Ep. 51 - Lama Surya Das

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] And welcome to Episode 51 of Synchronicity. My guest today is Lama Suryadas. We'll get to Lama Suryadas in just a second. I'm sure some of you even know who Lama Suryadas is. That what we just heard was a set from Burning Man. This year's Burning Man by Vkin Arman.

And as a bonus, I am attaching that entire file. I think it's almost three hours long to this episode of Synchronicity. So if you want to download that, go for it. I'm also going to put in a link to the SoundCloud. But, you know, if you don't want to use your data and you want to download it, you can do that. So, segue alert. I somewhat planned this out, but just to let you know how some across these mixes. I am a huge fan. I've pointed this out before. Electronic music, especially a subset of electronic music. That sounds kind of like that merged with a little more up tempo, and that mix picks up, you know, it's three hours long.

You know, worldly eclectic sounds, but also with a steady beat for four. That's my kind of thing. So, I look forward every year to Burning Man. I've never attended, I've never went, but there's a crapload of really, really good music that goes on there on a multitude of stages and camps. And one of those camps is White Ocean. And this year at Burning Man, an interesting thing, and a not-so-good thing happened, that really also divided kind of a large subset of people who attend Burning Man and kind of believe in the ten principles, which is kind of what keeps the community together and is the foundation.

Burning Man's been going on a really long time, and only until recently have there been these huge kind of what are known as sound camps, which are essentially like mobile and stationary clubs in the open playa of the desert. So, this year what happened was the White Ocean camp was vandalized. It has turned out it's been disgruntled people who had worked with the camp and setting up their stuff for whatever reasons. I think they weren't retained this year because they went with different people, and it turns out those people came back and basically cut all these wires to the camp. Glued people's door shut, and basically just kind of like who organized the whole thing.

Apparently there's always been bandits out on the playa, so it's not the weirdest thing, but what is interesting is this then very quickly got out on a lot of big blogs, like even like CNN blogs, like big publications started picking up this story and saying, "Oh, this happened, this was such a big deal." And a lot of people were really upset, not at the vandals or the people who did this, but White Ocean, this particular sound camp, which I believe was founded by Paul Okenfold and like a Russian billionaire son, regardless of who founded it. And I mean, listen, Paul Okenfold was one of my first favorite DJs back in the day.

What a guy, never could mix that well, but had amazing songs until I saw him at a festival, an area, one festival. At Maryweather Post in Maryland, and I went into the DJ tent, and I have never been more disappointed and disillusioned with a hero or idol of mine at a time than after he played what he played. It was just the cheesiest of cheese, didn't like it. Regardless, White Ocean has consistently put on some amazing parties around the world, including at Burning Man, and the sets and the music that comes out of the White Ocean camp is consistently some of my favorite music. So, regardless of who started it, I always look forward to the sets that come out of there.

I also mentioned Robot Heart, really great stuff. I mention it because a lot of people were on the side of the vandals, from who attend Burning Man, right? And this surprised me. It's like how I thought that the general ethos of Burning Man is a communal place where people can get along and support each other and, you know, just come together, essentially. All of the pictures, all of the stories. I feel like I've known everyone who's everyone who's running Man at this point. That's the vibe I get from what it's supposed to be. So, to see so many people say, "Hey, this is great. Fuck these people."

They bring in their private chefs, they bring in their plug-and-play camps. They're not really participating in the spirit of what Burning Man is. These guys are assholes, they're exclusive jerks. I don't know how much of that is true, or how much of it isn't true. What I do know is, regardless of what you think of people, I would think that you wouldn't want them to get vandalized, right? Regardless of the situation. And so that was very disconcerting to me. So, this week I saw White Ocean released another statement basically saying, "Listen, we found out who it was. It was never our intention to not support Burning Man."

They quoted how many meals they served to people who weren't part of their camp and said they were generally a very welcoming place. It appears that they don't let some people into the camp, especially if they're supremely intoxicated. So, they're kind of operating like a mini club, right? And anyone who's been out to clubs knows that that can range from totally reasonable bouncers and people letting you into completely at a line just douchebags on a power trip. So, I'm sure there is a cross-section of that at White Ocean at Burning Man, too. Okay, I bring that up because it was weird to me that people who would be attending Burning Man, I was shocked at how many intelligent people it seemed were saying, "Well, they deserve it."

What? I don't get that. I really don't. Even if you think Donald Trump deserves, you know, the worst things, he's still a person. I know he seems completely deluded and totally off-kilter, but, you know, he's still a person. People are still people and you have to understand the situations and conditions that can lead people to become who they are. All right, let's get to some other stuff. This week, Book Giveaway is back. And I am giving away a copy of Lama Suryodas's book, Make Me One with Everything. I think you, this is what I'm going to start doing. When people come on and they have books and it's around the time I'm doing a Book Giveaway, I'm going to give away their book.

I also encourage you to totally pick up a copy of this because you'll hear Lama Suryodas is one of the most eloquent and erudite people who can take subjects and topics that are relatively complicated and make them very immediate and present and easily digestible, which is a very cool thing. Okay, what else do we have going on? Alan Watts, you've heard in the beginning. I don't even actually know, did you hear in the beginning? I don't know if I put the ad in this week. But if you did hear in the beginning, this episode is brought to you by the Alan Watts Foundation and it is brought to you in the sense that if you go to the Alan Watts online shop, link in this episode page, link on the podcast app.

If you're listening to this, the link will be right there. If you go there, listen to some talks, find some talks you want to get, download them, use the code S-Y-N-C, all capitals at checkout. I was going to say check off, I don't know why. Use it at checkout and you get 30% off. Oh, I realized now I said check off because I was conflating those two things. Again, if you use the code S-Y-N-C, all capitals at checkout, you get 30% off your first order. You want a recommendation of what you would check out? I don't know your price range. I don't know your budget. But for me, the extended seminar series is a hell of a deal.

There's, I think, like 200 hours, something like that of talks. So you're pretty much good to go on talks for an entire year. I think that's a great value. And you get 30% off. So it's not a bad deal. Okay. That's it. Keeping it short. I've been running down the up and down the East Coast. We're looking at New Yorkers. We are going to be moving there soon, most likely. Nothing is final, but we're looking at a place in Red Hook, New York, not Brooklyn. Not Brooklyn. Not Brooklyn. Two hours north of the city in Dutchess County. So I'm just throwing out out there, send good thoughts and vibes. Let's see this thing go through.

