Trauma, Teachings & Buddhist Texts With Randi Green

Besides the topics listed in the title this first one starts off addressing dukkha then moves into: Parallels and comparisons to the Christian gospels; Rajas; Nagas; Essence; Importance of and methods for studying texts; Being turned into an "-ism"; truth and reality; avoidance and non-avoidance; trauma; teachers; who the Buddha taught and how; mendicant lifestyle; authenticity of the Buddhist texts; value of Buddhist practices; Buddhist cosmos; levels or rings of great teachers; and more

Transcript

Wholeness,

This is Josh Tippold from Integrating Presence.

Today I have Randy Green again with me.

Randy,

What's going on?

How are you?

I'm fine,

Thank you.

Thank you for having me.

You're welcome.

And so we're gonna try something different here.

Randy's done a long series in the past.

It's called My Take on Buddhism.

I'll have her talk a little bit about that series when I throw it back over to her.

But we're gonna go straight into the core of what some people call Buddhism,

Right?

Which is the Four Noble Truths and specifically focus on dukkha or what some people translate as stress,

Suffering,

Unsatisfactoriness.

Those are the big translations.

And just to preface it here too,

It's also known as a chariot wheel where the axles are out of place and so you get a rough,

Bumpy ride,

Right?

This just kind of feeling that it's having a hard time moving through your environment,

Right?

And then also,

So I just throw it up here and we'll go back more into detail with this.

Dukkha and sukha.

Sukha means happiness,

Is usually translated as happiness,

Right?

But the thing is with this,

The du prefix means negative,

Su means positive and ka means no essence.

So du,

Ka would be negative,

But no essence kind of literally,

Right?

And then sukha,

Su would be positive,

But no essence either.

So that's a fascinating topic we possibly will explore here.

Before we jump into this topic though,

Just kind of know that obviously this is the standard disclaimers.

This is obviously my understanding of these teachings and with some practice.

I'm not,

I don't consider myself a Buddhist even though I've studied more of the Theravada stuff than anything else.

And I do practice,

Have a daily meditation practice for since 2012.

Also,

When I draw on the text and the things I'm talking about,

It's a mix between my own practice and stuff that I've studied,

Right?

But we have to be able and willing to completely at the forefront,

Like I heard Bhikkhu Analyo recently say,

We have to say,

We don't know for sure if this is authentic text,

Right?

We have to be willing to say,

Yeah,

I have no idea if the Buddha actually said these things or talked about these things.

If there's a historic figure,

If someone did achieve the highest levels of enlightenment,

We don't know for sure,

Right?

We weren't there.

And then tracing the authenticity of what he said and how it was,

How accurate of what he said during his lifetime or whatever when he taught,

How accurate it was then to what we have now,

Either in the Pali or the translations and the translations in another huge ball of wax.

So just put that that way.

And also,

It's also known that these texts,

The Buddha said,

Well,

You're not,

It's like a raft.

The teachings,

His teachings are like a raft.

Once you cross the flood,

Once you've used them for what you're supposed to use them for,

You're not supposed to carry them around further than that.

You leave the raft on the shore and so you can go on.

So that's important to keep in mind too.

Now,

Reini's unique abilities,

She has gift into,

I guess,

Maybe seeing and knowing things that are beyond the text,

Behind the text,

Under the text,

Applying them to things that a lot of people don't really have access to.

So that's another unique dynamic.

And I'm sure there's a few things that I'm missing here with my intro,

But I think that's enough for now.

I guess,

So Randy,

Maybe you can talk a little bit about your series on Buddhism and how you approach this.

And maybe you've talked about a past life that you've had as a Buddhist monk,

How that might factor in here.

And then how you haven't studied formally what this is,

But you,

You know,

How all that plays in.

I think that's enough on the plate for now and how we can lead that into our discussion about dukkha.

Yes.

Two thing comes to mind.

I'll return to the whole Sukha-dukkha thing.

First and foremost,

I'm a psychotherapist.

I'm a formal psychotherapist.

I'm working with clients since 2007.

So that factors in as well,

Because there's a lot of what we understand as Buddhism in the Western world that has an equivalent in modern psychology.

And if I'm not going to speak on the behalf of Buddhist monks but I recall different types of scientific studies where they have actually worked with Buddhist monks,

For instance,

Focusing the meditation on the frontal lobe,

Which we now know is part of the,

What Freud would call the overself or the one that confronts us with choosing the right approach to navigate through our chaos of emotions of the limbic system,

Our primitive levels of the little brain,

As I will call it in English here,

Not using the Latin words,

The instinctual emotional layer.

And I work with that in my teaching material as well,

Saying,

Well,

We do have the frontal lobe.

If you do focus on the frontal lobe,

Meditate on the frontal lobe,

Or do energy work on the frontal lobe,

You will actually amplify the study I recall.

And I'm sorry,

I cannot remember who did it,

Where it was done,

When it was done,

With which type of Buddhist monks.

I'm sorry about that.

Should have given the source of that one,

But just take this for granted that these Buddhist monks that were part of that experiment could get the frontal lobes up to,

I think it was 65 Hertz or something,

That goes into the gamma range.

So we can change our brain waves by doing meditation,

Which can be used in many different ways,

Psychologically,

Or as inner work,

Or as a path to enlightenment.

So we kind of know today,

We could say we have actual science that in a way backs up the Buddhist practice of meditation,

Of mindfulness,

Of working with calming the inner voice,

Become the observer,

Look into what does it mean to be human in this world?

How can we develop ourselves as a human being?

And that's where I incorporate the Buddhist line of thought,

At least it's called Buddhism,

Because in a way it's kind of being a practitioner of the path to enlightenment,

Which is a little bit long to say over time,

But being a practitioner of a teaching system that is not a teaching system,

It's sayings,

Sayings that have come from other practitioners on the path that has been given over generation to generation to different practitioners,

Either as text material,

Or as inner sayings,

As things you achieve when you do your meditation practice,

When you contemplate on different sayings,

On different words,

Insights,

You get this understanding.

And that is part of,

Interestingly enough,

I studied at the Copenhagen University,

The ancient Hebrew Bible,

I studied theology,

And that means there I learned the scientific method of looking into words,

Understand the root of the words,

Working with the prefixes and the suffixes,

How the cultural setting were at the time,

Not far from the same time around Buddhism,

Or the rise of the Buddha and his teachings and what his sayings have been incorporated into different text material.

The issue with the Hebrew Bible and the gospels in Christianity,

Not that I'm Christian at all,

I studied it for the purpose of scientific interest and learning the scientific method of working with ancient texts,

Not that we could say it's the same,

But there are similarities,

The way that the culture was around the time,

The way they approached different types of higher order teaching systems.

We could say when we talk about Buddhism in my take is that it's so much more advanced due to the Hindu teaching system,

Even though we could say that Buddhism is a kind of a counter to the Hindu teaching system,

Which is implied in the story about the Buddha himself.

It is a kind of a counter to that he was from a royal family,

He was a Raja,

So he came from this royal family.

