Latest / Lama Lena Teachings / [1/3] The Four Uncommon Dzogchen Samayas (Amsterdam, Jun 2023)

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[1/3] The Four Uncommon Dzogchen Samayas (Amsterdam, Jun 2023) · Lama Lena Teachings

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_03: Good morning.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_03: Good morning.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_03: Good morning.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah,
• 0:08
  I've got
• 0:12
  to have the iPad.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_03: I think that's all I need for the moment.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_02: Make yourselves comfortable.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, would you?
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to knock it over.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: We'll stop there.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: Good morning, everyone.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_03: It's good to see you all again.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_03: For those of you who are here for the first time today,
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_03: there's been a slight change in time schedule for the afternoon session.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_03: So instead of commencing at 3 p.m.,
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: it's going to commence at 4 p.m. That's because the Lama needs a nap.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_03: So we'll have a larger kind of lunch break in between sessions.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_03: So we just want to remind you also just,
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_03: if you're leaving the room,
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_03: just to bring any valuable belongings with you during the break.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah, we'll reconvene then at four.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, great.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, there's going to be homework this morning.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_03: You get to do it over
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: lunch, don't worry.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yin and Yang,
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_02: Sunyata and Bodhisitta,
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: not separate, together.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: If you think that on purpose,
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: when you go like this to do any kind of manlang,
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: after a while,
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: every time you go like this,
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: those thoughts will just automatically go, and you won't have to remember anymore.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's little tricks like this all through the Tibetan system.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: For example, how many people here just love chocolate?
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: How many people here who just love chocolate don't let themselves have
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_02: as much chocolate as they love for digestive or other reasons?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_02: So here's what you do.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_02: This is a Tibetan trick.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_02: Except they do it with rich buttered tea.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_02: And Samba, which they love, the way you love chocolate.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_02: Whenever you are going to do a session,
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: at least once a day,
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_02: a proper session,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: sitting on your meditation seat,
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: either using a text or not, beginning it with a bodhisitta and refuge.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_02: Keep a piece of chocolate there.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: Separately wrapped really good chocolate bites.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Sit down, put the chocolate in the mouth, and begin.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: The little boys and the little girls who begin in the Dharma,
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: who are
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_02: considered for a career of it and being trained,
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: it's an education,
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: when they get to be about Sixteen to eighteen they get to choose whether they want
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_02: that career or something else because they're taught other skills as well.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_02: But the first thing we do is we give them something delicious in their mouth
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_02: that they really like every time they do Dharma.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: So it gives them endorphins.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: Little kids get endorphins from food, sugar.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: That's why they're always after candy.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: So we do something that gives them endorphins every time they do this.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: Every time they recite
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: or read a text.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_02: After a while,
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: when they're older and not that food focused,
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: every time they recite or read a text, they get endorphins.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's very helpful.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Do it to yourself.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: Chocolate.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: See, the whole thing about Dharma practice is it only works if you do it.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of us, we'd rather think about doing it.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yes, I'm going to do this and I'm going to do that in a minute.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_02: But first I'm going to sit here and think about the clothes I'm going to buy tomorrow.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: What I'm cooking for supper.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_02: Whether or not my friend actually loves me.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to sit and think about this.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: When I'm done thinking about it, then I'm going to meditate.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_02: In a minute.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: In a minute.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_02: In a minute.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not the only one who's had this experience, am I?
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right, so you know that we're going to procrastinate, we're going to distract ourselves.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: See, you have this thing called the survival reflex.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: It wishes to maintain the illusion of an independent, self-existent entity.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: And it wants to pretend that entity is immortal, will never die.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: And it uses every tool at its disposal to do that.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: That is the opposite That's, I guess
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: you'd call it the devil, Maya.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_02: It tries to maintain the illusion.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: Even for an advanced practitioner, you are going to have the dance of Mara's sons and daughters.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: And you have to not grab and not duck.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: So there is no cheating.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not wearing it today because this is such a good chair, but I have a meditation sash.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_02: Supporting your body with straps, chairs, and all sorts of other
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: things is not cheating.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: If you happen to be from the southern Terai,
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: genetically the people there are slender,
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: with very thin thighs, And relatively balanced length of limb.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: The Dutch have much more length of limb.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: Legs and arms are longer compared to the torso than the people there.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: Do I see anyone who's got that little Southern Nepali build?
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, anyway, that build sits in a full lotus really well.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: And when the hands are brought in to four fingers below the navel like this,
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: They sit in the lap there.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's not true for a lot of us.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_02: For a lot of us,
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_02: we have to put a pillow there on top of the legs to get them to sit comfortably
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: without having to hold them up and have them in the right spot.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_02: Tibetans have very short legs, large hands and feet.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: We say they have short legs so they can ride the mountain ponies
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_02: without their feet dragging on the ground.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: So what you have to do is using your common sense,
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: which is one of the most important tools for the practice of Dharma,
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: support your body in a proper position with the channels in alignment.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: Find out the one that works for you.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: Go on eBay or Amazon.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: And start looking up meditation seats, meditation sashes, meditation.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_02: In fact,
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_02: we're going to have some people on my website selling meditation sashes who want
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: to make a little extra money for themselves.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_02: Except on my website, you can't buy one for yourself.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_02: You can only buy one for someone else as a gift.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: And then perhaps someone will buy one for you.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: It works.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: You'd be surprised.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_02: It works anyway.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_02: And then you get both a meditation sash and some gay one.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: What I'm saying is there's things that go around the small of your back
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: and hold your knees up with little cups.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: I've seen all sorts of inventions out there.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Find the one that works for your body.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: Find a shop that sells them so you can try them all on.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: To be supported in a relaxed way so that you're not using your muscles
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: to hold your back straight is going to help incredibly.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_02: You should be so balanced and comfortable that you can fall asleep in that position.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: When I was younger and more flexible, I could spend the night in a full lotus.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_02: Asleep in a gondry.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: What I really want to do is encourage you to use all the tricks and not to think it's cheating.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, the chocolate.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, the meditation sash, the special seat.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_02: We had a young man who was doing solo practice, very gifted practitioner, a Lama now.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_02: In fact, if anybody wants their very own really cool Lama that speaks English, he's available.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_03: Nobody knows him yet.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: Talk to Karen.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: He's in the sponsorship program.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_02: Monk Sona.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: He's got gray hair like me now, but he's an amazing practitioner.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: Anyway, he had polio as a child.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_02: So when he was doing salum,
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: we had to build my teacher,
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: his teacher,
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: who is also a friend and someone I consider a teacher in Sopema,
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_02: who doesn't speak English but is a great salum master.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_02: We built a special seat and sashes for him to support his body in spite
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_02: of one half being a bit shriveled.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: On the lower half and so he wasn't even of his butt so one butt had to have a wedge
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_02: under it and this and the other.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_02: Good old foam mattresses and a sharp knife.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: He can make anything.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_02: A little bit of a glue gun.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't cheating and it really helped him when he was studying the Tsalam practices.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_02: Which was quite a long retreat that he did with Lama Jigme,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: or Jigme Rinpoche, who's an amazing, solemn teacher.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: If any of you are willing to learn enough Tibetan to study with him, he's out there.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: Doesn't speak English.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_02: Old fashioned guy.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_02: Old school.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: Do you understand what I'm saying about make it fun, make it taste good, make it pleasurable?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: Do you understand why?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: Because you won't do it if you don't, will you?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: I wish I could make an Enlightenment video game so that you would play it
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: and it would work, but that is beyond my capability.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Is that called
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: the drill?
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_02: It can be, but it's not on video yet.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: How Nundro is so cool.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: The incredible experiences you can have while doing Nundro is amazing.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: I recommend it, but I don't insist on it.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't insist on any number.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: You just do it till you get experiences.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: Nyams are signposts.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: Go to the signpost, then turn left.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: Enough of a digression.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: But these digressions have information that is of great value to you.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: That for a Tibetan goes without saying.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: But being an NG, I tend to open my mouth and say all that crap.
• 13:35
  [music]
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: .
• 13:45
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• 13:50
  [music]
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: .
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• 14:15
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• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: .
• 14:16
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• 14:17
  [music]
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Chaginwari Lama
• 14:45
  [music]
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: Nyandu dangyandran Lama Namla Solvadev.
