I've heard that the Buddha says that the three worlds are just one mind. That outside mind, there are no separate things. The world, mind, world, living beings and Buddhas, among these three, no distinction. Three worlds is a Buddhist term for all the different types of worlds that living beings

[01:09]

can experience. One world is called the Kamadhatu, which means the realm of, actually, literally, sex. It's the realm, and within that realm, there's six realms, or six destinies, human, animal, hungry ghost, hell dwellers, fighting gods and divine beings. So, those all are kind of like, it's one kind of world that we can experience. The human world is kind of like a room like this, with people in it, and where they have clothes and hair and floors and ceilings and eat lunch and things like that, where most of us are familiar with the human world.

[02:10]

But we can also, I think, taste, at least, although it may not be our destiny, we can taste these other worlds, like the animal world is a world primarily characterized by fear, and the divine world is a world where things are very pleasant. And then there's higher realms of meditation, a fine material plane is the second world, where we don't in any way, when we're in that world, we don't experience gross things like people and cars and trucks and mountains and rivers. We experience more things like just colors, smells, but not smells like flowers and trees, but very subtle smells and very subtle sounds and so on.

[03:12]

And then another realm, it's kind of a meditational realm that opens up, like the previous one, is a realm where there's no material form, they're just mental images. So, in scanning the possible experiences of living beings, these three realms of the three major categories of all different types of experience that living beings can go through, can experience. So, the Buddha says that these three worlds, in other words, all the different worlds we can experience are just one mind. And that outside of mind there aren't things, there's no separate things. And within these worlds there's minds, there's worlds, but also living beings and enlightened

[04:14]

beings. And among these, there's no real distinction. Okay. Okay.

[05:17]

Okay. Okay. In terms of human sense, I don't know how you humans sense, but in terms of human sense it is sometimes said that heaven and earth give birth to human and non-human beings.

[06:54]

But in terms of Buddha's sense, it's the other way around. That human and non-human beings give birth or create heaven and earth. Living beings are minds, are bodies and minds, are body-minds, or mind-joined-to-bodies. Human beings and other living beings are mind-joined-to-bodies. And then, when mind is joined to bodies, we have different, we have many minds. Minds

[08:12]

connected to individual bodies. And all these bodies which mind has engaged with, then create heaven and earth, together. Many years ago, I read a Buddhist text called the Abhidharmakosha, and it said that mind

[09:18]

would not be able to know the world if it weren't separated from the world by sense organs. And the reason why it would have trouble knowing the world is because the world is so similar to the mind that it wouldn't be able to perceive itself. So the vision that I get from this is a mind which connects with bodies which are sense organs, creating a world of things. But the nature of these things is very similar to the nature of mind.

[10:29]

Prior to mind's imagining things, there are no separate things. However, there is always the possibility of many, of unlimited things, but these possibilities don't manifest until body-rounded minds imagine them, and not just one body-mind imagining them, but all body-minds imagining them together. And this world, the universe, whatever it is, prior to arising into things, knows itself by living beings together, making it into something knowable.

[12:10]

It's not to say that outside of mind there's nothing, because nothing is a mind-created thing. Mind and the natural world are not two.

[13:57]

Our bodies and nature are the same blood. In the tradition called, sometimes, Soto Zen, which is a lineage founded in Japan, excuse me, the lineage called Soto Zen which is transmitted to this temple is a lineage that came through Japan, through the founder Ehei Dogen. And in his teaching, I think it could be fairly said, that the natural world, which includes San Francisco and Hong Kong,

[15:10]

and the forests, and the redwoods, and the ocean, and the mountains, the natural world, the physical world, is the expression and life of Buddha. The natural world, which is the expression and life of Buddha, which includes the material world and all the living beings in it, is the life of Buddha, is the expression of Buddha.

[16:26]

And this life of Buddha can be understood through study of the mind. And you can study the mind by studying the physical world, because the physical world is inseparable from mind. Studying the mind, outside of which there are no separate things. Thank you. The Zen teacher Dogen said that

[18:19]

the true path of enlightenment is to sit upright in the midst of what he called the self-fulfilling awareness. And today, I would rephrase that by saying, the true path of enlightenment is to sit upright, or to be upright, in the awareness that the three worlds are just one mind. The focused awareness, the continuous focused awareness, that all worlds of experience

[19:40]

are just one mind. And the continual focused awareness, that outside of mind there are no separate things, and that worlds, Buddhas and sentient beings, have no distinction. And hearing that, you might say, could we have an alternative true path to enlightenment to that one? So I don't mean to be exclusive, I don't mean to say something that sounds exclusive,

