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Home , Mindstream, Robina Courtin

HOW TO LIVE & DIE WELL SO WE CAN GO HAPPILY TO OUR NEXT

INSTITUT VAJRA YOGINI MARZENS DECEMBER 27 2015 – JANUARY 2 2016 VEN These teachings have been prepared at FPMT’s Institut Vajra Yogini in Marzens, France, for the students of a retreat there with Ven Robina Courtin, December 27 2014 – January 3 2015. institutvajrayogini.fr

With gratitude to FPMT Inc. for the use of “The Heart of the Perfection of Wisdom”.

To Yeshe Wisdom Archive for “Bodhichitta is the Best Medicine” and “You Can’t Find the I Anywhere”. lamayeshe.com

And to Wisdom Publications for the teachings in chapters 2, 3, 4, & 5. wisdompubs.org

Cover: Shakyamuni Buddha passing away in the lion position. Statue in the courtyard of Jamyang Buddhist Centre, London: sculpture, Nick Durnan; photograph, Natascha Sturny.

CONTENTS

1. The 4 2. We Must Prepare For Death 6 3. How to Think About Death 11 4. What Happens at Death? 13 5. The Twelve Links of Dependent Arising at the Time of Death 16 6. Helping Others at the Time of Death is a Big Responsibility 18 7. The Ten Non-Virtuous Actions and Their Results 21 8. How We Create Our Reality: 27 9. How to Change Our Reality: Purify Karma 33 10. The Pure Nature of Our 45 11. Being Our Own Therapist 47 12. Bodhichitta is the Best Medicine 55 13. You Cannot Find the I Anywhere 63 14. Dependent Arising: the “King of Logics” to Prove Emptiness 72 15. Dedication 89

1. THE HEART SUTRA OF beholding those five aggregates also as THE PERFECTION OF empty of inherent nature.

WISDOM AVALOKITESHEVARA’S EXTENSIVE ANSWER “Form is empty. Emptiness is form. Emptiness is not other than form; form is also not other than emptiness. Homage to the Holy Perfection of Wisdom! In the same way, feeling, discrimination, COMMON PROLOGUE compositional factors, and are Thus did I hear at one time. The empty. was dwelling on Mass of Vultures Mountain in Rajagriha together with a great “Shariputra, likewise, all phenomena are community of monks and a great community emptiness; without characteristic; of . unproduced, unceased; stainless, not without stain; not deficient, not fulfilled. SPECIAL PROLOGUE At that time, the Bhagavan was absorbed in “Shariputra, therefore, in emptiness there is the concentration on the categories of phenomena called “Profound Perception”. No form, no feeling, no discrimination, no compositional factors, no consciousness; BUDDHA BLESSES THE OF SHARIPUTRA AND No eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue, no body, AVALOKITESHVARA no mind; Also, at that time, the mahasattva arya Avalokiteshvara looked No visual form, no sound, no odor, no taste, upon the very practice of the profound no object of touch, and no phenomenon. perfection of wisdom and beheld those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature. There is no eye element and so on up to and including no mind element and no mental SHARIPUTRA’S QUESTION consciousness element. Then, through the power of Buddha, the venerable Shariputra said this to the There is no ignorance, no extinction of bodhisattva mahasattva arya ignorance, and so on up to and including no Avalokiteshvara: “How should any son of the aging and death and no extinction of aging train who wishes to practice the and death. activity of the profound perfection of wisdom?” Similarly, there is no suffering, origination, cessation, and path; AVALOKITESHVARA’S BRIEF ANSWER There is no exalted wisdom, no attainment, He said that and the bodhisattva mahasattva and also no non-attainment. arya Avalokiteshvara said this to the venerable Sharadvatiputra. “Shariputra, any “Shariputra, therefore, because there is no son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage attainment, bodhisattvas rely on and dwell who wishes to practice the activity of the in the perfection of wisdom, the mind profound perfection of wisdom should look without obscuration and without fear. upon it like this, correctly and repeatedly

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Having completely passed beyond error, This completes the Ârya-bhagavatî- they reach the end-point of . prajñâpâramitâ-hridaya-sûtra.

“All the buddhas who dwell in the three Translated from the Tibetan by Gelong times also manifestly, completely awaken to Thubten Tsultrim (Geroge Churinoff), the unsurpassable, perfect, complete first day of Saka Dawa, 1999, at enlightenment in reliance on the perfection Meditation Centre, Dharamsala, India. of wisdom. Amended March 7, 2001, in the New Mexico desert. Published by FPMT. THE OF THE PERFECTION OF WISDOM “Therefore, the mantra of the perfection of wisdom, the mantra of great knowledge, the unsurpassed mantra, the mantra equal to the unequaled, the mantra that thoroughly pacifies all suffering, should be known as truth since it is not false. The mantra of the perfection of wisdom is declared:

TAYATA GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASAMGATE BODHI SOHA

[TAYATA OM GO! GO! GO EYOND! GO PERFECTLY BEYOND! GO TO ENLIGHTENMENT! SOHA]

“Shariputra, the bodhisattva mahasattva should train in the profound perfection of wisdom like that”.

BUDDHA’S APPROVAL Then the Bhagavan arose from that concentration and commended the bodhisattva mahasattva arya Avalokiteshvara saying: “Well said, well said, son of the lineage, it is like that. It is like that; one should practice the profound perfection of wisdom just as you have indicated; even the tathagatas rejoice”.

EVERYONE REJOICES IN THE BUDDHA’S WORDS The Bhagavan having thus spoken, the venerable Sharadvatiputra, the bodhisattva mahasattva arya Avalokiteshvara, those surrounding in their entirety along with the world of gods, humans, asuras, and were overjoyed and highly praised that spoken by the Bhagavan.

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2. HOW TO THINK person”. Look how we talk about dying ABOUT DEATH people, in hushed tones. We look at them sadly, “Oh, how are you?” We talk about VEN ROBINA COURTIN Aunty Mary only in relationship to her dyingness, the sickness; she’s no longer a real person, is she? She’s a dying person. You don’t even want to include her in parties. And this is because we have this 1. DEATH IS DEFINITE misconception that somehow this dyingness Everything that we’re involved with in our is something that defines her, whereas daily life is impermanent. There’s not a livingness defines me. However, as Lama single thing in the existence of the universe Zopa says: “Living people die before dying that is a product of cause and effect that people every day”. doesn’t change. The very nature of cause and Look at the silly way we talk, an indicator effect is that things change. In fact the subtle of our misconceptions. “Oh I feel so alive”, level of is the very coming we’ll say. Meaning we feel very good. Well into being of something assumes the passing excuse me, happy people die. You away of it. You can’t have one without the understand? Healthy people die. Young other. You can’t have anything that exists people die. We might think, “Well, I’m not that is within the process of cause and effect going to die yet. I’m not old”. And you keep that doesn’t change, that doesn’t come and adjusting that, don’t you? I mean, when I go. Come and go. Come and go. was 40, 61 was old. Now, 80 is old. Where is And that includes our self: death is Betty? Betty is old, she is 75. Aren’t you? definite. Intellectually, we know it, but Betty I’m 74! Unless you add a year for emotionally we cling instinctively to a strong the Tibetan calendar then I’m 75. sense of being permanent, unchanging. Okay, Betty is old, she’s 74. But she Intellectually it’s clear to us; emotionally doesn’t think she is old. She probably thinks we’re living in denial of it. And remember, her grandmother is old or somebody who is across the board, what Buddha is saying is 85 is old. So we all just keep adjusting that we have within our mind a whole series because we don’t like to put ourselves into of misconceptions about how we think that category. Dying people are over there, things are, but in fact we’re not in touch with old people are over there, because we have how they are. this deep instinct of grasping at permanent So okay, death is definite. How do you me, a living me. contemplate this, how do you think about So we’ve got to face reality. “What do you this? When you hear about somebody dying, mean: ‘Face reality?’” We think fantasies are your first response is, “Oh!” We’re so nice. Well, Buddha says fantasies have got us shocked. “But I just talked to them into big trouble. It’s a fantasy to think I yesterday!” So that thought is coming from won’t die. Not because he’s trying to be cruel the misconception that somehow and sort of rub our noses in death. But he is instinctively we thought that they were saying that given our consciousness is a permanently alive, you know. Lama Zopa continuity that didn’t begin at the time of says, we think, “I am a living conception, and given that it will continue, person, I’m a living person. And Mary, I and given that everything we say, do and talked to her yesterday! She was a living think will leave seeds in the mind that will person, how could she have died?” We’re bring future results that will be my shocked. experiences – this is the of karma – When we think of someone who is sick, then it just makes a lot of sense that death is however, we think “Oh, she’s a dying

6 an extremely important moment in your life. alive. So she had to leave him again. He was Because it’s going to be a transition from this a dying person and he didn’t die. And now body to another body. It’s a bit of a scary two years later he’s totally alive, he’s a living transition. We should be used to it, we’ve person again. done it a million times, the Buddha says. But So death is definite and it’s something we’re not mentally used to it because we’re that is just natural. When we hear that Mary clinging so powerfully to this one. died, it reminds us; surprise is not relevant. And we cling to everything so mightily – That’s the way to think about it. “Wow, Grandma’s cup: it’s so precious, you’ve got Buddha is right. Death is definite, there’s insurance on it and it’s up there and so dear nothing certain. Wow, look at that”. to you and you look at it every day. But its Everything that comes into being necessarily nature is to break, you can’t avoid that. But dies. But because of the ego-grasping, this we live in denial of that because we’ve primordial misconception, because of imposed all of this beauty and massive attachment, the main voice of the marvelousness and value onto it. And so look ego, we frantically don’t want to disappear. what happens when it does break. You have We want to be me. So we can’t bear to think a mental breakdown. You live in denial and that I will change, that I will die. So we have you start freaking out. You’ve got to blame, this big fantasy. you’ve got to sue somebody and it’s so Intellectually it would be silly to argue painful. And then we think we’re suffering with it: “Oh of course I’m not going to die!” because the cup broke. We know we will. But emotionally it’s like We think we suffer because the person that. We might as well say we’re not going to. died. It’s not true. We suffer – and this is That’s why were shocked. Death is definite. Buddha’s point – because we have a fantasy A simple way to bring this into our lives is that they won’t die, because we have a every time we see or hear about someone fantasy that they shouldn’t die. In other dying – a person, an ant, our pets – words, we’re not seeing reality. Across the remember that it’s natural: death is definite. board this is how Buddha is talking. We are And the real way to make it tasty is to think, not facing reality. We don’t see things as “That’ll be me one day. I will die too”. they are. We live in denial of things. We are not only not seeing how things are, we’re 2. THE TIME OF DEATH IS imposing a fantasy onto it. UNCERTAIN So this simple meditation here we are The second point, getting closer to home trying to do: using Buddha’s view of what’s now, is the time of death is not certain. So real, we’re giving it a go, we’re thinking even though we do factor in death to some about how he says things are and attempting extent – we have insurance policies and to make that the way we think, in order to pensions, we organize our funeral, we make argue with ego’s entrenched mistaken views. our will – still, even if we’re old, we haven’t So it’s a practical reason. scheduled death in, have we? “Well next I mean even when we think of a person week is the dentist, and the week after that is who’s dying, we think that’s permanent. A death”. Or even five years’ time. We can plan friend of mine and her husband, they split vacations even in five years, but we don’t up, and then he was diagnosed with some schedule death. No way, because even virulent cancer and was going to be dead in a though we do know we will die, that death is couple of months, she went back to him to definite, we don’t like to think that the time help him die. Well excuse me, he didn’t die! of death is uncertain. Why? Because I still She kept waiting! Two months later, three feel like a living person. How can I be dying months later, then six months later he’s still next week? Not possible. I feel alive.

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So the time of death is obviously is, we can have the luxury while we’ve got uncertain. We all know we’re going to die. this precious life to contemplate these But then if I ask each one of us, “Okay, stick things. To recognize the reality that the time it into your schedule. Come on, do a ten-year of death really is uncertain. schedule now, work out your schedule for Most of us, probably Betty can speculate, your life, your plan. Now factor death in being 74, that it’s possible that she could please” we’ll think it’s a joke. probably die sooner than a 20-year-old. But And, of course, we don’t know when we there is no certainty. I read about a will die. That’s the point. We vaguely know footballer who died, a 17-year old. Whatever it’ll be some time in the future. It’s a logical the reason was, he died. Now, believe me, he fact that if I know I will die and I don’t know didn’t expect to die. “No way, I’m young. No when, then I could die today, couldn’t I? But way, I’m healthy. No way, I’m happy”. we laugh if we say that. It’s an instinctive Fantasty, fantasy, fantasy. belief. “Of course I won’t die today. Lama Zopa says, “Best to think, ‘I will die Tomorrow? Of course not. Next week? No, today.’” If you really want to practice, best to come on, don’t be ridiculous!” There is a think, “I will die today”. Because then you story about a Tibetan astrologer, who had won’t waste your life. That’s the point Atisha done his own chart, and according to the wants from us by contemplating these things chart he was going to die today. His own right here, because it will energize us not to chart. He sat there thinking about it, “Where waste this precious life, not to waste this did I make a mistake?” He was totally opportunity. convinced he was wrong. And what And, you think about it: what’s the name happened was, while he was trying to work of the day you’ll die? It’s “today”, isn’t it! So out where he had made the mistake, we might as well get used to thinking it! convinced that he was wrong, the story is that he had this pokey thing and he was 3. WHAT IS IMPORTANT AT THE playing with it in his ear while he was TIME OF DEATH? thinking. And the window shutter blew open And that brings us to the third point, the and it hit him and he pierced his ear and he crux of it. At the time of death, at the died. He died that moment. But the moment when this consciousness leaves this immediate impulse was, “Of course it’s a body, what is important? What is useful to mistake. How can I die today?” me in that moment? What will be useful to And any one of us if we dared to think the consciousness that will leave this body that thought and really go into it and make a and take another body. What will be useful? meditation out of it, to use our creative That’s not the way we think of death. We imagination, it’s too scary to us, we don’t think of death as the end, and we see a big want to go there, because we can’t bear the black hole that we’ll sort of go into that no thought that we could die. And then to do one knows about. We think of death from the processing we’d have to do, like the the point of view of the observer. We should people up on the hundredth floor of the think about death from the point of view of World Trade Center, think of the vivid this consciousness moving forward to stories, and the wives and husbands talking another body, another house, you’ve got to to each other, and “I love you, I love you”, go to another house soon. So it’s a bit of a before they were burned alive in that difficult transition, and clearly, the more building. I mean you’ve really got to speed attached you are to this house, the more up the process of giving up attachment and painful it is to move. recognizing impermanence when you’ve only If we never confronted impermanence, got a few minutes. So what Buddha is saying our own, and never thought about death, the

8 definiteness of it, the uncertainty of the time a piece of ka-ka, so don’t worry about the of it, well then that’s how death will be, body; other people can take care of that. The death will be a very scary time. main point from Buddha’s point of view is to I remember a friend of mine, Lenny, who prepare internally, to think about your mind. worked for years as a hospice worker, she And how do you prepare for death? It said it’s a given that most people die with doesn’t mean you’ve got to imagine when fear. She said the ones who didn’t die with you’re dying, although that’s helpful. You’re fear were those who had some kind of not preparing for death by thinking about spiritual path. My feeling is it’s not because death. You’re preparing for death by they’re such a high practitioners but because knowing about impermanence now. How do the only people who think about death are you prepare for your driving test? By driving spiritual people, Christians, say, because a car now. It’s obvious. How do you prepare they talk about God or heaven. Materialists, for death: by facing the reality of it. And you why would we think about death? Because as prepare for death by living our lives in a way far as the materialist’s view is concerned you that prepares us for death. disappear when you die, there’s nothing left. The conclusion from this is it’s a wakeup So there’s no reason to think about death. call. And that’s the point that Atisha’s There’s no reason to prepare yourself for stressing here: to prepare ourselves. In other that event. words change the way we think now and If you’re a Buddhist you prepare for that therefore change the way we live our lives, event because you’re going to move from this because that’s how you prepare for death, body to another one. So it’s an important that’s how you prepare for this event. You event, it’s a very important event that’s going put all the steps in place. Like you prepare to happen in your life: your death. Like for the wedding, you prepare for the driving moving from your house, you prepare an test. You do the steps now and so when the awful lot for that. Look at the simple things day comes it’ll just happen in a natural way. we do that will happen in the future that we So this third point is, at the time of death have to prepare for. We don’t just say, “Oh, what is it useful to me? Well, there’s a few when it happens I’ll deal with it”. That’s how givens here: let’s look at them. we think about death. Given Buddha’s assertion that this We prepare in the most elaborate ways consciousness of mine didn’t begin at for the smallest things that are going to conception and goes back and back and happen in the future. Especially if you don’t back, and that it will not end at death, will know how to do it. Like your driving test. continue just into the future – it’s You don’t just say, “Oh, when I get to the indestructible this consciousness of ours; driving test I’ll manage it then”. Don’t be and given that whatever I have said, done, ridiculous! You’ve got to train now, you and thought in this life, and in infinite know, it’s obvious. It’s such a simple point. previous ones, necessarily leaves a seed in So if you think of death in this sense, not as my mind that just doesn’t disappear; and some black hole that I will fall into, but as given that seeds ripen in the future as one’s simply a transition. This is the Buddhist own experiences: negative actions of body, approach. From this body to the next. speech and mind necessarily leave seeds in Clearly a very important event to prepare my mind that will ripen as suffering and for. And I’m not talking about having your positive actions leave a seed in my mind that nice coffin, the way people prepare, and the will ripen as my happiness in the future; and nice plot, out there. We’re not discussing given that I don’t want suffering and do that. That’s just for your body. By the time want happiness – given all this, then it your consciousness leaves your body it’s just follows logically that at the time of death the

9 only thing that is of any use to me is the therefore, when it comes I’m not shocked positive seeds in my mind. That’s it. because I know it’s natural that I die. And The body is useless, it can’t help. Princess I’m prepared because I’ve lived my life by Diana died at 36. I always think of her. This practicing morality, goodness, by not gorgeous aerobiced body, totally in love, harming others – at the very least, this. everything is perfect, blissful, blah, blah, We don’t have to be fundamentalist about blah. She died. So at that moment, the only it and chuck out the husband, and chuck out thing that was any benefit to her were the the kids, and chuck out the reputation, and seeds in her mind from the virtue she had chuck out our money, no. Just change the done in her life. All the rest was worse than way you see them. Change your attitude useless. towards them. That’s the real point. Give up The things that I now see as most attachment to the house, the family, the important in life, Buddha would say – and body; give up the jealousy, the fear, the you analyze it according to his view and it’s neurosis, the blaming. Because those clear – they are totally essenceless. The imprints in your mind will be there when things we do take as the purpose of life, you you die and you do not want those. But you ask most people, it’s almost like a mantra: do want your virtue and your kindness and health and family are the main point of our your generosity and your patience and your life. Everyone will say that’s the point of life. non-attachment seeds to ripen. Well, the Buddha would say we are missing So you don’t wait until death to do it, it’s the point because at the time of death if they too late then. Start sowing seeds now. That’s were so crucial they would be a benefit to us, how you lead your life. By recognizing that but they are useless. Your family, your it’s going to change, that death is definite, husband, your children, your possessions, the time of death is completely uncertain, so your nice house, your nice body, your health, you might as well be ready when it does your reputation, money in the bank, all the come unexpectedly. It won’t give a warning: things we spend all our time worrying about “You’ve got ten more breaths left Robina, and putting into place because we believe in you better get ready”. We might have; we’d the propaganda that that’s the security we be lucky. It’s actually very fortunate if you are need, that that’s what life is all about; we get sick before you die, because you’ve got believe in the materialists’ propaganda, time to prepare. That’s actually really the which we are part of, we buy into it. Buddhist approach. My Buddhist friends on But at the time of death all the things you death row have been forced to confront the spend your life thinking are important are of reality of death, so they can prepare for it. no use. They crumble. There’s nothing. We How fortunate. all say at the time of death you can’t take it with you, but we treat it like a joke. It’s very From teachings in the FPMT’s profound when you really get an experience Discovering Buddhism Module 3, of its truth. Practicing the Path. So if this is true, then I had better prepare now by living my life in a reasonable way now: by trying to remove the negative seeds that I have already planted and by trying to develop the positive ones. This is reasonable, based on these assumptions. So at the time of death, when it comes, I must be ready, I have to be prepared. And the way to be prepared is by having thought about it,

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3. WE MUST PREPARE But preparing for a happy death depends FOR DEATH not just on practices at the time of death; a happy death depends upon how we live our LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE life every day, every moment. Practicing patience when someone is angry with us or provokes us or disrespects us, for example, is practical preparation for death. Practicing like this every day protects us from creating OUR GREATEST GIFT TO OTHERS negative karma, and that makes death When suddenly one day one of your loved lighter, less fearful. The future depends on ones dies and you don’t know what to do to the present. help, you’ll feel so confused, so lost. Recently Practicing every day and preparing for the a Buddhist student of mine told me that this time of your death is far more important is what happened for her when her father than going to the hospital to check the body, died unexpectedly. That made me think that because death can happen at any time – knowing how to help others at the time of even for healthy people. Today, many people death is such important education to have. have died, healthy as well as unhealthy. As you get older, you’ll definitely hear When you know how to die with full about people dying – your family will die, confidence that you won’t be reborn in the your friends will die (your enemies too!) – so lower realms, that definitely you will have a you will need to be prepared to help. This good rebirth, a good future; that death is just doesn’t just apply to people who work with change, that you’re leaving this old, sick the dying; everyone should learn to know body for a new, healthy one – then you are how to help. qualified to help others who are dying. You Helping our loved ones at the time of will be able to explain things skillfully, death is the best service we can offer them, according to their minds. You will create the our greatest gift. Why? Because death is the right conditions so that it’s easy for their most important time of life: it’s at death that minds to be transformed into virtue at the the next rebirth is determined. By providing time of death. You will know how to help the right support, the right environment, you them die with a happy mind. can help your loved one die peacefully, with And not only that: once you’re familiar virtuous thoughts, and thus have a good with what to do you can tell others what they rebirth. can do to help you at the time of your own death. BEFORE YOU HELP OTHERS AT DEATH, YOU NEED TO PREPARE DEATH IS EASY WHEN WE’VE FOR YOUR OWN DEATH GIVEN UP ATTACHMENT Before you can help someone else you need Death itself is not what causes fear. It is to learn how to prepare for your own death. simply the consciousness leaving the body; If you look at your mind and how much one labels death on that event. There is no attachment you have, I think you will see terrifying death from its own side; the that there is a lot of work to be done before terrifying death is made up by our own you face death, and this is true of almost mind. We have made death terrifying. everybody. Have you freed yourself from What causes the worry and fear, what attachment to your possessions? To your makes death so difficult is attachment, loved one and friends? To your career and desire, clinging: to this life, to the body, reputation? Could you separate from your possessions, family, friends and so forth. body happily tomorrow? This clinging makes death difficult, bringing

11 so much worry and fear. And we cause this FPMT.org/death. Published in 2016 ourselves. by Wisdom Publications.

ATTACHMENT IS THE MAIN PUSH BEHIND SAMSARA In relation to taking in the , the Refuge mentions “the supreme cessation of attachment” when it talks about the cessation of suffering and its causes – it doesn’t say cessation of anger, it doesn’t say cessation of ignorance, it doesn’t say cessation of pride, and so forth (there are many delusions). Why specifically attachment? Because it’s the main push behind samsara, this cycle of death and rebirth; the main cause. There is attachment that motivates negative actions, which cause rebirth in the lower realms. Then there is attachment to wanting to be reborn in the human realm, for example, as a result of which we create virtuous karma, which causes that rebirth. And then, as described in the twelve links of dependent arising, at the time of death the eighth and ninth links, craving and grasping – strong attachment, in other words – arise and nourish the seed that was left on the mental continuum by the past karma (the second link) because of the root ignorance (the first), making it ready to produce the next life. So you can see that even the nearest cause of the next rebirth in samsara is this attachment at the time of death. It is what ties us to samsara continuously, has been tying us to samsara continuously, and will continue to tie us to samara, because our consciousness has existed since beginningless time and will continue to exist forever. Until we have cut the causes of samsara, body after body will keep coming, like the assembly line in a car factory.

From How to Help Your Loved Ones Enjoy Death and Go Happily to Their Next Rebirth: available as a PDF from

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4. WHAT HAPPENS AT consciousnesses: the five senses and mental DEATH? consciousness.

LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE FOUR ELEMENTS Our body is made up of the four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind.

GROSS, SUBTLE, AND EXTREMELY WHEN DOES DEATH OCCUR? AND MIND, OR Death occurs when the consciousness, the CONSCIOUSNESS mind, separates from the body. Even when According to the explanations in highest the breath has stopped – this is what is , there is gross body, subtle body, and called the “outer breath” – or the brain extremely subtle, or very subtle, body doesn’t function, or the heart doesn’t beat, conjoined respectively with gross the person is not dead until the mind, the consciousness, subtle consciousness, and consciousness, leaves the body. There is still extremely subtle, or very subtle, the “inner breath”, and for this to stop and consciousness. the consciousness to leave the body can take The gross body is this one that we can see; anywhere from a few seconds to three days the subtle one is made up of channels, after the outer breath has ceased (or even winds, and drops; the extremely subtle body longer for experienced meditators). is subtle wind. Dr. Adrian Feldmann, an Australian The sense consciousnesses are gross medical doctor who’s one of the most senior consciousness. Subtle consciousness FPMT monks, explained how he saw a includes the various conceptual states of person whose heart had stopped, who was mind called the eighty superstitions, as well clinically dead, but who started to function as the minds of white appearance, red again. appearance or increase, and black, or dark, There are many, many stories like this. appearance. Finally, there is extremely These things happen because it’s hard to tell subtle consciousness, or the mind of clear when a person has died if you go by just the light. heart or the breath or brain activity. CHANNELS, WINDS, AND CHAKRAS THE COMPONENTS OF A PERSON The wind energies of the subtle body – more In order to better understand the process of subtle than the air we breathe – carry our death, it’s helpful to understand what makes mind through a system of 72,000 channels up a person, the one who dies. throughout the body. It is said that our consciousness, our mind, “rides” on these FIVE AGGREGATES winds. Buddha explained that a person is made up The main channels are the central of five “aggregates”: form, feeling, channel and the right and left channels. They discrimination, compounding aggregates, are in the centre of the body, measuring and consciousness. between the two breasts, and a little closer to Form refers to our body. Feeling and the back. At various points along these discrimination are two of the mental factors channels there are chakras, the main ones that we experience day to day; all the rest, being at the crown, the throat, the heart, the such as jealousy, patience, and love, etc., are navel and the tip of the sex organ. The two included in compounding aggregates. side channels do not run straight down Consciousness refers to the six either side of the central channel but wrap

13 around it at the chakras, forming “knots”. DEATH, INTERMEDIATE STATE, AND REBIRTH RED AND WHITE DROPS The process of death occurs in eight stages, At the moment of conception in our mother’s and is experienced by those who have bodies womb, our consciousness mixed with the red constituted from the sperm of the father and drop, or bodhichitta, from the mother and the egg of the mother: human beings and the white drop from the father. The essence some animals. of this conjoined white and red bodhichitta – During the first four stages we experience known as the indestructible drop, with its the gradual dissolution of twenty-two of red and white halves, the size of a tiny bean twenty-five components: four of the five – abides in the very centre of our heart aggregates, four of the five types of wisdom chakra. – the base-time wisdoms, not the resulttime Part of the white bodhichitta also abides – the four elements, five of the six sense at the crown chakra and part of the red at bases, and the five inner sense objects. the navel chakra. Our extremely subtle The breath has stopped by the end of the consciousness resides in the indestructible fourth stage, and by then the gross drop. consciousnesses have ceased. During the final four stages, the THE CLEAR LIGHT MIND OF DEATH remaining three of the twenty-five While we are alive, the knots at the chakras components gradually cease: the fifth prevent the winds from entering into and aggregate, the fifth wisdom, and the sixth flowing in the central channel. Otherwise sense base. these various winds and the states of mind During the fifth, sixth, and seventh stages associated with them would all dissolve into subtle consciousness gradually dissolves: the the indestructible drop at the heart chakra, eighty superstitions, bringing, in order, the at which point our extremely subtle white, red, and dark appearances. consciousness, the mind of clear light, would By the eighth stage, all that is left is the manifest and with it we could meditate on extremely subtle wind conjoined with the emptiness and thus free ourselves from all extremely subtle consciousness, the mind of delusions, eventually becoming enlightened. clear light, at the indestructible drop at the Throughout their lives the great heart. Death occurs when the indestructible meditators train their minds to do this. drop splits open and the conjoined Lama Yeshe, for example, in his daily tantric extremely subtle wind and mind leaves the practice was able to experience the various body. visions of the dissolution process that occur However, for ordinary people the mind naturally at death; in other words, he didn’t can stay in the body for up to three days after need to wait until death to experience them. the breath stops, although they are not Lama was able to open the chakras, causing aware. The great yogis, as I mentioned, can the winds to enter into and flow in the meditate in the clear light for as long as they central channel and dissolve at the heart like. chakra, and thus could meditate in the clear As soon as the mind leaves the body we light. Therefore, at the time of death the take a “life” between this life and the next great yogis can remain in meditation in the called the intermediate state, and up to clear light for as long as they like, which is forty-nine days later will take a new rebirth. what happened with Lama. .

