Following the other night's discussion we could [coughs] continue in the
particular understanding of the
impulse and mind.
In the some sense you could say
that state without impulse
doesn't have a mind,
purely mechanical,
but on the other hand you could say nevertheless
that impulse and mind work together
and if you have a mind alone
it would be difficult to have an impulse too,
mind situation. [Coughs]
But in lot of rare occasions that,
that happened,
that mind brings impulse along with it,
but at the same time mind is separated
from impulse,
nevertheless.
Impulse is somewhat of garbage,
an active,
restlessness,
but mind is somewhat
thought process,
thinking process,
in which the mind actually functions.
And the discursive mind,
the minds of understanding,
minds of insight and all the rest of it, so
impulse and mind become very
fuzzy at some point.
But however in the Buddhist tradition of course that we have
always divided those 2 sections as
being very separate thing:
action and thinking are very separate thing.
Quite often action could be wrong
but thinking could be right;
on the other hand, thinking could be wrong
but action could be right, then that's it,
we get into Vajrayana which we don't need to discuss this point, particularly,
however...
just occasional reference point here,
if you don't mind.
There's skilful means,
applications,
compassions,
against mind,
insight,
understanding,
sense of clarity as well,
are all included in those 2 categories.
But it is very vague, actually;
we can't definitely say
which belongs to which particular camp, so to speak.
And sometimes Buddhist logic becomes rather fuzzy,
at this point, because
for real Buddhists who are brought up in Buddhism
and have actually practiced, understood the whole thing,
couldn't care less
what part of which is function and which where.
So becomes somewhat fuzzy edge in some sense.
The definition of a mind
maybe we should discuss slightly more tonight,
uh, mind in this case,
the one of the definitions, according to the Buddhist tradition,
is
mind is so,
therefore you can
mind to situations.
So in other words,
the definition of mind is somewhat functional,
that mind can be only mind
if it only minds situations,
only relates with the mind, only related with situations.
That could be only function of the mind, otherwise
if mind doesn't function
in the relationship to situations alone,
then mind cannot be mind because it couldn't mind itself.
And beyond that,
has also the reference point of
dash of intelligence
and dash of also confusion,
which brings together
intelligent and confusion put together,
which usually tend to bring some kind of spark,
and if you're on the heavy side of either of those,
either you're called as completely freaked out or
neurotic, or schizophreniac or
whatever you have,
or else you are highly intelligent and very even minded,
as traditionally known in English language.
But the basic point of the mind here is not so much of the
traditional concept of the higher mind
of the dharmakaya or whatever we might discuss in the
vajrayana or really enlightened level,
but we are here, we're discussing
something that we perceive,
something we actually understand,
somewhat, and something we actually can watch our own mind
constantly taking place,
we can have a check
and recheck, check and recheck on our mind.
And mind checks itself,
as if a dog bites its own body
of flea,
the mind can only also can check
its own irritations and bite itself,
free from fleas, irritations, what have you.
So the mind calls by itself
and work with itself,
and at the same time also projects out whenever
there is any kind of danger,
or aggressive situation involved,
or any kind of situations where
mind would like
magnetize
its comparable babysitter.
or comparable companion,
and mind begin to
magnetize them as well at the same time,
and it's wishful thinking, of course.
So mind is somewhat
very flexible worm
which doesn't have a backbone to spray itself
but it could curl back and forth, even if it's cut in half
could grow itself by different individuals,
it's just like a worm
with a very flexible backbone, without a backbone,
but still functioning, mind is a worm you could say. [Laughter]
And then when mind begin to meet impulse,
which is a temptation
as the theistic tradition talks about
fall of man and all kinds of bad things that man did [laughter],
fall of man and all the rest of it.
That mind has geared
in the wrong direction, wrong situation as always,
according to the theistic traditions that we've never been right,
we've never been in the dot, properly,
completely.
And we swayed wrong all the time,
that as far as the idea of
impulse is concerned
that mind is such
that it could also run into problems
and promises of all kinds,
which conventionally are called
opportunities.
And people say that
going to the United States of America,
it's the land of opportunity.
You can be a rich person.
If not you can at least be earning your living. [Laughter]
Impulse comes from somewhere else.
Impulse is not really a separate entity
from that point of view particularly,
but impulse is just
a wall where your mind's echo begin to hit;
that's the wall of the impulse where
that echo transmit back its own reproductions
back to you,
what you projected back to you.
If you're nasty to somebody, shall we say,
and the wall begin to also repeat same
nasty words and say
piss on you.
