Loving Life, Loving Kindness

Loving Life, Loving Kindness by Ajahn Brahm

Transcription

Uh, actually, it's amazing just having a mouth. Just how far it can take. You going tomorrow to Thailand and to Singapore and Indonesia and many other places in the world. So you need you don't need etiquette. So you need a mouth and people will get you their air tickets. But giving so many talks, I always love it when I get some, uh, requests from somebody else. Can you give a talk on this, and can you give a talk on something else? And as usual, not knowing what you're going to talk about just on the way in here before the meditation, just I ask that president, why should I talk about this evening? And she was also in a rush. I said, loving kindness. What did I seem to talk about? Loving kindness. It's obviously because, um, when people are in a rush, they don't have time to think. They just come from their guts, from their heart. And as I said, as a mind, I always think that people should follow their gut feeling except in the case they have irritable bowel syndrome. Then please don't wash your gut feeling when it comes to, you know, deep inside without thinking. It's much better. And I'm also going to join the talk of a bit of loving kindness with another, uh, fascinating experience during the week when at a another little talk at a person's house, somebody asked me one of the best questions I've ever been asked for a long time now. So can I ask lots of questions? And there are very serious saying they really love Buddhist teachings, but. If you really commit to being a Buddhist, sometimes you have to take on such a heavy responsibility for your own life and for your own happiness. And sometimes it's easier, in a sense, to follow religion where it just tells you what rules you have to keep. You don't really need to think or contemplate or use any wisdom and just follow those rules and believe. If you do all of that, you go to heaven. It's very easy that way, which is why a lot of people feel comfortable in such traditions and they come to Buddhism and wow. And this is challenging. As you come here, you are challenged. It's not a case that I can give you some special prayer, and then you're sure to be happy, to be rich and to go to heaven. And life is happy ever after. As long as you get some sort of special gizmo or some special prayer. Unfortunately, Buddhism never got into that at all. It's very, very rational, very scientific, very questioning against superstitions. Even though we've got some interesting stuff in Buddhism, but it's only if, you know, it's validated by experience. So we don't sort of get into too much superstition here, so much so that we have all these amazing stories that are just what comes into mind about why we're not into superstition. Now, some of these people, they still want to wear their arm. The string around their wrists are just looking at how many of you got strings. I can't see one string around here. Well done. So sometimes people wear these holy strings. They call it thinking, if you wear a holy string, it's going to protect you from so many, many mishaps. And so sometimes we give people these holy strings around their wrist. It isn't protected from anything. It's just something you may be able to hang your keys on or whatever, I don't know. But sometimes the superstition is such that people want to have these things. Or sometimes you see, they wear amulets. Amazing just how many people wear these amulets around them. And sometimes they're fashion statements, but sometimes people take them seriously. Especially over in Thailand, they take this amulet so seriously that some. These amulets are worth a fortune. They're like half $1 million or something. And this was one case. This was in the local paper a few years ago. There's one general in a Thai army in Bangkok. I don't know where he got the half 1 million USD from, but let's not go into that because I'm going to Thailand tomorrow. They may be listening on the internet and I am making trouble. So he had this. I'm actually going into trouble because he's not around anymore. Look what happened to him. But half 1 million USD on an amulet. And apparently he was in his officers mess. It had his meal. He had a couple of glasses of whiskey, and he was boasting. See this hand over here? I bought it for half a million us. That's how much it's worth. And the reason I spent so much money. This amulet will protect me from bullets. It's magical. And it's been guaranteed to protect me from bullets. And he said, here you are. He gave his gun to his junior officer, and he ordered him, shoot me. This is how stupid people get, especially when they've had two glasses of whiskey and they have faith that is shoot me, he said. And of course, the junior officers. The army had to follow orders. Bang, bang. It was amazing. It was incredible. The general died. And of course, you know, he wasn't around to ask for his money back anymore. But you know it. Dykes said his superstitious belief that these amulets will protect you from bullets. We don't have that sort of stuff, you know, in Buddhism. And even Ajahn Chah, the great master, is this great story. When one of his disciples had been around a long time, was drafted into the Thai army, and there's always a lot of problems being in the army. Sometimes his skirmishes on the border or down in the south of Thailand. People actually get killed when you join the army. They got drafted in the army and he went to see the great teacher said, look, can you please give me something to protect me from harm, especially from bullets? He said, I know that you've got these amazing powers. I'm sure if you could give me some amulet to wear around my neck, a little Buddha to wear around my neck, I'm sure that that will protect me from bullets. Said. Though we don't get into that, you know, this is not what a monk is supposed to do. We're supposed to teach you how to live a good life, and how to look after yourself and take responsibility for yourself, you know, to keep out of harm's way. But be mindful. Be alert when you're in the army, because a lot of times people get injured because of stupidity. He said, no, you know, there's always things going on. Go on. I might be unlucky, I didn't please give me a Buddha statue and I've been looking after you for such a long time. I come to the temple, I give all these dollars in the donation box. I give you food. Come on. I'm only asking for a Buddha to wear around my neck. You can do that. So the great boss said. Oh. I will give you a Buddha statue to wear around your neck. And he said, I guarantee it will protect you from bullets 100%. And I thought, wow, this great monk with all his powers can bless a little admiral, a bullet, a bulletproof amulet. Why, there was a movie about that bulletproof monk or something. But anyway, this was a real story. I might probably put up proof that was was based on. I'm not sure I've never seen that movie. But anyway, he said, okay, I'll give you a Buddha to wear around your neck, which will protect you from bullets. Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. Where is it? And I don't see that big Buddha like the one behind me over here in the main hall. Put that around your neck. And I guess it was pretty Buddhist. He said that's the only one I've got which could work like that. It's true. That will protect you from bullets if you hide that around your neck. Like a second grade teacher. Because he said in such a way. The guy never asked any questions anymore. Too much superstition. Sometimes because people would love superstition. I don't know, even I did actually see the newspaper. Somebody won the lottery last week. I hope it's someone in here because we need money for our retreat center. But in all these lottery places, they have these, um, uh, so-called fat Buddhas are supposed to rub. And people actually believe in that. And apparently all this lotteries and stores have these fat Buddhas. I think, um, president, we should actually, um, get a cut of this because we're the Buddhist society. Now, of course it doesn't work. It doesn't matter how many times you rub that, it doesn't really matter. But too often that people become far too superstitious. And it's nice to be superstitious. It's nice to think if you wear a cross or you wear a Buddha medallion or a Western string, if you go and sort of pray or get some other thing that is going to protect you. But we don't get into superstition at all. It may sound easy for you. And, uh, believing these things might make it more comfortable when you think, oh, all I need to do is to go to church or go to the mosque or pray to the Buddha, then I'll go to heaven. But I would be a con artist, of course, if I said that work. I know it doesn't work. And also, I know it's actually dangerous. Just like that general who got shot because he believed in that thing or a person. I was in Malaysia and I was, I think, coming from the airport going into Kuala Lumpur, and there was, uh, a man on the side of the road, probably dead with a, uh, motorbike accident and people the ambulance was there and my driver said that many actually Muslims die in Malaysia because they don't bother wearing a crash helmet. They think that, you know, if it's Allah's will, they die. They just die. There was a point. Wearing a crash helmet or not. It's just not in my power. And of course, you can see what happens then. If people don't take precautions, they don't take responsibility. And because they believe in some other supernatural power, whether it's a God or an Allah or a medallion or a string or some prayer, when they really think that that's going to protect them, they become heedless. They don't take responsibility. Fair enough. It might sound a nice, easy way, but you can see that it doesn't work and hopefully you can see why it doesn't work. So another thing, for example, you know, you know, you've you've fallen in love with a nice other partner, but she hasn't fallen in love with you yet. So what do you do? Pray to the Buddha. Please mercy. Fall in love with me. May she really like me. I see Macy Macy mesh. Well. You can go to church and throw a donation in the box. How much does it cost? You know, so that she falls in love with me. And of course, that never works. And if you want her to fall in love with you, you would check out who you are and what you're doing, what you look like. Get your personality, get your teeth straightened or something. And then in my sort of work, and I think you get. Much more success that way than praying all the time. So you can see that a lot of times when we believe in superstition, we actually waste money and we waste time, and that's why it's dangerous. So we can be heedless enough. It can even kill us. You got sick. Some sort of disease. What do you do? And you go sort of to put some incense in the shrine. You go to some of these holy shrines. There's great places, you know, which. They're very magical. Heard somebody else say, gone to this shrine and they've given a donation. Or they rub this Buddha statue, although they throw flowers in the altar or whatever, and they're cured again. That's even. That's one thing which I saw. And the Sri Lankan people should be a bit embarrassed about this, but I went to Sri Lanka last month, last month. Time goes quickly, I'm not sure, but you know, not not so long ago at the Maha Bodhi tree, this is a sapling from the tree on which the Buddha became enlightened. In Anuradhapura I was meditating there, but other people were chanting, chanting, chanting. I said, what are they doing there? Cancers, sort of sicknesses, um, financial problems. And they were going to this really holy place and actually asking for things, material things, and missing the whole point of what Buddhism is teaching and especially making Buddhism too superstitious. And there's many people I've met are just thinking of this one person, a great scientist in Western Australia. You probably know who he is, but I better not embarrass you by telling you who he is. He is a professor of physics at UWA. And so he told me, he said he would be a Buddhist. He actually went to Thailand many years ago and he would be a Buddhist. He loves the philosophy. What really put him off was all the superstition and all the rituals. He said he can only sort of get that barrier away against the real dharma. Then things are much easier. And he would accept that because he was a