Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Over two hours, Venerable Tony Beaumont introduces Buddhist approaches to stress reduction, grounded in understanding suffering and the mind. He opens with a guided loving-kindness meditation, then walks through foundational topics: how to develop a healthier relationship with suffering by recognizing it as impermanent and transformable rather than resisting it with anger or distraction; the critical difference between fleeting sensory pleasure and lasting happiness built through mind training; and the eight worldly dharmas—attachment to wealth, comfort, praise, and reputation—which create anxiety and ethical compromise. He illustrates with practical examples from his psychiatric nursing background and prison chaplaincy work, showing how unrealistic expectations (about relationships, aging, appearance) drive depression and how compassion for oneself and others, grounded in understanding everyone’s shared karma-driven patterns, brings genuine peace. The talk pitches broadly at newcomers curious about Buddhism’s practical psychology while also speaking to serious practitioners, emphasizing that stress reduction is a byproduct of correct view, not the goal itself.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2015 08 11 Reducing Stress Week 1 11-8-15.mp3
UUID: ecb0d742-76d3-468f-9385-43b5616a91c4
Teacher: Ven Tony Beaumont
Collection: Reducing Stress Week (Ven Tony Beaumont)
Date: 2015-08-11
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 114.0 minutes
Words: ~13,112
So welcome everybody, and I’d just like to welcome Venerable Tony Beaumont to Buddha House. Thank him for coming down to teach us over the next few weeks. Venerable Tony first met the Dharma in the mid-70s in Nepal where he did some teachings of studying and retreat. And then when he came back to Australia, he did psychiatric nursing and then he became ordained at the beginning of the ’90s. And since then he’s been teaching different centres around Australia and sometimes in schools and in prisons.
And at the moment he’s residing up at Chenrezig. So thank you very much for coming. Okay. Let’s see if it’s working. Thanks, Judy.
It is it coming through? Yes. It is. Oh, sorry. We’ve got Chris, this lady here I have a hearing disability.
Right. So I read this bit, and if you read this bit, it enabled me to hear a bit better. Alright. Except that part is a wireless area. Okay.
So if you sort of Oh, no. It’s a knocker. Okay. Leave it. Thank you.
Okay. So I thought to start with some a few minutes of meditation just to focus the mind and to motivate for this session. Okay, so then in this meditation, first part, just a few minutes of breathing and then the remainder part of the meditation, meditation on developing, generating loving kindness, the mind of loving kindness. So now is to sit comfortably but in a way that is conducive to your mind remaining alert and focused. And generally speaking then what’s helpful in doing that is to try to keep the back straight, not rigid but straight in order to keep the mind focused and not to become sluggish.
And then here, you just simply observe the natural flow of the breath as it passes in through the nostrils and passes out again. And as best as possible to just remain on that sensation, the sensation of the air passing in and flowing out again. As the distractions arise, which inevitably they will, the thoughts arising, memories of past plans of the future, distractions from the point of view of sounds inside the room and outside, sensations in the body. These will arise and as best as possible to be diligently alert to arrival, to the arrival, but it’s a sense that they are like bubbles rising to the surface of a pond. So they rise and just as bubbles rise to the surface of the pond and there’s endless numbers of bubbles arising, that they arise and then dissolve back into the pond.
So similarly, just to sense that these events, thoughts, sounds, whatever they are, these events, arise, have a period of arising, abiding and then passing away. And to bring the mind back once more. Breath as best as possible. Keep the mind focused on the breath but if the mind wanders away then at that point, bring it right back again. Okay.
So now just to do this you know, a gentle but alert way. Okay. So then this next part of the meditation is this it? On top. On top, is it?
Oh, Is that off now? I think so. Alright. Okay. So then people can hear me okay?
Alright. So, okay, for this next part of meditation, meditation on loving kindness, then just to reflect how it is at this point of time in your life and up to this time that there have been various things or tendencies that you may have which are not so positive. Know, ones that you would like to eliminate or at least lessen. These may be various habit patterns that you have and they’ve been part of your character through this life. Then, Buddhist understanding that this is our situation, that we carry these different tendencies into this life and it’s appropriate to have an understanding.
Meditation means to make friends with yourself. So have an understanding and an acceptance at this point of time. It’s true. It’s true. I do have these unconstructive kinds of attitudes which lead me to perform unconstructive actions.
But at this point in time then, also important to generate that mind of understanding and kindness towards oneself. And then to think how it is that at a deeper level, the quality of our mind is such that the negative tendencies are only superficial to our mind, that they can be removed. That in fact these negative tendencies are like clouds in the sky. They might be very dark clouds, but they’re not one as clouds aren’t one with the sky. So likewise, the tendencies that we have are not one with our mind.
That as we engage more and more in spiritual practice, what occurs as we gain more understanding is what evolves in our life. Are the twin accumulations of compassion and wisdom. And so then sensing that these qualities we can develop within ourselves more and more. And may it be the case, and may it be the case that we’re able to develop this loving kindness, compassion and wisdom. And through these then, may we be able to become a much better person.
Not only a better person, but also be able to, and may we as people, individuals ourselves, able to have peace of mind and happiness. May it be the case. And then to think, bring to mind a friend of yours, someone who you’re close to. It might be a friend or relative, someone who you care about. And sense that also this person is not a perfect person.
They have certain patterns of behaviour which cause them problems. But may that person also as well be able to develop more of a sense of friendship towards themselves, acknowledging these shortcomings, understanding that they’re not one with their mind, that they’re superficial and can be removed. And that their mind can ultimately be removed or have these negative tendencies removed. They’re not one with their mind. And may this dear friend, a loved one, parent, child, whoever it may be, partner, May they be able to develop more and more compassion and wisdom within their heart.
And then may this person, how wonderful it would be if this person could be able to accomplish complete happiness and fulfilment within themselves. And then bring to mind someone who’s you wouldn’t call them is not a friend, not an enemy, stranger kind of person. You may have seen them many times. There may even be a neighbour that you’ve seen many times but they’ve neither helped or harmed you so you don’t really feel too much towards this person. Rather indifferent.
Maybe someone serves you in a shop or supermarket. But from the generosity of our own heart, we’re expanding our concern out towards people who we haven’t recognised as really helping us, but we see that that person is like us, wishes to have happiness to be free from suffering. Who’s like our friend wishes to have happiness to be free from suffering. And then give life to this person, not just like a cardboard cutout, but sense that this person also has certain negative tendencies, certain patterns, mental patterns, which are not positive, destructive. And so then whatever internal turmoil this person may have in relation to these negative tendencies, They develop a sense of self concern, positive self concern, compassion towards themselves, acceptance, while at the same time recognizing that their mind ultimately is free from these negative tendencies.
So how wonderful it would be if this person also would be able to develop these two collections of wisdom and compassion. May they develop these, may they nurture these, and through this may they find internal fulfilment. And then think about someone who’s been a problem for you in your life, someone who’s caused you problems, troubles that could be, you know, it may even be ex partner. It may be someone at work. You may even, you know, might be so strong as your emotion that you would label them enemy.
