For several weeks, we've been meditating on the mind of enlightenment. At the beginning, we distinguished between a conventional mind of enlightenment and an ultimate mind of enlightenment. We've been mostly working on the conventional mind of enlightenment. Tonight, I'd like to start talking about the ultimate mind of enlightenment. The mind of enlightenment which is enlightenment itself. We've talked about how the conventional mind of enlightenment arises in a living being

[01:30]

in the form of a mind which resolutely aspires to realize awakening for the welfare of all beings. This is a wonderful conventional mind, or relative mind. It's a deluded mind that aspires to the most wonderful thing, the ability to benefit all beings. That mind still, from the beginning and all the way along, still thinks in a deluded way.

[02:45]

It thinks in terms of things existing and not existing. This way of thinking and the language that speaks this way is a conventional truth. The first five perfections, the first five bodhisattva training methods, giving ethical discipline, patience, enthusiasm and concentration on bodhicitta, on the mind of enlightenment, they're still thinking in terms of existence and non-existence. We've seen that in the meditation process, by meditating on the equality of self and other,

[03:51]

and by concentrating on exchanging ourselves with others, we purify the mind of the clinging to the self side or the other side. We purify the mind of self-clinging. We get the mind ready and willing to open to the suchness of self and other, to the suchness of mind and objects. We get ready to be open to the way things really are. We get ready to open to the ultimate truth about things. The sixth training method of bodhisattva is called the perfection of wisdom.

[04:55]

The perfection of wisdom is a non-dual wisdom, which has as its object ultimate truth. But it's a non-dual awareness of ultimate truth, so it is the ultimate truth. It's focused on the dharma element, the reality of things. It's focused on the way things are, and it is the way things are. A wisdom which is the way things are. It does not think in terms of existence or non-existence. It thinks in terms of the ultimate truth of emptiness. And this emptiness which it thinks in terms of and which it is not dual with,

[06:01]

the emptiness which it is, is an emptiness whose essence is compassion. This ultimate truth, this wisdom, is born simultaneously with compassion. But this bodhicitta, this ultimate bodhicitta, does not think that ultimate bodhicitta exists or does not exist. The relative bodhicitta thinks that bodhicitta exists or does not exist. It's working for the realization of bodhicitta, but it still thinks maybe that the bodhicitta that will be realized will then exist. There's still some duality there.

[07:05]

So here we are developing now the perfection of wisdom, the prajnaparamita, which is the thorough liberation of beings from suffering. So we say, form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Form is not different from emptiness, emptiness is not different from form. Emptiness and appearances, emptiness and conventional things,

[08:09]

like the most wonderful conventional thing probably is bodhicitta. The conventional bodhicitta is the most wonderful conventional thing. But it's also just an appearance. But this appearance is insubstantial, is empty of having any independent existence. So appearances, illusory appearances and ultimate truth are united, inseparable, and they're not the same or different. Conventionally they're the same or different,

[09:10]

but ultimately they're not the same or different. They're united. Emptiness is that emptiness is united with appearance. The inseparability of ultimate and conventional truth is ultimate truth. The ultimate truth is that the ultimate truth is insubstantial. But the insubstantial ultimate truth, which is the same as the ultimate truth that conventional things are insubstantial, that ultimate truth also unites everything, makes everything come together in one path and one practice.

[10:17]

It's the unique breeze of reality. In realizing it, the mind turns in ease and joy to the welfare of all beings. The mind, realizing it, turns with ease and joy towards the welfare of others. And one of our ancestors says, The sitting meditation that I'm talking about is the Dharma gate of repose and bliss, is the true gate of ease and joy.

[11:26]

Ease and joy in serving the welfare of others. This is the sitting meditation of what you might call our school. But it sounds very similar to the perfection of wisdom. The sitting meditation of this school is the perfection of wisdom. The sitting that we practice is a conventional thing. We have to have this conventional thing that exists called sitting. But the sitting in this school is united with the emptiness of the sitting. And the union of the emptiness of the appearance of the sitting

[12:34]

and ultimate truth, that is the actual meditation. And that is the true gate of working with ease and bliss for the welfare of all beings. The joyful devotion to all beings. And then teaching them emptiness so that everybody together will bring suffering to the place it always wanted to be. So, the perfection of wisdom follows the concentration on bodhicitta,

[13:39]

but also the perfection of wisdom is concentrated on being the perfection of wisdom. Wisdom is concentrated on being reality. Reality, when it's realized, is actually concentrated. Reality, when it's not realized, is kind of dispersed. The unique breeze of reality, do you see it? Do you see it? If there's a slightest bit of flickering away from where we are, if there's any movement or noise, if there's any dabbling in existence and nonexistence, we might miss it. And when we miss it, we have some problems. Today, I went to the Department of Motor Vehicles, sometimes called DMV.