But I've been pretty busy. So I'm keeping this relatively short. We're coming up on a year next week. So thank you to everyone who has listened. This is already turning into a record month for Synchronicity. I really appreciate the continued support in the form of listens, subscriptions. Donations, reviews, ratings, all these things. They really do warm the cockles of my heart. Cockles cannot use that term anymore. But without further ado, here is one of my favorite teachers, one of my favorite people. I'm a certain nurse. Thank you again for coming on. This is really, I think it's going to be a treat for everyone involved, me included.

So let's start. There's so many interesting places we can start with this because one of the reasons I think you're a fascinating, let's say, character in kind of this whole consciousness, Buddhist mindfulness world is you have a lineage that I'm particularly interested in from the Buddhist side, which I want to find a lot more about. But you also have this cool intersection with Niamh Karole Baba. Exactly. One in two follows the live in India. So can you talk a little bit about how I've heard this story, but how you got introduced to Niamh Karole Baba, how that fit in kind of into your life, and then how you've noticed, I know this is a long, complicated question, but how that's also integrated in with your studies and practice of Tibetan Buddhism?

Well, that's a great question and jumping up point and a good story and makes my heart warm. You know, think about the guru, Niamh Karole Baba Maharaji, as we hold in the great Dharma King. He's really good to us. He gave me my name, of course, Sir Das. I'm one of the Das brothers. If she does, and Bhagavan does, then we will layer it as ashram at the same time as each other. We still do. May you show it to some of them last week. Anyway, when I graduated from college in '71, I went to India, and I had learned about Zen Buddhism and meditate a little, and Harry Krishna chanting, and you would call Jung's East-West thought and writings, and Joseph Campbell and other people, and went to the East to learn more about meditation and go to find truth, or God, or peace, or become peace.

Instead of fighting for peace, like an enraged Buddhist in the '60s, become more like an engaged Buddhist, becoming peace, is tiknahan, says. And then in India, I went over land to Greece and Afghanistan, Turkey, and buses, and trains, and the Chai King, the Volkswagen bus, and through the Khyber Pass in Afghanistan, it's India. And I met nearby in Krishna Bush there, in Kajmir, and by chance, you know, I mean, I heard your name, so I found the way I had known slightly in Buffalo. And the University of Buffalo, where they were, and I was, they were graduate students, and we went on a pilgrimage in the Himalayas for seven or eight days to a holy cave, and then they were telling me about the Guru, Maharaj, and Kurali Baba, and also we were meditating together.

They had learned that mindfulness and love and kindness met the meditation, the Pass in and met from Guwankaji, Mr. Guwankaji, the Burmese Indian teacher that we all studied with in his 10-day sound-tense of courses. So it was really, you know, the mixing pot and the melting pot. And we weren't trying to become Buddhists or Hindus, we were looking for something universal or beyond that, that's in all things, but transcends any one sector of religion or place. So they told me about that, and then they got a letter from Guwankaji's secretary that was going to be a meditation course in the desert, in the state of Rajasthan, western India, so they left.

I mean, my buddy Ken that I was traveling with, he said, "That sounds way too austere, being silent for 10 days, and no meals after lunch," and they thought that was a day. And so we didn't go. And a few days later, we were sitting up there doing what people did in the '60s, of course in '71, and in India, you know, Bob Shankar and all that, and getting high and listening to the river and eating Indian food and trying to do yoga and meditate. We didn't know how to do it. We said, "What the hell are we doing here? Why don't we patch up the Guru and Krishna go to that meditation course and meet the other, you know, people like us that are going to be there and hear more about these things and Maharaji and, you know, beautiful things."

So hard opening to hear stories about Maharaji from the beginning. From nearby Krishna, of course, I read Bob Rambas's great bestseller from 1960. I'll be here now about the old master in the blanket, Maharaji. So we went and we hurrieded and we caught up and got there at the last minute and went into the 10-day meditation course. And then we met a bunch of other people, of course there was silent, but afterwards, and, you know, we met people and then that's where you're going, where you're doing. And then we're going back to Maharaji's ashram and we wanted to meditate more because we were just getting into it, so we're going to go into his next course.

And then he went home, he'd been aged a few years. We went home to St. Louis. And I went to Nepal to pursue Buddhism and eat llamas. So that's when I met my first Tibetan llamas right at 71. So it was all mixed together. And sometimes Sufi saints there in India were Hindu swamis of the different sects. So there was one Dharma, which still is. You know, Dharma means truth or living spirit, not just one religion. So that's how it came to me. But of course, being young and questioning, my lama column changed to call me, of course, in Tibetan. My nickname was The Ocean of Questions. Yeah, the question is like this, or that, or can we do both?

Is there a both, or what is it? Right. And this went on for a few years and we were always discussing that. And some teachers said, Joan, should do one thing and some were more eclectic. And some had done all one thing themselves, like a wankagee. One could teach a minindra, who was Joe Goldstein's teacher, had done many things. He was learning and eclectic and universal. So some of the Tibetan lamas were very remay or non-sectarian universal, like the Dalai Lama. And my teacher was caught with the chain. He came to the chain. He came to the chain. So I was practicing meditation, and yoga, and fasting, and chanting, and vegetarianism, and celibacy, and became, who was training me in monastery, eventually a monkey, a three-year treatment lama training.

But I used to go back to Maharaji, to his ashram. Yeah. It's in each day with him, and with the Bhakti devotional chanting. And that was really hard opening. Otherwise, I think I would have been much more dried up, kind of Buddhist scholar. And only from the eyebrows up in that place, when you go coming from the heart. Well, it's like the merging of the... This is one of the interplays between Buddhism and the Bhakti tradition, which I find so fruitful, is you have this clear clarity and wisdom from Buddhism, not that there is not a tremendous amount of heart and compassion there as well. But the Bhakti is so steeped in that open-heartedness.

And I think this fusion, it's almost... This is probably not a great term or analogy. But it is like the union of emptiness and bliss, which is what is described in Buddhism as kind of the essence of that. That is everything we see and experience. It's kind of like mind and heart, or heart and soul. But mind, you know, embodied bliss. And then mind, you know, clear and calm and vast and wise. Traditionally, there are different paths for different folks. So it's called Bhakti and Gyan. Bhakti means devotion is the way beyond yourself or to God or to the highest. And Gyan is more like wisdom, knowledge, philosophy, meditation, as a way.

