Leslie that essentially it's not a good idea to take them out of the center. No, no, no, and Leslie never does fire watch I don't think so. Yeah, so it just seemed like the timing position, they shouldn't be doing a fire watch. That was my take on it. If you ever record, you should be able to see this needle bounce around a little. That's my recording right now. I didn't check that this morning, and I know what happened, but this tape's blank. Actually, you know, Actually, up around Cleveland. Only as entities are uniquely related, alienated, can they be described in terms of relational conditions.

[01:59]

For how can a non-relational condition be assertive of entities which have not come into being? What do you think? You give these, give rise to those, therefore these are called conditioned. As long as those do not come from these, why are those not non-conditioned? So when you say, these give rise to those, so those, these give rise to those, so these are called conditions, meaning the only reason for calling them conditions is because they co-arise.

[03:15]

In other words, there's not some other reason, like that these have this real connection with those. So as long as those did not come from these, why are these not non-conditional? In other words, since there isn't any connection other than this co-arising, if those don't come from these, these are non-conditional. And then someone would say, well, isn't there something more than just coincidence between the conditions and the effects or the things that arise?

[04:19]

Some people would say, isn't there something more than coincidence? If there isn't anything more than coincidence, if that thing is taken away that was coincident, it will no longer be a condition. Just like it says in the next part, as long as those do not come with these, why are these not non-conditions? So they have nothing more to them to be conditions other than these things co-arrived, which is also a coincidence. So what is it about some sets of event pairs but not about others that make them dependently related, if not some deep causal link present in some cases but not in others?

[05:31]

And for Nagarjuna it's just the regularity. That's all there is to it. If the regularity broke down, the conditions Because what happens is that if there is regularity, then you gradually start to seek some essence into the case, into the regularity. So you can say, it's a coincidence that you met with Dr. Scott talking about your students in your program? Yeah. When we're metaphysicians and we're substantialists or realists or reificationists, then, when we think that way, then these things that are there that we don't see as having causal power, we call them coincidence.

[06:39]

And if they happen again and again, we might still call them coincidences. But finally, after a certain amount of time, we might say, But we watched these things over eons, we saw some regularity, and then they became conditions in our explanations. But if the irregularity broke down, these things would not be conditions anymore, they might not do that. But if they have the essence in them, it's hard for them to break down. So again, it's hard for us to change the story, like some of the stories that were last night. you can tell a certain story about you know the real who's really responsible for an accident and that's and that then it's hard for you to sort of like get given later information to adjust.

[07:45]

Yes? It was a regularity check once or twice a week? I don't think the essence is fed by the regularity. I don't think the essence is fed by the regularity. I think the essence is fed by our sense of belief in something being independent. If you didn't have that idea that something could be independent, that something could be self-existent and have a pure identity, I think you could watch regularity for a long time and not attribute you know, essence to the process. Like if you're going to watch some stats, that happens regularly, like the sun rises, without attributing essence to the sun, and having light in it. But we don't have to watch things for so long before we start attributing

[08:55]

before we see regularity. You know what I mean? You need somebody, you need somebody right off to have the essence of something. Of course, you can say, well, you use other kinds of regularity for other situations to sort of map this projection of reality onto this person that you just met. In that case, the regularity may be the regularity of your own history or something like that. I don't think it's the regularity. In a matter of fact, that's the point we're seeing, is that the regularity is precisely why there isn't essence. Because the regularity is what makes the thing have a condition, and because the condition depends, and because being a condition depends on regularity, that's why the condition doesn't have essence. So if you watch the regularity, you see that's why it doesn't have S's.

[10:02]

And yet, watching the reason why it doesn't have S's, we make that proof that the heart does have S's. Just like again, the story of, this person is this way because of these reasons, that's exactly why this person isn't that way. Because this person does these things on a regular basis, that's why I say she's this way. That's precisely why she's not essentially that way, but that's just an explanation of why I say she's that way. But by going over the reasons which show that something doesn't have essence again and again, I go deeper and deeper and use those reasons why it doesn't have essence as reasons why it does. But I'm just looking for an excuse to have somebody be some way. Because I'm looking for an excuse for me to be some way. So do we have regularity in order to... I think regularity is practical.

