Well, I want to welcome all of you to this class. This is a subject that I've been thinking about for a long time, and so I thought that I would share this with you. I think it's an important part of our understanding, to understand in Buddhist terms how our mind works. Mind is a kind of generic term. My mind. But in the Dharma, we speak of consciousness, levels, various levels of consciousness. So mind, citta, is a kind of generic term for mind, although sometimes it's specific. In Buddhadharma it's always been how we study the various aspects of consciousness.

[01:11]

I have given you some material from a book written by Thich Nhat Hanh which outlines the Vijnanavada or Yogacara work on the eight levels of consciousness. Actually, sometimes eight, sometimes nine, but we'll get to that. And how the inner and the outer work together. A subject and object work together. And I've given you something that this book is a very important book for me, but there are other books as well that delineate this information.

[02:30]

Thich Nhat Hanh talks about how this study came about in around the 4th or 5th century, something like that. Masubandhu, one of our ancestors, Masubandhu Dayo Cho, was a in India, and he had a brother, Asanga. Asanga was a Mahayana philosopher, and Vasubandhu was a Hinayana philosopher. They were two brothers. One had—well, on one side, one on the other. But Mahayana, we always view the Hinayana as very narrow-minded.

[03:59]

And one of the distinctions is that the Hinayana, as you probably know, it's just Buddhist history, for themselves. Mahayana was a reaction to the Hinayana, and I profess that the practice is really salvation for all beings, before yourself. These are old designations and whether they apply today or not is a question. But for these purposes, this is history. So Asanga was the Mahayana philosopher.

[05:14]

One of the ancient ways, which is still present today, of study was discrimination through to discriminate each one and to see how none of these elements of our life add up to a person. So this is one of the basic teachings of the Dharma, is there is no essential self.

[06:20]

None of the aspects of our psyche or our physical body add up to a self. So this is just basic Buddhism in both Hinayana and Mahayana. But the Hinayana kind of stopped before researching what before researching the higher aspects of consciousness. So there's a story of Vasubandhu and Asanga. One day Asanga... One story says Asanga was in a moonlight, moonlit night.

[07:23]

This is the story he was living at. Moonlit night he was... Vasubandhu was nearby and he was impressed by that and he had an enlightenment experience and he became a Mahayana practitioner. The other one is that a sangha asked Vasubandhu to chant for him some Mahayana sutras. And so when Vasubandhu was chanting the Mahayana sutras, He was so impressed that he became a Mahayana philosopher. And he said, I want to cut my tongue out because I've been so, said so many bad things about the Mahayana. And I said, no, no, don't cut your tongue out. Just keep talking. we have the material.

[08:34]

So Vasubandhu introduced to the Abhidharma studies the eight levels of consciousness. And so he introduced much about history, but they had 75 dharmas, which were the constituencies of our physical and psychic life that they chose to work with. And later on we'll discuss those. But Vasubandhu added some, and he also added And the very opening of that book says, mind foreruns all, is the foundation of all, is the origin of all, and if one speaks or acts with an evil mind, suffering follows, as the wheel follows the ox foot.

[10:14]

So you're probably familiar with that. And so this is like There's a little list which I'll print later. I'm going to read a little from Yaha and talk about it. So there are eight levels of consciousness.

[11:20]

And sometimes we start at the top and go to the bottom, and sometimes we start at the bottom and go to the top. I like to start from the bottom and go to the top, but we start at the top, because that's the way it's laid out in the book. There's a... Vasubandhu wrote something called the Thirty Verses, the Trinsika, which explains the nature of consciousness in 30 verses. And he also wrote something in 20 verses. And Thich Nhat Hanh seems to have based the 50 verses in this book on the 30 verses and the 20 verses of Vasubandhu. And in all And of course there are 50 versions here.

[12:27]

So he says, according to the teachings of the Manifestation-Oben Buddhism, our mind Sometimes it's this teaching of the Yogacara school. It's called mind only, vijnapti, mind only. But mind only has the aspect, the understanding of everything that we see here on earth. of our own mind, but it doesn't mean that our own mind produces what's outside of our mind.