• 15:06
  [music]
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: The Four Uncommon Samayas of the Great Perfection.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously written by a scholar, Siltram Zampo, very great scholar in the 1800s.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, the way I was taught this was not as four
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: uncommon Samayas,
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: but as a singular, a central Samaya.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Which was utterly simple.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_02: In Sutrayana,
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: Mahayana Sutrayana,
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_02: you take the Bodhisattva vows,
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: which are quite complex and intended as guidelines, rubber buggy bumpers.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: There's things in the bowling alley that keeps your ball from bouncing into
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: the next lane if you're a klutz.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: The Bodhisattva vows.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: When you come within the Mahayana
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: to enter into Vajrayana and practice
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: the tantric precepts,
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: you receive the tantric precepts, which are also a further addition of complexity.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: It gets more and more complex,
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: as do the sadhanas,
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: The visualizations until it
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_02: gets to the peak of complexity and simplifies totally
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_02: in Dzogchen.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: Each Samaya overrides the previous ones.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: So your Bodhisattva vows override the eight, six,
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: eight Samyas of a practitioner in
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_02: basic Sutrayana, whether it's Mahayana or not.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then your Tantric vows override your Bodhisattva vows.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: And then your Zogchen vow, one, not four.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_02: There's four angles to look at
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: that one.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: Overrides all of that and it is very simple.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: And the delight of it is you cannot break it.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: It is adamantine and unbreakable.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_02: This is why my teacher fell off his throne laughing when he told it to me and gave it to me.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_02: The vow is very simple.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_02: Never to separate from semni,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: big mind, natural mind, tunni,
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: What's that,
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: dharmata,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: dharmadhatu, the union of dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, nirmanakaya.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_02: Real mind, natural mind, ground of mind, never to separate from open awareness.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, How could you get separate from your own self?
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: You see?
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: Edmontine and unbreakable.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_02: But you're not going to 100% believe me when I tell you that.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_02: Because you are experiencing confusion.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_02: And sometimes it feels realer than this.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my God, I am just so fucked up.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know that one?
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Periodically you feel it.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody feels it.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: It's just one of those things, you know?
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_02: Goes by, you don't have to entertain it.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: You don't have to slather it all over yourself when it goes by, you can just wave.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: It will continue to go by.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_02: I am personal friends with a few high llamas.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: Just the way things went down because in places I've been the only one they can talk
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: to because it's me.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: Tibetan.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_02: You know, run into them in some odd place somewhere.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody has that experience.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_02: Oh fuck, I'm all fucked up and I just did it all wrong.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: Even high llamas.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter because it's just nothing, made of nothing.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have duration unless you grab it and amplify it and tell it a story.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't have substance.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: So who cares if it drifts through your
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: thoughts?
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's the only difference whether you grab it and
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: Or you just let it drift on by, it's like, yeah, yeah, that thing again.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: So because of that,
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: it is very easy to not recognize the innate and
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_02: automatic nature of
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_02: the Zogchen precept.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_02: How can you separate from your own mind?
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you can separate from your body.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I can cut it up and put it in the four corners and you're not in there.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: You're somewhere else by now.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, I just taught you the Dzogchen preset.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_03: You do want more words, right?
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: Scholars.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: You gotta have them and I'm delighted you got a few here.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Then I don't have to do that.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: So the way it is said here in the text as there are four modes,
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: four ways of abiding by the Samaya.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_02: It is a matter of remaining within the essence of the wisdom of the great perfection
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: by these four modes or methods.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: However,
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: since the wisdom of the great perfection is utterly natural,
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: when you stop resisting it, there it is.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: When you just let go of the other crap,
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: what else is there besides Zogchen and the great perfection and the innate wisdom?
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_02: Just let go.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_02: Or somebody stamps on your little fingers often enough until you finally let go.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_02: My experience.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: The first is named non-existence.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, you can get the text.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_02: It's available.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: Somebody will send you a URL.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: Probably meet you.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_02: Should you want it.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_02: Or posted or something.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_02: The self occurring natural Samaya.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's what I said to you, except that's what it says in the text.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_02: And I was using ordinary words.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: That is the primordially pure essence of awareness beyond all elaboration.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: Is the Samaya of non-existence.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: Primordial purity, innate unfuck-up-a-bleness is what I call it.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: The word in Tibetan is kata.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know those white scarves that you are
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_02: always giving people that you wrap up
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_02: the cookies in and it's wrapping paper, it's a gesture, it's everything.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: And then when they're too old to do that, use them to clean pots.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: Or make dog leashes.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: Those are called kata.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: They are the symbol of your own innate, unlosable, natural, unfuckableness.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: All the things that you think are problems are just will-o'-the-wisps drifting by.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: So kata, herein, if you want the fancy terms, it's primordial purity.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_02: When you offer it to someone, you're offering them the best of yourselves.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_02: The part of you that cannot become distorted, which is really the totality of you.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_02: The rest has neither duration nor substance and therefore need not be bothered with.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: This is the Samaya of non-existence because there is nothing within it to be maintained.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Understand that?
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Nothing to keep, nothing to support.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: How much effort are you all putting into holding the sky up?
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: Have you been building pillars just to make sure?
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Samaya.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: The Samaya in which there is nothing to maintain involves simply remaining within
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: the natural great wisdom of spontaneously present perfection.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: You want to have a look at that right now?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, whatever you be thinking, don't stop.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: Don't try to stop the thinking.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's just the sparkle The shimmer of the clear light nature of open awareness.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Why would you want it to stop sparkling?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's pretty.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_02: Instead, relax your eyeballs.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: You've heard me tell you how to do that before.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_02: Channels in alignment, relaxed eyeballs,
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: Relax your attention from point focus on what you're thinking
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_02: to a wide, open,
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_02: vast awareness on where the thoughts,
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_02: feelings and sensations are occurring, perceptions are occurring.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_02: That.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_02: You didn't just make something.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_02: All you did was shift your attention
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: to something that was already there.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_02: You can look at the earth or you can look at the sky.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_02: It has absolutely no effect on the earth or the sky which way you look.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_02: A simple don't grab, don't try to maintain open awareness.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_02: Don't try to maintain the perception.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: Of the sky-like infinite openness of awareness.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: Relax.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: As that, without trying to keep anything.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: If it's good enough for this moment, it's good enough.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_02: Don't try to stop thinking.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_02: Don't try to stop the moving.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_02: Don't prefer the stillness to the moving.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Just relax.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: It is in this very expanse of vastness
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: that the phenomena of thoughts,
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: feelings, and perceptions dance without substance or duration.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: They're like sparkle.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: You are the aware-awakeness, the seer of the sparkle.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: You are the light,
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: the clear light,
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: that is inherent to and fills
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: the sky-space-like vastness of natural mind.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, it sparkles up.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: It can sparkle.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_02: Just relax.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: Stop trying to make anything out of it.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_02: Stop trying to find something that makes your eyes bug out and your mouth drop open.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_02: That's just going to look like a goldfish.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_02: Just relax as it is.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Utter simplicity.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's not new.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to be a better person to relax.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: Any idiot can relax.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't have to fix everything first.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: There is nothing more to be done.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: You simply remain in the non-dual recognition.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: However, your perception of this will move because perceptions do, don't cling.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: It is a dynamic, ongoing relaxation.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: A moment by moment choice
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: of whether to grab something drifting by and reify it
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_02: and wander off down there.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: Or just sit relaxed and let the display unravel in whatever time it takes to do that.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: Each moment is a choice of this.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: Relax or grab.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: Whether you choose in a given moment to relax or to grab makes no difference to this.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: It is there whether you know it or not.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: The jellyfish.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: Haven't a clue of most anything.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_02: Very few creatures think as little as a jellyfish.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_02: And yet, I'm thinking of moon jellies.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_02: They also have this inherent as their true nature.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, you can't tell them to relax into it.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_02: They're pretty relaxed.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: But not quite.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's an incompleteness in the relaxation of a sleeping animal.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_02: It is not quite this relaxation.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: The relaxation of a drunk, drooling.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_02: That's a relaxation but not this relaxation that I'm talking about.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have a better word other than relax.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: But this is an awake relaxation.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_02: Simply remain without ever departing from the suchness in
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: which there are no boundaries between observance and breakage.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_02: You cannot break this Samaya.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_02: You can only think you did.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: That was a thought.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: You all know what thoughts are by now, right?