[11:05]

No, it's not necessarily better. There can be a whole bunch of regularities, and they're all practical. We have a big repertoire of regularities, and they're all practical, but they're not necessarily better. They're just all practical. Of course, you can have things that are more practical, I guess, or less practical, but basically that's just practical. In other words, it's conventional. In other words, it's worldly. Yes? I've had this disturbing sense of there being a logical problem in the argument that you've used. And it's one that we've gone over before, so I'm more restless with it. And it feels to me like there's a crossing of levels of language. I want to clarify that I'm not arguing for centuries. are inducing of that relationship, of that characteristic, depends on regularity of occurrence.

[12:41]

That is to say, it takes us a while to catch on, and we may not be sure of it. So the regularity of occurrence is something that we can look at and say, well, it looks like there is something essential going on here because it keeps coming up this way. But that doesn't mean that the essential nature, that the attribution of it, that is to say, our knowledge of it. So it seems like there's a crossing of levels between an ontological argument and an epistemological argument. You don't have to answer that. that which makes, like, are conditions that which make something up?

[14:11]

Well, you could distinguish between conditions of the two types you just talked about. One type of, you know, in some sense there are conditions which we tend to associate with the identity of the thing more than other conditions. They wouldn't be considered ingredients. You might not call them ingredients. You might not call, you know, silicone an ingredient.

[15:13]

I guess you would. You might not consider the ophthalmology school as an ingredient in your glasses. I think that, for example, that the like the ingredients. And the things that we don't usually call ingredients are more like the fourth one. The dominant extent of it is more like the fourth one. The things which aren't, which don't seem to be related to the thing itself. We don't usually, we don't necessarily call the ophthalmology school part of the identity of the glasses. However, the glasses are due to the ophthalmologists and the glasses are due, to some extent, to your wanting your glasses.

[16:17]

There's a market for glasses as part of this dominant condition. For example, in the case of the acorn out of the oak tree, the acorn in the ground And acorns are more considered like hatred pratyaya. Primal causal, yeah, is more like the acorn, more like the ingredients, you might say. And the dominant cause is more like all the things that are not it, that surround it and make it possible, but don't seem to be part of its identity. No, those are conditions.

[17:21]

Those are part of the four conditions, right? It's just that they're different. We tell slightly different stories about those, right? You know what I mean? That's what they're saying. There are different ways you think about causation or conditions. These four are, you know, the examples you give, you can put in these four categories. There are a whole bunch of questions now. Abbey, Charlie, Anna, and Kriya was the translation for like functional force or power or action. Okay, so what is relational conditions? The word relational conditions is pratyaya. Pratyaya means condition and relational is, you know, a full blown or extended translation for pratyaya.

[18:23]

You could just say condition or relational condition. time before Charlie asked me. I want to say about regularity in essence. It seems to me that it's a question of slipping between regularity, understanding regularity as a psychological phenomenon, and projecting that onto the world, believing that there's an external world that's actually, in a sense, looping back on itself and repeating itself. So rather than seeing that there's certain apparent features that are taken as salient, where you understand that there's a standpoint and it's relative. There's that too, yeah. So once that relative standpoint is forgotten, then there's a kind of absolute tithing of that position, which is an essential argument.

[19:23]

And this is more the epistemological argument, right? of the dimension, but this is the epistemological. Did you follow what he said? In other words, there's regularities by which we come to have practical explanations of how things happen, but those regularities are also determined by our ... not only are they just regularities, but they're regularities of our processes of perceptions within a given person, a given culture, and so on. flies and rats and fish have a whole different, you know, way of life. Well, objectively extending, you know, is... Objectively extending means that every experience we have, it basically is everything that we can have an experience of is objectively extending, but it's dealing with it in terms of the fact that we can have it as an experience.

[20:42]

Okay? The point is that something can be an object of our experience. That's another condition. Anything can be that way. So, to see the regularity, to see that something is a condition is part of what we need to do in order to see the thing. Is it right that you can differentiate the four different kinds of conditions only by telling about the difference between them? Because otherwise you'd have to substantialize them again. Say your question again. saying this is other than that condition. You can only do it by making a difference between them, because otherwise you add substance to each of the conditions. I don't disagree.

