Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 46-minute talk, Lama Zopa Rinpoche dissects the false appearance of an independent self. Through careful reasoning, he shows how the “I” seems to exist from its own side, separate from body and mind—then demolishes this through logical absurdity. If the self were truly independent, it would keep sitting even when the body stands, remain eating when the body goes to the toilet, stay in the mother’s womb while it ages. These contradictions reveal the gap between appearance and reality. He extends this insight across all of life: birth, school, marriage, work, and death all appear as truly existent, yet are merely labels on dependent components. Suited to practitioners with some Buddhist foundation seeking direct understanding of selflessness.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 14 WWNN.mp3
UUID: 4a3b07b2-d40c-47d7-a644-c21d2c7bcd3b
Teacher: Lama Zopa Rinpoche 1
Collection: y What the World Needs Now 1987 Audios (Lama Zopa Rinpoche 1)
Date: 1987 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 46.4 minutes
Words: ~2,386
That’s not the question. So why why we believe that we’re at an arhat now? What makes us to believe? We’ve convinced ourselves that we are. We’ve gone through the process.
What makes you to be convinced that you’re an arhat? Recognition. No. Just the faith. What makes you recognize that you’re an arhat? What makes What makes what makes you to believe I is at Buddha’s house?
What makes to anyway, what makes to believe that I is now at Buddha’s house? The what? The base becomes the label. Yeah. To to the house.
Because we have No. Yeah. Mhmm. A base we that we label with the house, and this is how we recognize it. No.
No. That’s not my question. I’m not asking about Buddha house. I’m asking about the I. What makes us to believe I is now at Buddha house?
I’m not talking all question about the Buddha house. You know? This my main question is I. I, not Buddha house. The same thing.
What makes us to believe that that is a Buddha house? What’s the reason that a Buddha’s house exist? Anyway, so You see? Is there anything that anything that which you label Now, as I mentioned, everything’s a label, label, label, starting with aggregates everything.
Whatever we whatever whatever we label, you see, What is whether the base is valid, base or not, you see, we label on the base. You know? We label without the base without the base, there’s nothing to label on. So, you see, whenever we label, we label on on a base. What what, you know, what whether it is a valid base or not.
You see now? Now this way this way is to understand. You see, Now we believe, I’m sitting here. What are you doing? What are you doing?
I’m sitting here. Listening teaching. Okay? At the Buddha house. And the mind is perceiving.
So There is no other reason at all why we believe that I’m that I’m sitting, you know, sitting on this cushion or sitting in this room, you see, no other reason at all except only these aggregates. Base, the aggregates is doing the action seeding. The aggregates is here in Adelaide, and it is at Buddha House in this meditation room. And during the action, sitting. That’s all.
Nothing else. Nothing else. No no other reason at all other than that that I am sitting here. Aggregates is doing the action, listening to teaching. The mind is playing mind is the sense of ear, doing the function, listening to the teaching.
That’s all. Nothing else. No other than the reason. No other reason than that. I am listening the teaching.
No. No. Other reason than no other reason at all. There’s no other reason at all than the other gets during the action. There is no other reason at all that I am eating.
Other than Aggregate. The aggregate is doing the action eating. You see? The body Aggregate, the body is doing the action eating. No other there’s no other reason at all to that I that that I am walking other than the aggregates body is doing action walking.
There is no other reason at all that I am sleeping. I am laying down except only the aggregates, you see, are laying down. You know? The gross gross, you know, state has a sense the senses, you know, absorb this not a function. You know?
No other no other there’s no other reason at all than accept that, I am happy, you know, other than aggregates is experiencing pleasant feeling. Same for the patient,. When the patient says, one one says, I am sad. There is no other reason at all than the aggregates, the mind is sad. The reason why I’m not you say, why why one is not in Tibet now, the aggregate in Tibet now.
The aggregates based on which we label, you know, I, which is not in Tibet now. But if you can transform any aggregates, you see, emanate all over, everywhere in Australia, So one is able to transform, the Bodhisattvas, the ārya Bodhisattvas, or like a Buddha, can transform into many. Then you can be in Tibet and Greece and then can be in South Africa and then can be in China and everywhere. So all like this. So the are you talking?
No other reason at all that I am circling in the saṃsāra. No other reason at all except only the aggregates. Particularly the consciousness and joining from one From one life to another life. From one life to another life. Under the control of the under the control of karma and the disturbing thoughts.
No other there’s no other reason at all to say that I and that I become enlightened other than only. The mental continuum, if you see, the obscuration, the stains which are on this mental continuum, it is ceased. It is completely ceased and perfected in realizations. So, you see now, so now, like this, how the how the I is dependent. How the I is dependent arising?
So by depending on the aggregates and thought, you know, dependent on those two, then it exists. It it arises or it exists. So now so now you see very clearly how the I is dependent arising. Now if the I is not dependent arising, see, not if the I is existing without depending on the base, aggregates, and port, then the I would be, you see, independent. Independent.
If the I is independent, you see. Now, next, after this, when the aggregate stands up, the I will be still sitting. If the eye is independent, without depending on aggregates, without depending on the aggregates, without depending on functions of aggregates. Even if does not depend on aggregates, then it won’t depend on as well the functions of the aggregates. It don’t depend on that.
What does it mean? You see, if and there’s I there’s I now, and if this is independent, you know, now like this. Now now like this. You see? You see now.
Look at your I. Look at, you know, look at what’s your I. You see? Now, this, you feel somewhere inside here, somewhere inside aggregates, you see? Not outside of aggregates, but somewhere inside of this body, you feel there’s a real I there.
Now, you see, does it appear to you labeled I? Don’t follow the intellectual side. Just don’t think, oh, this I is labeled. I know. I know.