He had this,

This is where I flip quickly into the extraordinary perception of things,

Because for me,

A Raja is connected to the Nagas,

Which is a lineage,

Actually an extraterrestrial lineage,

So that's my other take on it,

That's kind of,

It's different than what most people have.

So thereby,

There are these insights that I've had in meditation.

When I began meditating in around 2000,

Actually,

I began my meditation practice,

And what I discovered there,

Including remembering that past life as a Buddhist monk in 1959,

Which had a very unfortunate exit,

And in that kind of saying,

Well,

I kind of have a knowledge here,

I don't know where I have it from,

Because yes,

I did read Buddhist texts when I was the Danish equivalent,

I come from Denmark,

The Danish equivalent to your college in America,

And there was just kind of historical religion-oriented,

And I remember I actually went to the Samet College with that one,

Where I got this question about Christianity and Buddhism,

The similarities and the differences,

And I jumped right in and said,

Well,

It's the same,

And I remember my history religion teacher said,

No,

It's not,

And then,

Of course,

I got all stressed out,

And I didn't get to prove my brilliant points there,

But still,

Today,

When Josh and I have discussions about Buddhism,

It's there's so much similarity for me,

And it could be in my mind that constructs it,

Because the mind does that,

Too,

It wants to find patterns,

It wants to find similarities,

But there are definitely things that are very,

Very similar.

I know when we talk about Buddhism that,

I know that from Josh,

That talking about past life is a little bit of a no-go.

Well,

I will get to the nuances of why it's so important and why there's taboo around it,

Too,

Yeah.

Yes,

So we could touch ground with that,

Too,

But what I wanna say,

The other thing I wanted,

When you talk about sukha,

Does it mean positive no-essence,

Or does it mean positive essence,

If you look at the term?

Oh,

Yeah,

So kha,

It means no-essence,

Lack of essence.

Okay,

Lack of essence.

So basically,

My understanding of that,

If we wanna jump into that.

Oh,

Okay,

Now I get it,

Okay,

Sorry about that,

I had a little bit of a ha moment here,

Okay,

But it's good to take that into,

When we talk about the ancient texts,

Because one of the things that the ancient cultures were brilliant at,

Which we don't have to the same degree today,

Is that they played with the words,

They always had several layers of meaning to each word,

So that's why it's so important,

When we work with the ancient texts,

That we don't just take what the scholars have decided that this is suffering,

Or this is painful,

Or whatever it is,

Because when we work with the ancient texts,

And I know for somehow,

Somewhere,

I don't know why,

But I know for certainty that the Buddha played with the words to initiate contemplation,

To put us into that state of wonder,

What is behind this word,

What does this mean,

So we would contemplate on the word itself,

We could spend hours,

I'm sorry for saying we,

But spending hours on the word dukkha in itself,

As in being the absence,

Or being the existence of,

What do you say,

Sorry,

Forgot it again.

No,

No essence?

Yeah,

Yeah.

So.

The,

That no essence is.

So,

Okay,

So yeah,

Dukkha,

This is,

This actually came from a monk that taught at a class I audited one time in real life,

And so I hadn't heard this before,

But this was the understanding of the prefix du and su.

So du is negative,

Su is positive,

And kha means no essence,

Or lacking essence,

Without essence,

So dukkha would be,

It's a negative,

But there's no essence to it,

Sukha would be,

It's positive,

But there's no essence,

So I think the overall,

What he was getting at,

Or what he was getting at is this,

Is that if you really examine something,

Even though it feels positive,

And it is positive,

But it would have to have a lasting essence for it to be more permanent,

But because things don't have a,

Because of the changeable nature of compounded things,

It's impossible for that to be there all the time.

We're gonna have moments of negativity and positivity,

Happiness,

Suffering,

Stress,

But just because there's no essence,

We can't extract something,

Put it in a bottle,

And keep it forever,

And say that's what it is,

Now I can reproduce it in a lab each time,

And have total control over it,

Right?

So that's one way,

I mean,

That could be totally off,

But that's how I see an essence,

Right?

Something that I know for sure,

It will have total control,

And it will last and be like that forever,

And never dissipate,

Always be permanent like that,

But due to the nature of that,

So that way happiness can come and go,

And stress and suffering can come and go,

Now I'm talking about on a relative level of reality here,

Of course,

Right?

This would only apply to a relative level,

Our kind of our day to day,

We have happiness and sadness,

These things like this,

Or stress,

I shouldn't say sadness,

Because that's not the same.

So yeah,

So that's what I'm putting,

So if you want to pick back up on that,

Because I have quite a bit of things to pick up on,

What you said,

That just spurred good things to mention here.

The only thing I want to kick in here,

And that's completely unscientific,

But it's still interesting,

Intrigues me though,

Because we could say,

Well,

Were there any connection whatsoever between India and Egypt,

And scientists say,

Yes,

They did trade,

Yes,

There were kind of trade routes,

And yes,

We had migrants,

And yes,

People were absolutely communicating,

Which we're getting more and more into in science today,

And I'm going to draw on science and say,

This is scientific,

But the interesting thing is that in Egyptian mythology,

Ka means the soul.

Yes,

Of course,

Yeah.

So that's just an interesting little thing there.

And the Buddha is known for actually redefining words,

Putting his twist on it,

Right?

Taking a word that people have been so locked into thinking of it for this way,

And now he gives his definition of it that completely flips the script.

He was brilliant at that,

And actually,

Some of your teachings,

I see parallels in that by having your own definitions for something that's a longstanding concept that these people are just kind of in a rut with it,

But now you kind of like jolt them and say,

Okay,

Well,

Look at it,

It's kind of pointing to that,

But this is the way that seems maybe more helpful,

Or look at it this way instead of just the same old thing on autopilot,

Right?

Yes,

So that's where words become important.

Also,

When we study ancient texts,

And that's some of the things I learned at the university when we studied the Hebrew Bible,

The enormous importance of the root of the word and how it is used in sentences and what is put before the word and after the word and in what context,

Because the same word can have a plethora of meanings.

Absolutely.

So I think that's one of the most important takeaways for people that want to study this today,

And they just read what the scholars have decided is the word,

And we can say quite a lot of the ancient texts,

The scholars didn't know what it was,

But then they got the Rosetta Stone or something,

Or whatever,

They have come to,

They have agreed on certain words mean that because they have looked into the text,

This is how it's been used again and again in that sentence,

So that is what it must mean,

But it's not the same as it actually does mean it.

It's a huge point because there's a site called puredama.

Net,

And he makes this huge thing,

He shows that these early European scholars,

They really don't have any context for,

They came across these texts and they're trying to translate them without deep practice,

Without cultural immersion,

Without all these other things that they're lacking,

And so he shows kind of the inaccuracies of these early European translations in certain key points,

And that's another thing,

There's Pali words in the Pali Canon that people just,

They don't have any consensus on hardly whatsoever,

Some people might translate it so far off from what others,

And even that,

Even if there is a strong consensus on a word,

I think we need to be,

Our scholars need to be open to consider looking at it other ways,

Right?

From grounds you'll always be able to rip everything apart and start from zero if they're really serious about it.