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YOUR DYING THOUGHTS ACTIVATE thrashing about, screaming, blood coming THE KARMIC SEED THAT from the ears, nose and mouth, and our eyes DETERMINES YOUR NEXT REBIRTH rolling up. If we have created very heavy As Pabongka Rinpoche says in Liberation In negative karma, all five will happen and as the Palm of Your Hand, your dying thoughts we are dying we will have terrible visions of activate the karma that will be the cause of our future life. We will feel that we are your next rebirth, and the activators of this moving from light into darkness. “throwing karma” are the eighth and ninth On the other hand, dying with a virtuous links, craving and grasping, as discussed in state of mind causes us to have a peaceful the twelve links of dependent arising. and happy death. In fact, if we’re like the Rinpoche says that this takes place while the best spiritual practitioners we will be joyful mind is still active and you can still recall at the time of death and will have a sense of virtue or be reminded of it by other people, passing from darkness into light. which is now. At this point it is so important to be able From How to Help Your Loved Ones to control the arising of the disturbing Enjoy Death and Go Happily to Their thoughts by remembering the guru, the Next Rebirth: available as a PDF from teachings – renunciation of samsara, karma, FPMT.org/death. Published in 2016 emptiness, loving kindness and great by Wisdom Publications. compassion, and the rest – which gives us the chance to be born in a buddha’s or to take a perfect human rebirth. If our last gross thoughts are virtuous the throwing karma will be virtuous; if the last gross thoughts are non-virtuous the throwing karma will be non-virtuous. The karmic seed that ripens is whichever is heavier, the stronger habit – which, as I mentioned, could have been planted hundreds, even millions, of lifetimes ago; if they’re equal, the seed that was planted first will be the one that ripens. If we die with anger, say, or strong attachment to our life, our loved ones, etc., our birth will be only in the lower realms, nowhere else. Generally, attachment causes rebirth as a hungry ghost; ignorance causes rebirth as an animal, and anger as a hell being. In these lower realms we will experience unimaginable sufferings for an incredible length of time. The suffering in the human realm is nothing in comparison – in fact, it’s like great pleasure in comparison. At this point, when dying with nonvirtuous thoughts five things can occur, although not necessarily all five. They include soiling ourselves, our arms and legs

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5. THE TWELVE LINKS because of the attachment to not wanting to OF DEPENDENT ARISING leave the body: that’s what causes fear at the time of death. After that, grasping arose, a AT THE TIME OF DEATH stronger form of attachment, this time – in LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE our case – attachment to receiving a human body. Now, in the case of someone who is going to be reborn in the hot hells the craving is the same – not wanting to separate from Cyclic existence operates through the twelve their body – but the grasping is to heat links of dependent arising. From (1) the because they feel very cold. Many times ignorance that believes in inherent dying people say they feel cold and beg for existence we create (2) compounded blankets, but even if you give them two or action, or karma, the imprints of which are three it won’t be enough: their grasping at left on our (3) consciousness. (Some heat is so strong. (This could also happen authors of the scriptures also count the because the fire element is dissolving at that result consciousness that enters the fertilized point.) The grasping at heat activates a egg.) Next is (4) name and form, “name” negative karmic seed, the second link, which referring to the four mental aggregates and causes their mind to migrate to a hell being’s “form” to the physical, the egg and sperm, body right after death. The grasping is the when the five come together in the womb. very close condition; there were, of course, When they begin to develop as the fetus the previously-created causes: the first link, they are known as (5) the six sense bases. ignorance, and the second, karma. Then comes (6) contact, when the mind connects with external objects through the GRASPING AT A HUMAN REBIRTH sense bases of the eyes, ears, and so forth, AT THE TIME OF DEATH IS A CAUSE followed by (7) feeling in relation to those FOR ACHIEVING ONE objects, either pleasant, unpleasant, or In our case, as humans, the very close neutral, which gives rise to (8) craving and condition at the time of our past death, just (9) grasping, then (10) becoming. Next before the gross consciousness ceased, was is (11) birth, and finally there is (12) old the grasping at, the wish to receive, a human age and death. body. In other words, in order to receive this perfect human rebirth that we have now, we THE TWELVE LINKS OF THIS must have had not only the karma of perfect PERFECT HUMAN REBIRTH morality and great generosity but also the Let us discuss the twelve links in relation to strong desire – grasping, the ninth link – to this human body that we have now. What have a human body. caused our consciousness to join the egg and When we understand that attachment to this sperm in our mother’s body? What made it life is never virtuous but attachment at the go there? time of death to either a human life or In past lives, because of ignorance we rebirth in a pure land is virtuous, then we created both non-virtuous and virtuous can understand the function of this link of karma, which planted seeds, left potentials, grasping. in the field of our consciousness. At the In other words, whereas craving and time of death of our life before this one, grasping are certainly operating in our daily whether we were a human or an elephant or life in the form of attachment, in the context a kangaroo, craving arose – craving to not of the twelve links they are more to do with separate from that body. Then fear arose, the connection of one life to the next. The

16 karmic seed that gives rise to the new rebirth in these four. Because we didn’t cease is there on our mind, the second link, but it delusions and karma in our past life by is grasping at the time of death that activates following the path, this self, this person, is its ripening. still caught up in samsara. Wherever our consciousness goes, this FIVE CAUSES FROM PAST LIVES, self goes with it, because consciousness is SEVEN RESULTS IN THIS LIFE the main base for the existence of self; the To summarize: five of the links are causes gross body exists for a short time and then from past lives: three delusions – the three disintegrates. As long as this self is bound by links of ignorance, craving, and delusions and karma there is no choice, we grasping; and two – the two links will be burdened by these aggregates. of compounded action and becoming. Delusions and karma have bound this self to First there was the delusion ignorance, samsara, and no matter how much we do not the first link, then the delusions arising at want this suffering, as long as we are caught the time of death, the eighth link, craving, up in samsara there is no freedom. and ninth, grasping. Then there were the two karmas – the second link, in our case a From How to Help Your Loved Ones virtuous karma (which could have been Enjoy Death and Go Happily to Their created thousands, even millions, of lives Next Rebirth: available as a PDF from ago), and the second karma, becoming, the FPMT.org/death. Published in 2016 tenth link: the previously created karmic by Wisdom Publications. seed made ready by craving and grasping at death: that is what is called becoming. It is these five that formed these aggregates, this body and mind, this samsara. Of the seven results that manifest in this life, the eleventh link, birth, started at the moment our consciousness joined the fertilized egg. Old age, the beginning of the twelfth, old age and death, started the next moment in the womb – “old age” is not just what is known in the world: the wrinkles, the white hair, and so forth. Now, all there is left is death.

NO DELUSIONS AND KARMA, NO REBIRTH From this evolution we can understand that if we had freed ourselves of delusions and karma in the past there is no way we could have come into existence. There’d be no reason at all to have taken this human body: to have to experience the suffering of rebirth, the suffering of sickness, the suffering of old age, and the suffering of death – not to mention all the other problems that we experience in daily life that are not included

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6. HELPING OTHERS AT especially when the time of death is close – THE TIME OF DEATH IS Rinpoche advises that it’s best not to allow anyone for whom they have strong A BIG RESPONSIBILITY attachment to be in their presence; ideally, BY LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE you shouldn’t even mention their name. Of course, if that person can help your loved one, help them solve their problems or alleviate their fears, then that’s okay. But if their presence simply increases As we’ve discussed, a good rebirth – a their attachment, their fears of separation, perfect human rebirth or birth in a buddha’s then it’s very harmful, making it difficult for pure land such as Amitabha’s Blissful Realm, your loved one to let go. where there’s no suffering and where we can achieve enlightenment quickly – depends A PRAYER FOR HELPERS upon dying peacefully, with virtuous May whoever thoughts. If we die with anger or strong Sees me, attachment or fear our birth will be only in Touches me, the lower realms. Remembers me, Therefore, the people surrounding the Thinks about me, person who is dying – friends, family, Talks about me, professional carers – have a big Praises me, responsibility. I will put it this way: Even criticizes me – Whatever arises in your loved one’s mind, May they immediately be free from all spirit whether their thoughts are virtuous or harms nonvirtuous, very much depends upon you And negative karma, and other helpers, how you behave towards And may they complete the path, them. It is a great responsibility. If you are And achieve full enlightenment as soon as not careful, if you do not have this education possible. – that the way you behave affects the mind of the person and therefore their future life – In this way you become wish-fulfilling for you will only harm them, not help them. your loved ones – for all sentient beings. As Chöden Rinpoche says that even if you soon as they see you, hear your voice, touch cannot help the person become virtuous, at you, or even remember you, they will least help them become neutral – not immediately be free of the fear of death and nonvirtuous, not virtuous. Best, of course, is their mind will be filled with great joy. Then to help them become virtuous. they will be able to go to a pure land, where they can get enlightened. HELPERS SHOULD BE CLOSE TO THE DYING PERSON USE YOUR WISDOM Rinpoche says that the people who help, who And remember, as I mentioned at the give advice and support, and especially the beginning, your ability to help your loved one who speaks the name of the person’s one depends on what you have practiced guru in their ear when their breath stops, throughout your life. The more you shouldn’t be someone they dislike; in fact, understand what you are supposed to do for there should be pure between them, your own death, the more you will know how a pure spiritual relationship. to help your loved one. The less you know, Also, in order to ensure that attachment the less wisdom you will have. When you doesn’t arise in your loved one’s mind – know how to die with a peaceful mind, then

18 you can confidently help your loved one. You loved one’s gurus. If they’re not Buddhist will be able to create the right conditions so you could have images from their own that it’s easy for their minds to be religion, such as Mary or Jesus or Shiva. transformed into virtue. Also display , prayers wheels, texts, You need to be skillful in advising your etc., ready to use for blessings. Put things loved one according to their state of mind, around nicely. their background, their life; whether they are a non-believer or have a religion, and if they THE POSITION OF THE BED have a religion what their level of If possible, your loved one should be lying understanding is. with their head pointing towards the north, We’re not clairvoyant, so we won’t know which means they are facing the west, which exactly what fits the mind of the person or is where Amitabha Buddha’s pure land is. when the right time is to explain it to them, This prepares them for the practice of or even whether they have the karma to going to sleep in the lion posture, which in listen to the advice or to understand it. turn prepares them for dying in this Check, analyze how to present the advice: position, which is how Buddha himself the right time, the right mood, and then passed away. Lying like this reminds them of educate them however you can, with as the Buddha, that they’re following in his much compassion as possible and as much footsteps. wisdom, with skillful means. NO TOBACCO MERELY HEARING SOME OF THE Do not allow anyone to smoke anywhere PRACTICES CAN HELP near the dying person. Besides causing But remember, as I mentioned and as physical problems, without question Rinpoche has advised, even if the dying smoking is harmful spiritually. It pollutes person doesn’t have faith in Buddha’s the subtle nervous system, the channels, etc. teachings it’s still good for them to hear the According to the great lama, Panchen practices; that receiving the benefits of Lama Chökyi Gyaltsen – who composed the reciting or hearing them doesn’t require incredible teaching, Guru Puja, as well as devotion. many other teachings, including a text on – when someone asked him to CREATE A CONDUCIVE perform at the time of death the first ENVIRONMENT thing he would ask is whether the person MAKE THE PLACE BEAUTIFUL smoked, and if they did he wouldn’t do the You should make the room as beautiful as practice. It seems that smoking makes it possible: a calm, peaceful, serene, holy difficult to transfer the consciousness to a environment is so important. There should pure land. be beautiful views, beautiful art, flowers – flowers give a very special spiritual feeling. NO PETS, ANIMAL SKINS The point is to help put positive imprints You should not allow any cats and dogs in on your loved one’s mind. If their mind is the room with your loved one, especially cats elevated they will not be afraid of dying. – it’s said that their hair is polluted. Here in Tibetan Ceremonies of the Dead the author says that if the person who is dying is lying DISPLAY HOLY OBJECTS SUCH AS on an animal skin you should remove it STATUES, IMAGES, before they die; the same if they’re wearing STUPAS, TEXTS, PRAYER WHEELS an animal skin or are covered by one. It says Display images of the buddhas and your that being around animal skins at the time of

19 death makes transference of consciousness to a pure land more difficult, even if it’s a lama who is performing phowa. I haven’t heard this said in other teachings, but it says it here. Also, it is said that the skins make the body smelly.

A CALM AND PEACEFUL ENVIRONMENT You must not create a situation that disturbs your loved one’s mind, makes them angry or upset. Don’t have anyone emotional in the room, especially when death is close. It is best that people don’t cry within hearing distance of your loved one as this creates clinging in their mind. And you should not hold on to them. Crying and pleading with them not to die won’t keep them alive and will only agitate them and make their death more difficult. In other words, you should create an environment that is calm and peaceful. This cannot be stressed enough.

From How to Help Your Loved Ones Enjoy Death and Go Happily to Their Next Rebirth: available as a PDF from FPMT.org/death. Published in 2016 by Wisdom Publications.

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7. THE TEN NON- indirectly by ordering someone else to kill. VIRTUOUS ACTIONS COMPLETION The other person or being dies before you do. (Suicide is a AND THEIR RESULTS negative action that will bring suff ering in COMPILED BY VEN. SANGYE the future but is not a complete act because KHADRO factors 1 and 4 are missing.)

TAKING THE UNGIVEN (STEALING) BASIS Something of value belonging to 1. HOW WE CREATE A COMPLETE another. NON-VIRTUOUS ACTION INTENTION Each of the ten non-virtuous actions – three a. recognition: You recognize of the body, four of the speech, three of the unmistakenly the object to be stolen. mind – has four components or factors. For b. intention: You intend to steal. the action to be complete, that is, to bring c. motivation: One of the . the full karmic result of lower realm rebirth, For example, out of anger, stealing all four components must be present. something from someone you wish to hurt; out of att achment, stealing something you – THE BASIS OR OBJECT OF THE wish to possess; out of ignorance, stealing or ACTION cheati ng, thinking that it’s not wrong. – THE INTENTION ACTION Whatever means you use to a. recognition steal, e.g., taking the object secretly, not b. intention paying taxes or fees you owe, misusing c. motivation donations, etc.; or getting someone to steal – THE ACTION for you. – THE COMPLETION OF THE ACTION COMPLETION You think that the object now belongs to you. KILLING BASIS A living being other than yourself. SEXUAL MISCONDUCT INTENTION BASIS For lay people, improper time, a. recognition: You recognize improper place, or improper partner; for unmistakenly the person or being you intend ordained people, any kind of sexual activity to kill. is sexual misconduct. (Some lam-rim books b. intention: You intend to kill. say that the basis is the person with whom c. motivation: You are motivated to kill you engage in sexual misconduct.) out of anger, attachment, or ignorance. INTENTION For example, out of anger, killing an a. recognition: You must be in no doubt enemy or a being that annoys you; out of att that the act is sexual misconduct. (Other achment, killing an animal for its meat or lam-rim books: You must have unmistaken skin; out of ignorance, killing animals with recognition of the object of your the belief that they were placed on this earth misconduct.) to be used by humans for food, etc., or killing b. intention: You intend to engage in an an animal as a sacrifice to a worldly god, improper sexual act. believing this to be virtuous. c. motivation: One of the three poisons. ACTION You carry out the killing by For example, out of anger one might rape some means, e.g., a weapon, poison, black the wife of an enemy; out of attachment, magic, etc., either directly by yourself or engaging in sexual misconduct with

21 someone other than one’s spouse or with division or disunity. someone who’s already married; out of c. motivation: One of the three poisons. ignorance, committing adultery thinking For example, out of anger, creating that it’s cool, or engaging in sexual disharmony among people you dislike; out of misconduct thinking that it leads to attachment, speaking in a harsh or rude way enlightenment. to be accepted by a gang, or insulting the ACTION The two organs come into husband out of desire for the wife; out of contact. ignorance, causing disharmony, believing COMPLETION [The two organs come that it’s healthy, or causing disunity among into contact.] followers of a religion you disagree with, believing this to be positive. LYING ACTION You undertake either to cause There are many objects of lying, but most are disunity among friends, or to prevent included in the following eight: denying reconciliation among enemies, by saying something you have seen, heard, something which is either true or false. experienced with your other senses, or COMPLETION The other people known; or falsely claiming to have seen, understand and believe what you say, and, as heard, experienced with your other senses, a consequence, become hostile towards each or known something which you have not. other. BASIS Another person who can understand you, and who can speak. ABUSIVE SPEECH INTENTION BASIS Another person whose feelings a. recognition: You must know that could be hurt. (We can express insulting what you are saying is untrue. words to a non–human being or to an b. intention: You intend to lie and inanimate object, but the action is complete deceive someone. only when there’s a being who understands c. motivation: One of the three poisons. and is hurt by our words). For example, out of anger, lying to hurt INTENTION someone or destroy their reputation; out of a. recognition: You must correctly att achment, lying to get something you identify the person you intend to insult. want; out of ignorance, not thinking there’s b. intention: You intend to speak anything wrong with lying. insulting words. ACTION Conveying the lie by some c. motivation: One of the three poisons. means, e.g., speaking, writing, making a For example, out of anger, insulting gesture with your hand or eyes, facial someone you dislike; out of attachment, expression, remaining silent, etc. speaking in a harsh or rude way to be COMPLETION The other person accepted by a gang, or insulting the husband understands and believes your lie. out of desire for his wife; out of ignorance, using abusive or rude language thinking that DIVISIVE SPEECH it’s cool to do so, or not realizing the hurtful BASIS Two or more people, who have a effect of your words, or thinking there’s good or bad relationship. nothing wrong with hurting others’ feelings. INTENTION ACTION With a negative intention, you a. recognition: You must have speak words pointing out faults, etc. in the unmistaken recognition of the parties other person, whether true or not, in a involved and their relationship/feelings for hurtful manner; or you get someone else to each other. speak such words on your behalf. b. intention: You intend to cause COMPLETION The other person

22 understands and is hurt. ACTION The wish to possess the object becomes stronger. IDLE GOSSIP COMPLETION Deciding to find a way BASIS Something meaningless or to make the object your own. The motive, insignificant, which you treat as important. deed, and final step are all part of one train (It’s not necessary that another being hears of thought. our words.) INTENTION MALICE, ILL WILL a. recognition: You believe that what BASIS Another being who would be hurt you wish to say is important or meaningful, if you acted out your harmful thoughts. although it is not. INTENTION b. intention: You intend to express such a. recognition: You correctly identify words. the being you wish to harm. c. motivation: One of the three poisons. b. intention: You wish to give harm to For example, out of anger, chattering idly in this being. order to disturb someone you dislike who is c. motivation: One of the three poisons. trying to meditate or do something virtuous; For example, out of anger, wishing to out of attachment, indulging in gossip or harm someone who has harmed you or who frivolous talk about things you are attached you dislike; out of att achment, wanting to to, or to spend time with someone you’re kill your father to get your inheritance, or to attached to; out of ignorance, thinking harm someone to get his possessions; out of there’s nothing wrong with spending time ignorance, wishing to harm others because idly gossiping. of thinking that violence is good, or that you ACTION Speaking without purpose, or can do whatever you like. getting someone else to do it for you. ACTION Putting more effort into the COMPLETION Actually expressing the wish to give harm, so that it grows stronger. words. COMPLETION You decide to act out your wish and do something harmful. COVETOUSNESS BASIS Another person’s property, WRONG VIEWS possessions (includes merchandise in a BASIS Something that exists or is true, shop), qualities, children, etc. e.g., the law of cause and effect, the four INTENTION noble truths, etc. a. recognition: You identify correctly INTENTION the object you covet. a. recognition: You believe that your b. intention: You wish to make the denial of the object is correct (that is, you do object your own. not recognize that what you are denying c. motivation: One of the three poisons. is in fact true). For example, out of anger, wanting to buy b. intention: You wish to deny something before someone you dislike has a something that exists. chance to buy it, or wanting to deprive your c. motivation: One of the three poisons. enemy of his cherished possessions; out of For example, out of anger, because of attachment, wanting to possess many things, hating someone who holds a correct view, thinking that they will bring happiness; out you deny what they say and assert the of ignorance, wanting to buy many things opposite; out of attachment, asserting some thinking that it’s good for oneself or for the wrong view in order to get something you economy, or as a habit or obsession. desire, or to impress or gain favour from someone in a powerful position; out of

23 ignorance, not understanding what is true will have the habitual desire to kill and harm and correct. others. ACTION Thinking about carrying out the Environmental Result Food, drink, repudiation of the object by, for example, medicine, and crops are scarce, always telling others what you think. inferior and low in nutrition or potency; they COMPLETION Definitely deciding to are hard to digest and cause disease; most deny the object. beings around you die before reaching the full life span. 2. RESULTS OF A COMPLETE NON-VIRTUOUS ACTION TAKING THE UNGIVEN (STEALING) Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in one of There are four different results of a complete the three lower realms. karma (that is, an action that has been Experiences Similar To The Cause committed with all four components/factors Lack of wealth, possessions and resources; present): you can never make ends meet; your things will be stolen or lost. What you do have is all FULLY RIPENED RESULT just common property with others. The future rebirth state you will experience Actions Similar To The Cause You as a result of having created a complete will have an instinctive tendency to steal. karma Environmental Results You will take birth in a barren place, where crops do not EXPERIENCES SIMILAR TO THE grow or are destroyed or have no power to CAUSE remove hunger, and there are shortages of Once your karma to be born in the lower food, and bitter frosts, hail, dry spells stay on realms has been exhausted and you take too long; it rains too much; crops dry up or rebirth in an upper realm, you will have die off; and business ventures fail. experiences similar to your original actions. SEXUAL MISCONDUCT ACTIONS SIMILAR TO THE CAUSE Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a Once your karma to be born in the lower lower realm. realms has been exhausted and you take Experiences Similar To The Cause rebirth in an upper realm, you will have the The people who work around you are instinctive tendency to commit the original unreliable; you find yourself having a lot of action again and again. competition for your partner. Your relationships, all kinds, don’t last. ENVIRONMENTAL RESULTS Actions Similar To The Cause Having When born in the human realm, you will the tendency to be unfaithful. experience results of your actions in the Environmental Result You live in a form of environmental conditions. place where there is urine and feces all round, and mud, dirt, filth; everything KILLING stinks, and everywhere seems unpleasant Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in one of and distasteful. the three lower realms. Experiences Similar To The Cause LYING Later, in a human rebirth, you will have a Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a short life or get killed, have ill–health, many lower realm. troubles, no success in your activities. Experiences Similar To The Cause Actions Similar To The Cause You Others do not believe you, even when you

24 tell the truth. People are always deceiving IDLE GOSSIP you. Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a Actions Similar To The Cause You lower realm will have the tendency to lie and deceive Experiences Similar To The Cause others. Others will not take your speech seriously or Environmental Results Your work in listen to what you have to say. cooperation with others fails to prosper and Actions Similar To The Cause Having people don’t work well together, everyone the tendency to talk continuously and fill any generally is cheating one another and is quiet moment with the sound of your voice. afraid, and there are many things to be Environmental Results Fruits don’t afraid of. grow, or grow at the wrong times, seem ripe when they are not, have frail roots; no DIVISIVE SPEECH leisure places like parks, glades, pools of cool Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a water; and many things to make you afraid. lower realm. Experiences Similar To The Cause COVETOUSNESS You will be lonely; you will easily lose Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a friends; people around you are always lower realm. fighting one another; people around you Experiences Similar To The Cause have an undesirable character. You will be unable to achieve your aims and Actions Similar To The Cause You get what you want; you will never be will have the tendency to cause disunity. satisfied with what you have. Environmental Results The ground Actions Similar To The Cause Your where you live is covered with obstacles like personality will be dominated by desire, and fallen tree trunks, thorns, stones, sharp your attachment increases. broken glass; it is rough, dreary, and there Environmental Results You will live are no streams or lakes or water springs; the in a place where the crops are poor and earth is parched and poisoned, burning hot, material resources are easily destroyed or useless, threatening; a place where there are lost. Every good thing you manage to find many things to fear. starts to get worse, decreases as seasons, months, days pass. ABUSIVE SPEECH Fully Ripened Result You will be born MALICE, ILL WILL in a lower realm Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a Experiences Similar To The Cause lower realm. You will always hear distressing words. Experiences Similar To The Cause You Others will abuse you, and even when you will be a person who easily becomes speak pleasantly, they will interpret it frightened and panicky. You always find negatively. yourself without help, or never find the help Actions Similar To The Cause Having you need; or always being hurt by others. the tendency to be critical and hurtful. Actions Similar To The Cause Having Environmental Results You will live the tendency to hurt others. Your personality in a place where there are many tree stumps, is dominated by anger, and your anger and brambles, nettles, sharp rocks, and thorns. hatred increase. [According to Lama Zopa Rinpoche}: You Environmental Results You live in a will be live in a desert environment. world of chaos, diseases spread, evil is everywhere; there is plague, conflict, and you have fear of your country’s or others’

25 external military; there are dangerous animals, and you are surrounded by harmful spirits, thieves or muggers, and the like.

WRONG VIEWS Fully Ripened Result Rebirth in a lower realm Experiences Similar To The Cause Being ignorant of correct views, and finding it difficult to develop realizations and correct understanding. Actions Similar To The Cause Having the tendency to draw wrong conclusions again and again. Your personality will be dominated by stupidity, and your ignorance will increase Environmental Results Having to live in a place where there are shortages of water and other resources such as food, and there are no precious things such as treasures, works of art, scriptures, or spiritual guides. You live in a world where the single highest source of happiness is steadily disappearing from the earth, where people think that unclean and suffering things are actually nice and happy; where there is no place to go, no one to help, nothing to protect you.

The Ten Non–Virtuous Actions and Their Results is based on a version by Ven. Sangye Khadro, with many additions from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teachings. Additional editing by Robina Courtin, Hobart, July 11, 2015.

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8. HOW WE CREATE OUR It’s a very simple concept, actually. Not OWN REALITY: KARMA difficult for us to intellectualize, to theorize about. Your mind is its own continuity. And VEN ROBINA COURTIN obviously, to assume this, you have to assume it’s not physical. Because, clearly, if you think your mind is your brain, then you did come from your parents, which is the materialist view, that they “made” you, you WHERE DO I COME FROM? know? According to Buddha we’re not created by anyone, either a superior being or our YOUR MIND IS YOURS parents. Instead, we’re the product of our And so the experiential implication of this is own past. In a simple sense, you could say that your mind is yours. And that means the you come from previous moments of contents of it are yours. And so what are the yourself. Think of your mind as a river of contents of your mind? All the love and the mental moments – your thoughts and kindness and compassion and wisdom and feelings of now, in the simplest linear sense contentment and anger and jealousy and of cause and effect, your thoughts and fear and paranoia and rage – all of this. This feelings of now come from the previous is the contents of your mind. So all of these, moment of your thoughts and feelings. And being contents of your mind, they too come your thoughts and feelings of the previous from previous moments of that particular moment come from – guess what? – the quality in your mind. previous moment of your thoughts and So this is a simple idea that implies feelings. You track it back to ten years ago, , isn’t it? It’s a simple concept. twenty years ago, in your mothers’ womb. Not a difficult concept intellectually. But “Well, maybe I began a month before we’re so familiar with the view that I come conception”. Well, no. If my mind existed from mother and father and my anger comes then, it must have come from a previous from mother and father and my jealousy and moment of my mind. Then clearly you get my depression and my all the rest come from back to the first moment of conception, the DNA and the egg and the sperm and all when we all assume we began. If you’re the rest, you know. They play a role, no Christian, God put a there, in the egg argument. But they’re not the main thing. and sperm; and if you’re a materialist, you For the Buddha, the main things are your are only the egg and sperm. mind, your thoughts, your feelings, your Well, the Buddha has this third option. emotions, your unconscious. Your The first second of conception in our tendencies, your feelings. All of this. This is mother’s womb is the entry of our own yours. This is yours. consciousness into the egg and sperm. So We come into this life fully programmed you can track your consciousness right in with all of our tendencies, with all of our this continuity of mental moments going characteristics. It’s a big surprise to us. I right back to that first moment of mean, we accept we come fully programmed, conception. “Well, I must have begun then”. but we think the programming comes from Well, yes, relatively speaking, this package mother and father. It doesn’t, Buddha says. called “Robina” began then, but where did Tendencies in the mind are mental and mind the body come from? Mummy and Daddy. is not physical and it comes from previous Where did your mind come from? Previous moments of itself, not from the external moment of itself. So your mind is its own condition, which is called the brain. continuity of mental moments.