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's the one in the text called non-existence.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_01: Are there questions?
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, come on, wake up, guys.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_03: A very simple one.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_03: If you can say a couple of things about the realization of the I.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_01: Turn your head to the right.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: Your eyes are looking to the right, so you're noticing what's to the right.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: It catches your attention.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: In a moment,
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: I will ask you to do the same thing to the left,
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_01: but without allowing anything to the left to catch your attention.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: Turn your head to the left without allowing anything over there to catch your attention.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: Didn't work, did it?
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_01: The attention follows the eyeballs.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: Once this is clearly noticed,
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: you've got a marvelous tool to move your attention around when you want to.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right now,
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: what we want to do,
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: from beginningless time,
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: as critter upon critter upon critter as we get,
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: Kinda sorta reborn,
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: only that's a whole
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_02: nother ball of wax that doesn't work quite the way it's assumed
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_02: to.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_02: You just think it does.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: Your next life, it's not the same person.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_02: You're dead.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: It's the results of the same person, but there will be changes.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_02: You go from male to female, big difference in hormones, very confusing.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_02: Did that this time.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_02: Oh man, was I a compute demon.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: The point I'm making here is that you have been in point focus forever.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: Point focus,
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: you look at this,
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_01: you think about this,
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: Your attention is on what you think of this,
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: how you feel about what you think of this,
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: and what you're going to do about what you thought about this, and how you felt.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's continuous.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: Point focus upon point focus upon point focus.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: This has been your experience
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_02: this morning.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_02: Breakfast, coffee.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_02: What do I have to do?
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_02: Where's my comb?
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_02: Where's my toothbrush?
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: Point focus to point focus.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: So we want to open it out of point focus.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that we are not in point focus on the thoughts,
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: but opening and relaxing the attention into the vastness of mind itself.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_01: So we're going to do a trick.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_02: It's not cheating, trust me.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: Take your eyeballs,
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: look straight ahead,
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_01: straight up and down,
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: slight double chin with it, pulled back to get this, get it all in alignment.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay,
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: there we go.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: Look at a spot two meters in front of your eyes.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_02: Point focus on that spot in empty space.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_02: Now let go.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_02: There are little muscles that move the lens of your eye from distant focus to close focus.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_02: If you want to feel the muscles, put your hand in front of your face.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_02: Look at your fingerprints.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_02: Now look at me through your fingers.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_02: Now look at your fingerprints.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_02: Now look at me through your fingers.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: See, feel those muscles shifting?
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the muscles you want to completely relax.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: So you pick a point about two meters in front of your nose.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: Focus on the point.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_02: Then let go of the point focus.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_02: Relax those muscles.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_02: At first it gets a little blurry.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_02: And then it goes to a point where your peripheral focus
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_02: and your central focus are equally clear, not clear.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_02: Auras become visible.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_02: This is the trick for aurocyte, which is used medically.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_02: Medical practitioners,
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_02: the auras that you see when you do this,
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_02: is useful for diagnosis if you study the subject.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_02: However, we are not doing medical, we're doing Dzogchen.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_02: So, let your eyes relax into this.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_02: Don't focus on the auras,
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: don't pay any attention to those, they're just a nyam, an experience going by.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_02: But allow your attention to follow your eyeballs
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_02: into a non-point focus called open awareness.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_02: It is the same awareness that point
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_01: focuses, but it's not doing, performing that action.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: It is relaxed and open.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_02: Instead of paying attention to what
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: you are thinking,
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: the attention expands into where those thoughts arise and vanish.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_01: Don't hold your eyes too wide open or they'll itch.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_02: But don't close them either.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_02: When you first begin to learn this tricky things the mind does, it sees things.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_02: They are distracting.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_02: It's almost like you're dreaming and the dreams come in.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_02: Don't pay any attention to the occurrences which are moving through.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_02: They might be attractive or frightening, never mind, leave them be.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_02: Just relax.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_02: Enjoy.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_02: Relax.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_02: Don't even grab the relaxation.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_02: Let it be natural, easy and dynamic.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: No need to grab the visions that arise.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_01: Did that answer your question about the eye gaze?
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, thank you.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_03: May I ask further?
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_03: So at times, it's very easy to keep a relaxed gaze.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_03: And it feels also very fresh, very refreshing.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_03: Other times, I might encounter two problems.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_03: One is that the eye goes around with birds.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_03: Or that my eyes get crossed.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_01: So two things are happening.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: When you get the burning sensation,
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: your eyes are a little bit too open and they're not tearing enough.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_01: Blink.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's okay to just sometimes go like that and open them again.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_01: It is physical.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: If you have allergies,
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: it will be particularly hard to have the eye gaze during your allergy season
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: because your eyes are irritated anyway.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_01: However, the eye gaze is only a tool.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: Once you have used it a lot
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: and you find it easy to make the shift from point focus
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_01: of attention, you don't necessarily need to do that much with the eyes.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit will happen naturally,
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: but you don't have to be as extreme as when you're first learning it.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_01: Make sense?
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_03: It just becomes difficult when you're doing practices like Nam Karten.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_03: It becomes difficult when you're doing practices like Nam Karten.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yes.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: Remember,
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_01: although it is not as important here in Holland as it is in the Indian lands,
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_01: it is advised when you're doing any sky work not to let the sun fall on your head.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_02: We do lose people to sunstroke out in the tropics who don't pay attention to that.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: Also, if you're doing, say, corpse pose with sky gazing, you don't do it at noon.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_01: You do it, say, when the sun is to the east, you're to the west of a tree.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: So that the sky is right overhead, but the sun is behind the tree.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: Once it gets above the tree and starts hitting you, it's time to go have lunch or something.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_01: Sky gazing is often difficult for this because of the eye irritation.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: Some people find that they get dry eye.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_01: From pushing it too far.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: And then they have to use certain eye drops.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_01: We use the Himalaya eye drops up in the caves when somebody's had an accident.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_01: But it's better to avoid the accidents by having common sense
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_01: about what your body needs while you're practicing.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's all very romantic to look at the
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_02: austerities of yogis.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_02: However, that's more of a Hindu trip and all that's going to get you is magic powers.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_02: Trust me, you do not want those.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_02: They're really more trouble than they're worth.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: More questions?
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_01: More pieces of yours?
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_03: Come for it.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, the eye crossing, when you relax completely, is it, you just let it happen?
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_01: Let it happen.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: You're not supposed to be so,
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_01: you let it happen but don't pay too much attention to what the eyes are doing.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_01: One of the problems with this method that I have found is that people tend to obsess
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_01: then with the eye gaze.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of using it as a tool, look,
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: you pick up the Phillips head screwdriver or the special wrench to get the back off
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: the computer box.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: But once the back's off, you want to put that down and pick up a different tool.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_01: So you have to remember not to take your tools too seriously.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: And the eye gazes are tools.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_01: The purpose is to relax into open awareness and to do things to help you do that.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_01: But once you've done that, don't worry about the eyes so much.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_01: The reason we don't meditate with closed eyes is because
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_02: at some point your meditation needs to merge with your daily life.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_02: At which point,
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_02: if your habit is to have your
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: eyes closed, you're going to be bumping into things.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_01: Which is counterproductive.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_01: And you won't be able to drive or ride your bike.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_01: Because you can't do that with your eyes closed.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_01: So start out with them a little bit open.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_01: Also, one of the problems people have is they try to hold them too open.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_02: And actually you won't.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_02: Like that.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_02: See, the mouth's a little open, the eyes are a little open, but not much.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_01: When you've been doing this a lot,
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_01: you're going to find that as soon as you put yourself in the position,
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_01: your mind just falls into that relaxation.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_01: No effort.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's become a habit.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's like anybody here who smokes or vapes.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_01: When you're stressed and you pick up a smoke or a vape,
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_01: in that moment it relaxes you because it's a habit that you use
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_02: that to relax.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's the pause that you have accustomed yourself to.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_01: Habits can be useful or detrimental depending on the habit and what you're doing with it.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_01: More questions from you?
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: Other person.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yes?