[21:52]

I'm having trouble understanding your question. Let me try again. Does everybody else understand? Peter wants to help. See if Peter helps. Well, I think what you're saying is that you can't... that to speak of each of the conditions individually by themselves is to give them substance. And that the only way that you can really do it without giving them substance You mean the conditions for a particular thing that happens? Yeah. That you're talking about? Yeah. In many cases you want to have four different kinds of conditions. Are you talking about the four different types or just the conditions for something that's happening? The conditions themselves, the four different types of conditions. Okay, so you're talking about the conditions, okay. Differentiation.

[22:54]

If you differentiate them, it is an impure essence. No, but it depends how you differentiate. If you get the meaning by saying, this condition is different to that, and this is different to that, then you don't substantialize. But if you take, if you explain them individually and add a substance, I think what Peter's saying is what I wanted to say. Say it again, Peter. That we can't consider one condition by itself, it has to be related to the other conditions. I think that's another way of putting it. If we consider one condition by itself, we're giving it substance. If we consider one condition by itself, then are we like saying that it has the essence, the essential power?

[24:02]

I was thinking that the Buddha and the Nagarjuna had an experience and tried to conceptualize or put a convention in this dependent co-arising. And then all of us and many, many other people are trying to do the reverse process. We first are trying to maybe understand these concepts and then have the experience, or is that how it's going to work? That's right, that's the whole point. And that's how it worked for Buddha too. They didn't have, Buddha did not have the experience. He didn't speak about this. Yes he did. Buddha did. Buddha did. He said he did.

[25:15]

He said I did. He had the concept and he studied the concept and by studying the concept he had the experience and then he told us about it. What? Yeah. The Buddha and the night of the Buddha's experience, he started the night by sitting upright and not moving. That's how he started it. That was his yogic commitment. Then he had various, what he called, shamanic experiences, and then he got into philosophy, had a philosophical experience, and what he studied was dependant co-arising, and he saw how we see in Karaka 10, depending on this, this arises, [...] he saw that, that's what he was seeing, that's And then, after going through that conceptual process, he woke up.

[26:16]

His awakening was based on tuning into his conceptual process. His awakening, however, was not a conceptual process. Awakening is not conceptual. There's no traces of conceptualization going on in awakening. However, the awakening completely penetrates the conceptual process. So first of all, you have to penetrate the conceptual process, He definitely was, he was doing this exactly, he was pointing to exactly this, and so was Nagarjuna. He was thinking. Buddha was thinking. And he was thinking about causation. And he saw that causation operates in this way, that depending on this, this arises. That's what he saw. And then how do you understand, depending on this, this arises? This is what this text is about.

[27:18]

How do you understand that basic thing, depending on this, this arises? Through a reading now. These give rise to those. That's what he was meditating on. And the profound impact of that is, these give rise to those, means that those have no inherent existence because they depend on these. And these also have no inherent existence. And the process has no inherent existence. The process by which you empty these, or those, of inherent existence is because we, though, depend on these. And also the process by which you did that also is empty. And that's what you realize, is that everything is empty within. That the whole process of suffering is empty. I've been given something to read here, number 115. This is why the Buddha at all times kept silent. Kari has commented, that's not the end of it.

[28:28]

About the fourfold format, with or without a limit, both or neither. Shall I keep reading? This doesn't sound like coincidence. It doesn't sound... It doesn't sound... Sounds like more than coincidence? Yeah, it sounds like more than coincidence. It is more than coincidence. What more is it? What word are you using? More? It didn't sound regular yet, but what was it? Conditioned or dependent?

[29:36]

They're dependent, right? And something that's dependent on something doesn't have an essence. So he was meditating on suffering and misery and the cycle So it looks, but some people say if you don't make a causal connection between those two, that it's just coincidence. Why isn't it more than coincidence? And the difference between the coincidence and dependency is regularity. fireman near your mother when she was born, but the next time you were born, not the next time you were born, but when your sister was born, the fireman wasn't there, then people wouldn't necessarily say that your mother's children were dependent on the fireman being nearby.

[30:43]

But if you say, dependent on the fireman being nearby, the children were born, then the fireman becomes a conditioned, and that shows that the children do not have essence, because they depend on something. This is what the Buddha saw. It isn't just coincidence. There's some regularity there. So he said, on a regular basis, depending on ignorance, consciousness appears, depending on consciousness and so on. He saw the whole thing. and each link in it, everything that arose, arose in dependence, therefore it was empty. And then it was a condition, it being an empty thing, then became a condition for something else. So, things depend on other things, therefore they're empty, and the other things they depend on also depend on other things, so they're empty, plus the whole process is empty, because the whole process is nothing more than the story.

