Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 77-minute teaching, Venerable Thubten Dondrub guides a Discovering Buddhism class through the practical methods for working with disturbing emotions, establishing this as the foundation of Buddhist practice. He opens by framing Dharma practice itself as anything that reduces or eliminates disturbing thoughts, making the management of delusions the core work. After setting bodhicitta motivation through visualisation of the Buddha and mindfulness of interdependence, Dondrub identifies five key conditions that activate disturbing thoughts: encountering the object of desire or aversion, unrealistic thinking about absent objects, negative social influences, media and distraction, and habit. He uses vivid examples to show how fantasies about objects can intensify delusions more than direct encounter, and how advertising and social pressure subtly amplify our afflictions. He emphasises that recognising and avoiding these activating conditions is the primary defence before developing antidotes, and stresses the role of courage, compassion and wisdom in making the decision to cut thoughts once identified. Pitched at students engaged in the foundational Discovering Buddhism curriculum.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2013 05 21 DB Samsāra week5 Dondrub 210512.mp3
UUID: 534d3082-0552-4da4-8617-b70f518b5255
Teacher: Ven Thubten Dondrub
Collection: DB Samsāra & Nirvāṇa (Ven Thubten Dondrub)
Date: 2013-05-21
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 77.9 minutes
Words: ~9,421
So welcome everyone to our Tuesday night Discovering Buddhism class. Class number five on saṃsāra nirvana. So all of the topics of the DB course program are all related to the Mahāyāna tradition, encourages us to realize the full potential of our mind to achieve enlightenment because as an enlightened being, where our mind has no obscurations, no negative qualities whatsoever, our mind is fully awake, possessed of every good quality in a way that they never decline or always operating fully, then in that state, we’re in a position to be of continuous, perfect, lasting benefit to all beings. And in this way we can repay the kindness that we have received from all beings in beginningless saṃsāra. So the wish to realize our potential, develop the determination to realize our potential is called bodhicitta.
This is the very best mind to develop, the best motivation to have. So please, if you can, and generate that motivation, especially by thinking, trying to have that awareness, that understanding that one’s existence in every moment, every moment of today, this week, this year, this life, every life we’ve had, every moment of it has arisen depending on directly, indirectly on all sentient beings. And especially, we depend on their kindness, especially the kindness of a mother, and we’ve received that from every sentient being. So try and have that understanding, that awareness, to help generate it. We think of all beings surrounding us, starting with those that we connect to most in this life.
So our parents on either side, family, friends, and helpers behind, harms us in front, and then as much as we can, to have some awareness concern for all the other beings of the realms of cyclic existence. And, as we think of them, we can be inspired by, the Buddha so we can try and visualize the Buddha in in front of us, having a sense of the Buddha as the very embodiment of all perfect qualities and a reflection of our own true nature. So as we think of these things, try and generate the best motivation for being here, then if you’d like to join in the traditional prayer, which is on page nine. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, Dharma, the Supreme Assembly. By the merit I create through listening to the Dharma, may I become a Buddha in order to benefit all sentient beings.
So then we imagine the Buddha pleased with our motivation and showing this by coming to the crown of our head so that when directly above our crown, the Buddha dissolves into light in order for that light, that blissful light, to pour down into us, blessing our mind. So then we can enhance that positive state of mind by doing the nine round breathing exercise just for a short time. You can strengthen it by combining it with the visualization of breathe with each in breath of the cycle, breathing in peaceful, calming white light, and with each out breath, imagining breathing out all agitation in the mind existing in the present moment, but also all causes of suffering and confusion and all the imprints from those delusions. Imagine breathing all that out in the form of black smoke. Okay.
Thank you. Tonight, according to our schedule, which is running a little bit behind times, I’m supposed to talk about how to deal with disturbing emotions, talk about the second noble truth, renunciation, and the twelve links. So I’m not gonna be able to cover all of that. So I’ve decided so I’ll mainly try tonight just in fact, all I’ll talk about tonight is dealing with the disturbing emotions. Just a little bit about that because this is really a very vital topic in the Buddhadharma.
Actually, it would be great if Discovering Buddhism had a whole module on this. There are many definitions of Dharma practice, one definition of what Dharma practice is, is that anything that is intended to and has the effect of reducing our disturbing thoughts or modifying them or eliminating them, that is actual Dharma practice. You know, because there are many things we can do that look like Dharma practice such as reciting mantras and meditating and all sorts of things. But if they don’t have them the intention, if we don’t do them with the intention and they don’t have the effect of actually modifying, at least temporarily, our disturbing thoughts, then it’s not really Dharma practice. You know?
If it’s not modifying our disturbing thoughts, somehow reducing our ego grasping and so on, then it’s not really Dharma practice. So this is really at the heart of the teachings because the Buddha’s second noble truth identifies our disturbing thoughts as the very cause of all our suffering. Right? All suffering, physical, mental, small, big, all of it. You know, individual suffering, group suffering, all of it comes from our disturbing thoughts and there is the, of course, the very root disturbing thought of ignorance.
But whenever a disturbing thought arises, whenever a delusion, a klesha occurs in the mind, that is we we are suffering while it is there. The moment is there. Whatever peace of mind and happiness we have is is gone when one of the disturbing thoughts arises. And we act on it and that brings more suffering in this life but generates negative imprints. And when they ripen, if they’re not purified, then more suffering.
