Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 95-minute teaching, Ven Jamyang opens with a striking observation: when the weather is pleasant, we waste those precious conditions on entertainment; when conditions are difficult, practice becomes impossible. This frames why human rebirth is so rare and valuable. He then explores why our choices keep producing suffering—tracing it to a fundamental misconception about the self, which we experience as a separate entity but which is actually just a collection of body and mind. From this philosophical ground, he guides an extended compassion meditation: loving yourself as you would a dear friend, healing wounds with white light, and extending that healing outward to all beings. The session closes with practical discussion of ethics, karma, and why human practice is the pathway to meaningful life.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2009 02 15 mind healing 5 – Track 10.mp3
UUID: 6150e018-a866-4e05-9cc4-acc1a766b66f
Teacher: Ven Jamyang
Collection: Jamyang Mind Healing (Ven Jamyang)
Date: 2009-02-15
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 95.2 minutes
Words: ~11,768
Is that not too loud? It’s a little bit loud. This is Jampa’s. You? Try Try it?
All of the above, I think. All of the above. How was your holiday? Very good. Very good?
Good. Good. Yeah. Is it hot down here in the night? Oh, yes.
You are It’s hot. Yeah. Was it? So can you imagine that if you would live somewhere in a place where it’s even hotter than we have now, how what it does does to our mind? Can you feel that?
What it does to the mind? And that it’s hard to really the mind becomes I don’t know. My mind becomes very flat and can’t think anymore, and it’s not flexible. I can’t direct it where I would like to direct it. And Buddhism, they say it’s very important to appreciate your human rebirth, you know, because when it’s nice weather and everything goes alright, we take it so easily for granted and we’re just gonna enjoy and have fun and whatever.
But then if you realize that actually the moments that we have, that kind of conditions, they’re very, very rare, you know. So if it’s now already hot for us and it’s still more difficult to work for the with the mind and that is actually what we wanna do, then if the conditions are better, that is actually time to start working with the mind. And that’s normally the time that we go and have fun because it’s so nice. So we’ll talk today a little bit about appreciation of, our human rebirth and also how it can give meaning to our life. But first, I would like to do, a meditation on love.
And last week or two weeks ago, we did a short meditation on that. And I wanna do deepen that and make it a little bit bigger so that you can use that more and more at home. And if I go back to what we did two weeks ago and you did you two guys find the the the city that I made for you? Just now? Yeah.
Alright. It’s in the basket that was waiting, definitely. Because we looked at a critical topic about it. Yeah. So did I have Yeah.
Wanna know the outcome. We were like, oh my god. What is this? So it’s on on the disc, the outcome. I can’t repeat it exactly because it was but what we were talking about was that we were holding onto these ideas about ourselves that we’re not good enough, this low self esteem and the guilt because somehow we want to be part of it, of our group, our family, stay close to our friends.
And you’ll miss that one. But we have been talking about what drives us, what makes that way engage in actions, what is normally the motivation behind whatever we’re doing. We’re doing a lot out of guilt. We’re doing a lot out of I’m not good enough, so, you know, I’ll just make sure that I please the people around me so that they like me, so that they don’t reject me, so that they don’t abandon me. And, these are very deep patterns and somehow we connected that last week with if you look at primitive I shouldn’t have used this word.
If we look how human beings behaved, say, two or three thousand years ago, living or even, you know, shorter. Hundred years ago in Australia, a hundred and fifty years ago, living in tribes and not being able to survive on your own when you lose your tribe, you know. So somehow you have to make sure that you keep connected to your tribe and another because if you don’t, you will lose your life. So there was always the choice. You have to give up something from yourself to be part of the tribe or you have to give up your life.
It’s almost that it’s a choice that we have many times in life. You know? Do I accept this for my husband or do I gonna leave? And if I leave, I’m alone with my kids and I can’t feed them and, you know, nobody’s gonna be especially if it’s happened fifty years ago, very difficult. You as a woman, you were not able to leave your husband even if he abused you.
Right. Right. Even now it’s very difficult. I’ll give you a good example of one person who who could not leave her husband because she was deeply religious and he was an alcoholic. Uh-huh.
And she just couldn’t leave him. I mean, there was no way she could go. So she lived her life with him. And he was banned to the sleep out, he was not allowed to come and sleep in her bedroom or anything like that because his behaviour was so very, very bad. But she did extraordinary things, she adjusted to the life.
She decided that when he was away up north north during the winter months, she’d have all the family parties. So while he was away she had the family parties. Was just an extraordinary woman the way she survived. But she eventually had a total and absolute coronary and never ever got over Uh-huh. So, obviously, it had a huge effect on heart.
Mhmm. On her heart. On her heart. Heart. Mhmm.
Yeah. Almost. Mhmm. And she And, you know, if you and and I’m not saying you have to leave your husband if he doesn’t treat you the way you want it, but it’s like I’m talking about the choices that we have. You know, we we every moment that we engage in actions, we have a choice.
We can choose for this or that. And I’m not talking about what is good and bad because in Buddhism, good and bad doesn’t exist. But certain choices will lead to more suffering and other choices will lead to more happiness. Right? So that’s that’s that’s the choice that we have.
At the moment, if we look at how we live, we do not have enough awareness, I think, most of the time. We’re trying to get more awareness so that we’re more mindful of what we’re choosing. And I think that as a study is all about, like, what consequences does it have if I choose this? And what consequences does it have when I choose this? Not just in the next five minutes, but also next week, next year, in ten years time, next life, you know, where do I want to go?
Not just with this life, but you know, where does my mind stream want to go? Where do I eventually want to end up? And if we look at how we live and how happy we are with ourselves, I don’t know, I think, correct me if I’m not right, that somehow we feel we can do better. Somehow we feel that the results of what we have been doing might be, we might be able to change them so that the results will work out better so that we have a happier life or a better life or a life with more well-being. If we already have that, we would not come here.
I think we would not be here. And that’s for all of us, me. So we make choices that do not give us a result that we actually want. And in the last four weeks, we have talked about why that is. And one side, we talked about the two wings of the bird and one of the wings is that we do cannot see reality.