scientist. So even though people feel sometimes comfortable with some rituals, and sometimes we do those rituals for people, but we always try to mention why they are there, what the purpose is. And you can't just rely on these things. You have to do something yourself, and what you do yourself is the most important. So we really are saying it's the law of karma. You do take responsibility for your life. It's a challenge, but it also opens huge amounts of opportunities because in the law of karma, it's always kind, is always looking forward, never looking back. An example of this. During the week another guy came up to me. I've known him a while. How are you doing? It are terrible. I said, I'm really in trouble. So I came over, had a chat after lunch. So what's wrong with you? He said, I found I've got HIV. He said, I don't know where it came from. Maybe three or 4 or 5 years ago. But I've been sick and the doctors have found I've got HIV. I said, are amazing. You just become a member of one of the most exclusive clubs, and you're going to make a lot of wonderful new friends in that club, the HIV club. You know, it's very hard to get in there. You have to get sort of the permission from the doctors and the certificate from them before you can get into the HIV club. And what? I was actually saying this. Hey, what are you so afraid of? What? Isn't that sort of a there's some sort of stigma. It's not like in the old days in Europe when he got leprosy and he had to have a bell and keep ringing it and clean and clean and clean to keep other people away. It's one of these diseases which is treatable. It's not contagious. As long as you sort of look after and protect yourself and your partners. But what's the big, big thing about it? Here it is. It's happened to you. And instead of getting sort of guilty about it, which we don't have anything to do with guilt in Buddhism, I'm going to get on to that with loving kindness in a few minutes if we ever get around to it. But no guilt in Buddhism except what you what, who you are and make the most of it. Because, you know, when you sort of get a disease like you've got a cancer, you've got HIV or any of these other diseases straight away, you're a member of a community and you get to know each other, and it actually binds you together sometime. And you make some really great friends that way. Are all of you who afflicted your afflicted by by your craving for Buddhism? Or you're like a Buddhist? The Buddhist sickness which makes you come here every Friday evening, that makes you have some nice friends as well, which is very, very wonderful. It's not really a sickness, but you can see what draws you. What makes you also gives you the opportunity to have more friends. But in particular, I'll get to the guilty. Now, telling this guy the whole purpose of Buddhism is we're not sort of any religion which believes in sin and all this terrible negative judgments on human beings and human beings behavior. Human beings are human beings. That's what they do. You know, you do have sex. If you're a monk, you don't know what monks are like. So this is what a human beings, laypeople are like. They get angry sometimes. It's just like, no, people sometimes come and talk about their marriage problems like, oh, my husband's, he does this and he does that, and he does this. He does. And I said, look, I've been a monk a long time now. I've heard this so many times. There's one thing I've discovered that all husbands are the same. So what are you complaining about? You know, you should have done your research before you got married. This is what a husband is, right? This is saying the other way around. Oh, my wife. She drives me crazy. Always asking for this. And I never really understand this. That's what women are like. What to expect? Their kids. Sometimes the kids, you know, you. You bring them out when they're very young. They're very, very nice. And then they get to those years, you know? 12, 13, 14. You think, oh my God, why don't I have this one for when they get this sort of. That's what teenagers are like. So stop complaining about your kids. They're gonna drive you crazy because that's what kids do. You know, it's your karma as well, because you probably drove your parents crazy as well. So it's this. Just what goes around, comes around. So there we have it. So the point is, as long as we know and accept the reality, then we can learn to embrace it and accept it instead of actually being judgmental. That's just what people are like. Economy. This is what the economy is like. It goes up and goes down impermanent. What do you expect? No. The bodies. Sometimes it's healthy, sometimes it's sick. What do you expect? But of course, all suffering in Buddhism comes from expecting what life will never give you. We want our husband to be like this, our wife to be like that, our children to be like this. What? I had none to be like this. But of course, you know, just. You can't do that. So instead of trying to change the world, we try and change our relationship to the world. And here is where we can add this beautiful, loving kindness to the world. So a loving kindness to the world. We understand it's not just loving kindness to our husband is like loving kindness to husband kind to wife kind the kid teenage kind of listener. When you add this word kind. It means that the whole set of husbands, the whole group of children and kind is actually the same word as loving kindness. It's interesting, isn't it? Why do we have this same word for a group of things and the way we should be relating to them? So if we can have kindness towards these things, loving kindness towards these things, again, it does not mean that you like them. Somebody can ask me the question, but there's some people I just cannot love. They are, you know, bastards. You know, how could you love some of these people? Do some of these crimes, such as people who like fires? Arsonists say in Victoria, how can you love things like that? Of course, you can't love them in the sense of not liking them. But what does actually Buddhist love really mean? Buddhist love what it really means. And I love actually getting these really extreme cases because it really brings out how on earth