y Respect Yourself — 2015-07-30

Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.

About this talk. Ven Robina Courtin teaches why respecting yourself is the Buddhist foundation for spiritual practice in this 112-minute Q&A. She argues that understanding your own mind comes before you can help others, and challenges assumptions about victimhood and whether anger justifies remaining in harmful situations. Drawing on prison chaplaincy work, she illustrates how karma operates as natural law—not punishment—shifting people from victimhood to accountability. She defines suffering through the four noble truths and explains how delusion, attachment, and anger cause our pain, not external circumstances. She shows why compassion extends even to those who harm us. The daily practice is learning to work with your own mind: changing your stories, acknowledging both your delusions and your good qualities—the foundation that alone enables genuine help to others.

File metadata (for organising)

File: 02 RY 2015 07 30.mp3

UUID: df26f5c8-ca59-4448-b67a-3cd54e462845

Teacher: Ven Robina Courtin

Collection: y Respect Yourself (Ven Robina Courtin)

Date: 2015-07-30

Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide

Duration: 112.4 minutes

Words: ~20,677

Okay. I don’t know if you’re. What is it not what is it you? I’m just a troublemaker. Sorry.

Yeah. I’ll say anything. Okay. Don’t say where it goes. Don’t I know.

She’s now where? She now knows. I know. Can’t. Please excuse me.

Okay. Can you hear me all? Yeah. Yes? Okay.

Alright. Okay. So we’ll just start with our little prayer, kind of setting us in the right direction. It’s it’s expressing two things. The first one the first two lines are for those of us in the room who kind of identify with being Buddhist, it’s reminding us or reiterating our reliance on the Buddha and his teachings.

And the second two lines, I mean, for all of us is expressing an altruistic purpose, if you like, or goal purpose of being here together tonight. Meaning, we’re gonna listen to these ideas, Buddha’s ideas, to see if there’s something useful we can take away from it, something some practical advice. And that’s really important because if this were cooking class, you’d be very disappointed if I just raved on about cakes. We never gave you one recipe. You’d be mean, you’d really disappointed.

So it’s gotta be practical. You know? Take some advice from it. There might not be any. You might not like it.

It’s okay. But that’s the point of it. If there is advice to take and use it for what? Well, to develop what the Buddha would say is our amazing potential so that in turn, we can actually help others do the same thing because we all live in this crazy world together. I’m kinda thinking like this.

Okay. Okay. Who is noises? Is it me? Okay.

Okay. Well, we we’ve been talking about what is the, you know, the essential kind of the essence of Buddhist teachings. You know, you strip away all the components that look like religion. You know? And once you get to the the essence of it is is how to deal with our mind.

This is really the essence for the Buddha. This is this is really what you could always say. This is what Buddha’s expertise is. You know, as we mentioned a couple of days ago, if we look at the background, the way Buddha the the in historical context that Buddha came out of, it was these marvelous Hindus who for several hundred years before Buddha came along were the ones who were beginning this investigation into the nature of self. That was their topic.

And these marvelous meditation techniques, these skills, these extraordinary psychological skills that are totally relevant, utterly relevant right to the second. You know, the world knows them as mindfulness. But these skills came from these amazing Indians, these Hindu thinkers, these these great scholars, these these psychologists. All that sounds surprising to us, but that’s exactly what they were. And then Buddha came out of that tradition and moved in his own direction, you know, with his own findings about human nature, basically.

So Buddha’s talking about how we’ve all got this one of his own findings, his direct findings, or his own direct experience for having delved into his own mind is this extraordinary potential we’ve got. You know, we discussed this on Tuesday. We were talking about it on Tuesday. So this is the basis really for why a person would want to be a Buddhist. I remember, you know, and there’s this nice analogy that a bird needs two wings, wisdom and compassion.

So, you know, on Tuesday, we talk more from the wisdom perspective, which is the work we need to do on ourselves in order to really investigate our own self, our own nature, our own mind, our own experiences, our own what is that noise to think? Who’s a sound man? Like, I’m no such this thing might be in this thing. Who knows? But but, you know, we’ve got this to to develop this extraordinary potential to begin to investigate ourself so that we can, you know, look at identify the miserable parts of us, you know, which the Buddha would say, you know, we’re completely universal, fears, depression, anger, jealousy, attachment, low self esteem, and these things, which I think in our culture, consider utterly normal.

But not kidding when I say that for Buddha, they’re all mental illnesses. You know? We we talk about mental illness, so it’s way on the end of the spectrum, you know, in in relation to people who we call mentally ill when normal, but it’s not a joke to say. You know, that for the Buddha, his view, his own findings about the astonishing potential we’ve got, being normal ordinary us with normal anger, normal neurosis, we’re mentally ill, which is kind interesting. You know?

So the the beginning to investigate ourselves and start to get some confidence in our own ability to change our mind, which means change our thoughts, gives us some extraordinary courage, and then we get some insight into everybody else. Because we live in this world together, you know, and the Buddha’s view is not just about me. It’s about everybody. And this is where this nice analogy that a bird needs two wings, wisdom and compassion. You could say the point of it all, which is often what people mean by a spiritual practice is a compassion wing where we help others.

You know? But as the Dalai Lama often says, and I mentioned on Tuesday, I think, you know, compassion compassion is the point, but it’s not enough. You’ve gotta have wisdom. I mean, you can’t even help a you can’t even help a dog if you’re completely overwhelmed by your own misery, your own rubbish. You know?

Because one of the consequences of our own misery, our own our depression, our anger, our jealousy, our fears, and this is a huge point, Is it the more we’re caught up in those, the more we suffer, but the more we’re blinded from seeing others. The way we think and feel, we can see it. It really it really affects the way we see the world. So we’re caught up our own stuff. We can’t see anybody else.

So we really wanna be a benefit to others. We’ve gotta benefit ourselves first. You know? Put yourself together. Understand yourself.

And you can say that in general, that’s the point of the spiritual path. But we can see, you know, I remember giving a talk in Kathmandu one time at our center there and the to a group of losers, really nice people, and really interested to hear the different views. What what does Buddha think? So we were discussing the differences. First of all, about the view of karma, you know, which we touched on briefly on Tuesday, that we come into this life informed by our own past and not joking, but saying quoting his holiness.

He says, you know, basically, Buddha says that we’re self created. We are the creators of our own reality, and there’s a whole, you know, massive teachings about that in Buddhism. Buddhist views about that are really extensive. But then on but then we also talked about this other idea, the Buddhist one as a compassion wing, the way how Buddha says we’ve got this astonishing potential to develop ourselves. Then the more we develop ourselves and become content and content and fulfilled, the more loving and compassionate we become.

And therefore, we see that, you know, if I don’t help sentient beings, who will? You know? And so you you they develop this extraordinary capacity from really astonishing levels. One can, Buddha says, of compassion and empathy with others and using this idea of continuity of consciousness and rebirth. And even though you might end up finishing the job, which is what nirvana means, you end up developing this marvelous potential in your own.

And at some point, you don’t need to get reborn. Goodbye. You’re finished. You’re done. You know?

You don’t come back. But they say with this compassion wing business, if you would happily choose to come back, life after life to help others. And I remember one of the guys, one of them, he said, oh my god. How depressing. He said, I don’t wanna know about that.

It was very straightforward. He said, what I wanna do is go ahead to be with God. You know? So in much sense, you could see spiritual path, the most of the, know, established religions, they believe in a creator, and the goal is to go to heaven. That’s the goal.

That’s, you know, the reference point for what you would do. And that’s not the Buddhist goal. As we’ll be talking weekly, it’s not the Buddhist goal. The Buddhist goal the Buddhist says, we’ve this potential to develop our own marvelous potential, astonishing qualities, capacity for goodness and clarity and confidence and and wisdom and and all these this all this business, the stuff that we know is nice. And then on the basis of this, we can see that we’re all in the same boat.

And because we’re such social beings, we live we’re we’re from the second we’re born, you know, it’s rare that we’re not contacting constant sentient beings, not just humans, but the big, you know, creatures in our houses, the dogs, the cats, the cockroaches, the rats, all these sentient beings, you know, develop this so we we could have to live together, then it’s first, you gotta put yourself together, and then you can be a benefit to others, whether it’s a household or an entire country. This is a very much the compassion we. But compassion is not an easy one. You know? When you hear the Buddha’s view of the the the level to which we can grow compassion.

And to really understand this, you know, to it we’ve got to really understand a little bit the Buddhist view of reincarnation and karma, which is pretty fundamental to the Buddhist philosophical view of the universe. Buddhist take on the way the world is and what causes the world and how come we are what we are, how come happiness, how come suffering, how come nuclear, how come mother Teresa, whatever. You know? Because Buddhism actually, especially studied in the big Tibetan monastic university system, which is the the tradition that we’re all from in the center. You know, Buddhism basically they study this worldview.

So it’s an entire worldview. You know, what is the universe? What is happiness? What is suffering? What is this?

What is this? Why this? Blah blah. Not everybody who becomes a Buddhist perhaps is interested in the whole deal, but it’s certainly all there by anyone who’s who is interested. You know?

So what happened? I lost the cross. There was a compassion. Compassion. Compassion.

Yeah. Okay. Okay. So we understand the word compassion. You know it means?

You see somebody suffering and you think, oh, they’re awful. That’s awful. You empathize. It’s called, you know, empathy and the wish even to help others. But maybe in the Buddhism, you would suggest that perhaps it’s bit limited.

Our usual compassion. You know? My feeling is that we have compassion for victims as long as you’re an innocent victim. And being a bit sarcastic here, that usually comes down to children and animals. You know?

And it often unfortunately, often too, we look at it. It often ends up being you see the innocent victim. You had compassion. But the next second, we’ve got again five who did the who who who did the harm, and then then we quickly become angry with the person who harmed the others. And this is really tricky combination, especially when there’s so much suffering in the world.

People do do terrible things to each other. But so much of our compassion is often mixed with immense anger, and we almost think it’s righteous to have that anger. You know? And for the Buddhist approach, that’s kind of problematic. So the Buddhist idea is you can’t really begin to somewhat understand somebody else’s suffering in general if you don’t understand your own.

So that gets us to really understand. If compassion is empathy for someone else’s suffering, we’ve gotta be really clear what Buddha means by suffering. You know? So there’s one of these packages of teachings. Buddhist teachings called the four noble truths, and the and the framework of this is suffering.

So the first one is there is suffering, and he and he outlines it very clearly. And this might not be necessarily how we always think of suffering. So, you know, there’s three levels of suffering, the Buddha would suggest. Because the second one is he lays out the causes of it. The third one is that we can be free of it, and the fourth one is his method of how to get rid of it.

So it’s a practical presentation, one way of sort of framing all of Buddha’s teachings. So suffering. Okay. First level of suffering, we all agree. The world agrees.

It’s called even they even call you Buddhism the suffering of suffering. It’s like in your face suffering. Basically, it’s when the bad things happen. Everybody agrees with that. Now you check the dog’s behavior, the ants, the cockroaches, they’re gonna agree too.

They don’t like getting harmed. No one likes getting, you know, stamped on or bad mouth or insulted or, you know, hurt, killed. This is pretty clear. So that’s called the suffering of suffering, and it’s very clear we don’t want it. But then the second one gets a bit depressing, actually.

And what we talked about on Tuesday actually is is sort of in is informing this idea. So Buddha calls it suffering the second kind of suffering is called the suffering of change, which sounds a bit boring. What he’s referring to, this one gets depressing, is what we call happiness. So you think, my god, we’re supposed to do that. It’s not about even happiness.

