Is violence ever warranted?

Ken: Okay. So, the question is: in what circumstances is violence appropriate or warranted? Well, let’s start with—what is violence? Here’s the definition that’s offered by a friend of mine. Violence is extremely rapid change. Now, we don’t usually think of violence that way.

I’m going to take a moderately extreme political example to show how we can also think of violence. Between the Gulf War and the Iraq War, Iraq was subject to sanctions by the UN at the insistence of United States. It is estimated that during this time 500,000 children died in Iraq because Iraq could not buy basic medical supplies. Now, that’s not extremely rapid change, but we would also say violence was done there.

So, I think we have two different ways that we have to consider violence. One is things happening very fast, and the other is the infliction of harm or injury in various ways on a person, or a group of people, or whatever. Well, from the Buddhist point of view, if you go with the first definition, there’s no problem with violence. Ideally, one stays present in the extremely rapid change, which can be a little difficult, but it’s just a description on the timeframe rather than on the effect.

If you look at the second definition, however, there are several factors which come into play very quickly. The basic principle of Buddhist ethics is not to cause suffering to others. But we have to look a little deeper into that because as we’ve noted earlier, there’s a strong tendency in this culture to take ethical principles as prescriptive rather than descriptive. And so people will take that as an absolute should never cause harm to others, or suffering to others.

But if we take the more descriptive approach, which describes how a person who is awake lives and functions, that’s what we see. A person who is awake lives and conducts his or her life in such a way that they don’t cause suffering to others. If I can bring in a Taoist principle here, it’s because they are paying attention to the actual balance in all situations.

And when you pursue that, you very quickly, quite quickly actually, arise at some of the Taoist principles of—to use Elliot’s term—”being the still point of the turning world.” The perfect man does nothing but many things happen around him, and so forth and so forth.

There’s a nice story that Thomas Cleary puts in at the beginning of one of his books, I can’t remember which one. The emperor has sought out a doctor, he’s ill, sought out a doctor who is very, very famous. When the doctor comes to see him, the emperor asked him about his family. He says, “Are you the only doctor in your family?” He says, “No, no, I have two brothers. They’re both doctors.” “Oh, well I haven’t heard about them.”

“Well, my oldest brother, he is able to detect illness before it comes into the body and takes actions accordingly. So, nobody’s heard about him. My next older brother, he’s able to detect illness as soon as it enters the body. So, there’s a few people in our village who know about him. But me, I don’t have their gifts. I prescribe potions, I stick needles in people, I give herbs and things like that. So, my name’s got out to a few people.” [Laughter]

Now, within that idea or that anecdote is the key to how—if you’re awake—you’re going to live life. So, I won’t say violence is never necessary, but it is unlikely to be necessary. And that’s the real Buddhist answer. You live your life in such a way that the question never arises. And there’s a very important piece to attach to that. Many people feel violence is justified when it’s for a higher cause, such as truth or whatever.

I think I may have mentioned before, reading this recent biography of Lincoln brought up these questions for me quite strongly, because the Civil War was waged in order to preserve the Union. Lincoln was not sympathetic to slavery at all, in fact, he was quite against it. But he decided to wage war because he wanted to keep the experiment that was America going. And this was its big test as far as he was concerned. Well, several million people died in that.

When we take the world in which we live to be real, then we’re faced with these things, and we need to preserve my property, my town, my state, my country, my family, whatever. But if we look at all of that from a Buddhist perspective, all of that is just experience. So, what are you actually maintaining? You’re maintaining a dream, a dream you take very seriously, but you’re actually maintaining a dream.

And so one person brought up the matter, what do we do as Buddhists to stop war and stop violence in our society? And in engaging that discussion, I raised the possibility of, what can you do to stop a war in your dream? You’re dreaming of war. What can you do in the dream to stop the war?

Student: [Unclear]

Ken: No, it doesn’t stop the war. That ends the dream. What can you do in the dream to stop the war? And the question I posed to her was, when you figure out how to stop a war in your dream, then we’ll think about how to work this in the society. And that may sound facetious or glib, but it’s actually right on, because that’s how we look at this world from the perspective of Buddhism.

Because anytime we say, “Well, there’s this, and there’s this, and there’s this,” we’re actually projecting our own ideals onto our shared experience in the world, which is something that’s a construct in itself. Do you follow? So, from those points of view, I could ask you—if I was going to be philosophical about this, which is to say to be irritating about it—when is violence justified or appropriate or warranted in your dream?

Student: [Unclear]

Ken: Well, actually you can actually learn to control your dreams. It’s standard operating procedure actually. But when you ask the question that way, it puts a whole different slant on it. Now in this world in which we actually live, the other piece that I came to quite a long time ago, and this was very much in the topic of war and things like that, but not just war, but other forms of violence. If you have to use violence to achieve your objective, then your objective is probably unachievable. Because as we know, wars very rarely produce the results for which they’re waged, and arguably never.