[20:44]

and I didn't, I don't think, except to say that because actually what I'm suggesting by saying that is that the true path to enlightenment is a focused awareness on non-exclusiveness. It's a focused awareness on how all living beings, there's no distinction among all living beings, that all living beings are just one mind, and all Buddhas, which are maybe you can't see, but all Buddhas are also this one mind, and all the things, all worlds of experience and material entities are just one mind, and there's no distinction among them, except the distinction among them

[21:48]

is simply the living beings among this one mind. So the one mind includes living beings, and living beings make distinctions, like I'm a living being, I make distinctions, some of you are living beings, I suppose, and you make distinctions, but aside from the distinction which the living beings are making, there's actually no distinctions among the living beings who are making distinctions, there's no actual distinctions, except the distinctions that living beings are making. So I may make a distinction between me and you, but that distinction only exists as a fantasy in my mind, it has no other existence than the fantasy in my mind. I may make a distinction between my body and the mountains, or my body and the oceans,

[22:53]

but that distinction is 100% fantasy. It's a 100% fantasy, which means it's a really good fantasy, it's not like a 98% fantasy, it's a full-fledged fantasy, but it doesn't exist at all, except as a fantasy. And also, I might distinguish between myself and Buddha, or maybe I don't distinguish between myself and Buddha, but maybe I distinguish between Buddha and you. But the distinction between Buddha and you, which I might make, or that you might make, doesn't exist in the Buddha Dharma. In the Buddha's teaching, distinctions between Buddhas and sentient beings, there aren't any. But there are, again, living beings who make distinctions between themselves and Buddhas. I imagine that leeches, I say leeches because people like to hear stories of my grandson, right?

[24:08]

After the talks, people say, I like the stories of your grandson, that was good, lecture. So I should tell at least one or two stories of my grandson. One is, I took him to a movie that had leeches in it, it's a story of unfortunate events, and he said, what's a leech? So his grandmother said, we'll look it up in the dictionary back home. So they looked it up in the dictionary, and they found out that a leech is a carnivorous worm. It's a carnivorous aniline worm. Got it?

[25:16]

Now, I brought that up because you might distinguish between yourself and a Buddha, but I imagine that worms do not imagine a distinction between themselves and Buddhas. I imagine that, because I imagine that worms have not even heard about Buddhas. However, I do think worms distinguish between themselves and the Karna which they boss. I think they do, I think they're like big into like, oh, there's some Karne over there which I'm going to boss. I think they just, huh? What? Boss, you know, carnival omnivores, carnivores. What's the root, boss or avos? To eat, right? Put in the mouth? Anyway, I think the leeches probably do make some distinctions.

[26:22]

They're living beings, they make distinctions. But we, in addition to making distinctions between ourselves and what we eat, we also make a distinction between ourselves and what we don't eat, and also between ourselves and Buddhas. We do that. However, the true path of enlightenment is continuous, focused attention. To the teaching that there's no distinction between you and all living beings, and all Buddhas, and the mountains and the rivers, and the trees, and the grasses. Again, I don't mean to be exclusive, but I'm suggesting that if we exclude anything by saying it's separate from us, we'll slip a little bit off the path to enlightenment. A little bit, I think so. So in that way, there's only one path to enlightenment,

[27:34]

and it's the path that includes everything. So in that sense, it sounds narrow to be so inclusive, right? Couldn't we, like, can't you have two paths, one where you include most things, or something, and one where you get to exclude some other stuff? Couldn't there be two paths? You know, I don't think so. So anyway, when I first came to Zen Center, I didn't think I would be a disciple of, or in the same kind of like blood as this person named Dogen. I didn't think that, but I find myself becoming more and more the same blood as him. I have the same faith as him, or at least I have the same faith of what I think his faith is. I think his faith is that each of us is born together at the same moment as the whole world, and with the whole world, not before and not after.

[28:42]

It's not like there's a mountains and rivers and then us, or us and then mountains and rivers. We're born at the same moment as the mountains and rivers, and we die together with them, and are born with them. That's, I think, his faith. And his faith, I think, was that the true path of enlightenment is to sit upright in the midst of this awareness of how we're all born together, and how there's no distinction between the different people who are born together with the world. This means that since there's no distinction between you and all Buddhas, that all Buddhas are with you, and since there's no distinction between you and all living beings, all living beings are with you. The world is created by all living beings together,

[29:47]

I am created by all living beings together, you are created by all living beings together, I am created together with all Buddhas, you are created together with all Buddhas. This is what I think is Dogen's faith. And the path to enlightenment is to somehow, for us to be steadily, moment by moment, aware, aware of how we together with all beings and all Buddhas and all worlds are just working together, and that there's nothing but this working together. No person, no animal, no plant, no rock, no water, no air, is not our life.