So dealing with the disturbing thoughts is the essential Dharma practice. Because all Dharma is about overcoming suffering and leading us to experience more and more genuine happiness until we can eventually achieve the the the pure happiness of nirvana and then eventually the peerless everlasting happiness that comes with enlightenment. So I did talk a little bit about I have already covered the delusions a little bit. Right? The the main ones to consider, of course, are anger and attachment and and, of course, ignorance.
So I did talk last week a little bit about ignorance, tried to say something about it, but there is a whole module on that that we can go into at some point. And, of course, there are many other delusions. There’s pride and jealousy. But since this is just an introductory course, we’re just gonna focus on a little bit on anger and attachment and and other things. So anyway, ideally, what we need to do to okay.
Ultimately, what we want to do according to the Buddha’s idea, what he did, is we need to eliminate the disturbing thoughts. And to eliminate them, the only way to eliminate them is to eliminate ignorance. When that’s gone, all the other disturbing thoughts go immediately. And to to eliminate ignorance, one has to cultivate the the wisdom that has that that perceives directly the way things actually are. Because ignorance is is conceiving experiencing things the way they are not, even though it looks like it’s the way they are.
Everything we’re experiencing now has something wrong with it. It has this overlay of inherent existence, which just simply isn’t there at all in reality. Anyway, to get rid of ignorance, we have to develop wisdom, but we can’t develop this wisdom while the mind is really agitated. We have to calm our mind, and that involves subduing the disturbing thoughts. Before we can eliminate them, we have to gain some control over them.
We have to be able to pacify them or subdue them, which is quite different from repressing them. Repressing them is not good. Repressing them because they’re still active, one’s just hiding them from either others or oneself. So that is not Buddhist practice. One has what we need to try and do is, with wisdom and compassion, pacify, subdue, modify our disturbing thoughts so that we get some calmness and clarity in the mind.
So we need that in our daily life anyway, but we also need it in this this ultimate aim of developing wisdom. Yeah. We to develop wisdom, one has to have a very calm, controlled mind. One can’t develop it any other way. It’s impossible.
So we need to calm our delusions for that ultimate purpose. But, of course, for just happiness in our general life, we need to be able to calm our delusions. Right? And for the sake of others, because if we don’t calm our delusions, we act on them, cause suffering to others, and then also the negative karmic imprints bring great suffering in the future. So real Dharma practice is about calming the delusions with the aim to eventually be able to eliminate them not only for oneself, for ones own sake, but especially for the sake of others.
So I think I’ve tried to explain earlier in this course and in the karma course that one way I won’t go into this anymore now because there’s no time. But one way to begin to subdue the disturbing thoughts is is one very vital important way, indirect way, is by avoiding the ten non virtuous actions. Yeah. All of these are motivated by self-cherishing and the disturbing thoughts of either ignorance, attachment, or anger. You know?
So the, you know, the ten non virtues, just to remind you, are the three of body, which is killing, stealing, sexual misconduct. Then the four of speech, which are lying, divisive speech, harsh speech, idle gossip. Then there are the three not in virtues of mind, which are covetousness, ill will, and wrong views. So every time we follow the only reason we engage in those negative actions of body, speech, and mind is because our delusions have become active, have taken over our mind. We’ve identified with them, and we do what they tell us.
Hate this person, steal from them, lie, cheat, engage in sexual misconduct, kill them, blah blah blah, kill kill, and we do it. Yeah. So this by avoiding those ten non virtuous actions, it means we aren’t paying attention so much to the delusions, which means by not paying attention to them, not listening to them, we are not feeding them, so they fade away to some extent. So that’s a vital essential aspect of dealing with the delusions. But there are many other things to do.
So one thing I’d like to talk about in some detail, and there’s a handout about it, which I’ll give out later on so you don’t read it while I’m talking. Is is how one okay. What I’m trying to say is that the the best way, the ultimate way, the final way to pacify the delusions before we’ve developed wisdom that eliminates them is to apply the antidote. So each delusion has its own unique antidote. Yeah.
But to be able to cultivate, to know those antidotes and develop them powerfully, it takes time and effort. Right? And so before we have developed the that that skill of developing the antidotes, one thing we have to do, if if we are serious, if we are serious in practicing the Buddha’s teachings, then one thing we have to do is be able to recognize the conditions that activate the disturbing thoughts so we can avoid those conditions. Because one simple fact is, if you think about it, that we all here, all sentient beings, all human beings, all sentient beings have the potential because we have ignorance for every negative state of mind to occur. We all here have the potential to experience anger and actually extreme hatred.
We all have that potential here. Right? We all have the potential for desire and attachment, for pride, for jealousy, etcetera, etcetera. We all have those. But fortunately, those pleasure, those disturbing thoughts, those delusions, those afflictions, whatever you wanna call them, aren’t operating.
They aren’t active all the time. It would be a total disaster if they were for ourselves and everyone else. But the imprints of those delusions because every time we follow one of these delusions, we generate the imprint of the delusion. So we plant the seed. We reap we keep putting the seeds of the delusions in our mind over and over again.
