a political movement or spiritual movement. Joining a community doesn't mean you have become a buddhist or that you· have become a meditator. You can't become a buddhist practitioner that way. A lot of people try to·do that and they find it extremely rewarding--from a hypocritical point of view.

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It is easy t6 sh~ve your head and put ori your robe and wear the club badge and speak the right slogan~ because you don't have to give up anything--you just join the crowd, which is· extremely simple, very easy to do. But we.are not talking in those terms. In this case, there's actually a relationship between· the dharma and yourself. Dharma literally means ·"truth" or'" "norm." It is a particular way of thinking, a way of viewing the world which is not a concept but experience.. This particular truth is very painful truth--usually truths are. It rings the soun4 of reality, which comes too close to home. We become completely embarrassed when we begin to hear the truth. It is wrong to think that the truth is_going to sound fantastic and beautiful, like a flute solo. The truth is actually lik~.a thunderbolt. It wakes you up and makes you think twice whether you should stay irt the rain or move into the house. Provocative. The sound of thunder could be nice and friendly or it could be a great hassle. The whole thing depends on your living situation. If you're camping outside without a tent and you begin to hear thunder, you feel threatened.' You feel terrible because you are exposed and you have to move under a tree or into a cave--some kind of roof is needed. Whereas in the opposite situatio~ in which you already have a roof or a·shelter, when you begin to hear thunder it sounds great, fantastic. And you can listen to the. raindrops as well. So the basic question is--who is actually· listening to the truth? What is his situation? And, in fact, what is truth? At this point we could.say quite clearly that truth is about you. It is not about celestial beings descending on you, or the golden age of Martians.· The truth is about you, your existence, your expe.rience. It's about you. Hearing the truth of dharma and becoming_ part of the aharma is willing to face yourself,. to begin with. It may be disturbing or encouraging--however, that's it. · Following the dharma doesn't mean go1ng along with a particular prescription and taking your . medication every day. Instead it's a basic commitment to the teaching, which means yourself. You.could get out o~ the organization, you could get out of the club~ But.that doesn't mean you actually have managed to·step out of the dharma. The dharma is always you. You are·always going to have the dharmaof you, your dharma. Your truth, your facts and figures, your reality, are always ther~. ~eople - 3 -

can try to escape .reality by recrea.ting the different seasons--in the winter·they can go to Florida; in the summer they can go up to the ·mountains. But it's not as simple as that. Re·ality is inescapable. The truth about you has different facets, obviously: "What is this truth about me?· What is that truth about me·?" You might think you are made out of some good things and some bad things. Sometimes you feel bad and sometimes good. And· you seem to be surviving) hopefully-~if you don't get any new ideas, such as destroying yourself or doing something unreasonable. Otherwise things are okay. It may be monotonous, but there are ups and downs as well. However, that kind of thinking is not quite enough. Regularity is not the point; experience is the point. Fundamentally, every one of us feels extremely insecure. You could have lots of money, lots of background, education, friends, resources, skills~ but none of that is going to make any difference to your security. The more we seek. security, the more insecurity that creates. It constantly happens that way. Basically you are incompetent about life. You could b~ a corporate president or the lord of the universe--you could be anything--but because of the style in which you operate your life,_ because of the .views you have about youself, you are incompetent and you feel threatened. You could place blame on all'kinds of people ~nd all kinds of situations, but those are just excuses. There's something fundamentally threatening and insecure taking place all the time. Something's not quite as solid as we would like it to be, so we need lots of reassurance--some philosophyJ some idea, some kind of backing from the-world of comfort, the world of companionship. There is always hollowness, an emptiness taking place in us always. That is our usual situation. Basically we feel we are broke and we have a poverty mentality. Very few people like to face that, but it's the first truth, one of the very valuable truths to· face. I.t is not really pleasant and it's not even helpful, for that matter. But maybe its unhelpfulness is helpful. There's always that possibility. Out of that insecurity we come up with a lot of strategies, plans of all kinds. We try to combat this insecurity by means of drugs, politics, philosophy, .religion, friends. Everybody has tried something. c And at this point, in this world, everybody had· tried everything. There'~ nothing left~ nothing that hasn't been tried. Absolutely. nothing. We've run out of

- 4-

material completely. Ne.vertheles·s we sti.ll go on. We begin to borrow each othe~'s ideas, to juggle· them· around. ·"Have .you -tried that? I haven't.. I woul_d like to try' yo.urs.. He:. has tried something else, but I haven't, so I'll tr.y his. Or-let .us try his together.'.' We keep exchanging ideas. But the _whole thing becomes extremely depres·sing, .very pathetic. r-t' s like telling each ot-her stories in a ~state of insomnia in a dormitory. You are not intereste.d in .the story; but you want to be occupied because you can't ~all asleep. Things have gotten that Qad, actually. But it is all experience." It's dharma, -in its own way, truth. What's so sacred about that? Where does sacredness come in? It doesn't co~-in. the form of religion, as a savior notion. The sacrednes~s-· is its truthfulness. It's true, therefore i~'s sacred.·· So ·it could be secular but still sacred. At the beginning that truth is unpleasant and very disturbing, .and absolutely useless in some way. You might say':.' "I already. know about myself. I've been studying myself for twenty-fo~r years, thirty years, forty years, fifty years. Twenty years of my_life I have spent on this same_old thing_, again and again. So te 11 us something new." (Laughter.) But there isn't anything new. We have explored all the space on this earth, externally and internally. There's no Shangri-la. We know the whole earth inch by inch, and we·have explored all of human behavior in its rough form. We know all the alternatives, all the tricks that we play on ourselves. When anybody discovers a new trick~he ·wri~es-a'book aoout it, publicizes it and sells it, so we know everythi_ng. The whole world is ·gett:i,.ng to be a ·gigantic bazaar, a supermarket, a shopping center. · "There is. a lot of truth in that, but where' s the quality of path in. it?" you mig·ht a:Sk. But if we don't face what we are experiencing, the~ there's no path •. It may be a- drag, but you must be willing to face and actually give in to what is happening. Nobody's going to come up with a fat check for you tomorrow~ At this point, believing in miracles is an obstacl~. There is great room fo~ our minds to. open, give, face facts--literally to face the facts: the facts·.of reality, fact of pain, facts of boredom. You might say you've done that already, but r·don't believe it. We haven't quite done it complet'ely or inte~sively

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enough.. The truth of the matter is that you still haven't faced f•cts. Because jou are here, it means you are still looking for a possible alternative. If you had already understood the whole ·thing, you wouldn't be here~ Let's face even that. So our world, this particular world, our dharma, needs to be acknowledged and needs immense surre~der­ ing-~not just a one-shot deal. It's very tricky actually when w~ talk about surrendering. U~ually you would like to double-cross the surrendering: "If I surrender, will I get something back? If I surrender, I will be. worthy of it. I'll be acknowledged. In the end I will be the winner in some sense." The whole thing gets very complicated. That is precisely the s_ymptom of one's mind not following the dharma butJ rather, behaving in an adharmic way. "A" is a negative ·prefix, ··so adharma is non-dharma, no dharma, anti-truth, false. Without this first dharma, understanding the truth and our relationship to the truth, we could not go further. Without this foundation, the other dharmas would be too abstract and too advanced. So the first dharma of Gampopa, following one's mind according to the dharma, is the first step on the path. Finally you and r,our world meet and are introduced to one another: 1My name is Mr. World, Mr. Adharma."'.' "Pleased to meet you." You shake hands and actually begin to give in. You're wil~ing to accept your world. You have never done that before. Either you've been too sneaky, too arrogant, too aggressive, too passionate or too jealous. Something is preventing you from actually meeting your world, let alone attempting anything as great as the idea of enlightenment. You haven't really met ycurself properly, or your world, which is yourself. "I" is you, "am" is your world. You have never met that particular world. And facing the fact--"! am"-you and your.world--is very important. It makes you less blind and less mute. Otherwise you are highly blind and highly dumb. You usually don't behave as your body tells you to behave, but rather your mind behaves for you~ body. So you find yourself becoming a ro~ot, not actually paying attention to what you are doing, what you are seeing, what you are experiencing. You are. ~not really ·.~xperiene1.ng or seeing anything at all~ Your whole world is just a rough guess, a preconception which keeps you going. When somebody tells you that your preconception is not valid, then you begin to break down and your computer system goes completely b~~serk. You are

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being very numb, bewildered. to face the truth.