But if you don’t have the enemy that intense, but just people, certain people or persons who you prefer not to be around you. And so once more, reflect on that person and think, well, they also have certain patterns of behavior and that may be very strongly imprinted, past life influence. And as negative as those tendencies may be, they are not one with the mind. They can be removed. And so then may that person also be able to develop these qualities of compassion and wisdom more and more.
So then having cultivated this attitude of loving kindness, then to sense that it arises in the center of your very being like a pearl of light, white light and compassion. And then it radiates out from the very center of your being so that it fills your whole of your body, saturates all the cells of your body with compassion, bringing healing to your body. And then to visualise that it radiates out from the very centre of your being in all directions. And it becomes like a wish that you have for others to have happiness, to be freed from suffering. Going out from here, from the center here, radiating out through Adelaide.
And then imagine wherever there are problems existing in the world, wherever there are trouble spots in the Middle East, Africa, wherever there are beings suffering, and this compassion energy radiates out to wherever there are beings who have need for peace to be removed from suffering, to have happiness. So then with this sort of attitude, then to take refuge, recite refuge and the bodhicitta prayer, which is in the book on page eight. Okay. So topic over the next three Tuesdays is related to dealing with stress. Then could say or you say from my point of view, anyway.
My point of view went and the leader to me becoming involved in Buddhism, my connection with Tibetan Buddhism was through Hatha Yoga, my connection with Hatha Yoga which I found very, very beneficial, very, very helpful like this. In fact was very helpful in reducing stress, bringing clarity of mind and so on as a way of doing this and bringing peace like this. Think, you know, Yoga was a physical, doing a physical thing but it was also periods of time of sitting and focusing on the breath, stilling the mind, reducing the agitation in the mind, calming one’s off like this. So I found this very beneficial and then also because it sensed, it was also sensed that the incredible value of this experiencing for the first time in my life, the ability to be able to find happiness, some degree of happiness that was not dependent upon something external. So I sense a great promise that was existing, that if you can find a peace of mind or happiness within yourself without depending upon external things, people, objects and so on, then you’re in a much better situation because otherwise if you’re depending upon external things, then those external things can change very readily and so then the state of mind is going to go up and down like This would follow through.
I could see this would follow through for the rest of my life. And I could see that that was really actually very unsatisfactory. Yoga was very helpful in showing me the direction to go. But the problem was for me, here I’m not disparaging yoga in any way, because for many people that is what they use and as a principle you could even say the spiritual practice is a spiritual thing. But for me there was difficulty because I could, you know, do these practices, you know, for two hours or whatever And then like this month come, living in a community house and then someone comes along and calls me an idiot.
And all that peace of mind goes out the window like that. I have to go back and sit back again for two hours. But I understood, I could see that the problem was in relation to my view of what was taking place because it doesn’t necessarily follow that other people would be upset by the same things that I was upset by. It had to do with the view of that situation. It had to do with my understanding of things.
So I knew then, I knew that this was the I had to find a method that would change my perspective on how things existed, my understanding of myself and the world around me, That was the driving force, I think, that you can meet when I set out on to my girlfriend at the time to go through Southeast Asia and then to India and then to Nepal. And then once gone to Nepal, the Kopan course in Kathmandu Valley. Kopan’s the center from which the center and all the other centers in FPMT. It’s the mother center. Going there and attending the Lam Rim course for one month, meditation on the graduated path like this in which it presented.
It was a graduated path to enlightenment, but it’s a presentation in a sense outlines a path. It gives you a sense of the path to enlightenment, gives you a concept of yourself and what you can achieve, your purpose path, your existence, presenting this. And along the way, methods for bringing about transformation in the mind. And I could sense, you know, of course immediately, it doesn’t solve all the problems, but I could see that the methods were there which certainly brought more peace to the mind like that. So I can, you know, this was my connection in my sense, this is the way to go because it brings that more sanity in the mind.
But of course we say in the function of Tibetan Buddhism Buddhism in general, particularly Tibetan Buddhism isn’t just simply to find relaxation or peace like this. Say it’s a byproduct of practice. The purpose of the practice is, as Lama Tsongkhapa says, the purpose for our existence is to attain enlightenment in order to remove all beings from suffering. That’s the purpose of human existence, to cease. But also at the same time, if our mind is agitated, upset, distressed and we’re tensed out, then all these ideas, you know, the great ideas are very difficult to achieve.
So it’s a practical thing then in the spiritual path are to reduce the levels of stress so that we can have the peace of and also be able to better accomplish the benefit of others. Each person is different in their make up, their physical, in a way we say a whole body mind combination. Each person is different in what they have. Principally perhaps we can say it’s due to their karma. A person is karma about the kind of body and genetics that you have, which in turn is going to influence your mind state.
But in Buddhism we say that the source of our mind, the mind is a mind stream, so it’s a stream and it comes from its previous moment like this coming from past lives. Each person has their own types of imprints and tendencies and so on. There’s different levels of energy and different levels of motivation in previous positions. Not everyone is the same. So some people are probably less troubled by stress than other people or less likely to become stressed out.
Some people have got a tendency, anywhere, whatever they do, they’re always going be high energy people. They’ve always got to push really hard and they bring that attitude. That’s why in spiritual practice they’re very strongly energized. They maybe only have a couple of hours sleep at night and they do a lot of selfless service as well. It may cause them more stress if you’re high to tie them down.
Get stressed out, do a retreat. No, it would really make me really stressed out. I’m less stressed out if I’m, you know, actively doing things. People are different. Everyone’s different.
But at the same time, I think it makes sense that on another level we need to be a little bit kind and compassionate on ourselves to not get to that point where you burn yourself out. Of course certain conditions are the case with us individuals. If we can’t resolve issues and stuff then it can make more sense to take Valium. But ideally it’s best not to. We can avoid it.
If we can find methods to counteract that tendency, then it’s better. Similarly, of course, blood pressure tablets might be necessary but those may be coming about a necessity for high blood pressure maybe as a result of not being able to realistically deal with our life circumstance or not having a healthy perspective on life, not having an inner refuge so that we then have a need for these external things. So we say, ideally in Buddhism, if we can, to apply these organic methods to internal development in order to bring more peace to the mind so that we can better accomplish the path better, be more effective in how we can work to benefit others. So this is a general idea behind it. I remember some years back though, one guy, because he was thinking, because he knew I was a Buddhist.
This is before I was a monk and I was working with him. His understanding was that meditation is there. The purpose of meditation is to you know, you do it because you want to relax and he was convinced. That certainly can be the case but in Buddhism we don’t see that as the real long term purpose of meditation. We just simply need to be relaxed like that.
A person can dedicate your life and you develop more and more relaxed states of mind and less and less so on. But you don’t necessarily have really accomplished anything positive with your own mind and then you die and the imprints in the mind are still there and you get projected into the next life like this. Know, and you have this human potential. You may have had peaceful state of mind but in another way what you’ve done is exhausted a lot of positive karma and not created any virtuous power of karma. You may not have created negative karma but nothing particularly virtuous.