And of course both are intermingled. But some more focus on one like Krishna Murthy was very Gyan... Right. ...or clearing mental. Oh, he loves the yoga, by the way, every day. But he didn't teach it. And then people like Ram Dasa, Maharaji, or others, are very Christian, that's very Bhakti, very devotion. Although, of course, they meditate, and they study, and they're wise. So the different types of spiritual personalities in different paths, just like the people who are more physical, so than yoga. And the eight women's yoga, at times, only these are good. Not just physical yoga, but it's a good path for them.

So I found my way in this intersection. Really, Tibetan Buddhism has an R lineage of the Kavyu and Yingma, has a great familiar rapper, and so on. In Kala Rinpoche, and my teachers, they teach us, as a great lineage, and practice of devotion. And Guru Yoga, we call it. You mean with the Guru as a way to return to your Buddha. You mean, Guru, your own Buddhist nature. So it's for a consistent congregate with the Bhakti Yoga, of Bhakti Baba, and Vishnu worshippers, and Hanuman Bhakti's that he's part of. Lord Hanuman, who says, "When I forget who I am, Lord, I worship you, when I remember who I am, I am you."

So that's just like Tibetan Guru Yoga, not worshipping the person, but the Guru was a portal to the oneness beyond separation. Yeah, so this is something I'd love to talk about, because I just finished a book that, one of my favorite books I've read on Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism in particular, which is Mind Beyond Death by Zokchan Pono Rinpoche. And one of, I mean, there's so much, such a great practical handbook, and kind of exposition and explication of what goes on in the after-death states, and kind of other Bardo states within life. But one of the things in the book is this practice of deity yoga, and how the Guru and lineage is such an important part of Tibetan Buddhism.

And I find this to be fascinating, because I think when most people, I mean, I don't want to generalize, but when a lot of people hear about Buddhism, there's a few things that stick in their mind. One is, life is suffering. So people hear that and immediately are like, "Ah, I don't really want to do that." Although, when you dig in and you realize that's just stating a fact, it's not like life sucks, there's no hope. And then the other thing is... Okay, process, and then the other half is the cure. That's right. That's exactly right, which I think can be easily forgotten, because people don't want to hear life is suffering, right?

And then the other thing that I think throws people off, depending on their theistic inclinations, it could be a good thing or a bad thing, is that there's no gods. There's no Buddha is not a god. Buddha literally means one who is awake. So it's not actually saying he's a deity himself. However, in a lot of different sects and paths and courses of Buddhism, there is this practice of deity yoga. There's these manifestations that actually involve very intricate visualizations, specific... Yeah, so talk about a little bit about that. I'd love to get here more. Devoting realms and visions and gods and goddesses, if you want to use that word, it's not the right word, because we don't see things outside of ourselves or outside of his mind.

The universe of his mind is part of it. But yeah, as I see it, big words like God and also truth realities, like placeholders, for something less severe, barely got much deep into and it's hard to conceptualize. So, seeistic and non-theistic is okay to talk about, but like in Hinduism, Vedanta, that worships the way Shiva, but it's a non-dual traditionism is. It's very much like the middle way philosophy, the great emptiness of Buddhism, where there's no separation. The Buddhism takes the other side, like not two. Hinduism says one. It's different to that if you look into it. So, and then people accused of being a secret Vedantist in Tibetan Buddhism, or a chariot of the family of Vedantus accused of being a secret Buddhist, like Mavic.

Now, you buy your own peers and critics and other philosophers because of this. Because I think if, and this is just one image will look past, or like climb up this spiritual mountain, I know there's just unidirectional. It's much more multi-level than that, but if there will climb up this spiritual mountain, I think all of them need the apex. So, all the sages kind of have a singular, and if I say understanding, it sounds too mental, but realization or... Knowing or something. Yeah. If theistic saint realizes oneness with the ultimate, whatever he or she calls it, a Buddhist master saint, Zen, or whatever, realized the Dharmakai, or the ultimate, how could that be different?

It's the universal, principal cosmic. You know, there's no separation or part of it. It's imminent, whatever you call it, it's imminent in each of us. It's indwelling, but it's transcendent over all of any of us. So, such as an egotistical to awaken the Buddha within, both to find the Godhead with him. Because when I find it in moi, I then see it better in twa. Right. Right. Well, then you naturally treat others as they would like to be treated, as you would like to be treated. Because they're not different, separate than you. Yes. It's a way to love. And that wisdom opens the heart of empathic, warm, compassion, kindness, love, giving them all the virtues.

Yeah. And they do work in tandem, as you're saying. And I will say, it gets harder to be worse to people when you have that realization. I wouldn't necessarily get easier to be nicer. Maybe it does, but it gets harder. Because you're natural because your right hand doesn't attack your left hand. Right. Right. That would be the outside rules or let, you know, police security to protect, you know, because it's yourself. So when we recognize these others, you know, since you mentioned theism, as God's pseudo-pods, like an amoeba has these false appendages that stick out and then come back, then we see, you know, underneath through all that work interconnected and kind of one.

But, you know, you see a unity in the diversity. It's true. You look up in the diversity. And then you love others as yourself. You see yourself in others. As Buddha said, if I see, when I see myself in others and others and myself, who would I harm? Who would I abuse? Who would I exploit? Right. Because it's going to be yourself, essentially. And it does. You know, you'll love it in the best case. Right. But more people are, I mean, in widening concentric circles, not just your one or two or three, beloved family or whatever. Right. And one of the things that I, and we're talking about getting to these kind of universal truths, which I know is a very conceptual way of kind of talking about this stuff.

But one of the ways of getting to this stuff is through meditation. Right. And what's interesting to me as I, I've been steeped in a lot of Rambas's meditations, a lot of Rambas's friends meditations, ranging from Vipassana to Mehta. But I've, I've really, really had an affinity and a strong connection to Tibetan Buddhism in particular, long before I even knew anything about Bhakti, or even really who Rambas was. And Padma Sambava has always been an interesting, the first mantra I ever learned was on Money Pimmi Home. And I, I don't even, it was in something so disconnected from the field I'm in now, it almost like it came to me from somewhere else that I can't really pin down.

