...Right? Be aware of that.
So when you're doing it,
when you're not conscious about it,
what you're doing is you're grasping it.
Your deep insides are saying, "I hate this."
Very quietly, but "I hate."
But if you're conscious of it, in that moment,
you look at a famous person,
you look at them from a place of openness.
You have to look at the image,
because the image is where you're storing that information and emotion.
You look, but you're trying to look from a different place
You're reprogramming it you're restructuring it.
You are healing the relationship.
So if you look with that openness to that same image,
At some point that image will have different meaning for you.
It will not carry the same meaning.
If you look at it in your own body,
if you look at it in your health, probably the same thing
You know, wherever the cells are in your body
producing a kind of disease, like a cancerous cell,
if you look at that, if you're being aware of that in your body
aware of yourself, the whole aspect of yourself,
it will begin to give different information to the rest of your body.
And therefore, that information helps begin to restructure
your biological conditions.
It is what we believe, how to understand it's going to happen to the body.
Reproduction of cells, like cancerous cells, the same principle.
That's how the cancerous cell knows how to reproduce the cancerous cell.
It will do wonderful thing if it forgets one day.
And it's producing some new cell.
Probably that's what happens if the deep pattern of identity
it shifts something inside you
It shifts what it brings in the body.
So the principle here is
the power of openness and awareness is able to change things
in our body, able to change the way we identify ourselves,
it's able to change the way we relate to the world,
it's able to change everything.
That's why it's called vision, it's able to cut those things.
So that's a bit of explanation.
Any questions?
I'm happy to see that many European people are staying up really late.
They are participating with us.
So any questions?
Do you think that in openness, there's a possibility to maintain curiosity?
Curiosity? Yeah, and there is some degree of curiosity in ourselves.
And there's also curiosity on some survival level, you know
I'm curious to know what I need, and so on.
Curiosity has a lot of playfulness,
and you cannot have playfulness
if you're not open to it.
What we use, what we say, we are serious.
That's what happens in a relationship, when people are very serious
in a relationship, that is the beginning of divorce.
[laughs]
They are curious about each other? Yes. Too curious about each other.
They are not that curious, they are very open to each other,
that doesn't mean loyalty and things like that.
There's some sort of sense of openness
and that brings a lot of playfulness.
I was in a place in a country where people are usually serious,
and I was making a little joke, saying,
"How are you going to be a little more playful here?"
So how are you going to be a little more playful? Of course,
first thing, you kind of have to go inside yourself, wherever this
seriousness is stuck. You have to go to that place inside and loosen that up.
You have to feel some confidence.
I think that confidence is clearly a key to be playful.
So if you're confident that you can be a bit more playful, if you're playful you
can have humor, and you can have curiosity in a good way.
If whatever you're curious about is not showing up, you're curious
why it's not showing up!
Rather than feeling pain that it's not showing up.
You're open to every direction.
So yes, I don't think openness prevents anything.
Openness makes life richer not poorer.
Openness is the source of knowledge, more than the knowledge we conceptually know.
There was a study in Netherlands about these
executive people making big decisions about a big company.
The research was based on, did they make a better decision when they're taught alot?
Or did they make a better decision when they didn't think much?
The conclusion was, they made a much better decision when
they didn't think much.
So of course, people who think a lot,
they believe we have to think.
we have to think to not to think.
But, some sense of these practices call for a direct path.
Direct path means you don't have to think about it.
You can just be aware of it.
Any other questions?
We have a group of people in Brazil who we've met with before,
they're asking, "Please, what do you mean by the essence of sky?"
[laughs]
[he repeats the question.]
First, when I say essence, the sense or meaning of essence is "the truth"
the truth of the sky, the truth of the phenomena, the truth of the mind.
So in some sense, the essence of sky I mean, the truth of the sky.
So what is the truth of the sky?
It's that boundlessness. When I'm gazing the sky and I'm aware
of that boundlessness, because the sky is boundless.
When I'm aware of that, it's something deep.
Psychologically it does something to me inside.
I feel that boundlessness.
But when I'm looking at the sky I have to be aware that that's what I'm feeling.
That's what I'm seeing, that's what I'm experiencing, that's what I'm aware of.
Very often people will not be aware of it.
I gave one example where people were doing a sky gazing practice in New Mexico.