[31:47]

which was said in here. And again, because I was very sleepy that night, I know I'm taking it out of context, questions out of context. But somebody mentioning another person, I believe, maybe an Indian American who I've never heard of, said that, I believe he said that this man believed in Atma. And I started to think about the And my personal feeling is that Atman is an experience, not a belief. But also my feeling, which is not so much for Atman, is that if Atman is an experience and it can be named anything, I mean, and it can be ascribed any meaning or any The assumption about Atman is that if one believes in Atman or one has an experience of Atman, that therefore that means that Atman is the only or primary cause of the arising of, say, life or death.

[33:28]

that that negates this teaching or that, which I don't see. I don't see that it does. It seems to me if there are four relational conditions, primary, causal, and the others, that, say, Atman is not necessarily of a greater import as a primary, as having essence or primary cause than, say, these five. And this is sort of a question that I'm asking. I'm not quite sure. I can't guess that one thing denies another in this case.

[34:47]

But I'm wondering if that's the case. Well, I don't hear you putting it that way. No, I know. I'm making a statement. I know I phrased it as a statement. Yeah, so the way you put it, I don't see a problem, but somebody else could put it differently and say that Atman does have the causal power, that it has the power to make the thing happen, therefore, and the thing it makes happen is something that actually exists. And then there would be a somewhat different way of putting it, and then we'd have some reputation going on here. But you didn't go that far yet. No, I would go to the point of saying that Say, Otmon, for example, could be seen as a... well, sort of similar to the acorn, like... I would like to go that direction.

[36:02]

I can see that you're wondering. See, you're not coming out of the closet. You believe in Avalon don't you? But that does not mean, because I call it Atman, it does not necessarily mean that... And that's what I mean, you're not coming out any further than that. So far it's okay. But some other people, you know, I'm not criticizing you, but some other people came out further and they gave signs of, you know, that what they were talking about had, you know, something to it.

[37:12]

You know, you could have an experience and then get a name for it. But you can really, you know, be looking for a name for something that you really think is really there. And then when you use the name, the way you use the name, we feel maybe, from the way you use the name, that you think there was actually something there that you're using the name to apply to. And then that's good, because then it surfaces your belief in the essence of your experience. And this is all, you know, this is all related to, you know, fundamental ordinary experiences of, you know, pain and suffering and identity, but also to enlightenment. Some people have some great experiences. Now that's got to happen. And part of the development of our awakening is to experience some insights and then watch us attribute substance to those. I'm playing kind of loose about this, so I don't see any reputation necessary from any side.

[38:19]

You're not bothering Nagarjuna, and Nagarjuna isn't going to bother you yet either. And maybe you don't need any help right now. Steve? I'm just having a hard time getting from the Karaka itself about regularity and coincidence. Well, maybe I'm going, you know, maybe I'm drawing it out a little bit here. It's true. Well, I'm just saying, given you got these, if these, these give rise to those, okay? In other words, that's a statement of regularity. Not this gave rise to this, that this is coincidence, but generally speaking, these give rise to those.

[39:20]

Therefore, these are conditioned for those. That's the statement of Gregory, that's the way I read it. But, just so you don't think then that we're saying that these have within them the power to give rise to those eternally, I would say that if it ever happens that these don't give rise to those, then these lose their authority as conditions. later they'll come back and be conditions again, but right now they're not conditions anymore. That's the next part. As long as those do not come from these or with these, then those are not, they're not, we can call them non-conditions. In other words, as soon as the regularity breaks down, we don't, we don't have, they're not going to lose their condition So this is part, you know, if something, anything that's arisen falls into one of those classes of conditions that you, you know, some of them are not, as he puts it, uniquely related.

[40:24]

We can't see the connection. a condition happening from something that doesn't exist. That seems to be what this is. So, the way I read this line is, you've got something, okay? So long as these others do not arise, why are they not non-conditions?

[41:57]

So if it doesn't, then it's a non-condition. But we're talking about something that has a rhythm, maybe we don't see the rhythm. No, no, the others are the things that arise, not the conditions. Well, you've got to learn to handle this all different ways, okay? Okay, I'll do the translation on this one you have, okay? But here's basically what I'm saying, here's my concept and see if you think it's different from what you're saying and show me how you think it's different if you do. We're saying these arise from those, okay? These arise from those, so those are conditions for these. Wait a second, wait a second. Did everybody else see this? In the first part? Yeah, first part. You saw it?

