The greatest way to be responsible for your karma is not just to say, okay, where do I sign? But be aware of it. Study it. Who did I think I was at that time? What did I think I was doing? What was my intention? What did I think would happen? What did happen? How did it happen? As long as you're involved in karma, then this is really responsible. to monitor it, because then you're doing the work which will gradually transform your karma and make it better, as long as you're involved in karma, you'll make it better, setting up the conditions for liberation from that whole scenario of you doing things. It can get you closer and closer to a practice that you realize a practice which you realize rather than a practice you do. So you can realize Buddhist practice, which liberates you and all beings, but you can't do Buddhist practice.

[01:05]

And many Buddhist people, teachers and also card-carrying Buddhists, say, I do Buddhist practice or I do Buddhism, I'm going to go do some Buddhism, I'm going to go do some meditation. They say that. ...way of talking because people, you know, to help people who are still talking that way. So if everybody talked like me, a lot of people wouldn't be able to start practicing Buddhism because they'd say, well, you can't do it. So I'm going to go someplace, get some religion where you can do it. So as a skillful device, people say, well, let's hear some practices you can do. One I'm teaching you today another way, which is actually practice. Buddha does not do practice. Buddha is practice. Buddha realizes practice. You can realize practice, but you can't do that practice, though. ...realizes a practice which liberates you from practices which you do. Mostly people are hung up on practices which they can do, but this gets boring, to say the least.

[02:11]

So gradually you can move to practices which liberate you from doing. But in the meantime, what you are doing will get you ready for that. It's a good preparation. So studying practices which you can do is a preparation for practices which you can't do, but which you can realize. Buddhism can be realized. It can be realized, but it can't be done. It's too big to be done. But it's not too big to be realized, because that's exactly the right size it is. It's huge. The huge practice can be realized, but can't be done by a person. It can be done by everybody at once. That's Buddha. Buddha's practice is everybody's practice. The Buddhist practice is the practice of every living being together.

[03:13]

And even Buddhists can't do that. That is just Buddhist practice. And all of us have to do that through selflessness. But in the meantime, we're doing stuff all day long, right? Things are happening, so by full expression, you tap into selflessness. So partial expression is hard, right? It's got various problems. Full expression is hard too. It's got different problems. It seems dangerous and scary and death is real close and all that kind of stuff. So it's not that much harder. It's much better. So try it. environment with people who theoretically, anyway, say, yes, I think I do want you to fully express yourself. What do you mean by that? I went home from a workshop one time, and I said to my wife, do you want me to fully express myself?

[04:18]

And she said, no. So, you know, the people you think would want you to may be angry at you for a couple of days ago and not be ready to say yes. So you have to, you know, but really later she said, I really do want you to. Because you didn't let me fully express myself before that. Ming, did you want to say something? Yes. Yes. Yes. Right. in a blackout, in an alcoholic blackout, they do things that they would ordinarily never do.

[05:27]

Right. And many things happen in that situation, which is very hurtful to people. You know, people are beaten, people are raped. Right. You know, children are hurt by their fathers, too. Yes. Right. Right. Yes. I think I understand your question.

[06:35]

We are responsible for unconscious activity too. Even if you're not consciously aware of, I did it. Like I said before, even if you block out and cover up that you're doing it, like I said, like a murderer or something, who kind of puts himself into some kind of trance beforehand, so that he won't think I'm about to kill somebody. It doesn't get into the self-expression at all. In some ways that makes it easier to do unwholesome things, to put yourself in a kind of trance. And I used to go to prison to visit people and I'd talk to these people and they seemed like really nice guys, a lot of them. And when I found out what they did, almost always they were stoned when they did it. They almost always get jacked up on something or jacked down on something when they did that stuff. Almost none of them did the stuff sober that I met.

[07:38]

Especially nice, reasonable guys, you know, intelligent, a lot of energy. And so on an unconscious level, If you think yourself as independent of others and you act from there, even though at that level you're not aware of that sense, that you're understanding at that deeper, darker level, or your ignorance at that less articulated conscious level, that counts too. Not just up at the level of ordinary consciousness. Now, if you're in a trance, or you're really blacked out, then what you do there wouldn't count. But you wouldn't hurt anybody in that state. So a yogi who goes into a state where they don't do anything and they're really blacked out and nothing's happening, there's no karma of that, but they don't do anything.

