When we talk about having a balanced practice, the word, "Balance", it's so important. How many of you can ride a bike? Probably all of you. Did you have to balance in the beginning? Yes. How many of you can ice skate, how many of you can do other things that require balance? Does it take practice in the beginning, do you fall off sometimes? Yeah. Now within our practice, if you use all the techniques in a balance, you're not going to get into the Dukkha of being too heavy because we don't teach that. But if you stay just with Dukkha meditation, if you stay just with death meditation, if you stay just with the heavies, then, yes, you're going to exhaust yourself. But we're not saying that, we're saying to use the other techniques, as well.
Now, the Compassion/Lovingkindness meditation that we teach has a built in balance so that we don't go into the heavy too much and we don't go too high, either. It has the compassion which looks at the Dukkha, it has the lovingkindness which looks at the ending of Dukkha, and the freedom and happiness that comes out of that. So when you're doing the Compassion/Lovingkindness wish, to actually know that you're ending on a high, you're not ending on the low. If you're doing Compassion/Lovingkindness and your making yourself depressed, you're actually not doing it right. Talk to us in the interviews, find out what you're doing wrong. Because the Compassion/Lovingkindness starts with thinking about Dukkha and wishing the person can end it, and the phrase that we use ends with wishing them peace of mind, wishing the big one, wishing that they are able to get out of all the Dukkha. Maybe you're not using the phrase right, maybe you've invented you're own which is also okay, but maybe it's not working right in regards to the effect it is having on you.
So, what about How Fortunate You Are? Is there anyone of you here in the hall who is not fortunate? Raise you're hand if you're really not fortunate. Should be impossible, your arm should weight a thousand pounds right now. You can't say you're not fortunate. I don't care what your background is, and I know all of your backgrounds, and I know some of you have had worse things happen to you then other people here - but it doesn't matter because you're here. You're actually here doing this retreat, you have the chance of a lifetime and it's not your first chance either. Everyone of you have done at least two retreats, some of you have done tons of retreats - this is great, this is wonderful. Now all of a sudden, as I'm talking here to you, some of you have some smiles coming up on your face. Nice. Can you do this to yourself? Do you need me to sit next to you and do it for you all of the time? I can't be there - sorry, I don't have that psychic power. So you have to do this to yourself. You have to truly understand how fortunate you are, you have to really reflect on it; and you don't just have to reflect on it, you have to believe it. There is a difference. You have to believe it.
Open your vision up to everyone else on the planet. Would you like to trade your life with a lot of other people on the planet? Imagine there are a hundred people on the street, all wearing hats, and you're in a building next to this street on the fifth floor and you look down and you can see those hundred people down there, all wearing hats, but you can't see what they look like. Now I'll ask you, would you trade your life for anyone of them? Just pick one and consider to yourself, "Would you trade it?" No! What's the reason why you won't trade it? Because you think you might get a worse deal. Yeah, because most of the world has a worse life than every one of you here. So you have to reflect on this. You have to drive it in there and you have to believe that, and when you believe it you're going to have a lot more happiness in your life. You're going to watch self-pity kind of disappear and you're going to wonder what happened. You're going to be a person whose inside is smiling most of the day. You're going to be more content. You're not going to get weighed down, you're not going to be, what did this person say, "Losing my equanimity and falling into despair". No, you're not going to be like that if you actually believe how fortunate you are. And then that energy gives you more energy to do this practice - which is so hard.
Now, what do I say in the hall tomorrow morning? I say this is the hardest thing in the world to do. The hardest thing in the world to do. But you have a chance. How many people don't have a chance? How many Westerners are on the island today? How many are getting stoned, getting drunk, doing whatever, playing, swimming, blah, blah, blah, and do they care about something like this? Some do. Some do, but a lot of them don't. We know dozens of people that have been living on this island for a long time and they don't ever come here for a retreat. Doesn't matter to them, they're not interested. So, I was talking before about Kamma, their Kamma is not strong enough to support coming here, but you guys you have it, you have this wonderful chance. So open that up more and more.