And we tend to think that somebody else said that and
we begin to
to attack them and we begin to have
a terrible time them with them,
and if you say fuck you!,
and the wall says fuck you too,
and it only gets louder and louder and louder
and keep on saying it
until we are exhausted ourselves,
that that wall begin to transmit back
its own messages, constantly again and again.
So that's the epitome of impulse,
fundamentally speaking.
That the impulse is not so much
impulse as wrong-doing,
or impulse that you get yourself in an accident, particularly,
but impulse in some sense from the point of view that
you have produced enough input
and because of that
you get what you put out in return,
which is the impulse situation,
that if we have a negative relationship
with the world,
the world gives us a hard time too
because that's what we put in,
and the world returns its
reflections,
which is volitional action
in the Buddhist tradition of Hinayana discipline,
of karmic consequences. Not so much of
there is guy who is trying to
judge every action that you have committed or done
and trying to put you in their black book,
but it's just simply mechanical reactions that bounce back
and forth constantly.
Actions and reactions.
And interestingly, the skilful means
could come from that echo;
that that's why the whole thing is known as skilful means.
Why skilled?
Why means?
It's because it depends on how you
put in to the situation
and how you wanto to tone
your echo when it returns to you,
and you can make
some kind of statement
when your voice is bounced back on a wall.
Of course, that through the transmission of
your voices bouncing back from your mouth
to the wall
and getting back to the wall
to you,
you begin to hear in your ears,
there are lot of distortions involved but
the ideal skilful means is that you have
so much understanding of the
journey that takes place with your voice going there
and coming back to you,
and also the level of what kind of surface you're reflecting
your voice, whether it's a hard surface
or soft surface,
and you have a complete understanding of all that situation;
so skilful means becomes further feedback
to be more skilful, in other words,
that you have more understanding
of how you project yourself,
and when you project yourself properly
in a very well balanced way
it bounces back,
and bounces back in your favor,
so to speak.
So that seems to be the very basic
ordinary level of Hinayana
discipline of skilful means,
and also mind,
and the mind has to operate at the same time.
Nevertheless at the same time the mind itself
has its own inbuilt chamber
of echo chambers
within mind itself at the same time.
You're having thought flashes in your mind - ding!-
and then goes dong! and
it comes back to you;
and sometimes
first flash is excitement
and second flash is
what can you do with that,
whether you can actually
achieve something out of it,
so mind begin to
work in circles.
Then finally we decide to actually project the wall.
We make a statement of that
and it bounce back on a greater level
from that point of view.
So the wisdom and compassion,
or the wisdom and skilful means level
in the very primitive level we are talking at this point
is also very interestingly powerful,
very powerful.
I don't think I should
tell you too much
and maybe you get more confused,
so that you are unable to tell the echoes
in this ripe situation, whatever,
so the question/answer period is
open for you. Please.
Q: I was wondering if there's a word for spontaneity in the
Buddhist tradition, like,
say someone scares you and
you react, you know, it doesn't seem like
there's an echo going on;
is there an echo really going on or
is there a place where you can just react?
VCTR: What you mean by that?
Q: Well, I know that personally, like if I'm scared or
you know someone surprises me
I see my body is all prepared
and ready for action, you know.
I don't have any...
it doesn't seem like I have time to think about it.
VCTR: You don't seem to time to think about it?
Q: Mm-hmm...
VCTR: You don't seem to be trying to think about it?
Q: No. I just react.
I don't... what I'm asking is if that is an echo?
VCTR: Not necessarily but
when you say react,
it means echo already
in the linguistic point of view, I suppose.
Q: That I've already been processed to react in this way?
VCTR: Well, it doesn't take all that long, you know.
It's very fast.
And as we say in the books,
that aggressive moves take much faster
speed
and then with the passionate moves
it takes much slower.
Whereas passion and aggression mixed together
then becomes very frantic
because you are struggling with the slowness
of the maturity of your passion
or your lust, whatever,
and the same time speediness of the whole thing
so there's conflict then, that's why
you fall in love. [Laughter]
Q: In the hell realm the situation is really crowded
with a lot of heat
and it strikes me maybe a situation could get so crowded
that there wouldn't be room for any echoes.
VCTR: Echoes?
Sure. The heat bounce back on you.
Q: I mean, like could get so crowded that...
VCTR: Well, not only, there are 2 types of hell realm
which is one is extremely cold,
one is also hot at the same time.
But nonetheless
those are not particularly the issue
but the issue only comes
that
hell realm is your own manifestation
rather than you are put in the nazi camp
by mistake.
Q: Put which?
VCTR: Nazi camp. By mistake.
Hell realm is not like that.
Q: Yeah. So you couldn't envisage a situation where
where there wouldn't be room...
VCTR: There's no any situation in the whole of the cosmos law,
so to speak,
where there's no bouncing back and forth that's taking place
unless it is your doing.