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes when I do this relaxation, I sense that my energy in my channels stops flowing.
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_03: When you do what?
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_03: Direct relaxation.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_03: So I feel that the energy stops flowing in my channels.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_03: And is it okay?
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_01: How does that feel?
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: It should settle.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_01: But it's still flowing, it's just flowing very subtly.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like nothing, everything stops.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's fine.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, not a problem.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_01: Even sometimes it feels like you're not breathing.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the chi doesn't feel like it's flowing.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_01: It hasn't actually stopped.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, for people who can't get it to slow down, it's actually supposed to do that.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_01: What you're talking about.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's fine.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's good.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's a nice nyam.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the end-all be-all.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's a nyam.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a good signpost of relaxation.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: But a lot of times when people are trying to get it to do that, they can't.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_02: That's why this here is another trick.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yogis have lots of tricks.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_02: You breathe in relatively rapidly through your nose, down,
• 50:27
  SPEAKER_02: all the way down,
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_02: fill yourself fully, and then you breathe
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_01: out slowly through your mouth.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think there's a count that this is sometimes taught with, but I don't remember the numbers.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's like this.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_02: It settles the qi in your channels.
• 50:56
  SPEAKER_02: If it was, you know, sometimes your qi is going,
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_01: you know that feeling like too much coffee?
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: So this will settle it.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_03: Is there a trick how to recognize if I block my qi at that stage?
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_01: I have not heard of that occurring.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a new one on me.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_01: Block your chi from what and where.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe some fears to feel something during the relaxation.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_01: Usually,
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: people experience that,
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_01: in my perception, as a tightness in a specific place in the body.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like here, or here, or here.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_01: When it is located there are practices to unravel the block in the chakras.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's one of the rushens.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_01: It is the inner body rushen.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_01: I teach it periodically, but I'm not teaching it this weekend.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think you have some blocks in your chakras,
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_01: you might want to try that practice and see if you feel a greater smoothness
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_01: to your Qi flow after.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_01: The Qi actually does slow down, both with age, whether you're a practitioner
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_02: or not.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_02: Well, time speeds up.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_02: Not so much the chief slows down, but the time speeds up.
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_01: You move through time at a much different pace as you get old.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_01: Any old folks in here have noticed that time has definitely sped up?
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_01: You're moving through it too fast.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_01: Summers are like a blink, and then fucking it's Christmas again.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_01: I just got the decorations down.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_02: Remember how long summers were when you were six?
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_02: Time is not a steady state.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_02: Don't believe it's a steady state just because some scientist told you so.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_02: Go poke it at yourself and see.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_02: People believe that clocks are real.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_02: They believe that hours are real rather than mind-made phenomena.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: Bretons don't have hours.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, now they have wristwatches, but in the past it's like when the sun is there.
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_02: I'll meet you when the sun's high and we'll have lunch.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_02: The sun's going down, it's time for me to go do my practice.
• 54:04
  SPEAKER_02: In fact,
• 54:04
  SPEAKER_02: when people ask me how to schedule their retreats,
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_02: it's always according to where the sun is.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_02: And it's different in summer and winter, especially this far north.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_02: Winter Retreat has a very different schedule than Summer Retreat.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_02: I finally stuck them up on the website for people.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_02: The just standard Tibetan schedule for retreats.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_02: So your Chi's movement will change
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_01: from childhood through adulthood to old age.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_01: Time will change and as you practice You will become more aware of the fast and slow
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_01: of your cheese movement.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_01: You will become more aware of, say, the effect on your cheese movement of coffee.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_02: Or mate.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_02: Or alcohol.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_02: All of which will affect that.
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_02: Or meditation.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_01: A blockage is another matter.
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_01: It usually is experienced as a tightness.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_01: Is there any location you're having an issue with?
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_01: Like right now, it's more because of the position of my body.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, fix that.
• 55:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_01: You probably need a backrest.
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_01: They have these nice little seats.
• 55:36
  SPEAKER_01: They fold up about the size of a nominal aphasia, laptop.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_01: A modern laptop.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_01: And they have a seat that you put on the floor and sit on.
• 55:52
  SPEAKER_01: You put a cushion on that if you need one so that you're at a slight slant.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_01: Some people need that slant for the sake of the knees.
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_01: Some of them have straps to hold your knees up if your knees don't go down flat.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then they have a backrest.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_01: They unfold like that.
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_01: And they can be extremely comfortable.
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_01: I got one for an old yogi, one of my teachers, Annie Mung Chung.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_01: Because Rinpoche gave her a high status seat because she's one of his lineage holder
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_01: among the Tibetans.
• 56:24
  SPEAKER_02: Only didn't have a back rest and her back was hurting because she's,
• 56:28
  SPEAKER_02: goodness, getting on for a hundred I think.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_02: So I got her one of those and it works quite well.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_03: Is that the camping chair ones or is it specifically for meditation?
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_03: It's a meditation one.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_03: It might be.
• 56:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't quite remember but they're pretty good and they're quite portable
• 56:54
  SPEAKER_01: and they give you that bit of lumbar support that you need if your back doesn't want
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_01: to do it by itself.
• 57:02
  SPEAKER_01: So you may wish to experiment with
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_01: Things that help, props.
• 57:13
  SPEAKER_01: If you find it in a place,
• 57:15
  SPEAKER_01: we'll talk further
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_02: together about where you found it and how to get it moving.
• 57:21
  SPEAKER_02: Some chakras are easier to dredge than others and there's different methods.
• 57:29
  SPEAKER_02: Other questions?
• 57:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes when I sit through the picture,
• 57:38
  SPEAKER_03: I feel that the very road relaxed focus let my eyes start to wander around a bit.
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_03: But it doesn't feel point focused.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_03: It feels like I can stay in the same life stage, even just walking.
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 57:55
  SPEAKER_01: Do it.
• 57:56
  SPEAKER_01: But don't try to maintain that.
• 58:00
  SPEAKER_02: Allow it to extend itself if it does, but don't try to make it do that.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_02: If you try to make it do that, it's going to be counterproductive because that's a grasp.
• 58:18
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas at times it will just do that and that's great, go right ahead, take a walk in it.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_02: The way to cause that to happen occasionally For those of you interested,
• 58:33
  SPEAKER_02: is called gam, the second word of Garagdurji, and it's quick glances.
• 58:39
  SPEAKER_02: Periodically during the day, check and see if your mind's still there.
• 58:42
  SPEAKER_02: Do it often enough,
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_02: and what he is talking about experiencing begins to occur naturally at times.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_02: But don't force it.
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's a grasping, and that will switch it a bit.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_02: And what you'll be maintaining is an experience,
• 59:00
  SPEAKER_02: a perception, which it is possible to maintain for a very long time.
• 59:09
  SPEAKER_02: And then, shh, look.
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_02: And the problem is that if you get good at maintaining something,
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_02: and you die while maintaining it, you will have a delightful life in the God Rooms.
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_02: And then you will die again.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_02: And having used up the result of that cause,
• 59:35
  SPEAKER_02: it don't go well.
• 59:38
  SPEAKER_02: You can get all sorts of special, magical, fancy stuff from maintaining and from austerities.
• 59:50
  SPEAKER_02: But they wear off at very inopportune moments.
• 59:54
  SPEAKER_02: Leaving you scrabbling and in a mess,
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_02: I actually ended up,
• 1:00:01
  SPEAKER_02: after magicing up a mansion,
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_01: everything I could,
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_01: a pure silk wardrobe,
• 1:00:07
  SPEAKER_01: everything I could imagine,
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_01: I ended up working three
• 1:00:11
  SPEAKER_02: fucking jobs to support the whole thing.
• 1:00:14
  SPEAKER_02: God knows, maybe I'd still be there if that Gazzotti hadn't come and laughed at me.
• 1:00:21
  SPEAKER_02: So, don't encourage
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_02: Power.
• 1:00:28
  SPEAKER_02: Or anything else that requires maintenance.
• 1:00:30
  SPEAKER_02: It was after that episode that I asked the Tibetans if they had anything
• 1:00:34
  SPEAKER_02: that didn't require maintenance.
• 1:00:38
  SPEAKER_02: That's what got me into Dzogchen.
• 1:00:42
  SPEAKER_02: Because the Hindu methods are very effective at getting the magic.