[14:43]

Quite a few years ago, I realized that almost all my problems had something to do with motor vehicles. You had a problem with a bicycle, too? Even non-motor vehicles. That was a recent thing. Anyway, maybe in an earlier yoga room class, I told you that my billfold was stolen from me at the Mill Valley Community Center. Did anybody hear about that? Somebody stole my wallet. Where's that backpack? Here it is. They stole this backpack. And in this backpack was my wallet, cell phone, and a Buddhist book called

[16:01]

Dependent Co-Arising and Emptiness. At first, I was sad that I lost my wonderful wife, and my beautiful Dependent Co-Arising and Emptiness book. But then I thought, well, maybe the thief will read it, and become a great disciple of the Buddha. Anyway, a couple of days later, I was at the community center, and I saw something that looked like this black bag, and I said, could I see that bag? They said, sure. I said, oh, that's my bag, and I reached inside, and there was Dependent Co-Arising and Emptiness, but no wallet. So one of the things I had to do was get a new license. And guess where I went to get the license. And when I went to get the license,

[17:05]

they didn't pay me the money I lost. They asked me to pay them some money and give me a new license. And then they gave me a new license, and then, in my attempt to go around the world teaching Emptiness so that people will be happy, I went to the security line in Houston and put my driver's license, my identification, in one of those baskets. And I haven't seen it since. So you know what you do, then you go back to the DMV to visit again. And then you pay them some more money. You also wait in line for a little while. And sometimes your trusty assistant comes with you to make it easier on you. Partly because also you don't have a driver's license,

[18:07]

so she drives and sits next to you. And then while you're waiting, people come up to you and talk to you about Buddhism. And the time goes by very nicely. You don't mind how long it's waiting because you're studying Dharma there in the DMV. And then you think, hey, this isn't so bad, because here we are, an impromptu Zen center. And you just have to pay a little money. After giving the teaching, you just have to pay some money. So I get the license. But I don't really get the license. What I get is a temporary license, because they're going to mail me the real one with my picture on it. So I leave,

[19:07]

and then I go about my business, traveling around. I go to Germany and Switzerland and Sweden, and I come back. When I get back, I kind of remember, shouldn't my license be here by now? Thought crosses my mind. I look through the mail. There's no license. So then I go to the airport recently to pick up my grandson, and they point out to me that my temporary license has expired, so I can't have my grandson. I said, well, please. So they let me go to get my grandson, even though my temporary license had expired. And I had an old license with my picture on it. And they said, it's up to the TSA people.

[20:12]

They let me through. So I got the grandson. So then I called DMV and said, it hasn't come yet. Would you send me another one? They said, we can't do it. You've got to go to DMV. So today, I went to DMV, on my way to BER, etc. So I go in there. I'm waiting in line to get a number. And a woman says to me, Reb, what's your name? And I look, and there she is, an old friend. And she says, how are you?

[21:12]

And I said, fine, except I'm here. And she said, I missed that. Would you say it again? I said, fine, except I'm here. And she said, oh, now I get it. And then she said, you're here to help me. That's why you're here. I woke up. I was at DMV to help her. And that's where she was. She was at DMV. She's a bus driver. So she goes to DMV a lot. She's going to be a Muni driver. And she said, that's the goal of all the bus drivers, is to work for Muni. It's really a good job. So then we,

[22:14]

again, we were together through the whole thing. She was G-183, and I was G-184. And she let several people go ahead of her, because she was in no hurry, because she was with me. And I remember it. But the point is, we're here. We go to DMV for the people in DMV. It doesn't matter where we are. Because the people in DMV are emptiness. And emptiness is the people in DMV. And if you practice that, when you go there, you help the people in DMV, which is the Dharmagate of Repose and Bliss. But you have to study and practice, otherwise people won't remind you of that