Previously, I used to go into prisons quite a bit, particularly one prison in Victoria, Ararat Prison, which is a protective prison. Principally, most of the prisoners in there are sex offenders. So you know the thing was there. There were cases of people there that they, you know, the only thing they were interested in, when the we came and teach, they weren’t interested to hear about Buddhist point of view, ethics or anything like that. Their thing was to just to be able to find some sort of method to simply relax And I guess there for me there was a little bit of dilemma, know, what is the real benefit, especially if the drive is two hours away from the prison.
So it takes a whole day actually by the time you’re there and come back again. To what extent is this beneficial? Maybe we’re placing seeds on this person’s mind, a bit of things like that. But long term, if that’s all that’s happening, are you doing? You’re creating a relaxed sex offender?
How much benefit is that for the person and for the society? It certainly became an issue to think about for me. What is your responsibility like this? All right. So this approach in Buddhism then is more from a transforming our conception of things, our view of things, and in so doing then as a byproduct of that is that it should bring about a result of less uptightness, less stressness, more sanity in the mind, less resentment and so on.
All these things to stick mind. I think that’s a pretty good yardstick in one way. Buddhism, if it’s of any value, then it has to be in in accordance with reality as far as I’m concerned. If it’s in accordance with reality, then it should. If you’re living your life, you’re conducting your life, if your view of life is in accordance with reality, it should bring more sanity, more peace to your mind.
This seems to me to make sense. And we see this, you know, is this true or not? You know, look at his arms, the Dalai Lama. Lama Zopa Rinpoche. I don’t know if they get stressed out, there’s certainly high demand on their time, both of those.
His Holiness is now eighty years of age. But that high demand on the time like this, you know, mind not agitated. How often do they get upset, you know? You know, I just conceive of a day of Lama Zopa, know, what it would be like to be that day. That’d drive me crazy.
You’d be like, give us a break, come on. Roger Kunsang, Lama Zopa’s attendant, he’s never known Rinpoche to even ask for a cup of tea. Know, because his mind is so much more concerned with others, but at the same time, it’s not like being as a martyr or anything like that. It’s a very organic process, a natural process taking place from a basis of internal change. So I think this is a good measure, you know.
Do the methods there within Tibetan Buddhism if we apply them, if we understand them? And it’s not necessarily so easy to apply them to our life in a deeper level, but if we’re able to do this then it should bring more sanity, more peace, less stress. So some of the things, I’ve just thought during over these three sessions, some aspects of Tibetan Buddhism that seemed to me, well certainly was not just seems to me, but you know the Lama was also of course saying, be helpful in bringing more peace, more sanity, less stress to our body mind combination. Because the stress is going to be physical and mental really. So a good place I think to start perhaps is this notion of suffering given it’s the one that was taught first by the Buddha.
To develop a constructive, healthy way in relation to this. So we say in Buddhism, and probably in truth in all religious traditions, mainstream religious traditions would be indicating that coming into this world means that there’s going to be problems existing. We’re going to experience difficulties They will arise. Whether we like it or not, they will come. So one way, it’s one analogy in terms of getting a sense of one way of having a healthy approach to this understanding that the suffering does exist is the analogies of imagining like arrows fired at us.
So if we, as an ordinary person born in this world due to the power of karma and affliction, that means we’re going to experience problems, difficulties, difficulties of sickness, age and death, being confronted with people who are in pain, you know, like this, being separated from the people we don’t think are in pain but we really want around and then not getting the things that we want. And there’s a myriad of different things that can manifest in our life in terms of those things that we don’t, we prefer not to have to happen to us but they do occur. It happens. So this idea, the analogy of sensing, that it’s as though their arrows fight at us. Although on one level we can say, Well we created the cause, the karma, previously to experience this.
But that manifests and when the conditions come together, they are there whether we like it or not. They are there. When the girlfriend that we’re really strongly attached to decides to leave and this is it, that’s the end. That’s it. She makes a decision.
It’s finished. You can’t turn back the clock. It’s finished like this. When your loved one, the close one who’s closest to you gets killed on the car accident, the conditions have come together and that’s it then. You’ve experienced that.
And at that we would say you don’t really have a choice. You have the arrow that’s fired at you. It’s been fired at you. You’re experiencing that arrow. So that’s one thing.
But then the crucial thing, we can’t stop that, but the thing that becomes a problem for us, if we’re not skillful in understanding suffering, is our reaction to that that or injustice or whatever we want to label it occurring, and then if we react in terms of, you know, fist up here to God. When I was a kid, I used to do that, but my electric chains weren’t working properly. Come down here, you bastard. The guy like Storms had thought I was crazy. That sort of reaction.
It doesn’t have to be like that. It can be like an internal anger that becomes really depressed. It can be what’s the problem thing in our society, certainly is the addictions. The problem reaction of an affluent culture is to end up with the addictions and our society is so supportive of it and there’s such a denial of suffering anyway, know, so we chase it away. There must be something wrong with me if I’m not having pleasure or enjoyment.
Buddhism is saying actually this is a reality that we have. If we react to those arrows being fired in that fight with anger, resentment, bitterness, indulging in the addictions, this becomes a second arrow. Who’s fired that but us? We very clearly at that point, we are the ones who fired the arrow at ourselves. So Buddhism here at that point is saying the wise approach is to understand sure, arrows are fired first off, but to be skillful and peace of mind is not to react and react and say that is to fire another arrow to ourselves because that’s where we hurt ourselves each time react, so upset, or get any addictions or whatever.
So this approach of Buddhism is that way to understand problems arise and not to make it worse by that second thing. But then with Buddhism, take it a further step if we’re really in tune with the methods within Buddhism, is that these stop thinking the suffering as a curse but as an opportunity. So that at that point you’re transforming that arrow, it then becomes an acupuncture needle for your own healing. The suffering you experience you use as an opportunity to bring about healing. So this is really an intelligent, wise, and almost like a self preservation, preserving our sanity, peace of mind, out of wise self interest to take this approach.
I think you can see from this point of view, in itself is a huge way of reducing stress in our life, and the complications that occur so much, but comes from not opening up and acknowledging the problems existing in our life. And I think that that skill in itself, I think the skill in being able to what we’re doing here is the patience, the quality of patience, the patience that voluntarily endures suffering and transforms it into a path. It’s not like you’re delighting in the suffering. You’re saying, I want to deal with this most skillfully and not cause myself more suffering. So what I’m doing here is I’m opening up voluntarily enduring this suffering.
That’s why karma created this. And then using it as an opportunity to transform it into a power. So that skill, that skillful approach, is a practical way you could say if we’re able to do that, it’s almost like an antidote in future lives to become an addict because you’re setting a habit in your mind of opening up to the suffering and not you know, rejecting it. So I think there’s a problem with the person with an addiction. In the end they can’t bear the experience of suffering.