can you practice metta and compassion for a person who has caused so much damage, destruction, pain and misery, saying, Victoria, how could you do that? The reason you can do that. Number one, guilt, revenge, punishment has nothing to do with Buddhism because if you have guilt, revenge and punishment, what happens? It doesn't matter how much you punish. Say the arsonist. Is I going to bring those towns back to life again? Is it going to make the trees suddenly burst into green? Is it going to restore the homes and the lives, and dry the tears of those people who are just devastated by the loss of everything? Course it doesn't. Revenge and punishment only creates more. In Buddhism, we're very realistic. These things happened. It's there. They cannot be changed. We don't look to the past. We look to say, what are we going to do with this now? All guilt, all revenge is being trapped in the past. We can never move forward when our attentions, our energies are focused, is in something which has happened some time, which can never be changed anyway. Every time we look for revenge, we look at guilt. We look at anger about things we have done. It means we're not doing anything right now. Positive for the future. So we put aside the past, especially the pain, the guilt and other stuff in the past. And instead we look at the present moment and the future. What can we make out of this? What a loving kindness does. It means it straightaway takes away the negative emotions I wanted to punish and hurt. Getting angry. Getting. And I now notice a lot of times this just becomes our conditioning. It's almost as if we think this is just this. It's the right thing to do. Somebody hurt us. We need to punish them back. Somebody created a lot of pain. We need to give them some pain to teach them a lesson. Does it teach you a lesson when you've made a mistake and get punished? Does it teach you a lesson? It doesn't teach much of a lesson, or it teaches you more violence, more angry anger. And that anger, violence. Tit for tat. That's what creates all this pain, misery, wars, aggression, violence and separation in our world. I often said, I'm not sure if I said this last week. One of my favorite sayings. It is a bit coarse, but that's why people remember it. In Buddhism, we don't seek for revenge because we know that karma will get the bosses anyway. I say it that way just so people could remember it. So we don't need revenge anyway. Karma will sort it out. So because we know that karma will sort out anything to do with justice. What our job is as human beings is trying to move forward. So trying to move forward with a lot of times that people act in mean, spiteful, terrible ways simply because we just don't know. Kindness is foreign to them is something which they've hardly ever experienced and lived a life of rejection, humiliation, pain, separation, and fear. And some of you may know a few of those emotions sustained over long periods of your childhood. Sometimes that when you actually investigate why people do these things and find out their history. Sometimes you think, gee, if that was me, I had so much pain. Hope I would not take it out on others or take it out of the community. But maybe, maybe I could understand why people do these things. But don't need the cruelty back then is something else which is much harder. The feeling of kindness and gentleness to get to know it. Because when we get to know that from somebody else, because first of all, we have to feel it from someone else. Someone who just accepts us for who we are. Even though we're not that good. Which is why many of you seek like a partner in life, someone who loves you. And I don't mean sexually. Someone who actually understands and accept you for who you are and they just don't want to change you or maybe make you a bit better, but doesn't matter. It's not important. They'll still stay with you as you are. That's just a bonus. That's just gravy. Love is sort of this unconditional. That's the amazing thing which I think many of you would always seek for. And if ever you find it, you find yourself so lucky and you don't want to mess up that relationship at all. If somebody can love you unconditionally, accept you for who you are. You feel that last is somebody. Who understands me, who understands. I'm not perfect. I do make mistakes. And as someone who can love me in spite of those mistakes. Beautiful. When you can feel the love from someone like that. And many of you who've heard me talk before. Know that I learned that love from my father, who once took me aside in this street in Acton, west London, off Churchill Road in Acton. This is I still remember the place and the road in his beaten up old car. Maybe it not quite sure at the time. 13 or 14 years of age. Parked the car down the side street, just the two of us in his car. Turned around to me and said, son, whatever you do in your life, I want you to always remember this one thing. The door of my house will always be open to you. He said, no matter what, you turn out as where you go. What happened? The door of my house is always open to you. That's what he said. 13 or 14 year old. You're not that smart. Of course you think you are. But it was one of those things you remember. There's a few occasions in life. You know, it's important. You haven't figured out why it's important. It stays in your brain when you meditate. You have a few moments of quiet. These things come up. You contemplate it. You find out why it was important. Find out its true meaning. Its deep meaning. My father didn't live in a house. There was an apartment. It was what he called a council flat. He was very, very poor. He was used to get quite sick. And so he never really held a job for too long. And that's why he had to live in a council flat. I did it tough, but had a very happy family. So his door was not much to open up to anyone. In fact, I joke that we were never afraid of burglars. When you're poor, you're not afraid of burglars. In fact, you usually leave your your door unlocked, hoping a burglar might come in, take pity on you and leave something. That's the sort of house we lived in. And I grew up here. It was a happy place. I realized they had nothing to do with