• 1:00:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I had Indian disciples following me.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, it was a weird shit.
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_01: But it wore off.
• 1:00:59
  SPEAKER_02: Quite suddenly, and there I was, three jobs, I was exhausted.
• 1:01:05
  SPEAKER_02: Just to pay the dry cleaning bill,
• 1:01:07
  SPEAKER_02: the rent on the mansion, the two expensive men that I had in the mansion.
• 1:01:13
  SPEAKER_02: Lovely matchbook hands, a blonde and a very dark one.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_02: They were gorgeous.
• 1:01:18
  SPEAKER_02: One was French, one was Indian.
• 1:01:22
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, I was 21 maybe at the most, and no better than I should be.
• 1:01:31
  SPEAKER_01: Does this answer your question, including a few stories for amusement?
• 1:01:36
  SPEAKER_03: What can you do that you keep recognizing that you're doing it to prevent that you grab?
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_03: You didn't use the word grabbing.
• 1:01:48
  SPEAKER_01: To prevent grabbing?
• 1:01:51
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_01: Every time you notice you've grabbed something, let go.
• 1:01:56
  SPEAKER_03: There are moments that you do that you don't notice, only later.
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_01: Then as soon as you notice, you let go.
• 1:02:05
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, it's not going to be perfect.
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's why you practice.
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, you're going to notice you grabbed something because it felt good.
• 1:02:18
  SPEAKER_01: So you decided to keep it for a while.
• 1:02:21
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, this is a nice mood.
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_01: I think I'll maintain it.
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_01: I'm happy.
• 1:02:28
  SPEAKER_01: I like this.
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, let's keep this for a bit.
• 1:02:31
  SPEAKER_01: And then you notice you're doing that.
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: I find that that particular breath,
• 1:02:47
  SPEAKER_01: if I find I've grabbed something as it went by,
• 1:02:50
  SPEAKER_01: that particular breath helps me to release.
• 1:02:54
  SPEAKER_01: Because it slows the chi, it settles it.
• 1:03:00
  SPEAKER_01: And usually a grab is somewhere you've wrapped Qi around something in the channels.
• 1:03:10
  SPEAKER_01: You can think of yourself on a lot of levels.
• 1:03:12
  SPEAKER_01: You can think of the body on a lot of levels.
• 1:03:15
  SPEAKER_01: When you think of it as channels,
• 1:03:20
  SPEAKER_01: you can sort of see, feel how an emotional grab onto something is a
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_02: Pulling the channels like this.
• 1:03:33
  SPEAKER_02: There's also other channel exercises.
• 1:03:37
  SPEAKER_02: You all want a basic one?
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_02: The yawn.
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_02: Do you know the yawn?
• 1:03:42
  SPEAKER_02: Anybody not know the yawn?
• 1:03:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, I think I should teach it then.
• 1:03:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's really fast.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_01: As you in, okay, your channels.
• 1:03:54
  SPEAKER_01: Which are a manifestation of
• 1:03:56
  SPEAKER_02: your attention,
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_02: or you could say your attention is a manifestation of how you hold your channels.
• 1:04:07
  SPEAKER_01: Most of us, we walk around looking kind of egg-shaped.
• 1:04:12
  SPEAKER_01: If you look at a Tonko, which I don't have one with that right now up.
• 1:04:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think I can make it big enough on my iPad.
• 1:04:21
  SPEAKER_01: But if you look at one,
• 1:04:22
  SPEAKER_01: you'll see there's like a pointy spear around the head with little lines.
• 1:04:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then another one around the body with little lines.
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_01: So those are your channels.
• 1:04:38
  SPEAKER_01: They all come out of the chakras.
• 1:04:41
  SPEAKER_01: They say a chakra looks like a wheel.
• 1:04:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's a three-dimensional wheel.
• 1:04:47
  SPEAKER_01: That's why we carry the slinky to show you.
• 1:04:54
  SPEAKER_02: So a chakra...
• 1:05:00
  SPEAKER_02: I'll get this.
• 1:05:01
  SPEAKER_02: There.
• 1:05:08
  SPEAKER_02: Looks like this.
• 1:05:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, it's a wheel, and you can only draw it in two dimensions on a piece of paper.
• 1:05:16
  SPEAKER_02: Remember, all these texts are from before we had 3D holograms.
• 1:05:23
  SPEAKER_02: But this is actually closer to the shape.
• 1:05:26
  SPEAKER_01: These go around, but they also spiral out.
• 1:05:31
  SPEAKER_02: And then they curve in around you because you hold yourself in.
• 1:05:35
  SPEAKER_02: You hold yourself.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_02: You maintain yourself as a singularity.
• 1:05:40
  SPEAKER_02: Part of that is something you do with your channels.
• 1:05:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like in Refuge, Tsar Lung Tigli.
• 1:05:49
  SPEAKER_02: Tsa, the infinite openness, they actually have the potential of infinity.
• 1:05:55
  SPEAKER_02: Lung, Sambhogakaya, the life force that rides in it.
• 1:05:59
  SPEAKER_02: Tsa, Dharmakaya, Tigli, the creativity, the sparkle, Nirmanakaya.
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_02: So, there's all these little lines of light.
• 1:06:10
  SPEAKER_02: Tsa, channels, coming out of your chakras.
• 1:06:17
  SPEAKER_01: Normally they're wrapped around you.
• 1:06:19
  SPEAKER_01: Round your head because your attention is on your own stuff.
• 1:06:24
  SPEAKER_01: My life, my friends, my lunch.
• 1:06:27
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_01: So you hold them close in.
• 1:06:32
  SPEAKER_01: In this exercise we will unfurl them.
• 1:06:37
  SPEAKER_01: We will blow chi through them to make them go like this.
• 1:06:51
  SPEAKER_01: So as we inhale, Lung, which is the chi that rides in the channels, also air.
• 1:07:02
  SPEAKER_01: As we inhale,
• 1:07:03
  SPEAKER_01: we're going to inflate our channels that are like this and reach them out
• 1:07:11
  SPEAKER_01: to infinity.
• 1:07:13
  SPEAKER_01: Now, however you want to see the universe,
• 1:07:15
  SPEAKER_01: if you want to put marrow in the middle,
• 1:07:18
  SPEAKER_01: You reach them out past the four continents,
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_01: past the iron fence at the edge, into the eternal space beyond, above, and below.
• 1:07:30
  SPEAKER_01: Or you can go past the galaxy and past the local group and past the major group
• 1:07:38
  SPEAKER_01: that several local groups orbit in, local groups of galaxies.
• 1:07:42
  SPEAKER_01: However you like to perceive your universe,
• 1:07:47
  SPEAKER_01: Reach out as far as you can, not just this planet, with all your channels on the inhale.
• 1:07:56
  SPEAKER_01: At the peak of the inhale, do not close your glottis.
• 1:08:03
  SPEAKER_01: Bear down or do a kegel.
• 1:08:08
  SPEAKER_01: Do not do those things that you would do if you were doing tumor.
• 1:08:13
  SPEAKER_01: It will cause this noise.
• 1:08:18
  SPEAKER_01: Which is the way that she squeaks in the chandles and it hurts.
• 1:08:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's like nails on a blackboard.
• 1:08:24
  SPEAKER_01: You don't want to give a squeak.
• 1:08:26
  SPEAKER_01: So don't do the tummo thing of a Kegel with a bearing down.
• 1:08:32
  SPEAKER_01: Hold the air in your lungs for a moment just with your diaphragm and rib muscles.
• 1:08:39
  SPEAKER_02: Not by closing here.
• 1:08:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then slowly release it.
• 1:08:47
  SPEAKER_02: In through the nose and out through the mouth, but with this visualization.
• 1:08:51
  SPEAKER_02: And it is good to also move your
• 1:08:54
  SPEAKER_01: body like this.
• 1:08:58
  SPEAKER_01: So this is what it looks like.
• 1:09:15
  SPEAKER_02: Once you've done it a few times, it's easy and fast.
• 1:09:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's very similar to the first thing I told you to settle the G,
• 1:09:29
  SPEAKER_02: but it's done also with the visualization of your channels reaching all the way out
• 1:09:35
  SPEAKER_02: and then just relax.