So a few things now going back,

This name,

This is another pet peeve of mine,

This name Buddhism,

So it turns it into another ism,

You can call it whatever you want,

We'll call it that for now,

But at the core of this,

I'm only really interested in the true nature of reality,

Right?

And for the reasons of my benefit and the benefit of others and for everybody,

And for ending the stress and suffering and unsatisfactory to us.

And because if we don't know what's true,

Then it's hard to really take any action because we don't,

It's almost a waste of time.

Now,

Also it's important.

May I?

Please,

Yeah.

I just wanna put that in there so people kind of,

Because the whole,

When we talk,

Why practice the cessation of dukkha or learning how to work with reality,

Observe reality,

Be in the now,

Being mindful,

Learning how to deal with the inner emotions and you say to end,

And this is interesting because this is where my mind quickly jumps into on its own,

Avoidance,

Avoid suffering.

So that's not what it is.

Because as I work with this one in my teaching system is that we kind of work with,

We confront what's there.

As a psychotherapist,

We don't avoid painful things.

We don't avoid our childhood traumas.

If we wanna heal,

We have to confront it.

Of course,

Not everything as a psychotherapist,

I work with people where I did the assessment that that person is completely functional and it would be detrimental to that person to go into some childhood trauma that's better off hidden and stoved away.

But most people,

When they have,

When it bleeds through,

When it comes into their everyday life and it makes it difficult for them to be in life,

Be with other people and it keeps coming in as this reappearing childhood trauma that defines reality,

Creates stress,

Creates frustration,

Creates negative outcome of all interaction potentials,

As I call it,

Makes a kind of what we call an in negative narrative about who and what we are.

Then we must address it.

Then we must work with it because we must confront that constant,

It's called a cognitive scheme that plays in and distorts our perception of reality,

Our encounters with others and our understanding of who and what we are as people.

And that's the same ideas we find in when we talk about avoidance of suffering,

Which is not,

Or ending of suffering as a kind of saying,

Well,

It is a very early type of psychology.

Whereas we could say,

I'm not going to go into the gospels,

But that has another thing to it that's not literally psychology in the same manner.

We can't make the same,

What do you call it,

Connections as we can with Buddhism.

There is this kind of,

It's clear,

This is a way to work with yourself to achieve a higher potentiality of who and what you are as a human being.

So that's where,

That's why I've often go to Buddhism and not deliberately and not knowingly use Buddhist ideas and concepts,

But it just melts into my psychology training as an existential psychotherapist.

There's so many good points with this too.

And so if we're looking at that,

It's not all or nothing.

Like you have to face it all the time because some things are so overwhelming,

Right?

Just in everyday life.

Now,

Since neither of us are technically trauma-informed,

Right,

In the traditional sense,

We're going to set that aside because a lot of the things that we talk about,

It doesn't really apply in the same way with trauma.

So we'll just,

That caveat,

Right?

Yes.

And so there's- I want to put in,

Yes,

I am schooled in trauma,

But not as,

I'm not working as a trauma psychotherapist.

There's a difference there because when you do work with trauma,

Casualties of war,

There are different levels of trauma,

Which we don't need to go into.

I just want to make it,

Yes,

I have definitely- I see,

My bad then,

Yes.

I do work with childhood trauma,

So,

And that goes into sexual abuse and the whole spectrum of that.

But I haven't worked with people in war,

Trauma from war,

Or trauma from what we call life and death situations out there,

But the psychological trauma of being in a stressful environment as a child.

That is just as traumatizing for many people.

So there are different degrees of trauma.

It is,

And there's also different sectors in society that you,

To work with trauma in a certain way in society,

You have to be licensed and all this stuff and approved to do so,

But then there's other healing modalities where it's more acceptable to deal with trauma in other ways too.

So to come back around here to the,

So these approaches for dealing with these things,

The other thing that occurred was that in once,

Let's say we do have,

We have faced certain challenges in life that are very stressful and well,

One way to illustrate this is a little classical saying that I'll just say here,

But before I do that,

It's like,

Well,

Let's say we have addressed things and it's going well now,

How often do we want to keep revisiting it?

Because sometimes we can get back in the same rut.

So the little thing is I was walking down the street,

I fell in a hole,

Okay?

Then I came back,

I walked down the street again,

I saw the same hole,

But I fell in it anyway.

The third time I saw the hole in the street and then I walked around the hole and I kept going.

The fourth time I saw the street and I didn't even go down the street,

Right?

Yes,

That would be avoidance,

Right?

Complete,

I avoid the street because there's a hole there.

Exactly,

So that's the healthy form of avoidance,

But you actually have the experience,

The real life experience.

So then you know,

It's not the avoidance like a psychological term,

Like I'm putting it off and bypassing it,

Don't want to deal with it because I'm too afraid or don't know what's there.

No,

You have the actual experience.

Now you see,

Oh,

I've already been down that path to do that.

I know what that's about.

That leads to nowhere.

So I'm going to,

You know,

Not,

Yeah,

Avoid that street.

So it's a different type of avoidance than,

Oh,

This is just too much.

I can't take this.

I don't want to spend the time to work on myself.

Thanks.

So that's a very important distinction.

Yes,

But it's also interesting when we talk about a little bit about confronting things and see things as they truly are,

But kind of with that,

I could almost in my head make this,

Okay,

I have this using your analogy of the road,

Which is funny,

Sorry,

I think it's a little bit funny.

It is,

It is really,

Yeah.

Yes,

But this kind of way,

Okay,

I got this road,

This path that is a kind of a symbol of a path of life,

And there's a hole in that path,

And I'm walking down that path and I'm being mindful,

I'm observing the environment,

The energies and what's going on there.

And then there's that hole,

And I fell into the first time because I was not,

I was absent-minded,

I was not there in the present.

So I didn't see the hole,

So I fell into it.

So the next time I go there,

I would use my mindful practice and I would say,

Okay,

This is the road,

This is a symbolic representation of reality,

There is a hole there.

How do I approach that?

Go to the hole and look into the hole.

What does it mean to me?

What is the experience of that hole?

How can I adjust to the experience and the environment with a path that is a hole in it and go all berserk in contemplation of reality and holes and falling into them and being absent-minded and can not as in,

Yes,

I can't transform matter reality,

But I can transform my approach to the hole.

I can look at the hole,

I can recall the experience and I can look at it as an experience of being absent-minded instead of looking at it as an experience of pain and suffering and I fell there and what the fuck.

And then to go in and say,

No,

This is interesting.

Why was I that absent-minded?

Because I need to be present in my body,

Present in reality,

Present in my experience of reality.

And if I had been that,

I would have observed the hole and I would have walked around it and I wouldn't have got trauma or suffering or pain or frustration.

And this is the investigative quality.

And this is a requirement for awakening to look,

To ask these questions,

To examine it and to go over it.

And yeah,

So that's investigation.

That's very well needed in how we view it and how we respond to it,

Right,

Too.

Yes.

And because,

Yeah,

Just going into those pity party stories,

That's actually suffering because that's optional.