You simply don't want

Question: My question is about the first part of your talk, about how we are joining the club and also being isolated in our seeking. How do we join the club and not join the club? Rinpoche: Are you familiar with the buddhist term, "sangha?" It is a group of practitioners,· and it also means refugees, in some sense, people who have left their security, their homeland. They happened to get together because of a common situation, rather than because of a movement taking place. The idea of sangha is that you have a sense of standing on your own feet--and somebody else is s~nding on his own feet as well. So you find a lot of people who are alone, lonely. And sangha is a lot of lonely people together who are essentially on their own. They s~are a mutual interest rather than being saved by the flock, particularly. It's a question of sharing experience with each other, but not being caught in the security of the party line. It's like the way we grow up. We have our own parents; we've come into the world individually, privately, so to speak. We were born in different places and now we begin to hang out together. We have our own hearts; we have our own brains. We begin to eat t9gether and live t6gether, but:·nevertheless we are individuals. We have to grow in our own way: nobody can make you sixteen years old. You have .gone through that already. Q: You were talking of the ego and its relationship to the outer environment--as best as I was able to understand it--in terms that were in keeping with a traditional buddhist understanding of the relationship between the individual and the outer environment. Does that process of surrendering hold through time or does it alter in termsof the· time frame in which ·we find ourselves? The particular reference in that instance is to the implications of the intellectual understanding of the relationship between conciousness· and technological extension of that consciousness, Buckminister Fuller's and Gregory Bateson's intellectual understanding, cybernetic understanding, of the possibility of arriving at a moment of transcending what was the human condition through an understanding of the relationship between technology and conciousness itself--

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R: I don't see any paTticular problems, sir. The question is whethe·r we are with ·ourselves to begin with. I£ we are not with u~, then any collecting of further understanding doesn't help--it will take us away. If we are with ourselves, and able actually to relate with our s~ate of exp~r~ence, state of mind, then a technological discover~ or scientific discovery, whatever it may be, is part of that cosmic truth. · There's ~o problem with it, absolutely no problem.

Q:

I didn't think there was a problem, but the technological reality of milieu, the outer env.iron-. ment·, alters through time,· ·and the traditional buddhist view of ego's response to an outer environmental condition which you'~e elucidating, stems from a totally different technological environmental condition than that in which we find ourselves. I£ that relationship does not alter through time, perhaps we may be at the verge·of the realization of our cond~tion that is loosely termed-R:

Well, you see, if Gregory Bateson were here •..

Q:

Is he here?

R:

He.' s not here, but supposing he were here.

Q:

Yeah, that would be .••

R:

Uh.

Q:

Enlightening.

(Laughter.)

R: He was in Bouxder last year and we had a lot of ·chats about that, actually. It's quite interesting. But if he wer.f? here, he would be in the same tent as you are. That's~ the time situation. There's ·no problem. I mean, time does not come as a concept. Time comes as time·. The sun is in the West now as far as this particular world is concerned--we a.ll know that. Maybe people from the East or the South would describe it quite differently, but as far as we are .concerned, in this part of the world the sun in is the West. I think experience is more important than possibilites. Possibilities come from experience--experientia'l possibilities. So, as the Zen master says: "When I eat, I·eat; when I sleep, I sleep"·~

Q: I'm not· entirely sure we've reached an accord, but thank you. R:

You're welcome. - 8 ..

Q:

I related very strongly to your statement that we are here b~c~use we are still looking for something-so strongly, in fact, that I'm leaving in the morning. (Laughter.) The reason I'm leaving has to do with my feeling that this for me is the ultimate ego trip. The.reason we are not surrounded by ten million other people is because there .is something which prevents your message from reaching the large masses of people. I feel that for me this is an intellectual and spiritual ego trip, and I don't see how this can be generalized to the world. R: That's a very interesting reaction. Well, you can leave tomorrow. I don't see any problems with that. But I don't think it's a question of how we can relate the truth to the public, how we can gear it for.the mass media. The truth has to be individual. If you have reacted that way ·to what I have to say, then obviously something has clicked in you. So in fact, as far as I'm ~oncerned, you are part of the mess. Q:

I agree.

R:

So goodbye.

(Laughter.)

Drive carefully.

Q: You spoke ·about my relationship to truth. I'm so accustomed to not seeing this, that I wonder how I can learn to see my relationship to truth in any given moment.

R: Tha~'s an interesting point. Don't ask me. In such situations, look into yourself. Where is the barrier? Where is the obstacle? If you begin to find the barrier or obstacle, then you have already reached some kind of understanding. Work with that.

Q:

Well, maybe I'm being too general, but I feel that that barrier is my ego, which is the case with everybody. R: Sure, but you have your personal ego, too. So you might be generalizing too much in your mind. Your particular style is distinctly different than anybody else's, so you have your own world. The question to ask is how that question carne about. Is it because you want some kind of response, some kind of remedy, or is this simply a personal experience of uncertainty? Once you actually begin to be able to find out who is the questioner and where the problem arises, then there is no problem. Try harder-but not too hard. - 9 -

Q:

You·spoke about the world becoming like a supermarket, that whenever someone gets a new trick, he writes a book about it. But The Tibetan Book of the Dead--on the first day, the blue or whatever, you know--that seems just as tricky as all the rest. It doesn't make any sense to me. I suppose I have to believe it. R: I do~~t think you have to believe in it, particularly. It.should be experience.

Q:

But it seems that studying the dharma becomes just reading, sometimes. You know, after you sit for awhile, you think: "Now I'm into the dharma so I'll read these books." I came to this seminar with the book, The Jewel Ornament of Liberation, because it was entit~ed "The Four Dharmas of Gampopa." But it doesn't make any sense to me; it just seems 1;ke dogma, beliefs, tricks. I can!t relate it to my own experience. R: Maybe you're being too tricky with yourself. You see, you could create all kinds of chain reactions~ outsmarting somebody's project constantly. But it finally bounces back on you. If you're trying to outsmart everybody, it finally bounces back on you, which is not very pleasant. And even then it seems to become a trick, sort of a dungeon.

Q:

You say not to outsmart everybody, but then there's this trick and there's that trick--

R: That's what you think you have done rather than what you actually can achieve. In other words, we think we are outsmarting ourselves--and then finally we insmart ourselves. (Laughter.)

Q:

That doesn't help me at all, but I'll think about it.

R:

Well, I. think that will help.

Q:

In the long run?

R: At least in the long run. Yeah. The point is that we haven't really caught up with ourselves enough. That is the problem.