We cannot see reality as it really is. It’s like we always have a veil. Our perception is not pure. So we have a wrong perception about reality and on that basis we make decisions. How can that give the result that we want?
It’s like walking around with a blindfold and then trying to do the right thing and then being disappointed when it didn’t work out. We have to guess what is the right thing for us to do or what is going to give us the result that we would like to have. We’re guessing all the time. So that is because we don’t have a view or we don’t have the beliefs that are in accord with reality. We hold on to beliefs many times that are completely the opposite of reality.
And we talked a little bit about how things exist and how we believe things exist, know, and especially if we look at me, who is me, and how this me appears as somebody who is completely independent, as somebody who, as a single entity. I appear as a single entity. It’s true, isn’t it? There is one me appearing. And if we’re going to look for that one me, very diff we can’t find that one me.
And now we look at the body and we think, is my body the me? No. The body is not the me because I can say my body. So me is somebody else than my body. True?
And then I can think, oh, it’s the me. It’s maybe part of my mind or maybe it is my mind, but I also say my mind. So the me appears to be the owner of the mind. So then we can say, okay, if the me is not the body and not the mind, then what is the me? Is the me something different than the body and the mind?
There is this entity who controls the body and the mind and who directs the body and the mind because that is how it feels like, isn’t it? Especially when emotions come up very strongly we have this appearance of a me that is completely separate from body and mind. If we’re going to look for that we don’t find anything. We cannot say this entity is that me that appears which is separate from body and mind because if that me would exist there would exist something that is something else than the body and the mind. And the body is matter and the mind is consciousness.
So if we want to put there a third entity that controls that, what is it made of? It can’t be made out of matter because then it will be part of the body. It can’t be made of consciousness because then it will be part of the mind. So if that entity exists it has to be something different than the body and the mind. And Buddhism says you can’t find that.
That doesn’t exist. So that me that appears so strongly and so independently and as a separate entity, you can’t find it. It doesn’t exist. That doesn’t exist the way it appears. That doesn’t mean that I don’t exist.
I do exist. You can see me. You can hear me. I do exist. You all exist, but not the way we appear.
It appears to us. So if the mind is if it’s me, it’s not the body, it’s not the mind, and it’s not a separate entity, then what is it? But because we do exist, so it must be something. So you can say there’s a collection of all the parts, but if I chop up all the parts and put them on a pile and say, can you recognize Helena? We would say that’s not Helena anymore.
Helena was somebody else who had a body that functioned and who could talk and who could if we put it all on a pile, it’s not there. It’s something so Buddhism says what I is. I is a mere imputation, a name that we give onto a base of the body and the mind. So the I is not the collection of body and the mind, but it’s the name that we give to that collection. And it arises together with my mind and my body, arises the name I or Jamyang.
They come together into existence. So the name is not the basis, my body and my mind. Two different things. Can you see that? I’m going really fast now because I want to go somewhere else, but I want you to have a kind of feeling for that.
Are you saying the me is? Me is the name that we give to the collection of the body and the mind. Why couldn’t it be the God within? The God within, what is that? You say then that the God is something else than our body and our mind?
Well the God within is, I suppose, our survival, our capacity to survive. The God within is what gets us through our life. What is it made of? Obviously it’s spiritual. Yeah.
And therefore I can associate it with the mind quite comfortably. And I think that God also is associated with the body because he warns us or she warns us of dangers and things like that. And I think there is a possibility that it is Is that an entity that does something different than you? No, no, don’t think so. It’s part of you?
Yes, I think so. So is it part of your body or part of your mind? I think it manages both during our lifetime. So is it something separate from your body and your mind? No, no.
It’s It’s sometimes your body, sometimes your mind? What do mean your soul? Well, a term could be used for it. It’s just a term. Soul or me doesn’t really matter.
It’s this thinking that is behind it. Because if you say, sometimes it feels like my mind and sometimes it feels like my body. Then how many mes do I have? Because sometimes it’s my body, sometimes it’s my mind, sometimes I’m angry, sometimes I’m compassionate, sometimes I’m happy, sometimes I’m Or do I have so different ‘me’s’ or is there a collection of things that I call me and that ‘me’ can refer to many different parts? I just think that God is our survival through life.
He manages our survival through life. If you talk about God and you have to talk about The God within. What is it? Because God is a name. Could be a human God.
But God is a name. The power of our life. The power of your life. So like your life energy. I was gonna say, the energetic component.
That’s what keeps you alive. And the savior of our life, yes, which warns us of danger and is able to perhaps warn in the sense that we might be almost going to walk in front of a car and for some reason or other we stand back. That god was able to pull us back. Isn’t that common? Why so now it’s like, how do we gonna label things, isn’t it?
Yeah. True, isn’t it? So if you talk about god, and I can’t go into that too deep today. No, I’m not talking about a spiritual a Christian God. I’m talking of the God within me that has me to survive and looks after my life till I die.
If I talk about God, know, God is a word, and that word refers to something. My survival, my living survival. And my guardian, the person that warns me danger and guides me through my life. Yeah. So even your survival mechanism refers to something.
It’s just words are a reference to something. Words are not it, what we’re really talking about. True, isn’t it? If I talk about the table, the table itself is a word and that refers to this. The word table and this are two different things.
We mix them up. For us they appear as the same thing. The mind is so tricky, isn’t it? Can you see that Jane? I believe this is a table.
And when I see this my mind thinks straight away table and I forget that table is just a word referring to this wooden piece. Same as me, me is the word that refers to a basis of body and mind. And if I talk about me I forget that me is the name and not the basis. So when somebody says something about my body, I think, they’re talking about me! That’s how we feel, as if there is a separate entity that owns the body actually they’re talking about that entity and it is saying something not nice, I feel what would I feel?
How do I say that in English? I feel insulted? But if I would say this is just a body, this is not me, the body is not me. If I feel insulted, I get angry and I start reacting and I create all these negative actions and I maybe have a fight and from this fight can become a bigger fight and it can take for years before that’s finished. That’s all the ego.