You know? So we’ve got to it’s really easy when you read the Buddhist literature. You know? It’s really easy to misread that, to gloss over it too easily, and it ends up becoming very depressing. Kinda like you gotta give up everything in order to be happy.

As long as I’ve said, you know, we think when when Buddha says we’re give up attachment, which we did mention Tuesday, we could talk more about now because this is very, very related to this kind of secular suffering. But when we hear that we’ve gotta give up attachment because we don’t have a a really clear view of what he means by attachment. We’ll get our own view. It sounds like says, oh, you mean I’ve gotta give up my heart? I’ve gotta give up my happiness?

And that’s often a really cliche view of what being a Buddhist is. I mean, you know, long nose and depressed and serious and having no pleasure somehow. You know? Completely inappropriate. Completely not the point.

Buddhist Buddhist goal one way of one way of describing Buddha’s goal, what he has found to be possible for every being, he calls it freedom from suffering, which has been abstract. But you flip that over, what is that called? Fullness of happiness. These two words, happiness and suffering, have a massive role in Buddhism. He says every living being desperately wants happiness, and every living being desperately doesn’t want suffering.

Well, that’s a pretty clear fact. And this is often in Buddhist terms is the basis of why you want to develop your own potential and help others because we’re all the same and wishing to be happy and wishing not to suffer. But he’s gotta get down very specific approach of exactly what suffering and happiness are and indeed, crucially, what are the causes. You know? So the second kind of suffering, if he means it’s what we mean by happiness, then to really understand this and this is actually talking more of what we talked on Tuesday.

We’ve got to really understand Buddhist model of the mind. And how this you know, I remember I mentioned on Tuesday, if you look at the Buddhist model of the mind, it’s very specific model, very precise, very immense detail in the literature. You know? And in simple ways, the words are similar to how we talk. We all know the words love, compassion, jealousy.

They sound so obvious. You know? This is the stuff of the contents of our mind as far as the Buddha is concerned. But he’s distinctly different because remember I mentioned Tuesday, his crucial point, and we can only take this as our hypothesis because it’s not easy to prove it immediately, that that his view is that the mind our mind is not physical. So when we studied psychiatry and psychology and and neuroscience in the west, you gotta know about the brain.

When you ask some great meditator in Tibet who hasn’t had much to do with the western world the last fifty years, where where you know, in his cave working on his mind deeply and transforming it in the way Buddha talks, You ask him where his brain is. He never heard of such a thing, but he knows his mind well. So it’s kind of interesting. You know? So the watershed of the mind that we mentioned is that it’s not physical.

It’s not your brain. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t play a role. It’s not a question. Of course, it does. But the crucial thing is the emphasis for a person who’s using Buddha’s model of the mind in their life.

You’re learning to understand the actual cognitive process. As I already mentioned on Tuesday, well, you’re talking about cognitive behavioral therapy. Yes. Buddha is your best cognitive behavioral therapy you could find. That’s his that’s his approach.

Absolutely. Knowing your own thoughts and and emotions and feelings, and then particularly, as we as we develop in these techniques that Buddha teaches, we learn to listen to the thoughts at the deeper, subtler level that inform all our intense emotions. You know? We really develop this amazing awareness. So what we’re dealing with finally is the actual our own cognitive process, our own emotions and feelings and thoughts to the subtlest degree in the long term.

So then when we understand that, then we then we look at the Buddhist model and and and okay. One more point. One thing that Buddha is saying, and I think we can see this, that whatever goes on in your mind, whatever goes on inside here informs the way the world appears to you. It’s not rocket science. Look when you’re angry.

Doesn’t everything look horrible? Look when you’re depressed. Look how the world looks. Look when you’re happy. Look how the world looks.

You know, it’s sort of obvious. We don’t really we don’t really pay attention to this. It’s not obvious. And this is a a a really powerful point. The Buddha is basically saying that whatever goes on in the mind plays this immense role and that this is what we have to learn to understand, know well, and then to con to reconfigure.

So in understanding this, we look into the Buddhist model of the of the mental consciousness, is referring to all the thoughts and feelings and emotions. We’ve got sensory consciousness, which is the way our eye consciousness sees functions, our ear consciousness functions. Then we have the mental consciousness, and that is Lama Zopa — this is where the workshop is. That’s where everything is stored away.

The Buddha’s view actually is that every millisecond or whatever we see and hear and think about is stored in our mind, not our brain. It might be, but we’re not discussing the brain. It’s stored in our mental consciousness. It’s all stored away there. And there’s already understanding the difference in Buddhist psychology between the way the senses work and the mental consciousness is really telling.

This really is in in reinforcing this point that what goes on in our mental consciousness is, you know, informs everything in our lives. And it’s the one thing we can learn to change. But so what for example, you know, let’s say, you know, I might go I might go, oh, what a pretty cup. And I sort of would. But yellow is quite appealing, you know, for my eyes or my mind.

Okay? So then you you know, we sort of assume from those words that my eyes are seeing a pretty cup. Buddha says nothing ridiculous. The way Buddhist psychology talks about the sensory consciousnesses is that the the eye consciousness, for example. And remember the word consciousness in Buddhism is virtually synonymous with the word meant the word mind.

Consciousness, mind. So eye consciousness, putting it really elaborately, is that that part of my mind, which isn’t physical, that functions through the medium of the eyeball and all bits and pieces and the knowers and so on. You know? So we say, oh, look at a pretty cup thinking our eye consciousness, but not at all. As for the Buddha’s view, you know, when you study the Buddhist model of the mind, you learn eye consciousness, for example, has the capacity to cognize precisely two things, shape and color.

That’s it. So then immediately, the question is, well, I wonder where what a pretty cup comes from. What part of the mind is is cognizing that? Well, that’s in your mental consciousness, which is this point already that whatever goes on in here in the mental consciousness. This is the stuff.

This is where the workshop is. This is where the source of our happiness is. This is where the causes of our suffering are. And another way of putting in Buddhist view, everything that goes on in the mental consciousness is a viewpoint, an opinion. So it’s very shock it sounds a bit shocking to think that anger is an opinion.

Well, listen to it. You know, say, Gay was my sister, and she dares to disagree with my views. How dare gay this, gay that she did this, she said that, how dare she this. She’s this kind of person, and you let’s say, know her, but you don’t see it the same way that I do. You’re listening to what I’m saying thinking, oh, that that’s not the gay that I see.

Well, what do you think? We’ve got two different opinions, aren’t we? They’re they’re opinions. They’re viewpoints. That’s a bit of shock to us because we think of anger as an emotion, you know, because you hear the shouting and yelling and see the tears.

But when you when you boil get past all the behavior part, get to the actual mental consciousness, all the thoughts that are going on in there, they’re the ones. They are these elaborate conceptual stories. And it is this. She did that. She said this.

How dare she that? Well, what a pretty cup. It’s the same. It’s an opinion. So the Buddha’s idea then in mental consciousness is that you got three categories of of states of mind in the in the mental consciousness.

A very simple model, not at all complicated in terms of the names, not at all complicated in terms of the states of mind, like the way it is in our psycho psycho psychiatric volumes, but but certainly goes to great depth in describing these states of mind. But simple in terms of of the the names of the states of mind. There’s three categories. And the two crucial ones, and these are almost deceptively simple, they’re called negative states of mind. We mentioned Tuesday.

Positive states of mind. Now there’s a third category called neutral, which doesn’t mean they’re not important. There’s lots of these, But they’re the they’re the parts of the mind that are neither good or bad in their nature, but they’re crucial to function, like concentration, the ability to remember what you’re doing, all many, many of these states of mind. And, again, like I said, it goes into great depth in the Buddhist literature. So that the crucial one we have to learn to become familiar with is we have to learn to know deeply and well.

We learn the job of being our own therapist as Lama Yeshe puts it. We learn to distinguish between these two categories, and these are these are huge. But the the moment they’re completely mixed like a big soup, we can’t tell one from another. You know? And this is where all these opinions are.

So the Buddha’s view is that the negative states of mind, and it’s a technical term, not a moralistic one, they’ve got particular characteristics, Two main ones, and this is indicated by two of the many synonyms in Buddhist psychology for these unhappy states of mind, these neurosis. So neurosis, I think, is a good word. We call it, you know, like, in in our culture. Neuroses, they’re called mental afflictions. They’re called afflictive emotions.

They’re called disturbing emotions. They’re called, you know, delusions. They’re called negative states of mind. All these different words referring to what? This, like I mentioned before, this hierarchy of the neuroses.

The root neurosis, this deep primordial mistaken sense of a self, which gives rise to this massive attachment of neediness to get what that self wants, which then gives rise to anger or or, you know, panic or aversion or depression when it doesn’t get what it wants, which then gives rise to jealousy and all the other dramas. You know? There’s many, many of them, but there’s just half a dozen few that are really absolutely central, and every every body can recognize them. These negative ones, and these for the Buddha are the cause of our suffering. But they’ve got two main functions.

So one of them is pretty obvious. They’re referred to as disturbing emotions. We’re gonna check the last time you were jealous. Check the last time you were depressed. You don’t go, wow.

You know, was depressed two weeks ago. It was just wrecked. There’s just no way we talk like this. We know it is unbearable. The jealousy, the anger, no matter who else you harm, forget that.

We know the having of those emotions is unbearable, heartbreaking. We sort of know it, but somehow we don’t really get some learning from it. You know? But but the other the other characteristic, which is so interesting, which really comes to the viewpoint business, is that the and this is indicated by this really fantastic word in English. I know because I go to different countries, and I have to translate.

And I noticed in in these other languages, many other languages, there’s no really good word for a translation of this particular word from the Tibetan or from the from the Pali or the or the Sanskrit, but it’s excellent in English. And it’s the word delusion. So, you know, you know yourself, if you’re accused of being delusional, you’d be really offended because you know exactly what it means, that you’re not in touch with reality. Well, you know what? This is so precisely what Buddha is saying about why we suffer that it’s really that it’s more shocking to hear it.

Delusion. It’s exactly that. And all these neurotic emotions, the unhappy emotions, the attachment, the anger, the pride, the jealousy, the low self esteem, the self loathing, you name it. This is the main characteristic, and this is the source of incredible suffering. And this is how they inform the way the world appears.

I mean, we all know that if you hate somebody, you’re angry, you’re hurt, you’re angry with somebody. I mean, they you’re horrible to you. They look ugly to you. And especially if it’s a person you, you know, maybe, you know, it’s your sister and you’re forgiven next week and you love her again. But let’s say somebody who really has harm during this time and you can’t forgive or people who are really, really think of the monsters of this world.

You know? I mean, when I remember, you know, when you put on the anyway. Yeah. I mean, it’s our culture. When you put I remember when I saw Robin Hood was the big bad guy.

There’s never a really handsome picture of Time magazine. They always chose the slimiest picture. You know? Isn’t it? When you don’t like somebody, you think it’s horrible.

She’s horrible. They always have the worst picture. The worst one. They said we’re so childish. You know?

And if it’s a lovely person, we make sure it’s the prettiest picture, the nicest picture. So we we can see that the so one of the ways that Buddha is saying that these dilute these unhappy emotions, first, they cause us pain and suffering. That should be enough for us to never want them again. But the way they inform how the world appears to us, this is really crucial in the Buddhist approach. Because one way Buddha is saying is, we make way we suffer because we don’t see things that we don’t we’re not seeing reality.

And he means that at a really subtle level. Across the board, we’re constantly not seeing the way things are. We’re embellishing everything. So these delusions, as Lama Yeshe says, what they do in the mind, and this is why Buddha talks, and it’s totally fascinating when we go into it when you study it in-depth, is that these delusions, these neuroses decorate on top of what is there, layers upon layers of characteristics that just aren’t there. So when these strong emotions are there and you’ve got, you know, and we have compassion for this little pussy wussy that got kicked by this mean guy or the cute little dog that got hurt or that child who got abused by some horrible pedophile, immediately, the innocent victim looks so kind looks so special.