[13:40]

So this is very, we have to understand this, we have to understand that mind only does not mean that we invent what's out there. One is the nature of imagination, and the second one is the nature of interdependence, and the third one is the nature of seeing everything as it really is. So, instead of mind only, Techno-Han uses the term manifestation only, which he says is the correct term, the way everything manifests through mind, but it doesn't mean that only

[15:05]

But our mind does create the way we see things, and the way we imagine things, and the way we interpret things. So we're creating our own world all the time. And that world is usually based on imagination, or based on independence. we don't have a correct idea or understanding of what it is we see or feel or touch or cognize. So this is called the realm of delusion. So according to the teachings of the Manifestation Only Buddhism, our mind has eight aspects

[16:16]

or we can say eight consciousnesses. The first five are based on the physical senses. They are the consciousness that arise when our eyes see form, our ears hear sounds, our nose smells an odor, our tongue tastes something, or our skin touches an object. So the tongue, the taste, the feelings, and so forth. So these five are, in order to hear something, there has to be an ear. The ear is the receptor of the organ. And what the ear hears is the object.

[17:21]

And the subject is consciousness. So we think, or we can think that there's such a thing as consciousness that exists independently of the organ and the object. But actually, the organ and the object together allow the consciousness to arise. So when you close your eyes, you don't see something. So the consciousness of seeing does not arise. It only arises when there is an organ. And as we know, this is common knowledge, that it's not really the ear that hears or the eye that sees. The eye is just a, or the ear is just a receptor, part of the process for seeing. And so what we see and hear We say, was that a dog barking?

[18:39]

No, actually, it was the guy upstairs moving his chair. So we have various ways of perceiving things, and then our mind creates an image. You're walking in the dark. It's kind of dark, but kind of at sunset, and you see a rope in the road. But it looks like a snake. And so you think it's a snake. And then you get up a little closer, and you think, oh, it's only a rope. And then you see, when you really start taking the rope apart, you see that the rope had just is the observation from the three levels.

[19:45]

One is the nature of imagination, which is, I think it's a snake. But when we get up and see, it's not a snake, it's a rope. That's the, looking at it from the nature of interdependence, we see that the rope is made of these various things. And then if we look further, So that's the nature of seeing it as it really is. But all three have a function. So there are the consciousnesses that arise when our eyes see form, hear sounds, nose smells an odor, our tongue tastes something, and our skin And mind is mano.

[20:49]

Mind consciousness, mano vijnana. That's the sixth consciousness. Mano vijnana arises when our mind contacts an object, a perception. So the function of this mind consciousness, mano vijnana, is to cognize the outside world through the senses. So when we see something, it's Manu Vijnana which sees. When we hear something, it's Manu Vijnana which hears that consciousness, that level of consciousness. So this Manu Vijnana is tuned outwards and open to that information which it delivers to the higher levels of consciousness. This is the entrance. And it separates the various sense consciousnesses, so where it accurately says, I see the floor, rather than I hear the floor.

[22:00]

So it separates according to the way So the sixth mind consciousness, Mano Vijnana, arises when the mind contacts an object of perception. The seventh consciousness, Manas, both Mano Vijnana and Manas are both Manas. They're both levels of consciousness, but they separate them, and so Mano Vijnana So the seventh consciousness, or Manas, is part of the consciousness that gives rise to and is the support of mind consciousness.

[23:08]

But actually, this is the consciousness that thinks, and it will be explained, but it's really what we identify as ego, the seventh level of consciousness. Consciousness is not quite self-consciousness, but the sixth and seventh interact with each other. And the seventh is the support of the sixth. The seventh manas is part of the consciousness that gives rise to and supports the mind consciousness. And the eighth store consciousness, alaya vijnana, is the ground or base of the other in that computer.

[24:15]

It's called the mind ground. It's like a big field where everything we've ever experienced is there in the memory bank. In one snap of the fingers, your whole life is laid out in front of you in an instant. And time has nothing to do with it. And so the access to the alaya is complete, but normally it's not. about, because we're not aware.