That’s all the ego, but that’s because somebody says something about my body and I believe they’re talking about me. Hey, how dare you to talk about me like that? Because we have the strong feeling of me. From that feeling of me what I’m saying is me, how that appears, doesn’t really exist like that. But when it appears like that we react in a certain way to whatever happens to us.
Because that I doesn’t exist in the way it appears our reactions are not accurate. Our reactions are not valid Strange isn’t it? It’s like we get deceived by our own senses all the time. Because our reactions are not valid we create all kinds of thoughts and beliefs which are not valid, which are not in accord with reality. And we believe them, we hold onto them.
And we all have a story about reality and why things happen and what it means, but it might not be in a court with reality. Most likely it’s not in accord with reality just because of the way we exist. So that’s one reason why we make mistakes and why we create more unhappiness for ourselves than we actually want. The other mistake that we make is the way we engage in the actions because it’s based on something that is not valid. The way we engage in actions is also not skill ful or not in accord with reality.
So our view and our actions are both not based on reality. And the more they are different from reality the more misery comes to us. The more we suffer from reality, you know, because if we have beliefs that are very different from reality and reality shows itself to us, we get upset. Oh, how can that happen? So that’s the question, what is If you can see that that eye appears in a certain way and if we’re going to look for it but can’t find it, then you can say, Oh, it doesn’t exist like that, then how does it exist?
Then we can start thinking about that, and we will. But first you have to challenge your own beliefs before you can replace it with something else. So we first got a challenge and we got to shake it. Then reality is not something that is created. Reality is something that is already there.
So in order to know reality we just have to open our eyes, just have to wake up basically. If we could remove the veil that we have we would see reality. Reality is not something obscured. It is for us because we have that veil, but if we could see it it’s just there. So Don’t you disassociate your emotions that also color what reality is?
Yeah, does color what reality is because we have a wrong belief about how we exist and then when things happen to us we get emotional and that colors us even more reality. And many times we say: Yeah, I knew that this was going to happen, you know, because we already color reality in a certain way and we think: Oh, this is probably going to happen. And we think it again and we think it again and then it happens and we say: Yeah, knew that. We never think: Oh, maybe I invoke that by the way I think. And maybe when I change my way of thinking I can actually change my reality.
Not completely Buddhism, not completely cognitive behavior therapy Buddhism goes much further than that. We’ll get there. I remember saying to Jampa that Buddhism, I did the first course, Buddhism seemed to me a mixture of CBT and ethics. And also when you say Buddhism is cognitive behaviour therapy, it’s like, but who was first? Who was first?
And yes, they’re psychologists and they do go into Buddhism and they get ideas and they create their own therapy and say, you know, we created this. Mindfulness therapy, you know, that’s exactly the same. That is Buddhism. But Buddhism is about the mind. Buddhism is like how does your mind work and what can you do in order to affect your mind, in order to change your mind so that you get more what you actually want from life.
So that you become more happy, so that you feel healthy. And the more we live in accord with reality the more happy and healthy we are. So I want to go to the meditation and I just have to say one more thing before we are there. So if we cannot see reality at the moment how it is and how is reality, so I’m going to say a little bit about that. According to Buddhism our mind is obscured by wrong beliefs and lots of emotions that are invoked by that.
In essence we are pure. In essence our mind is stainless. In essence we are perfect. But because we have the wrong beliefs, because we’re holding onto a way of existence, of ourselves that is not in accord with reality, because of that we have emotions arising, we have separated ourselves from that reality, from who we really are. And when we talked last week about how we survive and how guilt is involved and how low self esteem is involved that is not who we really are.
That is how we behave in order to sustain ourselves. So what Buddhism does is they do a lot of practice where you practice where you imagine how you really are already in order to help you reduce that veil, these illusions that we have, so that we can connect more with who we actually already are. So if we are already perfect that means that in essence happiness is part of our mind, happiness is not disconnected from it. And we know that when we get upset we feel disconnected. Oh, I’m not myself at the moment.
And there are moments that we feel unbalanced and we feel open. I wish it could be always like this. Now I really feel that I’m like this. But these moments are very rare. So what we’re going do is we’re to do that love meditation.
In essence, the nature of the mind is love. If we could get rid of all the veils, the delusions, all the wrong ideas, what is left is clarity and love. That’s it. So what we can do is when we meditate and we start to imagine that, what we are doing is we are actually connecting with who we already are. We’re not connecting with a kind of delusion that if we believe in it strong enough it’s going to happen one day.
We’re connecting with who we really are. And because we do that there is a power in there. If I’m going to give you a fantasy and that you fantasize on it, fantasy doesn’t have any legs, you know, cannot walk, ground, cannot find any if there is no basis it cannot work, it doesn’t have any power. True? Only when something is real, it has a power.
And the more we connect with reality, the more power things will have. If I’m in my car, if I press the wrong pedal, I won’t be able to move. But if I find the right one, I can move very fast. Children know this one. Well, don’t have that strong aspiration that we have, you know?
When I worked with children, the first two things we ever did was one, I used to say, if we’re on the planet we’re wearing L plates. It doesn’t matter how old, young, the boss, mum, dad, the doctor, whatever, And the other thing is at our very core we are truly good. And I get them to close their eyes and just go inside to that place where they middle at the center of themselves, I said, where you you know you are truly good. And they they knew. And they went, oh, yeah.
And that’s who you really are, and the rest is learning. But I lost sight of it myself. We all lose that. We all have lost it. Yeah.
But the kids knew. They’d go, yeah. I worked like this with the kids. Yeah. And I had one guy and he was he was already fourteen or something, and he was like this mad.
And I took him inside and I would say go there and at a certain point he could find it. And then later his mom said every time now when he gets so busy he says to his mom, mom I have to go to my room and find my place. And he would go and he would come back completely relaxed, everything go on. And he knew how to do it, you know, he could just turn it around like that. Quite amazing.
This boy, she We just went to the airport with little Solen. You know Solen? She is such a beautiful girl. So Robina was like, oh, who are you? And then we sat down and we had a coffee and Robina gave Christel a hand and held it a little bit longer than what.
And Sulento just said, Oh wow, you know how to shake hands! And everybody mouths, you know, it’s like children are very connected. So when we do that meditation, just what I want you to realize is we’re connecting with who we really are. We’re trying to find that. Okay?