his house. What he said, what he meant in his own way, was whatever you do in your life, wherever you go. The door of my heart is open to you. It was about opening the door of your heart. You could always come inside my heart, he would say. However you turn out to be. And that was why I was so important to me. That's why I remembered it. It was the first time that someone expressed to me unconditional loving kindness. It said it in such a beautiful way. Whatever you do, wherever you go, however you turn out, that doesn't matter. The door of my heart is always open. You can come in here. And that physical idea of being able to come into another person's center, of their being center of their life, their own heart. You can come in. I'll never keep you out. I mean so much to me. Not just those coming from my father, but it was actually teaching me something. Something which will stay with me for my whole monastic life and to expand it to so many areas of life, what real, loving kindness is. And of course, I think only a few weeks ago I said, and I often say this one of the most important things of your spiritual life and a wonderful time happens to everybody. Eventually, sooner the better. When you in some quiet moment, but no one else around. Look at your own self and say to yourself, me, the person I can never get away from. Whoever I am, whatever I've done, whatever I would ever do in life, good or bad, the door of my own heart is open to me. You give that amazing, loving kindness to yourself. It's an amazing thing to be able to do because sometimes you think you should maybe go to other people, but really, the first place it should really go to the most important place from which all other love spreads is to give it to yourself. You are not perfect. You do stupid things in your life. I don't stupid things enough. You know, one of the things which I was always felt so guilty about for years because as a poor student, I got a job selling encyclopedias door to door. That's how desperate I was. The worst thing was I actually sold one. It was actually a children's encyclopedia. And after selling one, I felt so guilty afterwards. Who said it? This stupid, worthless encyclopedia. This young family who just had a kid and they would feel guilty because you actually trained how to make parents feel so guilty that they were just no one step less than paedophiles or child abusers. They didn't buy this stupid book for their kid. So they bought this book and obviously they wasted money on this stupid book. And they're struggling to survive. And I felt terrible for years on that. And so one day, actually, I told that story here and somebody came up to me and they said, this is weird. They said, it's just too much of a coincidence. But some of these coincidence because of the law of karma, that's how this coincidence happens. They said when I was very small, this woman said she lived in England. She said, this young student came to my door and saw my parents, this children's encyclopedia. And she said, I loved those books. They meant so much to me. And I had so much happiness reading those encyclopedias. I don't know if it was you, but it could have been. And as soon as I heard that, I thought, wow, I actually did something good by setting. The great example, because sometimes we we can be so critical of ourselves, we don't know what we did or why we did it and how the karma works out. So we forgive ourselves all these things which we've done in life. At least we can accept ourselves. We don't have any guilt because all guilt is hating ourselves for hating part of ourselves. And that's the same. We can't separate out. Know who you are from what you've done. You are what you've done. That's what makes you up. So actually, we learn how to love ourselves for who we are. And the great thing is everybody has ever done this properly. They become beautiful, virtuous, good people. The reason why people get angry, cruel, vindictive, selfish, arrogant and create all these problems in this world because they don't know what the kindness is, and they're always running away from themselves and they hate themselves, so they take it out on other people. People are allowed to be at peace with themselves and accept themselves. I don't tend to get angry and upset at other people. They can be with people. They can always be with themselves. If you learn how to love yourself that way, forgive all the faults. Then you're no longer a violent, angry person. You don't create those faults which you've forgiven. You've done with them, moved on, and left them far behind. So having that bit of loving kindness towards yourself changes you. You don't need to be punished to be a better person. You need to be forgiven to be a better person. You need to be loved. To be a better person, to be cared for, to be a better person. And don't wait for someone else to do that. You do it for yourself. But even more than that, there's another aspect of loving kindness which I wanted to focus most on this evening. It's actually loving kindness towards life itself. Because life can be so difficult sometimes. I don't know about you. I've had a really difficult week messing around with building this retreat center. Oh, it's a real headache in the end. That's why I shaved my hair. So I can't put anything out so I don't go gray. Not only that, I'm having all sorts of problems and things happen in this world. David actually had to have a tooth out last week, and I think I missed an opportunity because actually the dentist, he told my tooth I could have actually taken it to Singapore and actually auctioned it off as a relic. Could have made a lot of money for charity. So that's another missed opportunity. Now, I think that dentist is probably going to auction it off on eBay. Buddha's tooth relics and it's worth a fortune. Maybe I'm not up to that standard yet, but, you know, sort of. It might be an investment for the future. Worth keeping, just in case. Well, whatever. So we do have difficult days. But I look back, I said, what do I expect? And if you're doing any building, how many of you have built a house? You know the suffering when you get towards the end of trying to make it this way and that way and that way