How did people feel when reflecting on feelings last week?
Did they gain any insight or a new perspective with last weeks information?

Some students did not know certain Buddhist terms
Samsara and karma
karma is an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth, or an act that has been done and the fruit of that act (good or evil). Karma follows you through lifetimes for example if you kill someone it may catch you this lifetime or next lifetime.

You reap what you sow. The action and the result of that action

Thay Do: how many types of karma?
Good, bad, and neutral.
Thay Thanh Karma can be natural such as eating or breathing. Getting a desire for a tasty food would create some other type of karma. There is a condition between cause and effect. If you change the conditions the effect changes.

So if I accidentally run over a dog what karma is that?

Thay Thanh: if you do it accidentally, then there was no intention to do a bad karma. However not being mindful is a bad karma. So practice being more mindful

Samsara is the endless cycle of rebirth and death. This life, the next, the next etc.

If you are not mindful of your karma you are subject to samsara.

It struck me how we take feelings and let them define us. We should not take these feelings as mine. Just acknowledge them.

If there is no me then there is no offense taken. If I am mindful of my surrounding and am not any different from anything else, then I can't be offended by anything else.

Goes back to buying into what you think you are. For example if someone is abused and assumes they are only good for being abused which is not true. If someone has a car and gets to attached to their car it can become their identity. But who are they actually? Why do they wish to buy into negative things? When we buy into negative things it increases our sorrow and suffering.

You should not worry about feelings and other things. They come and go. Feeling good, bad or neutral it always changes. Something that changes all the time is not worth holding as your identity. Anything that changes is bound to bring suffering. How you view everything is through your mind and perception. If you base yourself on such things as feeling you will live in the fear of regret.

Even good feelings can bring suffering. All feelings are temporary and if you get attached to them when they disappear, you will suffer.

So should we hold on to love?

If you cling on to any good feeling, which eventually will change as everything does, you will suffer. But while you have that feeling you can enjoy it. In the moment at the very time. But be prepared and expect that all good things come to an end.

Buddha was at one time gave up his kingdom and wife and child to become enlightened. Where is the middle path? Do we have to stop living as a householder and give up all love?

The Buddha taught the middle path. Yes you can be a householder and also attain enlightenment. If you stop clinging, you can still have whatever object you choose. Everybody has to take a different path to enlightenment. Monk life, renunciation, wanderer or householders are all good options. However it is easier to reach enlightenment with little to no attachments.

But where is the line when someone is running away? It is a dedication to the Sangha and dharma not an escape. Being a monk is just as hard as anything else. If you only walk 20 minutes a day it takes a long time to reach a destination, if you walk hours a day you reach that destination faster.

Enlightenment takes your burden cares and worries away. Not physically but mentally where we can get away be totally at peace and at ease. We try to meditate 5, 10, 15 minutes and more and more. Monk or householder its the same process. It takes diligence and hard work. Everybody fights to get rid of one thing or another, then they attach on to something else. Everything we consider ours, family, friends, and possessions. But it all goes back to centering oneself and being mindful of the moment. There is only one moment.

Thay Thanh: we don't compare with other people. We simply do whatever we can now.

Thay Do: in Buddhism we teach about no self. The no self was discovered by the Buddha. No one else taught about that. So there is no comparison to other religions. The Buddhist destination is different than others. Other religions preach taking care of the self or soul. In America we go to high school and learn to get a diploma. Then to get a job we get a college degree then we want to get married why? To be happy. Then a house, then a TV then on and on until we are too old we keep looking for happiness. I am chuc do and I have to have this to be happy. The Buddha talked about four ways to enjoy life.

1. Make money in the right way
A.saving b.Enjoying daily life c.merit/donations d.for support of family

We can enjoy what we do, if we do it in the right way. The monk does not practice an extreme way. They have what is needed for survival just as everyone else must have. Monks vow to go this way and this life, but anytime they can stop. Buddha did not force anybody. When you have the Dharma you have more ways to handle life and enjoy life. You don't have to be a monk for that. If you can practice and see anger coming and acknowledge it then we can better handle it. No self means nothing exists by itself, it is all dependent on something else. When we don't see things as a combination and continue to question it as separately, we suffer. Everything is connected, so we can be at ease knowing that. When we have an itch during meditation, we acknowledge it, if it continues to itch even worse then its ok to just itch it. When we see this is mine or that is mine we make it two things. This is my happiness. Happiness is my object. When we see the separation between the two then the object disappears. How can we suffer because of something that comes and goes. We are the combination of all feelings we can enjoy a good feeling and still enjoy when its gone, we can also enjoy a bad feeling. Suffering is an attachment from the mind. My object this or my object that, we attach to it.