I offer talks here. I'm asked for a title so they can, you know, title the talk and put it on the internet, on the website. So for quite a long time, the title, the first title that I've been giving to the talks was is Embracing the Great Vehicle. That's probably the title I'll offer for this talk too when they ask me. Except it's like Embracing the Great Vehicle number one, number two. So this is about number, what? Huh? This is number 22. Embracing the Great Vehicle, number 22.

[01:05]

And then there's usually a subtitle. So I'll be asked tomorrow, what's the subtitle? One possible subtitle would be Creating Alternative Worlds. Creating Alternative Worlds. That could be one subtitle. Another subtitle could be All We Know is Appearances or Everything We Know is Just Mental Construction. Another subtitle could be, Liberating This World by Creating Alternative Worlds.

[02:28]

The great vehicle, those words are words for a teaching and a social movement of enacting that teaching The great vehicle also could mean an understanding of the teaching. An understanding which is liberating living beings in the world of suffering. Yeah, an understanding which is liberating living beings in the world of suffering. It's a teaching for those who wish to devote their life to helping living beings realize freedom and peace and happiness in this life together.

[03:41]

People who are thus devoted are sometimes called bodhisattvas. sometimes called enlightening beings, which is a translation of that. Beings who are working to enlighten and liberate all beings. It's a teaching for such people, for such beings. The one way the teaching is offered is to say everything, everything that we No, our world is nothing but mind, which is distinguished from saying there is nothing but mind. We're not saying there is nothing but mind, we're saying everything we know is nothing but mind. saying that everything we know is nothing but mind is not a statement about what is.

[05:00]

It's a statement to help liberate us from this world. It's a force to shake up our world a little bit, to turn it a little bit, to let the light of wisdom in, to shift the world, create another world so we can see that our world is just conscious construction. Because it's just conscious construction, we can be free of it or with it. Another teaching of the great vehicle is that all, everything we know and focusing on the present, what we know right now in the present is completely given to us. And again, what is given to us, what is completely given to us is just actually the workings of our mind.

[06:10]

This world which we're living in is just the workings of our mind. And The world is given to us by the workings of our mind. Our mind works to give us a world which looks external. It gives us a world where the trees and the other living beings, other humans and animals and walls and ceilings and mountains and rivers, where they appear to be external. This externality is a mind creation. It is only a construction. When we see, when the appearance of externality is given to us, and it is given to us, moment by moment, it's given to us. When it's given to us, and we believe it, we feel stressed, more or less.

[07:15]

Our fear is based on the sense that what we're aware of is external. Our fear of other people and animals is conditioned by, depends on the sense of their being external. When we become free of the illusion of externality, we are no longer afraid. We can still deal skillfully with tigers which might be to move away from them when they're at the appropriate distance. We can still step back from a cliff, but we don't actually need to be afraid anymore of cliffs and tigers and death and birth. We don't need to be. Matter of fact, we will not be unless it's helpful. Then, okay, I'll be afraid. Everything that we, our life is completely given.

[08:29]

And it is completely constructed. It is completely given. And according to this teaching, we must respond to it Morally. Morally. In other words, we must respond to this world that's given to us and out of a sense of compassion towards it. We must practice compassion towards this world which is given to us. We must deal with it compassionately. It's proposed that this sense that we must deal with it compassionately, that we must love it compassionately, is part of our nature.

[09:34]

What we are to live, what we are to live is given. What we are to live is given. Like now, this is what we are to live. It is given. How we live it is undetermined. It's undetermined because what is given to us is conscious construction only. What we are to be compassionate towards, what we are to love, is given to us What we are to love is given to us in the present moment, right now. What we are to love is given to us. How we love it, how we live with it, is undetermined. Because what is given is conscious construction only.

[10:46]

We are free if we respond to what is given without any fussing, without any argument, simply respond with the sense that it is our job to respond to what is given right now with love-moral action-compassion. Sometimes I think, you know, Being moral is different from love or perhaps even vice versa. So I'm trying to actually promote the use of the word love to include acting morally and vice versa, acting morally to include love, to include compassion. Compassion acting morally, I would like them to be synonyms. I would like acting morally to include generosity, being very careful, alert and respectful and patient.