[08:38]

They don't hurt people in that state. So they don't get any merit for not hurting people either. If somebody comes up and kicks them and they don't hit back, they don't get any merit for that. They're not practicing patience. They're not getting anything out of that except a break from karma. And whatever level of understanding they have stays. That's why going into certain kind of trances is just vacation time. And you shouldn't spend too much time like that because you're using part of your lifespan for that. But sometimes it is a really nice break and it's okay to do it. But if you hit somebody, that doesn't happen by accident. There's still some kind of sense of me and me. So even though they've dulled themselves to such an extent, I shouldn't say dulled themselves, but as a result of their alcohol, their system has dulled them to that extent. It still counts, and it's still irresponsible. It's different, though, than being aware of it.

[09:39]

In terms of spiritual evolution, it's worse when you're not conscious than when you are conscious. And then if you're really conscious, it's even less bad because you're starting to learn. The point is, the situation where you have some slight possibility for learning something from your mistakes is better than the situation where the same act is committed where you have no chance of learning. So if you do something evil with no consciousness and no way of even being conscious, that's a worse evil than where it's a situation where you're vividly and really feel bad about it. Even though in the latter case you really feel terrible about it, in the other case you seem like you feel fine, the one who feels terrible is more likely to learn from it. Does that make sense? It looked like... For a second there.

[10:42]

Well, I'm responsible for my consciousness. I'm responsible for my consciousness. Yeah. Responsible means everything, all your consciousness registers on your life stream and the continuity of your existence. So even your sensory experiences are registered and have effects. But sensory level, direct sensory experience, you don't know about because direct sensory experience, there's no sense and so on. There's no external object in sensory experience. At the sensory level, you don't think that the object is external. It's not, because it's touching you. So we don't know about that level. It's unconscious. It's not conscious in the sense of object knowledge. But it still counts. It still is our life. I mean, it's a huge part of our life.

[11:49]

A lot of what's going on in our life we don't know about and we never will. And there's nothing wrong with that. That's just the way it is. And that's the way it is for lots of animals. They have consciousness. They're having direct experience. But they don't think of what they're aware of as external to themselves. And there's no self at that level. But that is our life. And so then the next level I talked about is the level where you're aware of things as objects, as external. Next level is self, next level is karma, so on. Next level is study. All these different levels. But all of them are connected and they relate to each other. The way your sense organs operate gets modified by the way you meditate. and so on. Or, it gets modified by the way you don't meditate. If you commit karmic acts and don't pay attention to them, it changes the way your sense organs work. The very way you experience reality starts to change depending on whether or not you meditate.

[12:52]

You can't go down to the level of direct experience and do anything directly because you don't even know where it is or how it's operating. What you think of as your sensory experiences, like seeing people and so on and so forth, is not sensory experience. It's not direct sensory experience. It's conceptual. It's a conversion of direct sensory experience, which you know about. But the way you relate to that, and the way you do karma in relationship to that, the way you meditate on that, that actually... It transforms your sensory experience, which you don't know about, but the more skillfully you meditate on the gross karmic acts you commit, or the subtle karmic acts you commit, the more you meditate on your karma, the more your consciousness is transformed by that process of meditation. It actually transforms the way you actually experience sensations. And guess what? In a good way, I mean in a happy way, you start to really feel good about what's happening. The result is that you appreciate sensory life more.

[13:56]

It's like sensory light turns into light. It's like, you know, smells have light. Tastes have light. Everything starts turning into light. as a result of meditating on the stuff you can meditate on, in the sense of where, you know, the you and others, so on and so forth. So they're all connected, and they're feeding back and evolve, you know, they're evolving together. But every level counts. And, of course, if you meditate up here, you tend to drink less alcohol and have less alcoholic blackouts, and so on. your sensory life becomes so horrendous that you're more likely to try to take painkillers, like alcohol. If you fully express yourself and meditate together, you need less alcohol to cope with the pain. Take less alcohol, then the pain becomes more negotiable, and so on.