[25:28]

It's just a different thing. Dr. Roshi, a moment ago you said we see the floor with our eyes, we don't hear the floor. We see the floor, we don't hear the floor. There's also an expression in our tradition about seeing forms with the whole body and mind, and we should actually hear the food and kind of mixing the organs with the objects. Could you say a little bit about what that is referring to? Yes, but this is about separating. You know, we can't talk about the six consciousnesses. Before we talk about the subtleties, we have to talk about if I can get some clarity about what you're saying.

[26:34]

I'm trying to understand the difference between a perception in the realm of sense consciousness, I see the floor, or maybe that doesn't even arise, that it's really mind consciousness that is involved in other aspects of mind that allows the identification of that as floor. is conscious of sensory input. The seventh consciousness is inward. The sixth consciousness is on the shore, looking out at the sea, whereas the seventh consciousness is inward.

[27:41]

Inland. It receives the information from the sixth consciousness and transfers it to the eighth. That's a function. I'm trying to actually experience the first consciousness. Well, who experiences it? Oh yeah, that's the self-witness. There's something called the self-witness. And the self-witness is the one who is conscious of experiencing. or the second self-witness which corroborates that. So we have a self-witness which recognizes what it is that's, I see this, and I'm sure that I see this. Well, that's a good question.

[29:08]

I'm not sure I can answer that. I'd have to think about it a little bit, about where language comes from. But I think it's a combination of consciousnesses that where language comes from. Because the sixth and the seventh This is kind of the gray area of consciousness between the mind consciousness and manas, which is self-consciousness. So self-consciousness is the thinker. The seventh consciousness is the thinker and the imaginer, and it's called the false sense of self. thinks it's what it's not.

[30:12]

Well, if you're looking at the ocean and you think that's the ocean, from a past experience I know that's the ocean. Is that the sixth or the seventh? That's the sixth. The sixth. But the seventh also has something to do with it, because the seventh consciousness says So the seventh is one that identifies it as something... Yes, it's imaginative. Whereas the sixth is not imaginative. It's simply saying, this is what this is. It doesn't think about what this is. It just cognizes what this is. So, this is called direct perception. There's three levels of perception. One is direct perception, which just sinks. You know, when we're sitting in zazen, we say, Let seeing see, let hearing hear, let touching touch, let feeling feel, but don't say, I. The seventh consciousness says, I hear, I see, I think.

[31:24]

So the seventh consciousness is the I consciousness. And so, the sixth consciousness receives the ocean and is one with that reception. But seventh consciousness discriminates and says the ocean is out there. But the sixth consciousness doesn't say the ocean is out there. Because this is before the bifurcation between subject and object. So the sixth consciousness just sees everything as it is. And it's the seventh consciousness which discriminates it. It discriminates between subject and object, and elaborates. So the first level of consciousness is direct perception, bare attention.

[32:28]

Buddhist meditation is bare attention, basically. And then there's elaboration, levels of elaboration. And then the third level says, the ocean is wet, but there are fish in it, and there are boats, and stuff like that. So the more it elaborates, the more the levels of consciousness elaborate, the further they get away from direct perception. So this is all an imagination. So we live mostly in imagination. So if you don't say, I see the ocean, but you just say, ocean, is that already discriminating? Yes. Don't say anything.

[33:32]

Good, that's good advice. You have to continue with the ocean, too. Oh, you had to call me on that? Yeah, did you have your hand up? So getting back to my original question, it seems to me there's a big overlap between monovigilana and, say, eye consciousness. Because eye consciousness is so elemental that we don't even know that it's happening except through monovigilana. Yes, that's right. So there's no way for us to experience eye consciousness. The way to experience eye consciousness Consciousness is what allows the experience. It is the experience. The experience is inward. It's not out there. Everything that's experienced is experienced within consciousness.

[34:38]

So, verses 1 through 14 in the book are about The first is to store. To store consciousness has three functions. It's good to remember these terms. The first is to store and preserve all the seeds, or bijas, of our experiences. Bija is a seed. So everything that's experienced, is experienced and deposited as a seed.

[35:41]

So that when we, in the memory bank, the seeds buried in our store consciousness represent everything we have ever done, experienced, or perceived. The seeds planted by these actions, experiences, and perceptions are the subject of consciousness. The store consciousness draws together all these seeds just The second aspect of store consciousness is the seeds themselves. A museum is more than a building. It is also the works of art that are displayed there. In the same way, store consciousness is not just the storehouse of the seeds, but also the seeds that are found there. So the store consciousness is not a thing. It's only... I think of a gingerbread house.

