Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The self that looms in a darkened room — almost tangible, impossible to grasp — is the central image in this 45-minute session with Ven Jampa Gendun. After opening reflections on motivation and the gap between habitual choices and our deepest values, he introduces the first of four analytical essentials for understanding selflessness: identifying the model of “I” that underlies emotional experience. Listeners are guided to recall a strong emotion — fear, elation, anger — and then, using a small spy-like portion of the mind, observe what that “I” actually looks like. A vivid example has the Dalai Lama’s brother identifying this in freefall from a parachute. The session also includes a compassion meditation using a graduated circle of people from beloved friend to difficult adversary, and a nine-round breathing practice. Pitched at practitioners already working within the series.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 HMA 1997 10 01.mp3
UUID: e2ceb8e9-94c7-4b8a-bcda-a117e837de45
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: The Heart and Mind of Awakening 1996-1997 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 1997-10-01
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.0 minutes
Words: ~5,660
We begin as we always do in terms of adjusting our motivation. You know, most of you probably lead very busy lives. You have lots of practical necessities to take care of, to deal with in your everyday life as opposed to my everyday life which is pretty impractical I think. Anyway you have demands made upon your time. Perhaps over the course of the various activities you lose sight of or get out of touch with what is important to each of you, or each of us.
What what is it that brings meaning to our life? What is it that gives us a sense of self worth and feeling good about ourselves? What is it that we would very much like to see our life as an expression of in our final moments but for one reason or another we get out of touch with, we lose sight of. So in this time that we spend together and readjusting our motivation, this process of reorientating ourselves and reprioritizing what is important to each of us is like I guess a very necessary stock taking. You know, stop speeding, stop acting, and just pause and reflect.
You know, I think I’m I’m quite fond of the Chinese saying, if you keep heading in the same direction, you you’re bound to arrive where you’re headed. And where is it that you’re headed? In terms, you know, in the overall patterns of your everyday life. These seemingly insignificant choices that we’re continually making continually over the course of everyday life. You you make one choice and it opens up certain possibilities and precludes other possibilities that the path not taken would have brought us.
Following that path along that brings its unique choices and still more choices to be made. And it as if maps out a destiny almost, a lifetime. Of course, our life is very much a summation of the various choices that we make, the various paths that we follow. Our habitual choices are our fate. And what kind of choices are we making?
In terms of what priorities, in terms of what standards, in terms of what values. Think it’s terribly important, isn’t it? What we experience is intimately in terms of our happiness. It’s not on. Yeah.
And to conclude with, I would just like to add No, I think that’s enough. I think I’ve given you the benefit of all my wisdom and I’ll leave it at that. So, you know, we all want to be happy, don’t we? We don’t want to suffer. That’s kind of our bottom line.
That’s where we’re at. So we have to be intelligent, we have to be skillful how we go about expressing that that fundamental motivation in our everyday life. So we need some kind of information which might help us. You know, that’s what Buddhism is essentially, a resource for us to help us to make proper decisions, make better choices, more skillful, more functional, choices which are more appropriate to what it is that reality has the ability to give us, What it has in fact the capacity to deliver for ourselves. You know going beyond some of our unfounded expectations, unrealistic hopes, and beginning to to deal with the real world in in very realistic fashions.
And, maybe we can begin to experience a a level of fulfillment and a depth of peace that, our particular dysfunctional patterns haven’t been able to bring us. And that’s the, the realistic hope that Buddhism holds out for us. Some way of dealing with our problems at a more fundamental level than we than we normally operate at, and we have to do that. We’re fortunate in having opportunity to be exposed to some necessary information on how to deal more effectively with our life. And it’s not the kind of thing that they teach in schools, is it?
In the various information that we’re we’re fed in in through our education is might help us to get a job or to find that can, you know, find economic means in our life. It really doesn’t hit the doesn’t apply to how to really find happiness in life, does it? The kind of the real questions of life are kind of left are avoided or left unanswered. Maybe this is the province of religion in general. You know that one of the definitions which is useful in this regard as to what is in fact a religion is that which brings about an ultimate transformation we call a religion.