[15:05]

There is a possibility of this positive evolution. But you've got to work, you know. Yes. for the author? Yes. Well. The previous one is actions of ripening. Number two is actions of ripening. Number three is talking about where they go after they ripen. So we talk about ripening. Do you want to talk about ripening or coming back to the author? So ripening. Here's a little bit about ripening. Wholesome actions ripen. as happiness and you know positive happy good life that's the way wholesome actions ripen they ripen as experience of happiness happiness in the sense of not many levels positive sensation health and but most importantly

[16:27]

Wholesome karma ripens in the form of being able to hear the teaching of meditation. So if you act in a wholesome way, in a skillful way, paying attention to what you do and doing something which you think will be beneficial to other people and you, or you and other people, that kind of meditation which is beneficial to the most possible person, somebody really, really concentrating on what's going to be helpful to living beings, what's going to be protecting living beings, what's going to be protecting life and respecting life. This kind of action, which is called wholesome, and which actually is wholesome, like you think maybe helping this guy would be wholesome, you do it, you think it's helpful and you find out it wasn't, Then later you say, oh, it wasn't, so blah, blah, I changed my story, and the next time I try it differently. But anyway, by trial and error, you get more skillful, you do wholesome acts, wholesome acts lead to happiness and spiritual opportunities.

[17:35]

And the greatest spiritual opportunity that leads to in a karmic realm is it leads to the opportunity to study karma. That's a great benefit of doing good karma is you get to study karma. So then doing good karma leads to the possibility of liberation from karma. But good karma itself has a result, and results are to some extent a problem because they get boring and they're prisons. But anyway, that's wholesome. Unwholesome karma tends to lead, also matures, but it matures as unhappiness. And the worst and worst result of unwholesome karma is it tends to foreclose, limit, and discourage and undermine meditation on karma. Like alcohol leading to blackouts, which make it impossible to meditate on karma. You're doing karma, and you've done bad karma, that you don't have a chance to study karma without even the possibility of studying it.

[18:43]

This is the worst situation. And under that bad situation where you can't even observe your karma, you do more and terrible karma, and you don't even have a chance to learn from your mistakes. This is like the worst possible situation. This is like the lowest possible place that a creature can be, well, that humans can be, is the place where you don't even have a chance, but you've changed your physiology, so your physiology is now fighting your meditation practice. This is a terrible result of unwholesome karma. Okay? That's how it matures. Now, this is, that's a very simple way to put it, and that's not deterministic. What I just said is not deterministic. That's the rule, but it's not a deterministic rule. And not deterministic, that there's various factors that contribute to that.

[19:44]

But that's the basic paradigm. Skillful acts, happiness and spiritual opportunity. Unskillful acts, unhappiness, material disadvantage and reducing spiritual opportunities. That's the basic paradigm that the Buddha taught. The complexities there are one of the complexities, the situation that it happened in, and also the intention or the resolution of practice at the time of the maturing of the act, and of course the ongoing practice of the person. These are factors which also come to interact with this maturing, Are you following this so far? That's kind of what you want to hear about? Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead. You don't want to do it now?

[20:48]

Okay. So, tell a story. One story. I told some people that one Buddha's example is of so you heard the various factors that determine the way things mature. It's the initial act There's the context in which it arose, and there's the resolution, the practice resolution of the person as the fruit comes, and of course the ongoing practice of the person. These are the factors, which is kind of the same as the last one. These are the factors which determine the quality of the maturing. So a couple of examples is the metaphor of a grain of salt. And I guess they had pretty big grains of salt back in those days. He says if you take a grain of salt and you put it in a cup of water, the water will become undrinkably salty.

[21:56]

But if you take a grain of salt, A large lake, a freshwater lake, the water will not become salty and you can drink it. So if you do a minor unwholesome act, that's like a grain of salt, a minor thing. If I were to be disrespectful to somebody here, say some disrespectful comment, that might be a minor unskillful thing to do. That would be maybe a minor and difficult thing to do. Now, that's the grain of salt. Not only do I act disrespectfully, but I actually don't respect the person. And also, I've acted in a way that the person feels I don't respect them. And I really haven't been practicing, and I really don't care about other beings, generally speaking. And I don't feel committed to devotedly practice good

[22:59]

You know, I actually don't want to benefit beings or myself, and I really have a low opinion of myself, then that grain of salt, that thing will fit very nicely with that mind, and that will, you know, my mind's very small, that'll fit right with it, fits right in, and that'll just go right along and will lead to me going to hell for that act. That act will fit in very nicely with my petty small mind and will result in a major terrible thing for me who did it. It will just fit right in with the ongoing accumulation of disastrous results for me for that one small thing. Actually, a small deed like that will lead to hell in such a mind. In other words, it will completely salt it. Now, if a person who has a very big loving mind would be disrespectful to someone that they really do love and really do respect, basically, and really do care about and feel devoted to big time, and they're always cultivating mindfulness, and they're always studying their karma, and they're completely dedicated