And certainly the history of war in China, one of the things in Sun Tzu, it’s a very crude instrument and it always produces unexpected results. So, it’s the tool of last resort. In the Mahayana, I think it’s fair to say, violent action, even causing other people injury or harm, is not proscribed. But you have to be absolutely clear in your intention. Which if you think about it, it actually takes you back into the dream analogy. What am I actually doing here? What is this world, in my experience, that I am prepared to take this step? Okay? Susan, did you have a question? Speak up a little bit.

Susan: The goal might not be too … [unclear].

Ken: Well, as Zhou Enlai said when he was asked—on the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution—”Do you think the French revolution was a success?” He said, “It’s too early to tell.” And given what is happening with the division, the polarization in the country—a considerable amount of which can be traced back to the Civil War—it may be too early to tell. And I don’t mean that at all facetiously. Seeds were sown in the Reconstruction that were directly responsible for the Jim Crow laws, the emergence of the Ku Klux Klan, and all of that, and it probably would’ve been different if Lincoln hadn’t been assassinated. But the more radical members of Congress overpowered Andrew Johnson and insisted on inflicting a very, very punitive Reconstruction philosophy or approach to the South, which they resented naturally, and has perpetrated the very division that they were seeking to heal.

Okay. Shall we turn to the text? So, on verses 14, 15, 16, and 17, is that right?

Even if someone broadcasts to the whole universe
Slanderous and ugly rumors about you,
In return, with an open and caring heart,
Praise his or her abilities—this is the practice of a bodhisattva.

Even if someone humiliates you and denounces you
In front of a crowd of people,
Think of this person as your teacher
And humbly honor him—this is the practice of a bodhisattva.

Even if the person you have cared for as your own child
Treats you as his or her worst enemy,
Lavish him or her with loving attention
Like a mother caring for her ill child—this is the practice of a bodhisattva.

Even if your peers or subordinates,
Put you down to make themselves look better,
Treat them respectfully as you would your teacher:
Put them above you—this is the practice of a bodhisattva.

37 Practices of a Bodhisattva, Tokmé Zongpo, verses 14, 15, 16 and 17

Student questions: verses 14 to 17

Ken: Are there technical questions? [Laughter] Anything you don’t understand? I won’t say, “Is there anything you don’t want to understand?” I’m just asking, is there anything you don’t understand, or any questions about the translation, etc.? I haven’t compared this to other translations. I’m depending on you for that. No? It’s pretty straightforward. Okay, so let’s jump to section number two. What was this like? What’d you run into? When you think about this, what are your …? Dave?

Dave: Well, first my first association was pretty obvious. It’s from the New Testament. “Love your enemies.” [Ken laughs] That’s my condition. I even wrote it down, “Bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you.” It seems to be very similar.

Ken: So, this is recycled Christianity, is it? [Laughs]

Dave: No, not at all. It’s responding with the opposite of what the normal reaction is.

Ken: Isabelle.

Isabelle: I think it actually works because I remember one time, this was quite a few years ago, when I had a real problem with somebody who hated me. And I was able to treat the person very kindly and it sort of took the sharp edges out of the whole thing.

Ken: Okay, so it works, meaning that it resolves situations?

Isabelle: Well it—

Ken: What do you mean by “it works”?

Isabelle: Well, the situation was resolved because the person was able to get what she wanted from the situation. And I got what I wanted, which was—I was teaching—to get this person out of my classroom, because she was dangerous. And so everything worked out very well.

Ken: Okay. Does it always in that sense? No. Okay. So, what does that mean vis-a-vis these instructions? It can work in some situations. But I’d like to ask you what does “it works” in a Buddhist context actually mean?

Peri: Can I say what it’s not?

Ken: Okay.

Peri: It’s not a strategy for making things all better.

Ken: It’s not a strategy for making things all nice in the world. Why do you say that, Peri? [Pause] You said it somewhat adamantly, so I’m a little curious [laughs].

Peri: [Unclear]

What is the point of Buddhist practice?

Ken: Yeah. Okay. What is the point of Buddhist practice? This is an open question. Peri can answer it, but anybody else can too.

Student: Experience what arises.

Ken: Why?

Student: [Unclear]

Ken: Why do we do it? Why do we want to develop the ability to experience what arises?

Student: [Unclear]

Ken: Okay, so why do we wake up? You’re going to say “so we don’t suffer.” How does it help Jessica? How does experiencing what arises stop suffering?

Student: [Unclear] [Laughter]

Jessica: It creates compassion?

Ken: I don’t want you to guess. Good grief.

Jessica: You mean from our own experience?

Ken: Yes, thank you.

Student: To stop suffering.

Jessica: But you still suffer.

Ken: Okay. It doesn’t. So, why are you doing this? [Laughter]

Student: What if you’re able to actually experience everything that arises? You stop fighting your own experience. And then when you stop fighting your own experience, you stop suffering instantly.

Ken: So, you stop fighting your own experience. And that’s how it stopps suffering. Okay. Anybody want to add to that, Peri?