So what I would love, I rarely get a chance. I've had some Tibetan Buddhist teachers on here. One Lama, Lama Somo, you're the second Lama to come on. I love, I would love to hear from you. Kind of, can you explain to me what Zogchen is and then also what Vajrayana is? And I love that you are also talking about, this is another thing in Tibetan Buddhism that I absolutely love, is that everything is already here within us. So when we get angry, as I understand it in Tibetan Buddhism, anger is not something that's supposed to be pushed away. There is an inherent clear wisdom in that and that we uncover that and purify it rather than kind of changing it into something else, or that it's not there or it's something outside of you that you have to correct the behavior.

Could you just though, before getting to that, what is Zogchen? How does this fit into the cosmology? You already said what it is and that's why teachers need to be here to highlight that you already have everything you need. Like I said, this is more or less quoting you. Tibetan Buddhism, Vajrayana says everything is already here. So I'll quote from the scriptures, this is a traditional guide, but also a collective American. There is the Zegre Zen Master, Hakugu Zen Ji, in his sonu Zazen, the Zazen Wasen sings. This very land is the Pure Land, Nirvana. This very body, the Namanakaya, the body of Buddha.

So he ain't just talking about his body, he's friends. So that's the message of Zogchen. Translate is the natural great perfection or the innate great completeness. It is all here, we just have to recognize it. So my own Rulamakala Rinpoche, I was used to quote from the Hevajra Tantra, the left environment, Tantric scripture, Dhandual scripture Buddhism, Vajrayana Buddhism. We're all Buddhas by nature, not Buddhist, God forbid. We're all Buddhas by nature, we only have to recognize who and what we are. We only have to awaken to that fact. So that's like the shorter direct path. There are different paths in Buddhism, like in religion and in the world.

There are roundabout ones, there are shortcuts, there are safe ones, there are dangerous ones. There are different ways of skiing. Skiing straight down the mountain ain't necessarily the best way, and you might have a crash landing. Fast this way, but probably not the best way. So, and there are different ways of climbing up a mountain, straight up or back and forth, the young stages and so on, gradually. So in Buddhism, since you asked about that, there's the two or the three honors, and there's the basic Buddhism that's safe and moral and monastic and ethical and... Is that the Hinayana? Well, that's a pejorative term, yeah.

Theravadam, the elders, the original Buddhism, the root vehicle or the root path, as my teachers call it, to avoid any of these small, and the Mahayana, which means big or universal. I see. Including life and lay people and, you know, body and other things, and less monastic, and that's more... The original was more about renunciation, of that suffering and the causes of it, and purification and trans... You know, true far in the way, your negative karma and vowing not to do unwholesome things is the way we put in Buddhism. And then Mahayana is more about bodhicitta and emptiness, like the awakened, compassionate heart, and seeing through the illusion, the dreamlike illusion of life.

And then Vajrayana is more about transformation, it's more dangerous, rocket-fueled path. That's why I think I'm grounding towards it. Yes. Right. Well, it's predicted by Padma Samvava. You mentioned the family to the end of Buddhism and the head of our zocha and lineage, who came to the best from India in the 8th century AD. He said that Vajrayana and zocha was what was needed in the end of times when he didn't have time to go through all the stages and study everything for many decades. And they could get right to the nature of mind teachings, how directly with the mind, study everything about truly and philosophy and transformation and cosmology and so on.

And the direct experience. Yes. So, introduction to the nature of mind, we call it the zocha and Mahamudra, the ultimate perspective, that's kind of another. Mahamudra is a zocha and called the highest practices of Tibetan Buddhism. So, it's the mind to Chingla. I don't awaken to a Buddha mind in this life. Not gradually estimated lifetime until enlightenment, as it says in the Theravadam and Mahayana traditions. So, it means it's like the Vajra Diamond shortcut, we call it the Vajra shortcut. It means it's more tricky. It means you have to rely more on your guru than just on the scriptures and checking things out gradually.

That's where the deity stuff can reel in the guru yoga. And the guru yoga comes in, so there's different schools that have different more reliance on the teacher or less on the teacher. So, Vajra, you can teach yourself how to play guitar, but if you have a guitar teacher, it shows you the shortcuts and the tricks and adapts it to you and your handy size and all. So, if those better, faster, shorter. That's a great example. I love music as an analogy. I'm a musician I grew up playing, and I actually taught myself guitar where I was taught saxophone, and my proficiency on saxophone is significantly higher than it is on guitar.

I can pretend to play guitar and get myself through a lot of different things, but my knowledge and clarity of understanding is certainly better from the stuff I was taught by people who had been doing that their whole life. Okay, so I want to ask you this, because this is something that I don't want to say grapple with. I have my own views on it, but one of the things that is fascinating to me are the six realms of existence, the samsaric realms, which we can go into in detail, and then also the pure lands, right? These realms that supposedly, after death, you can access, as I understand it, potentially real "places"

that are actually in existence. So, from your understanding or your experience, I understand that the realms can also be processed as mental states that we all go through, and that I'm abundantly familiar with. I have direct experience up the wazoo with all of those six states. Like the homey ghost state, this seems like mythology, but think about addicts. Right, right. It is the hungry ghost state. Or Donald Trump, this is one of my favorite things, the Dalai Lama, I think, said it sent a coded message not too long ago, where he was, you know, they're like, "What do you think of Donald Trump?"

And he goes, "Oh, very small mouth." And then he started minding. He saw them like, "Whoa, the Dalai Lama is taking shots at Donald Trump." And I think what he was intimating is that Donald Trump is a hungry ghost. He's got a teeny little mouth and a huge appetite that he can never satisfy or fulfill. So, I wonder if he was actually saying that. But they are, you know, states of mind, but also everything. See, you said in quotes. Yes. That's the important part. Right. That this life in quotes is real. Right. If you have a dream at night, now I'm really asking you to just play the game. Yeah. Is it real?

So, my personal... I don't have a dream when you're lying to me. See, now this is my dream. A dream is as real as the daytime. But, you know... And I think it's a real place. A real dream? Yes. So, I'm just saying. So, every different levels, the reality and experience. So, you see a rope on the ground in the dark and you jump because you think it's a snake. Oh, Vedanta. You're going Vedanta on me. Did you see a world snake? No. But did you see a real rope? You really saw something. Right. And did you experience a real fear? Yes. Right. So, everything is like that. It's very subjective and interconnected without inner circumstances and conditioning.