Perhaps it doesn’t matter but maybe that’s a good working definition and this is what religion should is the province of religion is that we most of us see our problems as most everybody sees their problems as to some degree adventitious to themselves. And by that, I I mean extraneous to themselves as as if something has gone wrong and by adjusting the dials of our world we can make it better. We can that that the it’s like something that’s been invaded our system. It’s alien to ourselves. Some kind of foreign substance, some kind of toxic substance that we’ve taken by mistake and we can purge our system by various methods and be rid of that suffering.
But there’s another alternative approach to the way that we live our life and how we view and respond to suffering and how we understand it. And that is it’s very intimately bound up with who we are as a person, how we think and behave. And at this level we have to deal with the problem of suffering. And of the main factors in this process of dealing with suffering is our motivation. And that’s why it’s quite necessary to keep readjusting it, the intention behind what it is that we’re doing.
Most basically, we would we don’t want to suffer. So we want to find out the means to stop suffering and not the means to have more money, not means to have a bigger house, not the means to to become powerful and famous. Those might be ways to become more happy. We have to check that out. But those quite often are are the the mask behind which our real wants and needs hide.
We’re looking for something of the sacred in our life. You know, what is it that we mean by happiness? What is it in effect are we looking for? You know, even when we’ve we’ve been able to to grab hold of some of the little morsels of happiness over the course of our life, has our hunger really been satiated? You know, have we has it gone away?
Have we found what we want? Even if we had all that the material world could give us, you know, well, would we have anything that would that would really satisfy our deepest most needs? So by all means, perhaps we have to address the the notion of suffering at various levels. Maybe we have to we can work at the material level and the level of technology and trying to bring about our well-being, both physical and mental. But part of our energy is part of our attention and our resources and our our time has to be expended, to be directed toward something more than that, something deeper to that than that.
So tonight tonight we’re we’re sharing some information which the Buddha taught over twenty five hundred years ago about the nature of the self, nature of the eye which is seen as the the ignorance of which is seen as the fundamental source of our problems. So it’s tremendously important, isn’t it, in that regard, in that way, as to bringing about this ultimate transformation which religion which is, you know, at least the working definition of what religion is and as a means to finding it satisfying our inmost hunger. So it’s important what we do together. It’s just not another activity. Another more it’s not simply gathering more information.
It’s it’s meant to, in some way, transform us. And as to the extent of that transformation and whether it does or not is dependent upon the why, the intention behind our listening and discussing together as we do. So for ourselves, in order to to work with our problems at a more fundamental level, in order to find some kind of deeper happiness and satisfaction peace in our lives. But but also for the sake of others. And they’re going going beyond the our ritual self interests, our exaggerated self concerns to to widen the scope of our concern beyond our own narrow needs which really hasn’t gotten us very far in the course of our life thus far.
And to be concerned that this is important but it’s not only important for me. Why? Because others are just like myself. And whatever we might be experiencing in terms of our dissatisfactions, disappointments, our frustrations in the course of our life, we can be one hundred percent sure that others are experiencing very much the same as we are. You know, maybe the forms that other people’s suffering takes is unique to each of them, but its truth is universal.
It applies equally to us all. And, you know, if I can if I can only develop myself, even if only to a little degree, to a limited degree, then maybe I can not only help myself in working with my problems, become become more skillful in dealing with my sources of suffering and finding the happiness that I want to attain, then maybe I can be of that much more benefit in working with others and helping them to do the same. And then I think this is a worthwhile approach to life. I think only good can come out of it. We can be assured that we’re heading toward a direction that in our final finest moments we would want to go.
If in terms of our wisdom, in terms of our compassion, in terms of whatever understanding we may have. Then we can have some kind of confidence though we may not know the the end point of our journey. At least we can assure that we’re on the right path. So in this terms, the inner focus of our life becomes Buddha and this happy, healthy, loving, sane human being which becomes a great of great concern to ourselves, becomes a model of sanity which we’re seeking to actualize. And this ultimate transformation which we’re moving toward, working toward.