and this way, and the builder wants it this way, you want it that way. You told a builder you want it this way, but he's done it that way. I know what it's like. It's just par for the course. But still, you enjoy yourself, you know, getting in there and having a bit of an argument or try and do your best, but you can expect that. So embrace that. So you love that. You don't expect it to be anything different than it is. That's what it's like doing a building or being an abbot of a monastery, or you don't know what abbot suffering is like. As I see you know, the Abbot Placid, he gave a talk. He's the abbot of the Benedictine monastery in North Korea. He's one a really lovely man cub there, because we know them very well. He's now become the new abbot of New Norcia. Father John, really great guy, I'm sure. Try and get him to give a talk in one evening. But I'm going to see him shortly. I'm going to tell him. Oh, you're in trouble now. Now you're the abbot of the monastery. And you know I'm going to tell him all about Abbot suffering. That's what it's like when you become an abbot. So you love it. You embrace it. You allow it to be. You say, the door of my heart is open to all those problems which are going to come into my life. For those decisions you have to make, sometimes tough ones. Sometimes people will like it, sometimes they won't like it. All of those things which you have to do when you take on responsibility, and all the other discussions and the work and the telephone calls and the letters and everything out the door, my heart is open to it. And even the tiredness, sometimes the door of my heart is open to it. So when you open your door of your heart to these things, you become a peace with them. All the problems, all the activity, all the decisions, all the disappointments, all the achievements of all works. The open door of your heart sends unconditional loving kindness to life. It can be done. It's unconditional. It's not. If life is good, then I love it. And I would now get my own way. And I found this beautiful partner. And oh, and he loves and she loves me and always thinks I'm the best. And I think they're the best. I have beautiful kids and get a great job and people like me at work. And so the Eagles always win and the Dockers always win. Except when they play together and they draw. Is it going to be fair in this place. And everything goes well in my life. And of course it's easy to love the nice part of life. Anyone can do that. But to really understand what unconditional love is, the whole thing. I love the whole of life. Even the disappointments and the tragedies. Getting HIV, getting sort of divorce, losing someone who commits suicide, having death when someone is very young. All of these things, it's amazing. Can actually open the door of your heart to everything. Of unconditional love was a whole of life. Sometimes when we can see that big picture why these things happen. They are learning experiences for us. Life is not meant to be pleasant all the time. If it was, we wouldn't learn anything. Life is meant to teach us lessons about what husbands are really like, what women are really like, what kids are like, what bushfires are like, what? See what life is like, what economies are like. When we understand those things, we can embrace them and we can flow with them rather than always fighting against them. How many of you fight against life and make yourself so frustrated and tired? There is a time to fight if it's something you can actually do. But a lot of times we fight battles which we will never win. Finally change things which are impossible to change, such as the past. Still fighting a battle with your past. Even fighting a battle with your future. This is a point because, as I mentioned often, the only time you have to affect your future is right now. It's a wonderful sort of insight. Right now is where you are building your future. In this moment, you're making prosperity, happiness, health, wealth right now. But every time you think about the future, worry about it planet. You are neglecting the place where the future is built. No wonder people don't get as much success as they should have. Work now, in this moment and then the future will be the best. Don't think too much about this is amazing. It's just true. The retreat center which we're building. Never thinking too much about what's going to happen when it's finished. That's our events committee worrying about the opening ceremony. I'm worried about the bricks which are being laid today, or the sort of the concrete path which is being laid today. Because I know that right now, today is where my retreat center is being built. This is where I have to focus. Same as in life. This what you're doing today? That's where you're going to create a good future or a bad future. What are you doing now? This is what we mean about the law of karma, and one of the best karma you could possibly make, if not the very best, is to have loving kindness towards the present moment, to be at peace with the now. You're stuck with this present moment. It's come. You've only got two choices. What you do with the present moment. Like it or lump it as they used to say. In other words, here you are with HIV. Sickness. With a friend who's committed suicide with financial problems. You're here with it right now. It's here. What are you going to do with this? Open your door of your heart to it. Give it loving kindness. And then you find, number one, you're at peace with it. And number two, you can actually do something. It does grow into something beautiful for the future. The negativity is like some sort of disease. Like a cancer. It eats away your happiness, your prosperity. Sunny, so are your health. No wonder people get all these sicknesses because they're far too negative in life. They said developing negativity. We do the opposite of everything loving kindness towards the whole of life. It doesn't mean liking it as I say. It means realizing that this is how life evolves for you, for other people. You are not special. I know people think that they're very special. Everyone else makes mistakes, but not me. Everyone else may have difficulty in their relationships, but I am smart. I can