[31:00]

Our life is not expressing our life, because our life is the expression of Buddha, and all of nature is the life and expression of Buddha. So the ancestor Dogen says, the mountains and rivers of the immediate present, not the mountains and rivers which I imagine, because the mountains and rivers which I imagine are like, that's in the realm where I imagine the mountains are separate from the rivers and separate from the people. Those mountains we're not talking about, we're talking about the actual immediate mountains, and the actual immediate rivers.

[32:07]

The mountains and rivers of the immediate present are the manifestation of the path of the ancient Buddhas. Abiding together in their normative state, they culminate the qualities of thoroughly exhausted study of the Buddha way. Because they are events prior to the appearance of time, they are the livelihood of the present. Because they are the self before the emergence of subtle signs, they are the penetrating liberation of immediate actuality. So here sits before me anyway, the question of how is it possible,

[33:32]

not how it's possible, but do I wish to try for a moment to open to the meditation that the distinction between me and you, and between me and Buddha, and between me and the mountains and rivers, and the trees and the grasses, that there isn't any, open to Buddha sense, and enter the Buddha way. So here's another grandson story. He's at an age where he goes to the toilet, he gets in the room by himself and he sits on the toilet,

[34:38]

like a lot of people I know, gets stationed there, and then he goes through this process of elimination, which I understand most of us do. The distinction between the different people when they're in this physical act, the Buddha teaches there is no distinction between the different eliminators. Still, when he gets there, he's not yet skillful enough to do a really good job cleaning up afterwards. He does a pretty good job, I should say, but anyway, some people would like him to do a better job, and he can't quite do it yet. So he asks for assistance, usually, if there's someone to assist him.

[35:39]

I think he's been instructed by somebody to ask for assistance. So he calls for help after he's done his part. Usually he calls his mother, I suppose, but when his mother's not around, he will ask for someone else to help. But sometimes, even when his mother's around, if there's grandparents around too, there's a number of people that can be chosen to help him. So his little mind, like our little mind, connected to his little body with his sense organs, makes distinctions among the various potential wipers. And particularly the grandparents, his grandparents are kind of like wondering, who will he choose? Who will he favor with this opportunity?

[36:42]

It's kind of like, who does he feel closest to? Something like that, anyway. On one occasion, he chose his grandmother. And she went in, and he said, he calls her Abu, it's Chinese for grandmother. He says, Abu, it was really hard to choose. And I chose you. So there is, whatever you want to call that, sweetness, light, love, in the midst of distinctions. But really, it's the absence of the distinctions

[37:44]

that makes the distinctions actually kind of fun. It's reality that makes illusion enjoyable and precious and adorable. But if we lose sight, if I forget that these distinctions do not exist in the awareness of the Buddha, then it's possible, it's possible that I might not want to wipe somebody. Or I might feel angry if I'm asked to wipe when I don't want to. Or I might feel angry if I'm not asked to wipe. I might not appreciate life. What's life? What is it again? Life, life. I wrote it down here, what life is.

[38:53]

Oh yeah, life. Life is nature, life is all living beings, which are just one mind. That's life. And outside this life, there are no separate things. And we won't even have a separate thing outside them called nothing. Nothing is in the realm of mind. You could say outside of mind there's a possibility of unlimited separate things. I think, I would say that. In a sense, outside mind, but again, outside mind is another thing. So there really is no outside or inside. Outside and inside are mind things. I heard that the ancient, the ancient sages passed eons living

[40:27]

in the mountains and the forests. Only then did they unite with the path of enlightenment and use the mountains and the rivers for words and the wind and the rain for a tongue to expound great emptiness. And again, until recently, like a few seconds ago, I thought, people might think, well it's nice for the ancient sages to go live in the mountains and the forests, what about me? I have to live like, you know, in an urban area.

[41:30]

So how am I going to, so I won't be able to use the mountains and the rivers for words. And I won't be able to use the wind and the rain for a tongue. Today I don't think that's what it means. I don't think that's what's meant. I think wherever we are, and on this planet for example, we can use the mountains and rivers for words and the wind and the rain for our tongue.

[42:38]

Not our tongue, a tongue. But we can also pass on that and have the mountains and rivers not be our tongue. Have the whole world not be our body. Make a distinction between other bodies and our own bodies. We can do that too, because we're living beings, we can do that. While being a living being who can distinguish between herself and other living beings and between herself and the mountains and the rivers, while being such a living being, it's possible to enter the Buddha way. By being a living being who can make distinctions,

[43:41]

but also who learns to pay attention in a moment, and then maybe another one, and maybe another one, but anyway, starting with one, pay attention to the self-fulfilling awareness, the awareness that fulfills the self. And what is that awareness? It is the awareness that all living beings and all Buddhas in the entire world create you now, that you are born together with them, they support you, and there's only one thing that doesn't make you, and that's you. You are made by all Buddhas, all living beings in the entire world, and the entire world and all Buddhas and all living beings are made by you together with all others. This awareness is what I call the self-fulfilling awareness.