They’ve gotta look nice. We we we and I’m stopping horrible here. We we have they have to be an innocent victim. And then to that extent, we hate and loathe and find like a monster, the person who harmed them. And we don’t wanna find anything forgiving about that.

We just have to have this view that they are horrible, especially when it really is terrible. I mean, world does people do do terrible things. There’s no discussion about that. That’s clear. So then Buddha’s view of compassion, which I’m what I’m getting to, includes them, and that’s two shocking conundrums.

So what’s the logic of that in Buddha’s view? Why on earth how could you have compassion for a pedophile first, the extreme example, not to mention your mean sister, you know, or your ugly old alcoholic brother who causes problems. How can you have compassion, and why would you? For a pedophile, why would you wanna have compassion? Why would you wanna have compassion for a person who harms others?

This is and this is a bit almost a bit shocking, actually. So if you think of you know, I always think of an example of a mother and her kid, this junky kid, nobody can stand him. He cheats. He lies. He’s a pain in the bum to be around.

You know? But she has unbelievable compassion for him, doesn’t she? Why? Because she can see he’s harming himself, and that’s the point. So as much as, yes, it’s true, pedophiles and terrorists and murderers and rapists and all the rest, not to mention the ugly husband who gave you up for a younger version or whatever it is, the mean boss who sacked you.

We’ve all got people like this. They might be as heavy as pedophiles, but we’ve all got people we don’t like. You know? It’s a way that it’s extremely hard to even see them as human, not to mention a compassion for them. So it takes a lot of courage.

And often, you know, when you can talk about compassion using the Buddhist view, you courageous compassion is a really good way to put it. You know? So why would you want to have compassion for people who are lovers? Well, you know, this brings in the Buddhist view. The the big picture view would be that we come into this world programmed by our own stuff.

So whether you’re Hitler or mother Teresa or the pedophile or us or, you know, you, a nice person, a relatively nice person, we come into this life informed by a bunch of past habits. And then secondly, and this is even more interesting when it comes to karma, we’re highly social beings. We can see this. So starting from the lama Yeshe says, the Buddha would say, you don’t bump into strangers. There’s no random the Buddhist view of karma is that it’s a totally natural law that runs the universe.

You know? The Buddha is saying whatever we think and do and say programs every individual being’s consciousness that sow seeds in the consciousness and don’t go astray. And eventually, unless you pull those seeds out, they’re gonna ripen in the future as your happiness or your suffering. And every being is in the boat the same boat together, he says. Every person who gets harmed is because they’re harmed before.

Everybody who is who has been who are kind to them is because they’ve been kind before. There’s not a single event or experience the Buddha would say from this big picture view he has, which is kinda shocking to us initially. They’ve got we we’ve been meeting at each other countless lives. You know, we’ve got history, intense history with each other. And there’s no because he says karma is a natural law.

Remember, Buddha not a creator. Buddhism is not from revelation. It’s therefore not fundamentally a merely a belief system. This is utterly contradictory to Buddhist whole approach. He was his regular guy who do using these techniques coming out of the Hindu tradition came to various observations in his own mind.

So what Buddhism is actually is a presentation of his findings. That’s why not to believe or not believe, believing isn’t the point. It’s more and which is a surprise to us. Like, you know, I mentioned, you know, you don’t say, oh, I believe in mathematics. You could.

But if you just merely believe it, it it’s fine because mathematics does work. It’s worthy of being believed in. But what good is it to merely believe in it? It can’t help you. You can’t apply it.

The same here. Merely believing that, you know, your neurosis caused you suffering and that you, you know, your mother that you you are created by your own past experience and will produce your own future. What good is that if you don’t if you can’t unpack it and use it as a tool to help you develop yourself? It’s useless information. You know?

That’s why the Buddhist view is not finally a belief system. As the Dalai Lama often says to us Westerners, if you use Buddha’s methodology and get to a certain point where you do actually do follow what he says and it doesn’t bring the result and you really have done it, then Buddha’s wrong. You must reject him. It is a bit shocking to us to hear because we don’t think of religion like that, you know, spiritually. We’re the boss.

You know? Not Buddha. We are the boss. So this you that we’re all informed by our own past and bring it into the present, and secondly, that whatever experiences we have at the hands of others, not random events. And this is a massive point, you know, for the Buddhist view.

Did I mention the the Richard Gia story? I mentioned that. Okay. This is a perfect example of the Buddhist understanding, informed by the view of karma. You can come into this life.

You know you’re the part you you take on you know, taking as your working hypothesis that you are the product of your own past. And what happens to you, good or bad, by the way, is is the result of your own actions. There’s the the the experiential application of this is enormous accountability, real courage, and the opposite of victim. It stops the victim mentality. We can really own responsibility for whatever goes on.

It’s an intense point. I mean, it’s it it needs really hard work. But the the transformation it can bring for yourself, the opposite to blame. It’s so so it’s accountability, self confidence. You give it enables you to give up anger, give up neediness, giving up blame, giving up guilt.

It brings enormous accountability. And then on the other hand, on the on the on the on the the basis of this, you realize everybody’s in the same boat. You know? You’ve got this history with these meanies, and you’ve got the history with these good people. So you own all the good stuff as well, which often we forget about.

Those are ridiculously negative. You know? So there’s out of compassion then. It’s if you’d like the view like those young Tibetan nuns I mentioned, they you know, often these extreme examples can be helpful. Or another one in our own world.

When I was working with people in prison, there’s one of my friends in North Carolina who works with young black kids. He happens to be black himself. He’s a Buddhist. And one day, his son got stabbed to death in a bar by another young black guy. You know?

And he was asked that night on the television news. I think it’s even look at you can look it up, you can find it on the on the Internet. He was asked how he feels about the murderer of his own son. He was in tears of compassion. He said, how could I not have compassion for him?

His suffering has only just begun. Well, it’s astonishing, isn’t it? His own boy is stabbed to death. He said we must help our young people. We must look after them.

He he had this ability to have empathy for the murder of his own boy because he could see that they were in the same boat, the product of the same system, the product of the same delusions. It was really very, very moving. You know? So therefore, shows possible. He’s able to have compassion.

All these young nuns are saying. So the thing is there’s two things there’s one point here that I find very interesting. Let’s say you don’t have the view of karma. Let’s say you don’t. You don’t want to have.

That’s perfectly fine. But since we this nevertheless, not even knowing why a person might harm you or why a person might be kind to you, there seems to be a very compelling reason to want to give up anger, blame, fear, neurosis, jealousy, bitterness, and resentment. And that is because of the harm it does to us. This is really hard to see. We’re caught up in the victim mentality, and we’re caught up, say, in the suffering that has been done to us by a horrible person or the people who are close to us and they’ve been harmed or brutalized by others.

It’s we are really convinced in our culture, I think. Yes. We have enormous compassion for that person’s suffering, but we we feel it’s right to have huge anger and blame. And almost as if if you give that up, you’re letting your own beloved person down. I think that’s very strong inside us, which seems to me to show pretty fairly evidently that this righteousness that we have, this feeling that I’m allowed to be angry, we’re not able to see the unbelievable pain that is causing us ourself right there this second.

I mentioned the old bloke, the Catholic bloke tonight on Tuesday. This old one of my friends on death row, his friends on death row in Kentucky, and they told me about this old Catholic fellow who comes to visit them. Catholic. His daughter had been raped and murdered thirty years before, thirty years of rage and, of course, grief. And we think those go together.

We think it’s correct they go together. We can’t see the way out of that. You know? Even though we hear people like my friend Andre, we just think he’s exception. The norm is to be angry as well as grief stricken.

We just accept that, and we build up our right to be angry. It’s very powerful. I don’t think he here. But he said, after thirty years, he he was exhausted. He went back to mass.

He became forgiving, and he said, I realized what the main cause of my suffering during those thirty years was not the death of my daughter, was my anger. I think this needs real humility. So forget karma. Forget whether you think, you know, past life, future life. Who cares?

It seems to me we really can look into our minds and have this incredible honesty and recognize the pain that anger is causing me. We would only want to find ways to give it up. But what is terrible is we don’t think the anger is causing the suffering. We think the person who did the harm is causing the suffering to me. So this need we’re gonna look at this.

We’re gonna look at this. The person’s they said the person this, you know, this guy is dead. This bloke, he was on death row. He had he was executed. This bloke that killed that man’s daughter.

The man’s dead. Good how can, you know okay. I’m sure you understand what I’m saying. This is the point that Buddha is making, but Buddha doesn’t own this. Anybody with half a brain can see it.

That what goes on in your mind informs whether you’re happy or suffering. It’s sort of clear. You You know yourself, forget you. If you know people who are self piteous, always miserable, always moaning, always complaining, and I’m not saying they haven’t got good reason in the world’s terms. They they a plan is about to be around.

Who wants to go visit the whole time? They’re always unhappy, always expecting more, always blaming people, always criticizing, never never satisfied, always angry, upset. They’re exhausting to be around. We know that. It takes extra effort to be kind to them because they can’t see that their own anger, their own self centeredness, their own depression is what’s breaking their hearts and what causes nobody wanna be near them.

You know? Somehow we can see it, but it’s very hard to change. And I think the key reason is because when, you know, like and I think I mentioned this. That’s how I met mad at Gabe. And Aleka says, what’s wrong, Robina?

And I start saying Gabe did this, and Gabe did that, and Gabe did this, and she said that, she is this. Right? And and Alekka will say, well, that’s very nice, Raveena. Tell me about your anger now. You just described Gabe.

No. I just talked about my anger. You didn’t. You just described Gabe in great detail. I didn’t describe my anger at all.

I didn’t describe my suffering at all. I gave you my vivid, elaborate belief system about the monster called Gabe. So because we have that in the mind, if we listen to depression, if we you know, which is which is about our self and how hopeless everything is. If we listen to anger, how it’s always finding fault with this and that and this and this, listen to jealousy. It these these viewpoints, emotion based viewpoints are completely vivid views about this, about that person, about that event, about that thing.

So in our mind, we think that person is why I’m angry. It’s really hard to hear this sometimes, but she was mean to me. What do you mean she’s because she’s the cause of my anger. No. She’s not the cause of my anger, but it says.

She pats you in the nose. Yeah. No argument. I saw her do it, But the anger is yours, Robina. And it’s exactly the same.

Why are you happy, Rubina? Oh, Aleka’s the best friend. She’s so kind. She looks after me. She feeds me.

She gives me things. Why are you happy, Rubina? Because Aleka’s kind to me. So I think my happiness comes from Aleka, that my suffering comes from gain. It there’s a there’s a relative truth there.

But the Buddhist view is that they’re basically catalysts. It’s a really fine point. It’s a powerful point. They are merely catalysts for my suffering and happiness, but we believe they are the cause of my suffering and happiness. And that’s the point.

That’s the key point that Buddha is making. Again, like, could say he didn’t he doesn’t own this, but he really runs with this approach. And be beginning to take this approach on board gives us great courage. That there’s an advantage to me to give up being angry with that wretched person. The nightmare of holding on to it.

You know? The suffering is beyond bearing for ourself until we can see this. You’ve got to say we’re just living in victimhood, you know, because we believe it’s true. And this is what Buddha what Buddha says where attachment comes from and what anger comes from. Attachment is the belief that the not people and things and events are the cause of my happiness and that people and things and events, which is anger, are the cause of my suffering.