• 1:09:36
  SPEAKER_02: Don't try to bring them in.
• 1:09:38
  SPEAKER_02: Just leave them, let go.
• 1:09:39
  SPEAKER_02: They'll come back in naturally.
• 1:09:43
  SPEAKER_02: They always do.
• 1:09:50
  SPEAKER_02: That is a very basic channel qi exercise
• 1:10:00
  SPEAKER_01: that can just help you let go
• 1:10:02
  SPEAKER_01: of your obsessions, at least for a little bit.
• 1:10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Other questions?
• 1:10:13
  SPEAKER_03: I'm a little bit confused between the teaching about,
• 1:10:16
  SPEAKER_03: like you explained,
• 1:10:18
  SPEAKER_03: resting in awareness,
• 1:10:20
  SPEAKER_03: and then I had other teaching where within this awareness,
• 1:10:24
  SPEAKER_03: we look for the eye,
• 1:10:26
  SPEAKER_03: and I found a little bit like...
• 1:10:27
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, you are looking at what's called a Rondrich, where you look for the eye.
• 1:10:35
  SPEAKER_01: That is a method
• 1:10:41
  SPEAKER_01: Methods are contained in the how-to's.
• 1:10:50
  SPEAKER_01: So this teaching that I just gave on
• 1:10:57
  SPEAKER_01: the first of the four uncommon sammias,
• 1:10:59
  SPEAKER_01: the one called non-existence,
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_01: this one
• 1:11:07
  SPEAKER_01: was without method, is-ness.
• 1:11:12
  SPEAKER_02: To come to there, Ron Rick is one of the methods.
• 1:11:21
  SPEAKER_01: Generally though,
• 1:11:23
  SPEAKER_01: if you try it too soon,
• 1:11:25
  SPEAKER_01: you will simply come to the knowledge that you don't exist,
• 1:11:31
  SPEAKER_01: which is utterly useless.
• 1:11:36
  SPEAKER_01: Because you will still feel
• 1:11:38
  SPEAKER_02: like you exist.
• 1:11:40
  SPEAKER_02: Knowing you don't exist, and then you get into some kind of nihilism usually from that.
• 1:11:46
  SPEAKER_02: So that method of Ronrich self-seeing,
• 1:11:51
  SPEAKER_02: I've heard it phrased, turn around and gaze into your own eyes.
• 1:11:54
  SPEAKER_02: Who's there?
• 1:12:01
  SPEAKER_01: It is done from the perspective of open awareness.
• 1:12:10
  SPEAKER_02: After the skill of relaxation,
• 1:12:14
  SPEAKER_01: because if done before the full skill of relaxation
• 1:12:18
  SPEAKER_02: into isness,
• 1:12:20
  SPEAKER_02: it will become distorted by focus on the idea of self, being or not being.
• 1:12:31
  SPEAKER_02: A quote from Sarah, all is's and isn't's aren't.
• 1:12:36
  SPEAKER_02: It's one of my favorite quotes.
• 1:12:42
  SPEAKER_02: The teaching in which that quote comes from is being given month
• 1:12:46
  SPEAKER_02: by month online now, by me, since we finished Flight of the Garuda.
• 1:12:53
  SPEAKER_02: So that's the next one.
• 1:12:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's a mahamudra.
• 1:12:57
  SPEAKER_02: Did this answer your question?
• 1:13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Be careful of Romeric intellectualized.
• 1:13:06
  SPEAKER_01: Although the Tibetan scholars were often pointed out intellectually,
• 1:13:13
  SPEAKER_02: There are those who believe strongly enough in intellectual formations among
• 1:13:18
  SPEAKER_02: the scholars that you can pretty much chase them over the cliff like you can drive
• 1:13:24
  SPEAKER_02: a computer mad with the unanswerable question,
• 1:13:31
  SPEAKER_02: the question that turns into a circle.
• 1:13:35
  SPEAKER_02: That is found in science fiction where that's how you drive computers mad.
• 1:13:40
  SPEAKER_02: But it will probably work
• 1:13:41
  SPEAKER_01: on an AI.
• 1:13:44
  SPEAKER_01: So you will find in some texts that it's used like that.
• 1:13:49
  SPEAKER_01: That is only effective for those who are really
• 1:13:51
  SPEAKER_02: trapped in their intellect.
• 1:13:54
  SPEAKER_02: And you have to be very, very careful.
• 1:13:59
  SPEAKER_01: Where's Jay?
• 1:14:02
  SPEAKER_01: Be very, very careful not to believe the thoughts it causes to arise.
• 1:14:16
  SPEAKER_02: Make sense?
• 1:14:17
  SPEAKER_02: Got the context of these two?
• 1:14:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 1:14:21
  SPEAKER_02: Who else has a question?
• 1:14:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 1:14:23
  SPEAKER_03: Last year you gave me a rush,
• 1:14:25
  SPEAKER_03: and I don't know if you remember that,
• 1:14:29
  SPEAKER_03: but first you said that she was a small batch, and
• 1:14:35
  SPEAKER_03: said I'm not good for that.
• 1:14:40
  SPEAKER_03: But I practice it.
• 1:14:42
  SPEAKER_03: And my question is, should I continue it now?
• 1:14:46
  SPEAKER_01: No, I think you've discovered what I was pointing at.
• 1:14:51
  SPEAKER_02: When you get stoned or drunk, what changes and what doesn't?
• 1:14:59
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes that's worth noticing.
• 1:15:02
  SPEAKER_02: Especially when someone has gotten too stiff
• 1:15:07
  SPEAKER_02: and you just want to shake that and make it wiggle.
• 1:15:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah?
• 1:15:14
  SPEAKER_01: If you got already the result of a greater flexibility and the ability
• 1:15:22
  SPEAKER_01: to see what
• 1:15:24
  SPEAKER_02: is not moving
• 1:15:28
  SPEAKER_02: when you're drunk or stoned and when you're sober,
• 1:15:33
  SPEAKER_02: what doesn't change and what does, then no need to continue that practice.
• 1:15:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's a tool.
• 1:15:47
  SPEAKER_03: I sometimes get confused about open awareness and my attention on it.
• 1:15:55
  SPEAKER_03: When I try to put my attention on open awareness,
• 1:15:58
  SPEAKER_03: I feel my attention is kind of limited or it is better close to my body and
• 1:16:03
  SPEAKER_03: then it gets weaker with distance.
• 1:16:07
  SPEAKER_03: At the same time, I notice that it's just my sense organs that are limited.
• 1:16:13
  SPEAKER_01: What's going on here is you're trying to point focus
• 1:16:17
  SPEAKER_02: on open awareness.
• 1:16:20
  SPEAKER_02: Don't do that, it won't work.
• 1:16:22
  SPEAKER_02: Which you appear to have noticed.
• 1:16:26
  SPEAKER_02: Instead of putting your attention on it, relax your attention into it and past it.
• 1:16:36
  SPEAKER_02: It is a letting go, not a putting.
• 1:16:40
  SPEAKER_02: Feel?
• 1:16:44
  SPEAKER_02: Easy answer.
• 1:16:48
  SPEAKER_02: Other questions, yes?
• 1:16:49
  SPEAKER_03: Could you share your insight about the different channels, like recognizing them?
• 1:16:54
  SPEAKER_03: Is it at all useful to recognize the difference between the central channel and...
• 1:17:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that really depends
• 1:17:02
  SPEAKER_02: on what practice you're doing.
• 1:17:05
  SPEAKER_01: In Purzogyan, nah,
• 1:17:08
  SPEAKER_02: who cares?
• 1:17:11
  SPEAKER_01: In Tantra, Especially in Salong, absolutely you need to.
• 1:17:17
  SPEAKER_02: So not all of us at all times are all doing the same practices.
• 1:17:22
  SPEAKER_02: They wouldn't fit.
• 1:17:25
  SPEAKER_01: You have to follow the map from where you are to where you're going.
• 1:17:31
  SPEAKER_01: The map from Paris to Moscow is utterly useless in Timbuktu.
• 1:17:40
  SPEAKER_02: It will not get you to Moscow.
• 1:17:43
  SPEAKER_01: So you're doing different practices and throughout the course
• 1:17:47
  SPEAKER_01: of your life you will be doing different practices.