Everybody was having this wonderful experience!
But one guy was getting really agitated about it. He looked around,
and it seemed like everyone seems like they were having a good time.
He's wondering why they're having a good time and he's looking up at the empty sky
And he said, "What am I supposed to see?"
[laughs]
Well, he's not seeing the essence of the sky.
He's not seeing the boundlessness of the sky.
He's expecting some stuff to show up right in front of him,
what he would desire.
So that's what I mean.
I saw a cartoon in New York Times one time,
there was this wall street person, and he's in Tibet with all the
hiking shoes and all those things, and really getting up in the mountain.
And on top of the mountain he sees a clear vision of himself;
Not with the hiking shoes. He sees himself with the suit and tie
and breathless with this pure vision.
So, no matter where you go, you might see your impure visions
you're not even able to see what you're seeing.
You're only seeing what you're wanting to see.
Yeah.
[asking question] This is somewhat related.
Kelly is in Vietnam right now, and she's watching the broadcast.
She says, "Here in Vietnam I'm more lonely than I was even in the dark retreat
Everything truly appears to be illusion.
How can I keep myself connected when there are so few supports?"
It seems like she's in a place where she's lacking support.
Sure. Well, you know,
the opportunity for you to be completely open to the
lonely person in you.
So that basically means what we were saying earlier when we said,
"It really hurts me. I really feel lonely, I really feel lonely."
And probably that sense of loneliness, probably everybody feels it.
At some times we have to go so far away to feel it really strong.
So when you feel it really strong, you have the opportunity to
to know that.
And to know that will be fully open to that
and when you're fully open to that, it will go away.
When it goes away, the voice saying, "I'm lonely," and the energy
bringing a sense of loneliness, and the one who's thinking, "I'm far away,"
or "I'm thinking maybe to move away,"
Out of all those voices and cards and the way you relate to yourself,
all those somehow are like a cloud.
The way you let them go away is by being fully aware and connect.
Connect with them, so it's like a loving mother sending this love to this
napping child. So radiate the love and attention with your open awareness
to that lonely experience in yourself.
That awareness, when you open to that, it will help.
It will dissolve. And when it dissolves,
you come to a place where you don't feel that loneliness.
So you need to become familiar with that place where you don't feel familiar.
The question is, how do you get to that place where you can feel
"it's okay." So that's what I was saying earlier that pain body.
The principle is the same.
And we all, right now with the internet, you're not lonely, you know?
Everybody's together. Yes?
[questioner:] Could you comment on the role of medical diagnosis
when one experiences certain aches and pains? Does seeking that
diagnostic action from a Western medical practitioner, is that a way of
staying attached to the story of the pain rather than being with it
and allowing it to disappear?
Well I think that....
Well, I think in the West, all the doctors are trained to tell some sense of truth.
So people say, "Okay you only have five months to live," or something like that.
So if somebody has 5 months to live, do they really need to know that?
I mean, how important is it for a doctor to tell you you have 5 months to live?
From my point of view, I don't think it's that important.
If you have some suggestion about what you can do to do something,
so somehow the way people...
bring this kind of energy, there's a sense of harshness. Maybe not a lack of
compassion, but maybe it feels like a lack of compassion and attention
because there's so much time pressure of so many patients he needs to see
So, the point is, when somebody labels themselves as something,
or "now I am this," I think it's terrible for sure.
So how you don't do that? Again, You have to try to be open.
If you're not identifying with being something else,
why do you have to identify with being sick?
You're sick maybe, but you don't have to identify with that.
You know, last moment of breath for a woman,
you can live with full sense of joy, no matter how sick you are
or how much pain you have, that awareness, that joy, that openness,
it doesn't take away. But again, the point is how we can feel confidence
to know that is the case. To even attempt to try,
that have glimpse of experience.
It's true, and people do have those trusts in themselves to not be influenced
by those labels. For sure it's a challenge
The question is practice.
Angel from Paris, Texas is asking, "Can we access emptiness through
the experience of the boundless space?"
Well, I mean, the word emptiness in Buddhism is used a lot.
And sometimes in the West I think that people... When we were in the
monastery growing up for 15-30 years,
we were studying about emptiness, we never felt emptiness was something
wrong, that there's something wrong with emptiness, but here,
when we use the word emptiness, it's like, "Oh.." So it doesn't look so good.