[24:19]

developing understanding, and so on and so forth. For a person like that, you put it in. And what tends to happen is, and other people also know that the person has this commitment, is that the person that they speak disrespectfully to says, see, that wasn't very nice. And the person says, yeah, I'm sorry. And that's it. That's the maturity. It matures very fast. And it's almost like nothing. And because the mind is so big, it matures very fast and is almost nothing. And not too much did happen, actually. For somebody else, it's a big deal because that's the way they treat everybody. And they treat people like that all the time. So nobody says anything to them, even. Nobody says, gee, that wasn't very nice. They say, yeah, that's the way he is all the time. So why even say anything? So you don't.

[25:22]

So he doesn't get the result. So it just goes on. Until finally somebody tells him something. Many lifetimes later. And by the time they tell him that, it's bad news. Guess what's going to happen now? Guess where you're going. For a long time. No more chances to hear Buddhist teaching for you. So the way it matures, generally speaking, is that the more you practice, the quicker small deeds mature. Also, the quicker major misdeeds mature. Now, if a person who is dedicated to, you know, has a very big mind does a bad thing, then it won't be just a small thing. Then it won't be like nothing. It'll be big. But it'll be also sooner. But it will be big. Double practice is a big thing, of course.

[26:24]

It won't be sooner. It will be even later. It will even be worse. So, your practice makes a context in which your karma is different according to your practice. The truth differently. depending on the practice that creates it and then the practice that receives it. Another example, and this just seems to be like the Buddha-Gedis example, but I guess it's more like a schematic. Is this schematic or... Schematic, what's the word? Schematic or paradigmatic kind of example. is two people, two women. One woman did, never did, in the present lifetime, never did any unwholesome deeds. The other woman did almost all bad deeds.

[27:24]

And then they both come up to a time of death. And as they're dying, the woman who did all good deeds It was always like meditating on her karma and carefully judging and avoiding evil and practicing good. As she died, the prospect, or what do you call it, the appearance of a destiny of hell appeared to her. She didn't actually go to hell, but she saw that sort of apparition of hell appear before her. And she said, oh, too bad. Well, here I practiced good all my life and things are going to hell. Well, I'm still glad I studied and practiced good my whole life. I'm still glad I don't regret it. I'm sorry I'm going to hell, but, you know, I guess... I guess my deeds from the previous life are manifesting in this next life, so that's the way it works.

[28:29]

But I'm going to continue to practice my study of Buddhism, even in hell." And then the hellish apparition faded away. A woman who had lived a bad life, an apparition of divine rebirth appeared, and she said, wow, this is terrific. I didn't study all those years. I just studied Buddhism, and I was kind of wondering if maybe I was going to get in trouble for that. I didn't even study Taoism or Confucianism either. Or, you know, I didn't study anything. I was just kind of a bum. And I thought I was going to get... So, actually, it's probably good that I didn't. That's great. And I guess I won't... I'll just go to heaven and I won't study there either. So then the heavenly thing came away and the hell went up.

[29:30]

Instead of saying, you know, my God, I was bad my whole life and here's heavenly... Boy... teaching of karma must be true, because I must have done something good before. My God, this karma thing, this Buddhist teaching is really incredible. I'm going to really start studying now." And the heavenly thing would have stayed there, and she would have gone to what he called, happy . She would have gone to this place where she'd constantly have a supportive environment to study Buddhism. That's really heaven. So those are some examples of maturing. So my feeling is, I don't know what's coming to me, but I have a feeling that some stuff, some tough stuff. So I'm, you know, partly, part of what I'm doing is trying to train myself so that I'll be able to have some in the midst of the difficulties that are coming. Because I think, you know, if my health is good and I live to be old, I'm going to get into some trouble.

[30:41]

You know, what I'm really going to have trouble with, how am I going to practice meditation if I have Alzheimer's? That's going to be tough, you know. If I have Alzheimer's or a stroke, how am I going to continue full expression with diminished capacity? You know, probably it will happen unless I die pretty soon.

[31:06]

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