[11:57]

I would like all those things to be part of acting morally and all those things as part of compassion, as part of love. So, I'm starting now to try to remind myself and encourage you to remind yourself that to encourage ourselves to trust that we must act morally, we must love not like or dislike we must be compassionate and love what is given moment by moment and we must love what is given in order to create alternative worlds with what is given not argue with what the world is given

[13:05]

but fully embrace it and thereby create an alternative world with it and understand it and become free with it. So, the first step on the path to liberating beings from suffering and realizing peace is to trust Not trust what is given, but to trust that what's happening for us right now is given. It's not like if somebody's mean to me, I trust somebody mean to me. I trust that somebody mean to me is being given to me. Oh, this is what I have to deal with now, if somebody's being mean to me. If I... And if I'm unskillful, I don't trust me being unskillful. I don't trust being unskillful. I trust that me being unskillful is being given to me.

[14:08]

I trust not it, but that it is given. And this is my job now. My job now. This is what my job is applied to. My job is to be moral with everything that's given to me and what's given to me right now is what I am to be moral with. I am to be ethical with. I am to be loving with. I would like to promote that trust in myself and others. That's the first step. I propose Next step is, oh, and how do you trust? How do you trust and test the trusting? First of all, can you really be generous towards what is being given? Can I really be generous towards what is given? Part of trusting that this is what I'm to work with is to say, yes, thank you very much for this moment, for this conscious construction only.

[15:17]

Thank you for this person and this sickness and this happiness and this pain and this pleasure and this sun and this fog. Thank you very much. I have no complaint whatsoever. That's the first step of generosity. Gracias. Muchas gracias. Next step is to be ethical in the sense of being respectful and careful of it. If it's a sickness, after you say, thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever, then you say, maybe these people would like me to consult an expert on this disease. I think I'll go get some consultation about, get some help to look at and be careful of this disease which is in my life now. Because it may be asking me to take care of it in a certain way. To respect it.

[16:21]

To not kill it. To not lie about it. To not try to get a different state. To not slander it. To not put ourselves above it like, I'm better than this illness. This is beneath me. This illness, mental or physical, is beneath me. I'm better than this. No. No. That's not ethical. Don't hate it. And, of course, don't attach to it. Don't attach to illness. And if health comes, also don't attach to it. Don't be possessive of it. You can say thank you very much to healthiness, too. Welcome healthiness, but don't be possessive of it. And don't lie about it and not hide it from other people so they won't take it from you. And be patient with it. Be patient with health. And be patient with illness.

[17:23]

Be in the present with it. This is what I mean by trust in what's given for us to love. Well, yeah. Trust that you should love and then when you love that's enacting the trust. Trust. Again, likes and dislikes are given to us about other things that are given to us, and those too should be cared for. If we wish to be free, those should be cared for with love. If we do not wish to be free, those should be cared for with not love. And don't be ethical, and then you will be guaranteed to be unfree and unhappy and not at peace. But most people already know how to do that, so the great vehicle is to teach us something we don't know how to do very well yet.

[18:29]

Once we respect what's given, Once we accept that what is given, yeah, what is given, then we have a chance to think about beyond trusting it with compassion, how can we move towards being creative with it, understanding it, and becoming free of it. And the first step after you accept what's given, after you trust what's given as what's given and not yeah, and not try to get away from that is to think about well, relaxing with it. So trust and then if you really are trusting and you're really kind to it you're ready to relax with it. To relax before you're kind to it is not the kind of relaxation that I mean.

[19:47]

I don't mean like walk away from it and be irresponsible towards it. I mean after you accept and trust that you have a moral responsibility towards what's happening right now, if you really accept that fully, now you're ready. Or I should say as fully as you can at the moment, you might be ready to relax with it. And relax with it means relax with the world, the whole world, and all the different parts of it. Relax with it. And then, if you can relax with it, with whatever is given to you in the moment, right now, after trusting, loving it, now you relax with it, then you're ready to play with it. Play with illness. Play with the world that has illness for myself and others.

[20:50]

Play with cruelty in myself and seeing it in others. Play with my sense of separation from others. Play with the sense of the world being external to me and the fear I have about it. Play with fear. Play with anxiety. Play with tension. Relax with tension? Yes. Relax with tension. Relaxing with tension, not getting rid of tension. Tension is given. Tension is given. Completely given. So, we have a moral responsibility to all tensions. To love them. To respect them. Now that we respect tension, we can relax. If we don't respect tension, we're not ready to really relax. Ignoring tension, disregarding tension is not loving it.