[36:48]

So the gingerbread house is made out of the stuff that you eat. So there's no gingerbread house without being able to eat it. So it's like the seeds are what the storehouse is. So without the seeds there's no storehouse. So we have to remember these are not things, they just represent, the words just represent an image, a model. for us. So it ain't notes of consciousness, it's just a model of consciousness. We can't attach to the model. So, the second aspect of store consciousness is the seeds themselves. A museum is more than a building. It is also the works of art that are displayed there. In the same way, store consciousness is not just the storehouse of the seeds, but also the seeds that are found there. The seeds can be distinguished from the store consciousness, but they can be found only in the store consciousness.

[37:53]

So when you have a basket of apples, the apples can be distinguished from the basket. If the basket were empty, you would not call it a basket of apples. So store consciousness is at the same time both storehouse and the content at a store. The seeds are thus also the object of consciousness. So when we say consciousness, we are referring to both the subject and the object of consciousness at the same time. The third function of store consciousness is as a store for the attachment to a self. This is because of the subtle and complex relationship between manas, the seventh consciousness, and the store consciousness. Manas arises from store consciousness, turns around and takes hold of a portion of store consciousness, and guards this grasp part as a separate discrete entity, a self. Much of our suffering results from this wrong perception of Manas, and it is the subject of our in-depth study in Part 2 of this book.

[39:03]

sensory level. So, we can't really study, I don't really want to just study one part at a time because they're all really mixed. So, I'll try to have some part of each chapter, of each section, so that we can go back and forth, because that's necessary. But today we're just going to study So we can't do the whole book. I'm just picking out sections of this book for us to study. Thich Nhat Hanh himself says, you can pick this up anywhere. Just open it up and study it. Although there's continuity, definitely, but still, each chapter is a way of understanding the whole. So what he's saying here is that the seventh level of consciousness, Manas, is dependent on the Alaya Vijnana for its existence.

[40:38]

And it thinks that the Alaya Vijnana is itself. So how does it do that? Well, the self has all of the seeds. input that's ever happened in our life. So that's what we think we are. We think that we are our experiences. You say that the consciousness believes that the alaya-jnana is the self. Yes. And the attachment to the self lives in that store of consciousness. And what? Attachment to the self. Attachment to self. lives in alaya, lives in bondness. Oh, oh, okay. Bondness thinks it's the Self. It thinks that alaya is itself. It thinks that everything, it thinks that all of our thoughts and feelings and so forth is our Self. And then it creates a Self out of that material.

[41:41]

So that's what we are doing all the time. We're creating a sense of Self out of that material, our experiences. And we say, I'm so-and-so, and I've done this and that, and I'm doing this and that. And then we think in certain ways according to the way we perceive our experiences. And that's how I create a self. But that's an ego. So there are two levels of ego. There are more levels than that, but one is our experience that we can recollect and cognize and experience consciously. But then there's the ego that's very deep. That's the experiences that we never even think about. And no matter how hard we try to be good, that ego that's subliminal,

[42:48]

Speaking of that, that undercurrent, so, you know, let's say that I intentionally have a practice of widening my sense of self to include, let's say around the theme of climate change, the whole planet, or what happens in Nepal happens, so I widen my sense of self to include all those in Nepal or in Baltimore or whatever. And so I'm widening consciously my sense of self. How does that affect, if at all, this other ego that I'm completely unconscious of? It's not another ego. It's just that there's only one ego. It's just that our ego is so deep. It's just a way of saying that our Our sense of our selfishness, self-centeredness is so deep that it's hard to access it all.

[44:00]

That's all. So is there any kind of benefit to a practice such as the one I just mentioned? Because there are plenty of practices of that nature that people practice. Practice is your salvation. Because we think at some point I'll be perfect. I won't have any sense of self. I'll have no ego, blah, blah, blah. That's idealism. Reality is, no matter how much I practice, the ego will still in the face of the impossibility, you keep going. That's called real practice. That's called enlightenment. That's not the same as subconsciousness.