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One can see indicators in the brain of to it, you know. Which sort of, for us, is a certain things, no argument with this. So this way of saying, “It’s not my fault”. fundamental point of Buddhism is that your We’ve got this dualistic view. We assume mind is yours. And whatever’s in it is simply we’re made by mother and father. We from you having put it there in the past. assume the anger and the jealousy and the Hardly surprising concept – cause and depression are either there because of the effect. genes or the DNA or they’re there because I’ve got a mean boyfriend, or because I had a KARMA MEANS INTENTION lousy mother or a horrible husband or a bad This is the essential idea of karma. Karma is kid or a horrible boss. This is the typical way a word, that is translated as we talk. And this is, in fact, the view of the “action”, really simply. Which implies materialist world. This is the philosophy of reaction. Action-reaction, in this meaning: the materialist world that is backed up by the cause and effect. Seed-fruit, you know. view that your mother and father made you, It’s also, more fundamentally, translated that you’re only physical. as intention, will, volition. Every microsecond of everything we say, ACCOUNTABILITY everything we think and feel, and indeed do One has to know one’s mind, because that’s and say, with our body and speech on the what we need to change. Yes, certain basis of what’s in the mind, is a karma. An people’s external conditions make it quite intentional action that necessarily will leave tough – if you’re in a prison and you can’t an imprint, or a tendency or a seed in your open that door; you can say “Well, I can’t consciousness and will ripen in the future in help being angry, I’m surrounded by mean that consciousness as your experiences. people”. You might say that. But the ones What goes on in our mind, in other who are really practicing don’t say that. They words, is the main cause of our future know that this is their physical condition, experiences. This is what Buddha says. and this is indeed the result of their karma This is a simple concept. Not a difficult (and we’ll talk more about that in a minute), idea. It’s just a question of being able to say and so they will adapt themselves to that it and get our heads around it. It isn’t condition and still work on their minds. complicated. We think it’s complicated, but The person who’s got the chemicals that it’s just because we haven’t got the right aren’t working, that seem to be the trigger words, you know. It’s not a complicated for depression, yes, you recognize that you’ve concept at all. got those particular chemicals, but the Of course, it’s not evident to us. So we depression is your mind, it’s your viewpoint. take it as our working hypothesis. Buddha’s You might be around people who are saying basically: we are the creators of mean and ugly who hit you all the time, and ourselves. It’s a very simple point. if you’ve got an angry tendency it’ll make it Whatever’s in your mind is there because easy for you to get angry, it’s true. But if you put it there, not because Mummy and you’re really being accountable, you’ll Daddy did something to you. This flies in the recognize the anger’s yours. face of the assumption that we all have that’s This is what we have to do. This is the the basis of our lives, and is, as Buddha toughest part. This is the part that’s massive would say, a misconception. That, you know, for us. So difficult because we’re so used to I am angry because my father was angry. I this dualistic way of talking. It’s always like, am jealous because my mother was jealous. I “It’s not my fault. It’s not my fault”. am depressed because I have certain And that’s the view of the materialist hormones. We always put an external reason world, you look. It’s an assumption of ego. “I

28 didn’t ask to get born, did I? It’s not my born into. So, you know, if we’re fault. My mother made me. My father made materialists, or if we’re Christians, for me”. So, the whole way ego works, Buddha example, we both agree on one thing at least says, is in its nature dualistic. It’s always, – that someone else made us. I was made by “Poor me, the victim”. Lama Yeshe would God. I was made by Mummy and Daddy. call ego the “self-pity me”. We’re always They’re the same principle, aren’t they? That trying to defend ourselves, “It’s not fair”, you’re made by someone else. Which means “It’s not my fault”, “It’s his fault”, “I didn’t it’s got nothing to do with you. mean to”. Everything to try to deny Whereas the Buddha says, “Everything to accountability. It’s so painful for us to be do with me”. Our past actions are the main accountable. This is how ego is, this is its cause of why my mind found its way to my nature. This is the way it is. present mother’s human womb. Why blame By listening to and thinking about the your parents? They’re just lying there having Buddha’s views of karma – that your fun and you come along. So Buddha puts us consciousness, your tendencies, your right in the centre of responsibility of even experiences, come from our own past why we’re human in the first place. Which is actions, not your parents; my mind is mine, I kind of an interesting concept – who would came fully programmed into this life. have thought that you were the main cause And, of course, this includes our good of who you are? Big surprise! tendencies and experiences as well, but we Not more than a few weeks before forget about those. We agonize, “Why do bad conception in your mother’s womb, your things happen to me?” We never agonize, consciousness was in another form, another “Why do good things happen to me?” We life. And at the time of that death, before you don’t care why, just give me more! But we stopped breathed, very simply speaking, a have all the good things for the same reason: very strong seed from having practiced I created the cause to have them. morality – in the context of keeping vows of morality according to Lama Zopa Rinpoche FOUR WAYS THAT KARMA RIPENS – was activated that basically programmed There are four ways in which our actions your mind after it left that body to find its from the past lives – you know, before we way to your present mother’s human womb. even entered into this present womb of our Your father and mother having sex is just mother – there are four ways those past a co-operative cause. They did not make you, actions ripen in the present. Or indeed, there they did not create you. Your consciousness are four ways in which our present actions had very strong karmic connection with leave seeds in the mind that will ripen in the them from past history with those particular future as one’s experiences. It’s a constant parents. process, ongoing. Every microsecond of One lama said that at the time of a male everything that goes on in our mind, and the and female human having sex, billions of things we do on the basis of those thoughts consciousnesses that are recently passed with our body and speech, this is the karmic away (and that’s obviously not just from the process. This is constantly occurring. This is human realm; Buddha would assert a whole the natural process of cause and effect, spectrum of possibilities of types of constantly in play. consciousnesses existing in different realms) are all hovering around trying to get in. Well, 1. FULLY RIPENED RESULT: A we got in! From Buddha’s point of view, we REBIRTH should be weeping in delight every day at The first, main one – they call it Fully how fortunate we are, getting such an Ripened Result – is the type of rebirth we get extraordinarily fortunate life.

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Clearly it’s easier to get a mosquito birth, musical tendencies. Hitler clearly had other dog birth, a fish birth: we can see there are tendencies, and he expressed them, didn’t billions and trillions of other sentient beings, he, in his actions. we can see this. But we got the human one. Our mothers and fathers – this is a big Amazing. shock to us – they’re not the main cause of That’s the first way our karma ripened – this. The absolute default explanation in the the type of rebirth we born into. materialist world is it’s all in the DNA and But, you know, Mother Teresa and Hitler the genes, etc. That’s why we always look both got one of those, so what causes the into the past, to our parents, for the causes differences? of why I am what I am. Yes, Buddha agrees: look into the past, 2. ACTIONS SIMILAR TO THE CAUSE: but not to your parents; look into your past OUR TENDENCIES lives. That gets us to the second way in which our Alternatively we see it all as conditioning. past actions ripened in the present. And this My mother was a musician, and everyone is our tendencies, our characteristics, our would say, “Yeah, Robina’s good at music personality; our depression, our kindness, because her mother was good at music”. our wish to kill, our wish to lie, our being Buddha would say, “No – Robina’s good at good at piano, our being good at math; music because she practised it before. My whatever it might be. mother had also practiced it before, and then And that’s an interesting point, she encouraged my music by teaching me. A psychologically speaking. In Buddhist terms, simple point, but shocking to us. we give equal status to whether you’re good So, your tendencies – they call this at love, good at anger or good at music. It’s Actions Similar to the Cause. They’re yours. just a tendency. You’re fully programmed with every one of But we see our artistic tendencies and our these from the first second of conception. emotional ones in a very different light in Millions of these different imprints. Millions our contemporary world, don’t we? of these different tendencies. They’re your For example, we’re honoured to own own past habits. responsibility for our being good at music. “Why are you good at piano, Robina?” 3. EXPERIENCES SIMILAR TO THE “Well, I have musical tendencies and I CAUSE: HOW PEOPLE TREAT YOU, practised really hard: that’s why I’m good at ETC. it. The third way that your karma ripens is “Why are you good at anger, Robina?” called Experiences Similar to the Cause, and “Oh, that’s my father’s fault! Nothing to that’s all the stuff that happens to you. The do with me!” No accountability whatsoever! people and creatures you meet, the parents We love being accountable for our being you get, the teachers, the abusers, the ones good at music, or maths, or being a gymnast, who are loving to you, the ones who rape you know, but not emotional stuff. We have you, the ones who give you a million dollars, this different set of laws when it comes to the ones who are kind to you, the ones who emotional stuff, which I find most steal from you, whatever it might be. The fascinating – no logic at all. way you’re treated and seen in the world. The Buddha says, those tendencies – The main cause? Your past actions. whether you’re angry, jealous or just being So Buddha puts every sentient in the very good at music – are just tendencies. Why do centre of our experiences. He says our we have a tendency? From having done it actions are the main cause of why we are before. Quite simple. Mozart clearly had who we are and why what happens to us. All

30 the good and all the bad. This applies to and even the way the physical world impacts giraffes, dogs, ants, fish, humans – all “sem- upon us – are all the result of our own chens”, the term in Tibetan for “sentient actions. Necessarily. It’s just the way it is. It’s being”: “mind-possessor”. We’re all mind- a natural law. It’s not blame, it’s not possessors. punishment. There’s no concept of Buddha says that there’s not an atom of punishment or reward in Buddhism – that space where you won’t find mind-possessors. implies someone punishing and rewarding, Trillions of them. doesn’t it? And for the Buddha there’s no one pulling the strings, no one running 4. ENVIRONMENTAL KARMA things. And fourth, they call it Environmental Buddha says each one of us in charge. Karma. Environmental karma, which is the “We are the boss”! Big surprise! So if I am very way the physical world impacts upon the boss of my own present experiences, if I us. For example, here we are sitting in this am the cause of it, then indeed I can be the room. It’s quite pleasant, isn’t it? It’s quite cause of my future experiences – which is peaceful, pleasant view out there, it’s quiet, why we should then check up: Do I like this you know – the walls aren’t dripping with life, do I like people punching me in the mould. It’s pleasantly painted. It smells nice. nose? Do I like having people being angry at No-one’s threatening us. me? Do I like being depressed and angry and We take this for granted – we never ask, jealous and poor and living in an ugly “Why are we having a pleasant experience?” environment? No, I don’t. Then, okay, there For the Buddha there are very real causes must be causes of this; what were they? created by us: this pleasant environmental Buddha lays it all out, all from his own experience is the result of our collective observation, his own experience. virtue. This is Buddhist practice. If suddenly the building explodes, or a gunman comes in, then we’d ask, “Why is FOUR WAYS THAT KILLING, FOR this happening?” This would be due to our EXAMPLE, WOULD RIPEN collective non-virtuous karma. Let me give one example of one action and Basically, Buddha’s point about karma is the four different ways it ripens; let’s say that suffering, which is when everything goes “killing”. If we look at the world, one of the wrong – it could be externally, could be the most harmful things we do with our bodies is people, could be the environment, could be to kill other beings, wouldn’t you agree? It’s in your own mind; when everything’s out of quite an intense way to harm any sentient whack, out of balance, disharmonious, when being. the elements are all crazy, when people are So, if as a result of the habit of killing in all fighting, when people are mean to you, the past a strong seed of it is activated at the when your own mind’s berserk – all this is time of your death, it programs your necessarily the result of negativity. consciousness to be reborn in a very And happiness: same: the result of suffering type of life such an animal or a positive karma, virtuous actions. spirit, for example. Okay. So we can deduce in our case, it was I’M THE BOSS morality that ripened because we got a The four ways our past karma ripens in the human life, which as we discussed is the fruit present – the very fact that you’re this of non-harming, in particular non-killing. human being, with this very particular But look at the human realm: most family and friends and people who harm us humans kill something, don’t they? Can you and people who help us; all our tendencies; see that? Due to past killing, therefore,

31 they’re born with the tendency to keep We all have ignorance. Ignorance is the term killing. This is the worst one. for this ego-grasping that’s this panic state The third way killing ripens is as an that rises as soon as we’re attacked or experience: you get killed or you die young, insulted or hurt or don’t get what we want. or you get sick. Well, animals live in that one. Your dog has The fourth way, environmental karma, been living in your house for years, and it would be the very environment itself, the barks every time it hears the gate squeak. By food, the water, etc., harms us. For some now you’d think he would have learned that people just eating peanuts can kill them – it’s the gate squeaking. But he doesn’t, the that’s a particular environmental karmic poor thing, because he’s paranoid. His big result for a person from past killing. eyes are round, he’s barking like crazy; his And we have the collective karma now to unhappy mind, honey, is called deep, deep have poisoned water, polluted air, haven’t ignorance, and fear: fear is a function of ego- we? The very elements themselves are grasping, of ignorance. harmful to us. That’s the result of killing. Buddhist psychology, remember, refers to all living beings, not just humans. THE PRECIOUSNESS OF THIS HUMAN REBIRTH Teaching given at Osel Shen Phen Q: I can’t see how being born as a dog is Ling in Missoula, MT, 2011. necessarily lower. A: I understand. I understand. Okay. Where that fits is this. As nice as dogs are, would you agree they’re not very bright? I mean, you talk to them about developing compassion, they don’t really get it. You try to explain emptiness to them, they’re a bit thick. Let me put it this way. If you want a really long neck, best to be a giraffe. Guaranteed. If you want to fly, be a bird. But, honey, if you want to work with your mind, make changes to yourself, quit the causes of suffering, etc., etc., probably best to be a human. So, it’s a contextual thing. It’s not high or low or some kind of hierarchy – it’s a question of what you want to achieve. Lama Zopa Rinpoche said one time, if just for a couple of minutes you could have a direct experience of the mind of your little cute dog, the suffering, the mental suffering of the most profound ignorance of that mind would be so intense, you’d never want to waste another second of your precious human life. That’s the ordinary ignorance of an animal’s mind. Now, we don’t think this way in our culture, I agree. But just think about it – it’s a different way to look at what ignorance is.

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9. HOW WE CAN THERE ARE CAUSES OF SUFFERING: CHANGE OUR REALITY: THE SECOND NOBLE TRUTH So, we’re locked in suffering – the world is in PURIFY KARMA the nature of suffering, the Buddha Well, it’s VEN ROBINA COURTIN got causes – that’s the Second Noble Truth. And guess what? There are two main causes, and we created both of them. It’s scary – we think it all comes from everybody else. One is the 1. past karma, the past As Lama Yeshe says, “We create negativity action, that left the seed in your mind when with our mind, so we can purify it by you did the negative action that is now creating positivity with our mind”. This is ripening as your suffering. And the second the process of purification. cause, and actually they both subsume down If we are the creators of our own reality, to this one, is the 2. delusions in the mind our experiences, then we change things. Of that cause you to do the negative action in course, easy to say, but very hard to see this, the first place, which then again manifests mainly because we’re addicted to the when you punch me in the nose and I say, samsaric way of interpreting life: that we “How dare you”, and I punch you right back, didn’t ask to get born, that it’s not my fault: and the ball keeps rolling. so deeply ingrained in us! TWO LEVELS OF PRACTICE THERE IS SUFFERING: FIRST NOBLE TRUTH 1. WATCH OUR BODY, SPEECH AND So, if we’re sick of suffering, we’d better MIND LIKE A HAWK AND REFRAIN know how to accurately identify it. This is FROM DOING HARM NOW the First Noble Truth. There are three levels So, in relation to these two causes of of suffering. suffering, there are two main kinds of 1. The Suffering of Suffering practice. And as Lama Zopa Rinpoche says, This is in-your-face suffering; all the bad the first one, the most immediate, the most things that happen. urgent, is in relation to the second cause of 2. The Suffering of Change suffering, the delusions: do not respond in a Now this is a bit depressing, because it’s deluded way to the good and bad things that what we actually call happiness. Buddha happen every day, which are the fruit of our calls it suffering. It’s a sneaky, honey- past action. covered razor blade; it’s basically when You own these karmic appearances as attachment gets what it wants. It looks to us yours, so you do everything in your power to like happiness, but it’s just the junkie getting not respond with negative mind, body, or the fix. It’s actually fraught with suffering. speech. You do everything in your power to 3. All Pervasive Suffering avoid harming the person back or grasping The third kind of suffering, even more at the good things; you watch your mind like subtle – we don’t even give it a name in our a hawk and try not to sow more negative culture, or even in our religions – is being seeds. That’s your first immediate practice. born in the first place with this body, which Every minute, watch your mind like a hawk, is the body of a junkie in a world constructed watch your body and speech like a hawk. You of junk, and to survive you need to ingest it. avoid at least creating more negative karma There’s no choice: it’s all in the very nature in relation to the situations of daily life. of suffering. That’s the third level of The second one is where you now have to suffering. take care of the karma you’ve already created

33 in all the countless past lives, the seeds that of my mother’s womb, shouting and kicking, are lying in your mind, latent, waiting for the we can deduce that I was programmed with conditions to ripen as your suffering. They anger. So, it’s a tough one when the haven’t ripened yet; so you’ve got to get programming is negative, because ahead of the game, you’ve got to pull them whatever’s happening to you appears bad, out, or at the very least weaken them. And not fair; it feels so spontaneous that you that’s what purification is. believe that anger is totally right. Another example I use, a friend of mine, WE ARE PROPELLED BY THE FORCE another mother of a child – she said when OF OUR PAST HABITS her little boy first saw the fishing, he ran like But before we get into purification, first let’s a magnet towards it. She hated fishing. She look at why it’s so hard to do the most never taught him this. He saw fishing and he immediate level of practice, the most urgent: was attracted to it. Why? Because he had the to watch our body, speech and mind and not tendency to kill from having killed before. create negative karma now. We can deduce he’s been in the lower So it’s a tough one, because the tragedy of realms in the past, he’s finished that karma, karma is, we’re brainwashed, we’re but the tragedy is, he didn’t purify all aspects completely conditioned, we’re completely of it. He’s still got the residual result, which habituated, we’re completely brainwashed – in this life is the habit to keep killing. The not by others but by our own past actions, habit is very strong. The three-year-old boy habits. We are propelled by the force of our with compassion, he didn’t have to think past habits. about it; it just spontaneously came because Now, when it comes to good things, aren’t he’d practised compassion in the past. we fortunate? For example, a friend of mine So this little boy, he must have practised taking the lice out of her three-year-old son’s killing in the past. He saw the river, the head, and the little boy cries, “Mummy, fishing, attachment is instantly activated. He Mummy, leave them alone, don’t hurt them. was magnetized by the fishing, and it looked It’s their home”. The little boy is full of so delicious to him. And the thing you run compassion. He’s three. She hasn’t taught like a magnet to is a thing you’ve done him this. So he is propelled by the force of before, then because of attachment it will his past karma, which is his compassion. We look good to you, it will therefore trigger a can deduce logically that he has practised good feeling, therefore logically you assume, compassion in the past so that now it arises “Oh, this must be good because it gives me a just naturally. And, crucially, can deduce good feeling”. So then he pursued it. He that he must have lived in vows of morality followed the fishing. He became a in the past, in particular, the vow to not kill: professional fisherman. that’s why there was no only compassion but His mother said she went fishing with no thought to harm the lice. him one time, to please her boy. And she How fortunate that spontaneous found it unbearable. All she could see was compassion arises in his three-year-old mind suffering fish. All she could see was the fish, and he cries with compassion for the lice in who by their body language were clearly his own head! How marvellous! showing that – poor things – they would Programming is good when it’s virtuous rather be in the water, please! The poor karma. things can’t shout; they haven’t got a voice. Look at Mozart: his mother gives him a Their poor little eyes can’t show much; the piano at the age of six, off he goes writing, best they can do is wriggle their body, isn’t his sonatas. We can deduce that he’s it? I mean, if he had the addiction, the programmed with music. When I popped out attachment to killing pigs, you’d know the

34 pigs were unhappy – they’d squeal and kick moment we get the object, that’s what we and try to run away on their little legs. mean by happiness. If we feel happy, then Who’d want to go pig killing? Nobody. We go we logically deduce the action we did must fishing because they die seemingly be good. peacefully, poor things – they don’t make a The same with the torturer – I remember noise. reading about one of those guys years ago, a So the tragedy is, because of his past multi-murderer and a torturer. He said, tendencies, and because of his attachment, from the time he could remember, he was which blinds him from seeing the truth, he compelled to kill, to torture and kill can’t see suffering. All his life he killed fish; creatures, little ants and animals, because it he was attached to it. He was addicted to it. gave him pleasure. And then of course as he Every single day going out – and the feeling got older, he graduated to humans. of feeling good. This wonderful feeling He intellectually knew it was wrong; comes from attachment to something. So, because he could see the world didn’t because the world accepts fishing, no-one’s approve, but you know, he had to keep it going to argue with him. If he was attached secret, of course. But he was totally addicted to killing poodles, he would’ve been in to the pleasure that it gave him. Why? Habit trouble – keep it secret, snuck out at night. from the past, programming from karma. No. Fishing, everyone does it so no-one tells We think in the West, Oh, he’s just this him it’s not good. So he never questioned it. devil, he’s an evil person. But the logical But his mother, having no attachment to reason he did it is because of his past killing, fishing, all she can see, nakedly, is the no doubt as an animal, torturing – look at suffering of the fish. He literally couldn’t see animals, they torture each other all the time. it, and this is the proof that we make up our Constant. They’re just addicted to torture. own stories based upon what’s in our minds. Being tortured and torturing – that’s what So, because he had a habit to kill and animals do because of their intense ego- attachment to it, then his rose-coloured grasping and their intense fear. Worst, most spectacles caused it to look good. He intense suffering. couldn’t see the suffering. Literally. He was a And what happened for this guy? He got lovely human being, she said, a kind, lovely, pleasure from torturing others: habit meets generous man. But he was blinded; and attachment equals pleasure. And the logic is, that’s what attachment causes – so sneaky. It “It must be good, because it gives me a good blinds us from seeing the truth. She saw feeling”. Of course, the world doesn’t agree, suffering; he couldn’t see it. He’d been doing so he’s going to keep it quiet. There’s always it for years, killed hundreds of thousands of this conflict in his mind. But he is addicted little fishies. He felt blissful. This is the to the pleasure. tragedy of habit. Look at our pathetic little habits, you know? Overeating, smoking, sex, maybe – JUNKIES FOR PLEASURE look how hard it is to get past our old habits, So we are propelled by the force of our past and we’ve got pathetic little habits, you habit. And that, conjoined with the know. Imagine if you got born with the habit attachment – you’re lost. Completely lost. to torture! What a terrible suffering – can That’s why it is so hard to change – because you imagine? Or just to even kill fish and not we are junkies for pleasure. We are junkies realize it’s suffering, not realize it’s negative, for pleasure. That’s this human realm. all because it feels good. This is why Buddha calls it a . So that means attachment is so tricky. we are junkies for pleasure; we are born with This is why we have to have really logical, these senses that crave their objects. The intelligent minds to have a sound basis for

35 what is good and what is not, and then judge acknowledge you’ve eaten poison. “Oh, what our experiences according to it. And then a fool! Quick, what can I do about it?” Then struggle to change our old habits. It’s a tough you find yourself a decent doctor; then you job, because we are propelled by our habits. do something to purify it, you apply the We’re on autopilot, you know. We think we antidotes. Then you determine never to do it make choices. We think we’re intelligent. again. This is reasonable; it’s practical, it’s We’re not. We’re just junkies for habits, you common sense. know, craving to get good feelings. Stuff the Trouble is, when it comes to morality, we food in, whatever we do. So we have to look seem to have this other set of rules and we into our minds carefully, and then struggle get all guilty and ashamed and neurotic, or to change the habits. And it’s not easy, we all we blame; we’re ridiculous. We do know that. everything to avoid responsibility. So that’s the immediate level of practice, the most urgent, as Rinpoche says, the here BLAME, GUILT, DENIAL and now, dealing with what arises every When it comes to doing things like killing second. and lying and stealing, instead of simply acknowledging it, we want to find someone 2. PURIFY THE KARMIC SEENDS else to blame. That’s as ridiculous as trying THAT HAVE NOT YET RIPENED to find someone to blame for the poison in This other one – the purification – is to deal my dinner. You’re dying, but all your with the seeds that haven’t even manifested thoughts are for blaming. Blame is pretty yet, that one can see no evidence of. This is useless, which is our typical mode. called purification. And as Lama Zopa says, Another typical mode is guilt – “Oh, I ate we are insane not to do this practice every poison. Oh, I’m such a bad person. I ate day. poison”. Every day, you’re getting sicker and sicker – “Oh, I’m such a bad person, I ate PURIFICATION IS A poison”. We love to live in this one. PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESS Completely useless. Complete waste of time. So, like all this work in Buddhism, this Totally impotent. It’s the same as blame, but process of purification is practical, it’s you’re the person you’re blaming. One is psychological. A really easy way to anger, one is self-blame. They’re the same remember is – and I like this one – is to call problem. the steps the Four Rs. There are different The third one, even more ridiculous – and orders of these, according to the practice, but we love this one –”Robina! There’s poison in I like this particular order. your dinner!” “There is not!” We call it living The first one is Regret, the second one is in denial. Reliance, the third, the Remedy, the fourth one, Resolve, the determination to make ACCOUNTABILITY changes. So we’ve got to be accountable. This entire process of purification is based upon the 1. FIRST OPPONENT POWER: understanding of karma and on the REGRET recognition that you don’t want suffering. So the first one is you’ve got to acknowledge Regret, the first step, is all about yourself. what you’ve done wrong. If you’ve taken So, we have guilt, now, which beats poison, let’s say, the very first step is to ourselves up. “I’m just a bad person”. Blame recognize that you’ve done it. You’ve got to or guilt, we run to these spontaneously first acknowledge there’s a problem. It’s because they are a natural response to pretty reasonable. You’ve first got to having ego-grasping, of having this