Every time we follow desire, we put a seed of desire in our mind. Every time we get angry, we put a a potency for anger in our mind. Every time we have jealousy and pride, etcetera, etcetera, we put an imprint, a potency, for that same state of mind to arise again. Right? So that’s the first reason why the disturbing thoughts arise is because we have the imprints of them.
But then we have to ask ourselves what causes or we should say more accurately, what are the conditions that make those dis imprints, those potencies active? What what are the conditions for desire to arise, for anger to arise, for jealousy to arise, and pride, etcetera. Right? So the the there is five main conditions that apply to all of us. Right?
There are five factors, conditions that set off these these passive imprints and make them active. So what are they? These are really important to know so that we can avoid them. So the first line of defense before we can apply the antidotes is just to avoid the conditions that set off our delusions. Right?
Of course, and the more and to avoid these conditions requires quite, in some cases, quite a lot of effort. A lot of courage and skill and compassion and wisdom, actually. And so to have the courage and compassion to avoid these conditions, we we have to understand more and more that it is our disturbing thoughts that are the source of all our suffering now and in the future and bring so much suffering to others. And the only way to be free of them is to stop following them. There’s no from a Buddhist point of view, there’s no other solution, really.
You know? Praying to someone isn’t going to do it. Praying to the God, praying to Buddha, praying to the Guru, none of that is going to stop one’s delusions. Even dying isn’t going to stop them unfortunately because you get just another continuum. Yeah.
They’re still there. Yeah. The only way to stop them is first not follow them as much, calm the mind, develop wisdom, eliminate their very cause. Okay. And because while our delusions are active, this prevents the activation of the very source of happiness, which are our positive states of mind, the positive emotions, the positive mental factors of love and compassion and wisdom, etcetera.
It’s a little bit like the analogy of a garden, you know, that if you have an untended garden, you know, all the weeds will just naturally grow. And while the weeds are present, any any good thing you want such as, you know, seeds and vegetables and flowers and fruit, those things won’t grow. The seeds are there, but they just can’t grow and flourish because the weeds are there. But if you cut down the weeds, then you’ve created some space, and these positive seeds will grow. Same without the garden of our mind.
I will go into this mushy analogy more during either tonight or next call next week. But we have this garden of the mind, this untended garden of the mind. And at the moment, our the garden of our mind, what we observe is just weeds, you know, prickly, prickly weeds. Yeah. And we think that’s all there is to our mind, but it’s not.
But if we chop down the weeds, we can create this space where the positive imprints can manifest and bring some happiness. And, of course, you have to keep chopping down the weeds, but the the beauty of the garden of the mind is one reaches a point like with an ordinary garden, you never get rid of the weeds forever. They always come back sooner or later. Yeah. Or you put so much poison in the ground that nothing grows and not even the good stuff.
Whereas with the garden of the mind, there is a point reached where you don’t you don’t have to keep cutting the weeds because when you get rid of ignorance, no weeds grow. Impossible. Good garden of the mind. It’s great. Anyway, so what is the main factor, the main condition that sets off our delusions?
Any one of them. Let’s mainly consider attachment and desire attachment and anger, but it applies to pride, jealousy, and everything else. What is the main factor that activates those disturbing thoughts? Ten points to whoever answers. Yes.
Yes. Well, it could vary, but this is one of the main ones is meeting the object. You know? You have no desire for something, but then the object of desire appears, is there in front of you, and bingo, desire arises. And with it, attachment.
You’re extremely peaceful, calm, friendly, lovable, and then the enemy appears. And then boom, anger arises. Yeah. The same, you know, everything’s hunky dory, and then someone who’s richer, better looking, more intelligent than yourself comes on the scene, and then jealousy pops up. And then you look, oh, you know, everything’s going around.
And then you look around and you think, oh, I’m superior to all these people. Or you think you are. Oh, then pride arises. So it’s meeting the object. Meeting the object.
The object of desire, the object of aversion, the object of pride, jealousy, fear, worry, etcetera. But of course, the object for each of us, what sets off the objects which set off my desire may be different than the objects that set off your desire. The objects that set off my anger and aversion may be different than set off yours. But there has to be the object. We all have our own unique objects of desire, aversion, pride, jealousy, fear, worry, etcetera, etcetera.
I mean, we share a lot, of course, but we also have our own unique ones. You know, people fall in love with someone and everyone else is thinking, why are they attracted to him or her? But this person thinks this is the most wonderful being in the entire universe. That’s when the desire is operating. When it stops, why did I ever think that person was any good?
Yeah. But while desire is operating, it creates this illusion. Yeah. It creates the illusion and we believe it. Totally.
We’re totally flat, totally caught up in it. This person is the most beautiful in the world. This person is so terrible. Yeah. We’re completely in it and especially when the object is there.
Yeah. When the object goes away, then the, you know, the delusion goes down to some extent. Yeah. So that’s the first thing. That’s the first factor.
You you often in most not always, but definitely that is a very very very powerful factor. So the simple fact is, the simple remedy is avoid the object. But of course this also is not so simple. In terms of the enemy, it’s simple in that we want to avoid the object, but it may not be easy to avoid the object because the enemy may like to hang around and annoy us. But that that that’s one way not to get angry is to recognize what things and situations and people make me angry.
Actually, they don’t actually make us angry. We make us angry by thinking about these people in a particular way. But while they’re around, that’s what happens. Because partly, this, of course, is karma. Why do I get angry with this this person when other people don’t?