And we have to do something. You know we have to work with some method. And the method that here is offered is the Dharma. You know the the truth the truth if you like, the techniques, the meditative tradition, the teachings, the information, all of this body of knowledge and realizations which we’re seeking to integrate in order to bring about this transformation. And it occurs within the social context of a spiritual community.
Those who assist us, who who aid us, and who in whom in return we seek to help. And again and again trying to raise the level of motivation. And I just maybe there’s somebody at home that you would you could help by who you are as a person. If you were that just that much more understanding, that much more tolerant and compassion, then it would be worthwhile what we do this evening together. You can and we could be assured that out of that motivation we are we’ll bring about a type of result that we would want for ourselves.
It won’t be an indifferent type of result nor will it be a negative result in any form. It could only be a type if if only maybe we can’t see the exact form it’s going to take but we can have some surety based upon the nature of our motivation that it will be what we might would want for ourselves and those around us. To the Buddha, the Dharma and the supreme community, I go for refuge until awakening through the creative potential of my listening to the Dharma. May I achieve the state of a Buddha for the sake of all living beings. To the Buddha, the Dharma and the supreme community, I go for refuge and to awaken.
Through the creative potential of my listening to the Dharma, may I achieve the state of a Buddha for the sake of all living beings. The Buddha, the Dharma, and the supreme community, I go for refuge into awakening. Through the creative potential of my listening to the Dharma, may I achieve the state of a for the sake of all living beings. Reverently, I pay homage with my body, speech, and mind and present clouds of every type of offering, those actual and imagined. I disclose all my destructive acts accumulated since time without beginning and rejoice in the skillful actions of holy and ordinary beings.
Please remain until cyclic existence has ended and turn the wheel of Dharma for living beings. I dedicate the skillful actions of myself and others to the great awakened. So we’re going to In terms of our meditation, we can We’re beginning to Our visualization or the object of our development of loving compassion is getting pretty crowded. We can begin to think about an individual that we’re very close that we that we love a great deal, that most significant person in your life. Then that someone next to them, someone outside that that circle of intimacy.
There’s still someone you a good friend, someone that you care about Outside of them, someone a stranger but someone very attractive to you. Perhaps just by their personal appearance but something that you have a natural inclination that you like to become closer to that person for one reason or another but you aren’t. And then a stranger who’s unattractive for one reason or another. Maybe it’s their physical appearance. Maybe they have some kind of physical handicap or blemish.
Maybe they’re of a different ethnic group or race that you have a problem with, but something that makes you feel uneasy that you have some kind of of instinctive aversion for. And adding to that crowd that we’re building up, somebody you’re having some problems with, somebody you don’t like, you’re having difficulties in your relationship with. So, you know, we’re going to try as best we can to develop these qualities toward this group of people. There there we have different feelings for each of them. They appear very different to ourselves.
We on the basis of an equality amongst them that you know, we’ve talked about this quite a lot that, you know, beneath the superficial appearances by which we usually judge people which mean, you know, beyond the nature of our current relationship with them, they’re sentient beings. And it is a mark of sentient beings that they want happiness and they don’t want to suffer equally without any difference. So there is a group of people and though we have these fluctuating feelings toward them in terms of the nature of our present relationship, beneath all that primary and of greater significance to them is the fact they want to be happy and don’t want to suffer in that regard. There’s no difference. There’s no difference whatsoever.
So taking that as a kind of a working basis, this is primary and deeper than the fluctuating and usually superficial characteristics with which we relate with people in terms of. Anyway, we’ll try using this group of people to do compassion. Then we’ll do mindfulness of breathing. And then we’re working with the four point analysis, the four essentials as a meditative method for coming to an understanding of selflessness. Well, we’re going to continue it but we’ve talked about the first point.
There are these four points. The first point is the most important also the most difficult. The the essential of determining the object of negation. You know, it’s a you know, it’s a tech sounds like a technical term, but it’s not meant to to make it to confuse you or or to hide any what is what we’re actually trying to get at. It’s important, this this information.