[23:17]

at DMV. They won't say, you're here to help me. You're not here to waste your time, you're here to help me. They'll come up to you and tell you, don't worry, no problem, you're helping me by being here. And the other people were listening to us. It was helping them too. Plus she was letting these people go ahead of us, they liked that too. And even some people who were ahead of us talked to me, they came and talked to me, and they just left DMV. They realized you didn't need to be there. I don't know why. But this guy asked me questions, and I said, oh, I don't have to be here. And he left. Everybody moved up. Emptiness is kind of a cold word, and if you think of a better word, there's other words, vastness, the void. But this emptiness, this ultimate truth,

[24:18]

the coldness of it is that you don't get to get a hold of it. However, its essence is in light, is compassion. So now for this class and the next class we're going to be, and also remember that emptiness, realized emptiness, is wisdom. It's not the wisdom that knows the emptiness. The object of this wisdom is emptiness, but the wisdom is not something in addition to the emptiness. So the wisdom itself, this ultimate, transcendental wisdom, transcendent, super great wisdom, itself is not something you can get a hold of either. It's insubstantial, and it's the most wonderful insubstantial thing. Because it's the insubstantial thing

[25:22]

that realizes the insubstantiality of everything and makes wherever you are where you're supposed to be. And wherever you are is helping people. And helping people wherever you are is emptiness. That's emptiness. So no matter where you are, nothing can stop you from being helpful. There's no form that has a substance that can stop you, stop the compassion working. This is the ultimate bodhicitta, the bodhicitta that works every place. We can just get distracted from it, is all. Or not be ready for it. Or not be willing to open to it. The unique breeze of reality. Wherever you go, it can wake you up and remind you

[26:22]

of the wonderful work of helping people. Just by being yourself. Really being yourself. So that's an introduction to the ultimate bodhicitta meditation. So now, we try to continue the relative meditation on bodhicitta. Continue to try to remember that others, whether you are into their existence or not, are yourself. And keep checking to see if you're ready to change places with people. Just keep checking if you're ready to let people go ahead of you in line. Are you ready for that? Are you ready to wish other people

[27:24]

to get to the line quickly? Wishing for them to be first? So, those practices are still part of the deal because the relative bodhicitta doesn't go away. We still need the relative bodhicitta, and you need to teach other people how to have relative bodhicitta, conventional bodhicitta. Now we're going to bring up the ultimate bodhicitta, enlightenment itself, which is never separate from the relative bodhicitta, which works along with the ultimate. Yes, Charlie? If it doesn't matter where you are, why do people go off and practice in the mountains for three months at a time? You're the one who said it didn't matter.

[28:26]

I didn't say it didn't matter. I think you said that. I don't think I did. Well, you've got the tape. I think I said, no matter where you are, no matter, no matter where you are doesn't mean it doesn't matter where you are. No matter where you are, what really matters is you remember that no matter where you are, this is the place to practice. That this is the place. DMV is not better than the yoga room. Anyway, it's like it's closed now, so we say the DMV parking lot isn't better than the yoga room or Zen center. It's that they're all equal opportunities for awakening. But still then you might say, well, then why go to a place

[29:29]

where people tell you that wherever you are is a good place to practice. And the reason for going to that place is so you learn to be more undistracted from this teaching. That you'll be with people who will allow you to think that way and talk that way to some extent. And will tease you a little bit if you're too stubborn. Sanctimonious or whatever. But that will help you actually be more consistent. So in the conventional relative world, we do mention to people that it is good to go to places where people remind you that wherever you are is a good place. And when they remind you,

[30:31]

you get to also remind them. We remind each other and we more and more remember, oh yeah, this is the place to practice. This is the place to practice. These are the people to practice with. Not, let's leave the yoga room and go find some really good people to practice with. Or let's leave the DMV and go to the yoga room where the really good people are. No. But still, let's go be with people who remind us. So the people in DMV reminded me. So the DMV proved that it was a good place. And if you're in places where you don't seem to remember very often, and you see some place where you think you might be able to remember more, it's okay to go there. So you can remember that the place you left was a good place.

[31:42]

So I see two brothers with their hands raised. I just learned today that Josh, David, and Ben are brothers. And now I see the family resemblance. Yes, Ben. Well, the first part of suchness is the one we've warmed up to in the last few classes. It's the suchness, for example, of self and other. You warm up to that by reminding yourself that others are yourself. And you warm up to that, you get over your resistance to the suchness of self and other by seeing if you can exchange yourself with others. Because the suchness of self and others is that they have no substantial separation.