Q:

Caught up. (Pause.J I interpre~ that to mean if I just continue to experience reality, then at ~orne point all those books will make sense to me and I will be able t~ read them. I can't read them now.

·th~t

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R: It's not the books that should make sense to you. That shouldn't be your project, particularly. But if what you are makes sense to you, in spite of being without ego, then books become purely confirmation.

Q:

In response to a previous question, you said to try harder but....not too hard. What's too hard?

R: It's trying to collect too much information, too ·many tricks. To try hard is a sort of leap. But if you try completely hard, then you ~on't actually take a leap but you plan further: "If I leap what's going to happen beyond the cliff?" And probably you put up wire netting and all kinds of things underneath--blankets. That's trying to hard.

Q: This insecurity that everybody's trying to cqver .up--is it possible that once one got over the shock of nobody being home, it would be a basis for emptiness? R: I think so.· But then the trouble is that emptiness is at home. iou have to think about that.

Q:

When I b"egin to face the truth about myself, what I get is the truth about myself plus guilt about that. How do I accept the truth about myself without getting any extras? (Laughter.) R: I think you need more surrendering. sounds like too much religion.

Q:

I didn't understand that.

R:

Too much religion?

And it

Q:

Yeah, I heard what you said but I didn't understand it.

R: Well, too many religious con~epts of good and evil. Too much ethi~s which goes· along with that.

Q:

Are you saying that we are what we see, so to speak, or that we are what we hear? L~ke there's a simultaneity of experience and what we· ·are? R: Pretty much so, but let's not make that intri party-line language.

Q:

It could become a whirlwhind at that point.

R: Yeah. We are he·re. Definitely. Some people try not to be here but they are still here. Even that doesn't help--they happen to be here. - 11 -

Q:

Thank you.

R: I think maybe ~e should close ·at this point .. Dinner is being roasted, or maybe· toaste·d. (Laughter.) By the way, before you leave I'd like to place definite emphasis·on the sitting practice of meditation during this seminar. If you just go back with ~ore concepts, ideas, quite possibly we're just complicatirtg things rather than creating any kind of clarity~ Therefore, actually combining sitting meditation with discussion and talk and experience would help a lot. Also, our community here is large1y based on contemplative discipline, and the community ~embers would like to share what they are experiencing here with you. So I would strongly encourage you to join in the sitting practice.

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TALK 112

"AGGRESSION"

In binding our mind to the dharma, we are able to realize the confusions that take place in our life and the amount of suffering created from our life situation. But we are still unable to accept the truth completely. So we have to become completely identified with the dharma, which is much more than believing in something, much more than taking a random step towards commitment. There's a tremendous difference between commitment to the dharma and actually becoming part of the dharm~: Taking a step towards it has something to do with making decisions, but becoming completely committed is more than a decision--it's leaping off a cliff. The whole thing depends on a sense of trust. Some sympathy,and trust, and a sense of warmth need to be generated-~to oneself, to begin with, and to others as one develops sympathy to onesel;f •. :rt needs to be beyond the aggression level. One o~ th~ obstacles to one's mind being able to go alo~g with or becom·e part o£ the dna·rma is your sense of separation ;fTom it) obvious-ly. That sense of separation comes ;from immense aggression, - 13 -

holding back, and the sense of fight or struggle . .You're ready to wage war with your world. Although you might regard your enemy as a real experience-dealing with an enemy and ha~ing a fight--the enemy is not you. So you constantly have a sense of separation betw§}.en yourself and other. There are several ways of becoming emotionally involved with the dharma. You may be inspired by a fascination with the teachings or by the fascination of friends who are involved in the teachings, or by a certain truth that it speaks. But inspiration doesn't seem to be enough. If grass is green, green is grass at the same time. You have to be soaked·completely in dharma, so that there's no separation between the greenness of the grass and the grass itself. You have to be completely soaked in it, which requires a 1ot of sympathy, and a loving attitude. Whenever there's any resentment~ the faintest resentment t~ some aspect of one~s life~~that you~re an employee, the nature of you~, work, the atmosphere at large, the change of season, too many flies--you say, "This is not really resentment, this is just irritation." Sure it's irritation, but that is a form of resentment. We have created a gigantic cast iron fortification. And even through we have particular irritations such as flies, mosquitoes, or whatever, we also express a constant sense of resentment in the form of immense aggression. Generally what has happened, particularly in the West, is that we have devel~ oped or grown up in a world that is a gigantic market place. You can bargain your way out and bargain your way in. If somebody's cheating you, you can bargain with him or you can go to the ne~~ stqre and buy the same thing cheaper. Everything that we do in our life is businesslike because we are trained that way. We feel that if we pay for something we should get our money's worth. We operate with an immense business mentality all the time. At the same time; we also have. a sense of warfare--who's going to win the war? That state of warfare becomes a natural ongoing process. Needless to say, a lot of the conflict that takes place in this world is not.based on)just a simple disagreement or misunderstanding--our aggression actually created the problem. This aggression be~ comes immense, and it takes all kinds of forms-sometimes very controlled and sedate, sometimes very active and articulated. Sometimes we even become victims of our own aggression. When we try

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to bounce on somebody else~ it bounces back on us as well. We begin to hurt ourselves, to make life. miserable. The opposite of that is not so much that we should reform completely and become a compl~tely peaceful person. That isn't particularly the idea. The idea is to understarid.that particular type of aggression and to work along with it in terms of our practice. It is an inspiration to relate with the dharma. The first dharma of Gampopa is knowing one~ self. That seems to be-·the meaning of one's mind going along with the dharma. One's mind begins to follow that particular pattern. You're willing to experience yourself to acknowledge how much time ·you waste through-this partidila·r style of ag·gression. 'You might say that acknowledging that is not quite enough. But we hav~ more to talk about tomor~ row-~if you don't leave. But fiist._things first; ~s they say, And that first thing is to see what's wrong with us. Then we can look further--what type of wrongness do we have? Then--what can we do about it? How can we cure it? That's the general approach. The steps we are following in this case are the four dharmas of Gampopa. The first one is following one's mind according to the dharma. It is actually acknowledging ourselves9 understanding the nature of samsara and the nature of our pain and our agression--which is very real and very personal. We've been liying with ourselves all our life (and will be for the rest of our life). So we know our~ selves better than anybody else. There's no point in pretending that nothing happened, every~ thing's b~autiful. We know that's not quite true. If you think that your whole life~~your past, future· and present--is great. I think you're under some kind of hyponosis or trip of ego. You're kidding yourself, fooling yourself. That's a very serious matter. It is worth thinking about. So in the first dharma of Gampopa we are re~examining ourselves. We are not trying to find a way ·to cure ourselves, necessarily. But we are trying to find out where we are--the way and style in which we are impr~sonedJ the reason we ended up in this particular iail, how our situation came about. And once we begin to know that, we begin to know lots of truths, lots of dharmas. But if we look at things from an arrogant as well as an aggressive apProach, we may not be able to understand anything at all. We might say:

~

15 -

"Everything's okay, there's nothing to worry about. We don't have to listen to this particular bullshit." But that is the voice of our aggression. Aggression could be highly articulate and very intellectual. or extremely impulsive and.emotional. lt takes all kinds of forms. It's not just one thing--purely an emotion. And it's not as if you're telling somebody: "Just calm down and take a.rest. Everything's going to be okay." It's not as simple as that. It is very subtle. It's very hard to discover ourselves. In fact, the particular type of aggression we are talking about is very difficult to di~cover until we have completely overcome the basic nature of ego. But at least we can make early discoveries o£ the crude aspect of it. As far as this present situation of the world of ambition is concerned, aggression seems tp be .a success. Aggression made the world, and we also have products of aggression: efficiency, richness, great learning. Everything has become the product of aggression--not only the product but also the seed. We are constantly involved in an ongoing chain reaction of aggression and its results, which creates seeds ·of: more aggression. You can't buy an automobile if you never check where you buy the spare parts you might need later on. And if you're buying a foreign car, it's more difficult because they might have to ship them from overseas. We would like to make sure we know where w~ can get spare parts . . It's exactly th~ same with aggression. We woul~ lik~ to have spare parts available if we break down~ We have all kinds of reserve supplies--new tactics, new techniques-~ stored in our minds all the time. We say: "I don't have to use this at this point, but I might need it later on. Before I use my capital, maybe I should experiment with small thinking to get my position without spending capital. If worse comes to worse, I will strike." Whether you are a kind-mannered, mild-mannered or aggressively-mannered person, it is exactly the same. All the time there is this big barrier, which creates obstacles to understanding. There's a big barrier, a big fence, between dharma and us, which prevents us from actually clicking or communicating. That seems to be the basic point: In order to become a follower of the dharma, one has to become nonaggressive, beyond aggression. In order. to do that, there has to be some kind of warmth in oneself, gentleness to oneself, which is known as

- 16 -

maitri, and there has to be greater gentleness to others, which is known as karuna or compassion. When we begin to make a·connection to.dharma, we are willing to open our gates, to tear down our walls. Then for the first time we begin to realize that the joke has beeri on us all the time. Accumulating ammunition and building fence after fence was our trip rather~than something actually having taken place. We have wasted so much of our energy and economy on that trip. When we begin to realize the joke was on us and created by us, then we are actually following our minds according to the dharma. Naturallyj that discovery goes along with a sense of humor. It's not another resentment at all. That wouid be the opposite direction--that you want to kill the person playing jokes on you (which is yours!£) and keep going all the time. Question: You spoke against aggression, but don't you think that sometimes the energy of aggression can produce a more harmonious situation? Rinpoche: Well, I think it's a question of what kind of aggression we are talking about. Aggression with stupidity and confusion is self-destructive. It's like aged wine turning to vinegar as opposed to aged wine.

Q:

Will you speak a little about aggression ahd change, bringing about change in our lives in a nonaggressive way? R: Well, you see, ~hat we are discussing is not particularly how we could combat aggression. That would be impractical. What we are talking about is simply how we can realize its style of operating in the world. Then I don't see any particular problems. You are actually approaching aggression from the back door, so to speak, and various ag- . gressive activities could become part of the learning process at the same time. This particular discussion today is not really complete without going through the next three dharmas of Gampopa. Once we put all the pieces together it will make it much clearer.

Q:

It seems that one of the obstacles to feeling aggression is feeling that aggression isn't right.

R:

That aggression isn't right?

- 17 -

Q: Well, I guess that'~ an aspect of aggression ~s well, feeling that it isn't right or acceptable in certain situations. R:

Yeah.

So, can you say something more?

Q:

Uh, it's

R:

Aggression is always·, personal.

difficu~t

to get personal.

Q:

Uh, in many instances, in my relating to you, there's a difficulty because I feel anger. And the anger seems to be not wanting to be exposed in many instances--and who are you to expose me? It seems to take that form, anyway. There seems to be a great difficulty there because of your place and my place, the guru-student relationship. R: Well, that's not a particularly unusual case. (Laughter.) ·

Q: It may not be unusual, but it still presents problems. R:

Sure, if you call it a problem.

Q:

At this point it's not a problem; at this point it seems to be humorous.

R: It's not a pro~lem. Something's actually beginning to work. When you feel touchy, when the relationship is so much on edge--something's about to spark~ There's obviously resentment. There's obviously some kind of arrogance on your part that you have a right to have your ego and confuse the world. You don't want anybody to mind your business, particularly. I'm sorry to put it so crudely, but that's usually the case. I think that's the beginning of working with the student-teacher relationship, when something like that begins to happen. It's a very hot point, obviously.

Q:

Egads.

R: It's just about to spark something. And that seems to be a very interesting point--you could go further wit-h that, you could explore more. The relationship is lik~.a mirror reflection--you could get angry with the mirror because it makes you look so fat. ·

Q:

I've never thought in terms of getting angry at the teacher though. - 18 -

Well, that'.s exactly what happens, you know. That's the kind of thing we are talking about. There's somebody who minds your business andreflects backcon you. That's a highlight of one's life, I would say--there is something coofing. R:

Q:

I'm· in complete agreement ·with that.

(Laughter~)

Q: Could it be that in other relationships in which you feel resentment to a person whom you . certainly don'~ consider to be your teacher, that could also be a mirror in some sense? R: Sure, definitely, but the relationship may be less intense.

Q:

I often feel· that I have confidence in a teacher as being a ~lear mirror, but some peopie are very, very muddy.

R:

But it's still a mirror. Whether it•s a good one or a bad one, it's still a mirror. That's the difference between a teacher and other people. One is clear, the other is slightly clouded. But it is still a mirror, there is still some truth in it.

Q:

I feel that the direction in which one thinks the way one is. That is, if one thinks negatively it seems to me that one becomes negative, and the same with positivity. And after working for many years in a teaching which followed the line that you are presenting, it got to the point where I was completely negative, a kind of negativity that I'd never had in my life. I got to the point of feeling that working towards seeing the negative facets of myself resulted in my being more negative than ever. I began to look for a teaching that stressed love and light and positivity. And at this point I'm just confused. Could you comment on that, please? determi~es

R: Yes, indeed. (Laughter.) Well, how should I begin? You see, the whole approach is not so much that since you have had one extreme experience al~ ready, therefore you should seek the other extreme. That will create a heart attack. You become a flea;· jumping back and forth. One of the problems is that· you want to solve your problem. You want to solve it very badly:and you try to find the best remedy, which creates more problems. But as a matter of fact, the problem isn't there at all, even at the beginning. You have created the problem yourself.

- 19 -

You are so panicked by the problem that you begin to be unable to look at it. You see in the dust a snakeshaped rope, and suddenly panic,saying: "Oh, there's a snake, let's get away! Tell everybody there's a snake over there." But you never explored whether there was a rope or a snake at the beginning. This is a very old buddhist analogY-. When we panic, we see· things in an exaggerated form, usually for the worse; and out of panic, if we look for somebody loveand-lighty, we might find· one. That person could be extremely aggressive at heart, but still, seemingly at lea~t, it's a change to talk to somebody who appears to be good, kindly. I think a lot of people get sucked into that kind of situation by jumping to their first conclusion and being unable to relate with their own panic. Panic is a very interesting experience. It makes you completely petrified. You actually can't even think. There is .a kind of sunyata nonthinking experience occurring in panic. But that's very hard to detect if you want to recapture it. (Laughter.) Don't leave tomorrow. (Laughter.)