So, this is... Similarly, when you fall asleep, you dream according to your subject. You know, your karma conditioning. Right. You dream about whatever, let's say you see your friends or grandparents or maybe dead in your dream, not mine. Sure. And so, they say, when you die, that you're entering other... You know, your light body or your mental inner light body. Yes. Your spirit would be the word name is probably... You know, goes on and doesn't die. And has its body spin kind of its conditioning, you know, like a world in the river. Oh, you know, it's just water, but it's a world pool. Right.

So, carefully, you can see it going down and transforming into the next form. So, that's how you think about it. The Pure Lands of Paradise is... First of all, this was not basic Buddhism. Right. There are vases. One of Mahayana came later, but Buddhism's old tradition, half of enlightenment, religion, the feudalist, and a philosophy, a way of life. And so, it's evolved over 2,600 years. And the Mahayana came, you know, 300 years after the basic teachings of Buddha, the living teacher, 2,600 years ago. So, people were having experiences, not just after they died, but you can also access these Pure Lands while you're alive.

You know, in your vision or the awareness meditation states, let's say, higher consciousness, or maybe drugs, I don't know, you know, in different ways. And these states, the consciousnesses, the states, the experiences that go with it. So, this is part... So, there are different realms of existence, like some people live a sort of animalistic realm. Right. It's about food, sleep, and whatever it is, fear and greed, and, you know, one what they want when they want it, can't put it off the later. Other people live them with divine kind of way, but it's still very pleasure and sensual oriented, you know?

So, the six realms, as is laid out, is just kind of a general map, just higher and lower. But according to your acts and intentions, then you get different results. Right. And that's the idea that you have some agency where you can have self-mastery and go in a better, put up higher, or deeper, or truer direction, and have some choice. And it's not the wind conditioning that just blows you away. Like, you have to be like a dead leaf blown away by the wind. You can learn how to sail and navigate better. I like that. And that's where these practices come in, mindfulness, awareness, self-consciousness, introspection, purification, transformation.

You're really with karma, you know? Like, virtue is by generosity and patience. It'd be loving and helpful and altruistic and so on. And then, you know, it's like, if you wake up angry the morning, you start stubbing your toe and having some bad, you get feedback from the environment. That's right. So you, if you wake up on the other side of the bed, you're more uncheful. It seems like a more, about a few people, not more of being nice to you. Right. Of course, bad things happen to good people. Okay. Like, first of all, but I'm just saying the general principle is according to the karma, the conditioning, the causation of the situation where you are.

Like, in the Northern Hemisphere, plant in the fall harvest, plant in the spring harvest in the fall. Right. In the Northern Hemisphere, the opposite. Still appropriate. Plant in the right. The law is still saying plant in the right season, harvest in the right season, not backwards, if you want certain results. So that's the law of karma and how the Buddha said we can people around, seem unhappy. Life is difficult. Unline life is full of suffering. That's really the right translation. It was another life, the enlightened life. That's full of bliss and peace and harmony. And that's what we strive towards and work towards together.

And I love that how basically karma is a logical explanation of how things are and come to be and were, even to some extent, depending on your conception of time. But what I love about this too, in Buddhism and in Hinduism as well, is that there is an aspect where you don't have to be at the mercy of all of your past actions and all of your karma, karmic stains and seeds. And that is that transcendent element that we're trying to uncover and kind of look at our life situation. I mean, we could take the exact same situation. Someone has a family member who dies. Someone who one can look at that and say, why me?

This is horrible. This is such a horrible thing. Why was I born, now I have to experience all this loss, there's so much. And another person can look at the same situation and experience the same pain, the same suffering, the same emotions. But say, you know what? This is a catalyst for me learning about myself, about life, about the impermanence of everything and what a beautiful experience was to be with these people. And that's the point too that I should live now and do often to like, quote, retire or something. Right. It can. It can. And that brings you into the here and now, which is something, as I understand it across all philosophies I've read, all religious scripts, texts, thinkers, as they talk about this essential element of the present moment being the real experience of what is actually going on.

And that's where the power and opportunity lies actually experience and transcend what kind of our normal, just kind of going through this, what feels like a continuous set of moments in time is actually just one moment that we're carrying with us from place to place. So, okay. So I also want to, I want to, before we get to like the practical applications, because I know that's going to be a huge part of this. So let me just say, yeah, this is all about time and the moment. Yeah. I wrote a whole book about this called Buddhist Standard Time, like it into the infinite possibilities of now. And in a distance, things that you don't find in Buddhist, in Western Buddhist books, like about, to that zotian idea of the sacred fourth time or the, like Christemus is called the divine time.

An example is Buddhist talk about the three times past, present, the future, which we can all understand. I'm not going to go into relativity here, any, just general analysis. Sure. When your time moves from like, let's say left to right, you know, past the present. In the future, not backwards unless you're watching the time machine movie or something. And then, but each month, that's horizontal time, where everything's born, ages and dies and deteriorates, but there's also the vertical dimension. That's what the Christemus is called the divine. Every moment of that horizontal time in which everything changes and turns to dust or whatever you think of it revolves is bisected by the ascendant time.

That's the holy fourth. That's the holy now, the divine now, the moment of zotian, the natural, very protective. That's always now. So if you're, now I'm saying something that's challenging. It's very straight. I give this to you, you know, as a gift, you go in here this everywhere, but it's right on the zotian, fifth instructions. The, the, the nowness, awareness is the Buddha within, authentic Buddha within nowness awareness. So when you told me now, you are, there's no you because you was a collaboration of memories and conditions. In the now, there's only the bead of the rock model of the rosary.

There's no string connecting it to the other beads. So you are free of the past and future in the now, and there's no you because the conditioning is deep. It's not like you have conditioning. Yes. Right. Right. So holding the beads together, if you're only in the now, there's no string of continuity. Of course, things are flowing, but in the now, descend the time, the divine times, like everything stopped, you're off the wheel. That's full deathless Nirvana. That's called Dharmakaya. There's no time to place in time, but the realization is beyond time and infinite, eternal, timeless, you know, every words you use.

So practice being more now, cultivating now, mischievaintfulness, and advanced mindfulness, you know, without goal, without watching the time, awareness style, like awareness is not necessarily mind. You observing anything like in mindfulness is just naked awareness of pure being, right? It's a little abstract, but well, which is the whole thing when we get glimpses, I think of that nowness. I think that's this is one of my favorite things. I mean, it happened my most present and direct experience of this was my first introduction to psychedelics when I realized that the self that I had known as Noah, well, for my 15, 16 years of life before I had taken LSD, didn't actually exist.