Don’t think we are just imagining something to make us feel better. Yes, we are imagining something to make us feel better, but we are imagining all the time something which makes us feel worse, you know? That’s what we do know all day. So now we’re going to imagine what is actually closer to reality and which is going to make us feel good. And because it is closer to reality if you would do this again and again and again there is a power in that and your mind will feel like oh yeah, wow, yeah I like this, oh yeah, I want to go there.
Because the mind wants to go to their natural state, you know. We have wounded ourselves up. It’s like you have this we make it more tighter, more tighter, more tighter, try harder to be better and to be more perfect, but we’re winding ourselves up. And what we just have to do is unwind, unwind, unwind and we’re naturally there. But our whole belief is no, I have to wake myself up in order to be good enough and in order to survive.
Buddhism says no, unwind, just unwind and everything will be alright. So that feels like This is strange because what we’re going to do is completely against our natural tendency. But our natural tendency is so not natural. Okay. Are you alright, Jem?
Yeah. I’m okay. What’s what’s wrong? I’m sorry. Oh, my bladder is really bad today.
Oh. Painful? Really painful. So it’s alright. Nothing I remember before.
Not a problem. I you know, I’m familiar with that. Alright. So you care with the meditation? Yeah.
Okay. So keep that in mind when we do that, and then make yourself comfortable. Meditation literally means familiarizing. So we have familiarized ourselves with ideas of ourselves which are not in accord with who we really are. And we use the meditation to familiarize ourselves with who we really are, who we are in essence.
And the more we familiarize ourselves with that, the more that part of us can focus. So first of all, adjust your motivation. By thinking that whatever happiness is going to come from this meditation, that we share that with everybody around us, that we don’t keep that for ourselves. We keep it for ourselves, but we also share. And then let your mind relax.
And allow your awareness to sink into your stomach, to your pelvis. You can observe the movements of the breathing, movements of the abdomen. And try to make yourself comfortable with yourself, like you’re sitting with a very good old friend, And you just wanna hear her story. You wanna be with her. Are you interested?
Whatever surfaces you’re interested in, what it is. And it might be easy to put yourself in front of you. And just as you look at a good old friend, you look at yourself. You see your faults, your shortcomings. You see your good qualities.
And you see the potential in yourself that you can free yourself from all your problems. See that you have that strength, that power. Also see your knees, your hurt, your love. Your compassion. There’s no judgment, just full acceptance.
And then generate from the depth of your heart a wish for yourself to experience all the happiness and goodness you can imagine. And to support that wish, you can send from your heart white light, which fills your whole body, giving you everything you need, giving you all the love you need, all the compassion, the wisdom, the strength. And you can imagine that it penetrates every cell in your body. Keep on sending white light and feel that your needs become fulfilled. And the more you need self fulfilled, the happier you become.
And imagine yourself becoming more and more happy. Imagine that a smile appears on your face and that you feel fulfilled, blissful, content, happy with what you have, with your life, with yourself. And then imagine your mind as a river in front of you, and walk along that river to a place and time in the past where you feel that you need some healing. Just walk until you feel, yes, here is where I have to be. And if you arrive at that spot at the river, see what age you are at.
And visualize yourself in front of you in that age. And you can imagine that you are your own child child in pain, in need. You as an adult, you know how to love yourself. You fully accept yourself. And from that maturity, you can see the needs of the child.
And when you look at a child, sometimes the needs can appear very strongly. So strong that you don’t see the good qualities of the child, you don’t see the humor, the laughter that is behind the pain. So try to see that part of the child. How would a child look like without any pain? Connect with that part of the child where there is strength, courage, and joy.
And then listen to the child and ask what it needs. Maybe it wants to tell you a story. It wants to share something. While the child is telling its story, you sent white light. Recognizing the power of the child to heal itself, you sent white light.
With that white light, you give the child everything it needs for that healing to occur. You imagine that a white light is all the pain dissolves into the white light, all the trouble, the problems, the darkness. It all disappears. Keep on sending white light until you feel that the child is completely fulfilled. Calm.
That has let go of whatever it was holding on to. And then visualize around you sentient beings. The right side, your mother, now your father, and on the left side, your father. Your friends and relatives behind you, and those who have hurt you in front of you. And maybe there is one person that you feel that you would like to do some healing with.
Maybe somebody has hurt you in the past. Maybe somebody hasn’t understood you. Maybe somebody that you have hurt. Place that person in front of you, and be aware of the feelings that arise in your mind. And first of all, acknowledge that it takes a lot of courage to do this kind of exercise and rejoice that you have this courage.
And then exchange with that person in front of you, whatever you need to exchange. Maybe you like to say something, and maybe you have to hear something. You can ask questions that you always wanted to ask, and listen what comes back. And then look at that person in front of you and see that he or she has exactly the same needs as you. He or she also wants to be happy, wants to be friends with you, wants to heal whatever has happened in the past.
And may or may not be capable of doing that. But you, from your side, if you can see the potential for that person to be happy. You can help that person to find that happiness by sending white light from your heart, and that white light carries everything the person needs. Love, forgiveness, wealth, strength, courage. And while you send that, you slowly slowly see the person changing, moving towards his or her potential, becoming more and more happy.
And slowly, slowly, a smile appears on his or her face. The body relaxes, opens up. When you see that happening, you feel a fulfillment. You feel kind of happiness in your heart. Like, oh, how wonderful if it could be like this, if this person could just let go, open up, if I could help that person to be happy.
How wonderful. How much easier would life be if that could just happen like that? And if you can do this with the person in front of you, you can do that with many others and maybe even with everybody. So now you imagine that whoever is around you, friends, enemies, strangers, you send white light from your heart towards them, recognizing their potential for happiness, recognizing their potential for happiness, for perfection, for wisdom. And you see how their body gets filled with white light, and white light dissolves all problems, all obstacles, all harm, all unhappiness, and all people around you slowly, slowly start to reconnect with their essence, with their potential.