• 1:17:51
  SPEAKER_01: So I can't answer that question in a singular absolute.
• 1:17:56
  SPEAKER_02: It just depends on the current practices.
• 1:18:04
  SPEAKER_03: Other questions?
• 1:18:06
  SPEAKER_03: So yesterday you talked about the aggregates
• 1:18:10
  SPEAKER_03: and how thoughts and feelings have no duration.
• 1:18:15
  SPEAKER_03: How can I work with that in daily life?
• 1:18:19
  SPEAKER_01: Gone.
• 1:18:23
  SPEAKER_01: So
• 1:18:25
  SPEAKER_01: as you go through daily life,
• 1:18:29
  SPEAKER_02: notice this while thinking and feeling.
• 1:18:34
  SPEAKER_02: It's easier to notice it if you take 10 minutes and sit down with a pebble and try
• 1:18:40
  SPEAKER_02: to hold your thoughts and feelings still on the pebble.
• 1:18:44
  SPEAKER_02: You will find within a few minutes that that is not possible.
• 1:18:49
  SPEAKER_02: You will actually come to notice
• 1:18:53
  SPEAKER_01: through the use of a pebble which isn't moving
• 1:18:57
  SPEAKER_01: or is actually
• 1:18:57
  SPEAKER_02: very slowly moving just how fast your thoughts and feelings move.
• 1:19:03
  SPEAKER_02: When you force yourself to sit with your gaze resting on a bevel for ten minutes.
• 1:19:11
  SPEAKER_01: In daily life, the idea is to learn
• 1:19:18
  SPEAKER_01: to relax into noticing the existence
• 1:19:22
  SPEAKER_01: of open awareness repeatedly during the day without attempting to maintain that.
• 1:19:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's again and again rather than ongoing.
• 1:19:38
  SPEAKER_01: Different people call this different things.
• 1:19:41
  SPEAKER_01: Candice O'Denver calls it short moments, short glances.
• 1:19:48
  SPEAKER_02: I call it checking to see if your mind is still there.
• 1:19:53
  SPEAKER_02: It's a quick glance and a letting go without maintenance.
• 1:19:59
  SPEAKER_02: In the teachings of Garagdurji, they're online, you can get the text.
• 1:20:12
  SPEAKER_01: It is the second part, the second word, gam.
• 1:20:16
  SPEAKER_02: The first is to actually notice open awareness, in Dzogchen called tawa.
• 1:20:25
  SPEAKER_01: Then the second is this continual quick glancing, without grasping, called gom.
• 1:20:34
  SPEAKER_01: The texts talk about doing it all the time,
• 1:20:38
  SPEAKER_01: but it's only in the oral teachings that I have found that
• 1:20:43
  SPEAKER_02: one is encouraged not
• 1:20:44
  SPEAKER_02: to try to maintain it all the time, or to stabilize the moving.
• 1:20:51
  SPEAKER_02: But rather to do a repetition of quick glances again and again during the day.
• 1:20:59
  SPEAKER_02: Some people use some kind of mnemonic.
• 1:21:03
  SPEAKER_02: A bracelet, an earring that hits their neck and bothers them.
• 1:21:10
  SPEAKER_02: A ring that's too big.
• 1:21:14
  SPEAKER_01: So,
• 1:21:16
  SPEAKER_01: different people use different things in the very beginning to help them remember
• 1:21:20
  SPEAKER_01: to do this.
• 1:21:23
  SPEAKER_01: But after a while it becomes automatic.
• 1:21:27
  SPEAKER_01: This leads to the third word.
• 1:21:32
  SPEAKER_02: And Garagdorji just simplified all of Dzogchen really beautifully.
• 1:21:36
  SPEAKER_02: So it's considered the root text.
• 1:21:39
  SPEAKER_02: Of Zogchen in the Ningma line.
• 1:21:41
  SPEAKER_02: Just as 21 Nails is considered pretty much the root text of Zogchen in the Bon line.
• 1:21:49
  SPEAKER_02: Both beautiful texts.
• 1:21:53
  SPEAKER_02: Both available in teachings online, I think.
• 1:21:58
  SPEAKER_02: Tenzin Wanjiao has done a recording of 21 Nails, somewhere out on YouTube or some place.
• 1:22:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I know I've done Garab Dorji,
• 1:22:08
  SPEAKER_02: and there's one by my teacher of Garab Dorji with translation.
• 1:22:12
  SPEAKER_02: The third word, SOPA, you can't do.
• 1:22:16
  SPEAKER_01: It do you.
• 1:22:18
  SPEAKER_01: Can't make it happen.
• 1:22:21
  SPEAKER_02: However, it results from those quick glances.
• 1:22:27
  SPEAKER_02: And it is a certainty.
• 1:22:34
  SPEAKER_02: Like the certainty you have of the law of gravity.
• 1:22:38
  SPEAKER_02: You're all sitting here without a narrow one of you worrying about floating up
• 1:22:42
  SPEAKER_02: and bumping your head on the ceiling.
• 1:22:45
  SPEAKER_02: You keep picking things up and then putting them down
• 1:22:48
  SPEAKER_01: again without worrying
• 1:22:49
  SPEAKER_01: that they won't stay where you put them.
• 1:22:55
  SPEAKER_02: And yet you're not thinking about gravity, but you're sure.
• 1:23:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and how'd you get sure?
• 1:23:01
  SPEAKER_01: You sat in your high chair.
• 1:23:06
  SPEAKER_02: For a good year or two, dropping things out and discovering that they all go down.
• 1:23:12
  SPEAKER_02: It was a surprise to you the first time.
• 1:23:16
  SPEAKER_02: Mamas, you've seen this stage that you remember.
• 1:23:19
  SPEAKER_02: Many of you may remember it from your own childhood.
• 1:23:26
  SPEAKER_02: So, gone would be the answer.
• 1:23:30
  SPEAKER_02: If you want to refresh your memory of the teaching of Garak Dorji, go find it on YouTube.
• 1:23:36
  SPEAKER_02: Several people have taught it out there.
• 1:23:41
  Thank you.
• 1:23:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yes?
• 1:23:45
  SPEAKER_03: That's what Tawa is.
• 1:23:49
  SPEAKER_03: The first word, mind, mind-looking.
• 1:23:53
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 1:24:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, because the nature of mind is vast open awareness.
• 1:24:14
  SPEAKER_02: So when mind looks at itself, mind-to-mind looking.
• 1:24:19
  SPEAKER_02: Tawa is simply the shorthand word for that vast open awareness which is seen.
• 1:24:30
  SPEAKER_02: It's also being because it's not just you see it like I see the damer out there.
• 1:24:38
  SPEAKER_02: You are it because it is my seeing itself.
• 1:24:45
  SPEAKER_02: So identify with tawa as tawa rather than externalizing it.
• 1:24:56
  SPEAKER_01: There was someone else in the back.
• 1:24:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, gentlemen.
• 1:24:59
  SPEAKER_01: Do stones of consciousness Some, not all.
• 1:25:06
  SPEAKER_02: Some are inhabited.
• 1:25:07
  SPEAKER_02: Some perceive themselves as sentient beings.
• 1:25:11
  SPEAKER_02: Some of the big tours out in England, definitely, and there's somebody in there.
• 1:25:16
  SPEAKER_02: You'll see one.
• 1:25:18
  SPEAKER_02: But many stones do not.
• 1:25:21
  SPEAKER_02: They're like dream things.
• 1:25:25
  SPEAKER_02: When you see a stone in a dream, does it have consciousness?
• 1:25:35
  SPEAKER_03: What are these sparklings?
• 1:25:37
  SPEAKER_03: How are they connected to the awareness?
• 1:25:41
  SPEAKER_02: They are a symbol.
• 1:25:44
  SPEAKER_02: A symbol of the way bodhisitta arises in sunyata as sunyata.
• 1:25:53
  SPEAKER_02: The sparklies, the rika that you see in the sky,
• 1:26:00
  SPEAKER_02: The glass is too dirty.
• 1:26:02
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, no, I can see them.
• 1:26:05
  SPEAKER_01: But the dirt is a distraction.
• 1:26:09
  SPEAKER_01: So when you go out to lunch, look for the Rika.
