The Power of Openness

...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 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.