[44:49]

Again, it's easy to pass on that and think of the awareness which distinguishes, which really believes that we're separate from each other, the Buddhas and the whole world. That's easy, that's our habit. That's not the path to enlightenment. But the person who doesn't take the path to enlightenment is actually inseparable from all those who do and do not take the path to enlightenment, and from the natural world which is actually expressing the life of Buddha. Can I be mindful of the teaching, and by being mindful of the teaching develop this awareness which is the path?

[45:52]

There's not one separate thing, actually. It has the character separate in there, which is nice. No separate things, no distinction among things, no distinction among beings. So in this talk today, I have come back to this topic a number of times. It has not necessarily been a continuous awareness, but there's been some moments where the words and the awareness may have been tuning into this self-fulfilling dimension, which is the awareness of this Dharma teaching of the Buddha. Dogen says that this statement, that all worlds, sometimes put in the category of three, but all the infinite worlds, actually, which are three types, are just one mind.

[46:59]

Outside this, there's no separate thing. World, Buddha and sentient beings, no distinction. This teaching of the Buddha, Dogen says, is the whole life of Buddha. It's Buddha's teaching about what life is, and it's Buddha's whole life of teaching. According to Dogen, continuous attention, focused attention on this, continuous focused attention on this, is the path, the true path to enlightenment. And this focus also, you know, this word samadhi, I said self-fulfilling awareness, but actually the awareness is the word samadhi. So it's the focused or concentrated awareness of this teaching. And Suzuki Roshi said, samadhi is when you forget all about yourself.

[48:09]

So again, if I open my mind to this teaching of all worlds, just one mind, and so on, the way of attending to that teaching is to forget all about myself when I attend to it. So again, it's not that I'm contemplating the teaching that there's no distinction, and then at the same time distinguishing myself from the teaching. We're contemplating the one mind and then separating my mind from the one mind. It's to attend to this one mind so fully that I have this samadhi of one mind. The one mind samadhi, the self-fulfilling samadhi. I forget about myself in the process of this attention

[49:13]

to myself, which is totally embraced by this one mind, and totally embraces the one mind, totally embraced by the whole natural world and all living beings and Buddhas, and totally embraces all living beings, all Buddhas, all worlds, the mountains, the rivers, and the great earth. Which embraces being chose, then, to wipe a butt, or not chosen. Which enters the mind, which gives up the distinction among things. Right while the distinctions are there, because this one mind includes all distinctions, and how does it include all distinctions?

[50:17]

In the understanding that they're just fantasies of all the living beings that are included. And we love all the living beings who are imagining they're separate from us, and choosing whether they want to get together with us separate selves, or avoid our separate selves. So some people who feel separate from us want to get us, and some people who feel separate from us want to avoid us. But the basis of that desire to avoid or possess is a fantasy. We don't really possess each other, and we can't avoid each other. However, we are not separate. When you're not separate, possession doesn't have much meaning,

[51:18]

and avoidance doesn't have much meaning. That's why possessiveness and avoiding are unskillful emotions. Gratitude, however, makes sense. Appreciation works. Devotion works. All that will thrive in the realm where there's no distinctions. You will be able to be devoted to the people you already kind of appreciate. I will be able to be devoted to the people I already appreciate. But we will also learn to be able to be devoted to the people we appreciate less than fully, even people we don't appreciate at all. And in our devotion to them, we'll find appreciation. That's a nice time, for me anyway, I think it's a nice time.

[52:28]

Eleven-eleven. Like that's less than an hour. Not that long, right? Wow. Seemed like longer, didn't it? The first part was kind of heavy. But I was trying to imbue the basic teaching, let it sink in. So probably it sunk in. Now to play with it. If you want to. If I want to. To play with. Yikes! Not separate from anybody? Yikes! Then of course, I shrink back from the teaching and get self-concerned. But to pay attention to that teaching without worrying about what's going to happen to me if I don't hang on to my distinction from others.

[53:31]

Don't worry about that. Because if you think about it, you could get ripped off. Etc. Etc. Because, you know, how do you defend yourself against people if you don't remember you're separate from them? Yeah. How? Jeez, how would I? Like, they could ask me to do anything and how would I be able to not do it? Etc. Don't get into that. That's not the focused awareness. Just open to the teaching without worrying what's going to happen to you if you do. The proposal beforehand is that this happens to be the true path to enlightenment. So I don't know what's going to happen to you, but it's the true path to enlightenment. I don't know what's going to happen to me if I think about it. I might hesitate to take this true path of enlightenment because I'm talking about giving up distinctions here. And another thing people like is a song.