He says, yes. They played a role, but they’re merely catalysts. And this puts enormous emphasis, therefore, on oneself, one’s own responsibility. So it doesn’t mean that Gabe is good in harming me. No.

No. Not at all. It just this this view brings enormous empowerment and courage and humility because it’s not easy to to give up being angry with a person who’s mean to us. It’s really hard. It goes really deep inside us where it catch ourselves, you know, very deep.

But it’s for it just to see it as for our benefit, not some moralistic thing, oh, you should forgive. No. Not should. It’s to my advantage. And this is one of the key points that we’re gonna talk about, the wisdom wing.

We’ve gotta be recognizing that I’m sick of suffering, not just the gross suffering, the inner suffering. This this is the one of the so called suffering of change. It’s referring to happy to when the nice things come. But, basically, that view of happiness for the Buddha is like a honey covered razor blade. Because if I’m addicted to Aleka being kind to me so I can get happy, which is what he says that’s a subtle level of suffering because I’m setting myself up for disappointment.

Because it’s not it’s not it’s not possible that a person the person I expect to make me happy is like a terrible demand to put in a normal human being. They’re not gonna be perfect. And we know if we had masses of this attachment, masses of this neediness, masses of this expectation, because that’s what attachment is, then it’s guaranteed to be disappointed. Guarantee. So that it’ll turn into suffering.

The millisecond the leg is less than perfect, I will be angry with her. And why am I angry? Because anger is thwarted attachment. In that sense, what we think is the happiness that comes from getting what attachment wants is leads to the downside because it’s all about fantasy expectations and neurotic demanding and and manipulating to get that nice thing to be the way it is. We really understand attachment.

The way Buddha talks, we can see it, but it’s hard to see. And then more broadly, in other words, this, you know, this I think I can I just mentioned it Tuesday? Mentioned it here. These prisoners that I work with and what they often write to Lama Zopa. And I mean, I meant I did mention, I think, some of these prisons, especially in the States, are like, hell, you know, they’re like just garbage dumps.

You treat it like an animal. Fifty years to life, if you’re lucky, you might get out. Not to mention death row. You treat it like an animal. You’re overcrowded like you can’t believe.

Every every aspect. So definitely think that’s called suffering, the regular suffering, horrible stuff. But this is what I mentioned, love it. One of these young men, Arturo, young Mexican, wrote to Lama Zopa. And he said to him, and this is this is this is this is one of the second kind of suffering.

Your prison is nothing in comparison with the inner prison of ordinary people because of attachment, of anger, jealousy, and this stuff. And in the Buddhist view of the mind, this kind of hierarchy of these neuroses, effectively in daily life, this attachment, this bottomless pit of neediness to get what I want every millisecond is what sets us up for all the other rubbish. This is why it’s this whole being caught up in this stuff, the inner prison. Buddha’s not joking, you know, but it’s very hard to see until we start looking inside. But my friends in prison who are practicing, they know this because they cannot change.

They can’t open the doors. They can’t get out. They can’t demand anything. They can’t get the stop the noise to stop. They can’t make the cooks cook better food.

Not possible. So you either go mad or you change your mind. We often know ourselves when life is so full, things are so bad, you can’t make anything different. You go nuts or you change your a way of seeing it. And this is all Buddha saying.

Change the way you see the world. Change these viewpoints. But it’s the hardest job we’ll do because there’s so entrenched. And then the tragedy is also, you know, as as the Buddha is saying, what’s in our mind, let’s say these neuroses, lots of anger or lots of attachment, lots of jealousy or lots of so low self esteem or lots of arrogance or whatever, these are informing every one of our experiences and are causing the person to appear that way to me. So first of all, as he said, that what goes on you know, that that these delusions of decorating on top of what is there, layers upon layers of things that just aren’t there.

But another way of saying it is, as Lama Yeshe says, bad enough. When I when I think of Gay, she appears like a monster, all this ugly this or horrible that or mean this. It is a viewpoint. It’s a story my anger has actually made up. But the worst thing is, bad enough, I think it.

But the worst part is I believe it’s true. This is the killer. This is what keeps us paralyzed. Yeah. So if you really were stuck in the anger and someone suggests like that maybe by changing your own anger, it might be better for you.

You think they’re insane. I’m allowed to be angry. I’m right, we’ll say. We all recognize this is not rocket science. You know?

It just takes courage. And not just and the biggest part, think, too is not see it as moralistic. And this, I think, is a very interesting point when it comes to, comparing the the basis of Buddha’s view of morality and these things we’re discussing here and comparing with, say, like, for example, my upbringing as a Catholic, and I really am grateful. I’m telling you. I was I was in love with god and our lady and the saints.

You know? I I’m really grateful for my upbringing and for the nuns’, you know, education and things. So what happened? Is that a voice? Just my voice.

Alright. So let me give you an interesting point here. I find this point quite actually fascinating. So the usual I think, you know, when I was a Catholic, God was the boss, wasn’t he? God made me.

God created the universe. God created me. God created the laws of morality. So therefore, God was to be obeyed. So I’ve got I’ve got this Jesuit priest friend.

We have these discussions, and I asked him, what by definition is a sin? By definition. He says, by definition, a sin is doing what God said not to do. So that means if you, you extrapolate, being good is defined as doing what God said. So what does that imply?

It implies when you’re bad, you get punished by the punisher, and you get rewarded by the rewarder. Now you look at our world, our materialist world. Not religious at all, let’s say. The view is it the philosophical view of goodness and badness, of morality, of sets of rules, of ethics. I think it’s pretty similar.

And when I was a girl, my mommy would say, don’t do that. And being a smarty pants, I probably said, why not? And we know her answer because I say so. We know that. Well, look at the entire way our world is and what we think of as morality.

We think of morality and ethics is a bunch of rules imposed upon us by somebody else, which is why we resist it, why we feel rebellious, and also why, crucially, let’s say mommy isn’t there and she doesn’t see me do that naughty thing. Of course, I feel, oh, I got away with it. That’s how we feel, isn’t it? So we think of it so the Buddha’s view is this is really superficial, a really superficial, almost childish view. For the Buddha, it’s a bit like, you go to the doctor and she tells you, Robina, you might get cancer, so I suggest you don’t smoke.

So, you know, then you go home and you notice your doctor’s not there, so you get out your Marlboro. Oh, she’s not here. I won’t get cancer. Excuse me. People would laugh at you.

That’s the Buddhist approach. He’s not he’s not a judger. He’s not a rewarder. There is no concept like this in Buddhism at all. There’s no per person to reward or punish.

And this is how you think about it. It’s quite shocking because we assume when we hear, let’s say, with your karma, if you do bad things, you’ll suffer. If you do good things, you’ll you’ll you’ll get happy. That’s what we’re gonna say. But that just say, oh, that just sounds like senior, that we’ll say.

It just sounds like punishment and reward. Well, no. Punishment demands a punisher. Reward demands a rewarder. There is no view in Buddhist philosophy like that, which is why we’re the pros why we’re the boss.

My mother used to say, my Catholic mom, virtue has its own rewards. That’s the Buddha’s view. So the Buddha’s view of reality, you know, of virtue, sorry, of morality, It is a natural law. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that he said it. Like, it’s a natural law that, you know, as the doctor will say smoking might cause cancer.

She’s found it to be so. There’s a relationship between cancerous lungs and smoking. It’s not punishment. It’s a childish way to think. But we think it when it comes to the stuff like this, very deep inside us.

Don’t you tell me what to do? That’s why we like to hide our bad things and have no one see because we we think we got away with it. I mean, it’s infantile. The Buddha said you can’t get away with anything because it affects you, but your goodness brings your own happiness. Your badness, your neurosis, your anger, your fears, your ego, your demented, unhappy, painful, heartbreaking neuroses bring you suffering.

We cause our own self happiness and suffering, Buddha says, not just in the present, but in the future. I mean, this view, which is the view of karma, if we take it on board and you one doesn’t have to, it brings enormous accountability if we apply it properly. You know? But we have an instinct, the irony of ego, way Buddha says, this is one of the innocent victim. And that’s how material is view.

Hey. I’m not to get born. It’s not my fault. His fault, her fault, their fault, everybody else’s fault, isn’t it? That’s how we think.

Very deep in this. It’s very entrenched. This this kind of blame victim mentality. Border has got nothing to do with it. Morality is a natural law.

And, basically, what he means by that is just do a bit of market research in this room. You know? You’re not getting killed, lied to, stolen from, bad mouth, kicked in the teeth. No. Thank you.

What he says, there you go. That proves it. That’s what a negative action is. One that harms another. Proof right there.

Not because he says so. Nothing to do with the fact that he says so. He simply observed it to be so. So he gives it as recommendations, you know, as a starting point in practice. Back off and don’t harm others.

But what’s extra interesting here is his view that that the first reason he would suggest, like a good doctor, that we back off from killing and lying and stealing and raping is because it’ll harm me. And why it’ll harm me? Because those actions are motivated by anger and neurosis and fear and depression and jealousy and the rest, and they are what poison us. They are what destroy our mind and our peace of mind and our happiness and cause us now and in the future suffering. It’s quite subtle point that the whole Buddhist view in the literature looks at all this.

You know? So the first point is you gotta have it’s like you gotta have compassion for yourself. You gotta realize that your neurosis and your ridiculous rubbish and your lousy behavior is what harms you. And it’s not because mommy said or deity said or god said or or Buddha said. It’s gonna be because you can see that’s true so you own it.

You know? Gotta grow up. We’re the boss. I like to say that a lot. It’s really true.

That’s a big difference. And this view is this this victim view, this blame, reward, punishment view is very entrenched in us. It’s very instinctive in us. So to get past it is not easy. So they won’t the more all of this is the wisdom we’re go back and forth, the more we can see this, the more we will be fed up to our teeth with my own ridiculous rubbish, and the more I wanna give up this nonsense for my sake.

Not because anybody said, not because I should or this or blah. You’re fed up to you’re sick of it, you know, to suffer. You’re fed up with those old habits. You’re fed up with the misery, the self, the depression, the anxiety. We can own it to your own mind, and and it does you know, don’t hold your breath.

It doesn’t go overnight. But to have this confidence that I can change myself, that I can, as Lama Yeshe says, mold my mind into any shape I like. Wow. That’s amazing. You know?

He has great confidence. Then we’re gonna have compassion for others because we’re all in the same boat. You know? We’re cut from the same cloth. But you can’t really have that compassion for others until you look at your own, until you see your own.

It’s really it’s a really important point. And that’s why we gotta know where we’re at, like, in a relationship. You know? Let’s say you’re a victim in a relationship. You say you got a wretched bully old partner, and you’re a victim and afraid and miserable and unhappy and frustrated and jealous and all these things.

You know, you you you’re not ready to have compassion, but they may and they may be a creep. They may be a bully. No. Don’t jump at that having compassion for them yet. You gotta have compassion for yourself.

I don’t enough courage to say, okay, babe. I’m going. That’s really important. Compassion is the point in the long term. That’s massive.

What goes your compassion? It is massive. There’s some gooey feeling for little dogs that get hurt. Believe me. I mean, don’t get hurt.

So anyway, blah blah. Any questions? Three ten. It’s three ten. Oh, it’s o one three, one or the other.

I’ve got I’ve got it at the time. I’ve a watch today. Ten past eight, I think. Time. Any any any or maybe that’s an eight gone wrong.

Yes. An eight gone probably an eight gone. Oh, that’s not maybe there’s a piece missing. No. That’s a three.

Definitely a three. Yeah. Could you quickly tell the story of the Richard Gia. And the nuns for those of us that went to your Oh, okay. Sure.