It becomes unbearable. Anything to obliterate remember one time, one of the long term people who have been around a long time in Buddhism that was in discussion about the subject of suffering, because understandably, you know, you teach a number of teachers at a Kopan course in the old days, think maybe you talked three weeks on suffering. People were pulling their hair out. There were people there that, you know, I remember one, they used to have the discussion groups after lunch and this person came in. I think they might have had some problem with the office getting their money back or something because they wanted to leave.
And they protested, you know, and I think people really felt empathy towards us. I came here Before I was happy, was okay. I heard all this. And not only that, they won’t give you the money back. But I think that in the end they give the guy the money back.
But generally, was a mixture between sniggering, some people laughing, Others were in agreement but they could also see, Well the problem is what he’s been saying is true, you know. So that can be the reaction. I remember someone saying when they’d heard first actually the teachings and quite intense teachings on suffering, when they heard it the first time, they felt relief. They felt relaxed when they heard It meant that they stopped the fight, the struggle. They started to sense that there’s not necessarily something wrong with me after all because I’m not that beautiful person with the advertisers.
Advertisements always promote the sense of we should be enjoying ourselves. We’re missing out on something, not enjoying ourselves. So that person’s always at war, but she could relax and say, Ah, this is okay. It’s all right. There’s not necessarily something wrong with me.
So I think embracing this understanding seems to me an insane way to approach things. Clearly it’s not masochistic. That’s realistic and source for bringing peace to one’s mind and mind. So there are sufferings that we experience, different types. When I working in psychiatric hospitals in Melbourne, the big largest private psychiatric hospital in Melbourne, Melbourne clinic, and all voluntary patience there.
Many people there are depressed, a lot of depression insisting in that hospital. Now I’m not too sure because they say it looks like, you know, depressions. Depression can arise as result of chemicals in the brain like this. It’s chemically induced like this. Then it seems the appropriate treatment is to find some sort of chemical that counteracts that and to some degree then it seems to work.
But from my point of view in discussing and talking with many of the patience there, my sense that a lot of the depression there was arising from unrealistic expectations about how the life should be or should have turned out. Particularly the idea that it should have turned out with the right partner and the kids and everything was going to be perfectly rosy as in our society. Think there’s a fantasy about you know, that I’m not saying of course you can have good partners and everything work well, but the idea that that in and of itself is a source of happiness out there with that person and when you’ve got that perfect house and children and partner, everything will be okay without any kind of so naive, without realising that it’s also so much dependent upon the state of mind. But because the things didn’t turn out as they expected and it may have been divorces and it might have been, you know, the kids haven’t turned out okay or even if everything’s sort of there, you know, the mind is still dissatisfied. The tendency still was to not look, to question the fantasies they’ve created about how things go, ah, but still to grasp on to the idea that, you know, I should have this.
Why shouldn’t I have this happiness? It struck me. It had to do with just denial of the reality. Things don’t necessarily turn out so very perfect. The partner doesn’t necessarily turn out so very perfect.
This is it. But no space, no freedom in the mind to be able to examine, to question that assumption. And so that person can live the rest of their life like this, can never look within themselves, never look at the demons within. And in a case like that, then of course then if they’re depressed, they have pressure put on them by the partner, husband, wife, whoever, to snap out of it. So from their point of view, if the doctor can come along, the psychiatrist can come along and says it’s chemically induced, it takes a lot of off the person.
You can understand that because you know it’s just like if you have a physical illness, know, you’ve got cancer, your partners are going to say snap out of it because physical basis exists. Similarly here is if the doctor can come and say well these are chemicals and we can give you something to the counter, right? Then the person doesn’t have to look within their mind which is the last thing that they really want to do. But unfortunately then, because of that, then if they do that, then the rest of their life, they’re stuck into this state. There’s no solution to it.
The solution can be may even just be a thought away, a changed view. Most agitated person I ever saw was one woman there who had agitated depression. She came in and previously she’d been a model. Think the whole life of the appearance is so important to how you appear. But by this time she was in her forties and so her hair grows gray and the body sort of starts to you’re not gonna be on the front pages of front pages of or even a billboard maybe.
If you’re lucky or unlucky, I don’t know if it’s lucky or unlucky, but she’s certainly not gonna be there. I remember her words as she came in, so agitated with the family. So I just feel like an empty shell. Empty And I guess her life had been focused around the appearance. She was so close to I think maybe she had an insight, maybe she was getting there, but that’s what she had become.
If that’s all you’re going to do is focus on your appearance, then that’s all that matters is this surface thing. But of course, if you’re getting older, then that shell is no longer attractive or appealing to anyone. So you’re left with a dry empty shell like this. But again, so close, you know. That’s exactly the right, in a sense, to go into that experience.
Really to go into that experience. How do I feel? I feel just like an empty shell. That’s right. Rather than fighting against it, to actually understand it more, to understand that experience, then it might give you some insight into the nature of suffering, into the nature of impermanence.
Because she was very much holding on to this idea of being a beautiful person and remaining a beautiful person. And this is so sad, isn’t it? And perhaps this is what we’re seeing with plastic surgery. In itself, can’t any action, like a person getting plastic surgery, You should not know what’s taking place in people’s minds, but I think in many cases people with plastic surgery is a denial about aging. And it can be so vain that you could be why you’re doing it is because you want to hear someone say to you, Oh, are you really sixty?
You look forty? I mean I think sometimes that’s what it comes down to. Because you can’t all the plastic surgery in the world isn’t going to change the fact that you’re sixty. For some people it seems as though that hearing those words is so very important. And yet they’re only creating a cause for more suffering because how can you you know, eventually the body’s sixty, seventy, eighty, you’re almost gonna be like so suffering.
From this denial. His Holiness, when he talked about impermanence, about impermanence, he said, actually the understanding of impermanence helps relationships to last. It seems to be in a sense irony, I think, where if you think impermanence and if you think things are impermanent, then your relationships aren’t going to last because everything is impermanent. But it has the opposite effect because in terms of your intimate relationships, if you enter into an intimate relationship with an understanding of impermanence, that is that my mind changes, the other person’s mind changes, our relationships change, our body changes, and it’s not something fixed we can hold on to.
So all the passion that you have and the sexual drive that you may have when you initially start that relationship, why its very nature is not going to last. For the person to have the understanding of impermanence, then they’re able to let go and allow the relationship to evolve through the various stages if they’re realistic. And they understand grasping for another person isn’t going to solve the problem because you find another person but it’s also impermanent as well. So when you’ve got the case of people being worried four or five times, I think it’s more often the case, that they’re holding on to this fixed concept. I’ve got to find that right person and the next person is going to be the source of my problem until the problem is then impermanence manifests whether you like it or not and you start the fights and the blues and everything else and you start to think, well, if I had another person.
So it doesn’t work. So at this understanding of impermanence, in terms of bringing you can see if you integrated that into relationships, an intimate relationship, so much suffering occurs without that understanding. The stress in the relationship, disintegration in the relationship, the suffering that the children have to endure There is a result very often from parents, unrealistic understanding of the nature of relationships. It’s good you how could you she did warn me about that. So what happens now is we have great tea, don’t we?