[54:45]

But I couldn't think of one new one, I'm sorry. So I'm going to do an old one. If that's okay with you. Is that okay with you, David? David? David? Yvonne? Susan? Is Vernon here? Boom, boom Boom, boom Boom Boom, boom Boom, boom Boom, boom Boom I can do what I want I'm in complete control That's what I tell myself I got a mind of my own I'll be alright alone Don't need anybody else

[55:48]

Give myself a good talking to No more being a fool for you But then I see you And I remember How you make me want to surrender To one mind You're taking myself away To one mind You're making me want to stay With one mind Boom, boom Boom, boom Boom Boom, boom Boom, boom Boom Yes The first world

[57:08]

The world of Desire The desire realm It's like Where you want to have lunch And want to take a nap And where you think lunch starts at a certain time And ends at a certain time And involves time That kind of thing And in the human dimension You see humans and you see animals And you see There's words and things like that The animal realm Can be seen as a realm of animals Or it can be seen as a realm where you feel Overwhelmed by fear The hungry ghost realm can be seen as Beings who are in a state of insatiability But in another sense When you feel insatiable As a result of

[58:09]

You know Greed and so on Acting out greed But in a sense you're in a hungry ghost realm Hell realm can be seen as Actually beings in A state of torment A state of almost extreme isolation Who actually Feel extremely isolated from other living beings But you can also When you feel like that in a sense you're You're experiencing An infernal retribution for Wanting to isolate yourself from other beings Divine realms States where you feel, you know Basically only positive sensation And Realms where you're kind of like Using power to get into divine states So those are the realms of desire And then There's meditation heavens Special states that come as a result of

[59:12]

Concentration practices Where you The world actually You don't actually see anymore The kind of composite images that you See in an ordinary physical world But you're still seeing physical forms But you don't see like People on trees and stuff You just see Just colors and shapes But not so articulated and so on And the same with sound You don't hear language anymore But you hear sounds But not linguistic operations In that realm of meditation And then a higher Even a deeper level of concentration Where you're There's no forms There's just mental images And they're big Juicy mental images Like infinity of space Infinity of consciousness And infinity of nothing whatsoever These kinds of mental concepts Very, very spacious mental concepts

[60:13]

And the Sense of well-being and ease Is greatest in these Formless realms In terms of material Or Worldly pleasure These are the highest states of worldly pleasure In these higher meditation worlds So those are Did you get those three worlds? Did that make sense to you? Well, there are realms of bliss But they're not usually called that They're usually called the realm of Fine material And formless But in the fine material and formless realms There's no negative sensation There's only positive sensation But not only is there only positive sensation But there's equanimity With regard to positive sensation In other words Even though there's positive sensation If you would

[61:15]

Take it away The person's so happy That they're not even attached To positive sensation Because they're experiencing The bliss of equanimity So these are All the possible realms Of mundane experience And they're said to be Just one mind All these different realms That we can go through And all the different realms That other people are going through Anything else you want to bring up? Yes You were saying That the wind The voice of the wind And I had heard you studying Some Tibetan Buddhism And I was just Kind of curious how You went to Dogen And you know And Buddhist philosophy And Elemental You know The element in Tara

[62:15]

And stuff And alchemy of mind You said You knew back there You know Different than The other type of things That you were doing So I was wondering What's the relationship with Tara And Dogen Because I find You know, Tara And Dogen Well I feel that The Zen teacher Dogen You know, I don't think He actually heard about Tara During his lifetime But I think he was What he heard about Was the name Avalokiteshvara Chenrezig I think that the Bodhisattva Infinite Compassion Avalokiteshvara In Tibetan Chenrezig

[63:17]

In Chinese Guanyin In Japanese Kannon I think he was Very devoted to Meditating on Avalokiteshvara And I think that It seems to me that Tara is In some sense A female version Or the female aspect Of Infinite Compassion So in a sense she's like Related, very closely related to Seems to me Amitabha Buddha and Avalokiteshvara So I don't know if that's I don't know if everyone would agree But I feel that Tara and Avalokiteshvara are You know, they're in the same team They're both beings of Infinite Compassion And But Tara with that feminine form Can be worked with in ways that

[64:19]

Avalokiteshvara in the masculine form You know, is different And in India And I think in Tibet too, but particularly in India Avalokiteshvara was usually portrayed In masculine form But in China Avalokiteshvara Was usually Most commonly Related to in a female form And in a sense The female form of Avalokiteshvara in China I feel serves a similar function In that Buddhist culture That Tara does In Tibet Or did in Tibet Or does in Tibet So Tara is not So So salient In Chinese culture As Avalokiteshvara So if you go to Chinatown Around the world In all the shops That sell statues Among the Buddhist statues

[65:22]