36 ignorance that clings to the self-existent me. suffering, and you understand that having It’s this dualistic state of mind that naturally harmed others will cause you suffering. blames others, or naturally blames yourself. And we have to conquer that. We have to WE HAVE TO SAY THE WORDS argue with that wrong view. So, when we do this practice at the end of the One time His Holiness was asked the day, you speak out to yourself what you have difference between guilt and regret. It was done to harm others. You bad-mouthed your such a sweet answer, but quite profound. He husband, you talked about your girlfriend said: With guilt, you look into the past and behind her back, you took the pencil at work you go, “I did this and I did that and I did and you never returned it. I mean, maybe this”, and then you go, “and I’m a bad you’re not going around torturing and killing person”. We just assume naturally that if I’ve too many people, but whatever it is, you’ve done bad things, I must be a bad person. got to acknowledge it. “I did do this and That’s how we think. That second thought is this…” And then you check the main things the view of ego, the view of ego-grasping, throughout this life – maybe you had an that over-exaggerates the badness, and abortion, maybe you went fishing, maybe paints the entirety of myself with that brush. you’re a hunter: you acknowledge it, and you The same with blame. “You are a bad regret it. person. You did this and you did this and And, of course, this step is most you did this and you’re a bad person”. This is important if you have taken vows: lay or what all delusions do; they exaggerate. And monastic vows, bodhisattva vows, tantric it’s just not accurate. Forget being not vows. It’s vital to regret having broken them, morally right – it’s just not accurate. It’s an and not just this life but in the past as well. exaggeration. It isn’t accurate to conclude And this is regret. You acknowledge what because you’ve killed and lied and stolen, you have done to harm others and, because that you’re a bad person. You’re not. That’s you don’t want suffering yourself – this is mistaken. Your actions are bad, no problem the motivation behind regret (compassion with that. That’s clear. That’s more precise. for others comes in the second step), you But the point here is, then His Holiness regret having done it. “I regret this. Why? said, “With regret, you also look into the past Because I’m sick of suffering. I don’t want and think, “I did this in the past, and I did the suffering that will come from this if I this, and I did this…” but then you think, leave that seed in my mind. Because if I do “What can I do about it?” Now, we have to leave that seed in my mind – that poison – it cultivate this consciously, it doesn’t come will ripen as my suffering and – hey! – I do naturally. Instead of saying, “…and I’m a bad not want suffering”. person”, you then say, “What can I do about This attitude does not come naturally to it?” You change the thought. We have to us. Guilt comes naturally! Even if we say the cultivate that view. That’s what regret is. It’s word regret, it still feels like guilt. So, we wholesome, courageous, and optimistic. have to spell it out to make it a new thought. You could say that regret is like It’s a really crucial point, I tell you. It’s not compassion for yourself. Like the poison, the enough just to say, “Oh, I regret killing and reason you say, “Oh my God, what an idiot! lying and stealing”. It feels like guilt, so Quick, where’s the doctor?” – it’s obvious you’ve got to change the words. why you say this. You don’t have to state it: The simple, most fundamental thing you know that poison will cause you about karma is that everything you do and suffering, and you know you don’t want say and think leaves a seed in your mind that suffering. Well, same here. You’re sick of can ripen as that experience for yourself in the future. You just have to think: do I like

37 being stolen from? Nope. What causes judge or the police, you know. We think it’s people to steal from me? I must have stolen done to us. from them. So if I’ve just stolen a pencil, It isn’t like that, not for Buddha. I asked a then I’ll get stolen from in the future. I don’t Jesuit priest, a friend of mine, “What defines want that. It’s just logic; you’ve got to think something as a sin?” He said, “It’s going it through, if you apply the law of karma, you against the will of God”. That is what defines know. a sin: something you do that is against the So you’ve got to be logical. Think it will of God. Now, that’s reasonable if God is through. Make it real for you, not just some the creator, and that’s reasonable if you are a religious feeling. Not some weird, guilty Christian. That’s appropriate. That’s correct. feeling. That’s useless. It’s practical – I But that’s not the Buddhist definition of a regret having done this because I don’t want negative action. Going against Buddha’s to be stolen from, I don’t want suffering, I’m views is not what defines something as sick of it. Yet again I’ve shot my mouth off – negative. It’s got nothing to do with Buddha! shouted at people. I’m sick of this habit. First That’s like saying, “Why is smoking bad? Oh, of all, too, you can even right now see the because my doctor told me not to”. Your suffering and the hurt it causes you, the pain doctor’s merely a messenger. The reason of that anger, you’re feeling all caught up in smoking’s bad is because it’ll hurt you, dear! it and fed up with it and you’re so sick of it. For Buddha, what defines killing as bad is You’ve got to feel that pain and be fed up really simple; it’s because it harms another. with it. “I’m sick of this suffering, I’m sick of Buddha says this is a conventional truth that this boring habit”. you can prove quite quickly. You just do a And, of course, the main suffering we do survey in this room right now: “Do you like not want is to be born in the lower realms, getting killed, stolen from, lied to, kicked in which is the main result of negative actions. the teeth?” Everybody will say no. We really have to think these things through. So we can deduce logically that a negative And we’re just talking here of the habits action is one that harms another, because that we do that harm others; we’re not you’ve just proven it by agreeing we don’t looking at just our own emotional problems like it. That’s what makes it negative. It does yet. We’re looking at the actions of our body not come from somebody on high, out there; and speech first – what we do to harm others and it is not, in other words, self-existent. It first – killing, lying, stealing, bad-mouthing; is a dependent arising. That’s Buddha’s view; there’s only so many names for them. You it’s a natural law. So, what a negative action regret them. Remember the things, your old is is one that harms another. habits in this life – you know, maybe you’re But in this very first stage of practice addicted to sex and you harm people with where you regret doing actions that harm your sexual attachment; but you look at the others, the reason first – you have to hear suffering you’re causing yourself. this point – the reason you regret having done it is not for the sake of others yet; it’s THE BUDDHA’S VIEW OF MORALITY for your sake, remember? So, a negative You see, this is a very interesting point, let’s action is defined as an action that harms look at this a bit more – Buddha’s view of another; but at this first step, you regret it what morality is. It’s a really important point because your doing it programs your mind to to think about. The usual view we have about keep doing it and to have it done to you, not morality, which is why we’re like children to mention being born in the lower realms. and resisting it mightily, is because we think So, you regret it because you don’t want it comes from somebody on high forcing it the suffering. This is a crucial point. We’ve upon us: either God or our mother or the got to understand this, not just be vague

38 about it. “Oh I do my practice, oh vows – vows of individual liberation, the I regret lying, killing. . “. We don’t even give vows you take for junior school and high it thought, you know, we just gloss over it. school – if you’ve broken those, then you So a negative action is defined as one that deeply regret having broken those. If you’ve harms another, but at this first stage – and taken bodhisattva vows, then you deeply this is the very meaning of the first level of regret having broken your bodhisattva vows. practice in Buddhism – in the first scope of If you’ve taken tantric vows, you deeply practice, junior school, I like to call it – His regret having broken your tantric vows, Holiness uses this analogy as well: the way because these are lifelong vows. So you the teachings in the lam-rim are structured, regret these, hugely, because you don’t want it’s like the education system. In Tibetan the suffering that this can cause in the medieval language they call it the Lower future: being separate from our , the Scope of practice. So junior school level of Dharma, the Buddha’s teachings, not to practice is to control your body and your mention other suffering. speech. And if Buddha is right in asserting, as he The reason you will regret killing and does, that we’ve had beginningless lives, that lying and stealing and bad-mouthing – and we’ve had countless lives as animals, and there’s not that many actions you do with that mightn’t be the most suffering life, but your body and speech that harm others, that’s where we do the most harm; animals sexual misconduct, lying, killing, stealing, just in their nature harm and get harmed. you know, shouting at people, harsh speech, Look at one whale: it opens its mouth for talking behind backs; there’s only so many. one mouthful of one breakfast on one day “You know what, I’m sick of this suffering, and forty million creatures go in. And you I’m sick of the pain it causes me right now get guilty because you killed one person. Get and I do not want the karmic fruits of this in some perspective, please! That’s a lot of the future. No way! So I regret having killed, sentient beings. So they live in a killing lied, stolen, etc. etc”.. environment; they live on killing, animals Then it makes it very real for you, because do. So, the harm we’ve done to sentient it’s about yourself. Don’t feel bad about this. beings as animals is inconceivable in Don’t feel guilty, like I should just be having comparison to what we’ve done as humans. compassion for others. Compassion’s the So if our minds are beginningless and Great Scope – that’s university, people! we’ve had these lives, we’ve done countless You’ve got to recognize your own suffering things and that means those karmic seeds before you recognize the suffering of others. are on our minds now. So, you better regret You’ve got to be sick of your own suffering – them, because you know you don’t want that this is what renunciation is – you’re sick of suffering again! “I regret anything I’ve ever your own suffering. That’s why you’ve got to done to any sentient being since contemplate how these ridiculous things that beginningless time”. Regret the lot! Because we do harm us. Don’t gloss over this step, it’s I do not want suffering – we’ve got to add extremely important. that thought. “Because I am sick of suffering. So, you regret the things you did today, Because I do not want suffering”. You’ve got yesterday, this life, in beginningless past to say that. That’s what makes it real, and lives – the things you’ve done with your body not just some nice religious feeling. Not just and speech to harm others. “I regret guilt. anything I have ever done, since That’s regret, the first of the four beginningless time to any sentient being”. opponent powers. And of course, for those of us with vows, deeply regret our broken vows: pratimoksha

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2. SECOND OPPONENT POWER: realizing emptiness is when you’ve finally cut RELIANCE. the root of the delusions, and that’s when we a. REFUGE actually purify our minds. Until then, by Now you think, “Well, good! Whom can I doing this purification practice we are turn to? Where’s the doctor, please?” So you simply stalling the ripening, we’re turn to Mr. Buddha. He’s our doctor. Second weakening the seeds, we’re like burning step: Reliance. them, we’re not pulling them out completely. There are two parts in Reliance: the first Until you’ve realized emptiness, you will is reliance upon the Buddha; that’s called never cut the delusions, you’ll always have Refuge. So what does that mean? Let’s look more suffering. We need to stop their at this again, carefully. If I’m a Christian, I ripening, though, and that’s what the would rely upon God, because he’s my purification process does. So, one relies creator. So how I get purified is by upon Vajrasattva. requesting him to forgive me. Well, Buddha So, we visualize him above our head, and will forgive you; he’s a nice guy, I promise. then we takes refuge, say a prayer But it’s got nothing to do with purification. remembering the Buddha, grateful to have a Nothing. It’s nice to be forgiven, but it’s not Buddha, and we imagine him as our own the point. It is not the discussion. Quite lama, who manifests as the Buddha for our different. benefit, to show us the way. That’s what So we rely on Buddha because he’s our refuge means. You rely upon the doctor. doctor – he’s got the methods; he’s got the Now, you’ve got to look at what it means, medicine. So, “Thank goodness I’ve got a “rely upon the doctor”. Why would you rely decent doctor”, you think. And you do a little upon a doctor? Two reasons: one, because prayer, you visualize Vajrasattva, the you do not want more sickness and you need particular manifestation of Buddha that all their medicine; and two, because you are the lamas praise as the best one for this confident they’re a good doctor. It seems practice. kind of obvious; you don’t go to a doctor In the bodhisattva path, the Buddha because they’ve got a cute nose. So you rely manifests as like, gorgeous, you know, upon their advice. It’s perfectly reasonable. jewelry on his arms and ears and throat, and Here, of course, this implies having silken clothing; they call it the royal aspect. thought about the Buddha, seeing that he’s This is coming from tantra, where that’s a valid, and wanting to rely upon the Buddha whole different discussion and it has to do because you want his medicine so that you with enhancing the senses and energizing can heal yourself. them. It’s quite different, another level. So, In other words, if you’ve never thought Buddha in that aspect is called , about suffering, and you haven’t regretted or in Tibetan, Dorje Chang. anything you’ve done wrong because you When I first became a Buddhist, I really haven’t thought about suffering and its like this name “Dorje Chang” and I asked consequences, then the Buddha will be Lama Yeshe, “Who’s Dorje Chang, Lama?” pretty meaningless to you. If you haven’t and he said, very simply, “He’s the biggest taken poison, or you don’t realize you’ve Buddha, dear”. I was very proud to know I taken poison, you might have heard about liked the biggest Buddha! So basically, that’s some amazing doctor who’s got every the tantric aspect of Shakyamuni Buddha. antidote to every poison on earth, and you For this purification practice, we use go, “Oh, how interesting. But how boring. another aspect of Vajradhara, who looks the Who needs him?” You don’t care. But check same, but he’s white: Vajrasattva. He’s how you feel when you’ve discovered you particularly to do with emptiness, because know you’ve taken poison; you’re going to

40 hang on every word that doctor says and is the only people we usually have take his advice perfectly. compassion for now; we love to have compassion for innocent victims, usually b. COMPASSION animals and children. The second part of Reliance is where you Now you see others suffering and you have compassion for those you have harmed. know why they’re suffering. It’s a crucial It’s a bit curious that it’s called reliance. The difference and one has to cultivate it lamas put it like this: here we are, now carefully. Again, it’s completely based on the wanting to cultivate compassion for the teachings of karma, so one has to think of suffering of others. Whom do we rely up, or this so carefully, analyze it so carefully. need, in order to accomplish compassion? Because the feeling we have now is guilt and Suffering sentient beings, of course. If we shame and hate and blame, you know. never meet a suffering sentient being, how Our compassion now on based upon there could we ever cultivate compassion. It’s in being no karma. We only have compassion this sense that they say we “rely upon” for innocent victims, because we assume the sentient beings. cause of suffering is the horrible oppressor. In the first step, Regret, it’s like having Buddha says, “Wrong view”. Actually, when compassion for yourself. You’re regretting you’ve got this view of compassion, you’ll the harm you’ve done for your sake. Now have even more compassion for the here, what you need to cultivate is oppressor. That’s a fact. Why? Very logical. compassion for those you’ve harmed, and It’s like a mother for her junkie kid. you regret for their sake and want to purify Everybody else hates him – he lies, he steals, yourself for their sake. But you can’t have he’s a pain to be around; but the mother, her that until you’ve got the first one. heart breaks for him. Why? Because he is Compassion is based upon this first one, on causing himself suffering. That’s the basis of Regret. You can’t have compassion for the compassion. suffering of others until you’ve got this real You see people who are the victims of sense of renunciation for your own suffering. harm, you realize it’s the result of their own It’s impossible, you can’t. You’ve got to have past actions and your heart breaks for them, this one first. but you have even more compassion for the Why? Very simple. Renunciation has two people who caused it, because the people parts: The first part is: you are sick of who are the victims are just finishing their suffering. Now, we all know that – we’re all suffering and the ones who caused it are just sick of suffering. But the second part’s beginning theirs. crucial: you now know why you’re suffering Once you’ve got this first for yourself, – your past negative actions and your which is renunciation: I’m sick of suffering, I delusions. When you’ve got these two, that’s know why I’m suffering: karma; then it’s renunciation. easy then to have compassion for others. You Compassion is these two as well, but can’t get it properly until you’ve got it for instead of yourself, it’s applied to others. yourself. This is a reasonable psychological One: you see people suffering, and you find kind of progression, and all of it’s based on it unbearable. But, two: you now know why karma. they are suffering, and that’s the big shift Now, in this second part of the second here. You now know why they are suffering: step, Reliance, you think about compassion because of their karma and their delusions: now. You think of those you’ve harmed, and They, like you, are the source of their own you know what it’s like to suffer so you know suffering. You don’t have compassion what it’s like for their suffering. You regret because they’re poor innocent victims, which for their sake, now. Compassion for others.

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And if you’re brave enough, you can have had compassion for our torturers, because compassion for those who have harmed you, we knew we had harmed them in the past”. because they’re going to suffer in the future. This is a huge point. This is why we can’t And of course, the dynamic of all this is you just gloss over karma, we’ve got to really give know you caused them suffering in the past, it thought. And this is the basis of all of that’s how come they’re causing you Buddha’s teachings. It is a way of spelling suffering now. When you’ve got karma out the law of cause and effect. Really think down, you can own it so strongly. it through – it’s the basis of all practice. And it’s the basis of compassion. WITH THE VIEW OF KARMA, NO BLAME, THEREFORE NO ANGER 3. THIRD OPPONENT POWER: THE In 2003 I remember, in New York, I was REMEDY there for a conference that Richard Gere had So now, the third step. Now you take the organized: a bunch of ex-prisoners, when medicine. You apply the antidote. You can His Holiness was there. Twenty ex-prisoners say in Buddhism there’s a whole medicine who had been meditating in prison: black cabinet of remedies, but all the lamas in the and white, male and female, Puerto Rican, Tibetan traditions praise this particular Mexican: a cross-section of American meditation, this particular visualization, this society. So people like me who had worked particular mantra as a really potent with people in prison were invited as well. medicine. Often this step is simply called We had this very nice talk all day, just a “applying the antidote”. lovely conference, you know? And they all So, you know, anything here would apply. met His Holiness. If you’ve got a habit to kill, you make a point Richard also invited two young Tibetan of saving lives. You go get a bunch of worms who’d been tortured and sexually and instead of having them killed as bait, abused in prison for a couple of years, you release the worms. It’s a powerful thing basically for just being nuns. So they were to do. Or one of your practices could be, one telling their experience. of your antidotes could be to help sick First of all, if you could quantify suffering, people: anything you do that’s opposite to then it was obvious to all the Americans that the thing you’re regretting. If you’re the suffering of the nuns was more than all regretting lying, you make a special point of of theirs put together. But second, it was telling the truth. You must do this anyway in really clear they weren’t angry, which is a big your life. They are necessary. surprise to us. Because we have a victim But here, in this step, the very powerful mentality, and because we think we’re practice, very powerful antidote, remedy – innocent victims, and we think suffering is and one has to think about why it’s powerful, caused by others, we assume anger is not just because it’s religion, you know – this normal; because anger is blame, isn’t it? very potent medicine of visualizing Anger is the response of the innocent victim. Vajrasattva and saying his mantra. This is But if you have the view of karma, you said to be a very powerful medicine that don’t have blame. The nuns were sad, there works at a very deep level of your mind. So, were tears, but they weren’t angry. And one does this visualization of Vajrasattva that’s a big shock to us: we assume anger is purifying the various actions of your body, normal; in fact, we’d think you’re not normal speech and mind and reciting the mantra. if you don’t have anger. All the lamas say that any practice that But these nuns, at the end of their talk, involves saying the Buddha’s name, they said very quietly, “And of course, we visualizing, reciting their , is hugely powerful, far more powerful than practices

42 that don’t involve the Buddha. They talk since. It’s like saying, “Oh, I’m a pianist, I about the “power of the object”, the object of played piano twenty years ago”. You’re not, one’s thoughts, actions, etc. So doing this unless you do it every day. We see these practice of visualizing nectar coming from things as so self-existent. It’s not enough. It’s the Buddha and purifying your negative an ongoing, dynamic daily thing. actions of body, speech and mind while you If every day you say, “I will never kill”, I recite the mantra, is like an atomic bomb on mean, excuse me, guess what the result will the negative karmic imprints. That’s the be? It’s hardly rocket science. If every day third step. you say it, that protects you every day from ever killing. It’s obvious. It’s so 4. FOURTH OPPONENT POWER: embarrassingly obvious. But we forget these RESOLVE things. So you need to reiterate your vows. I And the fourth one, as Pabongka Rinpoche will never kill. I will never steal. I will never says, is the most important: Resolve, or the lie. I will never whatever they are. I will determination to change. If you can’t own never break my bodhisattva vows. I will responsibility for what you’ve done wrong, never break my tantric vows. You need to say you can never make the decision to change, this every day. Reiterate your commitments. can you, because you don’t want to own it. And it’s not just because you’re hoping First with regret and then the determination God will make you good or Buddha will bless to change, you’re really becoming you; it’s you training your mind. Like if you accountable. You’re really growing up. do pushups every day, guess what? You keep You’re becoming mature. And you’re getting better at it. We understand it when it becoming your own friend. That’s why this comes to creativity and art and learning practice is so crucial to do. Not just to gloss it things, but we think this is “religion” so we over, say, “Oh I’ve done my Vajrasattva don’t understand why I should say every day mantras…” That’s not enough, I tell you. I’ll never kill. Because you’re training your That’s just not enough. You’ve got to think mind in that direction. Because everything through these four steps. It’s psychologically comes down to the thought. All you’re doing really profound. It’s being your own by becoming a Buddha is programming your therapist, as Lama Yeshe puts it, mind with positive thoughts. It’s nothing Things really shift if we can do this more secret that that. properly, because this is where we get the Then, of course, you don’t lie to yourself, courage to know we are in charge of our life as Rinpoche says. Look at our old habits, like and we can change. Because it’s the power of getting angry. So maybe you’ll say, “Okay. I our own will, our own determination to see the reasonableness of not getting angry. change. I’m going to give it a go. I won’t get angry for So this fourth step, again, is so practical: five hours”. Or you might say, “I won’t lie for you make determination not to do again. So, ten hours”, – and because you’ve got to go to if you have taken vows – I will never kill, I bed soon, when you’re asleep, you won’t lie, will never lie, I will never steal – you’ve believe me; you’ll keep your vow! taken those five lay vows, and they’re Be realistic; it’s an incremental thing, and lifetime vows, so obviously you need to you’ve got to take this seriously on board. reiterate that vow. That’s why you can’t just do your mantras Every time you say “I will never kill”, it’s and think, “I’ve done my practice”. It’s not like digging that groove deeper in your mind. enough. It’s a serious psychological It’s not enough to say, “Oh, yeah, I took vows procedure that you’re involved in. Practice is twenty years ago. Twenty years ago I vowed I real; it’s you dealing with your own mind. wouldn’t kill”, but you’ve never thought of it

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So, give yourself a timeline. And when it comes of course to your delusions, your neurotic thoughts, the things that harm you only – and I didn’t mention this in Regret – but of course you can think of your own rubbish: your own angry thoughts, your depression, your jealousy, which are destroying you. You can deeply regret these because it’s obvious the suffering it causes you; because you’re sick of the suffering. Now here in this fourth step, you maybe can’t say”, I’ll never be depressed again”; it’s not possible, if you’re caught up in the middle of it. But you make some decisions for yourself; realistic, humble decisions. “Okay. I’m going to watch my mind like a hawk. I’m going to do my best tomorrow”. Any vows you’ve taken, you must reiterate them at this step: I will never break my lay vows, I will never break my bodhisattva vows, I will never break my tantric vows, etc. If you haven’t taken vows, and if you can start to say I will never kill, lie steal, etc., then great. Take it at your own pace. Make decisions every night with this practice, and you will change. “We can mould our minds into any shape we like”, as Lama Zopa Rinpoche says. We’re the boss, remember.

Teachings given at Osel Shen Phen Ling, Missoula, MT, 2011.

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10. THE PURE NATURE mind is our habitual wrong view – our OF OUR MIND ignorant, insecure ego-grasping – that holds onto the hallucination of concrete self- LAMA YESHE existence as if it were reality. The way to break the spell of this hallucination is to see the illusory nature of things and recognize that all phenomena are nothing but fleeting appearances arising in the clear space of By contemplating our stream of mind. Thus the more we contemplate clarity consciousness in meditation we can be led of our own consciousness, the less we hold naturally to the spacious experience of onto any appearance as being concrete and nonduality. As we observe our thoughts real - and the less we suffer. carefully we will notice that they arise, abide By watching our thoughts come and go in and disappear themselves. There is no need this way, we move ever closer to the correct to expel thoughts from our minds forcefully; view of emptiness. Seemingly concrete just as each thought arises from the clear appearances will arise, remain for awhile nature of mind, so too does it naturally and then disappear back into the clear dissolve back into this clear nature. When nature of mind. As each thought disappears thoughts eventually dissolve in this way, we in this way, we should train in this type of should keep our mind concentrated on the 'not seeing,' the more familiar we become resulting clarity as undistractedly as we can. with the clear spaciousness of mind. Then, We should train ourselves not to become even when extremely destructive thoughts engrossed in any of the thoughts and emotions such as anger and jealousy continuously arising in our mind. Our arise, we will remain in contact with the consciousness is like a vast ocean with plenty underlying purity of our consciousness. This of space for thoughts and emotions to swim purity is always with us and whatever about in, and we should not allow our delusions we may experience are only attention to be distracted by any of them. It superficial obscurations that will eventually does not matter if a certain 'fish' is pass, leaving us with the essentially clear particularly beautiful or repulsive: without nature of our mind. being distracted one way or the other we When you contemplate your own should remain focussed on our mind's basic consciousness with intense awareness, clarity. Even if a magnificent vision arises leaving aside all thoughts of good and bad, the kind we have been waiting years to see you are automatically led to the experience we should not engage it in conversation. We of non-duality. should, of course, remain aware of what is How is this possible? Think of it like this: going on; the point is not to become so the clean, clear blue sky is like dullminded that we do not noticed anything. consciousness, while the smoke and However, while remaining aware of thoughts pollution pumped into the sky are like the as they arise, we should not become unnatural, artificial concepts manufactured entranced by any of them. Instead, we by ego-grasping ignorance. Now, even should remain mindful of the underlying though we say the pollutants are clarity out of which these thoughts arose. contaminating the atmosphere, the sky Why is it so important to contemplate the never really becomes contaminated by the clarity of our consciousness in this way? pollution. The sky and the pollution each Because, as we have seen again and again, retain their own characteristic nature. In the source of all our happiness and suffering, other words, on a fundamental level the sky the root of both the pains of samsara and the remains unaffected no matter how much bliss of nirvana, is the mind. And within the

45 toxic energy enters it. The proof of this is that when conditions change the sky can become clear once again. In the same way, no matter how many problems may be created by artificial ego concepts, they never affect the clean, clear nature of our consciousness itself. From the relative point of view, our consciousness remains pure because its clear nature never becomes mixed with the nature of confusion. From an ultimate point of view as well, our consciousness always remains clear and pure. The non-dual characteristic of the mind is never damaged by the dualistic concepts that arise in it. In this respect consciousness is pure, always was pure and will always remain pure.

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11. BEING OUR OWN This is okay, and necessary, but not THERAPIST enough. Our parents, our genes, the boyfriend, the boss, the external VEN ROBINA COURTIN environment – they are merely catalysts for our experiences, not the main event. The main thing is our own mind, our own emotions, characteristics, personality traits, tendencies: our own very being itself. The Buddhist view is that we’ve all got Investigating, unravelling, and extraordinary potential to cultivate our transforming this is the Buddhist approach minds, our consciousness. It’s not some to psychological work. special gift that only some people have; it’s innate within all of us. BEING OUR OWN THERAPIST But potential for what? Not something According to this model of the mind, holy, like heaven in the sky, or next life, but psychological states fall into three potential to eliminate entirely fear, stress categories: positive, negative, and neutral. depression, anxiety, neediness, low self- Leaving aside the neutral, the positive states, esteem and to fully develop love, which are at the core of our being, are contentment, compassion, clarity, courage necessarily the cause of own wellbeing and and the other qualities we want so badly. The happiness, and the basis of our capacity to accomplishment of this is what is meant by benefit others. The negative, which are not at “nirvana”. the core of our being and thus can be It is something very earthy, so tasty, not removed, are necessarily the cause of our something vague and mystical. This unhappiness and the basis of our harming potential exists, simply, in our minds, our others. consciousness. Therefore we need to learn The key job, then, is to develop the skill to how to access our own mind. Sounds simple look inside, to be introspective, in a clear enough, but it’s not a job we’re educated to and disciplined way, so that we’re then do. It is not our habit to look inside, much qualified to do the actual job of changing our less know deeply and well what’s going on emotions, of distinguishing between the there. positive and negative. To become our own therapist, in other words, as Lama Yeshe WHAT IS THE MIND? puts it. From the Buddhist point of view, the word Not an easy job. First of all, we’re not “mind” covers the entire spectrum of our educated to look into our minds. Second, we inner experiences: thoughts, feelings and only notice we’re angry, for example, when emotions, unconscious, sub-conscious, the words vomit out of the mouth; or that intuition, instinct, even what some might we’re depressed when we can’t get out of bed call soul – all of this is our consciousness. one morning. Third, even if we do look at And this, as Lama Zopa Rinpoche puts it, is our feelings, often we can’t tell the difference where the workshop is. This is what we have between the positive and the negative: to become deeply familiar with in order to they’re mixed together in a big soup of cultivate our marvelous potential. emotions – and a puréed soup at. Mainly what we’re familiar with, what we And one of the biggest obstacles is that we run to in order to understand our lives, is the don’t think we can change them: they’re so outside world, the past – the people and concrete, so real: “I’m born this way, what events and objects – which we’re convinced can I do about it?” We so fiercely identify are the main cause of our happiness and with the neuroses, believing that they’re the suffering.