So in two thousand three, Richard Gia, as you know, is a good Buddhist. He invited the to New York. And he also he decide I was working with we had this liberation prison project. We started it in California when I was based there in, like, ninety six or something. And we were working with people all over the country as well as in Australia, And he knew about the work we’re doing.

So he that’s when we got when he was we were discussing whether we collaborate on some kind of work with prisoners, you know, but in the end, they they didn’t do that. It’s okay. But he he anyway, for this event, he invited twenty former prisoners. All of you had done some kind of meditation in prison. You know?

So he chose, like, a cross section of American society, black, white, male, female, Puerto Rican, Mexican, you know, the whole works. And a few people like me were invited. It was a very moving day, all day talking about their suffering and the some of the dramas and the suffering. I mean, indeed, it is suffering. Believe me.

These prisons are garbage dumps. The system is unbelievable. I mean, you read about the papers these days. Unbelievable. So he also invited two young to make nuns.

And it was just very moving to hear them. First of all, you know, after hearing their story, there are young women, been Buddhists, they’ve been nuns all their life. You know? And there’s something you probably do wanna quantify suffering. You could almost argue that they’re suffering.

The prisoners have found out eventually. These other guys, twenty of them, probably could deduce that their suffering was worse than everybody else’s if you wanted to quantify suffering. They’ve been tortured, you know, sexually abused and tortured for a couple of years. So they were telling their story, and there were tears coming. They’re very quiet, very humble.

But the first point, which is interesting, is they weren’t angry. And this, I think, and I’ve been talking before, in our culture, it’s quite suspect because anger is a healthy emotion, especially if you’ve been victimized and abused. It’s healthy to be angry. But they weren’t angry, and that we don’t trust at all. But if you have if you understand the Buddha’s view of karma and just take this as your hypothesis that you they with their view since they’re born is the view that they came into this life from the past lives, that whoever they meet, they’ve got some history with.

Whatever they do to each other is because you’ve done that before. So there’s nothing that you so there’s for them, the huge question that is the question we all ask and go mad because we can’t find an answer, why is this happening to me? I think that’s the source of so much of our pain when bad things happen. We can’t get past that. We can’t find an answer.

There is no answer if you take the material as you. There really is no answer. No wonder we suffer, you know, but they don’t have that question. They don’t have that question. So they can get they can start to use their methods and their and their and their meditation and their practice and the way they think to to to to deal with this and to get past, know, not to have the victim mentality, but just put up with that underlevel something.

So, of course, if they’d given the key to get out of it, the prisoner would have run. Of course, they would have taken it, but they couldn’t. So they worked on their minds. And then the the other point, which is the basis of this, they said quietly at the end, and, of course, we had compassion for our torturers because we knew we must have had that in the past. So it’s kind of this is this is a classic example of of a of the approach of a person utilizing the techniques that are, you know, that are taught in the Buddhist tradition coming from the Buddha’s own view of the universe.

So now, well, that’s an intense view. Because part of the problem, we hear that, it sounds like you’re blaming the victim. It’s a very hard one to hear, but because we’re imposing our victim mentality onto it. There’s no blame. It’s not about blame.

See, because the Buddha, there’s no blame. There’s no question of blame. There’s no concept like blame. Blame implies, you know, a person judging, rewarding innocent victims of this kind of thing. There’s no view like that.

Buddha says we bumped into each other countless lives. We’ve all done countless things to each other, he would suggest. So that’s a very good view to inform. And, also, you think about these these two young women. There’s no way anybody like Andre who had compassion for the murder of his own boy.

That’s not a victim talking. That’s a powerful, courageous person. It’s only a person who doesn’t have victim mentality could have compassion for the person who harms them. It’s only that. You think about it.

You know? So interesting. There’s some ability for empathy even for a maniac. That’s an intense quality. Victims don’t have empathy.

A victim is overwhelmed by their own fears and self pity. I’m not being rude. We’re all victims. Join the club. But rage, all rage, anger.

You know? And this is it sounds cruel to say this, but My Geshe-la would often say that ego is the self-pity of me. Ego. And that sounds really quite hard. Don’t don’t mishear it here.

Yeah. Any other questions? Yeah. Why is it so hard to change? Habit.

I mean, I think that it’s just a habit. Only reason. It has to be habit, isn’t it? When I meet people who say, you know, at some point in my life, I decided I anger was terrible. I gave up anger, and I am gobsmacked because anger was like my middle name.

So, you know, and it’s like years of hard work. Do understand? But some people, obviously, was not very strong. It’s an easy habit to give up, isn’t it? So we can see this is the only way to understand it.

This, of is informed by the Buddhist view that we come programmed from the first, second, conception with all our habits. So since we’re tiny children, my mother didn’t have to teach me to be angry. I had it down to perfection. Well, you could argue often that Mozart didn’t have to get taught much music. His mommy gives him a piano.

Off he goes writing the sonatas at the age of six. So you can deduce or Hitler for that matter. Mommy didn’t teach him what to do. We we program, and we can see this with children. We take this view and see so many we often say in the west, oh, she’s an old soul, we’ll say.

We we come in form from that second with all our own tendencies. And if, you know, if you got a strong habit to be angry or habit to steal, you gotta see the evidence of it as a tiny child or music for that matter. You know? So it’s habit. That’s why.

Deep and the Buddha would say massive, countless lives long of habit. It’s a it’s a it’s a simple reason, isn’t it? You see? So this is why it should, on the other hand, give us quite give us courage. Because, you know, if I think about if you have a philosophical view, I’ll put it this way.

If you believe in the philosophical view that your money made you, we think it’s science. Buddha thinks it’s nonsense. Oh, he doesn’t talk like that. I’m just talking like that. He says she played a role.

Of course, she did. But she’s not the creator of you, dear. You’re the creator of yourself, he would say. So if you had a view that your mommy created you, which we all do, we take it as a scientific given, nobody questions that. Then, of course, like I said before, there’s no there’s no explanation.

There’s no there’s no you before the second of conception. So the only place you can look for why you are the way you are is in is mommy and daddy and grandpa and grandma in the genes, isn’t it? Go back that way and track it back. And if you can’t find evidence in, you know, you can’t find the evidence in in mommy’s behavior, daddy’s behavior, or even in your jeans why you’re why you steal, then, of course, the feeling would be then you know since a little girl, just can’t help but steal, but no one taught you and there’s no evidence for it anywhere else. Of course, you gotta be fearful.

Why do I do this? How do why do I do this? There’s no answer. There’s no answer, and that’s what brings so much fear. Even if you have the karma view as your hypothesis?

Well, it’s an old habit. I must have done it before. Oh, okay. Well, it’s a habit. I can change it.

And the other part is I think when the habit is so strong, but we think, oh, this is just who I am, we say. This I’m just born this way. This is where I am. That that utterly concretizes it. You’re frozen in space.

There’s no atom of possibility to change. And even it’s only until recently that they’re now talking in the western world about neuroscience, about, you know, neuroplasticity. The greatest finding of the twentieth century, one scientist said. That you know that you’re not stuck with the brain you’re born with. I mean, I’m trying to be rude here, but Buddha’s been telling us quietly for two and a half thousand years, dear.

You can change your mind. You know? So it’s kinda nice to see reinforced. Like, it’s great. It should give great courage that we’re not set in stone, you know, but it but it feels like it, doesn’t it?

I mean, even when I was a Buddhist for the first few years, I had the theory of Buddhism down. I’m really confident in this Buddhist theory, but the experience anger was like my middle name until I really worked harder. It doesn’t just change overnight. But because I had confidence, it was only a habit. You just keep plotting, keep working, keep chipping away, you know, rather than, oh, this is the way I am.

It’s not my fault, which is how we tend to do, and I’m desperate to always blame everybody else. It’s not my fault is our deepest thing. You know? Do understand? It gives courage, confidence.

Yeah. So yeah. I was just gonna say, when you’re comfortable with with what you’re saying about, you know, the Buddhist message and When you decide that this is that you’re working hypothesis. Yes. And you thought about it, looked at it, made a decision.

Okay. Like, how do you stop your ego kicking in and sort of you know, I feel like I kinda know it at some level. But how do you stop your ego kicking in and going, well, why aren’t you doing that? You know? That’s the fact that’s that’s the irony of ego.

The addiction of ego is I’m always it’s addicted to ego is addicted to negativity. And this is the deepest one of the deepest responses we have, this dissatisfaction. Our spontaneous response is always to look at the dark side, always look at the glass half empty, especially when it comes to ourself. And we almost think it’s a virtue. It’s just the deepest of deepest of deepest habits.

But but it’s a cognitive thing. So you’ve gotta kinda look right not kidding. One way of putting what we’re talking about here, the practice is writing a new script. The things that arises spontaneously, because it arises spontaneously, we assume it’s the truth. And we run to it like a magnet, almost like it’s virtuous.

But it’s it’s terrible thing against ourselves. It’s it’s, like, awful that we should do this. So we go consciously every day, change the words, hear it, and counteract it. And, you know, and look at the good side, look at our qualities, look at our potential, look at our efforts. We don’t often do that.

We also get the results. You know? So I remember always remember one of my friends in prison, Richie. He was a friend of Arturo, the first one who wrote to me. I always quote him.

He used to write letters. He was in this top security prison with Arturo where, you know, they’re in their cells twenty three hours a day and, you know, just like a nightmare, like hell. So he’d been a gangster all his life, like all these guys, killed several people on the streets. Well, they do. You know?

So he told me this letter that he was he liked the Buddhist practices, and he especially they like some of them, these Latinos, really like two things. They really like the idea that Buddhism is sort of to do with discipline, and they like that idea. And they also really like Tārā, Buddha Tārā, this green Buddha. They love Tārā, the Latino guys. You know?

So, anyway, he was telling me about this moment. He told me about how he’s very angry. He said, no. I’m very laid back, Rubina. But when I get angry, I really get angry.

So I went to visit him eventually, and there he was, the glass between us, and that we’re on the phone. You know? And he covered his tattoos. It’s very typical. These gangsters, a lot of them covered in tattoos.

And they told me proudly, it’s all prison art, me. They make their own ink, their own needles. They they they all learn these typography and these amazing complicated fonts all over their body. It’s covered in tats. You know?

So I said, how’s your anger, Richie? And he kinda blushed under his tats. He said, Robina, I’m sorry. I have to confess that I had a fight with my Selly. In California, they call each other their Selly.

They’re cellmates. I had a fight with my Selly this morning, and I put his head down the toilet. But then he said, but, Robina, I took it out again. I’ll never forget. So I thought, well done, Richie.

That’s practice. So, you know, you wouldn’t think of a Buddhist practitioner, but that’s practice. I rejoice the fact that he didn’t kill a fifth person. So, you know, Mexican gangster multimurderer. You don’t think, oh, Buddha’s practice.

Holy. You’re looking mindful. Excuse me. That’s practice. Rejoice.

Then he had the guy chucked out and he sat and did his Tārā meditation. So practice is relative. We’ve got to know this. We absolutely have to know this. And this is the hardest thing for us because we are really like my mother used to say, we are our own worst enemies.

We are addicted to believing we’re creeps, and then we’ve everybody else for it. Very naughty. You understand? You know, you’re you’re you’re my only mate just says, how are you? Boy, I had it all come down.

This and that. The fuck. I hope it’s I’m no good. I’m very bad. This is the way you go works.

It’s ironic. Yes. Come on down there. Yeah. I just want two cents further to her.

Yes. Oh, no. Further to your story about the head in the toilet. Yes. A knowledgeable man once told me that if you can make a murder murderer into a mere thief, you are making good progress.