It’s essential from the point of view of Buddhism that we that we we gain some feeling for this. You know we’re going to talk Obviously we’re going to talk a great deal more about it. But this this first essential we’re going to meditate on and the essential of determining the object of negation. And I talked about how to do this in terms of meditation last week. First we quiet the mind and then having quieted the mind we generate a strong sense of I And we can do this using your memory or your imagination.
You can remember some It doesn’t have to be a particularly negative. It can be a very positive emotional experience. You you won the Nobel Prize Prize or something. Fantastic. Or you won the lotto.
I won. I. That I. So so begin to to relive in an emotional sense this experience in which you as the I are the subject. Something that maybe we were going to have an accident or positive or negative, either one.
And one part of your mind is going to observe the other part of your mind. So it’s like a spy. So this is it takes a great deal of skill to to be able to do this. Why? Because what will most likely happen is that you will interrupt the process of of the reliving of this experience in your imagination.
That and there there upon when you do analyze, when you do try to get a sense of what the how the eye appears, nothing will appear. There’ll be a blank. So it is like, you know, you have to allow the the the emotional experience to be continuing while a small small portion of your mind acting like an undercover agent, you know, kind of peeks out from behind the bushes, You know, like a paparazzi or something like that. Trying to get a shot of this. What But but generally in our emotional experiences, we’re we’re caught up with the object.
You know, the money I just wanted to lotto or, you know, you really are a bastard or one way or another. Here, we’re not we’re we’re trying to ascertain, we’re trying to determine, we’re trying to identify what the subject of this experience, the I to which all of this is experiencing, what’s going on? I’m I’m afraid. What does that I look like? I’m so happy.
What does that I look like? I can’t I can’t do this. What does that I look like? And does it okay. Does it have is it material?
Is it immaterial? Is it is it does it look like it’s changing? Does it look like it’s unchanging? Does it is it look permanent, impermanent? Does it look like it has parts?
Does it look like it’s partless? Does it look like singular? Does it look like many? Does it have a color? Does it have a shape?
You know, we’re working we have a model of an eye which is going to you know, it’s like the premise. It’s like upon which this experience is is being generated. A model of an eye we’re making use of. I’m so happy. So that’s part of this overall experience which is occurring within your mind, a particular model which is which is integral to what what the rest of the mind is experiencing in terms of pleasure or pain, in terms of what’s going on for it, this this emotional experience.
Part of that that overall gestalt happening that’s occurring within the mind, this experience, an integral part of it is a model of the eye. It’s playing a part. And we we want to allow this experience to continue so that this eye remains. But a very another part of our mind is going to try what is to ascertain, to determine what does this model look like to gain a sense of that I. We have to gain a sense of feeling for it.
Otherwise, the the the rest is always going to be remain at a very intellectual academic level. We won’t have identified it the what they call the object negation. That we won’t have identified that model of the self within our own experience. We will only work on the basis of presumption or assumption or belief. And it will that will never have the force of mind where whereby to begin to undermine ignorance, which is misconceiving, which is grasping onto the truth of that model.
We have a belief in that this model of itself has some reference to reality. Unless we identify what we’re going to look for, when its non findability will have no force in our mind. It will always remain superficial. It will not have the transformative value which which we’re seeking. Therefore, it’s And this is what we’re ultimately trying to do to bring about this ultimate transformation.
So we we It’s like setting up a target. We have to identify what it is we’re going to shoot at. If you want, you know, the the traditional analogy. So if you want to catch a thief, then you have to know who you’re looking for. You know?
If I I can’t hold you all in the room just think like some of there’s some money missing. I’m sorry. None of you are going to be able to leave. You know? I have to know who it is that took it.
I have to identify them. So in this it’s it’s it’s admittedly, it’s not easy, to be honest with you. I don’t think but I think we have to start. But you can gain a sense. And I think this sense is very important even at even at our level of understanding.