• 1:26:12
  SPEAKER_01: Tiny, teeny, tiny,
• 1:26:13
  SPEAKER_01: bright little sparklies that dance in the sky,
• 1:26:16
  SPEAKER_01: in the empty openness of the sky,
• 1:26:19
  SPEAKER_01: in the same way that thoughts, feelings, and perceptions dance in open awareness.
• 1:26:29
  SPEAKER_01: Symbol.
• 1:26:35
  SPEAKER_02: The sky itself is a symbol of open awareness of natural mind.
• 1:26:43
  SPEAKER_02: The rika which dance in the sky are a symbol of the manifestation of phenomena
• 1:26:52
  SPEAKER_02: within natural mind.
• 1:26:56
  SPEAKER_03: And the manifestation of phenomena, is it the natural mind bubbling or how to see this?
• 1:27:09
  SPEAKER_01: You would do well to find a place
• 1:27:17
  SPEAKER_02: and lie comfortably on your back.
• 1:27:22
  SPEAKER_02: Corpse position,
• 1:27:23
  SPEAKER_02: just however it is most comfortable for you,
• 1:27:25
  SPEAKER_02: with your back in alignment because you're lying down,
• 1:27:28
  SPEAKER_02: maybe something under your knees so your spine is actually straight.
• 1:27:33
  SPEAKER_02: Make your position where you're in the shade,
• 1:27:36
  SPEAKER_02: your head's in the shade, but the sky is straight above you.
• 1:27:42
  SPEAKER_02: Lie there and watch the Rika dance while investigating how phenomena arises in mind.
• 1:27:55
  SPEAKER_02: Phenomena being your thoughts, your feelings,
• 1:28:00
  SPEAKER_01: and your perceptions.
• 1:28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, we're in springtime.
• 1:28:07
  SPEAKER_01: The sun is still pretty far south.
• 1:28:11
  SPEAKER_01: So if you do this over lunch to the north of a tree, I think you can find a spot.
• 1:28:21
  SPEAKER_02: My answering your question is not going to be as useful
• 1:28:24
  SPEAKER_02: as you answering your question by this method.
• 1:28:30
  SPEAKER_02: And if you're still curious and that didn't work, ask me again this afternoon.
• 1:28:37
  SPEAKER_02: Okay?
• 1:28:37
  SPEAKER_02: But try it yourself first.
• 1:28:41
  SPEAKER_03: I wonder if what you are talking about here,
• 1:28:45
  SPEAKER_03: is it the tiny, tiny ones that are dark in the middle?
• 1:28:50
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 1:28:51
  SPEAKER_03: Around?
• 1:28:51
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 1:28:53
  SPEAKER_01: No, those are Tiglis.
• 1:28:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm talking about Eureka.
• 1:28:58
  SPEAKER_01: They're much smaller and much faster.
• 1:29:01
  SPEAKER_03: Because since I was four or five years old,
• 1:29:04
  SPEAKER_03: I loved to lay on the lane and see those tiny,
• 1:29:08
  SPEAKER_03: tiny, but they were around and- Yeah, those are Tiglis.
• 1:29:12
  SPEAKER_02: They have a name.
• 1:29:14
  SPEAKER_03: And then when you relax, then you move slowlier, and when you are tense, then you move faster.
• 1:29:21
  SPEAKER_03: That's correct.
• 1:29:22
  SPEAKER_03: I thought it was something dirty on my eyes when I blew up.
• 1:29:28
  SPEAKER_01: Nah, it's not.
• 1:29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Those are ticklies.
• 1:29:30
  SPEAKER_01: And they're very, very useful in
• 1:29:32
  SPEAKER_02: certain practices.
• 1:29:37
  SPEAKER_02: It is not time to teach you those practices right now.
• 1:29:42
  SPEAKER_02: However, I will teach you one thing.
• 1:29:44
  SPEAKER_02: If you lie and look up at the tiglis,
• 1:29:47
  SPEAKER_02: if you enter into Dzogchen meditation, they will stop moving.
• 1:29:56
  SPEAKER_02: It's just a nice way of knowing whether you are actually in treacher or not.
• 1:30:04
  SPEAKER_02: So you relax and they slow down and you relax more and they slow down.
• 1:30:09
  SPEAKER_02: At some point they just hover there.
• 1:30:14
  SPEAKER_02: And then you're going to grab something and they're going to go.
• 1:30:18
  SPEAKER_02: But you can play with them that way, without harm.
• 1:30:25
  SPEAKER_03: I'm doing the,
• 1:30:26
  SPEAKER_03: I think I'm watching about the sky and I start looking around,
• 1:30:31
  SPEAKER_03: I see them everywhere.
• 1:30:33
  SPEAKER_03: And it feels just like a nyam.
• 1:30:37
  SPEAKER_01: Nyams can be useful.
• 1:30:41
  SPEAKER_01: Question?
• 1:30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Question mark?
• 1:30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Somewhere in there?
• 1:30:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 1:30:46
  SPEAKER_01: They are neither inside you nor outside you.
• 1:30:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's why they're an excellent analogy or symbol.
• 1:31:17
  SPEAKER_03: I had an experience on acid a long time ago when I was all the scenery
• 1:31:23
  SPEAKER_03: and all insects and the matter of everything.
• 1:31:26
  SPEAKER_03: Is it good to recall that or is it more like gravity?
• 1:31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Neither good nor bad.
• 1:31:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's a memory.
• 1:31:35
  SPEAKER_01: You can't get it back.
• 1:31:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:31:37
  SPEAKER_03: So it's not good to ponder on it so much.
• 1:31:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's just something that
• 1:31:41
  SPEAKER_03: happened.
• 1:31:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:31:43
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 1:31:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's not harmful to think about it sometimes, but...
• 1:31:48
  SPEAKER_03: It won't, I can't, yeah, it won't support me in my practice.
• 1:31:51
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's not going to support you in your practice.
• 1:31:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's just something like lunch, the thing that happened.
• 1:31:58
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, speaking of lunch, let us continue this afternoon.
• 1:32:02
  SPEAKER_03: We good with that?
• 1:32:14
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we're going to be back at four and we'll go on.
• 1:32:19
  SPEAKER_01: Meanwhile, today at lunch, I've offered a number of different practices this morning, right?
• 1:32:31
  SPEAKER_01: Unless I told you a specific one that I wanted you to do,
• 1:32:36
  SPEAKER_01: like I have with you, I'm going to recommend GOM.
• 1:32:40
  SPEAKER_01: Quick glances.
• 1:32:45
  SPEAKER_01: The easiest way to do that will be to sit somewhere nice
• 1:32:54
  SPEAKER_01: for a minute or two
• 1:32:57
  SPEAKER_01: with your channels in alignment and find your meditation.
• 1:33:04
  SPEAKER_01: Then go eat and talk and
• 1:33:10
  SPEAKER_01: While having, but slow down.
• 1:33:13
  SPEAKER_01: Do it a little bit slower than you usually would.
• 1:33:15
  SPEAKER_01: No rushing.
• 1:33:18
  SPEAKER_01: And just glance.
• 1:33:22
  SPEAKER_01: Glance.
• 1:33:25
  SPEAKER_01: You have to do it while you're doing stuff, not instead of doing stuff.
• 1:33:31
  SPEAKER_01: At all times and on all occasions,
• 1:33:35
  SPEAKER_01: notice the already known Dharmakaya nature of mind,
• 1:33:41
  SPEAKER_01: Garabhjorgyi,
• 1:33:44
  SPEAKER_01: while walking and talking, getting up and sitting down.
• 1:33:52
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever you do while you do it,
• 1:33:58
  SPEAKER_02: Notice the nature of mind.
• 1:34:01
  SPEAKER_02: So, homework.
• 1:34:12
  SPEAKER_01: What?
• 1:34:13
  SPEAKER_01: At four.
• 1:34:14
  SPEAKER_01: At four.
• 1:34:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, because I am overtired and need a nap to reinflate my talker.
• 1:34:21
  SPEAKER_01: Or I'll give it to you in too short aversion.
• 1:34:24
  SPEAKER_01: Like, look, it's right there.
• 1:34:36
  SPEAKER_00: We are
• 1:34:40
  SPEAKER_00: temporarily
• 1:34:46
  SPEAKER_00: complete
• 1:34:46
  [music]