They start to straighten up their backs, start to look happy, strong, soft, gentle. And feel what it does to your own heart when you see that happening around you. How wonderful that we can help sentient beings like this. And maybe this exercise helps you to connect with your own potential to love everybody. Recognize that you do have that potential and rejoice in that.
And then generate a strong wish to develop that potential more and more. And then then dedicate the positive merit that we created by doing this meditation towards the happiness of all sentient beings, including yourself. And then when you feel ready, you can slightly open your eyes and come back to the room. Are you alright? Julie, alright?
I had you alright because she was she had a few problems today. Yes. A touch of granny napping there. Alright. So I was in and out of it.
I’ve gotta be honest. Uh-huh. But I heard probably the main part that I needed to learn. Yeah. I had to watch myself.
You were distracted? Just a touch of granny napping. I don’t know what it is. Napping a bit. You know?
Oh, dropping off. Yeah. Dropping off. It was happening to me, and I thought, oh, and I get back in the. That’s okay.
Still here, is that though? Part is still here even if you’re gone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Not bad about it. No. No. Don’t feel ever bad. Oh.
There was a judgment. Oh, I’m falling asleep. I shouldn’t do that. Okay. That’s what I’m afraid I was.
Maybe you’re looking at this chart. So what we say is it’s very good. Yeah. You needed to catch up on something. I don’t like granny napping.
Well, week, did every afternoon, I did granny napping. Not even a granny. That’s good. Was it nice? It was beautiful.
Good. Do you have that on on a Yeah. We had taped it, so we can make copies if somebody wants. Yes, think, One, two, three or everybody? Okay, I’ll make some copies.
So this quality that we have of, this potential that we have of becoming loving sentient beings, or if we can develop our potential fully for love and for wisdom, you know, we do have that, we share that with all sentient beings. We share that with all human beings, but also animals have because animals have a mind just like we, they just have a different body they have the potential to develop this in the same way. It’s just that animals, because they have an animal body, they won’t be able to follow a meditation like this. They will not be able to tune into that potential that they have. But they really have unconditional love, don’t they?
Not all of them. Not all of them? There are some dogs who are very loyal. That’s a loyalty. That’s a loyalty that even when there was harm or when there was, you know, they come back.
But it’s unconditional, whatever. They drop it, they don’t hold onto things. I would say they don’t have the capacity even to hold onto things because they don’t have that awareness. So you could see if we you can drop it. The door can drop, you know.
As soon as there’s harm done the dog can drop it and then the love is again there. We have that same capacity, but the dog cannot train them with awareness. It’s because he’s stupid he does that, not because he’s intelligent. We would wish that we could do that because it would be so intelligent if we could, but dog is not doing it out of intelligence. The dog is because that’s all he can do with his nature.
We would wish we had the capacity but we are in between, you know. We have too many thoughts, too many crazy thoughts and assumptions and grudges and resentment that we hold on to in order to get there. But there are some animals that can hold on to it, like elephants. Elephants hold on to it. Yes.
We don’t want to become an animal, right? I was going to talk about our precious human rebirth. Yeah, our what? Our precious human rebirth. Oh, was thinking the wasp that came back to you.
Well, he’s not an animal, but your friend wasp? Yeah, he was an animal. Well, then he came back to you and said thank you. Yeah. So do insects have minds as well?
Insects have minds. They even say bacteria have minds. Anything that moves because it perceives something has a mind, although some, you know, they might That’s discussion, isn’t it? There was a lady, Pamela Lyon, she proved that all sentient beings have mind. But you know, you can debate about the very tiny ones, what they react, what their basis of reaction is.
But if you look at an animal and animal experiences pleasure, they like that. You can see that. You hear the cat what does the cat do? Snoring, purring. You’re not snoring.
Purring. See the dog, you know, his tail goes up and down. You see that an animal is happy. An animal can experience happiness, true? Oh yes.
An animal can show, I do not like this. They run away, they have the tail between the legs, they say, I’m not going to eat this. Even ants do that. They pull away and move away. Even ants do that.
Or if you look at a fly, if you come, the fly goes away. The fly knows that life is in danger. I don’t know. Why would a fly away if it doesn’t know, why would it react? Well, was bugged so much by a fly, and I blame you for this.
This is about two days ago. You’ve thrown me damn mad. Normally, I’d I’d get I’d I’d get the wartime. But I thought, no. I’ll get it.
I’ll just brush it away. And I’ve got this huge, big you can see it now, a fly. Me thinking, no, I can’t kill it because Jamyang says they’re all alive. So I’m, go, go away. And it’s still in the house.
What did it do? It bite you? No. I just hit myself so so trying get rid of the fly. So I wouldn’t kill it because you say they’re all alive.
Oh, how wonderful is that? Hell out of me for about twenty minutes. I couldn’t get it. And then suddenly, anyway, still in the house. Thank you so much.
On behalf of the fly, I would say thank you so much. That’s what Lama Zopa would say. Damn. You know? Because if you hurt yourself, know how you suffer from that.
You know? So you can imagine how much you suffer when you lose your whole life. You know? Now you only have a clue. I’ll give you some cream for that.
That damn fly, I can tell you. I could have killed it. But you rejoice in that you didn’t kill it. You rejoice that you You would have blamed for that, to be with everything. I would have blamed.
You had a choice, and you chose. You’ve abandoned it. And That’s fantastic. You bring peace to the mind of the flying. If it doesn’t contaminate our food then that’s all good.
Well then you deal with that. You know that you did something really, really good. Did I? Yes. It’s not coming from and good and bad is not coming from good is that if you save somebody’s life or do not kill it, you create happiness for a sentient being.
Yeah, but I did save his life. You prevent that sentient being from suffering. And because you give happiness to a happiness to a sentient being, you receive happiness in return for that. You have a small purification happening there, but on the longer run, will receive happiness from that action. Rejoice in that.
Will I know about it? Rejoice in that. But are we not now arguing for being a vegetarian when our last discussion look at life, if we could look at the nature of life, in every step we make, in every action we do, there’s killing involved. Yes. Any product I use, you know how many insects died?
But if we signed a head No, but I cannot stop nature of being nature. Cannot change that. I can be very mindful, but everything I use, everything I use, there has been killing involved. Everything. You know, you start thinking about how things come into existence and think what happened to sentient beings.