Q:

The four-dharmas of Gampopa is a series, a path that every person has to walk on by himself and can only do by himself. But the formulation by which we know it starts with a supplication. What is the relationship between those two, and to whom is it addressed? R: The idea of blessing is a very interesting point. When we talk about a blessing, it's not so much goodness descending on you; it's a ·form of inspiration in which you inspire yourself. At the same time as that inspiration takes place, the blessing is also present. You create your own situation. Most of the supplications that exist in the buddhist tradition are based on ·an awakening process rather than confirmation. It is awakening--how to awake, how to transcend. We are not addressing anybody · in particular, but maybe we are addressing the lineage (the practicing lineage, the Kagyu lineage). The reason we are doing that is because the lineage represents practice and discipline, and we follow certain formats with that lineage. We are practitioners of that lineage, which means that we have to go along with that.discipline in the same way as others have done in the past·-Gampopa and Milarepa and so forth. So, we're inspiring ourselves saying, "I'm going to be one too." It is .a personal com- · mitment. It is the same as reading the Heart Sutra and other·buddhist sutras, which are purely - 20 -

dialogues between Buddh~ and his disciples. At the same time, it has its quality of up-to-dateness.

Q:

Rinpoche, you said we should try to understand the nature of aggression and pain, not in the sense of trying to cure ourselves, but to understand wh~t's imprisoning us, and that to relate to that in an arrogant or aggressive way might somehow disallow understanding. And, at least at this point, I don't see how I can relate to anything other than aggressively or arrogantly, no matter what style I might adopt. And I also have a little problem seeing the difference between curing oneself, meaning getting rid of sickness, and seeing what's imprisoning us. R: Well, I think basically the point is a sense of understanding the aggression, to begin with. It's like the analogy of drowning. You have to use the water.to come up onto the surface. It's the same water, and whether you drown or not is up to you. You are drowning because you have mismanaged the water, and therefore you have to use a different approach. At the beginning, your approach may be an aggressive one, but you are willing to shed your arrogance and you are willing to be ripped off, so to speak, willing to become naked. Once there is willingness to be exposed without any hesitation, then there's no problem, no difficulty.

Q:

So that willingness doesn't rid you of aggression, but somehow changes the character of it.

R: Well, it might be the 'same style, you might be doing the same thing, but your aggression sort of uses itself up. The later pursuit through the path is very irritating, but it doesn't rely on any· aggressive means or any aggressive apnroach. It's a question of just acknowledging boredom. Boredom seems to be a way of transmuting aggression into practice.

Q: I was just thinking about the analogy of a mirror, that everybody could be a mirror or that situations could be mirrors. But upon looking at the mirror, would it be true that before you could see yourself, you would see your aggression? In other words, if I saw somebody--could they·really reveal-myself to me if I would allow myself ~o look at that mirror? R:

I think so, yeah.

- 21 -

Q:

But before I could see myself, would I see my resistance to that?

R:

Yeah, that's possible. According to the psychological steps that take place, you don't actually see aggression first. Aggression is the flash, and one's ego is the light which is permeating the flash. But, you don't have time to go through that process. It's so_ fast that you have been pre-programmed already. So, seemingly, the only things you see or care for are your reactions.

Q:

Then before I could recapture that flash or see the flash again, I would have to .work through all that _aggression.

R: Slow motion of some kind. But that seems to be a bit tedious, and analyzing it doesn't actually help very much.

Q:

Well, what would be the--

R: At this point, nothing, except understanding what's going on, rather than analyzing. Q:

Mm-hmm.

R: At the beginning, one has to develop a sense of intense imprisonment. That seems to be the first inspiration. Then, once you begin to feel the sense of intense imprisonment, you begin to feel more of a sense of the possibilities of not being there. Going back to a question asked last n-ight, with specific reference to the Jewel Ornament, and not being able.to relate or in any way experientially identify with almost any part of it--how does this relate to your discussion of relating to the lineage? Lineage doesn't seem--therers no experiential identity with it. Q:

R: Well, I think quite basically you should work with your aggression, to begin with, and what is available to you at this particular moment. Working through it. The first inspiration to become rich is to become penniless. You have to start from the beginning. ·

Q:

Where is the beginning?

R: Being· poverty-stricken and very angry, aggressive, wretched. (Laughter.) We are not talking about

- 22 -

something diff.erent than what you have, what you already have around you. We've got to use what we have as resources. Once we actually realize that there's some truth in it, that is the beginning or the root of the path. Then we begin to have a great grasp of it. The path doesn't omit or reject that part, particul~rly~

Q:

Specifically, I'm thinking of his whole thing of accumulating merit or the list of ways that we los~ merit. The worst murder was to murder your guru. (Laughter.) I got the impression that the worst offenses of all had to do with your teacher, and it seemed like it wa~ a trade union or something. (Laughter.) R: We discussed that alreidy, you know. If you don't like your mirror, what your mirror has to say, you don't break the mirror because you know you might find some other mirror which is also clear and saying the same thing. So from that point of view, the guru is not particularly one person. It's haunting.

- 23 -

TALK 113

"SUCCESS ON THE PATH"

I would like to go back a little bit to what we discussed yesterday in connection with the mind following the dharma. One of the characteristics of that is basic renunciation, but not renunciation in the o~dinary sense of leaving one's home town or country and becoming a holy man of sorts. Renunciation seems to be based on a true unde·rstanding of suffering. And then renun·ciation takes a further step, which is becoming part of the greater vision-leaving one's own home town, metaphorically speaking, or ego. This means that our familiar territory is not related with as a cozy home situation. We have actually left our home territory, that which encourages us in growing familiar plans and wallowing in them. And in understanding that sense of renunciation, we must realize the need for compassion, the need for warmth, as well as the need for less arrogance and aggression. That seems to be the first step, or the first ~harma. And now we're getting into the se·cond. dharma,. ··which· is: following the dharma, that one succeeds on the path. Succeeding on the path of following the dharma is comprised of three situations: you, the dharma,

- 24 -

and the path. .Y~u have become part of the ·.dharma already. In other words, you have already identified your experiences with the teachings,~ so the teachings become a spokesman or confirmation for you. Following in that dire-ction, once you have actually made some kind of connection or comP.lete link with the truth- -that you and the truth· are one- -e·nergy has already happened at that point; So you can't remain steady and you're never stuck in one place. Once the ~ruth and you are one, you are automatically moving, you are already taking a journey of some kind. You move automatically once that has happened, and very personally. The journey takes place automatically and the path happens automatically, so your journey on the path is very powerful and energetic. Something further seems to be necessary in this connection: there is a need for discipline. Discipline is the way finally and completely to actu:alize.the unity between yourself and the dharma. Discipline is the fuel, because·discipline is connect~d~t~ t~e.domestic situations i~ yo~r life~.Your da~-to-d~ l1v1ng. Your every day l1fe 1s some~1mes very .. -< trying, sometimes very easy, sometimes challenging. It takes all kinds of shapes and patterns. So basically discipline means. willingness to work with all that, a willingness for you and the dharma or truth to be one. In other words, you and the truth of suffering, you and the truth of egolessness, and you and the truth of irnpermanenceJare one. These are known as the three marks of existence, according to the buddhist tradition:· egolessness, suffering, impe·rmanence. They are very important subjects in realizing the truth about life. In this case, truth is not particularly the divine truth of the theistic traditions. This particular type of truth is nontheistic tr~th. It is truth. Truth without theism. That is to say, it is you and your world rather than you and your world and somebody else (or something else). So from that point of view, the practice of meditation is the ideal nontheistic discipline, the traditional discipline of meeting oneself without indulging. Meeting oneself and breaking through onese1f. \