Peri: Whatever arises, pain or suffering, is, but there is no one suffering. Pain is present. But not being separate from that pain, there is no one to suffer.

Ken: When I get food poisoning, it’s really difficult to work with that. So, what are you saying here?

Peri: But when you have food poisoning—

Ken: It hurts. I’ve had it a couple of times. I remember in Tehran once, I had something to eat, and the stomach pain was just, it was something else. I also had that in Italy too. I got through Afghanistan with just dysentary; that’s much easier. [Laughs]

Student: Was it pain or was it suffering?

Ken: What’s the difference?

Student: Suffering is a response.

Ken: Okay.

Student: Suffer a reaction. Pain to pain.

Ken: Okay.

Student: There has to be someone to react. Suffering is wishing it weren’t as it is, that it were something else.

Ken: Yeah. So, Peri would probably say, “There has to be somebody doing that wishing.”

Peri: I will.

Ken: Okay. All right. Now, look at these instructions in that light. [Pause] Do they appear different? Elizabeth?

Elizabeth: Well, the experience I had of these phrases is that it removes the “I” out of the whole equation … [Unclear]

Ken: Is that anybody else’s experience? It removes the “I” out of the equation? No. A lot of people are shaking their heads. You’re going to have to sell this one a little bit.

Elizabeth: Oh yeah.

Ken: What are you going to ask them? You saw all the hands, same as me.

Elizabeth: Who raised their hand? Okay. Robert, you didn’t feel it removed the “I”?

Robert: No.

Elizabeth: Because?

Ken: It just didn’t.

Robert: It’s really clear that this is about an “I,” but for me, what arose was the world that I was experiencing in reading these verses, and to me, it was the opening of the wound.

Ken: Are you going to let it go at that? I’ve got a clue what he means. I hope you’re going to—

Elizabeth: I’m not sure what you mean by “opening the wound.” Are you saying there’s a wound that’s already there, that’s been opened?

Ken: It just sounds like more suffering to me.

Elizabeth: Are we doing this or are you doing this? [Laughter]

Ken: I’m talking to you. I’m not talking to him. I’m just saying this. I just don’t know what to make of this.

Elizabeth: You sound like there’s a wound existing there, and that these experiences open that, and that that’s a good thing.

Robert: I’m just thinking about this … [unclear].

Elizabeth: What wound are you talking about?

Robert: Well, it’s about having a point of view about who I am. So, someone humiliates me. It’s not about externally someone humiliating me. This is something I get to do to myself all the time. And so it’s taking in that point of view that I have about this thing I call “me.” And that point of view and this don’t correlate necessarily. And so there’s pain that I experience, and it’s opening up to that pain.

Elizabeth: And you’re not discussing there being another at all, just the experience that you had of it, of whatever the event was.

Robert: Yes.

Ken: Are you satisfied with this?

Elizabeth: I don’t know.

Ken: Okay. Anybody else? Peri?

Peri: Well, if I respond in kind, I solidify “other” and “I.” So, by not, by responding with an open and caring heart, I am recognizing this as a dream. Like a dream, or as certainly not … ugh, of not [unclear] other … wait …

Ken: Okay. What’s everybody struggling with here? Susan?

Susan: I think we’re caught between worlds. It’s both real and not real to me.

Ken: It’s both real and not real.

Susan: Yeah. And there’re dreams like that. Well actually there’s a real incident in my life that I can actually use this story of. I feel completely frozen.

Ken: You’re caught between those two worlds? Yeah. Okay. Dave?

Dave: I wasn’t here last week, but I take a stab at this. It seems to me, my impression is that all of these “even ifs”, all six of them I believe, it seems like it’s not an accident that they follow number 11: “Exchange your own happiness for the suffering of others.”

Ken: You’re quite right.

Dave: It immediately comes up, and it’s like almost testing that. Have you really inverted things, do you put others first? Even if, even if, even if, even if …

Ken: Well, you’re quite right about the structure. The first one’s a general comment on taking and sending, and next six are: this is what it looks like. Yeah. Okay. Steve?

Steve: One of the things I thought about was that, we react to these types of situations because they interact with our stories about ourself. And if the story about ourself, there’s no no one to listen to it, the experience becomes not threatening or worth reacting to. We react to it when it elicits our own story. So, as we let go of the attachment to who we think we are, it doesn’t make that much difference what someone is doing or saying about it.

Ken: Clint, you have a little experience in this matter. What do you have to say about it?

Clint: Well, I worked on this. [Ken laughs] There are times I can actually approach, at least thinking of those who’ve done me harm as my teacher, and I can humbly honor people. But if it means, in some way, by doing that, promoting them to a position where they might have influence over others, that’s where I draw the line. I can’t get beyond it.

Ken: Okay. You were waving your hand, weren’t you?

Student: Robert, I was very interested in what you said, about this action opened the wound in you.

Robert: I’m sorry, what?

Student: The action that somebody did harm opens the wound in you?

Robert: No, sitting with it does.