You know, if you think about the digging to get the steel out of the ground, what happens? Many people are disturbed, how many beings are disturbed in their environment. Do you think about that when you buy earrings or? Most of the time, yes. So, then you know that whatever you buy, there is killing involved.
Know, but I just First you have to accept that. You have to accept that because I don’t think that’s a reason to then go and do more. It’s not I’m not saying that. So I’ll just eat meat anyway. I can stop No, I’m that.
I’m just saying you have to accept that you can’t stop that. Because what we are doing is that, first of all we cannot stop that. Even if everybody will be vegetarian, we cannot stop the killing that is involved in sustaining our life. Us to survive, many beings get killed. That is just how it is.
We will never be able to change that. You first have to accept that. No matter how hard and mindful I am, I cannot change that nature of life. That’s reality, that’s how reality, part of reality looks like. Conventional reality is like that.
Everything I consume, there is killing involved. Every happiness that I experience, sentient beings have given their life for me to experience that happiness. That’s a conventional reality that is just there. Then I’m part of that reality. If I’m not mindful, I just engage, just like everybody.
And this, we live in a society that is very driven to follow our desire, to get whatever we want, don’t think about anything. And what we have done is we have expelled all death that is involved in anything, so we can’t see it. So if you are not mindful and if you’re not connected to any religious or spiritual belief, you just follow that. True? So then when you start looking into the mind and you start learning about the mind and you learn how we have a choice if we’re involved in killing or not and that it actually affects our own mind, then you can choose what we’re going to do.
That’s our responsibility. That’s each individual’s responsibility. I cannot stop people from eating meat. I cannot stop people from buying chairs. Yeah, but there’s still some things we don’t have control over and some things we do.
And we do have control in Australia over what we eat. You have control over what you eat and I have control over what I As individuals. And everybody has to make their own decision how far they are. Last year we talked about killing and somebody said, Oh, but you know, naturally, that killing is not the right thing to do. And they said: No, not everybody feels that.
There are people who really do not feel that killing is wrong, that killing has a negative impact on their own mind. We know that, we can see that. And this lady didn’t accept that, kept on saying: No, you know that, the moment you kill the fly you know you’re doing something wrong. And I said: No, it’s not like that. And then somebody said: Oh no, I killed yesterday two flies and I was very proud.
Good? Proud of that. Fully, you know? I think later she realised that, oh, maybe she can do something else. But that moment, no hesitation.
For her that was completely right to do. We cannot force somebody to wake up. We have to bear that these things happen. We can’t change that. We can tell them, you know, actually when you kill, not only do you hurt a creature, but you also hurt yourself.
And they might say, Oh, that’s rubbish, that’s Buddhist talk. How can I? You know, and they won’t accept that. And maybe you slowly, slowly after ten years, they think, Oh, this Rachel, what did you say to me? Oh, maybe I have to look into that.
We don’t know, you know, maybe next life that’s going to happen. Oh yeah, no, I’m not saying everyone should, but I’m just saying if we all have this knowledge then what excuse do we have? Because we’re all learning it now. Yes. And then everybody is at their own level, you know?
So Judy is now trying to abstain from killing and she’s struggling because it brings up a lot. And even just sparing her on fly, it’s like the emotions that it brings up, it’s huge. But if she gets through this, next time it will be easier, and next time it will be easier. And then maybe slowly, slowly, at a certain point she goes to the supermarket and thinks, I’m not sure if you’re vegetarian or not, but she might think I’m yet. That’s from a real cow, you know?
And the moment you see the cow or you see how the cow is slaughtered, it’s going to be very difficult to buy any meat. Then there are situations that people need the meat in order to sustain their body. There are people who need meat. Although we can live without meat in general, there are people who need meat as a medicine. In medicine it’s just like that.
Meat is an antidote to lots of they call lung disease. If your mind goes a little bit crazy, it’s actually helpful to eat meat as a medicine. Difficult, isn’t it? So you have to think about that. What if somebody would get really weak?
There are some nuns at the Chenrezig Institute, I know they get really weak from not eating meat and there are some nuns who say: I’m just having a weak body, that’s okay. But you see them suffer and they take on that suffering themselves. You know that if they would eat a little bit of meat they would be much healthier. They can make their choice, other people will make the other choice. And everybody is where they’re at, and everybody makes different choices based on different reasons.
And we have to honor that in everybody. Yeah, no, I’m not saying everyone should, but based on what you just said about the fly now, I even more feel like I’m doing the right thing. You are doing the right thing. Yes. But I’m not saying everyone should.
No, but you have to see that everybody is in their own level. Yeah, no, not doing that for everyone. Yeah, not even everybody here. Can you hear that? Everybody here has a different story, everybody is on a different plane.
And everybody is doing whatever they can. And if you have the quality that you can think about, where does this chair come from? Most people think this is from shop. Seeing the steel and the cotton and whatever, seeing where that really comes from and seeing all the sentient beings that are involved, that’s a quality of mind, that’s wisdom of mind. Seeing the tree and the clouds and the water in the table is a quality of mind, that’s a wisdom aspect.
That’s not something that is naturally there, is it? We don’t have that naturally. Maybe you did that in your past life, you thought about it a lot, a a lot, and then you’re born here, and that quality is already there. The wisdom that we build up in previous lifetimes doesn’t degenerate, you know, you take that with you in your next life. So there are children who have that naturally with them, that kind of thinking.
But most people don’t. They say, what are you talking about? A tree, this is a table, It was a tree but it’s not really there. And they cannot see that whole picture. So it’s a quality of what you have and you can be proud of that.
And with that wisdom, generate the tolerance that everybody is on different levels. And yes, if you can be vegetarian, fantastic. Because the animals suffer a lot. But you do that when you’re ready. Okay.
I’d like to ask you a completely question that’s not actually quite in relation to what we’re doing. So I might not answer that, but go. One is I’ve always sensed that birds are calling my name, or that when I’ve lost someone who I’ve loved, I’ve imagined a bird that’s got quite close to me and stayed with me for a long time could be the spirit of that person. And that’s odd. It is an odd way to think, but I have always felt that way.