[32:46]

They appear to be separate, but the separation is an insubstantial appearance. That's the suchness of self and other, and that's the suchness of objects, according to one of the main schools of Mahayana Buddhism called the mind-only school. The suchness of objects is that they are inseparable from the knowledge of them, from the mind which knows them. That's their suchness. But another suchness is that objects have no independent existence, and that the appearance that they exist on their own is an illusion. It's an insubstantial appearance that they're out there on their own. And their out-there-on-their-own-ness can never be found. When you mentioned it before,

[33:48]

I thought of it like a ricochet between yourself and another person, or between yourself and the world. That it's like... And then you said suchness, as I have an image. And so I was thinking that myself is very various, and the more that I am myself, then that ricochet is as it should be, I guess. I don't know. Say it again, the more you're yourself, then what? Then the things, the people that I'm interacting with, we're creating, I don't know, the suchness. Right, that's right. And the fact that it's that way is the suchness. The consequence of that is that the separation cannot be found, and that all the elements

[34:51]

have no substantial existence. No independent existence of each other. So how can we keep focused on that? How can we be focused on that ultimate way things are? This is our challenge. Yes, Tamara? In my work, I work with autistic children, and as we were talking, I realized there are times when I have this thought I'm not healthy, and it's really painful. How can I practice that? Well, the first thing that comes to mind is when you're in pain... I don't want to speak specifically about you, you just said whatever you're doing,

[35:51]

you're helping someone. Right, so you're in a situation where the thought I'm not helping arises and you feel pain. So this is a good opportunity to help yourself by being gracious and ethical and patient with your pain. That's how to deal with the pain. Then you're ready to start arousing your energy to meditate on this person who you think you're not helping is yourself. Now you're ready to be yourself more, to be yourself who has these ideas that you're not helping. But along with my ideas, me, the person who has the ideas not helping, and this other person who maybe doesn't have the idea that he's not helping, he may or may not have that idea, maybe he doesn't, but I have the idea that I'm not helping him.

[36:52]

So I have to help myself who's got this problem. If I don't help myself who's got this problem, I'm not really ready in a meaningful way to say he is myself and I am willing to trade places with him. But first is he's myself, second is I will exchange myself with him. If I'm not willing to be patient and gracious with my pain that I'm not helping him, I'm not also ready to exchange places with him in his illness. I can't actually necessarily suddenly become autistic, but I can definitely train myself to be willing to be autistic. And wish him to be the therapist. Can you believe that some therapists

[38:02]

are not actually up for having the disease that they're treating? I'm being ironic. I think a lot of therapists are not ready to exchange places with their patients. And they are not up for and ready to see their patients as themselves. They're not doing that training. And if they're not, usually I think it's because they're clinging to their position, to their self as the therapist or whatever. No hard feelings, that's quite normal, quite common. Now we're talking about training ourselves to get over holding on to our position in the process of trying to help people. That's our job. But to do that effectively, we have to take care of ourselves in the earlier ways of benefiting ourselves

[39:04]

while we're still suffering. Then we start focusing on the bodhicitta and purifying ourselves of the problem. First take care of ourselves with this problem, then purify ourselves of it. The first part is focusing on relative bodhicitta. And more and more, the ideas I have of how I'm doing become the barter I use in purifying myself. They're the material I'm using for purification rather than my problem. Then we're getting ready to open to the emptiness. This is where we're really going to help an autistic person and a non-autistic person. This is the real place of helping people, supposedly. And this is the place where we realize emptiness, where we don't get exhausted in our work of helping others.

[40:04]

But we need not just the relative concentration, the concentration on relative bodhicitta, we need also the ultimate bodhicitta so that we can have the joy of doing this work. Including a million times of thinking, I'm not being helpful. Or a million varieties of thinking, I'm not being helpful. That's just like, yeah, right, that's part of the deal. And I'm up for this because it's all insubstantial. And I've learned to open to this because I know how to take care of myself when this stuff happens to me. But I realize other people are helping me too. Everybody's helping me do this practice. And I need that. I need it, and it's reality, and I need reality in order to realize reality. Reality is helping me realize reality.