[42:59]

Now, what I think it's saying in the second part is, if those things don't arise, you know, as long as those did not come, when you have these, then these are not conditions. When they don't arise in our mind, we don't make the connection? These arise from those, all right? Got that? Therefore, those are called conditions. That's what it is, right? Now, these do not arise from those, okay? Therefore, those are not conditions. Or can't we call those non-conditions? Non-relational conditions, yeah. How would it be different if it read, how can relational conditions be assertive of entities which it's not going to address?

[44:15]

How does the non... It comes from Nagarjuna. He wanted to put it that way. I just put it another way, OK? I said it a way... And then if you go over it enough the way I said it, maybe you can jump to the way he said it, but he said it this way, the best way, because he wanted to do it that way for some reason. These give rise to those, if you have these and then those, then those, okay? These give rise to those, so these are called conditions. As long as those do not come from these, these are non-conditions, or these are not conditions. That's good. So, a more literal translation is the one you have here. How can a non-conditional relation, how can a non-relational condition be asserted for entities that have not come into being?

[45:18]

Does that mean that, does that have something to do with the Torah making? That we say that these arise because of, those arise because of this, but if we if these arise without these, somehow there's a tendency to believe that these are there. Is that why he's saying this is what I'm asking? Okay, let's see what he's saying. I just want to say, the way he's trying to say it is harder to get to. but let's let's let's hear uh let's let her try to finish this she's trying to get she's trying to get at why Nargajuna would say this yeah why he would even mention it so um these arise because of those well not because these arise these give rise to those these give rise to those now if if

[46:26]

If these conditions don't exist, then those, then there's... As long as those do not come from these. Right. As long as those do not come from these, then these are non-enlightenment conditions. Yeah, couldn't you say that? And is the tendency then, is he saying that because there's a tendency to believe that these conditions are always arising in relationship to those. That there's this [...] tendency to believe that these saying, if now something doesn't come with this, then couldn't you call this now, this thing you used to call conditioned, couldn't you now call it non-conditioned? So in this way he has it here, which is more literal, for how can a non-conditional relation be asserted for entities which have not come?

[47:50]

A non-relational condition be asserted, in other words, how could you assert A non-relational condition is a condition for things that have not come to be. I'm sorry that that's the way you put it, but that's the way I understand it. In other words, how could you assert that a non-relational condition for something that hasn't happened? It's a simpler way to say it. Why would you say that something that is a condition for something that hasn't happened? I'm sorry about that. And this is a more liberal translation, but that's not... That's the way you have to understand it. Put it in acorns? Yeah, right. I've said that before, you know. Now we have a regular thing between acorns and water and oak trees, right? These arise from those.

[48:56]

Oak trees arise in dependence on acorns. Now, wouldn't it be the case if now, what do you call it, oak trees arose without dependence on acorns. If oak trees arose without dependence on acorns, couldn't you then say that acorns are non-conditioned for oak trees? Maybe if no oak trees arise, then you don't assert that acorns are conditioned. That too. It seems like what he's saying is that if there are no oak trees, then you wouldn't assert that acorns are non-conditioned, which I still don't understand. No, I think he's offering that you could say that. Why not say that? If you have an acorn and you don't have an oak tree, then you say,

[50:00]

is the causal efficacy. You have no oak trees. As long as you don't have oak trees, you couldn't do that. This is a non-condition. I think maybe the point of this is a little difficult to get at, but I think the point of it is to see that the notion that our sense of the causal efficacy of the condition and that the causal efficacy doesn't inhere in the condition. As long as the effect isn't produced, then it's not, it doesn't meet our definition of being a condition. So, under those circumstances, it's not a condition. Where is its causal efficacy? Under those circumstances, couldn't you call it a non-conditional condition? And as an example, why would you assert

[51:03]

Yeah. the format of his work is set up in such a way so as to present this information so that it cannot be, although it contained, so that when he's speaking that way about conditions, he's speaking in such a way that, and I'm just imagining, I don't have a lot of background, but he's speaking that way so that, imagine that the audience in which he's speaking into, there's other, these Buddhist characters who have

[52:36]

to be put into some one other variation of cause. Yeah, that's a part of the greatness of his work. It's going to be hard to put his work into the box. It seems like even listening and studying this, no matter what, no matter what, no matter what, when I hear condition, I quickly think of, I cannot, I cannot, I cannot hear condition without thinking cause. You know, because when I hear, okay, these and those, and then I notice that the thinking is, aha, so these three, just like you said before, these three are conditions, but these two arise, Aha, so now I know.