Q: Yeah.
VCTR: And that's well known fact
and fundamentally the whole thing is your doing
rather that anybody's doing terrible thing to you.
Particularly, you know,
there's no such thing as devil's advocate particularly, you know.
Q: So, so would you also say that
if there's always an echo
then you can't...
VCTR: There's always what?
Q: There's always an echo.
VCTR: Always echo, yeah?
Q: Then there's no such thing as let's say, ah,
a thought or an event...
VCTR: Yeah?
Q: That's pure in itself without any...
VCTR: Yeah. Sure, sure.
But your concentration is not good enough
to listen to the echoes all the time.
Q: Yeah.
VCTR: Which is the vajrayana practice, actually the mahamudra practice
which we discuss much later.
Q: When... when you say...
VCTR: But if you are constantly aware of the echoes all the time
then you are fine,
but we have not enough
span of attention
to stick with that any more at all
and we constantly just dream back,
we just close off the whole thing
and we daydream and produce more
and bounce back more things
so we don't really allow anything to happen anywhere.
Q: Is that like, like solidifying,
like the attempt to solidify is to ignore echoes
and just see clear form.
VCTR: Well, solidify in oneself but
you would like to have iron heart.
Q: Iron heart?
VCTR: Yeah.
That's usually the problem is
that you would like to be solid
and your heart can't pulsate it.
Q: No, no blurring.
VCTR: But at the same time
you don't want anybody to
penetrate through your heart.
Q: Yeah.
Q: Is there an energy behind skilful means?
Or does it just kind of arise?
Or appeared? Or get discovered?
VCTR: I think that's a stupid question to ask.
If I may say so.
I knew you were going to say that.
It is why it is stupid that there's no confirmation.
And if I said, yes there is indeed,
then what you doing to do?
If you look for it,
try to cultivate it,
then we produce more echoes.
You see what I mean?
It, the whole thing is not really mystery.
But it is very personal and direct.
Very personal and direct. And
maybe I shoudn't say stupid but
innocent, shall we say. [Laughs, laughter]
Okay, young lady over here.
Turquoise color.
Q: Rinpoche, for the last 4 or 5 months
I've been breaking a lot of glass.
It's been exploding in my face, and just
dropping it, it's really weird.
Is that a form of an echo?
Every time it happens I have a feeling
that someone trying to tell me something.
VCTR: You should read this book called
Tintin [Laughter]
There's one particular
volume, particular edition,
particular book,
The Seven Crystals
and it keep on doing that.
And you might enjoy that comic. [Laughter]
It's such a great one.
But what you're saying anyway?
Q: Well, the glass explodes in my,
practically in my face but I never get hurt.
And when it's happening it's always at a point where
things seem really chaotic.
And I just,
I have a feeling that a message is trying to be sent to me,
not sent to me but,
something is happening
but I really don't understand what is happening.
VCTR: Well, don't try to figure it out, just
watch your mind.
Sit and practice.
That's it.
It doesn't matter about glasses.
You might discover them later.
And, but read Tintin. [Laughter]
Seven crystal balls.
that's the title.
Tintin
"Tantan"
is French translation.
Young lady over there in green. Becky.
Q: I feel very confused about impulse.
It sounds to me as though you're saying that impulse is the echo.
It seems to me as though impulse might be
the projection of mind.
VCTR: Impulse is projection.
Yes, indeed. But nevertheless,
it functions by itself.
Q: I can see that, uh...
VCTR: But when you see
your projection usually what we think in those terms is that
we think we can control the screen.
If we have the projector of the movie.
And if someone says switch off that set,
he just switch off, the screen goes blank.
But in this case it's a different kind of game.
And even if you switch off this particular set
of your movie, your particular thing,
the screen still goes on.
Q: So that's sort of karmic volition.
VCTR: That's what volition actually, yeah...
good thinking,
well said.
Okay. Gentleman, shinny headed.
Q: Is mind somehow separate...
VCTR: Sorry? Can you say that again?
Q: Is mind somehow separate from situation or is there
in some sense only mind?
VCTR: Well, mind is mind.
And mind projecting to situation
makes mind mind.
Comprendo? [Laughter]
Red shirt.
Q: Rinpoche, is there impulse to open?
VCTR: What do you mean by that?
Q: Ah, well, it seems that, ah
that the impulses are sort of motion
that go on inside
and the motion is something
that you put out and it seems to be reflected back.
And, ah, some place along the line, i'm not sure whether it's a
hangover from
some sort of theistic training or what,
but I have what seems like a goodie-goodie impulse,
not all the time but,
a sort of an impulse to open and to want to
to make some sort of a connection.