We don't have to add that on,

Right?

And it makes things worse.

It's painful enough to just be around that hole and maybe fall into it too,

Right?

Yes,

And if we kind of tie that into childhood trauma,

There we say it's different because as a child,

You don't have the choice.

You don't have the choice to say,

As we have as a grown-up,

Where we can be mindful and look at and discern reality as children,

We are forced into these circumstances.

And that's why it creates trauma on a childhood basis is that you're not victimized,

That's the wrong word.

But when you are a child,

You are in a family setting,

You can't just walk out the door and say,

Hey,

I'm out of here because you're shitty parents.

So we have to endure.

And that's where the defense mechanism comes in.

That's where we create this narrative where we delude ourselves to say,

Our parents are good parents because as a child,

You can't cope with that.

You have shitty parents,

So you try to find the good stuff.

And that's where psychology differs a little bit from Buddhism because that's where we go and say,

Okay,

There are all these defense mechanisms.

We create comfort zones,

We create scenarios that allows us to exist in that stressful environment.

Yes,

And doing anything we can to get their love,

Right?

Our parents love and approval because we're dependent on that for survival.

So children can tune in very well what they need to do to get that from their parents.

And sometimes,

It just means acting out because they get the most attention right away and the most powerful.

So that's another thing sometimes with that.

Yeah.

But I just wanted to put in here so that when we do continue here,

That those of you who are listening out there that have childhood trauma,

That you don't think,

Oh,

I just need to do meditation and mindful practice and then I'm all good to go because they are different in their dynamics.

The psychodynamics are different.

There's a difference between working in mindfulness and observation as a grownup where we use the frontal lobes,

Whereas you as a child,

You are in your limbic instinctual level.

So that's very biological primitive in a way where the response mechanism is tailored all around what we could say fight or flight or survival or how do I cope with this because I have nowhere to go.

So it's a confinement situation in a way to put it very strongly.

So the dynamics are different.

This is a totally amazing point too because the Buddhist teachings that are handed down as far as I know,

He actually abandoned his wife.

So I wonder if psychologists would say,

Well,

He has abandonment issues.

So most of these teachings obviously are geared towards adults,

Not children.

Even I think his son Rahula met Burton or something like that,

Which is really interesting.

However,

He did later join the order supposedly and became full enlightened.

But it doesn't,

So we don't,

I think there's very little known about the Buddha's own childhood,

Which is another interesting thing as far as I'm known.

I mean,

With the,

Some people say they might be able to piece things together through these Jataka tales,

Which who knows the authenticity of those.

Those are later and I don't think they're included in the core canon.

I could be wrong about that,

But these are all these supposed stories of the Buddha's past life.

So that all that set aside.

So yeah,

That is a whole nother,

Yeah,

Ball of wax that are a can of worms that we probably ought not to open up.

But yeah,

It's a very,

It is.

One other thing is that the children's programs that Buddhists,

I haven't sat in on them in real life.

I have seen them and I'm just,

I just want to say that I don't know what to say about those,

You know,

I'm open to suggestions about how Buddhists could do things with their children's programs.

That's another interesting thing.

They don't talk much about that.

Meditation definitely and being observant in the now and being focused in the now.

But anyways,

That's not where,

Because that's a completely different,

But as far as the text material go,

As far as I remember what I read years ago is that the Buddha looked at his son and he says that he is like a chain around his foot.

And that's where the name came from.

He felt tied in,

In marriage,

In the royalty he had,

The whole circumstances of being a royal,

Being confined in the castle,

Not having any touch on the ground or with his subjects,

His people he was supposed to take care of.

So he went out and looked and he saw all of these people and saw all of these different suffering and aging and disease and all the things he wasn't confronted with in his safe upbringing in the castle.

But I want to put a little twist to that because I talked about that in both on my,

My free podcast series on past lives as well on some of the chakra system,

Because the chakra system is tied to Hinduism and he is supposedly going against Hinduism and the priesthood of the Brahman lineages as I call them in my language,

That he was a Raja,

So he was nobility.

We must not forget the fact that he was royalty.

And that means he grew up with education.

He grew up with,

He was being taught by sages,

By wisdom men or wisdom people,

Most of the men.

So he would have had educational level that nobody else would have had.

And that is play,

I think that plays into it,

The way he perceives reality,

The way he's able to process information compared to the layman he was teaching.

They were farmers,

They were,

They had no education whatsoever.

They couldn't even write,

They couldn't read,

They could barely speak the royal language.

They would speak,

They wouldn't speak Pali.

They would,

They would speak,

Or the temple language or- Whatever language they were speaking.

They would speak the communist language.

So there's this whole,

You have this hugely highly educated elite,

Nobility,

Royal person that goes out and get a kick in the butt,

Sorry for putting it that way,

By reality,

And then ask the questions,

What is this?

And then decide to leave his wife and his money and everything behind,

And then look for the truth of nature,

Of reality,

And why there is this aging and despair and disease and all this kind of things,

Asking himself these questions.

And that in itself is an interesting psychodynamic because yeah,

Dude,

You have it all,

Why leave it all behind?

And why go against leaving your wife and your son behind,

Which meant he absolutely,

What do you call it?

Kingdom too.

Yes,

In what you have an English word for,

You dethrone yourself,

As if you knew that word instead,

And go out and look for it.

So as we know from some of the ancient Greek nobilities,

They often had this sage that were teaching them,

The philosopher that came and taught them stuff.

As we know with,

I think it's actually Alexander the Great,

He had,

I can't remember what the story is,

But he had one of these wisdom teachers as well that led him into the search for uniting the countries around him,

Thinking that religion in its essence were derived from the same,

The gods were technically more or less the same.

He created the idea of syncronicity,

Sorry about that,

I'm translating Danish words here,

Where he would try to unify all religions,

Say,

Well,

Zeus and Allah or whatever,

Not Allah was not there at the time,

But Zeus and the Jewish god were technically the same or the Egyptian gods,

The Osiris and Zeus were the same,

But from different cultural settings that were interpreting in a different way.

And Alexander knew that because he had a philosopher that taught him.

And I think that the Buddha already in childhood had another wisdom person,

Which we don't know of,

That gave him some foundational ideas.

So when he was confronted and he went out,

He had already that mindset to not look at it from the typical perspective of a royal person as in kind of,

This is just how it is,

They are just the commoners,

I'm the king,

And they are just my subjects and whatever,

Laws will run this system.

So very good points,

Plenty to pick up on before I even circle back to the stuff before.

So this reminds me,

Right,

Just to pick up where you left off at,

Is I don't remember the exact details,

But there was a sage that came around the Buddha's birth or when he was younger or something,

And he started crying,

They asked him why he was crying,

Because he said,

Well,

He will,

And maybe I'm mixing a few different stories here,

But because he wouldn't live long enough to see that either the Buddha could become one of this great ruler or this amazing sage,

But he wouldn't live long enough to see this.