Why do I desire this thing, situational person when other people don’t? It’s karmic. Yeah. So, anyway, in the case of the enemy, it’s relatively easy emotionally that we don’t we we want to be away from it. The trouble with the object of desire is it’s much more difficult to avoid the object because we don’t want to avoid the object.
We desire the object. This shows also how desire attachment is the worst delusion, is the most dangerous apart from ignorance. It’s much more subtle because we like desire. We think desire is terrific. We we can all genuinely see that anger is not so great, but desire seems really nice.
It cheats us. It fools us every time. So then it’s much more emotionally difficult to want to avoid the object. But if if we understand more and more how harmful attachment desire is, then, you know, that’s why it needs some courage. And also, it needs wisdom seeing the truth.
Allow you know, have to because we in every moment, we have some freedom to follow the delusion or follow our listen to our wisdom. Yeah? Because that wisdom is always there. Because we’re all quite smart. You know?
We all do know things. We all have some intuition and wisdom. Yeah. This is something that Lama Yeshe emphasized so much how, you know, we have this wisdom inside. But unfortunately, we don’t listen to it very much and so it’s not very strong.
But the point is every time you listen to your wisdom, your intuition, that that your conscience and so on, then the more you listen to it, the more it develops. The more you don’t we don’t listen to it, of course, it weakens. It it will never go away because it’s a natural part of the mind. So we need this wisdom. We need that compassion to do what is what is wise.
Sorry. We need that courage, and we need the courage the compassion for ourself of telling ourselves, don’t follow it. It’s not gonna make you happy. That is being compassionate, and loving to oneself. Whereas the self-cherishing thought says, you know, go for it.
And the trouble is we’re not if we don’t purify our mind, work with our mind, we can’t distinguish genuine love and compassion for our self-cherishing. But there’s a vast difference. So we have to identify what people, things, situations set off our delusions, realize how harmful that is now in this life in general. But if we try to follow the spiritual path, if we see how important it is to have a good rebirth, to get out of saṃsāra, to achieve enlightenment, then especially we have to try and avoid object as much as possible. So okay.
That’s the first factor. The next one is or in this list, it’s actually number six in the list you’ll get. In this list it’s called unrealistic thinking or inappropriate attention, which basically means that even when the object is not present, the object of desire, aversion, or jealousy, or whatever isn’t present, if you think about it, then the disturbing thought arises. If you think about the object of desire, desire arises. If you think about the person you dislike or some situation you dislike, the aversion will arise.
If you think about the person that you’re jealous of, jealousy will arise. And if you think about it, sometimes, thinking about the object makes the delusions even stronger than even meeting the object. Because one with the object of desire, you can make the object of desire in your mind much more desirable than when that person is present. You forget about all the faults of the person, etcetera, etcetera. And and, you know, one creates these fantasies in one’s mind of how they are totally wonderful and totally in agreement with everything you think and do and want to do, whereas in reality, even the persons who like you don’t go along with everything you want to do.
So the fantasy object is actually create more desire and attachment than the real person when they’re actually present. Think about and check up your own experience. And similarly with the object of aversion, you think about someone and you again, one creates these fantasy scenarios where they actually haven’t said something but you imagine them saying, oh, you know, because there’s there’s been some bad history and then you think of something. Oh, they’re going to for sure they’ll say or do this and, oh, when they do or say that, how disgusting. And then you get so angry with them and, of course, they’ll even do that and that and that.
And And then you’re absolutely furious with something in your own mind, in our mind. Yeah? That this person hasn’t done any of those things, may never do them, but we’ve created that that thought, and we get incredibly angry, more angry than when we’re with the person. So again, one has to recognize that that that fantasy, those series of thoughts arising. And again, it requires some real strength of mind to cut those thoughts because we can do it, because they are only thoughts.
They’re not reality. They are just thoughts. I hope people tried the watching thoughts meditation. It is very it’s it’s deceptively simple but very, very powerful if one tries it. To realize that once you know, that what is going on is just thought.
It’s not good, bad. It’s not this, you know, wonderful thing we create. It’s just a thought. But, again, with the negative thought, you know, with anger and aversion, there may be some willingness to cut those thoughts because they’re very painful. But, again, with thoughts of desire and attachment, we don’t want to because we’re having a lovely time fantasizing.
But that’s where it requires some real courage to cut that trend of thought. And unfortunately, much of the time we don’t have it. I think, I’m not sure in this class, but in the Thursday night class I’ve mentioned this point several times. But my main teacher, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, who’s depicted in with His Holiness in that picture there, he has many many Gurus. Some of them very very famous, highly realized beings and some are just what appear to be very ordinary monks.
One of his gurus who from ordinary appearances is an ordinary monk was one of his uncles, I think, told him one sentence. One sentence which he thought was so profound that he took this monk as one of his gurus seeing him as a Buddha. Cause only a Buddha can say something so profound, which is that all Dharma practice depends on making the decision. You just have to make the decision to do it or not do it. So we have to make the decision.
You know, this thought is going through our mind, this lovely thought of desire or aversion or blah blah blah. We have to make the decision to cut it. And if we do, everything works. If we don’t, everything goes wrong. So that decision requires some courage, some compassion, and some wisdom.