[53:45]

I need these three things to align. It doesn't seem to be in alignment with what I was speaking about. The way you think doesn't seem to be in alignment with what you're speaking? Yes, I... yeah. So that's something for you to confess, right? That's what you're doing, right? Coming out. What? So it's good, it's good, except although you did that, you didn't just show it to us. I just thought I'd share that with you. Get that, Kenneth? Mom, I'd like to ask about the relationship between action and events.

[54:52]

Last night we received an example of this accident. It was an accident called an accident. Cardinals as well. These conditions seem to produce this response, the actual response. Maybe driver a little bit more faster, maybe a little bit more.

[56:08]

Maybe a little bit faster. But rather than an accident, One morning I found out that my responsibility was to take care of my family.

[57:25]

I don't see that level of discourse. Nagarjuna is primarily trying to uproot the sense of self that's running or not running through that story. And as to the attribution of responsibility and so on, if you're talking about the attribution of responsibility to yourself, something that's really there, then you would say you won't be able to do that. Ethics for Nagarjuna, what is ethics for him?

[59:17]

For any of us, ask the other people. Nagarjuna, what's ethics? Ethics is the study of the way you behave, and if you behave based on essences, to the crop.

[61:25]

I was somewhat surprised by the answer you gave to Sylvia a little while back, which was, I understood it right, that there's a certain concept that you had in mind, and then you had an experience. No, I didn't say quite that. You had a concept. Um, it's... A non-conceptual experience. Okay, okay. In other words, a non-delirious experience. Okay. Because all experience is conceptual. All experience is conceptual. How do you have this? Let's see if I can still go ahead with my line of thinking.

[63:34]

What I had in mind was that if I have certain concepts, then my words will be ordered. If you go through the same tracks that Buddha went through, you will have the same experience, basically.

[65:16]

It's not experience, and then you'll have the realization of moderation from experience. You'll be liberated from experience. Now, we have tendency to be trapped in experience because the way we experience things is this sequence of conditionings which are, you know, regularly happening. We're caught in a very regular thing. So there are this happens and that happens. But it isn't that we destroy that regularity or get rid of that regularity or that conceptualization and so on. It's by studying the regularity and not adding anything more to it or subtracting anything from it. See? You study the regularity without adding anything to it, then you're doing the Nagarjuna Bodhicitta. They just studied the regularity. They saw the regularity. And for him it was a reality before he studied it.

[66:30]

And for most of us, as you can see, for people to sort of come forward, it is a reality. And therefore we're stuck. We really do think we're a jerk, or we're a great, and somebody else is a jerk, or somebody else is a great. We really do think people are a jerk. to look at the regularity of your life without imagining anything extra, or putting any extra reality into your story. And it's also about, in the process of studying this, to watch yourself tributing reality as you read this text, and having it keep sloughing you off. We do, you know, have a hard time just watching what's happening without putting more into

[67:32]

But things don't have suchness. Suchness is the way things are, and the way things are is that things don't have it. But the way things are, you know, we have to see the quickness of this being able to see. So how come you... That's not the way things are, that we have the quickness of being able to see. That's the conventional world, that we have the quickness of being able to see. That's not really the way things are. How do you know? How does anyone know how the way things are? What? How do you know how the way things really are? I mean, we all know this to some extent, that the way we see things can be new. We all know to some extent that the way we see things is just the way we see things, not the reality. Right? You know that, don't you? Yes or no. Yeah. Well, the yes part knows that. And the no part is the part that thinks that what you see is real.

[69:03]

And we all have that tendency. But we actually think that our stories are just regular stories that we learn, and we didn't think so before, you know? When we were kids, we had different stories, and before that, we had different stories. And now we've got these stories, and we don't contribute essence to these stories. Therefore, they're true. They're not just my view. They're true. You know, part of what I'm saying is a somewhat rude response to why should I believe in Argentina or you, you know, in terms of you're right that what I'm seeing has a certain reality which is not other people's reality but on the other hand, the teaching of suchness is not that things have suchness.