[45:30]

Subconsciousness is deeper consciousness that is not available necessarily to consciousness. of all this room, but we only see the tip. So the rest is subconscious. And so most of our understanding are missing. Most of our psychic life is underwater. And it's great when we can bring it up. Mind is a field in which every kind of seed is sown.

[47:02]

That's what it says here. Mind is a field in which every kind of seed is sown. This mind field can also be a mind field. It can also be called all seeds. So he said, the primary function of store consciousness is to store and preserve all the seeds. One name for store consciousness is sarva bijaka. The bijas are the seeds, and sarva means all. So sarva bijaka, the totality of the seeds. Another is adhana, which means to maintain or to hold and not to lose. The brain cannot access them according to this.

[48:17]

So maintaining all the seeds, keeping them alive so that they are available to manifest is the most basic function of store consciousness. So seeds or bijas give phenomena the ability to perpetuate themselves. If you plant a seed in springtime, By autumn, a plant will mature and bear flowers. From those flowers, new seeds will fall to the earth, where they will be stored until they sprout and produce new flowers. So it's just planting of the seeds and the flowering of the seeds going on all the time, depending on our actions the way we act. So, our mind will be stored.

[49:19]

Our mind is a field in which every kind of seed is stored. Seeds of compassion, joy and hope, seeds of sorrow, fear and difficulties. Every day our thoughts, words and deeds plant new seeds in the field of our consciousness And what these seeds generate becomes the substance of our life. There are both wholesome and unwholesome seeds in our mind field, sown by ourselves and our parents, schooling, ancestors, and society. So everything we come in contact with affects us. So if you plant wheat, wheat will grow. If you act in a wholesome way, you'll be happy, more or less. If you act in a non-wholesome way, you will water seeds of craving, anger, and violence in yourself and in others.

[50:21]

The practice of mindfulness helps us identify all the seeds in our consciousness, and with that knowledge, we can choose to water only the ones that are the most beneficial. Karma works. Karma is a volitional action. So a volitional action that is wholesome, when practiced over and over, creates wholesome activities. And the same with unwholesome activities, as we know. So as we cultivate the seeds of joy and transform seeds of suffering in ourselves, understanding, love and compassion will flower. So this transforming is a key word. Because the Yogacara, Vijnanavada is a kind of offspring of the Yogacara school, which is a little bit different, but pretty much the same.

[51:36]

The practice of nirvana, [...] by any particular school. It's just a way of thinking of some Buddhists, especially the historical Buddhists. So in order to reach nirvana, you push samsara aside as much as possible. And this is like what asceticism is like. by denying the body and the mind, you strengthen the spiritual side.

[52:45]

But that's not Buddhist practice. Buddhist practice was the middle way to not separate the body and the mind, or not to separate, to discriminate. And Mahayana practice is to transform means that good and bad are a duality, but to reconcile good and bad and reach a higher state when they're above and beyond opposites, beyond good and bad. The reason this book is called Transformation at the Base is because transformation is the practice of taking evil and transforming it, or taking evil and good and transforming them into reality.

[54:01]

So this is, all these levels of consciousness become wisdom rather than consciousness. When these levels of consciousness are transformed, become part of the eternity. That's why, as we cultivate the seeds of joy and transform seeds of sin, So in us are infinite varieties of seeds.

[55:34]

Seeds of samsara, nirvana, delusion, and enlightenment. These are opposites, right? Samsara, nirvana, delusion, and enlightenment. They're opposites. Seeds of suffering and happiness. They're opposites. Seeds of perceptions, names, and words. Our store consciousness contains every kind of seed. Some seeds are weak. Some strong, some large, some small, but all are here. The seeds of both samsara and nirvana of suffering and happiness. That's a sentence. The seeds of both samsara and nirvana of suffering and happiness. If a seed of delusion is watering in us, our arrogance will grow. If the seed of enlightenment grows in us, our wisdom will flourish. Samsara is the cycle of suffering our growing place where we live in ignorance. It is difficult to remove ourselves from this cycle.