Quite a bit actually. But if we can make it and stick to it, then that’s when real Dharma practice starts. And the decision comes from understanding more and more, not just intellectually, but from experience that our disturbing thoughts, our self-cherishing is suffering. It is the cause of suffering. Nothing else.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche also once made a statement made the point that one of the best meditations you could possibly do is to keep a diary of all your self-cherishing, all the suffering results of your self-cherishing. And, yeah, reflect on it. Because we have to, you know, the the teachings say this and and we can think, oh, yes. But We always have these buts. You know?
We’re not a hundred percent convinced. But so but so we have to realize more and more that our disturbing thoughts are the problem. And the more we feel that, realize that, that will give us the courage to make the decision no matter what not to avoid not to follow them. So even to be able to catch those thoughts depends on, you know, working with the mind, doing meditation in general, calming the mind, being able to recognize thoughts as thoughts and this thought having the mind practicing mindfulness that is able to detect what is a positive meaningful state of mind from a state of mind which is actually harmful, unskillful. Okay.
So in fact, those are the two main conditions really to to be aware of and and to try to deal with to avoid as much as possible. Other factors are the third one is the society that we mix in. It can include, you know, just society in large. You know, we we in trying to follow the spiritual path of mental development, it’s quite tricky in these modern times because we we live in a society that isn’t doing that. And we live in a society where more and more there are more and more distractions of the negatives kind all around us.
You know, all all advertising, of course, is designed to rise our desire for things we never thought about before and don’t want. So advertising is designed to make us want something we don’t have and don’t really need. And it works. A lot of incredible intelligence goes into making these things very desirable. You know, the lighting and the wording and, you know, having beautiful models and stuff, whole trip.
And then you look at it and you think, oh, I want that. Because if I have that, I will be happy. I will look like that if I, you know Then I’ll be happy. And it really does, if if we’re honest, it works for all of us. We’re all, you know, susceptible to it.
Far more susceptible than it’s, you know, comfortable to recognize. Right. Well, some is not some is so ridiculous that it’s not but some does get to you. Yeah. Really?
Okay. Now where am I? Yeah. So the society at large is is so just on the other side of that, that is why it is so helpful to have Buddhist images around you because they are the very opposite, you know. All the advertising agencies in the world are controlled by deluded people, encouraging delusion.
All of these images come from the Buddha advertising agency. They are reflections of pure mind and have a pure wonderful purpose. So just seeing them, even if you don’t we don’t understand anything about what we’re seeing, has a positive imprint in our mind. So much better than all the junk around us, all the advertising for this and that. Anyway, that’s another story.
But anyway, so the society we mix with actually, I’ve gone into another bit. So this is the people we actually, that was entirely another topic. Yeah. Another condition. I’ve mixed the two.
Anyway, so the people we mix with also so the society in general is we’re unfortunately in a karmic time when the delusions of people are stronger, people self-cherishing is getting stronger and stronger, I think, in general. So by mix by mixing in in such a society, our tendencies that way will arise. But especially the people we personally choose to be with or maybe forced to mix with also will affect us. So if we if we hang around with people who have lots of desire and attachment and live a life that is focused on following desire and attachment, it’s very difficult not to be influenced by that. And similarly, you hang around with people who are very angry and resentful and bitter about stuff and always complaining about other people causes of suffering, my problems and our problems and blah blah blah, then, you know, one will be affected.
You know? I mean, in a society that developed in in in Germany where you have this man saying, all your suffering is because of this group of people, then, oh, oh, yes. Yes. Of course, they are. It’s a very good way to release all one’s frustration and hatred onto something.
You never thought about it before. You didn’t particularly care about these people before one way or another. But now you’re being told, yes. All your all your problems are due to these people. Of course, this is happening now in our world.
You know, all of these terrible refugees that can destroy our society. These six and a half people who’ve entered the country. You know, it’s all their problem. You know, all all your suffering misery is due to them. Yes.
You know, you have you have more politicians saying that saying that. More and more people around the newspapers, the television say it in subtle ways, and then lots of people develop all this hate and aversion. Yeah. Yeah. So if you have if we hang out with such people, then our delusions will will you know, especially because of the eight worldly concerns that we don’t you know, one of the worldly concerns is being liked, you know, and fearing, you know, fearing not being accepted and so on.
You know, fearing you know, we we crave acceptance and reputation and blah blah blah. So because of that, we want to fit in with people. So they say ugly things. So we, you know, we laugh at that and, you know, encourage it and join in sooner or later and end up believing it. That again is why why is so incredibly important for to have dharma centers and to come to them.
Because you’re with basically nice people who are on their best behavior, usually. Doesn’t always work that way. But generally, when when we’re at a dharma center, are on our best behaviour. Even, you know, I’m on my best behavior here. You should you should you don’t want to see me when I’m at home.
But when I sit up here, I’m quite nice. Yeah. As far as I can be. Yeah. So it’s really important to have it I when I first came here, one of the things I said is how vital it is to have dharma friends.
They don’t have to be, you know, highly realized. I’m not talking about highly realized, even lowly realized, maybe not realized at all. Just ordinary people who have some interest in the Dharma. It is absolutely essential to have Dharma friends and to mix with such people. Because even if those people, these Dharma people, have very little understanding of the Dharma and don’t practice it very much, it is still much more than being with people who have no understanding, belief, practice of the Dharma.