Is it right? Yes. Ten minutes. Ten minutes, but it usually goes to ten to ten. Now it’s good.
Left side is there. It worked okay at first. Is everything else working? Alright. Is that working now or not?
So Michael will be on here. Okay, so So it’s, you know, just like with that meditation to the beginning, that idea of reflecting a little bit on this Buddhist understanding of our mind and the idea that it existed prior to this life. And that there are, you know, this is from a point of view of developing more of a sense of kindness and understanding towards oneself because this is important as well. Some Lamas have said, It seems that Dalai Lama when he’s talked about this is when he was first meeting Westerners that one of the characteristics he came to see was that they had a sense of there was a lot of things like guilt and self loathing. It’s not to say that Tibetan people are perfect or anything like that but it seems as though there’s a less of a tendency there, supposedly not a word.
Guilt in the Tibetan language, I find that hard to believe but it’s certainly not such a characteristic and the sense of not self loathing, that as someone said to me the other day, even the most obnoxious Tibetan still has a positive view of themselves. So I mean that might be idealizing it but it’s still showing little bit of perspective, this idea that as negative as a person may be, that they’re not essentially bad. We have this understanding of Buddhism that our mind can’t be. We may do everything possible in the world to make ourselves one with negativity, but as effective as we are in doing that, we can’t make the fact that our mind is totally contaminated and can’t be purified. It’s not possible.
When you come into this world, we don’t know the various imprints that are existing in our mind from past lives, what we were doing previously that are influencing how we see things now. We don’t have knowledge or understanding of what those things might be. Nor do we have a memory of what took place, for most of us anyway, in the womb and even for most of us perhaps for the first three years. My first memory, I think, was when I was three, but for those first couple of years, two, three years, then we can’t remember, but things were happening, events were occurring, affecting our mind. Things may have happened also in the process of us being born and as well as that we don’t understand, we don’t you know, we’ve got genetic influences from our parents, The physical makeup of our nervous system, of our brain, all this influences how our mind is, how we are.
So this is worthwhile in terms of the we want a little bit of kindness towards ourselves and not to give ourselves or punish ourselves, cause ourselves unnecessary distress because we’re not meeting certain standards of why and why this way? Why have I got this tendency? Why have I got this level of jealousy? Why have I got this level of fear? You know?
There’s There’s so many factors. One of the prisons, one of the guys in prison there, he had been there. He was a very, very violent person, you know, and violence and rape. I don’t know how many women he had raped. I think there were many others that he probably had that he hadn’t been convicted for.
He was a murderer as well. He murdered in prison, he’d been in prison for a long time, I think. But when I spoke to him the first time, I was really quite taken aback, shocked because in a way because he was so so eloquent and intelligent and capacity to develop rapport. He may have been manipulating me. Might have been a psychopath.
He might have been Hannibal Lecter, you know, from Silence of the Lambs but I don’t think so. He said that coming to prison was a gift. I suspect, you know, I don’t know, he might have been reading some Maharishi book and he’d been in prison plenty of times before and that didn’t stop him from going back out and doing the same things again. So the gift thing indicating, you know, my life has changed, don’t know my own suspicion because you don’t know. But if he was released, then he would, go back.
The thing is, you know, when he committed these acts, he said always with alcohol, wasn’t blaming alcohol but it was a factor. He had a background, father was violent. Mother was very kind. He referred to his mother, when I was amazed. It wasn’t ‘mother’, but ‘my mother was mum’.
Still like that. Then also very low tolerance level. You could sense this sense of level of impatience and frustration, easily frustrated like this. So if he was to go outside again, released in the alcohol circumstances, the things would enrage him and for whatever reason, and then it would manifest in these different ways of the violence. Right?
But in thinking about him then, I don’t know, certainly a while. I’ve got imprints in my mind. I’m not aware of that sort of stuff taking place but certainly, you know, the imprints of fear characteristics throughout this life, very strong tendency there, manifesting negative fear, the positive tendencies, negative tendencies of those. The negative fears is there and very silent things, other people I think we all have different things existing in our mind. In his case, again, it’s similar in Buddhist understanding.
Of course, you need to be able to discern and distinguish what a negative action is. You also need to recognize for the society’s sake and you need to protect the society so perhaps best thing is he’s in prison for the rest of his life. To protect the society, you also have to have a system of punishment. You also have to have some sort of sense of deterrent these things will take place. But all that being said, you know, the importance in Buddhism in expanding our awareness and understanding of our own mind, our own mind and everyone else’s mind, similar kind of thing.
So like him, you know, as terrible as those things were, you know. So those tendencies come from past lives and also there may be genetics, maybe various other things, you know. One karma one karma ripens as a habit. He’s got a habit to do this in his life. One karma ripens that you have a father that survived so that then you resolve your problems with violence.
So in this point of view, there’s a similar thing and here I’m just thinking more from the point of view is that you know, having the attitude for ourselves, compassion for ourselves, also compassion for others, more of that expanse of understanding the nature of mind, everyone’s mind is same and similar, same. Imprinted a little bit different but the characteristics are same. So it’s not the case. This person, evil person, and should be, you know, should be executed, you know, subhuman because Buddhism, this is not understanding. So we open up more to this more expansive view, more understanding, more wise, more compassionate view.
This brings much more peace to the mind. Not so much resentment, hostility about bad know, the various politicians that we don’t like. All people, very similar. We should have happiness be free. All people, but calmness.
All people compelled by different karmas to do different things. Some people are stronger than others. The more we can sort of understand that then, you know, take that, embrace that attitude, then it’s a way of being able to deal with these difficult people. We know or hear about. So that’s more to just more to do with that subject of Of suffering.
Oh, no, some. Some things, more things to do with that. The benefits, you know, what the benefit is of experiencing suffering, right? How they can be a benefit doesn’t necessarily follow. It’s up to us how we perceive this experience of suffering.
So one way that an experience of suffering can become beneficial is that as a result of our experience of suffering that we become less arrogant or have more humility, genuine sort of humility because we don’t want to suffer, you know. We don’t want to suffer. You know, we don’t want it. We wish we could remove it but it manifests And in fact, we say in Buddhism, it’s a result of the karma we have created in the past. So we are subject to this law of cause and effect karma.
We can’t separate ourselves away from them. We can’t bribe a judge or bribe a god or whatever it is to, you know, to get us out of this situation. The reality is we are all enmeshed in our own coming, the results of our own karmic action. So if you start to sense that this that we can’t say, I don’t want anything more to do with it, We’re not in that situation. We are subject to the results of our actions causing to get karma.
So we take some board like this. This allows for the mind to become more humble, less arrogant. The expression is that pride comes before a fall. Was the mind that was full of pride, and praise, you know, it’s full of your own self importance, how important I am. You’re creating the circumstance for the life to fall apart.
