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May 20 Whoops!WILLING TO MAKE MISTAKES The notion of being willing to make mistakes is just the general sense that you are no longer hopeful, that you are no longer hoping to achieve complete perfection. You are confronted with all kinds of factors -- poverty, biasedness, aggression, passion, and trying to measure yourself -- and all those situations are the opposite of being willing to make mistakes. You don't want to make mistakes; therefore you want to stick with you biasedness; you want to stick with your poverty. You want to make sure that everything goes right. ...You don't want to make mistakes; you are hoping for something good. Whereas if you abandon hope, you have no idea what you are going to get in your life. Still, whatever comes is within the context of warriorship in any case. From "Outrageousness," a talk given to the Directors of Shambhala Training, July 1978. May 05 FoolishnessYou Cannot Fool Yourself
When we sit and practice, we begin to realize what is known as the transparency and impermanence of time and space. We realize how much we are dwelling on our little things and that we cannot catch any of it and build a house on it. We cannot even lay the foundation. The whole thing keeps shifting under our feet and under our seat. The rug is being pulled out from under us completely, simply from that experience of working with ourselves in our practice. When we realize that we cannot catch hold of phenomena at all, that is what is known as tondam, or "absolute truth." There is an absolute quality to the fact that we cannot fool ourselves. We can try to fool our teacher, who tells us to sit; and we might think that we can fool the dharma, which says, "Go sit. That is the only way." But we cannot fool ourselves. We cannot fool our essence. The ground we are sitting on cannot be fooled. From Chapter Ten, "The Five Paths," in THE TRUTH OF SUFFERING: and the Path of Liberation. May 03 Talking Flowers?TAKE ANOTHER STEP Whenever there is doubt, that creates another step on your staircase. Doubt is telling you that you need to take another step. Each time there is an obstacle, you go one step further, beyond it, step by step. You walk or you jump one step at a time until you see the Great Eastern Sun. I wouldn't suggest that in the beginning you look at the Great Eastern Sun directly -- the light might burn you -- but I wouldn't suggest you wear sun glasses all the time either. In the shade of fearlessness, you can appreciate the light that comes from the Great Eastern Sun and then you can appreciate how it illuminates the colors of everything around you. Then slowly but surely, you will actually see the Great Eastern Sun directly without it blinding you. That is the warrior's way, and that is the way that we can conquer fear. |
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