[70:40]

I don't know if I should answer that question. It's incriminating. Think about it. The question isn't incriminating. Your answer might be incriminating. You don't have to answer that question in America. I guess some of what I'm reacting to is sort of this dynamic where there's some kind of truth which some of us are not getting and we're coming forward and not getting it or using it with confession. supposed to confess is that you think you're right. And I think, I feel, I feel around the room occasionally, which is good, that somebody thinks they're right, they think their view is real. I'm not proposing a reality, I'm proposing, and neither do you, I'm proposing that somebody thinks there is some essential reality around here, rather than all we've got is conventional reality. And if you think you've got some place of suchness or something, then come on, admit it.

[72:26]

But you think you've got suchness on the line someplace. And it's good to admit it. That's what you should confess, if you think that you're right, that you can see that your view is true. It's different to say, all I've got is my view, and my view is simply delusion. You don't have to confess that, although you just did when you said that. But for me to say that what I think is true, that's something I should confess, and I will also notice that what I think is true is what causes me problems, and is the source of my bondage. And the concepts that I use, I think are true, because it's reality for them. And if I watch how I do that, I will realize suchness is a proposal. But suchness is not something suchness. Suchness is and totally includes your whole process of in the other template.

[74:02]

That's then attributable. That's attributing something to what God has done. Am I on or off? Yeah. The erasure is like this. The erasure is thus. It's quite different to say erasure is thusness. It's quite different. Yeah, I mean, it's talking about apprehending something in the moment, knowing that it's all changing. knowing that other beings are apprehending it differently, it's still this sort of wordless process. I don't know what. It's the same thing with emptiness.

[76:01]

I think you had something in there. It's the same thing, but the difference between saying... Yeah, yeah, and the one becomes a thing. You don't have emptiness. Emptiness isn't a thing that's sitting out here. And then we're looking for emptiness, rather than understanding what emptiness is. We can make emptiness into existence. You can even have, what do you call it, the realization of emptiness and then slip back into making it into existence. Um, Calgary's taking a piss, so it's probably a drink.

[77:41]

Well, you know, I still don't understand why, it seems to me, why liberation or enlightenment is characterized as non-experience. It's not categorized as non-experience. Well, you said, you described it as non-experience. I didn't categorize it that way. I didn't, I didn't feel like I was categorizing. I just said, if you say it's an experience, I'm saying it's non-experience. What I mean by experience is something I can experience, like, you know, a mental or physical experience. So, for me it sounds like, when you say that, that there's an implication of a transcendental realm. I know that you... I see that you're doing that. Well, what else is there? What else is there in that kind of... I'm not saying it's something else.

[79:12]

If I say something is... If you say something is... If I say something is non-experienced, does that mean I have to say that it's something else? When you say yes. Well... I'm wondering how you can say that... Either you're saying it's nothing, Or it's something else. I'm saying it's nothing? Well, either. It seems to me that you have a point. Oh, I have to say it's nothing or it's something else. Right. I have to do that now. Only if you want to talk about it. You can just say it like a poem. Only if I want to talk about it more. You could say it like a poem or something. Could I just say what I said and then stop? You can, but then if somebody wants to talk about it, then they'll probably, you know, and I want to talk about it.

[80:14]

You can say, well, it's not logical, but if I'm not one of those people, according to Jeremy, that's enough, right? I don't want to talk about any more than that. That's enough for me. For me to say, you know, that it's liberation is enough for me. For me to say that it's a way to be kind to people is enough for me. But being kind to people is not an experience. People can have an experience of kindness, but being kind is not an experience, is it? But it's not nothing, is it? I think it is an experience. Well, I don't think so. I don't see how it's extreme. So what is there besides experience? Being kind? But again, there's being kind. But you say it's something besides experience. I don't say that. Your mind won't tolerate kindness being something Your mind won't tolerate kindness being either, it has to be experience, or something other than experience.