[41:06]

But I also have to do my work. I have to take care of my suffering in these basic ways, and then I have to train myself in ways to get over my self-centered points of view. We come with that stuff. We need to remember it over and over and over and over until our perspective changes. And the theory is it will change. In this little world where we're noticing what's going on, by focusing on that, we change our karmic accumulations. By confessing that I see myself as separate from people and so on, that I don't see others as myself, by confessing that over and over, I address the place where that misconception comes from. I transform the ground of seeing others as separate. And I start seeing others as me. More and more. And I start seeing others as helping me remember that others are me.

[42:10]

How wonderful to walk down the street and have everybody come up to you and say, Remember, I'm you. Remember, you're me. Why do people talk to me like this at the grocery store? Also, this person I was talking to who said I was in DMV to help her, she also told me that she said, I wanted to tell you I got baptized. So this is a person who grew up in a Buddhist family. This is a person I knew from the time she was kind of a little girl. And now she's a big girl. And one of her step-sons just jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge a month ago. And she told me that she's baptized. And she said you had to get baptized because of her recovery work.

[43:13]

She needed to do it. I said, so now you're a Christian, huh? I said, I'm a Christian too. I got baptized 67 years ago. But I never stopped. I never kind of like, what do you call it? De-baptized. I never de-baptized myself. I never went to the church and said, I'm not a Christian anymore. I basically feel like all those Christian churches are my church. All of them. I mean, I don't press it on them, but they're all my church. And I kind of feel that way about synagogues too. And I'm trying to feel that way about mosques. Not that I possess them, but just... Anyway, she thought I was going to be angry at her for getting baptized. I said, no, no, no. She was relieved. And I wasn't trying to help her, but that was helpful to her

[44:14]

that she was not going to be excommunicated from Buddhism. And she was talking about all the ways that Buddhism helped her through all these troubles she's been through with drugs and alcohol and losing her husband and her children and almost killing herself. So Buddhism and recovery, and then she became a Christian to help her recovery work. Yes, Nancy. I was talking to one of your friends a couple of days ago. I was talking to one of your friends a couple of days ago. Beverly Tongari. She said, does my friend Nancy still take yoga room classes? I said, yeah, she's still there. Yeah. Yes, Nancy.

[45:14]

Sorry. And you said, would you be willing to exchange places with another person? And I was sort of taken aback because I had been so strongly black and white. That was not me. And then today, the same thing happened. It was a different person, but also walking disabled. And I did have the same thought. I mean, I just, I was aware that

[46:16]

I didn't save myself. Thank God that's not me. So it's a realization. Yeah, right. Before, I was really strongly. Before you felt that, you come to class, you hear some talk, your mind hears it, thinks about it, and that changes you. Not 100%, but if you do this over and over, you start having a different response. What is it? There but for the grace of God, go I? You know, there's something, there's something, it isn't there but for the grace of God, go I. In other words, there for the grace of God, I'm glad it happened to them. It's that that could be me. I'm glad it's them. And I'm not glad it's not me. It's not I'm glad it's not me. It's more, I could be, that could be me.

[47:19]

That way of reading it would be more in accord with this. That could be me. This person. Yeah, and that being the grace of God. That this, this whole process is the grace of the Buddhas. This whole process is arising from our relationship with the awakened ones. We're not making this thing run by ourselves. And we are getting fed. We are getting stimulated. And we are evolving. Yes, David. What occurs to me about the stories is how much help there is. Yeah. How much help there is. Yeah. [...]

[48:21]

Yeah. Yeah. And there was like a little, what do you call it, sort of a bevy of giving. It wasn't just me and her. All around us it started happening. And it's just, but, it's also fun that I kind of was, I mean, I called the people on the telephone. There's also calling them on the telephone and waiting to talk to people. There's that. I couldn't even figure out how to do the thing. Deirdre had to help me get a person on the phone to talk to. I couldn't figure out how to do it. So when I got to talk to the person, I actually kind of put my head down, like this, kind of like, when the person said, you know, you have to go back to DMV. But maybe the next time they tell me

[49:25]

I have to go to DMV, I'll remember. Oh, great. Without expecting it to be like it was last time. Without expecting the miracle. Go, huh? What? What? What did you say? Oh, yeah. These guys were very nice to me. They had pity on me. He said to me, you can make an appointment. He said, the next appointment is September 27th. So that means I have to be chauffeured until then. And I thought, well, maybe, I said, maybe this is all a thing that I should, oh, I shouldn't be driving. I should be chauffeured. Maybe this is, maybe the world's trying to tell me you shouldn't drive anymore. You never were good and you're getting worse. You should go to DMV frequently. But never drive. Yeah, the guy,