I wondered what it was. You kept feeling that connection with the person who passed away. And you saw that in the bird. Yes. It might have only been a momentary visit from that person that I have seen.
I’ve asked myself how I you know, why I would feel that way. I don’t know. It’s an odd question, and I don’t expect anything. Don’t you? No.
I think keeping that connection with, you know, the minds of beings that have been here, it’s quite a beautiful thing. And it both reminds you of them. Well, they’re creatures more than anything that you just hate the thought harming. Mhmm. Is that true?
Is that true? I feel so because they can fly. Yeah. They have this wonderful life in the past, and they can go. They’re simple.
Really? Yes. They’re simple. Somebody said to me, see that bird, and not a mass murderer. See how many insects they kill all the time.
I would never think about No, we never think about that, because to us the bird looks very beautiful and has beautiful colors and we go in and say, oh fantastic, oh I wish I was a bird and could fly, you know. Birds create a lot of negative karma because of their nature. They kill all the time. But all animals do it sometimes. Most animals kill all the time and they cannot stop doing them, you know, so that’s one reason why we appreciate human rebirth.
If we would see that animals have the same kind of mind as human beings and that we have the body of a human being. But if we think about future lives it’s not necessarily the case that we have the body of a human being. We might end up like a bird, we might end up as a whale. We might end up as an insect. We do not know.
We don’t know. We only know now at this time I have a human body. And because I have a human body I have an intelligence. Animals do not have that intelligence that human beings have. Because I have this intelligence I have an opportunity that I can use this body to change my direction in life, to change my mind in certain ways.
If I see aspects in my mind that I realise that is actually making myself very unhappy and is also harming others, but mainly harm that we do to others comes back to us and if we want to strive for happiness we have in this life an opportunity to change that. A life where we have the opportunity to change our mind is very, very, very rare. It’s incredibly rare. How many animals died in the fires? Half a million I heard.
Really? Great to think. I heard it from New Zealand, from the news. But that wouldn’t even count, the insect life and the tiny lizards and the small fish. No, half a million.
Two hundred human beings. So if you’re going to think about how many more animals exist than human beings then it’s very rare to find a human body. I always thought that if you had reached the plane of humanity through your previous lives and the many centuries that you’d lived, that you had earned the right to be to come back because of what you had learned and the good things that that have been been in you. Because But according to Buddhism, you don’t necessarily stay on the plane. If you are a human being, you have the opportunity to stay on that level if you use it.
I would certainly choose it. I don’t want to come back as a bird or an animal. Okay. The main thing to do that is practicing ethics and what you did with the fly is a very good move in that direction. Yeah, well I think I better do a bit more of this.
A bit catching up. So the causes to be a human being, to be born as a human being is practicing ethics: stop harming others. The more we stop harming others, the more causes we create for the next human rebirth. So as soon as we are born as a human being, there is this opportunity that we can create a cause to be reborn again as a human being. But that’s not naturally there, because if we see how most people behave they create a lot of negative actions, lot of harming, and they might not be able to sustain that level of being a human being.
So according to Buddhism you can drop very easily down, back to an animal, back to even deeper. But we also have the opportunity to stay there and it’s not too difficult if we start practicing ethics. And how do that animal to so big? It is very, very difficult because the moment we become like an animal it’s very difficult to get out of there because naturally we involve in killing, most animals, in killing to sustain the body. So very, very, very rare to get from the animal rebirth to the human rebirth.
But one day, you know they say the negative karma will be finished of being born in an animal rebirth, and then maybe good karma ripens. You know we can see that our very good animals who are very loving and taking care of their own owners, you can create good karma to be reborn. The animals have the imprints to be reborn as human beings also in their mind. Which Lama is it Lama’s over in Bodh Gaya that’s got the animal sanctuary? Yeah.
Yeah, and he wanders them around and says the prayers to them to try and give them a higher rebirth? Yeah, to help them to purify the negative Yeah, And what he also does is he saves them from the butcher. And then what he does with the prayers is he’s trying to change their karma so that they because as soon as you have entered the butcher shop it’s almost your karma to be killed is there. It’s already starting to ripen. Then it’s very difficult to change that, and for that you need many, many prayers.
So what we do in Buddhism is first of all we try to generate that appreciation for human rebirth. When we go home it’s so easy to go back to a normal life and just do whatever comes and problems are always there and work is always there and we keep on doing. We think first I’ll do the work and then I’ll do my meditation. Or first I’ll do the work and then I’ll see what I’m going to do with my mind. But the work in saṃsāra or the work in daily life is endless, it will never stop.
Might as well ignore it then. Sorry? Might as ignore it then. Well we can ignore it or we can just do whatever is necessary for us to do same, but not to engage too much. Or when we do it, while we are doing it, can watch our mind and we can learn to work with our mind.
It’s very important in Buddhism to go over that appreciation. Maybe I should bring you next time a meditation on the precious human rebirth. But there is a lot of Buddhism. I’ll try to change the wording a little bit so that it becomes easier. So then if you know that we have a very precious opportunity as human beings, that we have a mind that is changeable, that we have at the moment all kinds of beliefs that make that we engage in actions that actually lead to unhappiness and suffering, and that we have the ability and the opportunity to change that.
And if we realize that it’s very rare to find that opportunity, which means that if we realize it’s very rare we will use it. If we think it’s normal, we don’t use it, do we? It just passes. Oh, I’ll do that tomorrow. We start postponing.
Oh, my practice I’ll do that tomorrow, and I don’t have time to tell. When we know, well I’m not sure if there’s going be tomorrow and if there’s not going to be tomorrow I’m actually not sure where I’m going to be. Do I still have this body? Do I have another body? Even if I have a human body do I have conditions that I can practice?
You know think about all the human beings who are living in a space where it’s too hot to even think about practice, where there is no food, where you don’t want to know about any spiritual practice, you just need food, you need water, where there is a lot of sickness. If you think about the world, how many places are there where you can actually have a human body, have the conditions that are suitable for practice, where it’s not too hot, not too much rain, not too much humidity, not too much food either, too much cold, not too little money, not too much money, not too much unhappiness, not too much happiness, not very rare. You think about the whole planet. How many people are there who have these conditions together? And then even if you have the conditions, how many people are there who don’t have the idea I can do something with my mind?
