Our feelings, our perceptions, until we're kind of in that mode, then we do think, this is mine, this is what I am, this is myself. And because we think that, we are passionate about our forms. Passionate about our forms. My wife is a member of the Dolphin Club in San Francisco. And I am too. It's a club by the bay, San Francisco Bay. And we belong to that club so that we can go swimming in the bay. And then afterwards, there's a sauna you can warm up in. So she told me recently, and I hope this is not confidential information, because I'm going to tell it. This isn't like psychiatric. She's a psychiatrist, a psychologist.

[01:02]

So this isn't like her clients. This is her fellow members of the club, the women members. The women have their own locker room where they get dressed and undressed. But you know what else they do in that locker room? They talk. And you know what else they do? which they don't do on the boys' side, they put on makeup. And they put it on, she said, for a long time they put it on. She said, some of the women in the club, I mean, they really work at it. I said, well, how long do they do it? She said, for a half an hour or an hour. They're in the club after their workout, you know. They do their swimming and stuff and their running and then they go in and they put makeup on. I mean, big time, put makeup on. They are, it looks like, it just looks like, can't be sure, don't judge other people's practice, okay? But it looks like they are passionate towards the material form.

[02:05]

Their own material form. They are passionate about it because they think, this is mine, this is what I am, this is myself, I guess. They're passionate about it. But if we train ourselves to like this early Buddhist teaching. This is not mine. This is not what I am. This is not myself. And we're talking about this is something we're actually like feeling. smelling. This smell is not mine. This sound is not mine. This is not what I am. This eye, this vision, this is not what I am. This mind consciousness, this ear consciousness, this is not what I am. This perception, this attitude, all this stuff, whatever it is that I'm experiencing right now and I'm not distracting myself from, not mine, not what I am, not myself. We train ourselves that way. We become dispassionate about material forms. We become dispassionate about our feelings. We become dispassionate about perception.

[03:13]

We become dispassionate about formations. We become dispassionate about consciousness. Becoming dispassionate, lust fades away. With the fading of lust, her heart is liberated. When the heart is liberated, there comes the knowledge. It is liberated. She understands birth is exhausted. The holy life has been lived out. We become dispassionate towards the five skandhas, but don't worry, ladies and gentlemen, this does not make us into zombies. We become dispassionate about the five skandhas, but we become liberated from suffering. And if we are bodhisattvas, our compassion becomes unhindered by our bondage to the delusion that this is mine this is what i am this is myself so it's not that there's no passion left it just now the passion is the passion of compassion the passion of love for the welfare of all beings the passion for dharma and teaching dharma

[04:30]

is now completely unleashed, unhindered, and coming into its full flower. Great, great joy, incredible, inconceivable joy is now manifested. Even for those who did not have the bodhisattva vow necessarily, like these five, they even experienced great joy of liberation. But they don't have the additional joy, since it's not mentioned here, the joy of their compassion being unhindered. So we have our little problems, our little woes, our little sufferings, our little happinesses, we have our little difficulties, and even our pleasant feelings because of some association with this is mine, This is what I am.

[05:33]

This is myself. Even for a pleasant feeling, because of that association, there's bondage and suffering and anxiety. So again, the first middle way teaching, just let's not distract ourselves by indulging in these extremes. then the first truth starts to appear. And this truth appears because although we settle into our experience, we still have some, to some extent, some attachment to the idea of an inherently existing self. And we still think, oh, this is mine or this is not mine.

[06:34]

So there's still passion about our pain and pleasure. There's still passion about our consciousness. And so there's lust. And so the heart's not free. Perhaps this ancient teaching is appropriate even today.

[07:24]

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