[laughs]
So, in a way the word emptiness, the word emptiness and fulness no differences.
Because in order to be full, it has to be empty. If it is not empty, then it
cannot be full of the right things.
So, we were talking about finishing our 5 day retreat,
And one of the things we were talking, is that there's a concept in tradition
the great perfection tradition, that means that everything
is spontaneously perfected. It basically means that everything is perfected
in us. So for example, that means joy, it's not going to hinder itself
in light and quality.
Let's go down to one simple quality like joy and happiness that we all know
about it, right? So, joy, is it perfected in us?
Yes. The only way you're going to truly experience your true joy -
true joy means joy of being -
is to experience yourself clear from who you are NOT.
Probably right now, the way you feel who you are is occupying
so much of space, that it's not allowing you to feel who you are.
Therefore, probably you don't have so much of joy,
or joy of that being. But you maybe do have some joy of becoming, having,
of being something which is not necessarily who you are, but it's being
better than who you think you can be.
It's still in your mind. Or, "I'm better because I just finished a project!"
So finishing a project is better than someone who hasn't finished the project.
Right? So, I'm happy.
Today is a Friday afternoon so I'm happy, so Monday I will be sad.
So, all those conditions you create to yourself are simply a condition.
Through that you can have little joys, but true sense of joy is joy of being.
So what do you need to have joy of being?
You don't need to have anything to have a joy of being, you simply must be aware.
If you simply look this very moment, close your eyes, feel the stillness
in your body, draw attention inward, do you feel the joy?
Of course you feel the joy!
It's there.
Especially when you're open to it. The power of openness.
When you're open to yourself, you feel that openness in you.
In that openness, everything is perfected. That means joy is perfected
Can you be aware? Yes, if you're trying to be aware, it's there.
That means it's perfected there. Is that joy equally valuable then
to possessing a new car? Far better.
I guarantee far better.
Do you trust that? For sure we will not trust that much.
[laughs] I want to have that joy but also want the joy of a new car!
But at some point you need to have confidence enough to know that it's truly
better. This is better than the car.
That confidence you got to have one day. One day, we have to look for
that confidence. When that confidence comes, it's life changing.
So basically the question about emptiness, it's basically a fulness.
It's a perfection that's spontaneously perfected.
What kind of perfected? All the qualities of perfection like joy.
In order to feel that joy, one has to feel that empty or clear or open
otherwise that joy of being is hard to feel.
For example, in that space, talking about the loneliness.
In that space, if you're open to it and look inside there,
you feel one important quality. You feel connectedness.
Because you are connected to that essence of mind, to that openness in yourself.
You are connected to yourself.
When you feel that connection to yourself, you feel that connectedness.
When you feel that, you don't feel very lonely.
But when you don't feel connectedness yourself, you're seeking a connection
from elsewhere that's not inside yourself.
Therefore, elsewhere means all the familiar places when you're out in
the country where you don't know people, then you feel disconnected.
You'll feel very lonely.
Loneliness is a magic experience, same as connectedness.
You can be middle of the family, you can live with somebody,
but for a lifetime you'll feel disconnected!
Or you could be alone and connected with everybody!
The way you look, the way you experience the world
has nothing to do with your circumstances so much.
That's the beauty. The true realization has nothing to do with the
circumstances. I think that's beautiful news. Very good news.
Has nothing to do with anybody, therefore you have a chance.
If we have to fix the world to make you happy, forget about it.
[laughs]
If every family member has to agree with you for you to be happy, forget about it.
First, probably, it's never possible that every family member will agree with you.
Second, if it's possible, the day they will agree with you,
you'll disagree with them.
[laughs]
Yeah.
[questioner:] I just wanted to share what Susan in Vietnam said.
She says, "Thank you. I do feel connected now. My life and meditation is very rich.
I guess I'm just missing you all. Thank you."
And then, later, as you were talking, she says, "Perfect medicine this morning!
This is so great! Love to all."
And then, just to mention, in Monterrey, Mexico, there are 12 people in the cafe
there I believe. I don't know if this is a little off point, but often what they ask
is "where can we get further information about walking meditation?"
But anyways, I just wanted you to know that they are there.
Thank you. I think we've finished, so thank you.