VCTR: Connection to what?
Q: Usually with another being, another phenomenon.
VCTR: Another being? Q: Yeah.
VCTR: Flying saucer? [Laughter] Q: No, humanoide.
VCTR: What? Q: Humanoids
VCTR: What? Q: People.
VCTR: People? Q: Or animals or...
VCTR: Such as what?
Friends? Lovers? Parents? Dogs? Cats?
Q: Such as all of these.
VCTR: All of us? Q: Yeah
VCT: Yeah. So what?
Q: I'm wondering, okay, my sense of
what impulse was when you were talking
of it 2 days ago... VCTR: Yeah.
Q: that there were sets of aggregates that ah,
that ah, had to do with sort of neurotic aspects of mind.
VCTR: Well, let us not talk about neurotic aspects of the mind,
we are trying to talk about what
we are, basically at this point.
And it doesn't matter who has the bad
and the good impulse.
This case impulse is not particularly conditioned that level,
at this point.
Impulse is still simply impulse.
And you never understand the Buddhist path
if you begin to evaluate and say
this is your bad part of you,
this is the good part of you,
and let us work with your bad part and you're too bad,
you're too rigid, wretched,
and you're so bad but nevertheless
it's the best you can do.
That doesn't work.
In the Buddhist tradition we talk about
you have what you have
whether it is known as good or bad,
your particular culture or upbringing,
whether it is occidental or oriental approach,
culturally, whatever it may be.
But still very simply,
it is you simply functioning.
And that's why sitting practice of meditation,
whether orientals sit, or occidentals sit,
or the Afrikaans sit,
it doesn't really make much difference as that.
Is just simply that you sit and meditate.
And I think we ought somehow go beyond
the cultural and the conception level a little more than that.
Impulse is good
because it is connected with the Buddhist approach
and Buddhism is good in any case
because Buddhism covers
universal approaches anyway,
so we don't have to bother about that any more at all.
And Buddhism is everything,
including your cup of tea
or the dog shit on the sidewalk.
Everything's ace Buddhist experience
once you begin to get into that.
And I think we have to be much more brave
and more respectable
and we don't have to punish ourselves by being
terrible bad particularly.
It is nontheistic discipline. [Laughter]
Okay. Last 2 questions, okay? Um,
whom shall we choose?
There's lots of eager students.
Okay, this young man first.
Q: Rinpoche, if we're projecting on
situations all the time with our mind, how are we going to
go about feeling what we're bouncing off of?
How's that different?
VCTR: You don't. You don't how.
You don't how.
Q: You mean you don't decide whether is soft
or hard particularly? Okay.
VCTR: You don't how.
How to do it is ah, comes with ah,
the wonders of the western civilization. [Laughter]
You don't how, you do it.
Next?
The young lady in the orange scarf here.
Q: As regards the wall
it would seem like there's a relationship between the wall
and mirror.
But you have said that
the guru is the mirror.
VCTR: The guru is a different category all together.
Q: A different category all together
and ah, but, it's like
"mirror, mirror on the wall
who is the fairest of them all", no?
VCTR: It's a blank wall.
Q: A blank wall. [Video footage ends]
VCTR: That's very entertaining to have a guru as mirror
and a wall is a wall
and the wall is not a wall,
and your projection can be reflected in the mirror.
And you can entertain
sevenfold,
tenfold, you know,
if you see yourself
reflecting one mirror after another mirror,
you see whole corridor,
whole corridor,
whole hallway
of each other reflecting each other so
you never see the end of it.
But in this case we are talking about
solid concrete wall.
The way it reflects.
That something can bounce back
rather than something you can actually
watch.
As a cinema screen.
Q: Thank you.
VCTR: You're welcome.
Okay, that ends tonight's
DDT or whatever we have here. [Laughs, laughter]
What's the proper way to say?
Speaker: ATS
VCTR: ATS. Right. [Laughs, laughter]
Well, good night.
And I would like you to also be encouraged
to practice and sit a lot during this discipline.
If you don't do that
nothing will happen.
And particularly [laughter]
particularly I'm referring to those people who are
sort of simply guests or whatever you have
and simply just
onlookers,
watch,
watching what's happening.
Just sort of psyching the scene, so to speak.
But you maybe no able to
anything out of it.
Except a complete distortion of what we're doing.
So sitting practice of meditation is extremely important.
And extremely powerful. And
there are some
meditation teachers provided for your sake
and everything is settled in that area, is it?
With meditation teachers and everything.
Okay. Well,
let's see each other
the day after tomorrow, I suppose.
And...
tomorrow?
Okay, tomorrow.
See you again.
Thank you.