And the implication then, if you’re really constructive with that, then at that point, utilize the experience of the pain of the falling apart of the life of the suffering as an opportunity to become less arrogant, more humble. And the value of that is the analogy of the mind of pride. And some people, when a result of suffering, they have the result can be the very opposite arrogance, pride. Christians have got a big thing about this. They say, you know, it’s God’s wish and the understanding of that is it’s God’s wish, God’s it’s all part of God’s plan and if a person’s Christian takes it on board, then they can use it in a positive way because then their mind becomes more humble, open.
So in Buddhism we say a similar thing, we say it’s God’s plan, but the mind of humility leads us open to learn new things. If the mind is full of pride, it’s difficult to learn new things. Pride is like a balloon. The balloon filled with helium. I think helium floats, doesn’t it?
What it does, the balloon filled with this gas then rises like that. So similar than with the mind of pride, it separates us from other people. For the mind of pride, you’re not you lose your connectedness with others because you’re so inflated with your own self importance. At the same time, it’s it doesn’t have any substance to it. It’s just full of air.
There’s nothing there and all it requires is a pinprick. That’s a state of pride Whereas the state the mind of humility is like a mountain lake, crystal clear lake, and there’s only one way that that lake can fill with water is when it’s filled by streams, is that it has to be lower than the streams that are feeding into it. The streams of pure water so likewise with our mind is the mind of humility is a lower mind and when it becomes lower, it creates the circumstances for the streams of good qualities to flow within us like this. So it’s the opportunity that each time, you know, that catastrophe occurs in our life, it is the opportunity to generate that mind, to bring the result of humility which becomes an opportunity in itself to be able to learn to understand spiritual practice. Then secondly is if you understand karma more and more, you see that the suffering comes as a result of actions you’ve created in the past.
So the experience of suffering then becomes a motivating factor to abandon the causes of suffering and to create the causes for happiness because you don’t want to continue to suffer, that you want to wish to have to find happiness. So that experience of suffering comes a cause, can become a cause for you to abandon negative actions. The misfortune motivates you to abandon negative actions and motivates you to create virtuous actions. Then also, suffering can become a basis for developing compassion. Instead of allowing it to become one of self pity, me, my misfortune and what’s taking place, you can utilize that of your awareness of your own experience of pain a sense that it’s not unique to me, others are experiencing the same thing.
There’s a whole method of practice here in which, you know, not only that, but you start to open up your mind and say, Okay, I willingly take on this suffering on behalf of others. This cancer that I’m experiencing may be experienced on behalf of others. Maybe I experience this cancer on behalf of everyone else. It’s really need to develop compassion from that. So but even if you don’t take it to that extent, the experience of suffering can become an opportunity to empathize with others who go through similar steps.
So from this point of view, it’s not like we would say that, you know, you willingly go around and, you know, whip and bend yourself on your back, right, like this. But given that we’re going to have to experience certain levels of suffering, it makes sense to be skilful in using those levels of suffering to not create further suffering for ourselves and then to create a cause for humility, abandon negative actions, create positive actions and develop more compassion. That in itself, I think that this would be very helpful in reducing a lot of stress in in our life. So then, okay, let’s do suffering. Then another one is to recognize the difference between pleasure and happiness.
These are words these are only words but we’re not going to define these two here. Pleasure is that which arises from the experience of the various external things, pleasures of the senses and having money we can say. Hearing pleasing words from other people praising us like this, reputational, these external types of things, pleasure like this. Whereas happiness is more to do with that which arises in the mind on the basis of cultivating wholesome states of mind, abandoning negative states of mind. There’s nothing wrong with pleasure but the pleasures are only transitory.
They’re only balanced. They’ve got a tendency to if you fill your life with pleasure, it’s like drinking salt water to quench your thirst. You never find satisfaction in just pleasures. Some people fill their lives with pleasure and you do that, then you end up more and more suffering and become an addict like this. Whereas the happiness thing is it’s more it’s nurturing.
The more you develop the wholesome states of mind, the more you burn the negative states of mind, consequences, content, fulfillment, wisdom, compassion in terms of further like this and further content like this. And Buddhist, becoming Buddhist, it means an inner turning. That is that the person is recognizing that the source of their life, their life, happiness comes, is dependent upon these cultivations, wholesome states of mind, working with the mind. That doesn’t mean to say if you’re Buddhist, you don’t have pleasures. It’s just that you recognize the limitations of them.
That’s all, really. But it’s important. It’s an important point to recognize this. But the difference between happiness and pleasure. You’ll never find happiness if you just pursue pleasure but you’ll find happiness will come whether we like it or not When we ban negative states of mind, cultivate the positive states of mind.
This will occur. So one way it can be described in terms of how to waste the life is to engage in what we call the worldly dharmas. So these are well, it’s all pleasure, I guess it is. But the pleasure this is what we’re referring to as the worldly dharmas, talking about eight worldly dharmas. But it is the pursuit of material goods and money just in all or the pursuit of it or the craving.
It’s better to use the word craving after pursuit of material things and money. And then associated with that, once you’ve got that state of mind, then there’s also the fear, the craving to avoid the loss of those things. Then there is the craving after experiencing pleasures of the senses and associated with that is the craving to avoid the experience of anything unpleasant, any unpleasant experience like this. And again, the key word is craving. Then there is the craving after praise.
Sweet, ego pleasing words and craving to avoid criticism. And then finally, there’s craving after reputation and fame and power and craving, you know, against losing those things. So there’s a here of the emphasis of the word craving because, of course, if you’ve got a good reputation, then you can use it for the benefit of others. The Solstice Dalai Lama has good reputation and through that reputation you can benefit others. If you have money, then potentially you can benefit many people like So those things in the world is not a problem but where is the problem?
Is it in the mind is exaggerating the importance of them and the pursuit of these things? So sometimes it’s said, you know, the minimum level of practice of spiritual practice is to work for future lives. If you’re working for the happiness, meaning of this life, that’s not spiritual practice. And we could say that working after or chasing after those eight worldly dharmas is synonymous with pursuit of happiness of this life. So what’s the problem with that?
Well, the problem is when you’re pursuing the eight worldly dharmas, it’s very difficult to create virtue but very easy to create wrong action. As well as when you’re pursuing that anyway, you’re it’s not bringing fulfillment in your own mind, it’s bringing more dissatisfaction. So in relation to that craving after material things, you can see if you if it is your focus just to do this and many people it is. More and more that as much material things or as much money as they got or as much shares that they have, that’s never enough, they have to have more. We see the example of Gina Rinehart.
Of course, she may be blessed with everything fine inside her mind but I get a sense that she isn’t. People know Gina Rinehart as Australia’s wealthiest person or she was, maybe she isn’t there. So a lot of money there existed but very strong conflict, this is a conflict, ongoing conflict with her three oldest children. Maybe they’ve resolved it now becoming a big family span like this. So imagine you’ve got all the money in the world but you’re at war with your three oldest children.
Have you got peace of mind? Very different. And maybe we may also see examples of other people and hear about people who have a lot of money but their life is not one of contender. People we hear, you know, in America, particularly the wealthy people whose children, you know, have been left with this money. Very often, more often than not, their life ends up being kind of one of great suffering.