It is immensely helpful for us as ordinary people. And it doesn’t mean you you go you’re even talking about Dharma. You can be talking about ordinary and doing ordinary things, but somehow there is a different flavor to it. Maybe a little bit different, but it’s just that much different and helpful and important. It’s vital because otherwise, you know, even the the the difficulty in being a Buddhist in in a non-Buddhist country is often, you know, our close family aren’t Buddhist.
They may be even anti Buddhist. Even the people your, you know, your partner may not be Buddhist, may even be anti Buddhist. Your your friends may not be Buddhist, may be anti Buddhist. The and the people you work with aren’t Buddhist, maybe even violently against it. So it’s very difficult.
It’s very difficult. Ain’t easy. So that is why we need Dharma friends and why we need Dharma centers and that’s why Lama Yeshe died creating them. He didn’t need them, but he saw how vital it was to have dharma centers. Yeah.
A center, some place where there is some dharma, you know, yeah, some admiration of what is pure and good and kind and compassionate and wise and selfless. That is so so vital. Right. And, of course, in dharma centers, may meet extremely nice people, good people, and meet lamas and things who are very pure beings. You may bump into them occasionally.
And that is an incredible blessing to the mind to see, you know, these these beings, to be around such beings. Yeah. So it’s a great antidote to ordinary sentient beings. Anyway, so again, we have to have the courage, the compassion, the wisdom to recognize that these people I’m mixing with maybe this is they are they may be nice people, good hearted. They have Buddha nature, but, you know, they’re not they’re not interested in spiritual path.
They may be those who are really against it. This is not good for my mind to be with them so much. Doesn’t mean you reject them, have developed a version for them, whatever. But to protect, if we want if we’re one’s trying to follow the path in any way, then to protect ourselves, we need to, you know, create some distance, as much as we can. So another factor is, which I got mixed up with, was what is called distraction or discussion.
So that is, you know, all the advertising around us, the things we talk about, the movies we watch, the the books we read, magazines, the the newspapers, television, all of this. You know, if if we get involved in all of those things, talk about things related to attachment, watch movies, blah blah blah about it or aversion, the the thoughts will arise. The feelings will arise as well. Yeah. Discussion, talking about stuff.
No, think it means sorry, sorry, go on. Well, that that’s like a a quite a subtle version of it. The gross version is just yourself talking with other people about, you know I mean, this whole magazine’s now devoted just to famous people, you know, and all the things they do. And then you talk about all that. So that’s a a lot about, you know, can be jealousy, pride, attachment, blah blah, you know, that stuff.
And then talking of course, talking about politicians. This is a great vehicle to get angry, you know, to talk about politicians that you we hate. This is a favorite way to rip, you know. Yeah. Yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes. And it’s present and the trouble is I mean, in in one way looking at these things can be it’s all lum rim. It’s all telling you, you know, showing you showing us delusion and suffering and what and it can be very helpful if one can have that wisdom to watch it that way.
But there there is always the danger that you we get sucked into it. Maybe I should be careful raving, but I never I I I have to confess. I think I have watched most of the movie, but I couldn’t watch all of it. But I remember I shouldn’t even talk about this. But there was this famous situation when Brad and Angelina fell in love making this movie called Mister and Missus Smith.
So these are the two most, you know, the the most what are considered to be the most beautiful, sexy woman in the world and the most handsome, sexy man in the world make a movie where they are depicted as murderers and it’s kind of okay. And of course, it’s a comedy, but it shows these two incredibly attractive people killing people in a in a totally flippant way with these giant machines and everything, and eventually actually trying to kill each other at some point. And, of course, it’s all, you know, you know yeah. But there is something there that’s saying all of this is kind of okay. It’s okay.
Many people, you know yeah. And there’s many TV programs like that where the hero just casually kills people. But and because he’s a hero, because he’s good looking, anyone who’s good looking can kill. You know, that makes it okay. Shut up.
What are you doing that noisy for? Yeah. So there’s all very subtle things that, you know, the hero if as long as somehow it is presented as, you know, yeah, the the person you identify with, that person can do anything and it’s okay. And you and you kinda get into that to some extent, then you realize, I’m I’m agreeing with this guy murdering someone or whatever. Yeah.
It’s it’s quite insidious, some of it, really. And of course, the more we watch this stuff, you know, it it is creating this illusion. You know, so many I mean, yeah, many movies and TV programs show, you know, the heroes killing people and and and like it has no effect on them. But actually most people, even very tough people who have to, you know, kill someone or even see someone killed or see someone who has been killed, it is, you know, even for policemen, an extremely traumatic experience. But that’s not displayed on TV.
It’s shown as though you can kill someone, you know, blow them to pieces and you, you know, you you you know, you just look at them and and it’s perfectly okay. And you go home and sleep well. That is a really appalling image that is being and you see it so much so many times, you think that’s how it is. It’ll it’ll be okay if to kill someone. You won’t it won’t be any you know, you won’t lose any sleep over it.
But actually people do. It destroys their lives. So, you know, so the more we, you know, get caught up in this stuff, it affects our mind subtly and grossly. Unfortunately, maybe more than we are aware. So again, we have to make the decision.