[50:27]

these people on the phone, they were taking pity on me. And they did say, well, you can make an appointment. And the next appointment is, he said, maybe you should go in, just go in. Well, maybe you should just go in. Maybe you should go to DMV. Hey, maybe you should go to DMV. There's something waiting for you. There's a surprise over here. Yeah, the world is helping us. The Buddhas are helping us. The path is there. So how can we remember that? That's the hard part. Because we have this deep reservoir of karmic accumulations which is kind of like challenging us to remember. We have this little part, we have this little circle of water where we're focusing and surrounded by this huge ocean of karmic accumulations. So it's a struggle. But remembering this huge thing,

[51:29]

actually I think is good. This is going to be hard to actually stay on message. Yes, Enrique. I'm trying to integrate your teaching to the real life situation. Yes, good. Let's do it. I have... I was telling my mom as being her translator at the beginning, children can engage into a certain activity that would out of integrity. And I had a real reservations about her, but she had no other really choice. And I kind of didn't want to do it, but then settled with myself that I can be a translator. That's a somewhat neutral function. A translator. A translator. For your mother. For my mother. And you said there was some problem of integrity? Yes, and it was an activity out of integrity that she wasn't engaging herself into.

[52:31]

It wasn't an activity of integrity. And you were being invited to assist her in this non-integral activity. Right. Being a translator. Although I expressed my concern and reluctance to do that to her and all that stuff. But I settled with myself that I can do that for her being a translator without judgment. Because my judgment doesn't work in helping her make a decision or helping her in any way. Your what doesn't help her? My judgment. My judgment. I didn't see that my judgment was helpful. So as I now fast forward 18 months later, there are consequences of that out of integrity. And she's been, she will have to spend some money,

[53:32]

pay, and endure some hardship as a result of that. And I was the one that communicated to her. Why? Because my brother never comes to the house. I was seeing her, it was the first time actually in my life I was seeing her as, as you said, as a real person, the way she was. Although she wasn't perfect, it was okay. It's just like a very new thing to me that seeing her that she screwed up. She put herself, I mean, it's very painful to see that someone getting into the deep trouble, or at least trouble, and willfully doing something and I wasn't stopping her because I wasn't stopping her. For some reason I wasn't attached to, I wasn't attached to that.

[54:34]

I could see her as me doing that and being grateful that I could see that and not do the same. Yeah, that's great to see her as you doing that. Right. Yeah. I've done it in my life many times. Right. And with this particular instance I had someone more clarity than she did. And what's happening now is I still will have to help her with translation, obviously, through the process You'll never get away from her. No. I know that. That's good. That's the bodhisattva way, never get away. Exactly. I wanted to get away from her. I didn't want to do that. I mean, my resistance... Yeah, but now you sound more ready. Obviously, I'm seeing that it's not about me getting away from her. Yeah. It's actually I see that

[55:37]

It's actually It's really beneficial to me. Right. It's really beneficial for you to not get away from her. Yes. Or really beneficial for you for you to stop trying to get away from her. Yeah. And if you can be that way that will help her. That's the main thing that will help her. Exactly. I'm seeing that, actually. I'm seeing that. Yeah. Seeing with her to this difficulty and being with my integrity however not judgmental about her. Mostly, yeah. There may be judgment but that's just like what do you call it? A stone in your shoe. Right. It's not the point. The point is you're going to stay with the stone in your shoe the judgment or whatever it is. You're going to do this with her. That's the thing. And no matter what it is you're going to do this. And there will be consequences for everything both of you do. But no matter what you're going to stay with her.

[56:39]

Yeah. The more you just walk with her through all this process the closer she gets to realize that this is how this is the consequence of her own karma. Then she can realize that because you're just there with her dealing with the consequences of your karma. You're not trying to get away from yours then that shows her how not to try to get away from hers. This is how we learn and help each other. And this is how she helps you. This is how you're helped. Yeah. [...]