Well, there you go. It’s another there you go. A variation of it. Perfect. That’s exactly right.

It really is relative, isn’t it? You know? And that’s why even a couple of people on Tuesday mentioning things out, all the habit, all the anger, blah blah blah blah blah, anger blah blah, you know? So if you compare, not being rude about us, it’s not being arrogant. But here we are sitting in a Buddhist center for God’s sake.

I mean, how boring can you get? I mean, it’s not a bar. There’s not even a restaurant here. There’s no coffee. There’s no nice things.

I mean, get my point. I’m not saying it’s not a nice center, a lovely center. But it’s it’s hard work to come at one of these things. It’s not a bar. It’s not a party.

You’re not dressed up in your nines. Don’t have any good time. So you understand? You know? And nor nor are you out there in the gun club or the fishing place or that, you know, or, you know, doing it and killing in line and sitting or drunk on the streets or an alcoholic.

Excuse me. Excuse me. You’re already one of the one percent. The the one percent fortunate that we can actually even think the possibility that there might be something to be looked at in Buddhist views about morality and goodness that I can take as a tool to help you be a better person. I mean, this itself is phenomenal.

We we don’t realize because we’re addicted to thinking we’re not good enough. It’s just default mode. The irony of ego is that. So, of course, the other the other side that sounds like you’re being arrogant. No.

No. Be realistic. What is it that are not realistic? The the one of the key functions, like I said before, of all the neuroses is that they exaggerate. Delusions mean you’re not in sync with reality precisely, he says.

We’re not always these they they embellish. They embellish. So this dilute this this this dissatisfaction in us is embellishing our our bad qualities. And this is why we’re so distressed and so anxious and worried all the time, never kind of meeting up with our own expectations. That’s a never ending thing.

It’s like a nightmare. You know? So it’s a tricky thing to work with. It’s not an easy answer that needs this kind of clear looking at. Anyway, who else?

Yep. I’m stuck on a point that you raised earlier. Yep. About you you expressed in school that the karma, use the example of some extreme heinous actions. The one I’m stuck on is one example you use, which I think is any any crime towards children.

I just the most. But Yep. If am I understanding correctly that karma what is being suggested on hypothesized? These children, their karma Okay. Coming back.

Right. She’s been So you’re talking about bad things? Yeah. Let me reframe the question to you. May I reframe the question?

Okay. Did did you have a nice mommy? Certainly nice mommy and daddy? Reasonable. I mean Yeah.

Reasonable. Yeah. Okay. Oh, she’s doubtful. I think she’s probably Can you think of okay.

Forget you. Can you think of some children who have lovely parents and who are lovely children with all their limbs in the right place and their intelligence, they’ve got lovely homes and mommy, they can read them stories at night and kiss them and hug them and reinforce them and have good food and good education? Yeah. You’ve heard of those people? How come you’re asking me why do good things happen to little children, Rabina?

Why do we always only ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ask about the bad things? That’s my question to you because the the answer is identical. Yes, Buddha says, every living being, whatever experience they have, that’s the fruit of their past actions. But this is what I find in the thirty I’m not showing off here, but the thirty eight, thirty nine years I’ve been a Buddhist, no one has ever ever ever ever ever asked the question, why do good things happen? Because this is proving my point.

We are addicted to negativity, because the answer is the same, darling. Why a beautiful child with a beautiful mommy and a beautiful deity. Not Buddha says nothing happens without a cause, and nothing happens without a cause in the mind of the person who experiences it. So if you’ve got a fairly nice mommy and you’ve got nice people and you’ve good qualities in you, then you’ve created phenomenal virtue in the past. If people look at you and like you, it’s because you’ve been patient.

If people don’t kill you, because you haven’t killed. If they don’t lie to you, it’s because you haven’t lied. That I’ve steal from you is because you haven’t stolen. You’ve done the opposite. Everybody said, Buddha says, is experiencing the fruits of their past.

Everybody. All the happiness, all the suffering. That’s the answer. That’s the answer. You didn’t hear me.

You’re obsessed with children and dogs as most people are. Oh, come on. You do not hear my answer one bit. You can’t extrapolate. You’re very intelligent person.

I’m sorry. You got it because this is always the the point that comes up. Can you not hear my point? You can’t hear it, can you? I think I’m struggling with it.

I know because you don’t like it. That’s all. Do can you see it as a child? Okay. Can you see some Sorry.

Pardon? You have a room full of people that adults now, but as children or even children, room full of children who were molested and raped. Would you speak the same to them and express Excuse me. I’m talking to you because you asked me the question. Excuse me.

Understand Excuse me. I’m talking to you. You asked the question. If a child comes to me and talks about her daddy hurting her, I’d give her a hug and put the band in prison. That’s not the discussion here.

You asked the question. I’m giving you an answer to help you understand something. You ask the question because you wanna understand why things happen. Is that right? Are you trying to I just want a clarification.

This is for Sweetie. Sweetie. The the children that Sweetie. Horrible experiences. Oh god.

You see you’re just obsessed with the horrible experiences. Well, we’ll do Sweetheart, give me can you hear that how I’m talking? You can’t hear it, can you? You can’t hear how I use my example, how it’s answering your question. No.

Because you don’t care why good things happen, do you? You don’t ask that question because you assume it’s normal that a person should have a good experience. You don’t think there’s a cause. But as soon as you hear the Buddha says it’s a cause of the bad things, you have a panic attack. Darling, join the club.

Everybody’s the same. So I just jumped on you tonight. That was all. Sweetie, listen. You’re not following it logically.

You have to answer my point and see that you can extrapolate to what I told you. Buddha is saying, listen to me. I have to say it again to you slowly and more gently. Excuse me. Forget all that.

Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. Stop. Shush.

Shush. You’ve been also moralistic. You’ve been so heavy in typical moralistic. It’s alright. You’re like everybody else.

It’s okay. Listen. Buddha is saying, there are trillions of get a big picture. Can you get back from little children, please? Can I get a big picture?

All the trillions of beings, the swarms, the slugs, the dogs, the you know, there’s trillions of sentient beings, what it says. They’ve all got beginningless mind. Every millisecond of whatever they do is programming their mind that will ripen in the future as their experiences. That’s the big picture. That’s the answer to your question.

So that brings if you’re applying it for yourself, you don’t use like a big stick on people as a as as your own explanation to help you change because you’re sick of suffering. Buddha says, every living being, there’s no such thing as random happiness or suffering. It’s an insane view. But that’s what your belief is. You’ve this materialist.

You’ll be innocent victim. You know, you don’t wanna blame god. Maybe you’re born of a Christian. You dare blame God. So you prefer to blame mommy and daddy and meanies and pedophiles and naughty people because it’s a blame model.

You see? This is not a blame one. This is just a view that says every living being is necessarily every millisecond experiencing the fruit. Their experiences are informed by their past. All happiness, all suffering.

That’s the answer to your question. The question is too emotional. So this is the big picture. So you that’s what you gotta think about if you wanna think about it. If you wanna think about it.

Now I’m forcing you to, but you did ask the question. So the answer to your question based on this would be pretend you’re giving you’re giving yourself the answer. The answer is yes, isn’t it? But, you know, you’re obsessed with a child. Hitler was a child once.

Little old, little old, oh, adult. Excuse me. He came imprinted with his maniac Nazi tendencies. But you don’t like to think that you wanna think all babies are innocent because everything’s that way. Like, doggy woggies.

You know? But as long as I get the doggy woggies that humans hurt, animals are ripping each other’s guts out every day, but we don’t have compassion for them. We don’t care. We’d like to be mad at humans. She asked her.

It’s okay. We have masses of vested interest in our way we have compassion right now. It’s really for a few people, innocent little babies. Just innocent pussy wussies. Innocent doggy woggies.

Do Do you get any accidental? You gotta think about it, babe. There’s a masses of layers of stuff in what I’ve been saying. I just have to what what do you wanna do with it? Yes?

So this person had called on their own circumstance and by the way, tendency. Yeah. Does that then ease the that if you are a parent of a child who has experienced some terrible suffering, whether it be one instance or ongoing? The child or the parent? The child has suffered that.

The child has been, say, a victim of Why don’t we talk about the good for change? No. We love talking about the bad. Only get to the good. So does that mean the good thing then is if that person with their calmer tendencies had that package, then the birth parent can give up any guilt for having produced that child Of course.

Situation. Hitler’s mummy is not the cause of that maniac. I mean, there’s no evidence that she wanted to kill six million Jews or because she must have hit a hit him when he was a little boy. It’s beyond insane to think that. We’re just going west.

Oh, no one knows. We think it’s kind of scientific. So you just give that child a hard job to get support. You you give it everything in your power to help that child not be psychotic, not to go kill six million Jews, not to go rape people, lie, steal, kill, throw chairs at people. You do everything you can for that precious child.

And if you can, you protect them from harming others, but you’re not the fault. You just got some karma’d maniac as your baby. Yes. She’s not. She’s not.

She says the bear excuse me. You just want the baby to be a baby. Shush. Go. She didn’t no.

She did not say that. She did not say that, Darlie. She’s interesting. She’s like, she’s a nice girl, isn’t she? Look.

She’s a really nice girl. Woo. Sweetie, she said, therefore, the parent would give up guilt for being mean to for being mean to the child. Yes. For the child being a maniac.

Yeah. That’s right. So you just stop blaming your your mommy and daddy for being not less than perfect. Okay? You are the cause of any harmony to you, and you are the cause of all your good, your kindness, your prettiness, your intelligence, your love, your compassion.

It’s a you should be weeping in tears of bliss when you think of your past hard work just to be this person. The Buddha says it’s in areas. One lama said in a last book called the Tibetan Art of Parenting, well, these two American mummies interviewed various Tibetan mummies about how they prepare to get pregnant and everything. So one of the things in this the one lama was interviewed and he said, at the time of a male and female having sex, male and female human, billions of consciousnesses that have recently passed away, obviously, not just humans, not that many humans. Billions of consciousnesses that have recently passed away are all hovering around trying to get in.

Well, do you got in? And that’s the fruit of your phenomenal virtue, your goodness, you’re not killing, you’re not stealing, you’re not lying, practice in the context of a spiritual path, practice in the context of goodness that you’ve got a good body and nice you’ve been born in a decent country, you know, with good qualities. It’s phenomenal if you realize all the causes of just being a reasonably nice girl like you would blow your mind as a Buddhist you. You have to some accident where you deserve to be treated well by your parents. That’s so heavy.

Deserve. Because your assumption is babies don’t deserve mean parents. It is that. That’s why you asked the question. But everything has a cause, Buddha says.

We just don’t think there is. We think we have an assumption that good things should happen and bad things shouldn’t happen, and that’s completely the assumption of attachment. That’s why we crave and greedily want good things, and we have a panic attack when the bad things happen. I’m done. I’m packing a lot of stuff into this, you see.

You gotta fix that. Anybody else dare to ask? Yep. Yeah. Of course.

He’s got a view of reality. He says that’s what Buddha gets when you’re in bliss and you you achieve Buddha, and all the delusions are gone. All the suffering’s gone, all the victim’s gone, your mind is as big as the universe, have infinite wisdom and compassion. Yeah. That’s the goal, darling.

You finally see reality. They’re all living in la la and we’re insane. What do you mean by that? Don’t please have to unpack these words of yours. What’s this definition of yours of this emptiness thing?

What do you mean by that? About feeling that once you be patched, come from whatever you will do. I’m no doubt. Of the. So what do you kind of meditation do you use?

It’s much interesting. What is it called this one you do? You try to calm your mind down or something. Well, actually dealing with the necrosis. You try to get them calmed down?