[21:56]

Giving it full attention, careful respect, honoring it, really being grateful for the opportunity to practice generosity with it Now you can relax with tension. And now you can play with it, if you can relax with it. And if you can play with it, then you can be creative with it. You can make a great work of art with tension. you can create an alternative world. I say you can create an alternative world, and then I say you and me together can create an alternative world with the tension that's given in the moment. You and me, you, all of us together, including the people who do not want to accept what's given, including the people who do not trust

[22:58]

that they should work with what's given them. We live in a world where some people are doing this practice. There are people who want to. They want to trust the practice of compassion towards everything. And some people say, I do not want to practice compassion towards everything that's given to me. Those who wish to practice compassion towards everything, relax with everything, be playful with everything, and create alternative worlds with everything, they accept that some people do not agree with that project. The great vehicle embraces and sustains all beings and accepts that many beings do not want to embrace and sustain the great vehicle. great vehicle welcomes dissenters to the great vehicle.

[24:02]

It welcomes people who really actually will say, I want to hate and be irresponsible and immoral to some of the things that are given to me. Some children even say, I want to be immoral with everything that's given to me. Or even, I want to control what's given to me and then be immoral with it once I get it. Such beings are sometimes given to us. Sometimes they seem to be us. The path to freedom and peace is to trust, loving whatever is given. Not so much trust, loving, theoretical difficult guess, but actually the one that's given right now. The appearance that's, the constructed appearance that's given right now.

[25:07]

This is the one to work with. And not because it's ultimately real, but because it's given. And there's a teaching for it. It's, what we're working with now is We're working with the workings of our mind right now. Once we can trust compassion towards all things, relax with it, play with it, and create with it, we will understand what it means that it's conscious construction only. The meaning of conscious construction only is liberation from this world and peace. Belief in what is only conscious construction as something more than conscious construction is, for example, to believe that other beings are external to us.

[26:11]

To believe that the lives of other living beings are external to us. That is the path to disrupt peace and disrupt freedom. or to block it, to hide it, to obstruct it. Right now and right now we could be creating an alternative world not to make, and again I don't say alternative reality, I said alternative world. We can create alternative worlds to free us from this world.

[27:20]

It's not to make an alternative world and go stay there and think that that's real. It's to create an alternative world. An alternative interpretation. Freely interpret new worlds all the time because, in fact, we're doing that, enjoying that. We miss that. We're not usually with that. When I say we miss it, I mean we usually miss it. We don't understand how this world is constructed. It's not that we will understand how it's constructed, but we will understand that it is constructed.

[28:26]

so one of the ways a further way that the great vehicle is taught under the simple presentation that everything we know is conscious construction only or everything we know is nothing but mind an articulation of that is that given the appearance that we're dealing with right now, for example, given the appearance of being in this room with lots of people, this appearance has three characteristics or you could say three natures.

[29:54]

What we know, for example, our body, our thoughts, this room, these people, has a quality of, well, it has a quality of depending on something other than itself. It's dependent on something other than itself, this current appearance. And it also has the characteristic of appearing to have some substance. And this character is the character of an imagined substance or some substantiality of the experience. Like, for example, that a wall is substantial. The way we sense that the wall is substantial

[31:02]

is an aspect of our experience. The way we experience that we're separate and that that's a real thing is an imagined thing. The substantiality of the wall is imagined. The externality of the wall is imagined. The substantiality of other beings, the substantiality of our self is imagined. What appears has this imagined quality. And this imagined quality is based on the other dependent quality of this current appearance. This current appearance has an other dependent quality, which is the experience itself. But we don't know the experience. We only know the conscious construction of the experience.

[32:07]

So, there is experience right now, but experience is not known to us. What is known to us is the appearance of experience. We have a life right now, and this life has an other-dependent quality, but we're not knowing the other-dependent quality of our life, we're knowing the appearance of our life. We're knowing the substantial part of our life. We don't know the insubstantial part of our life right now. We know the substantial part. That's how it appears. But this appearance of substantiality is superimposed, is imputed to our insubstantial, ungraspable life experience. Life is experience, but we do not know our life experience. What do we know? We know an appearance of our life experience. And the appearance of our life experience is that it's external and substantial.