In meditation, you simply sit and breathe. Breathing i.s not .regarded as a tool. Crutches maybe, but not particularly a trick or gadget. It's impossible, since you have been breathing such a long time, that it could be regarded as a new technique. Just become one with the breath. Identify· completely with your preath; s.o that breathing becomes you and - 25 -

you become the breathing: body becomes breathing, breathing becomes body"~ mind becomes body, breathing. Very simple and direct. Thought-chatte.rs occur. · According to the samatha traditionJ when· thought· chatters occur, you just acknowledge your thoughts and return to your breathing. Religious thoughts, sexual thoughts, thoughts of aggression, business thoughts, domestic thoughts, thoughts that gossip~ thoughts that show your private cine~a show, thoughts that play _back on a record player: All of those are just thoughts, even if they're angry, jealous, or whatever, You could feel·greatthat all of those are just thoughts, thinking process. Whatever occurs i~ your thinking process are to be regarded as just thoughts, thoughts, thoughts. They're neither good nor bad; they're simply there, like clouds in the sky which come and go. Thoughts are there, simply there. And then after acknowledging your thoughts, come back to the breathing. There's ·one point I would like to raise: there's no such thing.as an ideal meditative state. Since this particular tradition is not cultivating any state of mind, any euphoric state of mind, the practice of meditation could sometimes be quite chaotic and disgraceful, and sometime it could be extremely good. But whatever happens, it's your journey that· you are taking. Having one's mind unified with the dharma, you are taking this journey. It is. endless, and sometimes it's circular: the faster you go, the closer.you come back to home. So there is no point in speeding. This journey is very real. The more you awake, the more painfu~ it is. The more you awake, the more you're involved with the sitting practice of meditation, the more neurosis could be seen through. That is, today your fever is liftin_g, so your original sickness .becomes more vivid. And as your original sickness begins lifting, the side effects become more complainatory. And as · the side effects dissolve, then little irritations become a big deal. So there's no end totrouble, problems. Through the process of .becoming more -~d ·more refined by means of the sitting practice of meditation, you become more shakey, basically, because ego's fortification, its maintaining of its enter.tainment, its territoy; and its kingdom, becomes doubtful: So there's a ,ense of loss, of losing heart. And what you're losing is your arrogance, your chauvinism. · Often you are tempted to go back to your good old days. Life used to be more colorful: more challenge,

- 26 -

more fights, more chaos, greater pain. But somehow, at this poin~.it seems to be too late. The sitting practice of meditation generally brings a lot of loneliness. You're realizing that you can't actually use others, you have to live with yourself. However hard it may be, still one has to live~. with oneself. It becomes problematic, very lonely, extremely desolate. You can't cry on somebody's shoulder, or jump on somebody's lap. And you can't tell somebody your innermost secrets about how the psychological disciplines are affecting you throughout this process. Ynu might think you are making some sense, but others have difficulty listening to you. Things begin to break down. The more you try to introduce complicated methods, the more lonely it becomes. Whereas, on the other hand, if you're just trying.to relate with the world simply and directly, a greater communication takes place. Very simple, direct communication,which is not involved with asking for sympathy or for a fight. It's very d.irect communication with no demand on either side. It cou~d be heavenly. So it is very important for us to realize that if we're going to do something about ourselves, it's best to ~ive up trying to do something in terms of goal orientation. As we discussed already, you can't watch your own burial. You can't have a graduation ceremony with ? host of buddhas and bodhisattvas congratulating·you. (Actually, that might happen, but then it will not be you but somebody else--I should say something else, rather than somebody.) So discipline is very necessary, important. Without it, we can't cut through ourselves properly. Discipline is the feul which burns ego; it is the sword that cuts through all preconceptions. Sometimes discipline becomes a source of resentment, and sometimes it is a source of inspiration. But in any case there are no difficulties when one is able to get into discipline. There are no p~oblems, no difficulties at all. The difficulties ~nly lie in that we don't want to give up "this"--we still would like to maintain our arrogance. According to nontheistic disciplines, realization and freedom ~an only be possible if we are able to develqp our own awakening. Supposing you fell asleep and. slept late. The dawn, the sunrise or the daylight wouldn't help. First you have to wake yourself up in order to see the dawn, the sunlight.

- 27 -

There.' s something in us which is awakening already.· And we have to tap that· particular source, that particular energy, by. means ·of discipline, the sitting practice ·of meditation. This has been recommended by the Buddha, and has bee.~ practiced for 2,500 years. It's old-fashioned truth, in some sense. But at the same time it is up-to-date, applicable--and a lot of us still do it. This is not particularly a testimonial, but it still works. It still happens. It becomes a part of basic necessity.· Even during prehistoric ages, animals ate, drank and slept, and even at this point in the twentieth century we still do those same things, and they still work. It's the same kind of thing: the sitting practice of meditation is not a new gadget that somebody just came up with. It is not a bright idea somebody jotted down in his notebook and decided to publicize, jazz up, and braodcast, which then got a lot-of followers and finally a few testimonial reports as well. At this point it seems to be needless to talk about its workability, but rather how it needs to be done. When your mind follows the dharma, basically you begin to develop a sense of realization. But that unity between mind and truth needs continual disciplineJso that it does not become purely a preconception, a conceptual idea, so that it actually works and it actually relates with our basic being. That is discipline, the practice of meditation, · which· according to the Buddha is very simple and direct. As far as technique is concerned, it is very simple. Basically it is working with what is available, that is, with yourself and with what is around you: your body, your breath, your mind. It's very simple. You work with your body by boycotting unnecessary activities, just sitting still. When you sit still, you feel your heart beat, you hear your breath and your thoughts begin to chatter. ·so what has been recommended. is just to go along with your breathing, which is a natural thing. Whereas if you try to hold your mind steady and still, ·the more you try to hold it, the more your mind becomes restless. Your mind doesn't want to accept that kind of authority. It becomes more inquisitive about entertaining one~elf. Question: What set you to laughing· in the beginnirrg of the lecture!

. .:. 28 -

Rinpoche: W~ll, I think w~'re still very much homeoriented,and that's very na1ve--and funny too. It feels as if everybody comes here after they've just finished the dishwashing, suddenly settled down, and now are watching television.

Q:

Rinpoche, would you say·that buddhism is a kind of ultimate coping mechanism?

R: I think all religions would say that, including buddhism. But at the same time, as buddhists, we think. that we've got the best.

Q: The best what? I go t lost. I'm not .asking you to find me, but I'd like to find you, your · teachings-.R: Well, the best. from the point of view of coping. You feel you aren't being cheated ~nymore, that the only process you're going through is re·discovering yourself.

Q:

Oh.

Q:

I seem to have a little trouble communicating in this realm of buddhism. Before starting on the path, we all find ourselves in a state of duality, and we think in terms of duality, and at the other end, there's nonduality. And the only way I can conceive of getting off the starting line, is talking ·a-tnt thinking in a mixture of both duality and nonduality, experiencing a little nonduality through meditation, if I'm fortunate. But I find it to be necessay to communicate in the dualistic manner. I can't comprehend trying to communicate in the nondualistic way. Is this unusual or is this a conflict? Have you found this to be .a difficult stumbling block as people start out from the word 'go~ and starting down the pCl.th slowly, slowly dissolve? R: ~···don't see any problems. Even if you reach the level of nonduality, that is duality already. So you can '·t just mimic nonduali ty. And I don't think there. is really such a thing as nonduality at all .. That'.s just another idea.