And yeah,

I just wanna say here,

Please call in,

I don't know who's gonna call in,

But there are ways to call in to leave me a message,

But write in,

Make corrections,

Because I welcome corrections,

So that I don't wanna put out disinformation here too,

And just know that things might differ slightly with Randy's take from the actual text,

And of course,

I probably get a lot of things wrong too.

Well,

When I remember that story about the royalty,

I'm trying to think of now where some people are saying that might be from somewhere else or something at a later time,

But there's also,

Maybe that was just the four heavenly messengers,

But I'm not sure,

But I think there's definitely some connection there,

But as far as the teacher,

The teacher is for sure,

So when he left,

He went and studied under the best meditation masters at the time,

Right?

It said that he mastered all that,

And it didn't take him to the full awakening that he said,

So he left them,

And then he also went with this extreme group of practitioners,

These ascetics for a while too,

And so he learned a lot from them as well,

And they all kind of helped each other,

But he realized that wasn't the way as well too.

Now,

As far as who he taught,

He supposedly walked in all kinds of circles of life.

He would do the commoners,

Like there's farmers that he had discourses,

So it's not like just he's standing on a pulpit preaching to tons of people in a sermon,

But he's done that too,

But he would also give individual discourses to people that would come to him and ask him questions or come to him with troubles and problems.

He even did this to devas too,

Right?

There would be a lot,

Certain amount of times according to the commentaries where he would open up to other worldly beings that would come,

And he's known as the teacher of men and devas or heavenly beings too,

So that was another one of his titles.

And he was also summonsed by kings too,

So he could move in those circles too.

There's times when he would go visit a king for whatever time and then go back into the forest and with his entourage of monks or whatever too that have joined the order supposedly.

Yes,

Which is very similar to the stories that were made up around the character we know as Jesus.

It's the same idea.

We have the three wise men that comes at his birth,

Which was at the Chaldeans where we had wise men,

I don't know what to call the wise men,

But the sages.

We had the priesthood,

We had the nobility,

We had the commoners,

And we had the wise men or the prophets.

We had that in the cultural setting,

And we had it in Egypt,

We had it in India,

We had it.

So that's a similarity.

We have the cultural settings that are more or less similar.

Yes,

Like a priest class,

And there's a merchant class,

Farmers too,

And then sometimes they lumped,

I think,

The warriors in with the nobility too,

But yeah,

There's a warrior class.

No,

But the important thing to understand is that both the farmers and the warriors and the tradesmen,

And not as much the tradesmen,

But most of these commoners were slaves.

So they were not free people.

They were under the slave of the king or the slave of the landlord or the slave of the nobility or whoever owned the land they were living on.

So they were not farmers for themselves,

They were farming for their landlord and what was left,

They could eat.

So we have this poverty that were ruling the commoners.

Or even the caste system in India,

Even if it didn't play out exactly,

There was the caste system,

Which is basically its own version.

Yes,

But it's the same idea,

Which we have in all ancient cultures.

So that's important to take in,

So we don't think that they were living like we are living today.

So when we talk about farmers,

Oh yeah,

We think,

Oh,

This is me having my own little farm.

No,

They were living seriously shitty lives.

So that's important.

I also think there is,

Not that I'm saying it's the same,

But St.

Paul,

When he was one of the teachers of Christianity later on from the offshoot of the Jewish branch,

He worked with the Greek people.

And one of the Greek seekers of Christianity,

Once it has shifted from being a Jewish cult into being what we could call for the heathens as well.

And St.

Paul,

He did that teaching.

And he was also,

He was from Taurus,

Which is,

I think it's Turkey today.

And he was this kind of guy that also had had this high level education,

Used to be a Pharisee.

Now to go into all of these details,

Point being is he was a higher level educated man.

He knew how to,

He didn't know how to write.

So he had other people writing things down for him,

But he had educated himself into Greek philosophy and all sorts of things,

Which is now being woven into Christianity as we know of it.

But he had the problem of trying to teach something for the Greek speakers,

The Greek language people,

Sorry about that,

Where he had difficulties in conveying the Jewish ideas to the Greek speaking people.

And he had to invent words,

He had to invent ideas.

And where I wanna go with this is that when the Buddha as a royalty,

Having studied old Hindu philosophy,

Which is enormously high level compared to the time and the age.

He's familiar with all of that.

Yes,

So he knew all of these things.

And he was talking to laymen slaves that had no idea of whatever.

How was he going to convey these ideas?

So there must have been where he used his practicality as what he learned from the gurus.

And when he was suffering himself or suffering himself,

He was starving himself,

Put himself into all sorts of weird experiences where he really pushed his body to the edge and discovered that was not the path.

The guru path was not to go into this strict discipline of starvation and just sitting still in weird positions.

And then understanding,

No,

This is different.

But how did he put that together and talk to these lay people?

So that's why we kind of say when we discuss the teachings or the sayings or the mythology,

Because it could be made up all of it.

But if we go with the idea that the sayings might be accurate to some degree,

Because they were downsized for laymen,

For lay people,

So they could understand it.

So did he really convey his information or did he make it more simple so people could understand it?

One thing's coming to mind,

If he's doing this lifestyle where he's begging for his food.

So if I had to beg for my food,

I would imagine though that I would be very tuned in with all kinds of people in order to get fed.

So the more I could relate to them and see how they are living their life,

Then the more I strategy I might have come up with of how to get food from them.

So that's the other thing that comes to mind,

But that's right.

So yeah,

It's very good points here.

It is the same,

Interesting enough,

Because there's a saying in the gospels where Jesus sends out his disciples and he says to them,

The only thing you have is your sandals on your feet and the clothes you're wearing and the knife in your belt.

And you are to literally beg for food because that will teach you how to be humble.

That will teach you the meaning of being a healer and preaching the word and the gospel,

Because that is also oriented around suffering,

Interestingly enough.

Absolutely.

So it's a redemption as in you need to suffer to redeem yourself to go back to the heavenly realm.

So that's interesting.

It is.

And I'm wondering about the knife and maybe we can come back to that in a second.

You cut the bread with a knife and you can cut woods with a knife and it's a tool of survival.

Interesting.

Now I'm seeing parallels in the Midwest,

In America,

Where a lot of people carry a knife on them so they can use it for all those different things,

Right?

Yeah,

So that's wild.

And then the amount of Christianity in the Midwest too.

And the way the mendicants,

That's a fancy word for basically you're a beggar,

Right?

A mendicant.

And so they go out and look for food,

But the way they look at it once you've joined the order too,

Is that,

Okay,

You're not just doing this on your own because you're a freeloader,

Right?

You're going there only during certain times.

There's so many rules about it.

So you're not imposing,

You do it during certain times.

And then it's like,

You're reliant on the community.

So you're not completely removed.

And so usually people want something in return for that.

So it's incentive to show that you will give teachings back,

You will give offerings,

Or they send,

What do they call it,

A chant.

They'll offer them a chant,

Well wishes or whatever they might do in return.

Freely offer teachings for people to benefit them more psychologically.

So they're supposed to be giving something back to setting the example for the community,

These types of things.

And also knowing,

Yeah,

That you might not eat that day either,

You know?

So that's when the hunger is a part of stress too.