Student: It opens the wound in you?

Robert: Sure.

Student: And you’re able to experience that wound?

Robert: Yes.

Student: So, what does that make the experience of somebody, whether abstractly or in reality—

Ken: Spreading, broadcasting, “slanderous and ugly rumors.”

Robert: I’m not sure I understand the question.

Student: Somebody called you ugly … [unclear], what happened?

Robert: [Pause] Well, if my image of myself is …

Student: Well, what happened? Your experience—

Robert: I experience what arises in that situation.

Student: Okay, so what does that make your situation?

Robert: I’m not sure what you’re asking?

Student: Is it helpful or unhelpful?

Robert: The situation?

Student: Yeah. The whole situation.

Robert: It just is. I’m not really sure what you’re asking. In other words, if I’m meditating on that, and I am using these exercises, or these verses, and I’m watching what arises, and I feel either anger, or pain, or anxiety, or whatever arises. It’s like opening to that.

Student: Right. So, is it helpful or unhelpful?

Robert: Helpful.

Student: The point being that if somebody says something to you like this, somebody broadcasts this thing to the world, or hurts you, and it opens a wound. You sit with the wound, you sit with the feeling … [Unclear]

Robert: Did you think I was saying something different?

Student: No. I was just using it to clarify.

The danger of suppressing feelings in meditation

Ken: Okay. Now there are dangers here, and I’ve heard and felt many of the dangers. People use these kinds of instructions to suppress what they’re actually feeling. That’s one of the big dangers. There are a number of ways we do that. One of them is to use phrases. I’m going to quote you here, Robert, “It’s just what is.”

Now in the Kagyu tradition of mahamudra, there’s a list of eight pitfalls in meditation practice. And for those of you who have the book, in certain chapter on faults and pitfalls, or something like that, in the Lamp of Mahamudra by Tsele Natsok Rangdrol, which is the book actually I’m going to be using for the mahamudra retreat in September up in Vancouver. And one of the pitfalls is to mentally label your experience as this or that, you can label it as emptiness or this is what is, and so forth.

One has to be very, very careful here, because while there is nothing incorrect about that, it’s an accurate statement. In terms of practice, it’s highly problematic because it means that you’re practicing at the level of concept. And it’s interesting here that Tokmé Zongpo is putting this in very, very graphic language. Why? Because he really doesn’t want you to practice this at the level of concept.

Now, I think you’ve heard me say before that the way mind training works—and taking sending is a form of mind training—it’s fundamentally different from presence practices, which involve sitting in states of attention, deepening states of attention. So, you’re just present. Taking and sending in the mind training practices work in a different way. You cultivate, you deliberately, or intentionally, cultivate perspectives that rub against the habituated conditioning in you. So, when we read, “Even if someone broadcasts to the whole universe, slanderous and ugly rumors about you.” Now what do you want to do when somebody broadcasts slanderous and ugly rumors about you?

Student: Kill them.

Ken: Yeah, kill them. And if you can’t do that, you’ll sue them, right? Okay.

In return with an open and caring heart, praise his or her abilities.

Molly: He’s slandering me. He’s great at it.

Ken: I don’t think that’s what they mean, Molly. [Laughter] Wonderful, bit of passive-aggressive there.

Student: It sounds like passive-aggressive.

Ken: It is, yeah. But that is not what Tokmé Zongpo … No, it is not. Okay. Now what does it cost you to actually do this?

Student: Giving up your big sense of self.

Ken: Yeah, but that’s a nice jargonistic phrase, etc., it’s easy. What does it really cost you?

Student: Your pride, your image.

Ken: Yeah, let’s get down to the guts of it.

Student: Ego.

Ken: Yeah, those are all terms, come on.

Student: Your sense of being. Your sense of justice.

Ken: Now we’re getting closer. Keep going.

Student: You’re right.

Peri: I feel like shit. [Laughter]

Ken: Doesn’t that feel better to say that?

Jessica: That does not answer the question what it cost you.

Ken: But it’s a far more accurate expression of it, isn’t it? Would you disagree with Peri, Jessica?

Jessica: No.

Ken: No. Okay. “It feels like shit”, but there you’re beginning to taste it. If I could say something like, “Well, it cost you, your sense of self.” How does that grab you?

Jessica: Not … [unclear].

Ken: Say, “It feels like shit!” How does that grab you? Do you feel the difference? And this is the level at which you need to work with this stuff. You’re going to feel like shit when you do.

Many years ago—I think I’ve mentioned this—some people interceded with Rinpoche with the intention of doing whatever they figured necessary to shut me up, including destroying my relationship with Rinpoche, if that’s what it cost, or if that’s what was required. They didn’t care. And what they told Rinpoche were straight lies, and they knew they were telling him straight lies. I did not go quietly into the night.