[57:55]

Congratulations. What's the acronym for being with mother? BWM. BWM is a good place to practice. Anything else tonight you want to bring up? Yes. Could you say a little bit more about emptiness or the void? This undifferentiated void and then somehow wisdom and compassion just emerged? More words about that? More words about emptiness. Well, no. About compassion and wisdom emerging. Well, the emptiness

[58:59]

of the Buddhas is a wisdom which has an essence of compassion. Yeah. Or another way to say it a vast a vast space filled with love. That's emptiness but that's also non-dual wisdom. And non-dual wisdom actually requires compassion because you have to actively engage all dualities. You have to

[60:02]

be present and not run away from your mother or not run away from your judgments about your mother or not run away from the pain of being with your mother and the consequences of her karma. The willingness to completely embrace that without any sense of separation from it is compassion but it's also wisdom. And when it gets to the point where you're not even into the existence and non-existence of the suffering and of the compassion that's emptiness. So there are kinds of people or kinds of kinds of people which means kinds of understandings. People are kind of different varieties of understanding where they kind of understand emptiness to some extent but it's not

[61:03]

emptiness that's filled with compassion so it's not the correct understanding. The correct understanding of emptiness is filled with compassion. And that really makes giving ethical study patients vigor and concentration. It really makes them transcendent bodhisattva practices but it also includes them and wisdom that doesn't include them wouldn't be Buddha's wisdom. So Buddha's wisdom knows this insubstantiality of everything but because it's Buddha's wisdom this knowing of insubstantiality which is not separate from the insubstantiality it's filled with great compassion. It's amazing. And the amazement is emptiness too and filled

[62:04]

with compassion. But also everything the emptiness of everything is like this. The emptiness of fear and of pain is the same. It's not emptiness over there. That's not Buddha's emptiness. That's not emptiness of the Buddha's teaching. It's emptiness which is non-dual with observing that. It's an observation which is not separate from its objects. This is we have to train ourselves we have to get ready for this and train ourselves in this work in this practice. Anything else tonight? Yes, Ted? You mentioned how the mind plays tricks in making us perceive some other person who seems to be over there. And sometimes

[63:05]

the words that we use seem to reinforce that even when we say others as ourselves. The mind which thinks that way and the language which talks that way this is conventional reality. This is conventional truth. But it's called a truth because in the conventional world you can say that these conventional truths of these conventional things are incontrovertible. They've been worked out. You are Ted has been worked out. So, it is called conventional truth and ultimate truth. But ultimate truth does not think in terms of existence and non-existence. Conventional truth does and there's a language which goes with it and the language which goes with it is part of what makes it incontrovertible. Because we work this out and it works for us in a certain way. And it also works for the Buddhas

[64:06]

to use our conventional truths to get us to understand the teaching and start doing the practice. So the language which reflects this conventional dualistic deluded way of seeing things is also the language which the Buddhas use to help people study conventional truth. And studying conventional truth leads to understanding conventional truth in such a way that you're open to ultimate truth. If we don't respect conventional truth, like Nagarjuna says, before you're familiar and it's kind of an understatement, but I would say before you're thoroughly familiar with conventional truth, the ultimate is not appropriately taught. That's why we warm up

[65:07]

for four weeks before we bring up the ultimate bodhicitta. With conventional things like your sense of yourself and sense of others, with these conventional things we need to really be intimate and practice with them with generosity and ethics and patience and concentration and vigor. We need to be that way with conventional truth and know conventional truth. For example, know that others are our self and know how to exchange ourselves with others is part of being familiar with conventional truth. So if you know something about conventional truth, good. Now, can you exchange yourself with everybody? If you learn how to do that, you know more about conventional truth than you did before. People who can do that are more skillful, are more knowledgeable, are more thoroughly educated about conventional truth than the people who can't. And without that

[66:09]

kind of familiarity with conventional truth, that emptiness should not be touched, taught or touched. So now I'm teaching the ultimate bodhicitta but I also should say there's some danger here. This ultimate teaching is not really appropriate unless it's grounded in your studying the conventional, being very respectful of conventional diluted consciousness. The mind which thinks in terms of existence and non-existence. You can see that mind will take care of it because caring for that is the basis for receiving the teaching of the ultimate. But liberation is not possible just by conventional truth. We also have to have ultimate truth. So ultimate truth should not be taught unless we're well grounded in conventional and we need the ultimate

[67:09]

in order to have liberation. So don't forget the first four classes as you start to open to ultimate truth. Don't forget the first four classes as you look and open to the unique breeze of reality. The one the one taste of everything. Okay. So we have one more class. Thank you very much for your wholehearted openness to these teachings. And I hope you come back next week. I hope I do too. Thank you very much.

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