[33:22]

So our present experience, our actual present life, is not substantial and we don't know it. What we know is a mentally constructed appearance of substantial life. And since it's substantial, we can substantially lose it and substantially be scared of losing it and so on. We have those two qualities every moment of our experience according to this teaching. And there's a third characteristic and that is that our life experience is actually never touched or disturbed by this projection of substantiality upon it. Even though life appears to be substantial and walls appear to be substantial, walls are never touched by the mentally constructed appearance of their substantiality.

[34:31]

Walls are actually not what we think they are. They're not how they appear. Walls are part of our life. Other beings are part of our life experience. And we do not know that life experience. This is just part of the deal. We don't know our life. We do not know our life. And we do not know our life. That's part of the teaching here. Sentient beings, hello? We do not know our life. What do we know? We know an appearance of our life. We know a conscious construction only of our life. And it's not like what some people might think, that if you could study this teaching, that what we know is conscious construction only, that then you could know your life. You could know your life experience.

[35:35]

But that's what we usually think is going on, is we think we know our experience. But the only way to know your experience is to make an appearance of your experience and think that the appearance of your experience is your experience, which is not knowing your experience. Experience is impossible to know. It's not that you're not too good at it. It's not that I'm not too good at experiencing. I am actually pretty good at experiencing and so are you. It's just that I don't get to know it. I don't get to know the experience that I am. I get to be the experience that I am. I don't get to know the life that I am. I am my life. My life is me. Your life is you. Your life is you. You are your life. You don't get to know it. However, you do get to be it. And also, being a living being like you are, which you are, and you get to be it, but you don't get to know it,

[36:39]

You can create stories about your life and think that the stories are your life. And in fact, that's what we do. And you can experience a life with a wall and you make your story of a life of a wall is substantial and that's what you know about the wall. You don't know how the wall is not experienced. However, you are living with the wall of experience and the wall of experience is living with you. But there's a third teaching, which is actually the wall is never touched by my stories of its substantiality or my stories of its insubstantiality. No matter what I think of the wall, the wall is not touched by what I think of it. No matter what I think of you, you're untouched, never reached by my stories of you. If I think you're wonderful, it doesn't reach you. If I think you're less than wonderful, it doesn't reach you. By being kind to these appearances, which we do know, we do know the appearances, and being kind to our sense that we must be kind to these experiences, we can relax with them and play with them and create with them and understand them and be free of the appearances without getting rid of the appearance that we're separate or that the walls are substantial

[38:11]

without touching it at all or being the slightest bit mean to it, without getting rid of it in the slightest, we can be free with it and at peace with it. Because we understand what we're dealing with is not something other than our mind. This world is created and therefore we can be free of it. But we cannot thereby think that we can overlook it and not take care of it. Because taking care of it in the most thorough way is the path of understanding it and becoming free of it. Understanding it does not mean that you know it.

[39:14]

It means that you are totally intimate with it, so intimate with it that it cannot be known. And of course we are already so intimate with our life that we can't know it. And we will always be so intimate with our life that we can't know it. And we will probably always be able to conjure up a story about our life that we can know and will know. And again, if we're kind to the story we make of the life which we can't know, a story which we can know about a life we can't know, if we're kind to that story, we can realize and live the life that we actually are. And in that life that we actually are, there's no fear. There's only peace and freedom. And true freedom cannot be grasped. Otherwise, it would be enslaved because can you imagine if somebody had freedom they could sell it for a lot but you can't get a hold of it so you can't sell it you can only tell stories of it and try to sell those true freedom completely goes beyond the appearances

[40:42]

without the slightest severing from the appearances. The world which our mind creates out of this unknown interdependence, unknown other dependence, the world that we conjure up, that it appears, Freedom does not separate at all from that world of appearance and completely goes beyond it at the same time. If you try to get the slightest bit away from this world of illusion, from the sense of separation, and the fear that comes up with that, that will block the realization of freedom. And then if you do realize freedom, then there's no fear anymore, but there's still a world there And because you're not trying to separate from it, you realize the non-separation from it and are free of it without tampering with it at all. That's the task.