And then when they have the idea how many people are there who are really going to do it? Very few. It’s hard work to do it, opportunity that we have now is so rare we do not know when it’s going to come again. So every day that you can do a step is a very, very precious step. And every day when you do it you say to yourself: Fantastic, I did another step.
I put five minutes of effort in changing something for the better. Even five minutes, even every minute you put in it, appreciate that. But try to make more than one minute, try to make as many minutes as you can. So Dan, if you appreciate that human body, it’s what time do have to go, Jane? Three thirty.
Hip hooray for it. Oh, Oh, good. I’ll go on then for another ten minutes and then we have a tea, a very quick tea. If we know we have that precious human body and if we know that we have, at the moment we are driven by surviving mechanisms, isn’t it? We just survive.
Although it’s, if you think about it, it’s like it’s not that much effort to survive, but if you see how we engage in actions that is based on surviving. We talked about that last week, Rachel, or two weeks ago. Do we have that clear or not? Do we have to go deeper into that? We are reacting from surviving most of the times.
True? Yep, okay. As long as we keep on reacting from surviving, we feel that am more important than others. We feel that my life is more worth than the life of others. We feel that my happiness is more important than the happiness of others.
Or maybe the happiness of my children is more important than the happiness of the neighbor’s children. Or the stranger, or especially that person who is doing so strange, you know. My kids are much more important than their kids. These kinds of ideas come from that holding onto a me and that me is coming has a lot to do with gets triggered a lot when we are challenged and are surviving. When we have to be competitive, you know, we have to boost up our ego, isn’t it?
Our whole society is based on that. Develop your ego. The more you can develop your ego the better you can survive. The better you make it in society, is it at the moment? That is our modern surviving, isn’t it?
You have the career, you have a good role, and you don’t care that you use your elbows and it’s just all about you. You’re the most important person, that you get what you want. So that you can give your wife what they want or you can give your husband what they want or you can buy what you want. So if you really look at that mechanism, we’re not different than animals when we do that. Animals can do that.
It’s all based based on instincts. It’s all based on I have to, I have to do this, I have to survive, I want to survive. Material security, personal relationships. Yeah. Sexual instinct.
Yes. Eating, sex, eating, drinking, social interaction, then competitiveness, money, house, car. How much energy from our life goes into that? Heaps. Heaps.
Everything. It’s very difficult to step away from that. How it feel when we engage in life like that? Do we feel satisfied and content or Stressful? Like an empty Empty?
Empty. Never satisfied. Stress, empty, not satisfied, what else? How do we feel? Disappointed because there’s exhilaration and inevitable let down.
Uh-huh, yes, you always have to come down. What goes up always has to come down, yes. So it’s constant dissatisfaction. If we lift like yes. New fashion.
My brown boots have to be black this season. The flares have to be skinny. Go to gym. Go to gym. So how would we end up when we die?
When we are at the end of our life? They even do it when they die. They have to have the best coffin and the biggest gravestone. It’s like it with them. There’s still things, you know, maybe then I feel good.
If I have a a better coffin, Pat? At the funeral, Tony’s mum at the funeral she’s so worried about, you know, how the padding had to look inside the coffin because it was all about what the relationship would think. So even in death, goes on. But we know that that is not giving us happiness, do we? We’re not around to find out, I would think.
What? We’re not around to find out if it’s giving us happiness, we’re to be leaving one of those big coffins. Why do you think, Julie, with everything that we have done so far? Well, I don’t know. I’m being cremated and scattered, so I don’t and I want the cheapest coffin going, so that’s that’s my That’s where the That’s where the bones are going?
Well, I don’t really need a coffin. You have to do, that’s compulsory. Oh, is it? Well, Or maybe you can borrow it. Can you?
I know it’s not an eco, it’s not important. Because for me it’s not important because there’s a little bit of carbon left in me and it was always my hope that my carbon might find some other carbon and who knows what could happen to me. Yes. I thought Oh, with you, with you or with the carbon that is in your body? And also I wondered So the moment you leave your body, is that still your carbon?
Well, on the ground, the burning of me. Is that you who’s burnt? It’s me, it’s what’s left of me. What’s left of it, but is that you? What if I’ve got a mind and I believe in it?
Or do we say that is Judy’s body? Well I’m afraid we have to say there goes Judy, that’s know Is that Judy who goes or is that Judy’s body? Judy’s body. Is there a difference? Well I’m burnt, yes.
Are you burnt or is that you who’s burnt or was that your body that has burnt? My mind has gone on to another life. My body has been burnt and the ashes are there and when Josh goes along the beach, and my daughter as well, there’ll be the wonderful waves coming in and all the wonderful feelings about being on this wild ocean beach and they’ll remember that’s what I wanted and my time there and they’ll have good feelings. They may cry but they’ll be good feelings too. But I want you to be mindful of your speech, how you use it.
You’re not your body. No, no, it was my body. It was your body. Yes. That’s a different feel, you’re somewhere else.
I’ll be very unhappy if I’m coming back as an animal, want to do that. I definitely want to come back as human being. So there are a lot of things I’ve got to put right. Yes. Well you know how to practice now.
No, not that fly. I mightn’t need anyone very much. I’ll give you some good cream and you know how to practice. So how do we give our life meaning? You know, we can live this life like this and then we end up at a certain point and we think, Is this it?
You know, and then we start looking for something. What are we looking for? Happiness? Yeah, that’s what we’re looking for. Sometimes we’re also looking just for meaning or purpose.
Why am I living? What is the purpose of my life? What is the purpose of my life? Maybe we think about that during the tea. I’m gonna miss that.
I’ll tape it for you. Just give you every time when you come back in your I’m getting closer to getting the four o’clock organized. Oh, good. Okay. But I’ll you take the CD with you from last time.
Yeah. I’ve got that. You got that? And then I’ll make this one, and I’ll put that ready for you. Thank you.
Okay? That’d great. Yeah. Shall we do that? Have a cup of tea?
Okay.