Yeah. And you succeed sometimes, and then what happens? You panic. You just said fear. Well, fear is pain, darling.

Another word for it. It’s the meditation of the mindfulness. Sweetie, you just said why is it fear? Yes. Fear is panic.

So you’re calming your mind down, and then you get a bit of a panic attack because why? You said emptiness. What do mean by emptiness here in this context? Feels strange. What is this emptiness?

Please define it. You can’t just make up words. It’s hard. I mean We can meet you. I’m I’m I’m gonna ask you a question.

Of what once you have your mind full of things, once you try to get the struggle of whatever is going on. Mhmm. Why should be afraid? Should be very happy. You just have seen it.

You got your mind calm down. So don’t ask me, baby. I know what you’re doing. Sounds very weird to me. I don’t know why I fear because I can’t hear you or your experience.

You’re saying is you do meditation, you calm your thoughts down, you really work hard, you calm your stories down, then you have fear. Can you please explain a bit more? Enjoy it. Jump into it. I mean, one thing love is open.

When he’s discussing meaning of emptiness, not the one you’re talking about, understanding reality in Buddha talks. You really learn to go to the subtlest level of your mind. This is advanced. The subtlest level of your mind using these amazing meditation techniques, thinking about the meaning of the self that put it on about. That’s incredibly subtle what does exist.

And he says it can bring fear, but he says, don’t be afraid of it. Don’t don’t resist it because you can’t disappear. Not possible. Because ego is so violently grasping. The the primordials ignorant the the primordial energy of ego is to grasp at the sense of our eye.

So as soon as it’s slightly threatened, we get a bit of a panic attack. So don’t don’t resist it. Relax. Go into it. You can’t disappear.

I promise. Yeah. I’m really is meditation a big part of your daily factors? So you have to tell me what you mean by meditation because there’s a million definitions. What what do you mean by it?

Well, I’ve just started meditating. Yes. What kind do you do? I do body scan. I do concentration meditation.

Okay. Good. Yeah. Great. And I do the nine cycles of breathing.

Very nice. That’s good. So I’ve just done. Good, darling. Well done.

Good tools. I was wondering, do you meditate a lot? Why? That’s a personal question, isn’t it? That was very personal.

You don’t talk about people’s practice. I’m not trying to embarrass you, but you wouldn’t talk about people’s practice. I understand. And the typical answer that Tibetan would go, oh, no. I don’t meditate at all.

I mean, reality is I don’t meditate at all. But they would say, I don’t meditate at all because you’re supposed to be looking humble. You’d never admit to meditating because that’s like showing off. Oh, good. Yes.

You’re very private. Private private private. Other thing I would ask you was I’ve heard a new term. I’ve never heard What’s that? Is essentially being Is this a term in Tibetan?

A term in in Buddhism, Buddhist psychology for all living beings. And the term in Tibetan is very nice. It’s a translation of their word, which means mind possessor. That’s a really tasty better translation, I think, than. I think it’s too vague.

So Buddha says, I’m just humans. He doesn’t use a word like soul. Anybody who’s got a consciousness or a mind, which is not physical, ants, dogs, miniature little grubs and bugs in the earth and all the ones in the dust mites and the ones living in your skin, you know, and on your arm. It’s like a zoo there. They’re all these mind possessors, all kinds of sentient beings.

So then Buddha so Buddha says all sentient beings as they need being equal. Equal from what perspective? Equal from what point of view? That’s an absolute term. What do you mean by equal?

Well, having the same value. Having the same value. Having the same potential. Okay. The same potential.

Okay. Better. I mean, they’re not equal. Giraffes beat the long neck every time. We’re not equal.

They’ve got the best necks. Birds fly, and we don’t. We part. We fail. But in terms of potential in terms of the fundamental right to be happy and not suffer, the fundamental need to be happy and not suffer, no difference.

And Buddha would say the potential to be free of suffering, no difference. The potential for perfection and Buddhahood, no difference. Absolutely from that perspective equal. So from what I understand, meditation is the word for enlightenment. No.

It is not. That’s a complete grotesque can’t No. It’s a complete this is the typical word of everybody in the world. I’m getting my blood really riled up tonight. It’s a complete gross over exaggeration of this thing called meditation.

Is it a step? Not even a step. It’s a technique, a necessary technique. So let me just put it in a particular way. Okay?

Okay. There are millions of kinds of meditation. So there’s millions of kinds of meditation, millions of ways to use your mind to meditate. The one that you’re referring to, which is the view that most people think of as meditation, the one that this lady is talking about, is where you it’s it’s where you concentrate. You learn to focus the mind.

So the three techniques you described are three of the techniques that we’re taught. So you have to ask the question, why would you want to focus your mind? Because in the long term, you want to get this mind of yours, this consciousness to a very subtle, more refined level of mind beyond the gross conceptual and the gross sensory, which is a level of consciousness that we don’t even posit existing in our culture. Right? And this is what the Hindus came up with.

The Buddha took this technique, and it’s the the goal of it is called single point of concentration. K? So you when you’ve accomplished that, you look like you were dead. Because you’ve gone to you’ve accessed very consciously a subtler, more refined level of your mind. So it’s not some cosmic state.

It’s super incredible. You’ve gone beyond delusions. Your mind’s in the nature of bliss. You you’ve developed very phenomenal qualities, but it’s just the beginning. You’ve now, like, honed this laser like level of mind to do the real job, which is in the second mode of meditation where you have to develop insight into how things exist.

Buddha says we’re living in la la land when it comes to reality. We’re completely caught up in all these delusions, and they cause us suffering. So we have to get to this much up in the long term. We’ve gotta get to the subtler level so we can do this real work of unpacking and unraveling and deconstructing all these highly complex mental illnesses, deluded, highly conceptual, highly elaborate, insane conceptual constructs that he says we’ve been having since countless lives that are all mistaken. So it’s a highly sophisticated job to do.

The reason you have focus, which is the purpose of meditation, is so you can do this unraveling and unpacking to the subtlest degree where eventually you unravel and unpack and finally remove from your mind all the neuroses one hundred percent totally, which is an unknown concept in our psychological model. And this is like lifetimes of hard work. So the technique that’s necessary to get to the subtle level of mind is called concentration meditation. Ninety nine percent of us in this life will never achieve it for long term. But we can utilize the skill that you cultivate from that, which is a stepping out of your own mess, and you begin to hear all the crazy thoughts.

So you can do the real job. The real job of being a Buddhist every day isn’t meditating. It’s being your own therapist, dealing with your junk, changing the stories, writing a new script, not believing your own rubbish, stopping believing in your anger, your jealousy, your fears, and your rubbish, and your low self esteem, and the rest. That’s the real work of being a Buddhist. But this is a technique that enables you to do it well.

That’s all. That makes sense? Yes, sir. Good morning. So you do the wisdom and compassion wings so you can help others.

Yeah. When you’re talking about anger, isn’t some anger a good thing? Like, just for example, you’re in a bad situation or a bad relationship and someone’s harming you. That’s right. Yes.

The anger that you if if you if you’re compassionate all the time with your partner and say, well, that that, you know, be compassionate is obviously the bad place. And it puts you in a place where you stay there because you’ve always got compassion and understanding. I understand. Yep. If you get to the point where you start to get angry about them harming you, isn’t that a kind of a good thing?

I understand. It gets you out of that relationship. It gives you it gives you a bit of energy to act. And that’s why we have it private. That’s right.

It it gets So I have to ask you a question. Then So then how long was this person Is this for you? How long was this person been abusing you? This for you. We’re talking a story.

Years. Years. I’m saying years. Okay. So then let me tell you this.

What is it yours? You’re talking in dental? We don’t want you personally. Okay. No.

That’s fine. Well, then then the question I’d have to ask is what an insane person are you to sit like a complete victim, like like a moth running to a flame. Yeah. That’s the problem. The fact that it’s taken you six, five, seven, twenty years to notice this guy’s a maniac.

So you gotta look at the other delusions in you. Join the club here, darling. I’m glad you’re gonna use you as an example, and that is the craving to be approved of, the fear of what people think, the running back like a child just to be goody or a goody goody business. Yes. Yes.

So, you know, in my life, the advantage of my type of nature, the millisecond the relationship was gone, I was gone like the wind, baby. I think that’s the great idea years for my anger to rise up. It was the clear it was a no brainer. The the happiness that you got out there was not worth it all the nightmare that came. I mean, I can imagine when I hear stories like that, I think is, you know, you’re totally mentally ill.

You know, you did I mean, there’s not being personal. There’s talking. Yeah. That’s the real point. So darling, how marvelous that your patience is an incredible quality to be patient.

I really and I mean it sincerely. I praise that. And the compassion that comes, but you got the Buddhist view is they’re not their problem. Compassion and patience are virtues. You can never criticize them.

The problem, and this is the highly covered razor blade, is this incredible meekness and attachment we’ve got since we’re born. Duck and junkie to be approved of. And then the trouble is because nice people like you, and I’m not being sarcastic. Please hear me. You are kind.

You are compassionate. The person is suffering. Only a person who a person who harms others is clearly suffering. Yeah. But all the time because of the attachment and neediness is the problem.

Not the not the patience is not the problem. Compassion is not the problem. It’s because you didn’t have enough courage from the very beginning to recognize that this neediness to be approved of by this idiot and constantly stretching your kind of and then giving him permission to be brutal and harmful. You understand? No courage to stand up and say, and you don’t need anger.

If you did in the beginning, hi, babe. I’m going. But it’s taken years. So then, of course, it finally does rise like a sleeping lion. I’m sad.

Thank goodness. But that’s not anger. That’s called wisdom. You see? It’s called wisdom.

It’s sometimes hard to tell the difference. It is very hard to tell the think, I’ve got so much anger in me. And then I think, well, that that’s the bad thing. I shouldn’t have anger. I should have compassion.

No. No. That’s that’s wrong thinking. You shouldn’t have anger. You’re right.

It hurts you. It hurts you. And it’s and the and the but the opposite, which is this paralysis of neediness to be a good girl and to be seen as a good girl, this is our worst attachment and the hardest one to see. Since we’re born, we’ve been craving mommy and everybody else to approve of us. So we constantly adjust our behavior to do the right thing to come to the world.

Yeah. That’s the worst one. We don’t have the courage to recognize this is not appropriate. A person with any self respect, that’s what we have to learn, would never put up with a person abusing us. Good luck.

I’m leaving. Thank you. And that instantaneously will subdue them. But the irony of a victim also is you give permission to this person to keep bullying you. Yeah.

Well, I’m glad you finally got the message. Thank you. But you don’t need to call it anger. It’s called common sense. It’s called intelligence.

Yeah. You see what I’m saying, don’t it? I feel the same. Exactly. But it’s very scary, especially nice people.

I’m not being sarcastic. There’s nice people. I look at my family. We’ve got dysfunctional family. We have seven kids and everything.

It’s kind of crazy. And two of my sisters, especially with the with the with the were like you. Nice people, kind, always the pacifiers, always the one sitting in the other side and having compassion, but also the the you know, whereas I was a troublemaker. I was like a big truck. They were always the pacifiers.

But it was the we’ve all got attachment, Buddha says. And all about attachment wants what I want. But when you’re a good person, that kindness and compassion is mixed with this attachment which poisons it and prevents us from taking making the tough choices. Because I had anger and kind of you know, I was able to make the tough choices. This is no good.

Bye. I’m leaving. You know? Do understand? Yeah.

I understand. So there’s a good side to patience, but the bad side to patience, the the negative aspect, not a patience, but a negative character that’s similar to patience is passivity. The negative side to anger is volatile, but the good side is sharp and critical and recognizing the problem. Yeah. You understand?