I think when you begin to play with this, to work with this, familiarize yourself with this process, you will begin to gain a sense that there is a model of an I, a type of self which which my emotional life is arising in dependence upon. And will moreover, in having gone through the rest of the essentials of this four point analysis, you will begin to gain a sense that this is simply a model which has no reference to reality. It’s it’s I can’t I’ve looked for it. If you can once you once some familiarization with that, when you become accustomed to that, merely the mindfulness of that in an emotional situation when when the moment like for example, anger is beginning to rise in your mind and you catch it soon enough. If you can if you can be mindful of the the nonexistence of the eye which this anger is is based upon, It will undercut the anger because it will undercut the ignorance which is which is the precursor to the anger, which is necessary cause of the anger.
And the anger will dissipate. Even at our level we can we can do that. Normally we aren’t very mindful but we can develop that. So okay. So in your in your your meditation, we’re going to to quiet the mind And then we’re going to very gently and calmly, you know, we don’t have to freak out here.
This is something that’s going to go on inside you. Very gently and calmly begin to recall. You know, imagine what what are we like? I don’t know. Like the Dalai Lama’s brother, Ngari Rinpoche.
He used to be a believe it or not, used to be the paratroopers in the Indian Army. He said jumping out of an airplane was a great opportunity to identify the object of negation. And you’re jumping out of it like this and a huge eye rises. You know, you’re scared like you’re scared as hell, I’m so scared. And the eye becomes very solid, very real.
That’s why we do this. That’s why, you know, it the eye always appears to be truly existent or inherently existent or all of these very terms that we’re applying to it. It always appears that, but it’s too subtle to begin to ascertain or determine that appearance. We we we generate a very strong sense of I and then it becomes more apparent, it becomes very vivid. I I can’t stand you.
You know? I know. It’s like something very solid and real is in there. You know? It’s almost like almost a physical sensation sometimes when you when you become so very upset.
I hate you. I no. I can’t stand you. That there’s something there’s a model that you’re working with on the premise of on the basis of which all of these this this hatred is arising. What does that I look like?
So the difficulty is to maintain the emotional experience while still performing the analysis. So so so it’s necessary to activate a very strong sense of I. You know, remembering fear, remembering the time when you felt dejected, when you were depressed, remembering some very positive emotion, something when you won you won the lotto or something, whatever. And and when there’s, you know, activating this strong emotion, this will cause a strong sense of I to arise. I’m scared.
I’m I feel terrible. I’m so happy. And we want to begin to gain a sense of what the I looks like. Now, again, we’re not talking I’m gonna emphasize this fact, we’re not talking about the psychology of the eye, the the self. You know, we don’t talk about an eye with regard to tables, with regard books, with regard to the self, self and I.
So we’re not talking about we wouldn’t we wouldn’t ascribe any psychological characteristics to the table. I don’t think so. I mean, don’t, maybe you do. Sorry, table. I was hitting it a bit hard there.
So we’re not talking about any psychological qualities. We’re talking about what its its ways of existing. Existing. Does it exist as a as a material something or immaterial? Does it exist as something which is changeable, changing or unchanging?
Does it have a shape? Does it have color? Does it is it permanent or impermanent? Does it look like one solid mass or lots of little bits? Does it look like it what you get what you can get is what you might get a sense of you have to identify this with your own experience and you will, but it’s you will.
And the the one that you know, it’s like if you were in if you were in a darkened room, like lying on your bed and you have a sense that some something is some some something is there kinda looming over you. It’s like you could almost reach out and touch it. It’s very the pitch the room is pitch black but you have a sense that something’s there and that it’s like an indistinguishable mass of something. Yeah. And it’s it’s it’s almost as if you could reach out and touch it.
So gaining you know, that’s a pretty big but that’s a sense. That’s that’s kinda what we’re trying to to clarify for ourselves. What is that sense? What is it that’s out there that’s looming over our bed in that pitch black? You know, beginning to clarify it for yourself in however you can.
So developing and generating a sense of an emotion an emotional experience. And then, beginning to then once having generated the emotional experience, then perform the analysis. Allow the emotional experience to become to strengthen. Don’t allow it to go too long nor, you know, don’t get lost in it either. You know, I can Then just, you know, it’s okay.