I clearly. That's right. Surround had constructed together, construct, and it was just the right, right, right. So this is, this is why I always put the quotes in, you know, real reality and quotes because our experience of moment to moment and second to second is something that feels incredibly accurate, right? We don't question that. Most people don't question that. Even if someone brings it up and says, Hey, you're not, you're not really experiencing it's the way you actually are, whatever that means. It's just not how things are actually going when you actually investigate it, which is why there is these practices of a Pashna and also Shimata, where it's just this resting awareness where you just experience what's going on rather than trying to impose a certain kind of schematic as to what's going on.

I imagine why this is why these are are taught so and encouraged that people practice these because then you get more direct experience with what's going on. So this concept of nounist, this concept of time, what I, what I'm always interested in is these other realms, right, these pure lands, these, these, these other overlapping dimensions of reality. What I've noticed in my life, albeit not that long in my 33 years on the planet, this go around, I've noticed as time goes on, I don't know this is, if this is a function of aging or if it's a function of or a symptom of our time, it seems as though many of these dimensions are starting to peek through more and more frequently and I say this not only from a personal experience of which I have plenty of anecdotal evidence, but also collectively, like I'm seeing this more now, I think a great example of this is this current election cycle.

This is, I don't know how else to describe what's going on. I have a few terms, psychedelic would be one of them bipolar in the truest sense of the clinical term, but it seems as though the constructs that have been kind of guiding or seemingly holding together society and culture over the past, let's say 2000 years, it seems like the mechanisms, if not already broken, are in the process of breaking and as that happens, these moments or dimensional realities seem to kind of slip in, a piercing of the veil, if you will, and it seems like it's increasing. So I was wondering if you had any thoughts on that, if that's something you've noticed in your life or in this current time, and then how that kind of interfaces into what Tibetan Buddhism would say about these experiences that we're going through right now.

Well, I can't ignore your mention of the local election that we're all suffering through, you know, the full year, each and all, but I would describe it, maybe I'll just pick on the debates, you know, just watch the debates, but I had to watch the last two debates. Me too, yeah. You know, gruesome, it's kind of a combination of unreality TV, electile dysfunction. But moving right along, I think, you know, we all have innate spirit, whatever word you want to call it, the innate boon in nature or the unconditioned, you know, the Jesus heart, I didn't know the art mod, you know, with him, Christian X is called the Godhead, the piano piece of God, it's a new juice called the spark of God, each soul is the spark of God.

And you know, the spark is the fire is the same as the fire of the son of the whole. So we'll have that. So of course, it breaks through and even with children, you see this not to over idealize children, but to not blank slates and I have a five month old, I know they are not blank sleets. But you know, they have their own natural spirituality, right? And often they see things, maybe in the church or maybe nature or maybe at home in a dream or on the floor in the nursery. And they say, Mommy, Mommy, I saw you know, you know, Jesus crying or whatever people say or light coming from the top of the, you know, church or I'm just too much or two people tell me about kids.

And Mommy says, Oh, yes, it's very nice. Don't tell people they'll think you're amazing. So we kind of clamp it down just like socializing them and educating them, often clamps down their psychic and intuitive, right, natural abilities. As we try and make that fit into the educational curriculum and so on and fit in and standardize. So I think it does show through and break through individually and collectively. So same with the culture and the time. So if I said since the 50s and 60s has been a lot of this kind of spiritual renaissance or East West Cross fertilization in the Western countries, Europe and America and the first world countries that have time for this in the third world countries.

Yes, right. Get a washing machine or a car or their kids to college. That's different. So there's been a lot of this in the last 50 or 60 years breaking through. Of course the spiritualities in evergreen subject has been going on for millennia and centuries. And I think that events were talking more like that at the cyclical rather than a linear upswing. Like things you're always progressing up with the spiritual, you know, the world's become more spiritually aware or anything like that. But I think the yoga and mindfulness movement and vegetarian and health food and non-violence activism kind of, you know, the word compassion, kindness that's coming to our discourse.

I heard Hillary Clinton talk about fundraising dinner this summer. She mentioned loving kindness. I mean, nobody mentioned that five or 10 years ago. It's coming in. Right, right. She would've said kindness or, you know, compassion maybe, maybe a best compassion, you know. But yeah, so these Eastern thoughts and values are having a positive effect and contribution and cross-fertilization. So I think that's happening. But it's also a dark time of, you know, divisive myths and politics and fear and maybe the Pacific Rim rising and the colonial powers or whatever the first world countries not having such a Gemini, you know, being all the superpowers is trying to realize there's a lot of fear also about what we're losing, what's going to happen to the generations.

I'm not to mention the global environmental degradation. Which no one seems to be talking about at the upper levels. Yeah. Right. But that, you know, what's happening, we're not being very wise or clear. Right. Kind of fiddling or twiddling our meditative thumbs while well and burns. So I'm always for an integration of the outer dinner. Yes. Consolation and action. And being very mindful or, you know, soulful or reflective or collaborative and, you know, form together and trying to awaken together and, you know, an outer inner and subtlest levels. And that's what Tibetan masters also told about, not just the physical, but also the most, you know, spiritual and then the subtle, you know, the spirit, inner invisible, realizing the timeless and visible, you know, whether the environment degrades or not, we can still realize the timeless nirvana or have anywhere.

Right. And, you know, heaven, right now, you know, heaven or hell is in the mind as the poet like says in mystic's side. So we can realize the pure one now, not just after we're dead. But you might keep asking that you've asked twice about the pure lands and paradises. So the Mahayana, if I've got a Buddhist, Buddhology, not really, the, the, the Buddhist, but the Buddhology of it is that these are like special realms that how like enlightenment is kind of sort of generated, that's not just the six realms outside of it, right? Simsara that we're in higher love, the conditioning. So it's kind of outside it by a little, a little connected, closer connected to it.

Like the Western Buddha field of Amitava and Ablokita compassion is like that the pure land school is prayed to be reborn and it's considered in the West just where the setting sun is. So it's not invisible, it's not that far. So it's kind of in this world, but not of it. Again, we have direct access now to our higher consciousness. And that's the important thing that my, our zochan non-dual tradition of non-separation always returns us to, so this is in a way, the ultimate pure land of humans, not later if and when. Right. So that's why I, I think I've been bringing it up whether consciously or subconsciously is I think that's an important concept.