know how to sort of get a guy or a girl and be happily ever after with them. Everybody else may have troubled children, but no, no, I know how to look after my children. Don't ever say you are special. We are all so ordinary. And that's what makes us really special. Just our ordinary ordinariness. This is the life we accept to have loving kids. And that gives you a great sense of peace, of feel. Look what happened when you meditate. You're sitting here and it's hot or it's cold. You're aching. Oh. You're bored. Of course I have to open my eyes early to see what the time is. You see a few people just sitting there plodding around. They're not meditating at all. I know. That's okay. The door of my heart is fully open to you as well. As I can. Come on. It's more important that I teach you compassion than that. You are some of these Z monks who come along with a stick and hit you. Or that poor monk will probably have a sore arm himself by the time he finishes dealing with you lot. That's not what Buddhism is really about, is it? It's the kindness and the acceptance. And that's why people come here. It's actually what I said cha told me, because he knew that many of his disciples would eventually go out and start monitoring for themselves or be leaders. He said the most important thing of being a leader, especially a spiritual leader. The most important quality is not just how much you know you're not a professor. It's not even just how good your meditation is. He said the most important thing about being a leader is how much loving kindness you have, how much compassion. You have lots and lots of compassion, then you become a great leader. Not out of force. Now this beautiful compassion which draws people together and which accepts people. And in that compassion, that beautiful space where you are accepted and respected. That's where growth happens. That's where spiritual growth happens. Not when you're told off or you're hit or you're criticized and you're sort of put down. Growth never happens there. Whenever you criticize that, you're shrinking at shrinking back, you get smaller. So when some people shout at you when you're loved, will you accept it when you're kind? Then you open out. That's growing. So never shouted, criticize and blame people. Are you going to do anything? Praise them. So say in relationships. Praise gets you everywhere. If you really want to get on with your partner. Praise them. They say how beautiful they are. You take your glasses off first of all, so you don't break your presents. Wow, you look very beautiful, my darling. This is a wonderful guy husband. There it is. Because when you sort of praise people. Obviously you're expressing your kindness, your compassion, your loving kindness to them. And look, this is basic teachings. You should know this. One of the reasons why kids misbehave, because you don't express your love to them and respect to them and acceptance of them. Now. Those of you who got kids, how many times a day do you spend pointing out their faults, criticizing them, saying they should do better? And how many times of the day to actually praise him and say how much they appreciated it, right? The kid's happy times. You say that to your parents. I really appreciate you. I really love you, daddy and your great dad. Instead of just. Okay. All right. So what? Whatever. Cuz you find kids. If you keep on saying to your mum or dad. Are you just a great dad? He's a wonderful brother. I love you so much, and I'm so grateful for what you did. Then you can ask, can I have some more? Yeah, sure. Cause. You could actually see just how praise actually opens up the doors of kindness and love and acceptance. Because that's what we need. We need to be reassured that we are respected, we are understood, we are cared for, and kids grow and become better kids when they have that environment. And husbands and wives actually can grow together rather than apart. One is more praise is more acceptance of them. Just like that guy who had HIV instead of rejecting him. Oh, you got HIV. Get out of here. I'm going to catch something. No, no. That's stupid. That's rejection. Instead of accepting being kind. Because if I could be kind to him, then he could be kind to himself. He could be accepted. One of the amazing things to have that acceptance to that kindness and life. Example. On the subject of meditation retreats. We have given so many retreats before, and I joke about this to the people who go on retreats because every now and again, they have to come into the interview room and tell me what they're up to, what they've been doing, and how it sometimes occurs. People are terrified. You know what? They're terrified because they've been spending nine days wasting their time fantasizing, dreaming, sleeping or whatever. I cannot tell you about that. But they come up and they say, oh, I've just been sleeping and thinking about all these things. And many of you can confirm this when you come in and tell me about all the silly things you're doing. I always say, oh, very, very good. Well done. Carry on. So what? I wasted my time. I told my heart. So you can waste time here if you're right. Now. Because I know psychology. Because if I say things like that, actually people go out there sort of try and actually meditate harder and not waste so much time. If I say, you terrible meditator, you are just such a waste of time and I just work my butt off for you and this is what you give me back. What type of disciple is that? What type of Buddhist is that? I'm going to take you off the membership. You never go to a blacklist. You. And if I do things like that, what's going to happen? Is that going to make people grow? So have a person on military, do you understand and accept them? Because I understand one thing about human beings, they do try their very best. Everyone's motivation is very noble. Even guys in jail. This is a nice story that comes up about jail. Some years ago I would I was used to go teaching in prison farm every week. The other monks do that. One of them is teaching this evening. Covid kind of person farm. I was teaching there and got there a little bit early. And one of the prisoners got hold of my arm, said, come over here. And he