Just this is a skill that we’re trying to develop, a skill working with within your own mind. So you, with a very small part of your mind, try to gain a sense of who it is that’s so scared, who it is that’s so happy, the eye of that experience, the subjective aspect, that factor with with what is going on in your mind. Now what may happen is nothing will appear. It may be a blank. Okay?
So it could mean that that you’ve you’ve been too force forceful in starting the analysis, that you’ve interrupted the emotional process. And now you’re in analytic mode of mind and the emotional aspect has been eliminated. So, again, calm in your mind beginning again. And this time, when you begin the analysis, see if you can begin a little more subtly, a little less gross, not like a bull in a china shop, that kind of thing. Or you may sense, well, it feels like it’s physical.
It feels like the body. Well, that’s because our conventional self is very closely, intimately associated with the body. So sometimes when we analyze what that self looks like, we end up analyzing what appears to be the body. But that’s not necessarily the self, the body, the eye. Sometimes we feel attention and quite often happens to meditators in general when they begin some kind of analysis.
So this is simply that the force of concentration is accompanied with a physical squeezing and this is, you know, it interrupts the flow of the energy, the psychic energies through the body. The flow on the air is moving through the through the energy channels in the body. And so this will we will feel some kind of tautness or tightness. This is not the eye itself. So all of these, you know, these mistakes you can make will will probably occur.
But that’s okay. That’s part of the process of learning. We’re just trying to it’s not you know, we haven’t cloned for the gene to be able to do this yet. So we have to go through the trouble of learning how to do it. But we can, you know, it’s not everything becomes easier upon familiarization.
So just just keep doing it and you will you will begin to learn how to become more skillful. We don’t operate our minds because we don’t know how they operate. We don’t operate our minds very well because we really don’t know how they’re operating operate. And meditation is very much simply learning a study of how our minds operate and becoming more skillful in in the with operating them. So if nothing arises, if there’s no sense of I, just simply begin again.
Calm the mind again and and in a relaxed manner generate a sense of I. I’m angry. I I I can’t do this. You know, I’m the only one in this room who can’t do this. I don’t I don’t know.
I’ve I’ve always had this problem. I I really don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve never been able to do much in my whole life. I can’t do this. I and use that I.
You know? Use whatever it is. Whatever it is. In a corner of your mind, observing, identify what this I looked like. Try to get a sense of it, a feel of it.
This is the most important of these four essentials because this is setting up the target and the rest will come quite easily, quite readily once once once we get this. So if you take a firm comfortable posture. So just getting in touch with your body, noticing any tightnesses, any tensions in your body, especially in the shoulders, neck, upper back, and bringing awareness to those areas. And consciously relaxing, softening, just letting go. So it may be useful just to imagine, actually imagine that you a sense of physical well-being, a sense of even a sense of sexual pleasure is pervading your body.
That might be helpful to help you to relax your body. Then we’ll practice the nine round breathing meditation, beginning by blocking the left nostril and breathing in through the right, going to white light, blessings and purifications and blessings from the Buddhas and bodhisattvas. Blocking the right, breathing out all the negativities and heaviness in the form of thick black smoke going off into the distance three times. And three times on the right, three times both. Now, again, we’ll cut a bit.
And love. Can you imagine on your left, on the extreme left is that person that you love a great deal. Next to them is that person slightly moved. To the right of them, to your right, is an attractive stranger. To the right of them, an unattractive stranger.
To the right of them, somebody you’re having some difficulties with that you don’t like. So this group of people is looking to you. Now how are you going to respond to them? And can you just simply develop a sense of friendliness towards the entire group of people? In terms of compassion, this a wish that they didn’t suffer, can you do that for them, this entire group of people?
It’d be wonderful if you didn’t suffer, if you didn’t have dissatisfaction and problems. May you not have any suffering. That’s what I want for you, all of you. I’m gonna help you. I’m gonna work with all of you alleviating your problems, your suffering.
Cultivate love towards these people, this entire group. It’d be wonderful if all of you are happy. I wish you all happiness. May each of you, all of you together, be happy. I’m going to help you.
I take responsibility for working with all of you in finding happiness.