Student: Did you praise them? [Laughter]

Ken: No I did not praise them. Even today [laughter] I’m not really likely to praise them. [Laughter]

Student: Good for you. [Laughter]

Ken: We’ll talk about this later. [Laughter] This is really, really hard stuff. And what we tend to do with it is to find ways to wiggle out of it. Molly’s was one. Well, you’re really good at insulting me. You’re sticking the knife in while you think you’re following the instructions, right? Yeah. Okay. Now we’ve moved this down a level, and I’m going to phrase the question in a slightly different way. ‘What do you have to do to actually do this?”

Julia: Surrender.

Ken: Yeah, but that’s somebody else’s terminology, Julia, with all due respect. Raquel, you’ve been here.

Raquel: About the “feel like shit” thing, I feel like shit. I don’t know if I can describe it … [unclear]. I’m not sure. My head has all these terms … [unclear].

Ken: Now it’s interesting how all of those terms flood in. Why do all of those terms flood in? What I want to suggest is that we go to those terms so that we avoid feeling it. This is why I’m encouraging you in this. When you’re talking about your experience, do not use jargon, do not use Buddhist terms. Don’t use anybody else’s vocabulary. It’s hard. It’s very hard. Okay?

What you have to do—what all of us have to do—is feel how this injunction, this instruction, rubs against all of that stuff we are so invested in. If you go into it, we’ll feel sick to our stomach, may feel burning in the heart or elsewhere. Emotionally we’ll feel betrayed by the teachings. “What do you mean?” “This was so unjust.” Yeah, true, so? And then we have all of these stories to play around. So, you’ve got the usual drill. What do you experience in your body? What do you experience in your emotions? What are the stories? And that’s experiencing the friction. Okay?

When Robert says he experienced the wound, that’s what he’s talking about. But this is not about being in what is. This is about deliberately putting our habituated patterns into friction with a different perspective, so that we taste viscerally how invested, and how attached we are to the way that we’re used to experiencing the world. And it’s not fun.

John: It’s still that point where you really do know that it’s not true?

Ken: Yes.

John: And then in a way is some sort of solace … [unclear] a truth you can …

Ken: What are you trying to hold onto there, John? What you’re raising here in a very interesting way—and thank you for raising this—what is truth? And what bearing does truth have on your practice? [Laughs] I mean, this is the really radical nature of this stuff. It doesn’t matter if it’s true. That’s another form of investment for us. So, when we say, “Well, at least I know I really didn’t do this.” You’re trying to hold on to something. I’m not saying that you should believe the person. I’m not saying that at all, but it’s a way of exiting from the friction. Okay?

John: I’m thinking of a specific situation, and my reaction was not anger with the person. I felt very bad about it. That they were experiencing that, rather than being blamed for what—

Ken: And what does that leave you with after the situation?

John: Besides the hope that Bill comes to his senses.

Ken: Yeah. How much does the situation weigh on you?

John: In this case, a great deal.

Ken: But is it the situation or the sadness?

John: The sadness.

Ken: Yeah. You’re already moving in the direction of what Tokmé Zongpo is talking about here. You aren’t taking it personally. You see the suffering that this person must be experiencing to act this way. You feel great sadness about that. That’s essentially compassion. And so what I’m trying to point out here is by moving in that direction, you actually don’t carry the situation with you.

Raquel: But if you do that, I guess not doing it too soon, you were to deal with it. But it just seems like if you’re pushing yourself in the direction of just feeling sorry for the person, you’re doing whatever they’re doing to you, you’re not feeling the anger.

Ken: You’re quite right here, Raquel. If you’re feeling sorry for, that’s pity, that’s not compassion. In compassion there is no sense of superiority. The slightest bit of superiority, and you’re in pity. Okay?

The three levels of practice

Ken: Now, you may also recall from one of our earlier classes that I said, there are three levels at which you work with stuff. If you can simply experience it completely in presence, then it arises, and dissolves as released on its own. That’s direct awareness level practice. But not all of us have that level of attention all the time. I will hold up my hand here.

The second level of practice in the way Tibetan tradition looks at it is this one, where we use the experience to grind at our habituated patterns. Which means experiencing completely all of the ways that it rubs against our cherished notions of truth, justice, rightness in the world, self-importance, everything. That only works if you actually can do that. Now as I just described, I don’t always have the level of attention, or even intention, to do that. I should, but I don’t.

And in that case, you move to the third level, which is you just don’t do anything which causes further suffering, such as retaliate. You walk away. Now, what’s very important to notice in this, none of this is about fixing the world out here. That is not the intention of Buddhist practice. One of the reservations I have about engaged Buddhism is that some of the proponents of engaged Buddhism say that social activism is a necessary result of practice. And if you aren’t socially active, then your practice isn’t a real practice.

Well, this goes a little bit against the grain because I think of people like Milarepa and others, really great people in the course of history. Ajahn Chah, so forth, many, many contemporary and historical teachers who were very, very important people, but they were never what you would call socially active or engaged Buddhists. And yet they had profound influences because of the depths of their understanding because they practiced like this.