So they,

Yeah,

You have to,

So that's that huge whole dynamic.

Now,

Going into what you said about how the similarities of Christianity and Buddhism,

I did read a book and I wasn't too impressed actually,

Honestly,

Is Thich Nhat Hanh's book,

"'Living Buddha,

Living Christ.

" But in that book,

He goes to the perilous,

And that's a whole other podcast on its own,

Right?

But so just know that you're not the only one,

Right?

It's been,

There's a- Yes,

I know.

And there's also within the esoteric communities,

There are the ones that are saying,

Well,

Jesus did go to,

He was taught by,

People are coming up,

Oh,

He was taught by the Buddha or the Buddha in an enlightened version,

Or he went to India and he was taught the Buddhist teachings or these kinds of things.

During the missing years in Christianity.

Yes,

Exactly.

Where was he at during the missing years?

Yes,

So,

And I'm just saying that's taking from a scholar perspective,

That the gospels are made up stories.

They are not accurate accounts of his living.

There might've been some sayings left,

But everything we know about that character,

That's why I call the character Jesus.

And there are things where we could say,

There might be proof that he actually did exist in some of the St.

Paul's texts,

Where he says he goes to Jerusalem to meet with the brothers of Jesus.

But the question is,

Are we talking the brothers in spirit,

Or are we talking actual physical biological brothers?

And they claim it is the physical biological brothers.

So,

But we don't know.

So the general understanding is that all of the sayings are put into these,

What we call biographies that were made later on to create a narrative,

A story to understand the sayings,

To put it into context where he's teaching,

Where he's saying this,

He's teaching the rabbis,

What have we.

And whenever I read the stories about the Buddha,

That's where my mind goes right away.

These stories are made up.

I'm not taking them as literal accounts of lay people who couldn't read,

Who couldn't write.

These were the first monks.

Having written it down,

No,

I don't see it that way.

I see it as something that's been created later on.

So that's another question.

We have to consider that,

Absolutely.

Because especially since the going story is that,

It was initially an oral tradition,

Right?

It was just never written down,

But then,

And then people memorized it,

Right?

So people supposedly memorized exact,

And they held a council as soon as he died,

And then they all got together.

Okay,

This is what the Buddha said.

And then,

You know,

It was just keep the basket of the suttas,

Right?

That most people know,

Not the Abhidhamma and the Vinaya,

Which is the monks' rules.

That's a whole nother,

Let's just say the suttas.

Yeah,

Or what,

Supposedly what the Buddha said,

You know?

And then,

So everybody would get together,

And they supposedly all agreed on what he said,

But they still didn't write it down.

It wasn't until the third council,

And I don't know exactly how long,

That there was some kind of fear,

Supposedly,

That it had run out.

And I was,

Even on Wikipedia,

I read that they were also afraid that people were infiltrating the order,

And trying to dilute it and confuse things.

And so they wanted to write it down,

Which,

Who knows?

I mean,

I don't wanna get into too much speculation,

But I mean,

That very well could have been,

You know,

If they were being infiltrated.

No,

It's the exact same thing that happened to Christianity.

Exactly the same thing.

It's interesting.

So,

And then not only that,

Not only that whole thing,

But then after the years go,

And the translation,

The preservation,

Because they wrote these things down on these,

What,

Palm leaves?

I forget the exact term for them,

But they had to keep copying,

Because they didn't last very long.

So they were always scribing it again,

And then they would hear,

They would hear somebody speak it,

Or something,

And then the word would change a little bit,

Depending on how they heard it,

And then once it wrote down,

Then some people would keep with that,

Or some people would,

So just all the time that goes by,

Where it can be diluted and watered down,

Even if it's based on something to begin with,

Credible to begin with,

And I don't,

We don't,

And then there's some scholars that say,

Well,

The Pali language,

If I'm getting this wrong,

I'm getting this wrong,

All right,

That he didn't actually speak Pali,

He spoke some similar version of that,

But it was kind of,

Came up afterwards when it was written down to preserve it that way,

But it's maybe like Latin today,

There's no native Pali speakers,

Like I don't think there's any country where people come out of the womb and then the whole country and everybody starts speaking Pali around them,

Just like Latin,

Yeah,

They don't,

As far as we know,

So that's another ball of wax,

So there's all these different things that are possible.

Yes,

It's exactly the same thing with the Hebrew Bible,

The translation,

It's the same with the Gospels,

That's why we had the Council of Nicaea,

Yes,

We're not going to conspiracy theories here,

But the first 300 years after the supposed living of Christ and the crucifixion was that exactly,

We had many different interpreters of what he was saying and they were also lay people and then there was this group that were around him and they were trying to preserve what was being said and then we had St.

Paul that created a whole new other branch,

Which is the one we have,

The Western Christianity,

And all of these things,

So everything was in the mix,

Everything was thrown up in the air,

People trying to remember what was said and again,

I want to point out that the ones that were doing this tried to preserve what he actually said.

Did they even understand what he was saying?

And they were lay people,

So and he had downsized his teachings,

So what did they carry on?

How accurate are these carry ons?

And how much,

The scholars say,

Well,

At that time people were good at reciting things,

Which we've seen,

They learned it verbatim,

They learned how to repeat it again and again and again,

And the problem then became when they began to write it down because then you had a smudge on the paper or you had something and then it had to be in a word,

So it's the same idea the scholars are using,

So we could say that's the scholars' approach of,

Sorry about that,

How things have been preserved,

But we don't know if that's accurate either,

So we are literally looking into,

Blindfolded into the past,

Trying to make ideas,

So when we talk about people that are discussing,

Does this mean this or that or whatever,

Then we are all on the same level because nobody knows.

Exactly,

That's why I was,

Early on,

I tried to trace it back to the origins as much as I could and I found things like,

Well,

The only complete Pali text is on woodblock in a monastery in Korea,

Of all places.

The rest are kind of here and there,

Pieces that they've kind of pieced together,

There's really no,

That's even the written thing down.

Now,

And plus there's no unbroken oral tradition,

So once the unbroken oral tradition where you have before the elders would die,

They would make sure all their various students would have this exact same knowledge of the,

They could recite the entire thing by heart,

And then if that's,

That carries down generation after generation without any error,

Supposedly,

Given that they still have all their faculties and there's enough people to cross-reference,

Well then it has more accurate,

But when you start writing things down,

Some people think the opposite,

Where it would be better preserved that way.

Well,

Yes and no,

Because if you can't,

If there's those little errors,

They add up and there's no unbroken oral tradition like that too.

Now,

The other thing is.

And you have to pick the words you're using,

But what if the words have several meanings,

How are you going to do that?

That's another thing too.

Well,

You first have to have the starting point for the literal,

Okay,

And then the interpretation comes later,

But even if you don't have the literal thing down there that you can refer to,

Then there can be,

The interpretation can be even further off,

Right?

Because if you get the thing wrong to begin with,

Then you can be interpreting the wrong things to begin with.

So there's all these complications with this.

And not only that,

The time period was so different.