47 real me. We even think they’re physical. And friends on death row in Kentucky told me anyway, who wants to look into their mind? that they receive visits from an old Catholic “It’s not my fault, is it? I didn’t ask to get man who, after thirty years of grief and rage born! This is how we all are! What am I after his daughter was murdered, finally supposed to do about it?” realized that the main reason for his Everything conspires against our doing suffering was his rage, his anger. this job. Delusional The other characteristic that these unhappy states of mind possess is that NEGATIVITY IS NOT INNATE they’re delusional. We’d be offended if To give ourselves the confidence to even someone accused of that, but that’s exactly start, we need to think about how the what Buddha is saying. The extent to which negative states of mind are not at the core of our minds are caught up in attachment, our being, they do not define us, they are not anger and the rest is the extent to which we innate, and thus can be removed. This flies are not in touch with reality. He’s saying that in the face of our deeply held assumption – we’re all delusional, it’s just a question of one that’s reinforced by all contemporary degree. models of the mind – that the positive and In other words, anger, attachment and negative have equal status; that they’re the rest are concepts, wrong concepts. It natural; they just are who we are. If you ask seems like a joke to say that these powerful your therapist for methods to get rid of all emotions are based in thoughts, but that’s anger, jealousy, attachment and the rest, because we only notice them when they roar they’ll think you’re insane! up to the surface as emotion. We can be forgiven for thinking the Perhaps we can see the disturbing aspect negative, neurotic, unhappy emotions are at of them, but rarely the delusional. the core of our being: they certainly feel like They are distorted assessments of the it! We identify totally with them, follow them person or the event that we are attached to perfectly, truly believing this is who I really or angry with; they’re elaborations, am. This is the irony of ego. exaggerated stories, lies, misconceptions, fantasies, conceptual constructions, NEGATIVE STATES OF MIND ARE superstitions. As Rinpoche puts it, they DISTURBING AND DELUSIONAL decorate on top of what is already there So, if the negative, neurotic emotions are the layers upon layers of characteristics that are source of our pain and the positive ones the simply not there. Bad enough that we see cause of our happiness, then we’d better things this way; the worst part is that we learn to distinguish them. This is the very believe that these stories are true. This is essence of the job our being our own what keeps us locked inside our own therapist. personal insane asylum. What are negative states of mind? They Understanding this is the key to have two main characteristics (which the understanding our negative states of mind positive ones necessarily lack) and these are and, therefore, how to get rid of them. indicated by two commonly used synonyms: “disturbing emotions” and “delusions”. ATTACHMENT AND ANGER COME Disturbing Even though we can see that TOGETHER anger is disturbing to oneself – just look at The delusion that runs our lives is an angry person: they’re out of their mind! – attachment. It’s a profound dissatisfaction, we fiercely live in denial of it; or we deflect it, neediness; a primordial sense that so determined are we to believe that the something is missing, of being bereft, lonely, external catalyst is the main problem. My

48 cut off. It’s just there, all the time, in the neediness, that bottomless pit of yearning, bones of our being. that hunger: that’s attachment. And it’s the And this is where aversion, anger, the main voice of ego, it is constantly there, exact opposite of attachment, comes into moment by moment; not just occasionally play. The split second that attachment is there, but constantly there. thwarted, doesn’t get what it wants – and This attachment, this desire, being a that’s a thousand times a day – aversion misconception, makes the mistake of arises. Then this is expressed externally as believing, a million percent, that that anger or internally as despair and delicious person, that gorgeous taste, that depression. Attachment and aversion are lovely smell, that nice feeling, that idea – utterly linked. Being a fantasy, attachment is that when I get that, when I have it inside not sustainable; the bubble has to burst, and me, then I’ll feel full, then I’ll be content. it has nowhere to go but aversion (or That is what desire thinks. ignorance, which manifests as boredom, This is so hard to see how desire is indifference, uncaring). deluded. And it is not meant to be a In our never-ending efforts to keep the moralistic issue. As soon as we hear these panic at bay, we hungrily seek the right words we feel a bit resentful, “What do you sounds, smells, tastes, feelings, thoughts, mean – I’m not allowed to have pleasure?” words, but the split second we don’t get That’s how we feel. But as Lama Yeshe has them, aversion arises, exploding outwards as pointed out: we’re either completely anger or imploding inwards as depression, hedonistic, and grasping and shoving guilt, hopelessness, self-hate. everything in, or we’re completely puritanical. And the irony is that they are DELUSIONS ARE LIARS both coming from a misunderstanding of At the root of this, as Buddha calls it, is desire; they both come from ego. ignorance: marigpa in Tibetan: Buddha is not being moralistic. He is not unawareness: a fundamental unawareness of saying we should not have pleasure – the how we actually exist. The function of this reality is he is saying we should have masses “ego-grasping”, as it’s called, is to isolate and of pleasure, joy, happiness, but naturally and concretize this universe-big sense of self, a appropriately, and, incredibly, without deluded sense of “I”, a totally fabricated relying upon anything external. This is our sense of I, whose nature is fear: paranoid, natural state when we’ve depolluted our dark, cut off, separate, alienated, and minds of the neuroses, in fact. overwhelming. Right now, because of the misconception This instinctive, pervasive sense of an that desire has, we have got the wrong end of independent, self-existent, real, solid, the stick. Desire thinks that the delicious definite me-ness, totally pervades everything chocolate cake, that gorgeous thing is out – there is not an instant when it is not there. there, vibrating deliciousness, demanding It’s at the deepest level of assumption, that I eat it – nothing coming from my side beneath everything. It is always there, at all. We don’t think out mind plays any role informing everything we think and feel and at all. We think that it’s all happening from say and do and experience. the cake’s side, all the energy is coming from And the main voice of this I is “I want”. the cake. Why? The vivid sense of a separate, lonely I manifests as a deep sense of missing OUR MIND MAKES IT UP something, not being enough, not having And the thing is that we don’t see this enough. And that is the irony of ego – we process! The fact is we are making up the actually feel empty, bereft. And so that cake – attachment has written a huge story

49 about cake and what it will do for us. It is a the outside object. Which is why we feel like complex conceptual construction, an a baby. That’s the victim mentality. And invention, an elaborate view, an victim mentality, the one of hopelessness, interpretation, an opinion. the one of no control, that’s the voice of We’re like a child, as one lama said, who attachment. Literally. That’s exactly how draws a lion, and then becomes afraid of it. attachment functions. Attachment is giving We invent everything in our reality, and then all the power to that object. It sees this truly we have all the fears and the paranoia and delicious divine thing, which in reality our the depression and the grasping. We’re too mind has made up, and then we believe it much! and then blame it. But we make up that cake, we make up the enemy – we made them up ourselves. ATTACHMENT IS NOT A FUNCTION This sounds pretty cosmic, but it is literally OF THE SENSES true. This doesn’t mean there is no cake “We make the body the boss”, as Lama Yeshe there – there is. And it doesn’t mean that would tell us. We totally follow what the Fred didn’t punch you – he did. We need to senses feel. We assume the delicious cake is distinguish between the facts and the fiction: an object of the senses – of course, it is; but that’s the tricky part. what we think we see isn’t what’s there. It is hard to see this, but this is the way What appears to the sense of sight, for delusions function. And basically they are example, is not a delicious cake but simply liars. What attachment is seeing is simply the shape and colour of the thing. “Delicious not true. What attachment is seeing simply cake” is a story made up by the mental does not exist. consciousness, specifically attachment. This There is a cake there, but what we think is is a crucial point. cake and what cake actually is are hugely Let’s analyze. What is being experienced different. This is interesting. And because in relation to that cake? What are the states this is hard to understand indicates how of mind? One of them is the senses indeed – ancient it is within us. we smell it in the kitchen, so there’s our nose What we’re seeing or experiencing, what sense. Then there’s the touch, the sight, we we are grasping at – delicious cake from its see the shape and colour when it comes to own side that will make me happy – is a total the table; then we touch it, the hand feels it, lie. It doesn’t exist like that at all. There is a then there’s the taste consciousness, the one cake there, it is brown, it is square: that’s we’re wanting the most. So four of the five valid. And this is what’s hard to distinguish senses are involved in the experience of that – the correctness, and the incorrectness. cake. What is actually there and what is not there. The senses are like dumb animals. Our That is the job we need to do in knowing the tongue doesn’t experience the hunger for the way delusions work and therefore how to get cake, it doesn’t leap out of our face and grab rid of them. the cake desperately; even our hand doesn’t, although it looks like it. The hand goes out to ATTACHMENT IS THE VOICE OF THE the cake, but not from its own side. So what VICTIM does? It’s propelled by the neurotic need to Another characteristic of attachment is that get the cake in the mouth. The mental it is the voice of the victim. We truly feel we consciousness, in other words. The thought. have no control – cake is this incredible It is the story about what is chocolate cake, powerful thing, and I just have to have it. and I need chocolate cake, all the stuff about What choice do I have? That is attachment chocolate cake that is chattering away in the talking. Attachment gives all the power to mind. That is where the delusions exist.

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Attachment is not a function of the taste. It right now it’s virtually impossible for us to is simply not possible. How can it be? Our have pleasure without attachment. tongue doesn’t feel neurotic. Our tongue doesn’t feel grasping, our tongue doesn’t ATTACHMENT TO A PERSON feel, “I want to have more cake”, it is just a It’s the same with people. Let’s look at the doorway through which this bunch of person we are attached to, the person we are thoughts, these concepts, this sense of “I” in love with – even more dramatic. Again, grasps at the experience, isn’t it? That is all. this soup of emotions, which we never So the senses do not experience attachment. analyze, never deconstruct. It is a logical fact. I can say, “I love you”. That means I wish them to be happy. Totally appropriate. WE ARE JUNKIES Unbelievable, virtuous. The more of this the So of course for aeons we have had the better. We will only get happiness if we keep mistaken assumption that satisfying the thinking that. “I want you not to suffer”, senses is the way to get happiness. So right that’s called compassion. Generosity, maybe now, we are totally dependent on sensory you’d like to give the person something. objects. We are all junkies, it’s just a Generosity, in its nature is a virtue, question of degree. We can’t imagine having necessarily the cause of happiness. pleasure unless we get that fix. That fix is So, love doesn’t cause suffering, any one of the objects of the five senses. compassion doesn’t cause suffering, the Which makes it sound quite brutal. senses don’t directly cause suffering, But unless we can start to look into this happiness can’t possibly cause suffering – so and cut through this whole way of working, what does? The cause of suffering is the we will never break free of suffering, we’ll attachment, first of all, the neurotic sense of never becomes content, satisfied, fulfilled. an “I”, a hungry “I” that sees this person, Ever. Which is why, the basis of practice, the grossly exaggerates their value to me, gives foundation of all realizations, is morality. too much power, puts the power “out there” Discipline. It means literally practicing in that person, just like the cake. We’re control over the senses. And it is not a giving all the power to this person, like it’s moralistic issue; it’s a practical one. The aim all out there, this person, so delicious, so is to get as happy as possible. This is the aim. gorgeous, this is exactly how it feels. So attachment is hungry and bereft and lonely. NOTHING WRONG WITH And is completely convinced that having that PLEASURE! person is going to make me happy. This happiness, this pleasure, is not deluded. What attachment does is exaggerate the If pleasure were deluded, we might as well beautiful qualities of the person, it is give up now. Pleasure, happiness, joy are exaggerating our sense of an “I” that needs totally appropriate. that person, because attachment thinks that So where’s the problem? Why do we if I don’t get that person then I am not suffer? Why are we frantic and anxious and happy; because we don’t believe we can be desperate, fantasizing about the cake before happy inside, we have to have an object. it’s even there, then shoving two pieces in Attachment then starts to manipulate this when it comes, and then being depressed person, expects massively that this person when we eat too much? Why all this will give me happiness. rubbish? Because we have these delusions. It’s the same with the person we loathe. Suffering doesn’t come from pleasure, it We really believe that that person, from out doesn’t come from the senses. It comes from there, from their own side, independently, neuroses in the mental consciousness. But definitely, is an awful person, as if ugliness is

51 coursing in their veins along with their mouth, the eyes open wide in panic, the blood. We hear their name, it appears awful, voice shouts. Or if we experience aversion as we see their face, it appears awful. The depression, the body feels like a lead weight; discomfort in our mind is huge. We think the there’s no energy, a terrible inertia. And discomfort, the unhappiness, the hurt, the then, when we boost our seratonin, the body anger, the pain, we actually think and believe feels good again. they are doing it to us. But these are just gross expressions of But it’s a lie. It’s our own anger that what, finally, is purely thought: a story made causes the person to look awful, the anger up by our conceptual mind that exaggerates that makes us so miserable. the ugly aspects of the person or event or oneself. GOING BEYOND ENEMY, FRIEND, Recent findings prove what is explained STRANGER in Tibetan Medicine: that what goes on in Usually the only person we wish to be happy the mind affects the body. – that’s the meaning of love – is the person Anger is not someone else’s fault. we are attached to. And the only person we This doesn’t mean that the person didn’t are attached to is the person we love. So we punch me; sure they did. And it doesn’t assume because they come together, they’re mean that punching me is not bad; sure it is. the same thing. It is just not accurate. We But the person didn’t make me angry. The need to start going beyond those limits, punch is merely the catalyst for my anger, a which is so scary. When we start practicing tendency in my mind. If there were no anger, equanimity, we analyze: enemy, friend, and all I’d get is a broken nose. stranger – we try to cut through this narrow Anger does not come from our self-centreed view of attachment, ignorance parents. We love to blame our parents! and aversion. Actually, if Buddha is wrong in his assertion Right now we assume it is normal that that our mind comes from previous lives and when a person is mean to me, I don’t like is propelled by the force of our own past them. So we call them enemies. And we actions into our mother’s womb; and if the assume it is normal that when a person is materialists are right in asserting that our nice to me, we call them friend. And when a parents created us, then we should blame person is doing neither, they are called them. How dare they create me, like stranger. That’s the reality of the entire Frankenstein and his monster, giving me universe, isn’t it? We need to go beyond this anger and jealousy and the rest! But they one. didn’t, Buddha says. (Nor did a superior WHAT IS ANGER AND WHAT IS being – but we dare not blame him!). They ANGER NOT? gave us a body; the rest is ours (including A perfect question. And the perfect answer, our good qualities). which I heard from a lama, is: “Anger is the Anger isn’t only the shouting. Just response when attachment doesn’t get what because a person doesn’t shout and yell it wants”. But what is it not? doesn’t mean they’re not angry. When we Anger is not physical. Anger is part of understand that anger is based on the our mind, and our mind is not physical. It thought called aversion, then we can see we exists in dependence upon the brain, the are all angry. Of course, if we never look genes, the chemical reactions, but is not inside, we won’t notice the aversion; that’s these things. why people who don’t express anger When anger’s strong, it triggers huge experience it as depression or guilt. physical symptoms: the blood boils, the Anger is not necessary for heart beats fast, the spit comes out the compassionate action. His Holiness the

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Dalai Lama responded to an interviewer who PRACTICE IS PAINFUL suggested that anger seems to act as a Real practice is painful – real practice. Until motivator for action, “I know what you it is painful, it is not practice, we’re just mean. But with anger, your wish to help playing safe. We’re just keeping our nice doesn’t last. With compassion, you never comfort zone. Practice has to threaten give up”. something – it has to feel painful. Just like We need to discriminate between good when we are overweight, we decide we are and bad, but Buddha says that we should going to get thin and beautiful, and we start criticize the action, not the person. As doing push-ups. It has to be painful at first. Martin Luther King said, it’s okay to find We know that if the second we start feeling fault – but then we should think, “What can pain from doing pushups we stop, we will I do about it?” never benefit from doing them. We can It’s exactly the same with seeing our own always pretend “Oh I did my pushups this faults, but instead of feeling guilty we should morning”, but if the second they started think, “What can I do about it?” Then we can being painful, we stopped, we know that if change. Anger and guilt are paralyzed, our muscles don’t hurt, they will never get impotent, useless. strong – it is logic. Giving up attachment is Anger is not natural. Often we think like that – it has to be painful. we need anger in order to be a reasonable Until then, we are just being in our human being; that it’s unnatural not to have comfort zone – we’re playing safe, thinking it; that it gives perspective to life. It’s a bit that being spiritual means smiling and being like thinking that in order to appreciate holy and having a pleasant manner. It is just pleasure we need to know pain. But that’s not so. Until we stretch, until we go beyond obviously ridiculous: for me to appreciate our limits, we won’t get better at doing your kindness, you first need to punch me in anything. We really get our body strong the nose? when we go beyond our limits every day. Anger is not at the core of our How do we become an accomplished pianist being. Being a delusional state of mind, a or anything? We have to go beyond our lie, a misconception, it’s logical that anger limits. That’s what spiritual practice is – we can be eliminated. If I think there are two have to stretch our limits. cups on my table, whereas there is only one, This means we have to be facing our that’s a misconception. What to do with the attachment every day, feeling the pain of it, thought “there are two cups on my table”? seeing it. And then, the second we start to do Remove it from my mind! Recognize that that, somehow we become fulfilled, satisfied. there is one cup and stop believing the lie. That is what is interesting. When we start to Simple. give up being a junkie, we start to become Of course, the lies that believe that I’m happy. We begin to taste our own potential. self-existent, that delicious objects make me As long as we continue to follow attachment, happy, that ugly ones make me suffer, that which is so deep, we will never be happy. my mind is my brain, that someone else created me – these lies have been in my PRACTICE STARTS WITH mind since beginningless time. But the MOTIVATION method for getting rid of them is the same. So how to begin? It starts from the thought. What’s left when we’ve removed the lies, We tend in the West to dismiss thoughts. We the delusions, is the truth of our own innate say, “It’s only in the mind”, we give no value goodness, fully perfected. That is what’s to the mind, even though we are caught in it. natural. We give no value to just thought. The point is, that if we really understand this

53 fundamental, and easily provable, truth that thinking. So we start with the motivation, every thought programs us into what we will start with the thoughts, and we go into the become, we would be so happy to have day, and bring that awareness with us. positive thoughts, and be content with them. Watch our mind, be careful of the rubbish, If I am going to get up and walk out the door, try not to shoot our mouth off too much, try what is the first thing that has to happen? to be a bit useful, rejoice in the good stuff. At My legs don’t just jump up and walk out, my the end of the day, we look back, we regret mind has to say “I want to walk out that our mistakes and rejoice in our efforts, and door”. So what does that mean? How do we then go to bed with a happy mind. That’s one walk out a door? The first thing is to think “I day of practice. One day at a time. It is want to walk out that door”. organic, and it’s humble. We start one day at So every day, you’re saying “I want to be a time, and slowly, something develops. compassionate, I want to be beneficial”. You’re aspiring, and then you’ll act. It is no mystery. That’s how we become pianists, footballers, a cook – or a happy, beneficial person. It starts with the thought, the motivation, the aspiration. So we just start our practice with powerful sincere motivations. We are sincere, after all; we do want to be these things, loving, compassionate, etc. Genuinely wanting, seeing the reasonableness of having a compassionate thought, seeing the reasonableness of turning around a negative thought. What we are is the product of our thoughts. It is simply a fact. This is what karma is saying. No one else made us into anything, we made our own self. As Lama Zopa says, we can mould our mind into any shape we like. Practice starts with motivation, motivation, motivation. I want to do this, I am aspiring to that. When we start every day, we wish “May I be useful, may I not shoot my mouth off to too many people”, etc. Even this is so profound. We have to value the thought, value the mind, it is so powerful. Like the says, we are then on the right track for the rest of the day. Don’t underestimate that. If we really got that, we would be so content, knowing we were sowing the seeds for future crops of happiness. It is like we had a big open field, and we are sowing seeds for the future. That’s practice. That’s how we start. We shouldn’t fret, “I’m hopeless, I’m useless”. We are too concrete in our

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12. BODHICHITTA IS THE suffering. BEST MEDICINE Bodhichitta, the altruistic mind that cherishes others and seeks to bring them LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE happiness, is generated in dependence upon the existence of suffering sentient beings; therefore, we receive all our happiness, all the good things, through the kindness of others. Living your life with the good heart, Good morning. -la [Geshe Lhundrup cherishing others, is the best way to take Sopa] advised that I should do some care of your health. It’s the best way to heal chatting, so today Mickey Mouse is going to AIDS, cancer, or any other disease. do some chattin. Everything we do in our daily life is for TAKING UPON YOURSELF THE happiness, whether our own happiness or SUFFERING OF OTHERS the happiness of others. Even though there For example, some years ago in Singapore are so many prayers to recite and so many when a student went to the hospital for a different meditation practices, the very heart checkup, he was told by his doctor that he of the teaching of our kind compassionate had AIDS. The student then sent a letter to Guru Shakyamuni Buddha is the loving, his guru, Rato Rinpoche, a very high lama compassionate thought of bodhichitta. who lived in Dharamsala. Even though Bodhichitta, the altruistic thought to Rinpoche himself was showing the aspect of achieve enlightenment for the sake of other sickness at that time, Rinpoche kindly sentient beings, is the best medicine, the dictated a meditation on bodhichitta that best meditation, the best Dharma practice. involved letting go of the I and cherishing Bodhichitta is the essence of Guru others. Shakyamuni Buddha’s advice. Bodhichitta In this meditation, by generating means letting go of the I and cherishing compassion, you take upon yourself all the others. We have to let go of the I, from where sufferings of the numberless other beings arise all our emotional problems and all the with AIDS and of those who have the karma obstacles to our own success and happiness to experience AIDS in the future and by and to our bringing success and happiness to generating loving kindness, you make the numberless other living beings. charity of your body, your happiness, and From where do all the problems and your merits, the cause of all happiness, to difficulties in life come? From the I; from the others, who are numberless. Rinpoche ego cherishing the I, or in other words from kindly dictated the meditation to Ruth the I. And from where do all the good things Sonam, the translator for Geshe Sonam come? From bodhichitta. Bodhichitta is the Rinchen, who has been teaching for many source of all happiness, of all desirable years at the Tibetan Government Library in things, from the temporary happiness of Dharamsala. You take the sufferings from even our moment-to-moment peace of mind AIDS of others upon yourself, upon your in our daily life up to the ultimate happiness ego, and use them to destroy your ego, from of liberation—total liberation from the entire where AIDS and other sicknesses come. You suffering cycle of rebirth and death and all then send light to others and give the problems that are experienced in everything—your body, happiness, and between and from its cause, karma, or , the cause of happiness—to other action, and the delusions that motivate the sentient beings. actions—and the ultimate peerless happiness After receiving the meditation of full enlightenment, pure happiness that instruction, the student did the practice for never degenerates, that never turns into

55 four days. He then went to the hospital for much negative karma, the real cause of another checkup and the doctor told him, sickness. This negative karma was within “You have no AIDS”. I thought that he must him, on his mental continuum, not outside, have practiced for many hours each day. and generating compassion purified that When I asked him, “How many hours did negative karma. With one way of thinking you practice?” and he said, “Five minutes”, I you can make your body and mind sick; you was shocked. But the five minutes that he can make your mind sick and that can make meditated on those four days was extremely your body sick. In a similar way, however, powerful. I would think that in that five your positive attitude can make your mind minutes of meditation on bodhichitta he healthy and that can make your body probably purified many more negative healthy. This is what normally happens in karmas and defilements than many months our daily lives. If you are aware, you can see of deity retreat, reciting mantras and this. It can be proved. visualizing deities, even Vajrasattva, but I also heard that four people in Spain had without strong compassion for others, recovered from AIDS by doing meditation without the altruistic mind cherishing practice, but I don’t know the details. This others. I think that his five minutes of was mentioned to me by the lead singer from meditation on bodhichitta was like some the famous group called Meccano, who people’s months of retreat. The effect on his recorded a song about His Holiness the Dalai mental continuum, and even the benefit to Lama’s life. (I call the group “Nangcho”, his health, was much more than that from which means inner , because their years of deity retreat done without a pure name sounds like “nangcho”.) motivation. Generally, our health depends on our While doing the meditation, he felt attitude to life. I think that anything unbearable compassion for others. When he happening in the body is an expression of thought of the other people with AIDS, tears the mind. The body is an expression of the poured out. He felt it was unbearable that mind; how the body appears is an expression others were suffering, especially the people of the quality of the mind. This is what I with AIDS. During those five minutes of think. So, how much you take care of your meditation, he felt so much compassion for mind determines how much you are able to others. So, that is what he did each day. take care of your health. This is the best way to take care of yourself. This is the best BODHICHITTA HEALS protection for your life, the best way to keep He was healed by his own compassion, by healthy, because it is the correct evolution. his own healthy mind, not by medicine. Even though external factors such as Making his own mind healthy by generating pollution do affect the body and the mind, this purest of attitudes affected his body; it there is a reason that they do so; it doesn’t improved his health. How does meditation happen without cause and conditions. What heal sickness? Generally speaking, by happens is a result, or an effect, so the cause understanding this, we can understand how has to exist prior to that. Since that result is meditation can heal sickness without a causative phenomenon, its cause has to depending on external factors such as exist beforehand. So, there is a reason for it. chemical medicines and so forth. Things do not happen without a reason, Compassion is very powerful. Generating which is the same as saying that things do compassion is a very powerful method of not happen without cause and conditions. purification and of collecting good luck, or merit. Because this student generated compassion very strongly, he purified so

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EVERYTHING COMES FROM THE we can eliminate our sufferings by stopping MIND or reducing the cause. Understanding So, what makes things affect you, whether it Buddha’s teachings on karma only gives us is a positive or a negative effect? From where more free will, more freedom. By does the reason, or cause, come? From understanding karma more, you see that you outside or from inside your mind? Again, it have more free will. It’s not up to somebody comes from your own mind. Whether the else. Your aim is to achieve happiness and effect is negative or positive, it comes from not to suffer. By knowing about karma, you your own mind. If it is a negative effect, it is know the causes of happiness and how to a creation of your own negative mind; if it is create them. You can take that opportunity a positive effect, if it is pleasurable, the cause to prevent suffering and to experience is created by your own positive mind. But as happiness. Therefore, you have free will. ordinary people without realizations we are Understanding more about karma gives you not aware of this, either because we don’t free will. Understanding karma does not put know about karma or we intellectually know you into a prison; instead it liberates you about karma but don’t practice from the prison of samsara, the prison of of it. Many people don’t know about karma, suffering, the prison of delusions. Rather about how our whole life comes from our than being caught in the prison of negative mind, about how all our happiness and emotions, understanding karma enables you suffering are constantly coming from our to know how to get out of that. mind; others know about karma, but aren’t Since I have brought up this subject, I mindful of it. would also like to mention one other point. Buddha taught that you are your own The Buddha’s fundamental philosophy is guide and your own enemy. When you create that we are the creator of our own happiness, good karma, the cause of happiness, you are our own liberation, and the creator of our your own guide; when you create the cause own suffering, our own problems. So, when of the problems for yourself through we use this , we accept generating non-virtuous thoughts, you are that there is no external creator whose mind your own enemy. You are the creator of all is separate from our mental continuum. your own happiness and suffering. You are Everything we do, including coming here to the creator of your own life. It is not that this teaching, is our own decision, our own somebody external with a mental continuum wish; it is not decided by somebody else. separate from yours creates your life, creates Everything we experience in every moment your happiness or suffering. That isn’t of every day is the creation of our own mind. logical and that isn’t the actual experience in Everything comes from our own mind. life. YOUR ANGER CAUSES THE BECAUSE WE CREATE OURSELVES SUFFERING, NOT THE PERSON WE HAVE SO MUCH FREEDOM We should remember this basic philosophy The reason that we have so much freedom in in our daily life, especially in circumstances our life is because we are the creator of both when there is the danger of generating heavy our own suffering and happiness. We have negative emotions, such as anger. Anger incredible freedom. Our life is full of destroys your life; it destroys your own peace freedom, full of hope, because it is not that of mind, health, and well-being and harms some other being is creating our life. others. Anger even makes the environment Therefore, we have so much freedom to around you negative and terrifying, causing make our life better. We can create the cause others to become unhappy and fearful. Your to achieve whatever happiness we wish and anger also causes others to get angry and to

57 engage in negative karma. Besides your person is causing harm to you at this time. engaging in negative karma, your anger also This person is now in the human realm, and causes others to engage in negative karma. who obliged them to harm you? It was your Not only does your mind engage in negative past action, your past negative karma karma through generating anger and so created in that way with that person. At this forth, but also your speech and body engage time the person has created negative karma in negative karma. In this way, others through harming you. This will cause the receive so much harm from your anger. This person not to be in the human realm, in the is just one example. Your anger makes the realm of the happy transmigrators; it will world negative, your own world and the cause their consciousness to be transferred world of others. from the human realm to reincarnate in the In such cases, immediately remember the hell realm. So, didn’t you make the person to basic Buddhist philosophy that you are the be lost in the hole of the hell realm? creator, that this problem came from you; it Now here, by remembering the basic came from your negative karma, created philosophy of Buddhism, you have no reason with your negative attitudes, so it came from to blame that other person. We should you. So, you are the creator. By remember this in our daily life, especially in remembering this, your mind will then the circumstances where there is a danger suddenly cool down, like pouring cold water that we will engage in some heavy negative into boiling hot water. Boiling water makes a karma. Remembering this stops our anger lot of noise, blub, blub, blub, blub, but and our other negative disturbing, obscuring suddenly becomes very peaceful when you thoughts. (“Disturbing, obscuring thoughts” add cold water to it. Like this, your mind is a translation of “delusions”. I have added suddenly cools down, becoming calm and the word “obscuring” because these peaceful. You have nothing to blame on that emotional thoughts not only disturb but also other person, that other sentient being, who obscure your mind, your mental continuum.) is the source of all your past, present, and Remembering this basic Buddhist future happiness, all the good things. philosophy that there is no one to blame not Suddenly there’s nothing to blame. The only only stops anger and the other disturbing, thing to do is to change yourself, to make obscuring emotional thoughts, but becomes your mind and your life better, by thinking the practice of patience, because you don’t of the basic philosophy of Buddhism. It only see any purpose in generating anger and persuades you to do that. harming the other person. Also, applying this basic philosophy in On top of this, it gives you space in your your daily life, especially in such situations, mind to generate compassion for that person only makes compassion arise for that other as explained. For example, if person. As the great bodhisattva, the great someone is sexually abusing you, you can saint, Shantideva mentions in A Guide to the think, “This person is doing this to me Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, Because my because I treated them in this way in past karma persuaded this person, I receive this lives, because in the past I committed sexual harm. By this, I make this person to be lost misconduct and abused others”. This person in the hole of the hell realms. then becomes only an object of compassion. You only want the help the person, to protect THE PERSON IS HARMING YOU them from creating negative karma and from BECAUSE YOU HARMED THEM IN their delusions. You feel unbearable THE PAST compassion for that person and only want to This means that in the first place you help them. You do whatever you can to help harmed this person, and because of this the them, to guide them.