I want to put the other side on that. That’s not to say that being socially active is not Buddhist. I don’t subscribe to that at all. It depends absolutely on the person. And for some people, their path is going to be a path of service, which is essentially what social activism is. It’s all as a form of service of some kind. And that is their path, in the same way that my own path happens to be in teaching, and for other people, their path will be in retreat. And these are different paths that people can take in how they approach being awake and present in life.

Student: What’s the difference between the then pratyekabuddha there and the bodhisattva?

Ken: Well, a pratyekabuddha is a construction of the Mahayanists to make bodhisattvas look good. But it’s important to remember, okay, they said they have the Śhrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas and they come to a partial understanding, it’s not a complete understanding, and they don’t really emphasize compassion, so etc., blah, blah, blah.

George: They’re very specific. They say it’s practice to try to try to become an arhant, to try to become an enlightened person, and that they may see the illusion of self, but they don’t see the illusion of all things.

Ken: Now the way to work with these kinds of concepts, Śhrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, is they’re not talking about people out there. Okay? George, I’m going to put you on the spot. Al right? Is there any part of you that wants to become awake and enlightened and doesn’t give a shit about anybody else?

George: Of course there’s a part of you.

Ken: That’s the pratyekabuddha. [Laughter]

George: But that’s my point in the question about, in this case being engaged in the world.

Ken: Yes. But, how do you work with that part in you? That’s the question to answer.

George: I think by breaking through my self-concern and self-cherishing.

Ken: Yeah. And this is one way of doing it. And there are many, many others. So, when you’re about pratyekabuddhas, we’re talking about that pattern in us, or part of us, that, “I just want out of this mess. I don’t really care about anybody else.” Okay?

Student: They contemplate the 12 links in reverse.

Ken: Yeah. Well that’s the standard method. I’ve never found the 12 links to be a very helpful meditation. I think I’ve given it to one person. Traditionally, it’s meant to counteract stupidity. I’ve never found it that helpful in meditation. But what I want to focus on here is, we have that part in ourselves. Okay. Now, when you feel it, what do you experience?

Well, I’ll just speak for me personally. When I’m aware of that part, I feel my world is like that. Okay? That’s how it feels. It’s nice, but it’s like that. And just becoming aware of that, I’m aware that it’s a closing down in some sense, it’s not actually an opening. And if I’m going to open to the totality of my experience, I’ve got to deal with absolutely everybody, whether I like them or not. And that’s that. And it’s not because I’m trying to inculcate some noble virtue in me, and it’s just that that’s how it is. And if I’m serious about relating to the totality of my experience, then I have to relate to these very painful situations.

George: Whether it’s on a small daily level, or in teaching, or in some other way, that’s still being engaged in the world.

Ken: I’m not sure what you mean by being engaged in the world. I feel you’re doing something slippery with language here, George. [Laughter] You changed the meaning of the phrase, which is a standard trick of philosophers.

George: No, I don’t think I’m doing that. What I think I’m saying is that you’re not being concerned only with your own enlightenment if you’re on your path.

Ken: Okay, I get your distinction. I’m engaging with the world of my experience. When the phrase—and you were doing something slippery with language here, because the phrase engaged with the world does not usually mean engaged with the world of one’s experience. It means engaged with the world that we project. And that’s a very different thing.

George: But I wasn’t using it that way, as the world out there, because the world in here is the same as the world out there, because we’re part of it.

Ken: Now you’re doing that slippery thing again. [Laughs] I can feel it. Clint.

Clint: How does coming to awareness that you’re closing down, coming to awareness, not become in and of itself a concept? Where does it end?

Ken: In your body. [Pause]

Clint: Doesn’t … [unclear] habituated pattern. There’s got to be—

Ken: You almost went there, Clint [laughs]. In your body, okay, right now, feel, “I want to wake up, I don’t really care about anybody else.” We all can all relate to that. How does that feel physically?

Clint: You asking me to describe it?

Ken: Yes, right now. Okay, that’s your homework then. Pick it up next week. [Laughs] Does that make you feel better, Catherine?

Catherine: Mm-Hmm, yeah, he gets homework [laughter].

Ken: Julia.

Julia: Experiencing it as you were asking, along with the closing down … [unclear].

Ken: Really? Okay. But let’s just do a little contrast here. “I just want to wake up.” Okay? Contrast that with, “I want to be awakened to the totality of my experience, whatever arises.” What’s the difference? Julia?

Julia: [Unclear] It was like reversing the order, but there was a sense … [unclear].

Ken: Right, and when you opened it to everything?

Julia: [Unclear]

Ken: Yeah. Did you get that, Clint? [Laughs] This is a good thing, but that’s where it ends. Because as long as we’re trying to do it up here, it’s all just ideas. The only way you experience an idea is to think. That’s this much of experience. All of the sensory sensations—sight, sound, taste, touch, smell—that’s part of our experience too. So, when you’re working with these practices, it’s very helpful actually to think, “How do I see this? How do I hear this? How do I taste this? How do I smell this? How do I touch this? What are the body sensations that arise out of this? One of the techniques I use with people when they’re stuck on a pattern is, I’ll say, “What color is the pattern?”