Q:

Mm-hmm. Well, I was listening to your tape today on Don Juan, and you were talking about the ·Journey. to Ixtlanh. and how Don Genera said that he would never get t ere, he would always be on the path or· on the journey. So in a sense, we·'re always

-

29 -

operating from a woild.o£ duality, correct! R:

Yeah--

--and we have to participate in the· thought processe~to some extent, that duality offers. Today, in our 'discussion, I found a very strong resistance to logic, you know, the implication that logic is dualistic and therefore that there's no place for it. Q:

R: There's no problem. Actually, what I'm planning to talk about tomorrow is the intellectual ~evel, how one•s mind works.

Q:

I'll wait until tomorrow then, and maybe ask my question then. R:

Don't leave before tomorrow.

(Laughter.~

Q:

In our discussion group today, we were talking about aggression, and--

R:

Can you raise your voice?

Q:

Yeah. It occurred to me that maybe our mere existence in some ways is aggressive in that we're taking up space. And underlying this aggression may be an insecurity of being. Would-you comment on that? · R: I think you are right, but then there is the obvious aggression which stems from that. Our obvious arrogance, obvious aggression can be worked on. The point is we can't knock the whole wall down at once, but we can take it down brick by brick. We can deal with what are simple situations now. Basic existence obviou~ly is a sense of wanting to hold on and a sense of being. It contains a lot of aggression already, for the very fact that l-and-other is already a step towards fortificatio~. You don't want to be attacked; you would like to ~ hold your particular castle.

Q:

Looking at ourselves as being aggressive and confuse.d, and at life as sufferingJ could become self-indulgent in negativity. And in that way, it would reinforce the negative rather than th~ positive. R: It dependi on how you are actually dealing with that situation. You could d.eal with that situation as going back to familiar ground, holding onto your territory, or you could. work on i~ as manure - 30 -

that could be abandoned in the field. useful to grow crops.

But .it's still

Q:

·Yesterdayr you alluded to aggressiveness having a relationship with boredom, and· I've been thinking about that because I'm bored a lot when I sit. Is boredom just resentment or is.there such a thing as an acceptable type of boredom? R: I would say boredom is resentment, definitely. But when the boredom begins to take shape, you .would like to get into boredom rather than active resentment. So boredom could be said to be passive resentment, a deaf-and-dumb approach: you don't want to see, you don't want to he·ar, and you don't want to speak.

Q:

Lately I've been feeling I had many hopes, illusions or ideas which seem to have fallen away--but not completely. I guess I still resent that. Everything seems rather star~,· barren, and vague. I just do not know anymore what steps to take or what direction to be moving. How do you work with that kind of vagueness, or if it's boredom, with that kind of boredom? R: Well, it's not a question of the direction that you're taking, that you must know that. It doesn't involve scheming. We basically lack an understanding of newness, of the present situation. You come up with the problem in the present and you would like to do something about it. But since you can't face the present, you try to study its case history, which is in some sense a cop-out.

Q:

But you must still do something. alive.

You are still

R: You can do. it in accordance with what's there rather than doing something according to Dr. Spock's book.

Q:

I don't understand that. Doing something means something to me. My hassle is that I have a lot of aggression and hostility in me. It's a big part of me. And when things come up in my life, heavy scenes, trips--when I have to react to my own aggression or somebody else's--I'm usually unable to do it. But I've only been meditating since Thursday morning. I don't even know if I'm meditating yet. Bu.t if aggression comes into my head whn I'm sitting, I start looking at it. And if I think I'm looking at it, all of a s~dden t~ere's-some- 31 -

thing else there, I don't know kow to deal with it and I don't think I can· learn how to de a! with it. I think that--here I am, thinking. My he·ad is so full of concepts and words, falling all the time, that I guess I have decided, somehow, to commit myself to sitting. But I'm still nervous. I'm shaking like a leaf right now, and "hello." ~:

Well, I think the simplest answer is, sit.

Q:

Thank you.

R: It's very tricky. It could be. It's in the process of trying to tone down, but at the same time, it could be a raging war--you know, planning your warfare.

Q: Should one give up an opportunity to attackJ even though that means you're not doing what you're feeling? R: Well, you see, this has been our general problem all along when we talk about emotion. We have a misunderstanding that emotions imply particular actions. For instance; we think anger automatically means hitting somebody. But that's not quite the case. Attacking is something other than actual anger. Attacking is the product of the emotion rather than the emotion itself. So the emotion actually lies within us. Emotion manifests in all kinds of ways, but acting it out is not quite the way to release it. What usually happens is that when you go along with the product of emotion, that recharges the next one, and so it goes on and on, perpetually. It never stops~ The question is how to have some kind of relationship with your emotions themselves, not just the product of the emotions. Usually what happens in the state of emotion is that we go completely stupid, and we actually don't have any logical minds or any intelligence at all. You could be a very intelligent person, but nevertheless when you are in that state, you're petrified and frozen completely. The emotions begi~·to take you o~er before you actually strike somebody. So there's a lot of room actually to make friends or harmony with the emotions at that point. Emotions can be worked with in your mind, as the emotions are actually cooking, when they actually happen, when they are actually brewing. They can be worked on at that level. I think that it's more a conflict between you and you, rather tha~ between you and somebody else from that point of view.

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Q:

In relation to what you said about aggression, I wonder how one can deal with other people's resistance to the path or to one's .involvement in spirituality--their lack of understanding or their resistance to it. R: Well; .I think trying to iay your trip on somebody else doesn't help. It becomes just another trip as far as they are concerned, obviously. I think that peop!_e can only understand your involvement in the dharma by your example, by where you are. Example is better than words. ·

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TALK ##4

"TRANSCENDING CONFUSION"

Our subject tonight is the third dharma of Gampopa: transcending confusion, clarifying confusion. "Well," we could ask, "If one is following the path of dharma, is completely unified with the dharma, and practicing meditation diligently--then what else is necessary?" But in many cases, situations arise which are completely beyond our expectations. We begin to get into so- · called trips of all kinds, wishful thinking, expectations, the need for certain revelations--all leading back to spiritual materialism constantly. This is the constant problem that we face. A person could be a competent practitioner, a good meditator; but he still has problems in actually giving up the goal, giving up preconceptions. In a nontheistic discipline, the idea of being saved or delivered into a higher goal, is always problematic. The nontheistic approach is much sharper than that. It is more accurate and precise for the student following the path. The notion of goal or promise, tends to bring unnecessary security, maybe false security. It tends to bring up the question of pleasure: that following

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the spiritual path is based on purely seeking greater pleasure. You can call it bliss or absorption or anything you want; but nevertheless, what it boils down to is seeking for pleasure. And that used to be the main selling point of assorted ·spiritual trips: "Other pleasures, such as becoming ·a millionaire, or having an air-conditioned home, or having everything you want, fame, glory and everything, didn't satisfy you. We, on the other hand, are offering greater pleasure. So why don't you come to us?" That used to be the great commercial. People got -sucked into it, and a lot of people thought is.was an extraordinariiy good idea. This particular pleasure could be jazzed up by saying: "It is not safe and not indulgent. It is ultimate pleasure. It has no comparison with anything at all, therefore it-is superior and supreme and fantastic. And it is also the truth. If you really experience the truth, you experience fant~stic pleasure, incomparable pleasure." This attitude has its roots in the theistic tradition in some sense--a perverted form, of course. And if we are swayed by that kind of attitude, we will have difficulty in actually transcending our confusion, which is the third dharma, or third step of the path. We will have no way to transcend our confusion. Buddhadharma is not based on creating and developing a sense of great pleasure. You might get a clear idea about pleasure or bliss or the jhana states or mahasukha or whatever you would like to call it. But that experience is actually still confusion. It has the sense of duality--experiencer and experience. You could say that this pleasure is supreme pleasure because you don't experience the experiencer, that you are completely, totally involved with the · cosmic orgasm and ~o forth. You might lose the reference point of experiencer when you are completely overwhelmed by pleasure. Of course. The same goes for anger, for that matter. But in fact that's the problem. There is a split, schizophrenia in the cosmic sense, rather than ~omebody being freaked out in a mental hospital. There is the greater schizophrenia of not being able actually to concentrate on onepointedness in dealing with one's ego. Immense confusion. It is true ~hat a lot of the current approaches to spirituality are geared for that particular pleasure, that particular promise, in a very sophisticated way-to the level of salesmanship in the ordinary sense. A whole range of salesmanship takes place. Nevertheless