[56:36]

Our parents suffered, and they transmitted the negative seeds of this suffering to us. If we don't recognize and transform the unwholesome seeds of our consciousness, it will surely, in turn, pass along to our children. This constant transmission of fear and suffering drives the cycle of samsara. At the same time, our parents also transmitted seeds of happiness to us. Through the practice of mindfulness, we can recognize the wholesome seeds within ourselves and in others, and more of them every day. So this thing about parents, some people have had wonderful parents who they honor and admire and follow, and some people have the opposite. But for most people, there's some sense of transcending the parents. But you can see how the world goes around through this information that's imparted down from one generation to another.

[57:49]

There's this saying, the sons will suffer the sins of the father to the seventh generation. That may not be accurate literally, But basically, it means that we need to see where our parents were successful and where they weren't. That's really important. Jacob? So Jim, will you talk a little bit about the difference between mindfulness and, say, zazen? No. I'm trying to get through this. Mindfulness is one of the conditions in Zazen.

[58:51]

Zazen is not a mindfulness practice per se, but mindfulness is one of the elements. Yes, without mindfulness it's hard to sit Zazen because your mind is always wandering, and so mindfulness brings you back to the subject. that all of the bhaji have to get to the alaya through the lower consciousnesses? Yes. All the information comes through the senses. Those are the doorways of perceptions. We have no other way to assess the world around us except through those five doorways. And then those doorways are caught in And the seventh consciousness transfers that information to the alaya.

[59:58]

And the alaya transfers that information through the seventh consciousness to, through, out to the, through the senses again. So the organ is essential? The organ is essential, yes. So the physical organ is essential? Yes. So then my question is, how do we understand the claim in the verse that there are an infinite variety of seeds in the Aliyah when we haven't had an infinite number of experiences? is experienced. That's why.

[60:59]

Because in Buddhadharma, it's like, in other dharmas, our life is horizontal or vertical. But in Buddhadharma, it's circular. So this is basic Buddhism. Believe it or not, you don't have to. Life is circular. We think it starts here, at our birth, and that it ends in our death. So that's a semicircle. The other semicircle goes this way. So we say what goes around comes around. So Buddhism is all about circles. It's all about circulation. And so we say it retains the seeds from the infinite past.

[62:08]

So that brings up the question, well, who am I? And what is the carrier of these seeds? So it will be explained that the seventh and eighth consciousnesses Always thinking, always active, whereas the first six are not. The first six are intermittent, but the seventh and eighth are constant. We say, rust never sleeps. The seventh consciousness never sleeps. The eighth consciousness never sleeps. It's always working. But for one, two, three, four, five, six, when you go to sleep, they're turned off. When you're unconscious, they're turned off. carry on the information, which is called the conservation of energy.

[63:20]

The conservation of energy means that the energy that is produced just keeps going on. So this is the theoretical understanding of us. It sounds like what Suzuki Roshi said, when you die, the whole universe goes with you. But the 7th and 8th, there's some persistence there. Yes, yes, yeah. Which is, where we could say there's a soul, but we don't say that, but that's... No, it's not a soul. It's not a soul, but there's some... It's energy. Energy. It's not... The 7th and 8th consciousness continue. The energy of the 7th and 8th consciousness continue.

[64:24]

That's not a heretical saying. That's authentic, or that's congruent with the Buddhist teaching. Yes. That's the general Mahayana. and whether or not that should always be challenged. Because there are certain points at which you can say, well, yeah, I can see that. And then there's a certain point where you say, well, I can't see that. So. just the energy of this consciousness that continues. But there's not a... The craving will transplant, right?

[65:28]

The what, Bill? The craving. Well, craving, yes, but the craving is not a self. No, exactly. Craving is just craving. That's right. Yeah, yeah. So that's why... three years old, started, without any prompting, singing verses, old ancient verses, Pali verses, Buddhist verses, that nobody had heard before. And he would, in the modern, in present time, but they were found to be these ancient verses. He was three years old. There's no way he could have learned any of this, and he did this for a long time, and he didn't even know why he was doing it.

[66:35]

It just happened. And then when he got older, about 15, he just decided he didn't want to do this anymore. So this happens, this is, you know, this is not uncommon. I think Toynbee or somebody, some people wrote like the story of the Roman Empire. He had all this information and never studied it. So, I'm not advocating that that's true.