Student: Shocking pink.

Ken: Oh, okay.

Student: When they’re stuck on the pattern?

Ken: Yeah. I’ll ask, “What color is the pattern? What sound does the pattern make?” And you start opening to the other senses, because that gets people out of their head about thinking about the pattern. And is not as threatening as asking, you can go from there into, “How do you experience the pattern in your body?”

It just gets them right out of their head. “What color is it?” But everybody gets a color [finger snap] like that, and everybody gets a sound. Mind you, some people will suppress that in the next microsecond, but, it’s there. Okay.

Student: So, Ken, can we get back to that place where we were, we’re nauseated and we … [unclear].

Ken: I don’t want to go there [laughs].

Student: You took us there. And then we are going to go the opposite of what our inclination originally of the anger. And it feels to me very similar to giving away my happiness, and the taking and sending, that not wanting to part with that. It’s like recreating myself in order to be the person that’s going—

Ken: Yeah.

Student: So, is that right?

Ken: That’s right. Okay. Yep.

Student: Just checking.

Ken: And as I said in the previous class, it’s very important that you—I think Randy used offer the word supple—that you’d be supple in this. If you become hard and rigid, you’re suppressing. And so you gotta to stay open, and that suppleness of experience, because if it’s like this, this is not about white knuckling through it. You can’t do it that way.

Student: Passive-aggressive behavior.

Ken: Well, it’ll become passive-aggressive almost certainly.

Student: Yeah.

Ken: Which is why in compassion circles, passive-aggressive behavior abounds, nonprofit organizations … [Laughs]. Michelle, then Randy.

Michelle: What’s the difference between the intention of these instructions and the Christian directive about turning the other cheek?

Ken: Well, I can’t speak for Christianity, but to my mind there’s no difference. This is the level at which Christianity, I think, was originally directed. It was a mystical tradition. And frankly, I think both Buddhism and Christianity and Taoism all picked it up from the same place, which was Zoroastrianism in Persia, which had a very strong ethic of compassion. The myth of the universal savior, the vow of compassion and the myth of the universal savior, which became in Buddhism, the Amitabha cult. And in Judaism it became Christianity.

Michelle: When I think of my experience of Christianity now, and I think of that phrase, it has an aura of a great deal of suppression, and a component of pity in it also.

Ken: Yes. And that I don’t think is how it was originally intended, at least I can’t imagine that it was. If you want to read, get a flavor of early Christianity, you pick up a little book called Wisdom of the Desert Fathers by Thomas Merton. These are anecdotes about the cenobites who lived in the Egyptian desert in around 300 or 400 AD. They’re great, and you get lovely stories. [Laughs]

Some people came to see one anchorite and he served them a nice meal. And these guys who lived on next to nothing. So, he used the very last of his food to serve them a nice meal. And then said, “Why don’t you go and see so-and-so? He knows much more than I.” Somebody much further out in the desert. But he said, “But when you go, give them this.” I can’t remember the details. And so when they gave him this, he immediately understood the message from his fellow anchorite. And so he regaled them with a tremendously long sermon, and serves them nothing.

This is how these guys communicate. They’re all about teaching, and there’s so many of the anecdotes that I recall, which are reminiscent of taking and sending. And don’t forget that that turn the other cheek was Christ’s response directly to someone quoting the Torah, saying “An eye for an eye.” And so he said, “Yeah, but … ” Randy?

Randy: He felt really trapped. He was spinning … [unclear] something humiliating him in front of a crowd. He turned to the crowd and said, “Oh, I feel compassionate about you.” The crowd would look at you, they would strangle you. It’s probably like American Idol, or something like that. And I’ve never seen it, I was reading an article on it, to see a host like that put the people down, and that’s what brings the ratings up. That how I almost felt like.

Ken: No, this isn’t about Simon. This is not Simon [laughs].

Randy: It’s almost like sending the wrong message. The person you cared for like a child treats you as your worst enemy. And then maybe it’s what Deborah said last week, she said, “Well, that’s the perception we have of the world. Why is that the right way to go?” But, “treats you like your enemy, lavish them with love.” What kind of teaching is that? [Laughter]

Ken: Tough. This is what the whole discussion is about.

Randy: It’s like they would continue taking advantage.

Student: It’s almost like where Clint’s story went, like he could take it so far, but if it meant them then carrying it a step further … and I guess that’s sort of what I thought maybe you were going to touch on before you got into engaged Buddhism.

Ken: Okay. Rinpoche said at the beginning of the retreat, “A cow flicks its own flies, a monk watches his own actions.” Now, he said this to us because we’re going to live seven guys together on half an acre of ground for three years. And Rinpoche’s taught a few three-year retreats. He knows what happens. Sooner or later, somebody gets the bright idea to tell somebody else that they’re not doing it right, and they’re not behaving right. So, he, typical Eastern fashion, he gives us this little dictum: “You don’t get to tell anybody that they’re not doing it right.”