I think when we hear about a pure land, I know when I was first reading about this probably 10 years ago, I probably, I mean, I conceptualize it like a heaven type place. This is somewhere after you're dead, after the Bartos, you're going through this, then you can be reincarnated there, but I noticed exactly what you're talking about. These realms are accessible, they absolutely are here and now, and if you've had the direct experiences of touching on any of these things, then it gets, it gets imprinted on you. You don't forget. Someone can't tell you, well, no, it doesn't actually exist. It's not actually accessible here and now.

That's just, you know, what these people are saying. And that is what I think is such an important aspect of all of this is that, and I remember a long time ago, I was on LSD, I was in a hotel room with a bunch of my friends, and I was having a discussion with one in particular, and she was like, you know, I was drawing a picture or something. And she's like, do you think that she wasn't on LSD? She was like, do you think that you can do whatever you want to do? And I was like, not only do I think I can do whatever I want to do, physical limitations aside, anyone can do whatever they want to do.

And I fundamentally, like, it wasn't even like I believed it, it's like I knew it exactly. And yes. We had the actual experience like a breakthrough or spiritual epiphany, genuine one, some kind of high, you know, with my initials, lama soon, yes, I'll see, I'll say I've never inhaled. But you know, the thing is when you really experience something, like before, I didn't know it was there, they are growing up in Judeo-Christian suburbs, and it was like cultural Judaism, not your experiential and mysticalism, so I didn't really believe in God and so on. But once you experience it, there, there's something transcending, yet, I mean, you can tell you it's not there.

Just like when you recognize your, I don't know, well, they're a father and a crowd at a big stadium, nobody can tell you that was bad. But you recognize, not just that you could do anything, but anybody could do anything. So that's how you get to the personal, the trying that you get to the universal, the transportation. Yes. And this is, this is my, there's a wonderful book by Marie-Louis von Franz, who is a disciple and student of youngs, an amazing teacher in her own right. And it's called "Psychian Matter," and it's fascinating. And what I love so much about it is it basically explores empirically and esotericly the connection between inner and outer, and you were saying that this is something that you're fundamentally interested in as am I.

I think this is, this is kind of where I fall, and you can tell me what you think of this. This is what I think. I think, one of my favorite Rambas stories is he goes, "Have you ever noticed how many angry people there are at peace rallies? They're chanting, "Peace, peace, peace, peace, peace, peace, peace." Sorry, Mason. It's not far from that to killing for God like that. Right. Exactly. And so I, that's sorry, sorry, highlights more than anything else to me, the importance of getting yourself straight before attempting to engage in outer experiences. And I also use the example of like, sometimes maybe if there's a friend or someone you know who's in a tremendous amount of pain, your natural instinct is to rush and go help them.

But if you don't have the tools or skill set to actually provide the medicine for what they need, you can actually go in and create a far more harm than just, if you just left it aside until you got yourself straight. So I know that there's a critical importance for the inner aspect. What is fascinating to me is not in an esoteric or kind of woo-woo way that if you change the inside, the outside changes, I have physically noticed an external reality quote unquote. When you change things inside, it reacts. Outside reality, external reality, whether in the form of people or circumstances or situations or being lucky or being blessed or graced, whatever you want to call it, there is a direct relationship there.

And I think we have access to it and we can remember it, but knowing that or even talking about it and realizing it is a fundamentally different way than we are taught or grow up and experience life, which is we're talking about fundamental transformations in life. So has this been your experience? I mean, I know this is kind of up in your wheelhouse. Absolutely. And that's why we cultivate or practice or strive on the path. We are seekers and one day seekers have to become finders, not just always stay on campus like a permanent graduate. So we practice, different practices, not just join something.

We take the journey, we don't just read the travel brochures, partly it's a journey from the head to the heart and beyond, and partly it's beyond ourselves and including others. And partly it's a journey from the small self and a small preoccupation, a small family to the universal family, the transpersonal self of being or whatever you want to call it. So I found that the best contribution I can make is to transform and awaken myself. And that kind of helps transform and awaken others. Of course, some people work from outside in and I've been an activist also and I try to balance that, but I was a monk, I did three year treats and, you know, and that was one of the best contributions I ever made.

Just before I ever did anything because like Buddha said, beneath the tree, in his ends script, he says, Buddha said, when I was enlightened, awakened, all were enlightened, even send the trees. So if that's too steep and hard to understand, let me let me retranslate it for today. This is my own experience. See if you don't resonate with this, everyone. When I am clear, everything is clearer. Yeah. I mean, that's how it's, yeah, on that or an interval, so subjective, it depends on our perception. It's not what happens to us, but when we make of it, how we perceive in what we do, it makes a little difference.

It's not the cards without, but how we play the hand. That's right. It's Asian, woo woo, saying that everything is a dream, it's everything is subjective. And the great Shakespeare said it was great and incites into human nature. Shakespeare said, there was neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so. It's a universal truth. It's of course, if we think different thoughts, or ways, or open on, expand our mind or become clearer, everything becomes clearer. It's so true. This is one of the things. We have all kinds of accidents. We can't see what the hell's going on. Right. Right. So bring a windshield or our vision or ourselves and our relations and our life, clearing up our life makes a big difference.

I love this. I've heard it described, and this is a lot to do with perspective, which is, I love this. But it's as though if you're wearing glasses and they're smudged, right? You're seeing the world in a different way than if you're clear and you can actually see, which is kind of what you're doing when you're carrying all these, you know, cliches or, you know, things that are put on in Superpose. Yes, yes. Right. So just like if you have rosy colored glasses, like polyana, you see everything rosy, even what's not. And if you have smoky colored glasses, you see everything is depressing even though it's not.

Right. That is, I think, an interesting, you can juxtapose that or relate that to the six realms, which is even at the top there with those, the devas, the gods, it's still not, you're still in an illusory world because while everything is great and everything is pleasurable and things are going, well, you don't really have an impetus to like transcend that. You're comfortable. Right. And because everything is impermanent, that won't last. Exactly. And then it deteriorates. And then you're upset. Yeah. And you know, the gods have long life, but no, have been realized, but it ends or whatever. So if you don't go beyond the cycle of this conditioning and causation, then, you know, to the timeless state or to the indomitable fortress of, you know, the gratefulness is intended to be.