Action. Action. Yeah. You see, very tricky. You know?

Yes. I’m gonna I was pretty late. Okay. Yes. In the past, I was brought up to believe when I die, I will either go to hell or heaven.

Right. Yes. I believe Yes. My hell and my heaven I hear. Is why I’m here.

I understand. Am I wrong? Well, darling, that’s for you to find out. I’m just telling you Buddha’s view here. Buddha would say that consciousness comes from before and will continue.

That’s his that’s his vision of the universe. That’s his observation, and then we create our own realities. So it’s for you to find out. Buddha says, don’t believe him. Look at his own findings.

Look at his observations, and then take him on board if you want to. You talk to us. So that’s why this is why for the Buddhist view to you know? I was not criticizing if you have lying faith in God. Please have faith.

I’m not criticizing. But this is the biggest one, I think. You’re talking about this point here. This she since we’re little girls and boys, we’ve always been trying to do the right thing, isn’t it? We wanna do the right thing.

We do what we’re told. We believe what we’re told, and we think it’s right to do what we’re told and believe what we’re told. Well, yeah, the Buddha’s view, and I think it’s a great one. Just excuse me. You’re the boss here.

If we if we or since we’re born, we’ve internalized deity’s views, mommy’s views, god’s views, the next door neighbor’s views. We’re running around trying to all these views together and trying to live according to them. We’ll go mad. Chuck them all out, honey, and check out what you think, and then start looking at them, and then put back into your mind whatever you think is what you are choosing to live by because you are the boss, nobody else. That’s the Buddhist view.

I mean, Christians and Muslims find that a bit arrogant. That’s not what I’m saying. That’s the Buddhist observation. We create our own reality. You know?

So it’s up to us. And not to blindly believe. Listen. Check. Think about it.

Take it on board. Don’t just don’t be fearful about it. Really look at these things carefully. We need to. Then we we then we then we become fearless.

Does that make sense? You know, I’ve been doing a talk with these Jews not Jews. Yeah. This in Miami, and the topic was why do bad things have good people. And there’s a rabbi, me, a Lutheran, and a Catholic.

Well, I was very straightforward. Blah blah. And the and the and the I couldn’t understand the Lutheran and the Jew the Catholic at all, but the Jew clapped. He said, we have the same view, all the Jews in the audience were gobsmacked. They’ve never heard of something.

He was a Kabbalah Jew. And the Kabbalah Kabbalah Judaism has the view of reincarnation of karma. They don’t use those words. So he said, we have a saying, and he crack jokes about Hitler. I mean, that’s a hurdle.

It’s incredible, buddy. And he he said, we have a saying. Every time something bad happens, you think, great. One less debt to repay. So the same idea here.

Because every time a fruit ripens, that’s the end of that seed, isn’t it? So every time a bit of moment of suffering comes, one less seed you’re gonna rip you’re gonna experience. So, yes, cheer. Well done. Think you’re more optimistic.

You know? I mean, stand up being miserable. Why even more miserable? You know? I mean, stand up having bad things happen.

Why be miserable as well? That’s my follow-up. Do understand? Anybody else? Where?

Yes? I’m also one that struggles with anger, and I find Yes. That over the years, I’ve become less grumpy. Less grumpy. Is that nice?

But there’s always those moments of relapse Of course, darling. Where you slow. Long way to go, darling. It’s alright. What techniques would you suggest Sweetheart, there’s no easy answer. Listen.

Okay. It’s a bit like asking me. You’re driving on the freeway, you know, a hundred and forty k’s an hour, and you’re back to crash. And you realize you don’t have any driving skills. And you say, what will I do?

Well, nothing much except damage control is the answer. So it’s all according to what skills we’ve learned sitting quietly in our previous environment on the back streets or on our cushion in our daily life. They’re the ones we bring to bear in the situation. So if you are at the point where it is exploding, then you just chose you, learn from it humbly. I’ve got more work to do and just pick yourself up and keep moving.

And, you know, there’s nothing much you can do when it’s got to the point of exploding. When the situation is about to explode, it’s too late. And this is where if we do use these techniques, you know, we’re talking about here, you learn the concentration technique, and you do learn to watch and look into your mind to take responsibility, then when you start to get some more focus and you learn to be more skillful at listening to the thoughts before it gets to the explosion, that’s when the real work has to happen. So then you you you you know, when you’re driving along the road and you’re not noticing your mind, you’re thinking all perky and happy and a car comes screaming in, then you will explode. But if you’re learning to notice what you’re thinking, the time you got up, being conscious of your mind, being aware of it as much as you are being aware of the cars, then you’re noticing the irritation.

You’re not just gonna be taken by surprise, and then you won’t explode. That takes time. Just keep working with it. Keep working. Don’t give up.

Understand? Yeah. Yeah. I’ve I’ve been practicing in even after the explosion Precisely. Listen to the story.

That’s exactly what’s perfect. And That’s exactly the point. Story. Yeah. That’s exactly right.

Exactly. And to take responsibility for it. And to listen to it and try and see that’s an exaggeration. All these things, this is the hard work we have to do. It’s like you play piano.

You gotta take responsibility for your mistakes and know what the mistake is and why you made it. This is Yeah. Same here. You’re learning a new skill, you know, but be brave. Don’t put yourself down for it.

Recognize the mistake. Own it. Don’t exaggerate. It’s the whole of you that’s bad because it’s not. It’s just your anger, and you just keep moving, keeping yourself up, having courage.

And practice makes perfect. We all know that. Does sound? Yes. Thank you.

Yes. In order to respect ourselves Uh-huh. How do we know when ego’s trying to wreck it? I’m telling you. Ego all all the delusions, which are the voices of ego, they’re not they’re unhappy feeling.

They’re distressed, they’re overinflated, or they’re underinflated, and they’re distressed. They’re naturally distressed. So if it feels uncomfortable, then it’s this delusion. If it’s a virtuous thought, it’s not delusion. It’s realistic.

So it’s very hard to hear the difference. But don’t be scared to praise yourself. Don’t be scared to admire yourself and tell yourself you’re doing a good job. We’re very scared of it. You know?

So just be brave and tested. Delusions are ex exaggerate, and it’s it comes quickly. Because as soon as we say I did a good job, we start inflating it. So you do a good job, recognize it, and then tell the rest to shut up. Stop the story.

This is okay. You understand? And it’s really it’s it’s it is subtle. It is subtle. These voices are all a million miles an hour.

But on the case, now it’s it’s such a sophisticated job to do, and we get better and better and better, but more brave as well. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. You understand? I I there’s a lovely saying too. If you’re feeling kind of over arrogant, you tell yourself something you can’t do.

And you’re feeling under kind of depressed, tell yourself something you can do. It’s so simple. It’s embarrassing. You know? It’s phenomenal.

It’s instantaneous. So I’m saying, so if you get a little bit carried away about how good you are, just tell yourself you can’t speak Tibetan or something. That’s why I among all the Tibetan lamas, some of them always call me off for not speaking Tibet because I was lazy and never learned it. So as soon as I get a bit ants, you know, sitting on the ants in my pants, I just I don’t speak Tibet, and I’m quiet. This is when you I really get me humbled.

I was supposed speak any language, by the way. Said Australian. You know? I’ve got all these countries, and I I mean, I just don’t say a word. I hear what they’re saying, but I don’t speak it.

So I’m immediately humbled. That’s what I’m saying. Don’t speak any other language but Australian, and I’m quiet. You know I’m saying? Do you hear me?

I know. Listen. The answer I know, darling. See, it sounds like a kind of it sounds like a tricky answer. It’s like a clever answer, but listen to me, it’s totally the correct answer.

If you were asking me the question, how can I look help my child learn their better mathematics? They’re really disastrous mathematics. How can I help them understand? How can I help them learn better mathematics? What would be the answer?

We have that situation. My husband No. What would be the answer? The answer is for the tutor. No.

The answer is you have no. We’re talking to get tutors. We’re talking about you being a parent. You having the wisdom to help your child. Oh, but I thought You had to know mathematics.

So how can you inform how can you know if they’re doing good or bad at mathematics if you don’t know it? So that’s the problem. If you don’t know your mind well, don’t know your attachment and your anger and your fears and your junk, you already with that junk and you was join the club, the way they appear to you is through the filter of your rubbish. So already you’re exaggerating their stuff, even your stuff. So it’s really hard to know how to help them if you don’t know yours and can’t separate yours from theirs.

So, like, you remind me to worry. All I see is a child getting raped every day. I mean, you know, one of my sisters laughs about the way she worries and can’t stop the stories. Can’t stop the stories about her child getting murdered, raped, and she turns the corner. I mean, that’s just it’s like she can’t see anything clearly when her own misery is there, when her own delusions are there.

So and also the way attachment is, it’s especially being a mother, your attachment everybody’s attachment desperately wants only the nice things. So then when that’s informing, when the when the child is is coming through that filter, then we can’t see clearly the child. Is it that you know, what you don’t know where to use discipline. You don’t know where to be soft because your own stuff in a way. And this is why you can’t be a good parent if you can’t work on your own life.

So the more you’re a good the more you work on your mind, the better parent, the more wisdom. And that’s the answer to it because then you’ll see them more clearly and be less, you know, less caught up. I can’t imagine being a parent. You understand? And see, one thing another thing, one of our parents, mommy, especially, will be at the class without leaving tears.

What about my daughter? She’s fifteen. She throws chairs at me and screams and yells at them. Like, the first thing I ask is, tell me her good qualities. Tell me your child’s good qualities.

He’s loyal. He’s cooking. He’s lovely. He’s really lovely. Intelligent?

Yeah. Moral? Doesn’t lie? Doesn’t steal? Doesn’t stick get dump on dogs?

Doesn’t rape? So they’re dying. He’ll be fine. Don’t cry. These are the saving grace.

I mean this. If you you know, I know one mother who has got a child who is psychotic. She’s she’s manipulative. She’s genuine. She’s really a suffering human being.

But because she’s taken years at moment to really relax about that and realize she can’t change her, and it’s not her fault. This is the child’s mind. We count our blessings. Pardon? If we do count our blessings, That’s right.

Tough love. That’s your wish, and that comes from your wisdom. And you won’t know it until you worked on your mind and seen your rubbish. There’s there’s no question about that. This is not there’s no shortcut.

Mhmm. I have time to go home, I think. I thank you for your questions. Thank you for your questions. Excuse me.

Thank you, everybody. So this is Buddhist views. Yeah. Is there something useful? Think about it.

Don’t believe. Don’t not believe. It was interesting. Think about it. If not, leave it there.

You’ll a one percent Buddhist. You’ll be a hundred percent Buddhist because you’re the boss. So we think, you know, anything that has been useful, some tools we can take, even one phrase that is useful to us, fantastic. Take it with us. Utilize it.

For me, the the key thing is never give up on ourselves, you know, never give up on our own potential, never give up on on knowing we’ve got this marvelous potential and to acknowledge it and own it and recognize it, which gives us then the courage to recognize the rubbish that has this power when we can own our good stuff. You know? This is such no. That one. So we just dedicate, thinking all these seeds we planted, the Buddha would say as many moments as as they have been since we started is as many seeds we each planted in our mind, and it doesn’t go astray.

We’ve got those in there. So maybe nourish these seeds from this moment forward with our efforts and our goodness and our, you know, hard work on ourselves and our ability to help others so that we can develop our marvelous potential in the long term for the sake, our own sake and the sake of others. And the second little prayer, just this aspiration that compassion, bodhicitta grow and grow in the hearts of all. Thank you.