But just natural, you see. Look at without analyzing. Look at it look at the eye without analyzing. Does it appear to you Does it appear to you labeled or unlabeled? Now, this real I unlabeled, it appears, in a kind of starkness.
Not one hundred percent something clear, certain, but some kind of starkness. And then I, real I, is an unlabeled one. Unlabeled. All not labeled by thought. Not dependent on aggregates and thought, you see.
There’s I existing from its own side without dependent on aggregates and thought. Now, so this is what he means independent, Independent I. This I does not appear as it exists in reality. How? Is it how it exists?
Depend on the aggregates and depending on the aggregates based on the aggregates and thought. Now, this is so the I what is appearing is This I, what is appearing, it appears independent. Okay? Independent. So now, if this is true, if this is completely true, independent, as it appears and as I believe everyday life, they are not.
If this is true, then, you see, when I stand when my aggregates stands up, the body stands up. Since since this I, there’s there’s I now existing from one side, a sitting one, I believe. So it’s independent. So even the aggregates went back to home, even the I, the body is at home, not at Buddha’s house, the I will be still sitting here on the same place. Even the body, even that, my body is at home.
Laying down, you see, I could get asleep. I could get sleeping. Would be sitting here listening to teachings on and on and getting tired on and on. Then same thing. You see?
So, you see, when I you see, when the aggregates stands up, the I would be still sitting. You see? And then when the aggregates stands up, standing up, when the aggregates changes action to sitting down, the I appears again, independent. Also, again, during the time during the time of standing, the I appears independent, unlabeled.
So, again, if that is true, if that is true, because the I is independent, then, you see, when the I sits down, then the I will be still standing. You know? The eye will be would be still standing. You see, when the aggregates yeah. When the aggregates after eating, out of finished action eating the aggregates, you see, out of finished action eating when he goes to toilet.
Aggregates, you know, out of finishing eating when he goes to the toilet. Then we see then the I will be still eating at the same time. The eye will be still eating there on the table. Yeah. Mhmm.
The other way, other the aggregates are out in the toilet, then the I is eating, you know, in the in the dining room. It’s not not possible. I see. So the actions of the I, since I is independent, does not depend on the aggregates and thought labeling. Thought.
Since I does not depend on the base, the aggregate and thought, then the action of the I does not depend on the action of the aggregates. It doesn’t follow. It doesn’t have to follow according to the action of the aggregates. That’s one thing, you see. One day, you know, when the aggregates see when the aggregates is in the old form when aggregates is is in the old form, you know, eighty years old, you know, ninety years old, you see, the I will be still in the mother’s womb.
And the eye, you know, the your it was the I, that very I, would be still in mother’s womb. Because even during that time, you see, the I, that one, that which one merely imputed on the aggregates does not appear as merely imputed. It appears that it exists from its own side even during that time, even during the conception, even during those time, even while one is a mother’s womb. So if that appearance a complete not false, complete true, that unlabeled one, then, you see, it would be like this. So now you can see, completely contradictory.
Now complete contradictory. You know, you can see I, the I, what exists? The I, you know. I what exists in that action of, you see, walking, sitting, eating, sleeping, all these activities is the one that which is merely imputed on this base. But this one, as it is merely imputed, it does not appear as merely imputed.
It does not appear. But what doesn’t exist? What appears is what doesn’t exist. What appears to oneself, what one believes is what doesn’t exist. I’m asking to say that what exists doesn’t appear, what doesn’t exist it appears.
You know? Like that. So same thing how it happened, how see, our experience of I, see, reality and appearance, conflict. So like this like this same thing with the body mind, When we look at the house, the sense objects, subject to object, action, everything like this, appearance and reality, is are opposite. Everything, you know, what occurs, what is believed, completely opposite to reality.
So therefore, So the the and the you see, The appearance which is contradictory to the reality, that is what is refuted object is. That is what is empty. That is what is empty, and this is what we have to realize, that which is empty. So now, for conclusion, like this, how the life is, May, you see, in reality, like this, Merely labeled, you see, I was born. Merely labeled, I was born.
Merely labeled, I lived. Merely Merely labeled, the parents. And, you see, merely labeled eating merely labeled food. And reading merely labeled clothes staying in the merely labeled house. And going to a merely labeled school. And and receiving merely labeled degree..
Married the merely labeled husband, raised merely labeled child. With the merely labeled money, going to the merely labeled shops, buying merely labeled all the stuff. Like this. So, with merely labeled ignorance, disturbance, merely labeled karma. Then experiences, labeled, rebirth, and death.
Circle of death and rebirth. Mere labeled and rubric, mere labeled death. This is the mere labeled the suffering of the mere labeled saṃsāra. By practicing merely labeled path, achieving the merely labeled enlightenment. So, like this, from the beginning, this is a birth, from the beginning’s time up to enlightenment like this.
But according to our appearance, you see, born to the you know, truly existent parents, you see, who do not exist. Truly existent oneself who do not exist, born to the truly existent parents who do not exist, according to the appearance and belief And truly existent I, going to the truly existent school, with a truly existent I. Truly existent I, married with a truly existent husband, having truly existent child, which are all completely empty. Two legs and I, with truly existent money, going to truly existent shopping centers, buying truly existent things, which are all completely empty. So that is the whole thing.
From the birth into the dead, from the birth, from this morning into tonight, like this. So this is how we now spend our life, the appearance and beliefs, From birth into death like this. It’s another complete another world from the reality. So that’s how that’s how there are so many problems. That’s how that’s how the life is filled with the problems.
The life is they just don’t cease one another. And yeah. This the real eye appears inside, you see, in in the body. You see, that which appears real, you know, a real existing from its own side. You see now, if this really if this really exists, and then you see,