Last week, we talked about the “Energy ball.” I hope you have been investigating this practice of transforming the dark, negative energy with compassion.  When you do this, in the place of the destructive energy, we have a different power which is love, and understanding, and caring, and sharing, and helping each other to grow and heal. I hope this is what you have discovered.

Many times, even if you are not wrong, it is good to apologize just to give space to the other person to be able to come down to that level. Then, they can say, ‘Hey, you know what? I am sorry. I am the one wrong. You are not.’ 

Do you see it? You need to give that space.

If it is just fighting like two… we call it, “Pelea de Gallos,” like a cockfight: “Oh, look who has the bigger feathers, who has the cooler walk,” or whatever, like that… it just goes on and on and on endlessly. It will never reach anywhere apart from merely boosting each other’s ego. Also, it creates that habit of… putting yourself in this kind of vicious cycle of suffering.

Eventually, I mean anything that you do that can hurt someone, will eventually end up becoming suffering for yourself.  When the motivation is egoist….like, ‘Oh, no, I have to show that I am right.  I do not care what I say or how I do it. I have to show them that I am right!’ like that, then, that is not a compassionate way of doing things. 

Sometimes, you must let the other person be right for them to recognize that they are wrong. Does that make sense?  Yeah!

So, just make sure you confront yourself. Do not do spiritual bypassing. Ok?  If you do spiritual bypassing, then, it is going to be… that you are practicing for thirty, forty years and you are going to be in the same place.

So, spirituality is complementary. Ok? The guru is complimentary. Dharma is complimentary. You are not going to the guru.  You are not going to the Dharma, ok? 

You are trying to find yourself.   You are trying to find the potential to understand yourself, to understand the nature of the mind.  Use it as a tool to help others so that they, also, can find that peace of mind, to find that happiness, that joy.

Happiness can only come from within… right?  That is, I think, a treasure. When we know that, when we discover that, we already have everything we need to be happy. It is just a question of perception.  It is a matter of, “Habit alignment.” Do you understand? 

It is a case of motivation and intention. If the intention is… empathic to help others to improve their lives to be better, then that is automatically going to make you happy. The result will always be happiness and satisfaction… Right? 

Even if the other person does not value you or they are not grateful, if your intention was right, you will be happy. Their attitude is up to them.  You cannot take other people’s mistakes and make them personal. You cannot mix it. I hope you see this. 

There is a story about the Buddha. When Buddha was starting to teach, he became a kind of a big threat to the Hindus and to some other religions that were there at that time.

So, there was a man who was sort of a priest. He got really upset with the Buddha. He was like… “I am going to make him get angry in public so that everybody sees that he is not a real… teacher, or a real Buddha,” or whatever.

So, he went to challenge the Buddha.   He was outraged. He was full of hate and anger and other similar emotions. He already started shouting when he was far away from the Buddha. He kept getting closer, getting closer, getting closer. Then, he was quite near the Buddha shouting at him.  He was just really insulting him putting him to the test. The Buddha did not flinch, at all. He was smiling, super calm, super happy.

After about an hour, the guy is wondering, “Why? What is up with this guy?” 

There was a point where he just gave up… He was like… “Wow, the Buddha is awesome… It is amazing.  It is not bothering him as it would normal people.”

So, he gets on his knees.  He is like, “Hey, Buddha. Can you tell me…?   What is your secret? How come it did not affect you?  I mean, nobody could withstand so much verbal attack in front of everybody.  Anybody else would get nervous and protective, defensive, whatever.” 

Then, the Buddha did something that he often would do. He would answer a question with a question.  So, the Buddha said, “I will ask you a question.”  He said, “If somebody comes to your house with a gift that you do not accept, who gets to keep it?’  That was his answer the Buddha gave to this man.

So, already, that guy, was like, ‘Wow!’ His mind was blown away. So, he goes, ” Yeah, I get to keep all my shit.’ He left but, at least, his mind was transformed, you know.

I truly like these stories because they say a lot about many aspects of life. It is true. So, many times we take personally what other people do because we expect them to love, or appreciate us, or be grateful for us. Then, that is why we are not giving love unconditionally… unconditionally. There is a condition there.

If what you call, “Love”, brings the result of suffering, then, it is not real love. It is an attachment. Unconditional love does not come with strings attached. There is no expectation. It is not like, “Ok.  I will love you if you stay with me only”. Do you understand? That is not unconditional love… I mean … come on!

Maybe you will disagree with me but… I have had that issue many times.  It is difficult.  Sometimes, we do have to challenge ourselves and be more flexible to be able to find that balance within ourselves which is what we all want. 

My father used to always say,… “Everything with, “Moderación,”…you know? …everything with a balance…everything with a limit.

What do you say?… Everything in moderation… is good. Anything without moderation is bad. I think this comes from the Roman comic dramatist Plautus, ‘moderation in all things is the best policy.” 

The point is that, without moderation, even water can kill you.  There is a water drinking competition in the States.  Somebody drank so much, their stomach exploded.  So, you see, that is the thing… everything with moderation.

It is ok if you know where the limit is. I am not saying to eat something radioactive. I am talking about in general.  I am talking about, like within ourselves. We must be able to find that balance. Many times, the question is…’Oh, but this…”  “Oh, but is it like that… ?“  “Is that ok?”   “Is that not ok?”  “Oh, oh… dah, dah, dah”. You know,  it is like… sometimes you must answer the questions yourself. You cannot always rely on somebody to tell you the truth. You must be able to decipher what works for you. What works…What is your truth?

Many times, we want to be led. We want someone to take our hand and drag us somewhere.

No! Sometimes, we must walk ourselves. So, we must make that decision. We must choose what is good for us.  Similarly, we must choose what is not good for us.

Do not fool yourself.  Confront yourself. Check yourself. Be like, “Hey, ok, where do I want to go?” “What do I want to achieve?” “How do I want to be happy?” Do you see the point? 

If it is through having a disciplined schedule, that is good. My father has always been very disciplined. Without his schedule, he is super unhappy. He needs his schedule.

For me, it is the contrary. If I am too disciplined, too scheduled, then, I get paranoid. I get nervous. 

This is because my childhood was super scheduled, super disciplined. So, I need some flexibility. I need to be able to feel free to choose. I have to kind of like… maneuver.

So, each person must find that for themselves.  I feel that is, also, something important in life, to find that balance within you. You have to move a little bit here and there to find that.

Do not be too extreme.

Do not be too hard on yourself.

Do not be too light on yourself either. Do you understand?

Sometimes, you do have to be disciplined.