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As I was saying, bodhichitta, the main reason. compassionate, loving thought to benefit He would then come back to the centre others, is the best Dharma practice, is the and again do the practices. His health would best medicine for the mind and the body. again improve. Because he go better, he These days in the West, through research would then again go back to the city. He many highly intelligent doctors and went through this cycle a few times. psychologists have discovered that health When his condition was very bad, he has very much to do with a person’s attitude came to see me when I was in Brisbane. He in their daily life, with how much they are was so weak that he had to be supported by able to keep their mind healthy, positive. In two friends. He sat in a chair and listened as one book—I don’t remember its name—a I talked to him about how it is good to have person interviewed many educated people AIDS, how it is positive to have AIDS. I’m on this subject. One doctor and psychologist was not talking about positive-negative in explained how cancer came from the impure relation to AIDS, but about how positive it mind, from negative thoughts, and then also can be to have a sickness. I talked to him emphasized that the way to heal cancer is about all the benefits of having AIDS. I told through having pure attitudes. him that he was very lucky, very fortunate, because he could use the AIDS to develop SEEING SUFFERING AS GOOD bodhichitta, to develop compassion for all There was one student in Australia who had sentient beings. Having AIDS can be a quick AIDS. Every time he came to Chenrezig and powerful way to develop compassion, Institute, a meditation centre in Queensland, because having the problem yourself makes Australia, he did a lot of retreat and practice, it easy for you to feel compassion for others, with Medicine Buddha as the main one and for those with similar problems, as well as others. Doing all this practice and for those with other general sufferings. meditation would give him a lot of strength. It is much easier for human beings living These deities are very powerful. The purpose in this particular human world, the southern of their manifestation is only out of continent, to develop compassion than compassion embracing all sentient beings; human beings living in the other continents: no matter how much negative karma the eastern, western, and northern sentient beings create, a Buddha’s continents. Of course, there is no question compassion never gives up sentient beings that it is much easier for us to develop for even one second. Of course, their compassion than the worldly gods, but it is mantras are also very powerful and very easier for us than even human beings living blessed, so they have a lot of effect. Anyway, in those other worlds. It is easier for human after all this practice, he would get better; he beings living in this southern continent to would become so radiant that he looked as if develop compassion because we can see he had no sickness at all. He could then help many sufferings in our own lives and in the in various activities around the centre. lives of other human beings in this world. When he got better, the thought would Because we can see and experience these always come to go back to the city to help sufferings, it is easy to understand others’ other people with AIDS. However, whenever suffering and develop compassion. This he went to the city, he was unable to means that we can develop bodhichitta more continue his practice and his health would easily and more quickly, and thus can then deteriorate. He was busy, but I think achieve enlightenment. Human beings in that his health suffered not so much because this world can more quickly achieve the he was busy, but because he was unable to great liberation, non-abiding in the continue his practice. I think that was the sorrowless state, or full enlightenment,

59 which is the cessation of all the faults of the all sentient beings. Then, by giving all his mind and completion of all the realizations. merit, the cause of his happiness, to all But that is still not the final goal. Achieving sentient beings, he again collects skies of enlightenment means that we can liberate merit. And by giving all his happiness, the other sentient beings from all their result of his merit, to others, he again sufferings and the cause of their sufferings collects merit like the sky. So, it is just and bring them more quickly to full unbelievable! enlightenment. This is the main goal of life, When you want to do this meditation of the main objective, and we can accomplish taking others’ suffering and giving others this more quickly. your own merit, happiness, and so forth, I I told this student that having his sickness normally advise that in the times between gave him an incredible opportunity to your meditation sessions, while you are develop his mind in the spiritual path, in the working or busy doing something else, path to enlightenment. His sickness opened whenever the thought arises, “Oh, I have this the door to enlightenment and all other problem”, immediately think, “I’m happiness. Using it to generate loving experiencing this problem on behalf of the kindness, compassion, and bodhichitta for numberless other living beings”. Whether other sentient beings brings very powerful you have AIDS, cancer, a relationship purification. As I mentioned before, many problem, or a job problem, think that you hundreds of thousands of eons of negative are experiencing the problem on behalf of karma get purified. I don’t remember every the numberless other beings who have that single word that I said to him, but the problem and who have the karma to conclusion was that his illness could bring experience that problem in the future, and him to enlightenment more quickly. then on behalf of the rest of the sentient beings. Either one thinks, I’m experiencing NOT ONLY TAKING UPON this for all sentient beings. When the OURSELVES OTHERS’ SUFFERING thought comes, “Oh, I have this problem”, BUT ALSO GIVING THEM ALL OUR before fear, worry, and other negative HAPPINESS emotional thoughts arise, immediately think, We should use our life problems—whether “I’m experiencing this problem on behalf of AIDS or another problem—to develop the all sentient beings”. Think this, then try to realization of bodhichitta by doing tong-len keep your mind in that state. Each time you practice, taking other sentient beings’ think this you collect merit as limitless as the suffering and its cause within ourselves to sky; you collect skies of merit, of good destroy the ego, the source of all our karma, because those for whom you are problems, and then, with loving kindness, experiencing the problem are numberless. giving everything to other sentient beings. I told him that each time he did the PRACTICING “GIVNG AND TAKING” meditation of taking upon himself the – – KEEPS YOUR MIND IN suffering of numberless other beings he PEACE collected skies of merit, skies of good karma, Keeping your mind continuously in this state or good luck. And each time he gives his is keeping your mind continuously in the body to all sentient beings, he collects good state of happiness. While the problem is karma, the cause of all happiness, including there, you will be able to keep your mind enlightenment; he collects the cause of all continuously in a state of peace and the temporary happiness of this life and of happiness, and because of that, no other all future lives, up to enlightenment. He negative thoughts will arise. With this creates skies of merit by giving his body to thought, you won’t create negative karma.

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This thought is an incredible protection. mind in that state at that time; he had to Those other disturbing, obscuring thoughts continue to keep his mind in that state. This will not arise, so you won’t engage in would help him to stay healthy longer. negative karma, which not only harms you but also harms others. Keeping your mind in THE GOOD HEART IS THE BEST a state of happiness helps so much. Also, PROTECTION, AND IT BRINGS when you are able to keep your mind SUCCESS continuously in a state of happiness in this As I was saying before, loving kindness, way, you feel very free and joyful, and you compassion, and bodhichitta, the good then have so much space to communicate heart, provide the best protection, even with and to help others. There are no concerning protection of the life. Bodhichitta personality clashes because your mind is in is also the best friend. External friends can this very open, very joyful, state. You can change, but your bodhichitta is always the then communicate better with others and same. It doesn’t change; it doesn’t cheat you. can better help them. It doesn’t harm you, but always benefits you There is also continual inspiration to and other sentient beings. It’s the best, most practice; it gives you the energy to do various reliable friend. practices in your daily life. When your mind Your good heart, your bodhichitta, is also is too upset or too depressed, you can’t even the best means to gain success. Bodhichitta do your daily practices. Also, when your is the best method to have success in any of mind is so depressed, so discouraged, you the works of this life, success in the don’t want to communicate with or to help happiness of future lives, success in the others. There is no space to help others. everlasting happiness of liberation from the So, to get back to the point I am trying to entire suffering and its causes, and the make. I don’t remember what I told him greatest success of achieving full word for word, but the essence of the whole enlightenment. Even for success, bodhichitta talk was to get him to look at his having is the best. Again, the logic is the same. AIDS as positive, as beneficial. I wanted him Success is a causative phenomenon. Success to see the incredible benefit he could get is a dependent arising; it depends on cause from having his sickness by using it to and conditions. Therefore, success in finding develop bodhichitta. At the beginning, he happiness—I don’t know about success in was slumped back in the chair, but after I finding problems!—has to come from a had talked to him in this way, he was able to particular cause, virtue, good karma, or lift his body and get up. He waved his arms positive action; positive action, or karma, in the air, saying: “Oh, look! Look, now I can has to come from positive intention, or stand by myself”. You can see now how it has sempa in Tibetan, which is a mental factor. very much to do with the attitude, with the It has to come from positive intention. With mind. This applies generally to everything, bodhichitta, this thought of benefiting but I think that particularly in the case of sentient beings, one collects the most AIDS, if you are able to make your mind extensive merit, or good karma. This is the strong and healthy, you can live longer. Even logical reasoning. though the AIDS doesn’t go away, the person can live longer and also have a stronger, BY MERELY THINKING ABOUT healthier body by making their mind BODHICHITTA YOU COLLECT MERIT healthy. The immediate change was an As you will remember, it is said in the improvement in his health, but of course he teachings and in Bodhicaryavatara, even had to keep his mind continuously in that without engaging in an actual action to state. It was not enough just to have his benefit others, just by thinking to benefit

61 others, you collect merit like the sky. Since happiness to others. In this way, all those merely thinking to benefit others collects actions will become virtue and the best skies of merit, bodhichitta is the best means Dharma because they are unstained by self- to have success in finding happiness. The cherishing thought. They will become the same applies to finding wealth. best cause of happiness for you and for all By having bodhichitta, you become a sentient beings. In this way the twenty-four friend to all sentient beings. Having this hours of each day will become beneficial, good heart, this thought to benefit other useful. No matter what lifestyle you have— sentient beings, breaks down the wall whether you are healthy, with no cancer or between you and others. If you feel distant AIDS, or whether you have one of those from other sentient beings, as if there is a sicknesses, whether you are at home, in an wall between you and others, bodhichitta office, or even in prison—with this thought will break it down, so that you feel close to your life will always be beneficial for sentient all sentient beings. There is no distance beings. Whatever you do, it will always be between you and others. By having this beneficial for sentient beings. Your life realization, you hold all sentient beings in becomes useful all the time, because it is your heart. Bodhichitta is the source of all always for sentient beings. In this way the your happiness and success and of all the purpose of your living is achieved. happiness and success of all other sentient So, I think I will stop here. I thought beings. Your loving kindness, compassion, today to read you Pabongka Dechen and bodhichitta are also the source of Nyingpo’s very powerful instruction on happiness and success for all the numberless impermanence, but anyway whatever other living beings. happens, happens.... Due to all the past, present, and future UNIVERSAL RESPONSIBILITY merits collected by me, the merits of the The last point I want to mention is universal three times collected by the buddhas, responsibility. If you have the good heart, bodhisattvas, and all the rest of the sentient the thought to benefit others, numberless beings, which are totally non-existent from other sentient beings do not receive harm their own side, may the I, who is totally non- from you, which means they receive peace existent from its own side, achieve Guru and happiness from you. On top of that, they Shakyamuni Buddha’s enlightenment, which receive help, benefit, from you. Besides the is also totally non-existent from its own side, peace and happiness that is the absence of and lead all sentient beings, who are also harm, they receive so much peace and totally non-existent from their own side, to happiness from you. Therefore, all this peace that enlightenment, which is also totally and happiness they receive from you is in non-existent from its own side, by myself your hands. Whether or not you want cause alone, who is also totally non-existent from others this peace and happiness is up to you; its own side. it depends on what you do with your mind, Thank you. Thank you so much. on whether or not you generate this good heart, this bodhichitta, the thought to A teaching given at Madison, WI, USA benefit. Therefore, every one of us here holds on July 4, 1999. the responsibility for the happiness of numberless other sentient beings. If we live our daily life with this attitude, everything— all those many hours of working, studying, eating, sleeping, walking—will naturally become work for others, work to cause

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13. YOU CANNOT FIND but where is that I on the table? THE I ANYWHERE You cannot find I on the table. Even though you label I on the table, you cannot LAMA ZOPA RINPOCHE find it anywhere, on any corner of the table, inside the table, above the table – you cannot find I anywhere. Not only that, but this corner of the table is not I, this other corner is not I – no part of the table is I. Let’s concentrate for a few moments on what Even all the parts of the table together are I’m saying. [Silence.] We believe, “I am here, not I. in this building”. We believe, “I am in So now, like this, it’s exactly the same, America, Soquel, Land of Medicine Buddha, exactly the same, even though our mind Land of Medicine Buddha, Land of Medicine constantly labels I on this association of Buddha! I’m in this , I’m in body and mind [Rinpoche pointing to his Vajrasattva retreat, I’m on this cushion, I’m chest], constantly, twenty-four hours a day, in pain! I’m tired! I’m sleepy! I’m exhausted labels I on this association of body and from a long day! What is he talking about? mind, exactly as in the example where your What is he mumbling about?” Anyway, mind labels I on the table – even if you label thinking like that. I on the table, you cannot find I on the table We think there’s a real one, a real I, a real – the table is not I, nor is I on the table, me, here doing Vajrasattva retreat, or inside the table, or anywhere else; you listening to teachings. Here, sitting on this cannot find I on any part of the table, and chair, or on this cushion – a real me even the whole thing is not I – in the same listening to teachings. Now, I is your label; way, I cannot be found anywhere on the me, I. association of body and mind. If you look for You point to your body and label it I: “I your I, you cannot find it, from the ends of am going out”. You don’t pick up a book and your hair to the tip your toes – your little point to it and say, “I am going out!” No. You toes, your big toes – nowhere can it be point to your body and apply the label, “I am found. You cannot find your I anywhere. It is going out”. neither inside your nose nor on the tip of And as your mind does the activity of your nose! I’m joking! thinking, you label, “I am thinking”. Anyway, I is nowhere to be found, not As your mind meditates, “I am even inside your body. meditating”. By first thinking what kind of Normally you believe I to be inside, but activity your mind is doing – for example, even if that’s what you normally believe, it’s wandering – you say, “I am wandering. I apprehend – that there’s a real I inside the am not meditating”. “Are you meditating body, there’s a real me inside the body – if now?” you look for it, you cannot find it. When you “No”. You check the mind, then you say, start to analyze, it cannot be found. Where is “I am wandering”, or, if it is meditating, it exactly? Look for it. Where is it exactly, being transformed into virtue by analytical inside the body? Where is it exactly, inside or fixed meditation, you say, “I am the chest – the part of the body where we meditating”; you call, or label, it, “I am normally believe the I to reside? It’s meditating”. somewhere there, within the body. We don’t In exactly the same way as in this think that the I is outside – we think that it’s example, when you say “I”, instead of inside, inside the chest. But if you try to pointing here [at your chest], point at this identify exactly where the I is located, it table; label I on this table. cannot be found. There is no particular So now, you have labelled I on the table,

63 location. You can’t find it. If you look for the received. I, you cannot find it or its particular location. They are what is received, and I is the Even though you normally believe that receiver. I received these aggregates this the I is there, somewhere inside your body, time; I is the receiver. I is the subject who inside your chest, if you really check inside receives these aggregates, who has received, where it is, its exact location, you cannot find or taken, them. The I is the receiver. Can you it. say “taker”, that I is the taker? Like take- away food! I is to be taken away, like take- SUBTLE DEPENDENT ARISING away food! I is to be taken away. Anyway, When you think that the nature of the I is I’m joking...well, there is a way in which this dependent arising, subtle dependent arising, can be true. the real I that appeared to you at the In Tibetan, we say nye-wa lang-cha lem- beginning and that you apprehend, pa-ko. Nye-wa lang-cha: what is to be disappears. It immediately becomes empty. taken, the aggregates. The aggregates are It becomes empty, as it is empty in reality. If what is to be taken, and I is the taker, who that real I that appeared to you were true – takes them. I is the subject and the that you believed at the beginning to really aggregates are the object, what is to be be there – if that were true – according to taken. I is the taker of the aggregates. Nye- the way in which it appears, the way in wa langcha, and lem-pa-ko; lang-cha is which you believe – if that were true, then what is taken and lem-pa-ko is the taker. even after analysis it should still be there. So, there are two. The I created the cause Even after your analysis of its dependent of these aggregates; the continuity of this I arising, it should remain. You should be able created the cause of these aggregates, this to find it. But it is not there. samsara. Then this I has received, or taken, Even when you meditate on the chakras, a these aggregates. So the aggregates are what real I seems to exist, but there is no real I is to be taken and I is the taker. Subject and existing in this body the way it appears to object. Therefore, they are not one. exist, the way you apprehend, or believe, it to Therefore, the aggregates are not I, cannot exist. That I is not there, neither on the body be I, the subject. nor inside the body. The body is not I; nor is Because aggregates are what is to be the mind. Even the association of body and taken – the object. I is the taker of that mind is not I; these aggregates are not I. object. So they cannot be one. Without going through the Similarly, an ax and the tree it cuts cannot or lam-rim analyses of emptiness – for be one. One is the object, the other is the example, if the aggregates are I, then what subject, so they cannot be one. The cutter – happens, what illogical consequences arise? the ax – and what is to be cut – the wood – If the body is I, what illogical consequences cannot be one. The wood that is to be cut is arise? If the mind is I, what illogical not the cutter, the ax. consequences rise? – without going through all those detailed analyses, what I have just POSSESSOR & POSSESSION CANNOT mentioned gives you an idea of how the BE ONE aggregates are not I. From that, you can In that way, there’s one reason. The other understand, or get the idea of, the rest. reason is similar. [We say] “My aggregates, my aggregates, my aggregates”. Even from SUBJECT & OBJECT CANNOT BE ONE the common, language point of view, “my Even this association of body and mind is aggregates” shows that the aggregates are not I. As the texts state, the aggregates – this the possession, and my, or I, is the association of body and mind – are what is possessor. “My aggregates, my mind, my

64 body”. Even normal language shows that nobody saw it. If your I had no relation to these two are completely different; two your aggregates, you could say, “I did it”! completely different phenomena. They are Since doing the action that brings millions of not one. They are totally different dollars didn’t depend on the body or the phenomena. “My aggregates, my body, my mind doing it, you could take the credit, “I mind” shows that they are possessions, and did it. I should get the money”! You could from that it follows that my, I, is the argue like that. If there were something good possessor. to gain, something that you like or want to Again, through that reason, you can see acquire, you could say, “I did it”. But if what that there’s no way in which the possession, you’d done were criminal or subject to that which is possessed, can be the punishment, you could say, “It wasn’t me”! possessor, I. Anyway, I’m saying that if the I existed There is no way. The two are totally separately from the aggregates, it could be different phenomena. They don’t exist very helpful. You could do that. Maybe you separately, but they exist differently. could still argue, “I didn’t do it because I cannot find the I anywhere. I cannot see the THE LABEL & THE BASE CANNOT BE I, so how could I have done it?” I’m joking! ONE What I’m trying to say is that since the Perhaps another thing to mention is this. aggregates are the base to be labelled and I is The aggregates, the association of the body what is labelled on them – the aggregates are and mind, is the base to be labelled, and I is the base and I is the label – they are two the label to be applied – what the base is to totally different phenomena. Therefore, they be labelled with. Again in Tibetan, I is dag- are not one; the aggregates are not I. chö, the label to be applied, and the aggregates are dag-shir,what is labelled, the THE MIND IS NOT THE I base to be labelled. The aggregates are the Similarly, the mind is not I. It’s the same – base to be labelled, and I is the label, what is you can use all those reasons that I labelled on the base. Thus again here, one is mentioned regarding the aggregates, with the base, the other is the label. Two totally the mind, to understand that the mind is not different phenomena; two totally different I. Your mind is not you. My mind, your mind phenomena. They don’t exist separately, but – that shows it is not you. Your mind is not they exist differently. you; my mind is not me. If they did exist separately, it would help If something that the I possessed had to a lot if you were a criminal! be I, were the I, then everything you It would help a lot. Because then you possessed would be you. Your car would be could say, “It wasn’t me that did it; it was the you. Your kaka would be you! body. I didn’t do it”! Or you could say, “This It’s exactly the same with the table, as I mind did it, not me”! You could have many mentioned before. You can find the I arguments! In court! You could argue in nowhere on these aggregates. Neither are the court, “I didn’t do it – the body did it; the aggregates the I. mind did it”. If what you did was criminal or Exactly the same. Even though you label I something for which you’d get punished, you on the table, you cannot find I on the table. could say, “The body did it; the mind did it. I The table is not I. Exactly as you cannot find didn’t do it”. But if it was a situation where your I on the table even though your mind you had something to gain, then you could labels the table I, exactly like that, even say, “I did it”! though your mind labels I on the aggregates, Say your body did something that you cannot find I anywhere on the normally brings millions of dollars, but aggregates. Neither that, nor are the

65 aggregates I. either as oneness with the aggregates or as When you get a feeling that the completely separate from them; it has to be aggregates are not I, when you cannot find I pervaded by being either oneness with the on the aggregates, this understanding makes aggregates or existing separately from the very clear what is the base and what is the aggregates. But simply understanding that label; you are able to differentiate. Now you the inherently existent I is neither oneness are able to differentiate between the base with the aggregates nor does it exist and the label. After this analysis, you are separately from them – having a clear idea able to differentiate what is the base and that the aggregates are not one with the I but what is the label I. also don’t exist separately from the I – this Before, it was unclear to your mind; these awareness alone, the ability to distinguish two things were unclear. His Holiness the between label and base, is not the realization Dalai Lama would say those two are mixed of emptiness. Even if you had this awareness up, as if the table were mixed into the base, – the ability to distinguish label from base – as if the table were inside the base. even if the difference between the base and His Holiness used to say the label had become clear for your mind, that the definition of the object to be refuted still I would not say that you had realized is the appearance of the base and the label as emptiness. undifferentiable. When you realize emptiness – not just For your mind, in your view, the base and that there is no I, not just the feeling that the label – for example, the base to be there is no I – you should feel something labelled “table” and the label “table” itself – very intensive. It should be very much more are undifferentiable. His Holiness Ling than that. Your understanding should be Rinpoche explained during a commentary on something very intensive. Not just the the Seven Point Thought Transformation at feeling that there is no I. The feeling should many years ago that this be something very deep; the feeling “there is is the object to be refuted. no I” should be very intensive, very deep. You are unable to differentiate between You should feel as you would if you’d had a the label and the base. Your mind is very vision that you had received a million confused. Your mind is in a state of dollars, that somebody had put a million confusion. What appears to your view is that dollars into your hands, and you had totally, these two – the base, the aggregates, and the one hundred percent believed that you label, I, are undifferentiable. Now, through actually had all that money – and then this analysis, you can see clearly that they – suddenly realized it was just a hallucination! the label, I, and the base, the aggregates – It’s gone! Like that, suddenly you realize that are two totally different phenomena. it’s not there, it has totally gone. What you have believed, were one WHEN THE REALIZATION OF hundred percent convinced of, and so EMPTINESS OF THE I IS REAL, IT IS strongly clung to, grasped at, is suddenly, SO POWERFUL totally non-existent. Now, even if you have one hundred percent There’s nothing to grab onto, nothing to understanding, or recognition, that the base, hold onto. Suddenly, it’s totally non-existent. the aggregates, is not I, that the I exists Nothing of what you have been holding onto, nowhere, I would not call that having cherishing as if it really exists, is truly there. realized emptiness. In other words, you Nothing of what, so far, you have never had understand through the four-point analysis, any doubt about, have been grasping at the analysis of the four vital points, that if continuously, holding onto like a cat the I is inherently existent, it should exist grabbing a mouse – all its claws clutching

66 tightly together – nothing of that I exists. there is no I. It’s not just that. Suddenly, that about which you have never had any doubt since beginningless rebirths – WHEN YOU SEE EMPTINESS, THERE even since this morning or since you were IS EITHER UNBELIEVABLE JOY . . . born into this life – suddenly, it doesn’t go The right way of perceiving that the I is anywhere. Suddenly, there’s nothing there. empty is an extremely deep, intensive Maybe it’s gone to the beach! Or to the experience, but there are basically two kinds mountains! To a retreat centre! Anyway, it of experience you can have. You can feel doesn’t go anywhere. incredible, that you have discovered the Just there! Suddenly! You realize there is most precious thing, such as a wish-granting nothing there. Suddenly, it is not there. You jewel. Or like a person who has been looking realize that it’s totally non-existent. Totally for or waiting to meet a dear friend for non-existent. many, many years – praying, wishing, to There’s nothing to hold onto. It’s lost. meet that person for many years – and then, Totally lost. Just right there – where it was after all these many years, suddenly meeting – totally lost. Not that it’s gone somewhere, that friend. Or like you’ve been waiting to get but right there, it has become totally lost. a billion dollars for a long time and then There’s nothing to hold onto. You feel suddenly you get the money. In other words, something very intensive – not space, but when you see emptiness, you feel empty, like space. During that time, there’s unbelievable joy; incredible joy that makes no dual view, there’s no “this is I and that is you cry. emptiness”; no “here is the subject, perceiver, realizer and there is the object, . . . OR UNBELIEVABLE FEAR emptiness”. It’s not dual; non-dual. At that The second kind of experience is one of time, the view that should appear should be unbelievable fear, incredible fear. Not just non-dual, not “this I is meditating on any kind of fear. Not just the fear of being emptiness, seeing emptiness. Oh, that is attacked by somebody; not that kind of fear. emptiness”. It’s a very deep fear; something deep inside Instead, there should be a very intensive your heart, in the very depths of your heart. understanding, seeing very intensively that . A very deep fear. The other fear is not fear of . .the I is empty. It’s not just thinking that losing the I – something is going to happen there’s no I; it’s not just that. It’s not like, to this I, but it’s not losing the I. The after searching for the table, the labelled ordinary is fear that this real I is going to table, the general table – not the inherently receive some harm, but here, something that existent table but the general table, the you’ve believed in – not only from birth but labelled table – looking to see if any part of from beginningless rebirths up until now – the table is the table – it’s not that – or if something that you’ve believed in one perhaps the whole collection of parts hundred percent, only now, only now you together is the table – it’s not that either – realize that it’s not there. Only now you and only after all that, then thinking that the realize that it’s totally nonexistent. table does not exist. It’s not that kind of This can cause an incredibly deep fear to experience. Nor is it like analyzing the body arise. to find if the I is inside the body or on the As I often say, even when you recite The aggregates, or understanding that the Heart Sutra, when you say the words, “No aggregates together are also not the I, then, ear, no nose, no tongue...no ice cream! No after all that analysis, at the end, coming to coffee, no chocolate, no cigarettes, no the conclusion that there’s no I. drinks...!” – if fear comes into your heart Because you cannot find it, thinking that when you say “no this, no that”, if fear arises,