[67:40]

I'm just saying there's a lot of evidence, true or not, for, you know, we inherit stuff from the race. We're at the cutting edge of the human race as far as has been developed up to this point. And how does that happen? And it keeps being added to and so forth. And we all have various characteristics and various mental capacities and emotional capacities. Well, so this is talking about our parents, right? He says, you know, our parents give us some stuff. And the seeds that are in our life from ancient times, from the beginning, is part and parcel of how we couldn't operate without it. We just have a blank slate.

[68:44]

But we do have a blank slate, but we think everything is learned, but some seeds are new, but some seeds are already there as our information from our past, from someplace. Are you saying that the 7th and 8th, the energy of the 7th and 8th consciousness stays together as one lump? One of a lump. And then it comes back in one lump onto another person? Or it just stays and kind of spreads out and you get some of it? No. Well, see, when it comes to saying what happens, nobody knows. Right? I'll tell you that. But what's said, is that this energy is called blind ignorance. And ignorance not in the sense of, in the sense of, it's one-pointed.

[69:52]

It's just, and maybe ignorance is not the right word, but it seeks parents who are fornicating. So I'm gonna get in there. and there's a new world. So that's ancient theory. But I'm not saying that's true. But that's, I don't know, you understand? Is that the ignorance of the first link? Is it 12 links? Is it the same? Could be, yeah. Yeah, that's a good point. Yes, that's an ignorance, but it doesn't have a particular starting point because it's a circle. But I think that that's a good starting point. Because that's the point that usually is stated as the first point. Can you say that again? I didn't hear what Ross said exactly.

[70:54]

I can. Oh, he said, is that ignorance the same as the ignorance of the first link of the 12 links of causation? That's a whole other... So, let's go on. Did you ever notice that you look in the mirror one day and you say, gee, I look just like my mother. Or I look just like my brother. Anyway, so Nirvana means stability, freedom, and the cessation of the cycle of suffering, which is samsara.

[72:00]

Enlightenment does not come from outside. It is not something we are given, even by a Buddha. The seed of enlightenment is already within our consciousness. So this is our Buddha nature. So the seed of enlightenment is within our consciousness. This is one of the seeds is not a seed, but sometimes he says it is. So that seed is what we want to nurture. So there's intrinsic enlightenment and acquired enlightenment. Those are two aspects. Some people say, like materialism, that enlightenment is acquired through your practice.

[73:05]

And others would say enlightenment is something innate in us already. But actually, it's both. It's innate, otherwise we couldn't practice it. So what acquired enlightenment is no such thing. Acquired simply means Through practice, the seed of enlightenment grows. So in order to transform samsara into nirvana, there's transformation again, the key word. In order to transform samsara into nirvana, we need to look deeply and see clearly that both are manifestations of our own consciousness, both samsara and nirvana. are already in our store consciousness. We need only to water the seeds of happiness and avoid watering the seeds of suffering.

[74:10]

When we love someone, we try to recognize the positive seeds within them and water those wholesome seeds with our kind words and deeds. The seeds of happiness grow stronger when they are watered, while the seeds of suffering diminish in strength because we are not watering them So my little note here says that we see most objects according to what they mean to us. That's how we create our world. We walk down the street, and most of it's meaningless to us. It's there, and it helps us guide where we're going. But we seldom really look around. And part of it is exclusion.

[75:17]

In order to do that, there has to be exclusion and inclusion. So we include those things which suit us, suit our pursuit, and disregard those things that don't. And we do that all the time. If we really opened our eyes and our mind, we'd be surprised at what's really there. So, you know, we often walk with our head down. But if you look up, you can see the ocean's right out there. And if you look down the end of the street, it's there. But how often do we see the ocean at the end of the street? Sometimes, when there's nothing else going on. So anyway, our soul consciousness also contains seeds generated from our perceptions. We perceive many things and the objects of these perceptions are then stored in our store consciousness.