[41:45]

That's the subtle problem. How to completely embrace the world, not try to get the slightest bit away from this conjured up, created world, Really be there thoroughly, generously, very carefully and thoroughly and patiently. And in a very relaxed and intimately playful way. Enjoying the creativity of it without making the creativity something out there. Just plunge into it. Which you don't know. But you are. And then become free. And when that freedom, don't push it away. Push it away. You're just gone. You know, I have to go back to the beginning again. Our ordinary situation each moment is we just push the world away. Now, let's be kind to that situation. How do we push the world away? By making an appearance of it. That pushes it away.

[42:47]

It puts a covering on it. Okay. Don't be mean to that act of delusion. It's already been successful. Respect it. Delusion rules. Delusion rules. Okay. Welcome, delusion. Hello, delusion. Goodbye, delusion. I am here to love you. to love you until freedom and peace. And at that time, not hoping that you will go away, but that you will be part of the celebration. And you may continue to rule your empire called the world.

[43:52]

and we will just lovingly coexist with you in freedom and peace. We have realized our life and our life includes a generation of constructions of appearances. Our life includes a generation of the appearance of things which do not exist. And we're going to keep doing that in this great vehicle until everybody understands this and is free. At that point, maybe we'll stop generating these delusions. But until then, the work involves continuing to be able to participate with the generation of appearances continue to participate with the generation appearances in order to demonstrate being compassionate towards them and being creative with them and being liberated with them, to show other beings how to do this practice.

[45:08]

So we have to actually continue the magic show, continue the creation of alternative worlds and try to get more and more living beings to join the creative process. Well, everybody actually has already joined the creative process to help beings become conscious of joining the creative process, to be conscious of being compassionate towards these creations, this world, to be conscious of being relaxed and playful with this world, to be conscious of being creative with this world. even though we're conscious of the appearance of being created with this world. And willingly being that way and then understanding it.

[46:10]

And realizing a freedom which is beyond the appearance of freedom, but doesn't push away the appearance of freedom. In a few minutes, we'll do a chant here. And the first part of the chant goes, may our intention equally extend, may our aspiration equally extend to every being in place. What aspiration is that? Well, for me, it's the aspiration for peace and freedom in this world. May that aspiration, in my case, may that aspiration extend to every being in place with the true merit of this practice.

[47:13]

And then we say beings are numberless. I vow to save them? Is that what it says? I vow to save them? Yeah, so I vow to save them means I vow to work to work in this practice of really welcoming everything that comes, to show other beings how to welcome everything that comes. I vow to respond to everything that comes, to everything that's given, with great compassion, in hopes that other beings will see this and think it's really cool and will do it so also. And also so that I will see that other beings are doing it and that will encourage me to do it more. I vow to do that kind of practice because that is what saves beings. It's for me to do it and encourage others and others to do it and encourage me.

[48:16]

I vow to join that. And then, of course, again, I vow to save them means I vow to relax with them. In order to save beings, I have to relax with them. If I want to save beings, I have to relax with them. When they're crying, you know, when they're whining, when they're doing that, I vow to relax with them. When I'm doing that, I vow to relax with me. I vow to relax. I vow to relax. I vow to relax with them is part of I vow to save them. Buddhas, of course, we have this image of a completely enlightened being that really is devoted to the welfare of all beings. And my image of the Buddha is that the Buddha relaxes with all these beings that she is devoted to liberate. There's a statue of a female behind me.

[49:20]

Does her face look relaxed? Does her face look relaxed? I'm sorry to be sitting in front of her. Does her face look relaxed? Can you see her face? Does she look relaxed? Does she look welcoming? Does she look like there's somebody she doesn't want to be with? Does she accept all living beings? That's what the look on her face means. And the gentleman behind her, does his face look relaxed? Does he look welcoming? Now, does he look playful? Does she look playful? Can you see the playfulness? These are bodhisattvas. They are playful. They want to save all sentient beings. And then there's the great Manjushri back there, the big guy. Does he look relaxed? Can you see the playfulness? I vow to save them.