67 that’s a good sign. Fear arising means your meditation courses, especially my recitation of The Heart Sutra, The Essence meditation courses – of course, those are of Wisdom, is hitting, or touching, the root good to run away from! – if you run from the of samsara, hurting it. Your recitation of The fear that arises when you realize emptiness, Heart Sutra has touched the root of that is no good at all. samsara, ignorance; has hit it. Your recitation of The Heart Sutra, your BUT DON’T BE AFRAID THE I WILL way of thinking when you recite The Essence DISAPPEAR; THERE IS ALWAYS of Wisdom, is fitting – like an arrow or a CONTINUITY OF THE LABEL I bomb. As an arrow hits its target, as a bomb However, you never have to worry about the or a torpedo hits its target, the enemy at I ceasing, because the I never ceases. The I which you aimed, like that, your recitation of that is the label never ceases. The I never The Heart Sutra, those teachings on stops, never ceases. Why is there always emptiness, your way of thinking, your continuity of the I, the label? Why is there meditation, has hit its target, the object of always continuity of the self? Because there ignorance, the inherently existent I – the I is always continuity of consciousness. Even that is apprehended by simultaneously-born after enlightenment, the consciousness ignorance. You have hit the target you’re continues forever. supposed to hit. The target that you are Even though the body might change – supposed to hit with the arrow or bomb of one body stops, another body is taken – the your recitation of the words of The Heart continuity of consciousness is always there, Sutra and thinking on their meaning is the even after enlightenment. Therefore, the object to be refuted, the inherently existent I. continuity of the I never ceases. It always Fear in your heart means that you have exists because the base, the continuity of hit the target. consciousness, always exists. The texts explain that it is highly Therefore, thinking, “I’m going to cease, intelligent practitioners who have the I’m going to become non-existent” is totally experience of incredible, blissful joy, tears wrong. running down their cheeks, and feel as if When that feeling arises, the appearance they’d found an unbelievably precious jewel, of losing or having totally lost your I, you and less intelligent practitioners who feel shouldn’t be worried that that appearance fear when they realize emptiness. At that means you’re falling into nihilism. Because time, you should not try to escape from this of that appearance, you should not be fear – trying to do so is your greatest worried that you are falling into nihilism – obstacle to realizing emptiness. Instead, you just as you should not be worried that the I is must realize that this is the one time, the one becoming non-existent. There are two things opportunity, to realize emptiness – the only – one is the fear of falling into nihilism; the wisdom that can directly cut the delusions, other is the worry, “I am becoming the root of samsara, the gross and subtle nonexistent”. defilements, bringing liberation from You should not be scared of those things. samsara and full enlightenment. Knowing If you do get scared, you’ll block yourself this, you must go through the fear; you must from realizing emptiness; this one complete your experience. Go through the opportunity to realize emptiness will have fear like crossing a river. arisen and you’ll have blocked it yourself. Otherwise, if you block your own progress A very clear commentary on the the one time that you have the opportunity Mahamudra by Ketsang Jamyang (I’m not of realizing emptiness, if you run away from hundred percent sure that’s his name), that, like running away from teachings, from which is regarded as a very effective

68 teaching, explains why this appearance of doesn’t exist on these aggregates. The merely the self becoming non-existent happens. It labelled I exists because the base, the happens because it has to happen. aggregates, exists. In the same way, the base, Furthermore, it is a sign that there is no the aggregates, which are merely imputed, inherent existence on the I, the merely exists, but it doesn’t exist on the gathering of labelled I. There is no inherent existence on the five aggregates; it doesn’t exist there. The that I, and the experience of its becoming merely labelled aggregates exist, but they non-existent shows, proves, that. When you don’t exist on the collection of the five have this experience, you see the Middle aggregates. They don’t exist there; they Way, the Madhyamika, view. You see the cannot be found there. So that’s clear. The , devoid of the two extremes of merely labelled aggregates cannot be found nihilism and eternalism. on the collection of the five. They don’t exist there. REALIZING EMPTINESS IS THE In exactly the same way, for each FIRST STEP TOWARDS LIBERATION aggregate – for example, the aggregate of I would say that realizing that the object of form, the general aggregate of form – it’s ignorance – the concept of the inherently exactly same. The same logic applies. The existent I – is empty, realizing the emptiness merely labelled aggregate exists but it that is the negation of the object to be doesn’t exist on that base. Empty. It doesn’t refuted, is the first step towards liberation. exist there; it’s not there, not existent on this I’m not saying that by that alone you have base. The aggregate of form does not exist on entered – of the five paths to liberation – the the collection of the limbs, either in all their path of merit. I’m not saying that. But it’s parts or on the whole collection together. So like you’ve taken a step towards liberation, there’s no question about the inherently because that wisdom is the main thing that existent, real aggregate: it doesn’t exist directly ceases the defilements. anywhere. The real one appearing from there – the CONCLUSION: THE I EXISTS BUT aggregate, the general aggregate of form – NOT HOW WE THINK IT DOES exists nowhere. Similarly, if you go to the Just to conclude now – before we all go to parts of the limbs, to the arms, head, legs, sleep! – as I mentioned before, how when stomach, and so forth, all those merely you label I on the table, it’s not there – in labelled ones exist, but they don’t exist on exactly the same way, when the mind labels I their own bases. Even the merely labelled on these aggregates, it’s not there either. The head cannot be found on the collection of its aggregates are not the I; the I is not there. I parts, the brain and everything else. If you exists, but it’s not there. The I that is labelled look for head, it cannot be found there. by your mind exists, but it’s not there. Even Like that, it’s the same for the arms, the that is not there. Even that. Besides the real I legs, the main body – everything down to the that you believe to reside in the heart, inside atoms – that which is merely labelled exists, your body, not being there, even the I merely but it doesn’t exist on its own base. Even the labelled by your mind, which does exist, is merely labelled atom exists, but it doesn’t not there either. I’m not saying it’s not here exist, cannot be found, on the collection of [in this room], I’m saying it’s not there [on the particles of the atom. And it’s the same your aggregates]. for even the particles of the atom – they So now, the I that is merely labelled by can’t be found on their own base either. the mind exists. That is here, that exists, but Thus, everything from the I down to the even that cannot be found on these particles of the atoms, or, from the general aggregates, on the base of the aggregates. It aggregate of form down to the particles of

69 atoms, which appears as something real, is that knowing phenomenon, she-pa, because not there. It’s totally empty; every single that mind exists, your mind labels it nam- thing is totally empty. What appears to your she, consciousness. But using the same view, your hallucinating mind, seems to be analysis I mentioned before, neither that something real, from there – but it’s not consciousness nor the split seconds of there. consciousness can be found on their Starting from the real I down to the real respective bases. particles of the atoms, what appears is not Therefore, starting from the I down to the there; it’s totally empty – not space, but like split seconds of consciousness, each space; totally empty, non-existent. aggregate – form, feeling, cognition, That was form. How about the aggregate compounded phenomena and of feeling, that which is labelled on the consciousness, down to the split seconds of thought, the mental factor that experiences consciousness – everything that appears to pleasure, indifference and suffering? It’s the our mind, to our view, as real, as something same with the aggregate of feeling – the real existing from there, is totally non- merely labelled aggregate of feeling exists, existent. Normally, after making all this but cannot be found on its base. It’s also the analysis, you should meditate on this same with the aggregate of cognition, which emptiness; let your mind dwell in it for a discriminates phenomena as bad or good, as while. Looking at everything as empty, let this and that, as friend and enemy, fat and your mind stay in that state of emptiness for skinny, long and short, and so forth. The as long as possible. That’s extremely good, merely labelled aggregate of cognition exists very effective. – because its base exists – but it doesn’t exist on that base. So that’s the same. Then, if you DWELL IN THIS EMPTINESS OF analyze the pleasant feeling, the suffering NON-EXISTENCE FROM ITS OWN feeling, the indifference, you cannot find SIDE those feelings on their base. Similarly with So that’s reality; that’s how things are. This the aggregate of cognition – you can do the is reality, so let’s place our minds in this same analysis, but neither can cognition be state for a while. Concentrate for a little bit found on its base, even though merely on this conclusion that the whole thing is labelled cognition exists. totally empty. Everything – from the I down It’s also the same thing with the aggregate to, and including, the particles of the atoms of compounded phenomena. and the split seconds of consciousness – is It’s also labelled, merely imputed, totally empty from its own side. because its base exists. Subtracting feeling [Long meditation.] and cognition from the fifty-one mental The final thing is that it’s totally non- factors, the rest are called the aggregate of existent – from its own side. It’s totally non- compounded phenomena, labelled that, but existent, but non-existent from its own side. that aggregate cannot be found on that base. So the second part of that expression makes Finally, it’s the same with the aggregate of the way of thinking or the experience correct consciousness. Merely labelled – seeing it as not just empty, non-existent, consciousness exists, but it cannot be found but empty, non-existent, from its own side. on its base, like a carpet on the floor. The Like this, the nature of everything else in merely labelled consciousness doesn’t exist existence – forms, sounds, smells, tastes, like that. The mind, which knows tangible objects, hell, enlightenment, phenomena, which does the function of samsara, nirvana, happiness, suffering, life’s continuing from one life to the next, gains and losses, virtue, non-virtue, perceiving merely the essence of the object, everything – is totally empty, non-existent.

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But, non-existent from its own side. sufferings of each samsaric realm, and the three, four and six general sufferings of WHILE EVERYTHING IS EMPTY, samsara. By ceasing the cause – delusion THEY DO EXIST – MERELY and karma – you can achieve the sorrowless LABELLED BY MIND state of total liberation from samsara, and So, while things are empty – everything is only with this wisdom, the Prasangika view, totally empty from its own side – they exist. can you also eradicate the subtle They exist in mere name, by being merely defilements, achieve full enlightenment and labelled by the mind – which also exists in be able to do perfect work for all sentient mere name. Things exist as merely labelled beings, leading them to enlightenment as by the mind, which itself also exists in mere well. name. Everything is unified with emptiness and dependent arising, as Guru Shakyamuni Teachings of Lama Zopa Rinpoche given Buddha realized and Lama Tsong Khapa during a Vajrasattva retreat at Land of praised highly. Lama Tsong Khapa himself Medicine Buddha, California, in 1999. also actualized this emptiness – which is unified with dependent arising, subtle dependent arising – this right view, this wisdom, which is the only one that can cut the one particular root of samsara: the ignorance, the hallucinating mind that – while there’s no I on these aggregates, including the inherently existent I – through negative imprints left on the mental continuum, projects on to these aggregates the appearance of an inherently existent I and then believes it to be true; the ignorance that believes this inherently existent I is true, that it really exists. This particular root of samsara – the ignorance that apprehends the I, which is merely labelled by the mind, as existing from its own side, as not merely labelled by the mind – can be cut only by this specific wisdom, only by this right view, this wisdom, this right view. Only by generating that can you be totally liberated from samsara, from the entire ocean of sufferings of samsara, which are divided into three – suffering of pain, suffering of change and pervasive, compounded suffering. Within samsara, there are the specific sufferings of each realm and the general sufferings of samsara, such as the six, the four and the three. It is only with this wisdom, this particular right view, the Prasangika view, that you can be totally liberated from the oceans of samsaric suffering – all the specific

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14. DEPENDENT Things exist, and we can even agree on ARISING: THE “KING OF their bare existence – cups, toilets, love, omniscient mind – but it’s how we interpret LOGICS” TO PROVE them, understand them, their causes, etc., EMPTINESS etc., that distinguishes the different views. VEN ROBINA COURTIN There are the samsaric views, the Christian views, the scientific views – they’re all viewpoint. And, of course, Buddha has his own very specific views about how things exist. Paraphrasing Lama Tsong Khapa, Lama For example, Buddha uses the term Yeshe says that dependent arising is the “superior being”. Well, we all know from “king of logics” to prove emptiness. being Christians that’s exactly how they talk All of Buddha’s teachings, from grade one about God. The same term, superior being. to graduation, are based upon the You hear the characteristics of God: assumption of emptiness, and are leading us omniscient, all-knowing, all-powerful, to emptiness. Emptiness is implicit in all the pervading the universe, seeing everything. teachings. This is the unique characteristic of Well, Buddha agrees with this: there is Lord Buddha’s view. omniscient mind, it pervades the universe, it You could say that the view of self- knows everything, it is infinite compassion. existence – which is what Buddha argues You could say they agree on this. But the with, which is exactly the opposite view of difference is in the view, the interpretation emptiness – is the assumption of the views of how that omniscience exists, its causes, of samsara. All the views – my mother and etc. The Christian teaching, the Muslim father made me, or a creator made me, I teaching, etc., is that it’s self-existent, it didn’t ask to get born, it’s not my fault, I’m exists from its own side, it’s intrinsic, just the body – are all based upon the inherent, it doesn’t have causes. The assumption of self-existence, and this is the Buddha, however, says that, just like exact opposite of the Buddha’s view. The everything that exists, it’s a dependent exact opposite. arising, and he also says that every being And so, the point of it all is, as always possesses the potential to become a Buddha. with Buddha, we need to make it And, of course, the creator religions say that experiential. I mean, we can read all about this superior being is the creator of emptiness, we can squeeze our brains, as everything. Buddha disagrees utterly. We Lama puts it, we can get all very excited don’t need creating, he says; we already when we hear about emptiness, but unless exist. we understand how to internalize it, it’s just filling your head with words. WE’VE GOT IT WRONG So let’s try to unpack it, demystify it, and Christianity would interpret the world one see how it applies to our daily life. Because if way, materialism interprets it another way, it doesn’t, it’s completely useless. Buddha interprets it in yet another way. So, it has to do with interpretation, it has to do EVERYTHING IS A VIEWPOINT with view. One way of describing what Buddha’s saying What Buddha is saying is that we do not is that everything in our mind is a viewpoint, see correctly how things exist. We get things an opinion, an attitude, an interpretation of right to the extent that we can say, “I’m the people and things and events that fill our Robina and you’re Fred”, “That’s a cup and lives. not a knife”. That’s cool. Correct. But we

72 don’t get much right other than that. We get Working with Buddhist ideas has nothing to it wrong, he says. do with believing it, squeezing it inside So, things do exist in the world. Things yourself, not like that at all. And it’s got exist. But as Lama Zopa Rinpoche puts it, nothing to do with liking it or not liking it. the delusions in our mind, the neuroses, the It’s either true or it’s not. And we have to misconceptions, the wrong views, the find out. That’s the Buddhist approach. negative states of mind, what they do is Also, like Einstein, every word that decorate on top of what does exist layers Buddha says is from his own direct upon layers upon layers of characteristics experience, his own findings. He didn’t make that simply don’t exist there. it up; he’s not speculating; he didn’t have a And the point of all this? Buddha says vision or a dream about it; it wasn’t revealed that all these wrong views in our head are to him. why we suffer. And correcting these views, That’s why you need to check the cultivating the correct views about how Buddhist centres carefully, check the things exist, is the method to stop suffering. Buddha’s teachings carefully, check the people who teach, check the Dalai Lama, DON’T BELIEVE A WORD BUDDHA that he’s a valid person who represents SAYS Buddha’s teachings. If not, be careful! Don’t Buddhism is basically Buddha’s own direct confuse yourself. findings, his own experiences about how things exist and what’s possible. And of WISDOM MEANS SEEING THINGS AS course he would say confidently that his THEY ACTUALLY EXIST views are the correct view. He’s allowed to We hear a lot about “wisdom” in Buddhism, say that; anyone can say that. But you have but it’s not some special holy word, all high to back it up with your findings, your proof, and fancy. “Wisdom” simply means being etc., etc. correct. If you say there are two cups on my Buddha’s like Einstein. If I were Einstein table, that ain’t wisdom, honey, that’s here, and I start telling you about E=MC2 ignorance. There’s one. and I say, “This is the truth!” well, you would Of course, the wisdom Buddha’s saying hope I would be confident that it is true! If we can accomplish is a pretty outrageous I’m sitting here saying, “Well, I’m not sure if level of wisdom: seeing the universe as it it’s true”, you’re laughing and you tell me to exists without mistake. That’s the level of shut my mouth, don’t confuse you. If I’m not wisdom we can accomplish; he calls it confident, keep quiet. omniscience. I mean, my Catholic mother So we want Buddha to be confident that was shocked by that! It’s quite radical. he is right. But he’s not asking us to believe What sees how things exist is the mind, him: this is a crucial point that we’re not and that’s Buddha’s expertise. According to used to hearing when it comes to spiritual the Buddha’s model of the mind in our teachings. He’s asking us to check out his mental consciousness we have positive, findings, to discover the truth of them – or negative and neutral states of mind; there’s not! – for ourselves. It’s up to us; we’re the no fourth category. And these are technical boss, not Buddha. terms, not moralistic. Like with Einstein, we need listen to what Buddha says and then, with confidence, NEGATIVE STATES OF MIND ARE decide to use his views as our working NOT IN SYNC WITH REALITY hypothesis in order to discover the truth of The negative states of mind have two main them for ourselves. How else can you work characteristics: they’re disturbing and with something if you don’t propose it? they’re delusional. They’re liars, they’re not

73 in sync with reality. The virtuous states of there, from its own side, in and of itself, mind have the characteristic of being without depending on anything – let’s just peaceful – just check the last time you were look more broadly at how things do exist loving, kind, generous; you felt peaceful. conventionally, because that leads us to And, there’s a sense of interdependence understand their ultimate reality. there. You’ve got a sense of connectedness with others, which means you’re in sync – to THE TWO TRUTHS some extent – with interdependence, which Buddha talks about how things exist in two is reality. ways – well, many ways, actually. But this When you’re caught up in anger, particular way of presenting it he calls the depression, jealousy, it’s a nightmare, isn’t two truths: conventional truth, the way it? It’s like hell. These states of mind are things exist conventionally; and the way deeply disturbing and they’re delusional. things exist finally, or ultimately. So initially You’ve got this vivid, vivid sense of a when we hear these, they seem totally separate, unhappy self-pity me, as Lama contradictory. But in reality, they are like flip Yeshe calls it – lonely, bereft, not fair, poor sides of the same coin, and our job is to get me, things are done to me me. Hungry, to see that, to understand that, first needy, wanting something more, resentful, intellectually. angry, hurt, low self-esteem – this is The shorthand for how things exist samsara, being caught up in this junk, that’s conventionally is “dependent arising”, or samsara. “dependent origination”. Things exist interdependently. Things exist in UNAWARENESS dependence upon this and that, And the root, the mother, of all these lies in conventionally. And then ultimately, the the mind, these neurotic emotions, these shorthand is “emptiness”: “emptiness” is the wrong views, is simply called “ignorance”. nature of reality ultimately. This is the way Like all these words, it’s got a very specific they talk. definition. “Ma-rig-pa” in Tibetan; So let’s unpack these ideas, let’s look at “unawareness”. the use of these words, because part of our So, unawareness of, finally, how things problem is we don’t even know how these actually exist. Or, as they say in Buddhist words are used. We can’t get our head language, the ultimate way that things exist. around the general concepts. You know, This ignorance causes us to be utterly blind thirty years of hearing Buddhism, we still to this reality. As His Holiness the Dalai said haven’t got a clue what emptiness is because recently, this ignorance has two functions: we haven’t even technically got ourselves the first one is the mere ignorance of how sorted out, how to use this terminology. We things are, just merely not knowing; but mystify it. that’s not the main problem. This ignorance also has an added problem of having made THE WORD “EMPTINESS” up its own fantasy story, and that’s the one So let’s look at the word “emptiness” itself. we’re believing in now, which is the story, In the most simple sense, it means “absent”, the belief, that everything exists in and of doesn’t it? It means “not there”. If I say, my itself, from its own side, intrinsically, which cup has no water in it, we would simply say, is precisely the exact opposite of reality. This “My cup is empty”. What we mean is there is is so abstract for our minds. no water in my cup; it is empty of water; So, before we even go into the meaning of water is absent from my cup. what ignorance is – you know, what ignorance thinks: that everything exists out

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EMPTY OF WHAT? definition of an existent is “that which can be Clearly, Buddha’s not telling us that things cognized by mind”, a valid state of mind, are empty of water. So, what is he saying? obviously – and there are precise ways of What is he saying things are empty of? defining what is valid and what is not. And Okay. So, if you’re not colour-blind, let’s what we’re attempting to do in this pursuit say, you’re going to agree this white cup is of wisdom is to eventually cognize all not red. You agree, don’t you? This cup is not existents precisely as they exist, no more and red. So we would simply say, “You’re right, no less: that’s omniscience. Robina, it’s not red”. The Buddha would say, So, you agree, right, that there is an using this language, “the cup is empty of existent, a thing that can be cognized by the being red”. It’s a fancy way to talk, but we mind, called white? And it exists here on this can hear the meaning very simply, can’t we? cup, yes? Would you agree with that? White It’s just that we don’t speak like this. We does exist here on this cup, doesn’t it? It is don’t say, “The cup is empty of being red”, something that your mind can cognize. but the use of the word there is exactly the Okay, how do we know it exists? Well, we meaning. The cup is not red. have to first establish it conventionally. We And why would he tell us it’s empty of need to label it, define it, then check that it being red – I mean, it’s empty of being lots fulfills the definition and make sure there of things. The point is, he would only tell a are no other valid cognitions of it that person who is colour-blind that it’s empty of contradict this. Then we can all shake on it being red because that person think it’s red, and agree that this object, this phenomenon because their mind is making a mistake, is called white, exists here on this cup. seeing it wrongly. This is crucial to understand. COGNIZING THE ABSENCE OF SOMETHING ESTABLISHING WHAT DOES EXIST As I mentioned, let’s say I am colour-blind Okay. You can see the cup is white, right? and when I look at white I see red. I’m Well, you could say, “White exists on this making a mistake, aren’t I? Remember, cup”. It’s a quaint way to talk, but you we’ve established the existence of this understand the meaning, don’t you? “There conventional phenomenon called white by is white on this cup”. White is a defining, etc., etc., and agreeing upon that – phenomenon that exists on the cup, which is that’s what “conventional” means: by also a phenomenon that exists. convention it’s called white. Now, because of that we can see there’s When I see a red cup when you show me a no red on this cup. So, we can also say, “The white one, I am making a mistake. I am absence of red exists on this cup”. Would you seeing something that doesn’t exist, but agree with that? That on this cup, wouldn’t which I totally believe does exist. So you you agree, there is an absence of red? It’s a can’t just bully me into believing it; you have weird way to talk, so let’s discuss. to help me see the truth. And how do you do There is a good reason for talking this that? You help me correct the mistakes: you way. In Buddhist philosophy there are check my eyes, my glasses, the lighting, the several synonyms for “that which exists” – various dependent arisings. Then I look and Buddha is all about our discovering again at the cup and what will see? “that which exists”. That’s his big thing. Well, interestingly I will not see white, at Because he says we’re in la-la land right now, least not initially. Because I’m so used to believing in things that don’t exist. seeing red, I’ll get a big shock – “Oh my God, So, whatever does exist is necessarily a the cup is not red!” In other words, I will phenomenon, an object, an existent. The cognize the absence of red on that cup. What

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I see is the vivid phenomenon called “the ABSENCE OF THE INHERENT SELF emptiness of red”. Makes sense, doesn’t it. So Buddha is saying, “Robina, you need to When we hear “emptiness”, we tend to cognize the emptiness of the self-existent I”. think of it as meaning “nothing”. But the Why? Because for aeons I have been “emptiness of red” is a very vivid thing that imposing on my self – the conventional self does exist, isn’t it? But for whom? It’s that does exist – a characteristic that doesn’t obvious that this is only relevant to someone exist there. The mistake we make – our who always saw red when white was in front ignorance makes – is seeing an inherently of them. Now, having the fixed the problem, existent self where there isn’t one. And we do that person will see the absence of the thing this with everything. We see an inherently they always thought was there. existent cup where there isn’t one, an inherently existent dog where there isn’t one, ABSENCE OF KEYS an inherently existent everything where Let me give you another example. Let’s say there isn’t one. We’ve been decorating on top you are running late and you rush to the of what does exist – a conventional I, a front door and on the way you open the conventional cup – the characteristic called drawer where you always keep your car keys. inherent existence, which doesn’t exist and You know the keys are there, you totally never has. So Buddha wants us to see that expect the keys in the drawer. But when you absence, that emptiness. open the drawer you get a big shock. “Oh my And where does that absence of an God! No keys!” What did you just see in the inherently existent I exist? On the drawer? The absence of keys, the emptiness conventional I that does exist. Just like the of keys. It’s a very vivid thing, isn’t it? absence of the red cup exists on the white Now, if I look into your drawer and I’m cup that does exist, and the absence of ten not expecting keys, all I will see is a boring thousand dollars exists right there in the drawer with nothing in it. I see nothing. But bank account of zero dollars. you see something very vivid – the absence of a thing that you thought was there. And THE BIG MISTAKE that’s the idea about emptiness. And the only Buddha’s saying that for aeons we have been person who will see that vivid thing called believing in this big mistake. Where did you emptiness of keys is the person who expects learn this? We didn’t. We’ve believed it since keys to be there, who believes keys are there. beginningless time. And all of our suffering, all our attachment, all our anger, all our ABSENCE OF $10,000 pride, all the wars, all the dramas, all the An even more vivid example. Let’s say you rebirths – all are the consequence of this have been saving your dollars: every day misconception. This misconception is the your savings account grows and finally primordial misconception that is the source reaches ten thousand dollars. You know it’s of all suffering. there with such certainty. But we can’t see it, because it’s totally But one day you open up your bank assumed as the truth. It’s the default mode statement online and all there is there is in our minds. We can’t even begin to zero. Believe me, you won’t see zero dollars! comprehend the meaning of “I see myself as You will vividly, shockingly see the absence inherent”. of your precious ten thousand dollars! The So, “seeing emptiness” is a very emptiness of ten thousand dollars is a very meaningful way to say it. It’s the emptiness vivid thing for you! of the fantasy “I” that you thought was there. And, just like with the keys or the dollars, the person who’d see the absence of the

76 inherent I is, of course, the person who And this is Buddha’s fundamental point. If always believed it was there. we think even roughly, we’ll see there is You would see the absence of your nothing that exists that doesn’t depend on inherent I only if you had clung to and something for its existence. believed in an inherent I in the first place. It has nothing to do with vacuous space, vague THE MIDDLE WAY nothingness. It’s a very vivid, vivid thing, In the Buddha’s teachings, there’s different when you can get it. levels of understanding emptiness, and each When you see a zero in your bank of them removes a little bit more of what statement but totally expected $10,000, you they think doesn’t exist until eventually you won’t see zero dollars, for sure! That’s get to the highest view, the Middle Way, and nihilism, which we often mistakenly think is within that the view called the the meaning of emptiness: as if we chucked Consequentialists, or Prasangika, which is all the dollars and ended up with nothing. Buddha’s actual intent. His Holiness talked No! It’s not like that! You will vividly see the about this recently: when we finally have the absence, the emptiness, of ten thousand true view, according to , who dollars. really explained this fifteen hundred years, it As His Holiness says, it’s not as if when sounds so radical, so scary: that there is we search for the inherent I, the I that we nothing from the side of the cup, the I, the think exists, that we throw out everything table, the mala, the flower, there is nothing and end with nothing. Not at all. When we from the side of a thing that makes it that search for the I among the aggregates, our thing. parts, what we find is the massive thing We think there is, and we desperately called the absence, the emptiness of the I cling to there being something inherent – that we always thought existed. something in the “thing” that makes it the Of course, the emptiness of this inherent I thing. That’s what we think. That’s what this is far more radical than the emptiness of red ignorance thinks, and we desperately want or ten thousand dollars; red can exist, ten this. We cling to this, because our deep thousand dollars can exist, but that kind of I instinct is to think that there being nothing could never exist. from the side of the thing means nihilism. Buddha’s telling us that we need to And that’s why it’s so tricky. cognize the emptiness of the inherent I is not The moment we hear that there is nothing some fancy religious trip he’s putting on us; from the side of the thing that gives it its it’s not some abstract construct. It’s utterly thingness, we immediately hear it as, “Oh, experiential. there’s nothing there”. Nihilistic. We chuck And the realization of it is what cuts the the baby out with the bath water. Instantly, root of suffering. we hear it this way. We can’t help but hear it this way. Buddha says that’s one of the WHAT DOES INHERENT MEAN? extreme views deep in our minds. We go too So let’s talk about what it means, “inherent far, we chuck too much out. I”, “intrinsic I”, “self-existent I”, “I that exists And then as soon as we hear about from its own side”, “I that exists in and of dependent arising, that things exist in itself”. For the Prasangika-, dependence upon this and that, we don’t they are all synonyms for the mistake our hear that properly either. We hear it as, mind makes, for the mistake that this “Ooh, what a relief!” and grasp. “Thank ignorance in the mind makes. goodness there is something there after all!” If something existed inherently, it would So we reify it. We put too much onto it. necessarily not depend on anything else.