dragged me into the schoolroom. He wanted to show me something. And there was a board with all these cars from school kids. And he started crying. This prisoner. I just sort of get it out of it. While I was crying, he said, because in one of the primary schools in Perth, the principal, I don't know who he or she was. I say there was one wise, great educator in a primary school. They were concerned about their children being exposed to drugs. They wanted to do something. I tried to help children avoid the dangers of drugs, which are in the schools here in Australia. Instead of getting some professor from university or some expert from some social work department. The principal said, why not get a prisoner from the local jail who's in prison for drugs? Someone who really knows what they're talking about and who knows what happens when you get involved in that type of lifestyle. So the principal liaise with the superintendent of this prison. And they got two prisons, prisons, prisoners who had been involved in drugs, who spend the afternoon at a primary school teaching the kids. What happens when you start taking drugs from someone who's experienced that? And I could feel I understood. My insight tells me that those kids would have learned huge amounts, much more than if they had been told by some doctor or professor. These guys had been hurt terribly by their experience as well. They're in jail. But not only that, I know that people are put in those situations. One of the, you know, one of the worst things about being in jail is you can't do anything to help others. And they had an opportunity, a chance of helping kids. And of course, primary schools. What do you spend your time doing the next day? Okay, let's get some paper. Let's draw some pictures that says some cards to Nick. I remember one of the guys. I forget who the other guy was to nick and say John, thanking them for coming to our school. And so they received all these cards from primary school kids. Dear Nick, hope you get out soon. Dear John, thanks for coming to see us. I must be terrible in prison. Please come back again when you're out. And all his wonderful cards have kids expressing love and respect. And that was such an uncommon experience for somebody in town to get love and respect. And as little kids there are. Nick showed me these. He was weeping. Couldn't stop the tears. What a beautiful thing that was. You can't even have loving kindness to the people in jail. Give them an opportunity to express their loving kindness, to do something wonderful and beautiful. And how that helps not just the kids who heard that lesson would help those business as well. I did see Nick many years later at Perth Airport. Sitting there waiting for someone to come through the gate. It's not just me who travels. Other people travel and I receive them. I remember this hand on my shoulder. Turn around in the beautiful suit. He said, look how I'm doing. Well now. He said, I'm still meditating. I'm still meditating. He was very fair about that. It's really nice to see someone who appreciated the lessons which were taught. The opportunity to express kindness and love to others and how beneficial it was. So punishing. That doesn't get you very far. Learning. Embracing that. That's the way forward. So life. You can love it or you can lump it. You got a choice. Your partner in life like him, or most importantly, yourself. You got the choice, sir. Open the door of your heart yourself, with all of your failings and faults. With stupidities. And finally finding some peace in your life. Or always feeling guilty and upset. And always trying to change yourself. This way you're gonna go. You're wise enough to give yourself a break. And open the door of your heart to yourself. And then to life. And then to all other beings. And find peace at last. Thank you. Okay. Any comments or questions about this evening's talk? Yes. We have a question from a school teacher. Was very hard to love some of those kids. So usually the punishment is shown not to work. There was a study that of a hundred years ago and the tie was in dad in Bristol, Bristol jail in England, where at that time executions hangings were public but hanged people in the square or something. And this person, a psychologist or went to, uh, the jail and I talked to how many 60, 70 people on death row about to be hanged. They don't have sort of stays of execution in those days. No lawyers paid a lot of money. If you got so committed to death, usually ended up dying. Hung. Or rather 60 people. He found out that almost all of them had actually witnessed the public hanging conclude that it wasn't a deterrent at all. They'd actually seen the death happen, actually seen it, not just read it in newspapers. And so it didn't deter them. Because a lot of people think they won't get caught. Most crimes, whether it's speeding, reduce speed today. Some people are laughing guiltily. Why did you do that? Because you thought you wouldn't get caught. How many men who cheated on their wife thinking, I'm not going to get caught? How many kids have experimented with drugs? Thinking I'm not going to get caught. People light fires. I'm not going to get caught. Because I don't believe in deterrence. I don't really think it works. There's other ways. It doesn't mean that we should just leave it alone. There's other ways of dealing with the problem. It's the other way in which I'm more interested in it. Having a more caring, sharing community is, you know, most of the people who commit these awful crimes with arson, pedophilia, rapes, isolated people, people who don't have family for one reason or another, who are terribly alone. Sometimes have a family, friends. They know that if a person has predilections to ask that, they're see straight away. Our society is two fragmented, two lonely family structures, not as strong as they used to be. We live too much in a separate world from each other. That's one of the great reasons, I think, for the horrendous crimes. What's happening? Right. Maybe it's time to think about it anyway. I mean, some awesome butterfly. A one for dying ago. One dawn. Happy one day. Me. So I got up. I go out onto the Nama some. Paddy power up to a single column on.