Your concern, or our concern, in this is to undo our own investment in things, which are all projections of a sense of self, actually. One may object to that. They’re all projections of a sense of self: truth, justice, all of these things, pride, self-importance, “I can do it right,” all of these things. That’s the point of these instructions.

These are not instructions about rules for developing a good society. One can have a whole argument about that. They may be, but that’s not what they were originally developed for. They were developed so that you undid a habituated way of relating to the world, and could move into something far more open.

Now, there are many, many levels here. I don’t want to cloud the picture too much. You’ve probably had experiences like this where somebody has done something that is really objectionable, but for whatever reason it doesn’t stir up any reaction in you. Do you know what I’m talking about? And you can say something to the person very clear, which wakes them up. Do you understand what I mean? Okay. Could you do that if you’d been angry, or irritated, or offended, or whatever? No. Okay.

So, in the larger picture, there’s a two-step process here. The first—and since we’re using Christianity—is to get the log out of our own eye before we remove the mote from somebody else’s. That’s a really tough instruction.

There’s another whole level which we haven’t touched on here, but I do want to touch in reference to your question. If you look at this as different parts of yourself speaking to you, is there any part of you that spreads slanderous and ugly rumors about you? Okay. Is there any part of you that humiliates you and denounces you in front of a crowd of people? Okay. Now how do you actually step out of those behaviors? We have those parts in us. Those parts were all developed, and are in place because at some point in our life, we felt we needed that behavior to protect us.

And if we try to get rid of those parts directly, they will just say, “I’m under attack again.” Whomp, and they’re really there. Do you follow? But what if you say to those parts, “You’re really making life inconvenient for me right now, but you’re still part of me, and I’m going to take care of you.” What happens? Things open up. So, it’s another whole level.

And incidentally, since we’re really on Christianity, that’s what the parable of the Prodigal Son is actually about. It’s about welcoming back that part that you’re totally estranged from. They’re old, old Sufi stories. Did that help you understand this? Okay. It’s 9:30. Do you get something out of this?

Student: Yeah.

Feel how the body reacts to the verses

Ken: Okay. I’d like to check now on then. Okay. Next week just want to do 18 and 19.

When you’re down and out, held and contempt,
Desperately ill, and emotionally crazed,
Don’t lose heart. Take into you
The suffering and negativity of all beings

Even when you are famous, honored by all,
And as rich as the god of wealth himself,
Don’t be pompous. Know that the magnificence of existence
Has no substance—

37 Practices of a Bodhisattva, Tokmé Zongpo, verses 18 and 19

Let me think for a moment. [Pause] Yeah. That and the next two are in pairs. Yeah. Let’s do those two. Now, are you getting a flavor, or a taste, of how to work with these? I strongly recommend—and you’re probably going to get tired of me saying this—I strongly recommend that when you work with these practices, you let yourself feel first how your body reacts to them.

And the body’s going to go through a series of reactions as you allow yourself to move deeper into the instruction. But that’ll be a really good thing to focus on. How am I reacting to this? I mean, let’s take the first one. “When you’re down and out in held and contempt, desperately ill, and emotionally crazy, don’t lose heart.” How does your body react at that point? Yes, that’s right. What?

Student: Yikes.

Ken: Yes. Good. That’s where you start. Don’t skip over that yikes. That’s the first thing. He’s got to be kidding. This can’t be serious. And so you feel that reaction, and then as you feel that reaction, you let the instruction come into you even more. “Okay. What would it be like to actually do that?” And now you’re going to get a very different experience in your body. And this you can do it in your meditation periods. Doing it once or twice gives you the idea, but actually letting yourself feel this, this is where you’re really reflecting on and moving into meditating on these.

These are not difficult to understand, but it’s how you actually get them into you, feeling them in your body. Then when you’ve gone through the body, then you can go through the emotions, then you can go through the stories. But you always work that way. Never start with the stories. You’ll never get anywhere. Okay?

Molly: That’s what I was going to ask you. When it is helpful to bring in the story into it?.

Ken: Only when you’re able to stay clear and present in your body. Before then we usually get lost in our stories. We think they’re right.

Molly: What if we can’t access that feeling.

Ken: In the body?

Molly: It’s hard to access it.

Ken: Access which feeling? Yikes?

Molly: Well, it’s the one before, like being embarrassed.

Ken: Okay, let’s take number 17. Okay? So, this is for you, Molly. “Even if your peers or subordinates put you down to make themselves look better.” What’s going on in your body right now?

Molly: I’m sick.

Ken: Okay, there you are. It wasn’t so hard to access.

Molly: Well, you’re always are really good at that. [Laughter]

Ken: But I just read it. You can do the same thing.

Molly: You know what? Even then, I imagined something. I went to an experience that I had.

Ken: Okay, and now go to your body in that experience. Okay? And that’s fine. But you can recall an experience, but go to your body.