The most common one I think is this White-robed Avalokiteshvara White-robed Kanan With the flowing robes Holding the vase and the flower There's probably I don't know More of those maybe than Almost any other Buddhist icon But that's the female form Of Avalokiteshvara So maybe that's Why Tara is Not so So often seen In sort of The lowlands of China And In the Chinese outposts Around the world Anything else? Yes, you Where? I don't know where it came from I mean I found it in my notebook

[66:26]

I have a little black notebook That's where I found it And The Chinese character for In my notebook The Chinese character for mountain Is written And the Chinese character for Forest is written The Chinese character for wind is written The Chinese character for Rain is written So I was writing English And then I would insert those Chinese characters in my notebook The green Chinese character for forest The I forgot what color I made the wind And the rain was blue also It's in my notebook But I don't know where I heard it before Yes If it's all one mind What cons for individual differences

[67:29]

Or individual Well These bodies that have sense organs You know, these bodies are like In this In this big field Which is In this big field of mind These sense organs In that field Then the mind takes a particular Location, a particular grounding In these sense organs Because of the sense organs The mind starts making distinctions Because sense organs do that They kind of like make distinctions Between what they feel And what other sense organs feel And so then We have these individual Individual consciousnesses But really the individual consciousnesses Are just this One mind Which is hooked into An individual body And then because the mind

[68:32]

Now has this body The mind can know the world Through the body So the bodies, like our bodies Are the way the universe Knows itself You take all the bodies away The universe is just mind But it has no way of knowing itself So it knows itself Through all these individual bodies And the bodies give rise To the distinction among the bodies There's no, you know You won't find any distinctions Except in the minds That are connected to individual bodies That's the only place Where these distinctions exist Like there's not actually A distinction between you and me It's that I, my mind Creates a distinction between us And yours does But if you take away our distinctions There's no other distinction The bodies are part of the pool of mind

[69:39]

Yes They live in it And they live in the universe Of precipitated physical things Which all the individual subjects Which have bodies Create the physical world So the physical world Of trees, mountains, and buildings That physical world is born Of all the living beings Working together So all the living beings Live in the physical world Which they create And also their bodies Are built out of the physical universe Which they create So they live And the bodies are living In the middle of the world Which the bodies create That's why the world The physical world And individual bodies Arise together But the distinctions Which the minds Connected to bodies create Those distinctions are

[70:41]

Nothing more than a fantasy The fantasy, however Although what's being imagined Doesn't exist at all It's not just a fantasy That there is a fantasy That's part of the wonder Of being a living being Is that we fantasize But what we fantasize Is never what's happening But with the aid of fantasy That's part of the way We create the universe Is by fantasizing things That don't exist But even though we fantasize Things that don't exist And that's part of creating The world that does The things we imagine Don't exist Just the imagination exists Or the imaginings exist But we of course Have a strong predisposition To believe What we imagine As actually existing Beyond just an imagined And I think it's actually there

[71:43]

And therefore I'm afraid of people And then of course People are afraid Of other people Who feel separate from them Which makes sense Because somebody Who believes in separation Is frightened and dangerous They're armed and dangerous In a sense They're armed with the belief With the illness Of believing their fantasies So people are dangerous Because of that However, the people who are dangerous Because they believe Their fantasies are real Those dangerous people Are actually not separate from us And if you realize You're not separate from the people Who think they're separate from you And who are therefore Poisoned by that belief And suffering because of that belief And prone to unskillful action Because of that belief That separation is an illusion You're not afraid of them You overcome fear of them

[72:46]

Or if you practice generosity With all these people Who think they're separate from you You're happy Living with people Who feel separate from you But by practicing generosity You get over Your belief in separation And or When you get over your belief in separation You practice generosity Either way You become free of fear Of other people Who believe they're separate from you And who are afraid of you Yes? Yes, David? Did you hear his question?

[73:58]

He says he runs into people Who have fantasies about him Right? Is that right? Yeah, we all run into people Who have fantasies of us Who have fantasies of you People wouldn't be able to see you If they don't have a fantasy of you Only because of having fantasies of each other Do we have each other Otherwise we're not others But anyway If when you meet people Who have fantasies of you He said he has some tendency To want to disabuse people Of their fantasies about him Like if people think you're really wonderful You might want to disabuse them Of the fantasy, right? Mediocre You might want to disabuse them Of that fantasy But he doesn't want to do that He doesn't want to get into Disabusing people of the fantasies They have about him So how can he get over that? By not believing your fantasies About people By not believing my fantasies

[75:00]