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they are all saying the same thing: "How can we be more comfortable?" In other words: "This wretched life is so painful, we should renounce it. We should become ascetics so we can get better pleasure and we don't have to deal with this rotten, wretched life called samsara." The reason we renounce it is that we are disgusted. We don't want to live in a dungeon-we would like to iive in a diamond castle. That's the kind of situation that creates conflict. The more we think in terms of the goal and the object of the goal, the more our minds become schizophrenic. There is immense separation: the more we try to give in, give up, devote ourselves or worship, the more important the worshipper becomes. It is a mutual ego-building. You might praise the Lord. And praising the Lord, you get a reward: you become close to God or the Lord. And finally you become good friends and you can actually demand what you want from Him or Her. It's a kind of diplomatic game, that you are trying to reach higher and higher into the authorities, trying to get closer and closer. Once you are close to the authority or the president, the king or the queen, you have access to making yourself comfortable and happy, because you have great influence by then; You have a lot of credentials at the same time--which becomes a big problem at this point. Spirituality from this poin~ of view, according to the third dharma of Gampopa, is not so much seeking pleasure or comfort or security. Instead it is very straightforward and somewhat, you might say, dull. And there's no "fun-fair" involved. We explore our emotions, work with them in their own state rather than with their'products. We don't get a chance to change shifts, to take our minds off the miserable situations of samsara. Everything seems to be very dull and purely pragmatic. That seems to be the whole point: nontheistic discipline is very pragmatic. It's humansituation oriented, rather than another promise for ego. In other words, everything--whatever we do, any little steps we make--is based on the ide~ of the desolation of ego, of that which creates double vision. Basically what happens is a type of egomania. Ego is actually unable to make up its mind. Ego sometimes wants that, somtime wants this--constantly changing its mind. And at·the same time there is another situation--

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"me and other." So there is a fourplex involved-"me and other" and "this and that." Conflicting situations are constantly taking place and we have no idea what to do, once we become victim to them. But somehow, following the path of·meditation actually does create a sense of perspective, a sense of clear vision, a sense of reality. We are not searching for happiness or greater happiness, particularly, but we are searching for freedom. In order to gain real freedom, one has to be free from the search for happiness. That search could become imprisonmen~. If one really wants to have a long-term, complete project, one has to do a clean job of the whole thing. In , order to do that, one has to look at every detail of the "yes's" and "no's" that are involved in the whole thing. Freedom is not exactly the same as happiness. Happiness is a state Of mind, as I once read on a bottle of gin. It says, "Gin is a state of mind." (Laughter.) Even supreme happiness is a state of mind. But freedom is independent of a state of mind, a mind that actually minds "yes's" and "no's .• " It is total experience. When freedom occurs, there is no reference point and there is no celebration. You have freedom already, so there's no point in beating a dead horse. Sometimes celebrating breakthroughs is a hang-up. There is still something very sad about that. Celebrating.victory means that you are still in imprisonment, you're still struggling a lot. You haven't quite reached beyond this celebration of victory. So freedom, from the ultimate point of view, doesn't need celebration; it is a direct-and simple experience, all-pervasive. It is not a state of mind according to the emotionality or feeling level--the level of "for or against," in other words. So the basic notion of transcending or clarifying confusion is experiencing the state of freedom, an unconditional state of freedom. It's not pleasurable-and not pa~ticularly unpleasurable either. It's big thinking. And it has a huge mind, a big heart. It is all-pervasive. It covers all areas, but not for the sake of covering all areas--it just happens that way. Such a state of being is transcending confusion, transcending predominantly seeking pleasure. Some people seek pain, but that is not exactly the usual· style of human behavior. Usually if you are somewhat intelligent, you seek pleasure. But sometimes you might seek pain because your pleasure is too much.

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You need a contrast. It is like dipping into a Turkish bath or sitting in a steam bath and trying to live through the claustrophobia of all-pervasive heat. But that's just trying to create little contrasts, knowing that once you get out of it, you'll b~ fantastic. The application of the practice of meditation brings a sense of actual freedom. But in taking steps towards transcending confusion, it 'is necessary for you to give up hope and fear at once, simultaneously. You have to give up pleasure shopping. That seems to be an important point. Otherwise we constantly accumulate all kinds of things, one after another. You are involved in an endless game, an endless search. You pick up little pieces of that and this all over the place: you meet this famous person, that famous person; this writer, that writer; this eccentric sage, and that eccentric saint. You're collecting all the time. But at the same time, you could be said to be collecting a lot of imprisonment. You could buy a· gold chain; silver chain; a chain in.laid with diamonds, opals, rubies; wooden ones; bamboo ones; concrete ones (laughter); cloth ones; hoping it is going to be a good ornament to wear--but in the end it becomes a hang-up. That's what's called spiritual materialism. We might have a good time in the "fun-fair," on our. shopping trip--a glorious time, never a dull moment. But when we come back home with our collections,.that is something quite different. "What do we do with these? Which chains should we wear today?" The sense of renunciation that we talked about at the beginning--realizing the pain that is involved in our life and the confusion that is involved in our life, the chaos--it is not bad to think that over. It makes a lot of sense. It's very earthy. It's an original idea of ours, our own experiences, very simple and direct. Quite possibly that will bring us to a renunciation of our territoriality and ego-hold; and at the same time that might bring the possibility of transcending confusion. Confusion, from this point of view, is the desire for greater happiness. Greater happiness is a somewhat mythical theme: you are not quite experiencing greater happiness. You think that the best you can do is to try to experience it--which is already watered down. So whatever we do in our life is trying

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to boycott what we have in our existence--our mind, our body, our intelligence, our perception. We look for something else entirely different. We are more interested in foreign cultures than our own culture. We don't have happiness; we feel miserable. Therefore we import happiness as a foreign product and try to make the best of it. The question is how much are we fooling ourselves for the sake of freedom--so-called freedom, good living. It is also important to look at the path from a domestic poirit of view, in terms of our journey from the beginning to the end--how much development is taking place, or has it been the same old thing, that we are always getting in our own way? Maybe occasional doubts are the best remedy, the best way to transcend confusion. guestion: I associate these talks with what we read J.n the Sadhana: "Grant your blessings so that my mind may follow the dharma; Grant your blessings so that confusion may be clarifieQ.." I had some idea that maybe "confusion may be clarified" was what you called transcending confusion. Rinpoche:

Mm-hmm.

Q: When it's clarified rather than muddy, it suddenly becomes--it's no longer confusion. Is that right?