[50:31]

All these sentient beings are numberless. I vow to save them. It means I vow to welcome them. I vow to be patient with them. I vowed to be ethical with them. Of course, that's what it means to be, to save beings. I vowed to relax with them. I vowed to play with them. I vowed to create with them. And therefore I vowed to understand with them. And I vowed to be, to save them, to be liberated with them. Some years ago we changed that translation From save them to be liberated with them. Or to be free with them. And someone said, now put it back. Take responsibility. Accept responsibility. I vow. I vow. to relax with all living beings. I vow to play with all living beings, to be playful with them.

[51:35]

I vow to be creative with them, to create with them. I vow to understand with them and thereby I vow to save and be saved with them. I vow to realize peace with them. This is a vow we chant. So when I say this in a minute, I'm going to think, is that really true for me? Do I actually vow to do these practices? Do I vow to welcome all of you? Yes, I do. Do I vow to be ethical with all of you? Yes, I do. Do I vow to be patient with all of you? Yes, I do. Do I never slip up on that? Do I sometimes forget? Yes, I do. Do I have a practice for that? Yes, I do. What's my practice? I say, I slipped up. I'm sorry. I vowed to welcome you and I kind of didn't do it wholeheartedly. I'm sorry.

[52:37]

I regret it. I regret not welcoming any living being. I regret it. I vowed to do it. I vowed to welcome. I vowed to be respectful. I vow to be gracious. I vow to be patient. And then I vow to relax, to be calm, to be open, to be focused and attentive. And I vow to then be playful. and creative with every living being, which means each of you, each and every one of you, each and every one of you as you become different persons every moment that you're given a new version of you each moment. I vow to do that in order to understand.

[53:40]

But again, understanding is not what we know. We only know appearances. We only know these constructions. But we become our actual life. We realize it. We understand it. And when we understand it, we're liberated with it. With it, which is actually already liberated so we're liberated with liberation which means we don't hold on to liberation and we're liberated from illusion and all the stress that illusions creates we're liberated with it without messing with messing with it because we might mess with ascension beings who are not ready to be liberated yet they want to hold on to their illusions so we're liberated with them holding on to their illusions which they don't want to relax with they don't want to welcome They don't want to be playful with. They don't want to be creative with. They just want to get rid of them. So we relax with people who are at whatever stage in the path they're at, which means we're patient with them, which wherever they're at, we want them to be free.

[54:54]

But if they don't want to be free right now, we support their freedom to not be free. We are actually free to not be free. Excuse me for being somewhat pointed, but I'm going to point to this chant we're going to do now. And when you make that vow, please look at it. Living beings, sentient beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Please consider whether you vow to do these practices in regard to all living beings when you say it. And fortunately you get to say it twice, so you can look once.

[55:56]

And then you can look again. We should do it more than once to make it easier for us to look. Do I really want to... Do I really want to welcome all living beings? Excuse me. I almost ended the lecture, but I've got to say it again. do you want to liberate all beings? Do you want all beings to be saved from suffering? Do you want all beings to be at peace and happiness? And that if you do, doesn't it make sense to you that you can't liberate beings if you don't welcome them? Doesn't that make sense? You're not going to be able to push them away to liberate them. And if anybody disagrees with what I'm saying, please come to question and answer. Because to me it's like, how could it not be so that we need to welcome the beings that we wish to work to save? How could anybody not agree that we need to be ethical with the beings we wish to save?

[57:04]

How could anybody not agree that we need to be patient with the beings who we're trying to promote the freedom of? How could we not imagine that we should relax with the beings, like these great bodhisattvas? Isn't it obvious we need to relax and be playful with these beings that we want to liberate? But if you have any disagreements, please come and tell me about it soon. I welcome you who disagree with me, right? By my vow, I welcome the people who disagree with me. A lot of people disagree with me who I'm really devoted to. Not everybody that I'm devoted to disagrees with me completely. But many of the people that I just proposed my vow to be devoted to do disagree with me. So I welcome you to come and test my practice by telling me any disagreement you have.

[58:07]

Although right now I just cannot understand how anybody could disagree with me. It seems so obvious that we must be kind to beings if we're going to liberate them. And we must be creative in order to liberate. If we're not creative, we're just not joining the liberation program. Liberation program is the creation program. It's the creation project. Right? Isn't that obvious? Including creation of delusion, which is going to continue as far as I know. May our intention equally extend.

[58:50]

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