Oh my God. Well, back. All right. I have four questions, three quick ones, and then one at the end here, we're coming to the eye. And I, it goes without saying, I would love to have you on again and explore some of these topics too. I love these conversations and a testament to how great they are. Time is flying here. So I love that. So here I'm like flying too. Yeah. Do you ever say you'll fly too? I believe it. So okay. Here are my, my three rapid fire questions. What is your favorite color? Blue sky. I love it. What is your favorite number? One. I love that too. What is your favorite animal?

Of course. Okay. Cool. Oh, okay. Not at all. The one person. I, dogs are great. They're so, they're so wonderful. Um, okay. And then the last question. Can you share one practical tip, um, or something, a practical thing that has helped you specifically in your life with the listeners? Um, there's so much one could say, um, the things are now exactly what you think they are. You can't believe whatever you think you have to look a little deeper. There's more to life than thinking and concepts in your mind that you had, you know. I think that's my favorite practical tip that has someone has given.

I think that sums up my own beliefs and experiences pretty, pretty firmly. That's, that's pretty awesome. Anything else you want to add to that? Well, I have something, another one, you know, people say enough, um, so it's a little different tack, but it's really extremely helpful to me. I put it in the form of a tiny short anecdote here at the end of our, you know, my, our first three year, three months, three days, Oh, Jen, the treat in the West in 1984 was the first such a treat in the West, you know, it took three years and eight months. And we had to wait teachers, considering Pichay and Doodger and Pichay, and I actually can't tell you what is great.

It's not always, you know, easy, but it was wonderful. Of course, their intensive bomb training treat at the end of that. And some people outside, and I don't know what the people inside because maybe we were a little more used to these things after a decade or two and then talk to that. So we didn't expect us to come out and be like able to fly or do, you know, great masters or something. Yeah, it's kind of not exactly like that. But unless you really have unbelievable practice and experience, but my own teacher retreat master who lived in health family, that center took a pain along the aisle, who spoke English.

So this is not just my translation. He was talking about like that, you know, because he knew people outside were thinking to you, and he said, don't expect the struggle to end. I've been talking to you a lot over the years and decades, not be unrealistic. I love that. And life is difficult. Life is full channel. Not just life is suffering. Life is also full of joy and miracles and grace, but you know, the unenlightened life, the conditioned life, the changes in relative time in this body's channel, you know, it's full of difficulties and other things. Anyway, don't expect the struggle to change.

You know, and just because I don't know, you become a qualified yoga teacher or a three year retreat or, you know, anything, but the claret world doesn't make the saint. Yes. Yes. And the hairdo or the, you know, whatever doesn't make the master and quantity and time and quality, you know, diplomas don't make the realized want to make the difference. They have to have a heart full, soulful transformation. The more we get into it, the more we get out of it in general. Well, I love that. And I love that there are people like you who have had the direct experiences and are so adept at communicating some of these things that can seem at times very heady or complicated or foreign, but you can really bring it back down to our direct experience and, you know, the practical applications of this stuff.

Thank you. It's not that complicated. It's fairly simple. It's simple, but we're not simple. No, that's the problem. We can overly complicate anything. I know. The simplest thing is enough for us when somebody says, you know, there's no way to go or nothing to get. It's not enough. No, no, no. I don't want to hear that. I want to hear it. Yeah. Save us. You know, for some people, that's enough, but not for us. Jesus saved us. It's not enough. It's a search. But I have one more thing to impart. Yes. Yes. I want to hear this enough, but it's only true. I think of it as being there while getting there.

Every single step of the way, not waiting, if you lose your pot of gold at the end of the boat. I love that. Being here, being there while getting there every step of the way, not waiting. Right. And being a part of it to yourself so you're not just a distance. You're waiting together and is there something about this love the one you're with? Yeah. Very important. Not the one you don't have. Right. There you go. And you're with yourself most of the time. So thank you so much for coming on. It's a beautiful word to self. It's almost impossible to love and accept others if we don't love and accept ourselves.

That is so true. That's a crucial first step. Again, I mean, just going back, I think there are a lot of people. Who with very pure and good and open hearts who find it very easy to help and be compassionate and kind to others, but then when it comes to their own self and well being, they neglect that and don't do that because your help and your love and your compassion will be far more effective is if you start with yourself because then you have experience doing it and you know how to react when that happens. So I think that's I mean, I think if we had a four hour conversation, we would just be getting more and more deep into the wisdom and beautiful teachings you have to offer.

Thank you so much for coming on. Let's talk. Yes. We'll talk. We'll talk. Thank you so much. Talk soon. Good luck with your new house brother and take care. Bye. Bye. Bye. [Music] One of the reasons I love Lama Suryodas. Hello again, by the way. I'm just jumping right into this, but one of the reasons I love Lama Suryodas is he just is for someone who has, he's done silent retreats, he's been to India, all the world around. He's taught and met some of the most esteemed teachers and people you could meet and he's very just down to earth. He's always extremely pleasant to speak to and I think that's shine through in this conversation.

You can rest assured I will have him on again to the dear listeners who have listed past the music. That music that you heard right there is another little clip from the Vkin Arman White Ocean sunset at Burning Man 2016 as a reminder. You can download that in this episode. I'm going to be looking to do more of these little bonus download things. I think that's going to be cool. I don't know. I listen to stuff. I like it. Maybe you like it too. Thank you to everyone who has rated and reviewed this podcast, who has donated, it really does, I said it at the beginning, but it means a tremendous amount to me.

It is validation. I'm really happy to say the podcast is the numbers are going in the direction I want to see them go. Not necessarily for an ego boost as I point out sometimes, but just showing that this is resonating with people and it's something of value. Thank you to everyone who has done that. Next week got a real treat for the people who have been asking, Stephen Campman. I'm about to record that in like two hours. He's going to be the next guest. I use a repeat guest, father of Mikey Campman, dreams, we're going to talk about Demian. We're going to talk about so many cool things. So stay tuned for that next week.

That'll be the year anniversary. That's pretty nuts of synchronicity. So thank you as always and I will see you next week. The grill is shot. The chairs are held together by optimism and what happened to the rug? Sounds like your outdoor setup is not ready for patio season. Place it all with Wayfair, shop Wayfair for grills, rugs, furniture, and more. With 20 million 5-star reviews, room of choice delivery, and expert setup on qualifying orders, it's never been easier to do more for less. Get 10% off your first eligible purchase. Hurry to Wayfair.com or download the app now.