Am I going to get caught, you know, especially and a lot of this is just rubbish anyway even if it’s not negative, it’s a waste of time. So we have to make the decision. Am I going to, you know, spend so much time looking at these things and getting involved in these things? We have to make that decision, seeing how harmful it can be. And then just very quickly, because I think I do have five minutes left.
Twenty past, we finish. Yes. Yes. Just after. So I get finished at twenty past.
Right? In theory. Anyway, the final one, I think I’ve covered them all. Yes. The last one, which is really, the result of all the others is just why we, follow our delusions, why they become active is simply through habit.
We have been following them so often that just they they arise and instantly we caught up in them without any thought. Oh. I think that’s gonna have to be my talk tonight. We have discussion, so I’ll have to modify the homework somehow. Any questions?
Yes. Is very important. Yes. Divisive speech. No.
I don’t know. I mean, you can’t as an ordinary human being, I think we we have to discuss with other people our problems with other people. You can’t always talk with that person about it. It it depends on how you do it. Right?
Not in this if if you talk about the other person with the aim to blacken that person in the eyes of the person you’re talking to. This is negative and divisive. If you are as you said just trying to work things out in your mind and get some clarity from, you know, some input from the other person. You know, I I think that’s okay. That’s that’s alright.
Yeah. Yes. Yes. Sure. I’m just saying we haven’t got to the antidotes.
I was gonna talk about the antidotes, but there’s no time tonight. Before we can apply the antidotes, this is the first line of defense, is to avoid. Right. But as I was saying, in some cases, it’s not always possible to avoid the the object. And that’s why we need the antidotes because ultimately that’s what we because in many cases we will be confronted with the object of our various delusions.
So that’s why ultimately we need to develop the antidotes as much as possible. But the first line of defense is retreat. Until you’ve got enough ammunition, you run away. When you’ve built up when you’ve got your ammunition, then you charge in and fire. But in a nutshell, the the antidotes to our delusions are knowing all the faults of them.
That’s basically how you build up the antidote is because why we follow the delusions is self-cherishing tells us, you know, it’s not, you know, in a in a gross way. But if you think about it, why we why we continue to be angry is because we think it’s good. It’s working. This is useful for this situation. Why we follow desire, why we get jealous you know, it’s crazy with jealousy, but but is somehow that disturbing thought itself somehow tells us this is what we should be doing and we believe it.
You know, we get caught up in it. Right? So and it’s so it’s telling us oh, you know, desire, anger, blah blah, is so good. It’s had, you know, all these benefits. So the antidote, what the basic system of developing antidotes is to reflect.
We have to meditate, you know, strongly as much as possible when we’re not caught up in the delusions to see all the faults. And in the last course on karma, I did talk to some extent about the faults of anger. I hope you remember those people who did that cause. One has to reflect on all the faults of anger that especially from a dharma point of view because it is a disturbing state of mind it can only have a suffering result. Right?
The actual result is suffering. Karmically, not just in this life, but the karmic result of when the imprint ripens is great suffering in the future. The another great fault of anger is that our anger destroys our positive imprints, which are the source of our happiness. And the negative imprints of anger obscure our mind now. And an an obscured mind is an unhappy, confused mind that tends towards more suffering and confusion.
And similarly, if you look at the faults of attachment and desire, one thing to reflect on is that desire is for what is a pleasant object because wow, that is a really beautiful rose. Right? That is really, really beautiful. And so our desire for that object is telling us that is happiness. Right?
And of I mean, this is just a simple analogy example, you know. Most of us, I don’t think, believe that if I own a rose, I’ll be happy forever. But we do like roses because we think this brings some pleasure, happiness. But then there is the thing or person or whatever that we think, oh, this is it. This is really it.
Yeah. So what we have to understand is the second kind of suffering, that this happiness isn’t happiness anyway. It’s just the suffering of change. That’s one thing. But our desire for what is just the suffering of change itself is suffering and can only bring more suffering.
You know, we we seem to get our happiness from following desire, but the happiness we get from it isn’t actually happiness. It’s the suffering of change. But the craving for it, the craving for the suffering of change is itself suffering and its actual effect is real suffering, obvious pain, physical or mental. And it generates negative imprints that obscure the mind. And it makes us dependent.
It doesn’t make us strong. Following desire and attachment actually weakens, you know, are the basis for fear and worry, etcetera, etcetera. And the nature of desire is every time this is particularly with desire that every time we well, it’s not just particularly with desire, but the result is particularly noticeable that how do you say? Every time we follow desire, we just create the the habit to follow desire again. So there’s no end to desire.
Actually, the what seems like the pleasure of meeting the object of desire is the desire stops. When you’ve got the thing, when you desire something so when you desire it, then well, the desire for it has kind of stopped a little bit. So that is that’s kind of nice. But the trouble is then you’ve got attachment. Then you’ve you’re attached.
Oh, so my point is that, yeah, that following desire creates more desire which means we’re just creating a dissatisfied mind. Whereas a satisfied mind is a mind that has less desire, is content with stuff. Anyway, I thought I’d get further than I did tonight, but anyway, in knowing those six conditions, or one of them is the imprint, but knowing the five conditions which set off our delusions, this is one of the most useful things in the practical things in the entire Buddhadharma you can learn. The thing is to apply it. That’s that’s the important thing is to apply it.