[76:19]

So when we perceive an object in Buddhist terms, we see it's sign. Lakshana. A sign means it's what we call it. We're painting signs all the time. Meaning we're naming things all the time. The Sanskrit word Lakshana also means mark. In the Heart Sutra we say the mark of all dharmas is emptiness, which means the main characteristic of all dharmas is emptiness. The main characteristic is mark. The mark of fire is heat. The mark of water is wet. So the Sanskrit word Lakshana also means mark. or designation or appearance. So the sign of a thing is the image that is created in our perception of it.

[77:26]

Suppose we see a wooden platform supported by four legs. That image becomes a seed within our consciousness. The name we assign to this image, table, is another seed in us. Table is the object of our perception. We, the perceiver, are the subject. The two are linked. Every time we perceive this object we have named as a table, or even simply heard the word table, or image of a table manifests in our mind consciousness. So this is, we know it's a table because it has, because it means that to us. So does that mean that perception is a karmic act? Perception is not a karmic act because it's not volitional. But it does reinforce seeds. Every time I see a table I reinforce seeds. But all seeds are not karmic.

[78:27]

Somewhat related question. It's like choosing to water wholesome seeds as opposed to unwholesome seeds. Well, yes, and sometimes we choose to unwholesome seeds instead of wholesome seeds. Right, and then we don't like the results. And then the result, yeah, but the choosing is volition. Choosing is volition, so that's a karmic act. But just noticing is not volitional. There are seeds, but that's not volitional. When Manas engages, it's a karmic act. It's just perception. Oh, it's just perception, no, but when you are, you know, you're looking at, when you choose to act this way as opposed to that way, that's a karmic act. That's right, yes.

[79:28]

And so it sounds like choosing to water unwholesome seeds is just a really unsuccessful way of... It's an unsuccessful way, yes. So, you know, they say wholesome and unwholesome, but I kind of like the terms beneficial and or you can use various other terms. So Buddhism identifies three pairs of signs or phenomena. The first pair is the universal and the particular. So universal and particular means So Buddhism identifies three pairs of signs of phenomena. The first pair of phenomena is the universal and the particular sign of something.

[80:31]

When we look at a house, the sign or image, house, is initially universal. The universal sign, house, is like a generic label. A few years ago, you could buy generic food in the supermarket. I don't remember that. But there are some sources of it. Instead of color images and brand names, the label of a can of corn, for example, displayed simply the word corn in black type on a plain white wrapping. The universal sign of an object is like that. That's probably in Vietnam. But there was a store down here which many years ago that was a generic store that just had the label on it. So using our discriminative mind, however, we soon perceive thousands of details about each house, the brick, wood, nails, and so on, that are specific to it. These specifics are the particular side of the house. The house can be seen as a whole, its universal sign, or as a combination of its parts, its particular sign.

[81:37]

Everything has both a universal and a particular nature. So the second pair of signs is unity and diversity. Our notion of house is an idea of unity. All houses are part of the designation house. But the universal notion of house does not allow, does not show us any individual house, which is unique in its particulars. There are countless variations of houses, and that is the nature of diversity. When we look at any phenomena, we should be able to see unity in the diversity and diversity in unity. So this is very important. The essence within the particularity, and the particularity within the essence. So when we use Atman, it's stillness, it's activity within stillness. Stillness is the essence, and the activity is the dynamic.

[82:39]

And we should be able to see the stillness within the activity when we leave. So, the third pair of signs is formation and disintegration. A house may be in the process of being built, but at the same time is also in the process of disintegrating. So this is called birth and death on each moment. Even though the wood is new and the house is not yet completely built, already the moisture or dryness of the air is beginning to weather it. Looking at something that is beginning to take form, we should already be able to see that it is also in the process of disintegrating as well. So we say, living, we're dying. Dying, we're living. So meditation training is designed to help us learn to see both aspects of each pair of signs.

[83:53]

We see the whole when we're looking at the parts, and each part when we're looking at the whole. When a carpenter looks at a tree, he can already envision a house, because he's been trained in constructing a house from the material of the tree. He is seeing both the universal and particular aspects of the tree. Through mindfulness we train ourselves to see all six signs, universal and particular, unity and diversity, formation and disintegration, whenever we perceive a single sign, a specific object. So this is the teaching of interbeing. I think it would be nice if we had a couple of minutes to stand up and stretch.

[85:14]

Okay, that's good. I usually do that during the class.

[85:20]

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