So if we focus this craving after material things and know, also then you’re craving after them. It’s very much so if you like that, then you also got this anxiety about those things being damaged. I bought a car eighteen months ago, first time I had a car in twenty five years. Certainly, it wasn’t a new car. I don’t think it’d go nuts if I bought a new one.
Think it’d go insane, you know, don’t worry about that first scratch on it. God’s a little bit. Maybe you’ve got heaps of money, it doesn’t matter if you get a scratch on your coat and want to buy another one. But in any case, I think we can observe that in and of itself, to have material things, money, just in and of itself isn’t going to bring happiness. There are some people who have that skill who have, you know, I think it looks like Bill Gates who understood having this money that comes with it.
That’s not where their happiness comes from. It’s much more dependent upon using this money in some way to benefit others. So someone, you know, had developed a skill but if they’re mind and that can’t be, you know, a person that is craving totally after material things because otherwise, they wouldn’t be willing to give those things away. So that’s gonna do that and very difficult to have this peace of mind. That craving after them, you know, the pleasures, the senses, always having to have pleasant things around, everything to be pleasant sounds, smells, tastes, enjoyments and so on.
So that as well with that, if you’ve got then you can’t bear with anything that’s uncomfortable. It’s a co parent courses in the early days when they had the toilets, you know, the bottom of the toilets, these maggots. Some people would go there and leave straight away. New Zealanders coming to Australia, the snakes, Oh, to go to Queensland, Oh, I’m getting out of here. Like it’s so that the you know, that in a pleasant situation, agitation in the mind.
If you’ve got to have the perfect conditions, how can you have peace of mind? You’re always going to be anxious even if you’ve got the perfect conditions, as soon as the anxiety of those perfect conditions will change, giving them too much priority. Then praise, craving after praise. Of course, we say it’s important to praise children and it does make sense to give them confidence. But hopefully as well as you communicate to the child, we would say in Buddhism, communicate to the child long term that, you know, if you have a mind that, you know, is so insecure and needs to be praised all the time, it’s making them very, very vulnerable.
Here are cases of people adults who still, you know, years later because they sense that their brother or sister was the chosen one, was the preferred one, The parents used to praise the other one and not me so that the child is always yearning after praise, needs to have praise. I like this. Gee, I’ll tell you what, that’s the truth I would prefer, you know, is the importance of developing a mind that does not have a craving for praise because how can you deal with it? If you like that, if you need to have the praise, how insecure are you when you don’t get it and then knowing how do you feel when you get the criticism. You’re gonna go up and down emotionally just by the words of someone else.
Other people can control you. Your parents can control you. Some people, the time of their parents’ death, their conflict partner or their siblings, you’re always the favored one. Mind is obsessed, caught up with this thing that their parents did the wrong thing. That’s true.
Some parents may do that. Some parents may be manipulative by using their, you know, praising one and then by implication and, you know, to praise one, giving them praise by implication, I haven’t been doing the right thing. And their parents might be exactly doing that, manipulating. It’s true. But from our side, if we’re really trying to develop ourselves, you know, to see through this idea and not be dependent upon praise.
Because even when, you know, in our dharma centers, there’s a case you see, you know, a case where one of the centers is someone who had been involved in a project and that project was benefiting many people, put in many many years doing this project, building this getting involved in this activity. And from a point of view of Buddhist practice, actually, is that when you engage in this, the purpose is thinking about it, what, for the benefit because it’s going to bring benefit to others and it’s bring benefit to the Dharma which is exactly what his would bring. But from his point of view, there was a need to be praised all the way. So became more and more distressed, all the stuff that he put in and he wasn’t getting the praise that he was hoping to receive. And in the end, I remember it happened where, you know, after all this has happened and he really got upset and was clearing out because he felt that he’d been used.
He said, Oh, I put all these years, I put it all I’ve got to show for it was this thangka that I was given by the lama or Tārā. That’s all I’ve got to show for it. I was quite shocked, you know, his mind was thinking this way. And he was also critical of the lama. He said that lama all this time had never once said, Praise me for what I’ve done.
And it may be appropriate that it should have been that the lama praised him. But the problem isn’t there. It’s within his mind. It’s so insecure that it needs to be praised. So you can be in a dharma center.
You can be involved in an activity which brings benefit to others. But you missed it. You missed the point of this importance of working to reduce these disturbing states of mind. So his anxiety, there’s no doubt about anxiety and resentment in his mind is caused by the lack of praise, but in truth, it’s not caused by lack of praise, it’s caused by his craving for him. Then we have reputation, fame or whatever.
So I don’t know what James Hird’s motivation is if people follow the AFL. You’ve been following it, what’s happened with all the trials and tribulations of Essendon Football Club. So James Hird was the footballer for Essendon, Golden Boy at the club, captain of Essendon, Brownlow medallist, you know, best in the fairest that means of the year, years ago, two time premiership player, you know. The hero of many, you know, mothers, you know, if their child could write like James Hird, they’d be very pleased. If their daughter could marry James Hird, they’d be very pleased like this, the golden boy.
He never did anything dirty on the field, it’s true, you know. He was very fair on the field but very courageous. Then he became coach of the club and got implicated and then implicated in this whole drugs scandal. And as this has happened, then, you know, his reputation slowly erodes more and more, you know, what’s going to happen? It looks like probably either he resigns from that club or he’ll get the boot, whatever the reputation.
But if it was the case and it may not be the case, he doesn’t maybe care at all, right? But if his focus is very important, he’s craving for his reputation, he craves his reputation. Level of torment that must be existing in his mind and level of anger as well of various things that people are critical about, you know, causing incredible distress. Same thing goes for, you know, the people who become leaders of countries, you know, that they can bring many benefits to others but if they’re, you know, they’re craving for the power, reputation, name, whatever, and then they fall from grace to get kicked out, then that can be incredible. So it’s okay.
So it’s covered as a subject of the idea of suffering and a more healthy approach to it and then also the subject of getting clear about these worldly dharmas and understanding the real source of happiness is for internal development rather than pursuit of these pleasures rather than for spiritual development. Okay. So any questions? I was gonna ask a question, but I can’t remember what it was. Does that make sense, do you think?
Do you think that if you really if we really integrate that more into the life, is this a basis for leading a less stressed life, an understanding of suffering? And also a very clear understanding of those the pursuit of the worldly dharmas. Is that is it is it practical? And can it be applied? Think that, you know, they’re going to be beautiful and young forever, and they’re going to be able to do, you know, all the things they used to do when they were twenty when they’re actually sixty and whatever.
And, yeah, if if people had that, yeah, that concept that that everything is in the family, a lot of people will be less stressed and happier. But just what’s happening, I mean, Buddhism is saying something, isn’t it? But this force of the forces of our society stronger than ever, I mean, to the other way? Yeah. Isn’t it more and more?
The temples the temples are there. Modern temples are these big shopping complexes, aren’t they? It’s a pleasure. Depends how you see beauty because I’ve seen many eighty year old women who beautiful. Yeah.