It is very, very practical. Okay. So we’ll take a tea break, coffee break. So I’m sorry, I really haven’t had time to go into the antidotes to the disturbing thoughts because it actually was part of the homework. So if you look at the homework so on Wednesday is to meditate on conditions one to three of the conditions that set off one’s delusions.
So you’ve got the handout on the six conditions. So just to meditate on the first three. Thursday is to continue and do the next three. Friday is to meditate on the faults of anger. So I hope you can remember some of the faults of anger either from last course or some things mentioned during this time and any other faults you yourself can think of to really reflect on those.
Saturday, the faults of desire and attachment again if you can remember anything I’ve mentioned. Then Sunday is a meditation on desire so there’s a handout that you should have on that. Just a simple little meditation, just a series of questions to reflect on. Monday, unfortunately I didn’t have time to talk about this, was to reflect on the antidotes of two antidotes, general antidotes to the delusions is basically developing a contented mind which if you think about it, why another factor, underlying factor, why our delusions arise and take over is basically because there’s some discontent in our mind. If if if we were the more basic contentment we have, the less likely, even when there are conditions there, to set off our disturbing thoughts.
Maybe they will, but not as strongly and and for such a duration if you think about it. Right? Even just to think about that, to realize that all our disturbing thoughts and how frequently we get caught up in our disturbing thoughts and how strongly is a reflection of some underlying discontent we have about ourselves, life, etcetera, etcetera. Yes. Monday.
Monday. We haven’t got yet. Yeah. So how do you get a contented mind? Well, the Buddhist answer is practicing the Buddha Dharma.
Every kind of aspect of Buddhist practice will help to if if we do it properly, start to bring some basic contentment into our mind. Just doing some meditation of calming the mind, for example, watching the thoughts. These these kinds of meditations or every kind of meditation will will help us to understand our mind more and and make our life more meaningful and give us some contentment. Right? I mean, is a sign of practicing the Dharma that it’s working, that there should be a little bit more contentment than normal in our mind.
So the other antidote, I think I did mention this last week somewhere, that another general so there are the specific antidotes but having a contented mind is a general antidote and another one is well, that’s not so much an antidote, but it’s like a what would you call it? An underlying prescription not to not for the delusions to act too much. But another antidote, a general antidote is understanding impermanence and one’s own death. So the more we have an understanding of how everything that we were attached to that makes us angry, proud, jealous, fearful, worried, doubtful, All of these things, good and bad, are impermanent. They don’t last.
So why be attached? Why get so angry? If we could really understand that, not just the words, but we’ve reflected on it, understood it, have some experience of it. And especially if we have some understanding and belief in the law of cause and effect to reflect on, you know, to to to try and catch the mind that is under the control of a delusion and then realize that I could die now. Because death can you know, we’re definitely going to die.
We could die at any time, literally any time. So why die being controlled by a desire in a state of strong attachment or craving or anger or pride or jealousy. Because if we die with these strong emotions, strong negative emotions, this means that this becomes like a a breeding ground for one of the negative throwing karmas to ripen at the time of death. So if we die with strong negative emotions active as we’re dying, then there’s no way to have a good rebirth. And if we don’t have a good rebirth, the only kind of rebirth we get is a very bad one, a very suffering one.
So this is also extremely helpful to remember, not just like the words, but having some kind of power behind those words that I could die now getting angry or, you know, craving after this thing or being so jealous or proud. You know, what’s the point? I don’t wanna die like that. That would really help. Right?
So at least reflect on those things a little bit would be great. And on Tuesday, to do the practice of watching the thoughts again. Any questions? I don’t think I’m gonna get into because I’ve still got to talk about the twelve links, nirvana and and enlightenment and various things. I’ll try and do a little bit more next week, but I do have to talk about the twelve links.
But this is an extremely, extremely complicated subject. I think one of the most complicated subjects in the Buddhadharma in one way. Very technical, academic, and I and this is only an introduction so I’m only just gonna give a simple kind of little blurb about them to explain them would take many hours. Sorry? Well, I did talk about anger.
I did in more detail, but that not everyone did that course on karma. But yeah. But I mean, really, you can make up your own antidotes in the sense that of seeing the faults of something rather than focusing on what one what looks like the benefits of anger and attachment to try to see what are the in reality, the faults to imprint that because that’s what meditation is. Meditation means the the Tibetan word for meditation, gom, means to become familiar, to habituate the mind. Because right now, our mind is habituated with the delusions.
So meditation is to habituate the mind to be free of the delusions, to be habituated with the virtuous mental factors of love and compassion and generosity and kindness and wisdom, blah, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Yeah. Okey doke. So we can just finish if you’d like to join in by doing the dedication to dedicate the positive imprints of being here, of listening and thinking and discussing the dharma. So this again is on page nine.
Don’t be so anxious to leave, Sheridan, please. This is a little insulting. Oh, yes. Yes. I will just dedicate and then thank you.
Yes. Due to the merits of these virtuous actions, may I quickly attain the state of a Guru Buddha and lead all living beings without exception into that enlightened state. May the precious body of mine not yet born arise and grow. May that born have no decline but increase forevermore. Okay.
Just so as Peter mentioned, just quickly, this coming Saturday is