[81:21]

For me, kindness does not have to be experience, and doesn't have to be other than experience. I will tolerate that. And as a matter of fact, that's where my kindness lives, or our kindness lives. It lives in toleration of something that's not other than our experience, and that's not our experience. Kindness totally pervades experience, but experience doesn't pervade kindness. If it did, then experience would push kindness off the map sometimes. Do you understand? If there was a thing called kindness and experience could get into kindness, then cruelty would stop kindness. But there could be kindness in cruelty. Kindness is all-pervasive. Compassion is all-pervasive. Compassion is non-experience. Compassion is that you're there with people in their suffering. That's not other than their experience. Compassion is not an experience. Wisdom is not something other than experience. That's not experience.

[82:24]

Our mind wants to say it's either is an experience or it's other than experience. That's the way our mind works. Let's take our mind away and wisdom and compassion can totally penetrate all of our experience. And they're not experiences. If it wasn't that way, that means the I can liberate itself and that would be another experience, which means it couldn't liberate itself. So there has to be, I think it has to be that way, that compassion and wisdom. Do you see what I'm trying to say? that the I always needs an experience to substantiate itself. The I is born of experience.

[83:26]

Right. And so the I can't liberate itself because that's another... that's the I doing something in terms of... The I can't liberate itself, right. But the I itself is liberation. That's why liberation is not something other than the I. But liberation is not the I. It's the I itself. And experience itself is liberation. That's why liberation is not other than experience, but experience itself is not experience, but it's not other than experience. That's what enlightenment is, not experience. Enlightenment is experience itself, and experience itself is that it has no essence. Because it depends on things. Can one have so-called liberation without ever having thought of it?

[84:31]

Yes. Well, before we said that the Buddha first thought of it. He did not think of liberation. That was not in the chart. There was nothing about liberation in what he was thinking about. He may have thought of that, you know, when he was a kid. But when he was there, you know, full-grown yogi there under the Bodhi tree, he was not, there was nothing about liberation on the chart there. The whole chart was about suffering and samsara and bondage. That's what he was meditating on. He was meditating on conceptualizations. And he woke up in the midst of this contemplation of mundane, conventional, But he was not meditating on enlightenment. Deluded people meditate on enlightenment. Deluded meditate on delusion, on conception, on the process of cause and effect.

[85:33]

And they watch how it goes, and they watch how sometimes they attribute substance to it, and they watch how incoherent it is to attribute substances to it, and they watch how it's quite coherent just to watch it and see how it goes. And you just watch it and see how it goes, and watch it and see how it goes, and watch it and see how it goes, liberated from the process. If you keep looking for enlightenment all the time, you're going to be putting essence and enlightenment all over the place. It's going to be hard for you to see what's going on. You're going too far. You're making something up that's not there. What I mean is, can you have realization of how things work without having any questions, suffering, or anything at all? Ever questioned it? Yes. Did you say notice it? Not necessarily. No, I don't think you're going to change liberation from suffering without noticing the suffering. I don't think so. I've never heard of that one.

[86:35]

There's no stories like that that I've heard. There's no regularity. There's no conventional world like that where somebody didn't even look at suffering and became liberated. It seems like you've got to look at the suffering in order to become liberated. You've got to look at your conceptualizations. You've got to look at your beliefs. You have to look at this stuff and study it in order to be liberated from it. That's part of the deal. You've got to meditate on this stuff in order to liberate from it. So I think that the other is necessary. But you don't have to think about enlightenment in order to cut through this. However, most people have to think about enlightenment before they enter the process of study, because it's the process of you have your bowel and forehand. people aren't treating you well.

[88:01]

Or, you know, or there are problems in the world. There is suffering in the world. Well, we don't say there isn't suffering in the world. We don't say there isn't because that would be the opposite of what you think. And then you say that that's true? No, we do see suffering and we should admit we see suffering and then we should know it's My review is trying to show you a cleaner way to look at this. But in order to notice the cleaner way, you have to notice how you already are into this way that's not so clean. In other words, you're doing things which is making the whole process of study incoherent. So it's very confusing. And part of what we have to admit is we've made the situation much more complicated and difficult to study than it has to be. If you can take his advice,

[89:04]

Your meditation will be much simpler. And we stayed there the whole time. Surprise, huh? We could just go to the next chapter and we'd come back to visit chapter one later. 19 and 20, 18, 24, 19.

[90:09]

We can go there and then we can go around. Yeah, that's true. We could do that. So maybe we should, maybe, maybe we should just, maybe we'll never get off this chapter. So maybe we should just go to Chapter 24. So, next time we'll do Chapter 24. and shall be great in the days to come.

[90:44]

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