So just think about when my grandmother died,

And then we'll go into the good,

The positive versions though too.

So,

But just to set the ground here for that,

She barely recognized the life she lived.

She grew up,

You hear these stories,

But no running water,

Like they had to make their own clothing and food,

Right?

There was,

I think they even had horse and buggy maybe at the very beginning,

Right?

No outhouses and things like this and no communication.

Then you get to the,

Where at the end,

Where I'm showing her this iPhone and all the things that held in my hand that,

You know,

So it's just completely unrecognized.

That's only a hundred years.

So we're talking about what,

Five,

Is it four or five,

600 BCE,

Where this is,

So it's just almost unimaginable how different things could be in the state of mind that people could be in.

So that's another.

And I would actually claim when we talk about the philosophers and the sages,

They were probably more educated in the realms of the other worlds than we are today.

So I would,

I would actually throw in there,

If you ask me,

If I were to go somewhere to find what,

If I were to do an inquiry of,

Okay,

I want to know what Buddhism really is.

I did that actually years ago.

And my solution was that I needed to go into contemplation and I needed to go in and connect with the Devas,

The other world,

The beings,

The ones that,

Not that he told them,

But.

No,

He did.

Yes,

I know that's the saying,

But sorry about that.

I'm not going to buy that one.

But for me,

That's a made up story,

But he did have conversations.

Well,

That's why.

And you can go in,

If we talk about the Rupas,

The other world of beings,

That can both be the underworld and the heavenly beings.

They,

We definitely,

As I am having,

This is where I just throw that one in there,

Which alluding to the other podcasts we've done together,

I do communicate with other world of beings.

And some of them,

Yes,

You can definitely teach them stuff.

They won't listen because they're very,

They're very oriented within their own realms and their own ways of living.

And some of them are what we call extraterrestrials.

So,

The point is that they would,

Even them would not perhaps even have the correct version of it.

So where could we get that correct version?

And that's where,

In my experiences with this work,

I have kind of come across what we call the white naga,

The snake beings that are technically the guardians of the underworld.

They're keeping some very nasty things controlled down there.

But they're also the wisdom snakes.

They also call the flame lords.

So there you get some information,

But they are also oriented towards some kind of purpose of what they want to convey that information.

So when we talk about this,

Where do we then get the quote unquote truth?

Nowhere.

So what's the point of having this discussion as if we're doing the scholar thing?

I want to know the truth of what's going on there as you do the mold of thing.

I want to believe.

No,

I want to know the truth,

Right?

So where do we get that?

Nowhere.

So that's where we go and say,

Okay,

What then,

What do we have?

What can we work with?

Since we can't find the truth or the true teachings or the true understanding of things as because of what we talked about here,

Then we can,

As practitioners today,

Practice the dynamics of meditation,

Practice the dynamics of being in the now,

Of observation,

Of psychological developmental processes,

Of learning how to transform energy,

Learning how to evolve who and what we are,

And perhaps not into the original concepts of enlightenment,

Today we call it awakening,

But going to say expanded awareness.

How do we get to the faculties that leads us to expanded awareness?

And there I see the value of the Buddhist teaching system,

Because for me,

That's still,

Aside from psychology,

That only goes so far,

That could be kind of,

That adds in the extra,

Where you have the enlightenment,

Where you work with your brain in a way that science doesn't know of today,

With the Buddhist monks where I began,

In contemplation meditation,

You can develop your brain into developing new neural network via meditation,

Via contemplation,

Via working with energy.

And this is,

You kind of mostly said most of what I wanted to say too,

But yeah,

This is,

What is the importance of this text?

So even though it might not be accurate,

Is there still saljable things?

And I would say yes,

You know,

Some of the practices laid out like Anapanasati,

The mindfulness of breathing,

The four foundations of mindfulness,

These layout,

These things,

And it's also important,

The most important thing,

You have to see and know this for yourself,

Even the teachings say that,

You can't take his word for it,

You know,

You can't,

You have to put these things to the test along with your other things and be a practitioner,

That's all,

It's not just another philosophy,

Design's another philosophy just to read and think about and that,

That's part of it,

But it's also putting it to your own experiential knowledge,

Right?

And bouncing it off of otherwise folks,

Just a few things with the other worldly realms,

That's a whole fascination thing I would love to explore sometime maybe,

But I don't know too much about the Buddhist cosmology,

But you know,

The kind of the demons,

Their yakas are some of them,

And then there's also the devas and the different heavenly realms,

And then they go beyond that and there's the Brahma realms,

Right?

And then,

But even that,

If we know that things change,

Even these,

If people aren't practicing looking into these realms and interacting with these beings,

Then they're just repeating a cosmos story from way back,

But as we know in this reality,

Right?

Things change significantly,

So why wouldn't the other worldly realms change?

So I was wondering if there's deep practitioners with abilities who could go into these things,

Look at the old ancient texts,

See,

Follow the timeline from then to now,

See how these realms have changed,

What significant change,

There's just so much,

Right?

To the on the levels like Moggallana,

Who was known as the foremost psychic powers or Aniruddha was known as the one with the foremost divine eye that can see the most into these realms.

And so,

I mean,

Where are the Buddhist practitioners today?

I would say if there are,

They're locked up,

Not locked up,

But as far as the lay people go,

And maybe for good reasons,

In the monastic order,

And this isn't really for the laymen,

Right?

Because it doesn't apply to the layman,

But the one thing,

I mean,

This is just a kind of a hobby of mine,

These things like this,

And maybe it does belong behind the orders,

This type of work,

I don't know.

But the main thing is what kind of practical wisdom can be taken from the text,

And then either updated today,

What needs to be let go of,

What's applicable now,

And how do we do that?

How can we also extract what's most important and not have to spend years and years and years of study all the time?

Not that there's a quick fix all the time either,

But yeah,

These things ought to be known.

And I think we might wanna start wrapping this one up,

And we set off to talk about dukkha,

So maybe we can do that in the next one.

This is,

I think,

A good introductory,

Covered a lot of different things in setting this up too,

Yeah?

Yes,

Because it is important when we talk,

Many,

In my opinion,

Many people fall into the trap of reading the text,

And then they begin to discuss the text,

And then they begin to battle each other on who is right and who is wrong and how to interpret this.

And for me,

That's then missing the entire point of the text.

Absolutely,

That's scholar stuff.

Yes,

But also lay people,

As in kind of with the worshippers and the followers,

As I call them,

Then they cling on to the literal interpretation of the text and become very rigid and missing the entire point of contemplation.

So for me,

All of the texts that we have,

And that would be my point of view until otherwise proven,

Is that everything you will present me with of text material,

Whatever it's mythology or the sayings of the Buddha or whatever comes up,

He's,

Oh,

He said this,

Or this is how it happened or whatever.

I will always,

Sorry about that,

But I will need to be very square there and say,

As we say in Danish,

Very square,

Adamant,

Kind of,

Yes,

These are made up texts.

But we can use them for contemplation.

We can use them for inner work.

We can focus on specific terminology,

On specific sayings,

As with the hole in the ground.

What is this showing us?