About your fantasies And not believing my fantasies About myself Not believing my fantasies About your fantasies Not believing my fantasies About your fantasies About me Like you have a fantasy That I'm mediocre Or slightly below average You have those fantasies I fantasize you have those fantasies That I'm sort of mediocre I fantasize that you have those fantasies So if I do believe that Then I want to get you To get over that fantasy And think I'm above average Or below average I just want you to get over Your fantasies about me And actually I do want you To get over your fantasies about me I want you to stop believing Your fantasies about me And I want to stop believing My fantasies about you and me But the place to start Is me getting over my fantasies About you and about me That's where I start

[76:01]

Because I do have a strong tendency To believe my fantasies about people And I have a big job To get over my belief In my fantasies about people But that's where you start Once I get over them I'm not going to be so What do you call it? I'm going to be more skillful In helping other people Get over their fantasies I still may want them to get over it Because I realize they're suffering Because they believe their fantasies But when I don't believe mine anymore I'll be more skillful In helping others Not believe theirs I will be very patient with them Because I realize From my own practice How difficult it was To get over them So I understand they're probably Having a hard time getting over Believing their fantasies too So I'll be patient with them

[77:01]

And I'll be generous with them I'll appreciate them In their present state Of having fantasies And again It's nice to have a grandchild Because you see the person Having fantasies But you still appreciate them Even though they're like Having fantasies And believing them Like now he has strong fantasies That there are not monsters He has a fantasy That there's not monsters That's his fantasy And he really wants He's trying to get that Really well established That there aren't monsters Because a little bit He thinks that there are So if I'm talking to him Like one time I was Up here in the yard Talking to him And I put my hand over my mouth And I was saying Well let's go over there And do this And when I went He said

[78:04]

Do you believe me When I go like this And say there's a monster And he said Yeah, don't do that Then he says There aren't monsters But he's saying that Because he a little bit Thought for a second There his grandfather Became a monster So you can really Adore people Who are struggling They're still adorable They're still Worthy of our love It's just that they are Shaking When it comes to Understanding fantasy as fantasy He's too little to understand Fantasy as fantasy He's like He really like He's really working with him Intensely and Believing and unbelieving Like he says to me Let's play a game

[79:09]

I forgot what he called the game Let's play this game Of putting these animals They were mostly African animals Like giraffes and hippos and stuff Let's play A game of putting these animals In water So what he wanted to do Was get a big tub of water And put the animals in the water And So I said It would be easy To just take the Tub downstairs And fill the tub down there So let's take the tub with all the animals And go downstairs and fill it with water So we're going down the stairs And he's imagining As we go down the stairs He's saying This is going to be so much fun This is going to be so much fun We're going to have so much fun Playing this game It's going to be awesome And he's just talking With great excitement

[80:10]

But he's imagining that this is going to be fun He's not imagining that it's not going to be fun He could have done that But this one he's imagining it's fun And I'm listening to him saying This is going to be so much fun And I don't say Anything really But in my mind I'm thinking This may or may not be fun We'll see But I do see that you are Energetically pursuing this activity Because you think it's going to be fun And we got down there And we filled the tub with water And put the animals in And as soon as we got the animals in He took them out And then he wanted to play golf It might have been so much fun I didn't notice whether it was or not I didn't say was that fun? Was that like super fun? I didn't ask him It looked like it was Whatever how much fun it was

[81:10]

It was very short-lived And not very intense But I could be wrong But it was definitely short-lived It was very fast And we moved on to some other thing Which he also thought would be lots of fun And this morning I came down from Usually where I have my clothes Up in the Spring Valley And I was coming down with this dog called Rozzy She was following me And I found that she was quite a distance from me And I said, come on Rozzy And she came a little bit She was smelling something she wanted to smell I said, come on Rozzy And she kept coming And I had to keep inviting her to come along with me And she was kind of coming along But if Rozzy thinks something is going to be fun She doesn't walk like that She walks very fast With tremendous energy But she thought it was not going to be much fun To come with me and go sit in that room Even the dog imagines That it's going to be fun

[82:12]

To do such and such And when she does She believes it And she tears after this thing She thinks it's going to be fun And when she gets there After a little while she realizes It's not what she thought it was So even dogs imagine things Even carnivorous worms imagine things And humans are really good at it And so people imagine all these things about us And it's a real challenge For us not to believe what we think they're doing When they're imagining about us But that's the basic thing to learn Is to learn to not believe That what we imagine the world is Is the world Yes? The mind knows itself through beings And also the world knows itself

[83:21]

Mountains know themselves Through us We create mountains Together And then mountains Know themselves through us Through their relationship with us I got it, yeah That's a very good question And The mountains do not know themselves Through our ideas of mountains The mountains do not know themselves Through our ideas of mountains That's not how they know themselves They don't Our ideas of the mountains are not the mountains

[84:22]

