gathered here to basically to follow the Buddhist practice in general. And another thing I should tell you, if you want to follow Shravakayana and the Mahayana only, I would still suggest “Joining the Sacred and the Mundane‟ is necessary. But all the other and the next is”Following the Buddha‟s Footsteps‟ – even that is necessary, but after that, you don‟t really need. Or you should follow a specific Theravadan or Mahayana tradition.

So the Stage One “Joining the Sacred…‟ – I really, I consider this quite an important one because here you‟re planting the seed of spiritual path. It is also here you will, you know, you will develop this eh, develop eh, non-satisfaction towards the worldly logic. It is also here that you are developing the “seeker‟s‟ mind‟ – “searcher‟, “searcher‟s mind‟. At this point, searching mind is much more difficult, eh much more important than mind of somebody who found something. This will, I think, enrich you. This will make you, of course, maybe sad and depressed with the worldly logic, worldly system. That is the PURPOSE.

If you are happy with worldly whatever, then no need to go into here. But that‟s not really; you know there‟s so many great past philosophers. They have chewed the end of the cigar, War Ballet, and thought deeply drinking thick coffee, and really getting depressed about the worldly situation. But they didn‟t do anything to follow the path. You know I have a feeling that someone like Nietzsche; if you ask – well, why not take a, you know this “McDonald vow‟? You know, he knows all of this is sort of pointless and all of that, but again no path – this is how I feel. And especially „McDonald vow‟ sounds very childish.

And then here, you are just not reading you know existentialistic books and get so critical about everything. Here you are doing at least two things. You are medit…, you are sitting, you are just sitting and you have taken a vow of, I don‟t know, McDonald‟s, Coca-Cola‟s, whatever, something like that. And my advice – don‟t take too many vows. Don‟t take complicated vows. Not eating pasta may be not the best idea (laughter) but not eating McDonald‟s Tuesday, every Tuesday or Wednesday – much better.

Also don‟t take a vow, thing that is completely, something that you even don‟t do. You know, like I will take a vow I will not bungee jump, you know there‟s no point (laughter). Take a vow that you have a temptation such as McDonald‟s. This is what I mean by joining the sacred and mundane. To enhance this, I would suggest; let‟s say if you have taken a vow of McDonald‟s, I will suggest every Tuesday you go to McDonald‟s. Yeah, you take a vow not to eat but you go there (laughter); not just to use the toilet but just watch your temptation or read the menu (laughter).

We are talking about building spiritual world; okay next stage is „Joining the Footstep‟ – no; “Following the Buddha‟s Footsteps”. Ah, here you take refuge. But this is not part of the ngondro if you‟re thinking. This is still just; let‟s say you want to become a Buddhist, you want do a little bit of practice. Purpose of this practice is to really make your spiritual path worthwhile. So the purpose is like bringing you from the wrong path to the right path. So your wrong path from the Buddhist point of view is some, something that believes in, a system that believes in extreme view.

Here it is good to receive a Refuge vow. This is your first Buddhist vow now, more than McDonald vow. You can take it from anybody who has received one actually, but someone who has done a lot of practice – monks, yogis, lamas would be good. Then reading materials; please contact us, we‟ll…; you know, doesn‟t really matter, basically history of Buddhism, Buddha and his stories; and this stage has no time period But I have, I have a, I have wanted to encourage you something strongly. When you reach to this stage, I want to suggest you, encourage you really, implore you to read „Sutra of Fortunate Eons‟. This Sutra, I have a reason to do this, several reasons, huh. One – we, the followers of the Buddha, tend to forget reading his own words. We are all reading shastras and commentaries. We only read maybe Heart Sutra, that‟s it. We don‟t read the, you know, His sutras, His teachings, and so on. I want people to read that. It‟s the ultimate authority, His words; if you are a Muslim, Koran; mm, like that; if you a Buddhist – sutras, okay.

Another thing; when you read the sutras – I don‟t want you to read it as if you are studying; I just want you to read. Doesn‟t matter whether it‟s your understanding or not, doesn‟t matter; I want you to read just. Your mind is thinking about other things, doesn‟t matter, just read. If you CAN think the meaning, that‟s good but no stress, just read. If situation allows, read aloud. This is practice in many Buddhist countries. There‟re several benefits in it.

One – whenever we read the Buddhist book, we that think we have to understand the meaning of it. It already makes you tired by not understanding so you close the book. You understand; so you never end up reading the book. Remember we are trying to build the atmosphere, the circumstance of the dharma, dharma world; and this is one. For instance, if you‟re, you know sometimes we play background music. Each word, we don‟t have to listen but if it‟s there, it creates the atmosphere. Like this, you just read.

Now meditation; those are reading lists but now the meditation PRACTICE. You have become a Buddhist now at this point. So, but you are not a ngondro practitioner, I suggest, I stress. Oh, by the way when you read the Buddha, Buddha‟s sutra, you can even think that this is none other than the Buddha and you are reading the Buddha‟s, okay. You have daily practice and it is good to have a daily practice – three times of reciting the Refuge vow. And I really stress the refuge so much because this is really the foundation of all the path. And then reciting the “Sutra of the Recollection of the Noble Three Jewels‟; and a little bit of shamatha practice; dedicate the merit afterwards. All this will take a few minutes; but point is consistently doing it every day.