What's the dynamics here?

What is the learning lesson?

What's the energy behind?

And as most people will discover when they do work with ancient texts,

If they work far enough through the mythology,

Through the sayings,

Through the narrative,

Go and follow the trail of one word as Dukkha,

Which we'll work with in the next podcast,

There will be a symbol at the end of it.

And that's the symbol that's used for enlightenment.

That's the one that you need to put in the center of the head,

Which is the joint light that comes in your meditation practice.

Eventually,

There will be this center of light in the middle of your head.

And there the symbol will go in,

And that will technically ignite the light,

The eye that sees the worlds that are beyond these.

Ah,

Okay.

And so,

Yeah,

We'll explore that further for sure.

That's fascinating.

It's right,

Because even,

This is one thing I'm really drawn to,

This,

We'll just call it Buddhism,

Right?

Is there's,

The doctrine is kind of 180 on most things.

It's a doctrine of open inquiry.

So I would say anybody that ascribes to that,

Subscribes or aspires to that,

They have to start from that very beginning,

That what the text is,

There's a potential that that's not,

It's the validity or source of it,

It can be completely questionable.

So you have to even ask questions about that.

So yeah,

So the hardliners about this as well,

No,

No.

Well,

You have to be open-minded and do the inquiry on it to see and know for yourself that that is either valid or invalid,

Or here's what's helpful,

Here's what's not,

Right?

Yes,

So yeah.

So in my understanding,

Including also,

If we said there was a character,

Jesus,

That did these teachings as well as the Buddha,

If there was a Buddha,

As we know of it,

For me,

If I were to look in and say,

Okay,

How would that,

We're talking about the problem with language,

The higher level of education,

Not that Jesus had that,

But this is focused on the Buddha.

If he had this high level of education,

How,

And he had these encounters with the Arupas,

He had these encounters with the Nagas,

He was getting information from the lunar Buddhas,

Which were also other realm,

Other worldly beings from other realms.

There are the ancient councils of the ones that have gone before him that he was tapping into.

How would they have taught him these symbols,

These understandings?

This is after he went through all of these stressful,

With teaching the body in a specific way that literally broke down all of his barriers,

As we say in the chakras,

The teaching systems,

That should break down the seal between the chakras so that you reach the ability to work with energy on his correct level,

The pranayama using the breath,

Opening up to the higher winds that will open up your mind field that will allow you to work with these very advanced levels of information where you do connect to the other world of beings.

Then how did he convey that to his layman?

He would have given them sayings and then said to them,

Focus on this word,

Go in meditation,

Focus on that word,

Meditate on that word,

And continue to meditate on that word until it turns into a symbol.

And that's kind of where I want to end this podcast,

If you ask me.

I just wrap up here that,

Yeah,

Even if people are hardliners and say,

Well,

You know,

No,

Randy,

You're a little bit off.

He taught more standardized methods for achieving the thing.

But what it comes down to is the teaching of the handful of leaves.

He took the monks to the forest,

He grabbed a bunch of leaves and he said,

Okay,

What's greater,

The leaves in my hand or the leaves in the forest?

And they said,

Well,

Of course,

The leaves in your hand.

And he said,

Exactly.

While my knowledge and vision is equivalent to the trees in the forest,

What I teach though is just in my hand.

Dukkha and the end of Dukkha.

The question remains,

How did he get that other knowledge and wisdom?

You know,

Where did that come from?

He didn't teach that,

But he knew it.

So this is where I'm so fascinated in your work is because these are actual,

You know,

In a way,

If it can be called practical,

These are ways that how this extra knowledge is accessible and gainable,

Even though he didn't teach it,

You know,

He had access to all that.

And how did he get that,

You know,

Where did it come from?

And so these are types.

It's a good distinction you make there because I take it and made a little bit of what we call a mind jump,

Because what I teach and talk about here would be in your understanding of when we do the Buddha,

He would have exactly as you said,

Layman that he would convey one type of information to.

What I allude to here with all of these secret knowledge for the monks,

So whenever I talk about this,

It's not never really for the layman,

Because the way I practice Buddhism in my,

The monk I was back then,

That was the level that was the secret,

The esoteric level of it.

So I will always go into that.

So that's why I've got a lot of information that's not out there,

Which is not accessible,

Which is not part of the canon,

So to speak.

But because that was handed over by the layman and then the monks,

As it is with all secret societies and all esoteric teachings,

They knew the symbols,

They knew how to contemplate.

So we could say the Buddha,

He had probably as all wisdom teachers and all that are working with the secret teachings,

He would have had what we call the outer ring that are the layman,

The commoners,

And then he would have the different buildup of monks and then he would have the ones that were even closer to him and then he would have the one that would be completely as close to him as were possible,

Because they had genetic energetic affinity with him and they would get a lot of information.

No one else would get almost like an osmosis because they would be in his field,

Similar to what we know as the Diksha where you have this high level teacher that is able to transfer via osmosis or via hands or just by being in their field,

That high level of information.

They might not carry the energy for a longer period of time,

But they would have insights.

When he would go up in high energy and he would sit in his position either choosing one of the other mudras,

He would exemplify it for the inner circle with that level of information.

That's how they would get it.

They would forget it,

But they would at least have seen it.

So this is really fascinating how this,

Where this lines up with my understanding of the teachings and the extra layers.

So I just pick up on these.

So even though it said there's no esoteric teachings in Buddhism that he's not hiding anything,

The way this is kind of comes to a balance is that he,

Maybe that's true,

Maybe it's not,

But one way to kind of rectify that in a way is that he only taught publicly suffering and the end of suffering.

So that's why there wasn't too much stuff hidden in the canon in a way.

Now,

However,

There's a whole lot of evidence that there's a whole rule that I'm not,

Rules upon rules called the Vinaya for monks.

And I'm not very familiar with that,

But from my understanding,

They could not talk about their attainments to lay people.

They could talk about their attainments to other people in the order,

And I won't go into,

There's all kinds of reasons for that,

Maybe good and bad or whatever.

And so that was the way.

And then there's whole other things with the rules and what your mind or not,

There's kind of a joke around that which ones are still relevant today.

Yeah,

And then,

So that's another thing.

Then like you said,

With the close people,

There was the kind of the chief disciples,

They call them.

The one that was by him most,

It seemed,

Is his cousin attendant Ananda.

But the ironic part there is supposedly,

Maybe it was a teaching to him.

He didn't really achieve enlightenment until after the Buddha passed away.

And it wasn't until he finally gave up when his head was falling to a pillow that he gained awakening or something.

But that's not like the other ones,

Which it's known that,

Yeah,

He was supposedly,

He had all these ascetics that he just spoke certain words and teachings in his presence,

Right?

That they became fully enlightened beings because they were ripe for it.

And other people gained like the first level just because of his immense power.

And so this backs up what I was saying there.

Okay,

Well,

So we're gonna wrap this up and I guess we'll go on to the next one with we'll focus more on Dukkha and kind of past lives and how that might be involved too.

Yes,

Thank you.

All right.

Yeah,

Good foundation.

Indeed.