And actually If we believe that our ideas of the mountains Are the mountains We hinder the process of the mountains, learning who the mountains are. When I do not believe my ideas of the mountains, I help the mountains really be mountains. I aid them in being the mountains that they are, which are beyond my ideas of mountains. So it's not, although the mountains are precipitated, in relationship to beings who have fantasies about mountains. The mountains really know themselves when the beings who have fantasies about them and thereby create them, do not believe their fantasies about the mountains. It's by not believing them that you realize the actual creative process by which you and the mountains are born together. But if I believe my ideas about mountains and people, that belief blocks my access to the actual process, the mutual process by which the mountains create me

[85:26]

and I create the mountains. So it's the actual process of experience that helps the mountains realize that they're not out there all by themselves, that they're alive with me. Because I don't believe my image of them, but I do have images of them, and part of the causation of mountains is that they arise with living beings who have ideas about them. It's not living beings that don't have ideas about mountains, that manifest mountains. It's living beings who have fantasies that create mountains. But the fantasies that living beings have are not the mountains. They're fantasies about the mountains. And once again, if the living beings who work together to create the mountains and rivers don't believe that their fantasies about the mountains and rivers are the mountains and rivers, then the living beings and the mountains fully realize their life together. Pardon?

[86:30]

I think they can, I think they can. Whether they can do it as thoroughly, I have a fantasy that it looks difficult for them to do it because I don't know what education programs they have. Human beings have education programs for disabusing human beings of their belief and their fantasies, and those education programs are called Buddhadharma, even if it's not within the usual sectarian view of Buddhism. And any process which helps living beings get over their fantasies about things as being them, that we call that Buddhadharma. And I can see such training programs among humans and animals, but how much animals can follow it, I'm not sure. But I think that they do pick it up to some extent.

[87:35]

I think sometimes animals do have ideas about things, and they somehow, they somehow kind of like, it seems like they get over them. Here's an example. There's this movie, it's a movie, right? But still, it's a fantasy about animals getting over their belief and their fantasies. So these two brothers were, I think they're Bengal tigers, I'm not sure, but anyway, they were brothers, they had the same mom and the same dad. I think they were twins. And so anyway, people killed their mom, and they ran off with their dad, and then, I think actually maybe people killed their mom and one of them ran off with their dad and the other one got caught. And then later, people shot their dad, and the Maharajah or something that shot their dad, after shooting their dad, he had a picture, he was having a picture taken of himself, you

[88:40]

know, with his gun, with his foot on the head of the tiger, and then the tiger got up and ran away, because it wasn't really dead. He just shot a hole through the tiger's ear, so the tiger had an ear piercing, a hole about maybe half an inch in diameter through his ear, so he took off. But then they caught the one other little brother. So both brothers were in captivity from early age, and one brother was raised in such a way or he had the nature that he was more docile, which means, and docile means able to learn. So he was actually got in a circus situation where he was treated kind of meanly, but his response was to become docile, and he learned some tricks, and one of the tricks he learned was to jump through fire. And animals, again, the realm of animals is to instinctively fear some things, and difficult

[89:51]

to overcome that fear often, but not impossible, so he learned to jump through fire. The other brother, who was also raised in captivity, but raised in such a way as to make him not docile, I think what they did is they frightened him, and just frightened him, and frightened him, and frightened him, but no let up, and he became extremely aggressive, and much more aggressive than any animal in the wild would be, you know, tremendously aggressive and harsh. So then somebody had the idea of having a show of getting these two tigers together and having them have a fight. So anyway, they put the ferocious one in a cage, and then they had the docile one who knew how to jump through fire, they sent him into the cage, but on his way into the cage he saw this ferocious tiger, and he, you know, he cowered down and started shaking and wetting his pants, so to speak, wetting his fur. He was just, you know, terribly afraid of this big, horrible, vicious tiger, very afraid,

[90:55]

like animals can be, and even the fierce one was also afraid, and his response to his fear was to be super aggressive, and this one's response to his fear was like, try not to go into the cage, but they kept poking him and poking him, and they got him to go into the cage, and they got in the cage, and they started fighting, and he fought to defend himself, and I don't know how they did this, but they got pictures of these tigers fighting in this cage, and then they sort of, like in the movie, they show you them imagining or remembering, probably through their smell, remembering when they used to play together in the trees and how they helped each other, particularly the one who was fierce remembered how the docile one had helped him one time when he was in trouble, and then they remembered that they were brothers, and then they started licking each other, and kissing each other, and hugging each other, and this was very lovely. They got over their idea, they got

[91:56]

over their idea of who each other were, somehow, that happened, they realized, and then they got another idea of who they were, but anyway, they got over that one, and moved on to another one, and then people got very upset because they weren't fighting anymore, so they started poking at them to get them to fight, so then the ferocious one started poking at them,

[92:19]

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