Shamatha – is the usual shamatha here; we will have no time to explain, huh. Post-meditation practice – well, generally take, pay attention to the Refuge vows such as not harming other beings, such as respecting the representation of the Buddha, dharma and sangha like not to put the buddha statue, eh, you know underneath you, not to, you know walk over the statue, the dharma. Pay respect to the ordained sangha, and also; see all of these is a method of mindfulness. It’s got nothing to do with; you know if you don’t walk over a buddha’s statue, you know if you do walk over a buddha’s statue, the Buddha gets angry or something like that. Nothing to do with this; it’s all mindfulness practice.

And it is also; here again you see we are talking about the practice. Again we have to talk about the discipline. I would suggest here at the least, you visit to a place or a shrine that has a buddha‟s statue once a year and pay respect such as prostration, incense, flower or lamp. Observe, okay at least try to make an offering of either incense, flower or lamp or all three or two during one of the, eh, during, during the four Buddha‟s special days. See these are just to create mindfulness, again to create the atmosphere.

Now if your husband happens to be orthodox Jewish and if your father happens to be fanatical Christian and if your maid or the driver happens to be fundamental Muslim, meaning you can‟t do all of these in, in your house. Go to a dharma centre and do this. And very simple again; just to burn one lamp and walk out. Never make the practice very complicated; you know hours and hours, you can‟t do that. Now with that we have finished the general stages.

Now if you really want to pursue the spiritual path even more seriously and if you want to follow the tantric system, you go into ngondro. Now because it‟s a tantric practice, lineage is important. So therefore I would suggest you do receive transmission, „lung‟, of whatever ngondro you are going to practice – Longchen Nyingtik, Tersar Ngondro, Mahamudra, whatever.

At this point, it‟s good to have – it‟s only a suggestion, not must – to have a shrine. And again the shrine can as simple as a photo of the Buddha, nothing else. So do not over the board, buying all kinds of things and filling up all your space. Now if I‟m talking to my own students, I am telling them not to put next to that shrine, next to the Buddha, not to put like if I happen to be their teacher, not to put my photo. But actually there‟s a, there‟s a good reason for this.

You know it‟s really important; you see Buddhism at times suffers with being stigmatized as cult – which is absolutely unfair because from the philosophical point of view, Buddhism probably is the least cultish than ANY other religion. So I usually suggest to my friends or students, especially those who attract lots of visitors at home; you know when they see their sound and sober friend worshipping a human being, they have a strange idea about Buddhism. So in order to avoid that, because for them, for your non-Buddhist friends, non-practitioner friends, especially you know, for them they have no reason to NOT THINK this His Holiness this, His Holiness that as just another Jim Jones (laughter) – not think, huh. You know one who killed all himself and many students.

Also from the tantric point of view, ACTUALLY one is supposed to keep one‟s deity, guru and the consort completely secret. Okay, only on the shrine, you can put in the living room, kitchen, toilet, whatever; maybe not toilet – your Buddhist friends will condemn you (laughter).

Okay, reading lists; „Cutting through Spiritual Materialism‟ by Chogyam Rinpoche, and then you can also read my book at this point, and then „Words of My Perfect Teacher‟ by Patrul Rinpoche. Now this book „Kunzang Lame Shyalung‟ – again like the Sutra you read earlier, you read it for the blessing, not necessarily as a study material. And I am suggesting until the Guru Yoga practice, you finish reading „Words of My Perfect Teacher‟ three times. I‟ve written here five times but I think it‟s a bit too much; three times.

At this point it‟s good to have a teacher since you are a tantric practitioner. Teachers or a teacher; you can have as many as hundred and thirty. Both have advantage and disadvantage – I mean having one or many – both have advantage and disadvantage, okay.

What do you practice in here? Now this is really in the work in progress. I have suggested here five hundred hours. Maybe it‟s a bit too much so I have reduced to three hundred hours – three hundred hours of four eh, „Contemplating the Four Thoughts‟. You know, before the ngondro – precious human body, all that. It‟s really important because these thoughts will train your mind. It sounds a lot but it‟s REALLY important and this, the way to count the hours – similar to the last one.

Okay, now the actual Refuge practice – part of the ngondro, okay. So you have this traditional one hundred thousand prostrations with hundred thousand Refuge, what you call it – recitations. That you can do if you like. I‟m not opposing that, but I‟m suggesting two other options. Some of you who can‟t do prostration, let‟s say – five hundred thousand times of recitation only, no prostration – recitation of the Refuge, Supplication, whichever ngondro you‟re based on, and remembering the Triple Gem thirty-three thousand times. Ah, this is, this is something I need to explain. Let me finish the, the first what, you know, my options.