I don’t think beauty relates to age. I think it relates to what’s in your heart and where you lead your mind. Yeah. That’s that’s what we certainly, that’s right. That would be saying we say definitely in Buddhism.
It’s what’s what’s within you than the other thing. But I don’t know about the advertisers. Don’t say about that one. I was surprised to hear a story about the man who was doing the work and he wanted the praise because I thought he would have got joy from his work in seeing the results of his work helping people. I think so.
This is a because there are a couple of examples of people who I know or something similar, right? And you think that in one way, you know, that they had actually you know, that he would actually say, you know, that all I’ve got to show for is this. They’re quite shocked that he wouldn’t have understood the other thing. It may be that in those cases, I think what can happen is that people because it can go because it’s going on a long time, right? And over a period of time, there can be resentment going on because they’re putting a lot of this effort into doing some particular project which other people are going to receive benefit for because in both these cases, was true.
Other people were going to receive any benefit, but the other people weren’t doing too much to support them. Right? So that they feel yeah, they feel that they’ve been let down. A lot of other people don’t get involved because they see that person as their ego trip, right? It becomes a difficult one but I think it’s a pretty common one that can happen and maybe in general, but certainly in dharma centers, definitely can happen.
People Workplace. Doctor: Yeah, yeah. So I think it’s true from one point you stop and you think, Well, wait a minute, you didn’t do it for the sake of the praise. Surely you did it for the sake of that’s all you’ve got, that’s all you need. But somehow people still, even though that’s the case, they do want to hear those words.
And again, even if you give them those words, in the case of another person I was thinking about, even if they received the praise once, that still wouldn’t be enough twelve months later. They still want to have more. They want to hear that. So the motivations I think can be mixed. I think this is what happens quite often.
You’re complexed about why people do things and I think it can be it looks like it can be the two things. One thing is that there is a genuine sort of altruism and so on, but at another level, there is this other thing that’s taking place. But it is true. It’s unfortunate when it gets to the point that the person becomes embittered by it. Other people could even, from that point of view, think it’s a bit of a joke, you know?
Not in the person who’s experienced that, I think it’s a joke, other people, you know, especially those say, What? What we’ve got to show for it is a thangka. Yeah. Because of course. Praise.
Praise could be a kind of kindness. Kindness. Oh, you mean someone giving the praise? It’s kind to give praise, you mean? Yes, that’s right.
It’s there’s a difference. You see, there’s a difference, of course, to say that it may be appropriate our responsibility and, of course, we want things to work smoothly, that it is appropriate to praise people. But what we’re talking about is from the individual’s point of view as a practitioner, the problem is if you’ve got the mind that craves after praise, right, from your side, it’s creating problems for you. Do you see that? But that doesn’t mean to say at the same time that isn’t as an individual say as any individual, say as me as an individual supposedly is a Dharma student, then from my point of view, then I should be lessening the mind that’s craving after praise, hearing praise, and at the same time, probably cultivating a mind to sense where it’s appropriate to praise others.
So those two are contradictory. That’s where the key word, I think, is this word craving. So I mean, the conventions of the ordinary world, it’s very much to say, know, about the emphasis you’ve got to, you know, you should praise people or I should be praised or whatever but in Buddhism, we really are we’ve got some radical departure and view there saying that if it’s a problem for you if you’ve got the mind of praise after praise. You’re go all up and down like this. The other thing to do with all these eight worldly dharmas, an important thing to mention, was that when you’ve got those, it’s very difficult to not create non virtual because in terms of wanting material things, if that’s the number one priority, you’re going to do what you can do to get those material things.
Same with your enjoyment, same with hearing the praise, same with reputation, all these things. You’ll walk all over others in order to get these things, isn’t it? If you give those priority. It’s like the sporting world, it’s very difficult. How are they going to keep sports clean of drugs?
How are you going to stop people cheating? Because if the number one thing is to win, which it is, right? It seems to be the number one thing is to win, right? If you’ve got the opportunity to cheat, you’re going to cheat. If that’s the number one thing, right, because ethics is going to take a second place to winning and you expect these eighteen year old kids to be, you know, the same you know, the coach and everyone else in the team is telling you, You’ve to do what you can to win but at the same time, you’re supposed to be ethical about it.
That’s a difficult one to expect. I think a Buddhist football team would probably never win Olympic Games. Buddhist sporting team would try to win the Olympic Games. Maybe they would never win it. They wouldn’t even get a bronze.
Yeah. Because, you know, yeah, I just don’t think that level of ruthlessness. I may be wrong, but in another way, who cares? I think to where you need to be skilled. You need to be skilled?
Yeah, not necessarily. You have to be competitive though. I don’t know what’s wrong with being competitive. Is that a bad thing? Well, depends, I guess, but where it is that if it’s the thing is if you’re driven by the desire to win, right, and winning is the number one thing and it can very much be tied in with because it’s very much tied in with, you know, the reputation, getting the gold medal, being seen to be on the dais, right?
It’s very difficult to not develop jealousy towards the people who are winning. Very difficult. It’s a big ask to Yes. You know, right? If the number one thing in your life is to win, right?
If it’s a different thing, if the number one thing is, you know, ethically and winning and not winning, right? But to play fairly, that’s a different thing. But what seems to be colder, that’s not what’s really colder, don’t know. It’s a winning thing. Interesting.
Yeah. Work in a competitive environment. What is that? What do you in marketing, in sales, in radio. And one of the one of the things that I’ve been terrible since.
One of the things I honestly have noticed sometimes is the little voice in my head. If something good happens to someone else, I hear this little voice that, oh, why isn’t that me? And even though the next day something really good may happen to me, and I say, that’s great. You know, I want to I want to silence that little voice more and more, and I want to feel more happiness for the other people. Yeah.
And it’s I wonder when I think this is in our can be in your nature in that environment, and I think it’s a challenge. But the thing you said you said that you are you saying at one level you’d like to develop the rejoicing in others’ good fortune? Absolutely. But the problem is in that environment it’s not seem to be the It’s hard. I think it’s difficult.
Yeah. Because the way they run it like a like a sporting very similar to a sporting philosophy. Yeah. And it’s hard. So it’s challenging within that environment.
Yeah. And it’s very important to me to maintain my principles. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
I would think that that’s where, and I guess that’s where some people do decide depending on what the sort of job is and they may decide certain jobs are no longer appropriate to work in. I’m not suggesting yours, but when people become involved in Buddhism they sometimes think about it, and having established a certain set of values, they’re changing and they’re saying that the place that they’re working at is not consistent with that. It could be like sharpening a needle at both ends, So it can can happen. And as you said, the sporting world, from what I can see, it’s you know, maybe it’s wrong, not right for me to say totally ruthless but certainly many of its cases there are. It’s like that.
And unfortunately as well, we see the looks like with the example of the Australian tennis players that They might be coming well, in one way, they’re not even doing that, but competitive spirit, but there’s a lot of there’s a vacuum in the other internal development area, you know, winning at all costs. There’s an absence of other internal development taking place. Okay. Okay. Okay.