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These are the two extreme views that our this is very meaningful, this is very tasty, mind lunges between like drunken sailors a experiential. It’s not just intellectual clever thousand times a day. stuff. This is why it is crucial to have the right words. Buddha’s main gift is his words. DEPENDENT ARISING MEANS If you can’t put it into words, then we’re just EMPTINESS AND EMPTINESS being lazy. We have to practise, because MEANS DEPENDENT ARISING words are how we communicate. What Lama Tsong Khapa says we need to do There’s an old Danish guy in the Santa is every time we hear “emptiness” – that Cruz called Age, he’s ninety-something now, there is nothing from the side of a thing that and he was a friend of Lama Yeshe’s, and he makes it a thing, there’s nothing in and of is a Taoist. Lama asked him one time, “Tell itself that is making it that, there is no I from me what you think, what your philosophy its own side, there is no intrinsic, inherent is?” and he said, “Oh, no, it’s beyond words. me in there that makes me, me – instead of You can’t describe it”. And Lama said instantly going to the nihilistic view and something like, “Ah, you’re just being chucking the baby out with the bath water, intellectually lazy. You’re cheating. If you we need to consciously bring ourselves can’t describe it, then what good are you to toward the Middle Way and say to ourselves sentient beings? How can you help?” – which is counter-intuitive for us – “Aha, So he took this to heart, and he said he Robina. My “I” being empty means it is a spent twenty years thinking through the dependent arising I. There is an I: there is an entire philosophy and writing a book, I that exists in dependence upon this and explaining it to people, making it coherent. this”. Because if you don’t have words, how can And then every time we hear about you hear Buddha’s teachings? It’s not dependent arising, that there is an I existing possible. We have to have words and the in dependence upon this and that, instead of words have to be correct. If I just sit here clinging onto it and exaggerating it and and bliss out to you about how amazing, how reifying it, we will again go towards the special the taste of the cake is, wow, it’s Middle Way and say, “Aha, Robina, that beyond words – how mean of me! I have to means it is empty of existing from its own give you the recipe, don’t I? And that’s side”. words. Then you can get the taste. So, right now, these are opposite to us. Buddha’s main gift is his words. Words Because what Buddha’s saying and what are deadly serious, because they lead you to Tsong Khapa really runs with is that when the taste. So, get your words right. That’s you think “emptiness”, it should remind you why you need to listen to authentic it means “dependent arising”. And when you teachings. Check carefully before you read, think “dependent arising”, it should remind there’s so much junk around, you know, us that that means “emptiness”. They in fact that’s called Buddhism. Be very careful what are the two sides of the same coin. In fact you listen to, whom you listen to. You should that’s the true Middle Way. That when you check. You know, we all love the His think “emptiness”, you think “dependent Holiness, for example; we think, “Oh, isn’t arising”, and when you think “dependent he wonderful, he makes me feel good”. Well, arising”, you think “emptiness”. I’m sorry – Hitler made people feel very good! No logic. So check up on your facts, WE MUST KNOW THE RIGHT you know; don’t just go by feeling. Have WORDS some confidence, have some certainty. We have to practise thinking this, because intuitively we go to the two extremes. And

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ESTABLISH THINGS AS EXISTING When I first learned this from Khensur CONVENTIONALLY Rinpoche Jampa Tegchok, who was the So, if things exist in dependence upon abbot of Sera Je monastery for seven years, various factors, and if they’re empty of he was the abbot of our monastery in France inherent existence, then we need to think for ten years and my philosophy teacher in about it, we need to prove that it’s true. And England in the late 70s. He used the example to do that, as I said before, we have to start of the object called “Robina”. He said that it by establishing something in order to discuss can be said that everything in the universe how it exists. So how do we do that? Well, we up to the first moment of Robina is validly a start with the name, and then we have to cause and condition for the existence of define it. A definition has two parts. Robina. “Mummy, what’s a cup?” I’ll never forget it, and at the time it “Well, darling, it’s that flat-bottomed clay sounded pretty cosmic. But let’s look at the container with a handle on it”. I can see it, logic of it. It’s scientifically true. You can can’t I? “But Mummy, what does it do?” “Oh, start anywhere you like. Let’s discuss this it holds my tea, sweetheart”. cup here. So let’s say Mrs. Smith was the The first part of the definition tells you its designer of this nice cup. So we can say, conventional characteristics, its substance, obviously, one of the first causes of this cup and the second part tells you its job, what it is Mrs. Smith, isn’t it? Her mind imagining, does, its function. “It holds my tea”. conjuring up this design. We can say that, But I’m not confident yet. I can’t just can’t we? Very clear. We know it didn’t fall believe what you tell me. I now have to check out of a tree like this. A human mind created that it does, in fact, fulfill its function. So I it. So, Mrs. Smith had a mother, didn’t she? pour tea into it and if it holds the tea, then it And if Mrs. Smith didn’t have a mother, does the job we said it does. But there’s there could not be Mrs. Smith. So, Mrs. more: we now need to check that there are Smith’s mother had a mother, and then you no other valid cognitions in the minds of can’t help but say Mrs. Smith’s mother had a anyone else that contradict that. And if there mother, and where can you find the first aren’t, then we’ve established a cup, haven’t mother? Because as soon as you posit one, we? And then we all shake hands on it and you’ve got to posit the previous one, which is agree. the simple logic of cause and effect. That’s That’s conventional reality in general. It’s the simplest level of dependent arising. As a cup literally “by convention”, by soon as you posit a thing, it has to have a agreement. And Buddha says that that’s how cause. everything exists. Then you’ve got another angle – you think of the clay. Well, clay came from a mountain FIRST, THINGS EXIST IN and that came from previous something and DEPENDENT UPON CAUSES AND that turned into something else. Then you CONDITIONS think of the paint. Everything you look at Let’s look at the different levels of dependent about this cup – once you start, you cannot arising, taking it one step at a time, leading do anything but keep going back and back. us to the subtlest level. The first way in Of course, we are desperate to find the first which things exist is in dependence upon cause – but logically, given cause and effect, causes and conditions; they come into such a thing cannot exist. existence in dependence upon countless It’s fascinating: we always want a first causes and conditions. And when it comes to cause. As His Holiness said one time in his the thing called a person, that’s called conversations with scientists: “Big bang? No karma, isn’t it?

79 problem! Just not the first big bang, that’s conscious, angry, depressed, fearful – all the all!” drama. We live in the bubble of this sense of This is a result of having in the depths of a separate, lonely me, don’t we? There’s me, our mind the view of self-existence. This is and there’s everyone else. This is the biggest the view that is actually manifesting in the lie. This is the experiential, emotional philosophies that assert a creator – that consequence of believing in “inherent I”. there is a “first cause” and it’s called “God”. Like I said, we don’t think we believe “in Buddha says it’s irrational and illogical. If inherent I”, we don’t even know what it you posit a law of cause and effect you means. But this is the experiential cannot have an effect without a cause. There consequence of it. Fear, drama, anxiety, is nothing we can point to that exists that anger, depression, low self-esteem, didn’t come from something a moment loneliness, poor me – these are the before. (But you can have a cause without an experiential consequences of this primordial effect: if you have an egg, you don’t have to mistake. get a chicken, you can break the egg any time The deepest assumption about this me is you like. But of course, if there’s a chicken, it that there are no causes coming from me: I has to have come from an egg; and you know didn’t ask to get born, it’s not my fault, that that egg has to have come from a everything is done to me, things seem to chicken, and so forth.) happen randomly, unfairly. There’s this So, if there is an effect – and everything deepest, pervasive feeling of being an that exists at this moment is itself an effect, innocent victim, that whatever happens to isn’t it? – it assumes a previous cause, so you me has nothing to do with me – including will never find a first one. But we frantically the good things! But we don’t mind them, we want there to be a first cause. “But, but, but don’t mind if there are no causes: just give there must be”, we’ll say. We ask the me more please! question: “When did it begin? When did We don’t want the ugly things done to me delusions begin? When did suffering begin? so we have huge aversion and anger and When did karma begin? When did push it away, and we do crave the lovely everything begin?” things so we have attachment. Attachment We’ve got this view because we cling to and aversion are the consequences of this self-existence, because we have this ignorance, the natural outcropping of misconception deep in the bones of our ignorance, because we assume an I to have being. We assume there has to be a first things for. We assume an I that doesn’t want cause, because grasping at self-existent me, suffering. It’s an assumption deep in the grasping at “self-existent anything” is the bones of our being. This is the experiential opposite to cause and effect. consequence of this mistake that our So the first level at which things exist ignorance makes. interdependently is in terms of their existing But thinking about how I am the result of in dependence upon causes and conditions. past karma, I’m the result of past actions – you hit me because I hit you before, you’re KARMA IS THE FIRST LEVEL OF generous to me because I must have been DEPENDENT ARISING FOR THE generous to you before – it loosens the grip OBJECT CALLED ME of this lonely, bereft self-pity me. We can Karma is a marvelous example of this. Let’s begin to realize that I am in fact an look at the phenomenon called me or self or interdependent scenario, not some lump of I. So, right now, we can see we cling to a poor me plonked on this earth by someone sense of self that’s very vivid, that’s very else. That’s why to talk about karma, to think solid, separate, lonely, bereft, self-pity, self- about karma is the most marvellous way to

80 loosen the grip of the “self-pity me”, to And here we’re talking about the simplest loosen the grip of the ego, of the ignorance. level of dependent arising: that things are It takes time, of course. empty of existing independently of causes So the first level of dependent arising is and conditions. You keep looking for the cup that things exist in dependence upon causes but all you find are the causes and conditions and conditions. There is a cup that does exist of the cup, which is what triggers the insight, – in dependence upon countless causes and “therefore there is no cup from its own side”. conditions. But you will not find a cup among any one of those causes and SECOND, THNGS EXIST IN conditions. This is the first level to think DEPENDENCE UPON PARTS about. And what this means is, you think Now, the second way the cup exists in about this and what it brings – this is the dependence upon various factors is that it point – is the conclusion: “Oh, I see! exists in dependence upon its parts. There is Therefore there’s no cup from its own side”. a cup, but you won’t find cup apart from its You see the absence of the inherent cup: parts. But we think there is, and our emptiness. language cheats us. Our language is really tricky. It reinforces self-existence. HOW TO APPLY THE LOGIC OF Back in the seventh century, DEPENDENT ARISING TO , this Indian great commentator UNDERSTAND THE EMPTINESS OF on Nagarjuna’s teachings on the Middle THE CUP Way, which are at the heart of all the So how do we get to realize the emptiness of teachings on emptiness in , he talked the cup? Am I supposed to just sit there and about using the example of a chariot. “Well”, think, “The cup is empty, the cup is empty, he said, “ in order to look for this inherent the cup is empty”, waiting for some vision to chariot that we think is there, let’s break it come. Ridiculous! In a sense you can say that down into its component parts, to search for you don’t sit there thinking about emptiness; this inherent chariot”. You won’t find you sit there thinking about dependent anything left over after you have dismantled arising. And that thinking, that logical all the parts, and instinctively we think we analysis, triggers the conclusion, “Oh, I see – will. therefore, there’s no cup from its own side, Of course, the very tasty example is the therefore the cup is empty of existing from self, the I. So, we can do this little its own side”. meditation. First, remember, you have to Emptiness is the conclusion you come to, establish the existence of the self, having thought about dependent arising. It’s conventionally: label it, define it, check that a very practical thing. It’s not cosmic, it fits its definition, that’s there’s no valid because very simply, if you think about how cognition that contradicts it. Then you’d do the cup exists interdependently, this proves an analysis in your mind, you’d do it very that it is absent of existing independently. rigorously. You would start to break down Obvious – they’re the opposite. the component parts of your own self – just If it is empty, if it is interdependent, it is like with the chariot – and you’d put them all empty of being independent, isn’t it? If it is out there in little piles. All the hard bits and interdependent, it is empty of being the soft bits and the mucky bits and all the independent. Independent and bits of your mind – the negative states, the interdependent are opposite. So if it is positive ones – as many piles as you want. interdependent, it lacks being independent. Keep stripping it away, deconstructing this I Simple. That’s the simple way of talking. into its component parts in this rigorous search among the parts of the self for the

81 inherent self, which we’re so convinced is in dear. . . Most annoying, isn’t it? You can’t there somewhere. find a separate I. We believe totally that we’ll end up with It’s just the same with the cup. Cup has a this naked self-conscious little I that’s now handle and a base – there’s the base, there’s been exposed, that’s the owner of all the the handle. Where’s the cup that isn’t the parts. We talk like this: “I did not do this”. “I base, that isn’t the handle? Where’s the I am a special person”. “I am so fat and ugly”. that isn’t the nose, the foot? “I am not this”. “How dare you say that about me!” We really believe there’s a THREE LEVELS OF DEPENDENT component in there called I or self that is, as ARISING my friend Pende puts it, walking hand in The grossest level of no-self that Buddha hand with the other components, the parts, initially argues with is the view that there is a the mind, the body, etc., etc. We believe permanent, partless self separate from there is this me in there that kind of runs the everything else: unchanging and unitary. show, a mini-me, a landlord, the boss. The lower Buddhist schools of thought take Even conventionally, the Consequentialist this view as gross selflessness. Middle Way view says you won’t find that The next level of selflessness, which is one. Let’s do an exercise to prove it. Okay. subtle selflessness for all the lower schools, My table has a cup, a clock and a vase. Can is that there is no substantial, self-sufficient you see this? So, how many phenomena did I self. But they all end up positing that there mention? Four. My table, the cup, the clock, has to be something there among the parts the vase, right? Four phenomena. We’re that is called I, each of them positing talking conventionally here, nothing tricky. something different. If it’s a true statement that I just made, you The Consequentialist Middle Way view must point out four separate, distinct says no, there isn’t; there doesn’t need to be. phenomena: you have to point out a table For them, the truth is that there is no that is not a cup, not a vase, and not a clock, inherent I; that from the side of the parts – right? A clock that is not the table, the cup, because there is nowhere else there could be the vase. Etc. You have to point out four an I – there is not an iota of anything that separate phenomena. There’s a table, there’s makes it that self. Everything exists like that, a cup, there’s a clock, there’s a vase. You they say. agree, don’t you? And we can do that, can’t This is the most radical, the scariest view! we? Easy enough. And it’s what leads to the subtlest level of Okay then. Another statement: I have a dependent arising, that the self is merely nose. You agree? And I have a foot. And I labelled. And it’s said that you don’t realize have a hand. How many phenomena? Three? this subtle dependent arising until you have No. There are four phenomena, aren’t there: realized the complete lack, the total absence, I, nose, foot, hand. Do you agree? So, same the emptiness of an inherent I among the discussion. If those four phenomena do exist parts. conventionally, you have to find four separate, distinct phenomena, each of which THIRD, THINGS EXIST IN is distinct, is not the other, don’t you agree? DEPENDENCE UPON THE MIND Same as before. THAT LABELS THEM Well, there’s my foot – cut it off! There’s Cup is merely a name the mind imputes my nose – you can have it! There’s my hand. upon the parts, which is the valid base for Now, where’s the I? Where is the I that is not that label: the handle, the base, the clay, the the nose, not the hand, and not the foot. Oh this, the that.

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“Robina” is a name we impute upon the Rinpoche is a Sherpa and was recognized parts of Robina: the aggregates: the body when he was very small as the reincarnation and mind. of a previous yogi called Kunsang Yeshe up Our instinct is almost to then think, “Oh, in the mountains in the Mount Everest good there are the parts, there is region of Nepal. He was a lay meditator something!” No. Body is a name imputed by called Kunsang Yeshe. Eventually he left the mind upon its parts; mind is a name home and went to this little hole-in-the-wall imputed upon its parts. Same discussion – in the mountains, which is now known as you can’t find a handle among the parts of Lawudo. I think it was where they stored the the handle, because “handle” is merely a radishes or the onions; “Lawudo “ means name imputed on its parts. You can’t find a “radish” or “onion”, I can’t remember which. hand among the parts; it is a hand, it does Anyway, he pulled out the radishes and hold a cup, but it’s merely a name imputed moved in, and that became his little home by mind upon the valid base, which is the for the last twenty-five or whatever years of fingers and the thumb and the palm and the his life. He got to be known as the “Lawudo wrist, etc. Lama”. And so when he died, like all the Everything exists like this. Prison is made great yogis he had complete control over the up by our mind; love, anger, jealousy, hell, process and could choose his rebirth. enlightenment: they all exist in dependence From the time Rinpoche was a tiny boy, upon the mind calling them that, buying into apparently, when his mother would go their being that. outside to chop the wood, little Zopa (he But nevertheless they do function as that: wasn’t called that then; I can’t remember his as prison, a cup, a self, anger. They must in name) would be gone, you know. He’s order to establish them as conventions. You crawling up the hill towards the cave. And can’t call a cup a knife just because you feel from the time he could talk, he’d always be like it. You have to establish it going up that hill, always. He’s relentless, conventionally, and it has to function, and very determined. And his mother would say, we have to agree to it. But ultimately you “Come home!” He’d say, “No! That is my can’t find it. But these two together is the home”, pointing up to the cave. tricky job to be done. From the time he could play games, his As Lama Zopa Rinpoche says, “When we sister said, he’d always play the role of being have realized emptiness, realized how things a lama, sitting on a throne and having a actually exist, it’s as if there is nothing there, pretend bell and dorje, and leading pujas but there is. But what exists is so subtle it’s and making mud pie offerings. He’d as if it’s an illusion, it’s as if it doesn’t exist”. say, “All my benefactors are coming” and Or, as we’d say in the West, “It’s all smoke he’d mention the names of his benefactors and mirrors”. from his past life! His mother, of course, decided she’d WHEN WE KNOW EMPTINESS, better check with the local lamas, who THERE IS NO FEAR decided, yes, he seems to be the When we have realized the emptiness of that reincarnation of Kunsang Yeshe. Then he fantasy I, as Lama Zopa says, “Then there is became known as a Rinpoche, “Precious no fear”. Fear is finished, because fear is the One”. main emotion of all the delusions, in Anyway, years later Rinpoche told the particular ego-grasping. This ignorance is story about when he was eight years old and known colloquially as ego-grasping, and its up in the mountains with his manager at a main job is fear. Fear and panic. monastery. There was this big river and on the other side of the river he could see these

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“strange, pale-faced people with straw- beings: there’s no concept like this in our coloured hair” – Anglo-Saxons! He really contemporary views of the mind and what’s wanted to meet these people. There was this possible to achieve. little rickety bridge, it seems, and his So, for someone to be drowning and to manager kept saying, “No”, but he insisted. observe what’s going on with a clear mind, So there he was, holding a little bowl of and for the thought to occur that he was potatoes – being a Sherpa, you know, you about to die, and to have no fear: all this fits bring your gift of potatoes – and when he the behaviour of a person who has seen the was halfway across the bridge he fell in the truth of emptiness; who knows there is no water – they don’t learn to swim up there! self to cling to. In retelling the story Rinpoche said, “The It’s easy for us to say these thing in nice head was bobbing up and down”. Not even religious terms – nirvana, – “My head” – “The head”: a very objective but we need to hear it as real, doable, actual statement. He said he noticed his manager psychological possibility. running along the river bank, shouting and So this ignorance, this ego-grasping – this yelling. Then, Rinpoche said, “Hm, the deep, deep primordial delusion – this default thought occurred to me, ‘the person known mode, this ancient, aeons-old habit that we as the Lawudo Lama is about to die’” – this come programmed with from countless lives, very clear, rational observation as he’s going along with its branches called attachment up and down for air. And then he told us, “I and anger and all the rest – this is what we didn’t know anything about emptiness, but call normal in the world. But Buddha says there was no fear”. we’re all mentally ill. We’re all living in a What we can deduce from this, in my mental asylum in our own head. opinion, is that he already had in his All the delusions see something that isn’t the realization of emptiness: there. Attachment projects a delicious, that’s why there was no fear, that’s why he divine cup – the mistake called would think, “the person known as the “attachment”, the delusion, the lie; aversion Lawudo Lama. . “. instead of the huge – another lie – projects “ugly, revolting cup”. massive panic-stricken thought of “I!!!” that Ignorance informs both and it projects a normal people have. self-existent beautiful cup, a self-existent Of course, in our culture, we would find ugly cup on the dependent-arising cup. In this utterly inconceivable. You’d be called other words, ignorance underpins all the mentally ill if you proposed this possibility to other delusions. It’s the deepest assumption Western psychologists! Because Western underneath attachment, aversion, psychology is based – like I said, not just the depression, jealousy and all the rest. Once religious teachings but the materialist you remove that underpinning, all the other teachings as well – based on the assumption samsaric views collapse in a heap of of a self-existent I. We say it is natural to nothingness. have fear. We call it “instinct for survival”. So the deepest assumption, the deepest We assume fear, jealousy, anger, paranoia, mistake is this belief in the “inherent me”. upset, depression, all the rest are normal Like I said, it’s so subtle, we don’t realize we behavior. Animals have it. Humans have it. think it. No one taught us this. It’s just the So everything is based upon the assumption default mode. We were born with it. It’s in of this as reasonable mental health. fact the motor that propels us to even take a To hear that Buddha says you can remove rebirth in the first place. So, it’s pretty all these neuroses from your mind and go primordial. beyond all fear, and develop infinite wisdom Once we understand the branch delusions and infinite compassion for all sentient – how they misconceive, how they

84 exaggerate – then we can begin to In fact, things exist because they are understand the root delusion, the ignorance empty of existing from their own side. that clings to the self-existent I, the ego- Because they’re empty, they can exist. grasping. Q: You just blew my mind… Once we’ve seen the emptiness of the A: Okay, good! You see, our instinct is to fantasy I, we’ve pulled out the root and then, think “empty “ means “nihilistic”, so we hear of course, the others collapse, the branches the opposite. It kind of splits our head open! die. There’s no longer anything to be So we’ve got to keep remembering, attached to, or to be angry about, or to be emptiness means dependent arising, depressed about. dependent arising means emptiness. And then we’re well and truly on the road to enlightenment! HOW TO MOVE FROM INTELLECTUAL UNDERSTANDING ANY INHERENTLY EXISTING TO EXPERIENTIAL PHENOMENA? Q: I was wondering, do you have any advice Q: Is there any phenomenon that has for taking our understanding of emptiness inherent existence? from the intellectual to the experiential. Ven: No. Buddha says it’s a contradiction A: Yes, let me tell you how. It’s not in terms. You cannot have such a thing. If difficult. Have you ever learned anything you something were inherent, it would mean it didn’t know before? A certain science or a existed without depending on anything. And skill? Give an example. What is it? What that is simply an impossibility. Everything have you learned? Okay, you’ve learned that exists, necessarily exists piano. Okay. When you first began, it was interdependently. By definition, all existents merely intellectual knowledge, don’t you are dependent arisings. agree? Wasn’t it? And even then, when you This is where Buddha disagrees with the looked at those weird looking notes on the eternalistic view of “creator” and “soul”. sheets of music, you thought, “What is this They’re unnecessary. But there’s we have stuff?” You couldn’t get head around it, even instintive need to hold onto something, as if intellectually, could you?. Then you started somehow “inherent” is above everything learning the theory, didn’t you? And then else. And that’s very much the feeling. I slowly you started putting your hands on the remember talking to a friend of mine – she’s piano and you could gradually translate that a Buddhist now, but she was a Christian, and boring intellectual stuff into something very sincere Christian – and she said she had experiential. So what was the main that a real struggle when she heard that a Buddha thing you did every day? was ordinary first, and then became Buddha. Q: Practice. That seemed to diminish Buddhahood. A: And then guess what happened? It Whereas she was more comfortable with the became experiential, didn’t it? That’s how we idea, which is the Christian one, which is learn everything. Nothing special. Well, this that God is always above everything. And has is how you get enlightened. There’s nothing always been. And doesn’t exist in special. You just have to do it: start with the dependence upon anything. It sounds like words, the theories, then through thinking it’s diminishing God and meditating, they eventually become your But Buddha would say if you analyze very experience. carefully, you’ll see something that is If you had the wrong ideas about Bach’s inherent can’t exist. It’s the opposite to music, this theories, you’d never play it right. existence. So you got to have the right words, and then you just think about them every day, you

85 analyze, you meditate on it, you think about masses of virtuous karma that prepares your it, and gradually, slowly, over years, months, mind to do the actual job of being your own years, the penny begins to drop, until therapist every day and getting the eventually it becomes your direct experience. realization of emptiness. All the prostrations, It’s exactly the same process. You just have all the water bowls, all those different things to be patient and persistent. Do you see that seem so abstract and so disconnected what I’m saying? That’s the answer. from practice, that seem so un- Then, of course, in Buddhism, especially psychological, so “religious”. in , you’ve got all these kit But when we understand their function – of tools that hugely help this process happen. and we have to think about this carefully – Which seem to be the more religious side of they’re the ones that prime our minds, that things. The delusions, in our mind, the enable us easily to get the realizations. Then misconceptions, the obstacles are so strong, we can realize emptiness. so huge, that without these extra tools we can’t get far. THE BEHAVIORAL IMPLICATIONS My analogy is this: Let’s say you see OF WORKING WITH THE CONCEPT Michael Jordan getting all these balls in the OF EMPTINESS hoop. (I’m probably twenty years out of date, Q: Say I’ve learned to understand the but I always think of Michael Jordan.) And concept of emptiness. How does that next you go, wow, I’d like to do that. You go to make the leap to feeling less fear, guilt… him and you say, “Hey, man, please show me A: I understand. Initially, it doesn’t seem how to get the ball in the hoop”. Right? evident to us, doesn’t it? This is why you’re Looks easy, doesn’t it? You go boom, boom, asking the question. That’s why another way boom, you get the ball in the hoop. Because to put emptiness is to see things as you can see, with basketball, the essence of it interdependent. is getting the ball in the hoop. Remember the example of the young Now, he will tell you, “Okay, good. First I Tibetan nuns who were tortured (see page want you to go off for ten years, study 35). Now, if with the usual view that we have basketball theory, go on a special diet, do of “I didn’t ask to get born, it’s not my fault, I lots of jogging, build up muscles, train in this don’t deserve this. . “. we experienced what and train in that. . “. they experienced, we would literally have a And you say, “No, no, no – you didn’t mental breakdown, wouldn’t we? And we’d hear me. How do I get the ball in the hoop?” be angry, we’d be freaking out, we’d be And he’ll repeat his answer. Why? Because raging, we’d want to blame, we’d want to sue obviously, even though getting the ball in the – look at the mental torture we’d have in hoop looks so easy, you have to have relation to those kinds of things. amazing skills and training and years of But they said, “Of course, we had practicing other things that don’t seem compassion for our torturers because we directly related to getting balls in hoops knew that we must have harmed them in the before you can do it effortlessly. past”. This is essentially the view of the first Same with your mind. The idea of level of dependent arising of the self: that we familiarizing our minds with these new ideas created the causes for our own reality; that until they’re our own direct experience is the this self is nothing other than the coming job, but we need to do many other practices together of all the past causes. That there to prime our minds to be able to do it. can’t be such a thing as a self that The Tibetan Buddhist call them experiences things that the self didn’t cause “preliminary practices”. You’ve got to purify it the past. Karma is dependent arising, and your mind. You’ve got to create masses and

86 dependent arising is the flipside of a perfect example of how things exist in emptiness. dependence upon various causes and factors Because, if you look at the normal ego and things, you know. It makes us so brave, response, the way we have ego now, – Lama so fearless. Yeshe calls it “the self-pity me” – and I’m not Does it make sense a little bit? So, trying to be cruel, now. But it is the way we thinking about interdependence is the way to suffer. And if we analyze, if we unpack self- put it. pity, unpack anger, you see it is “poor me, I Saying “emptiness” seems a bit abstract, didn’t do this, I don’t deserve this, why is because interdependence is the flip side of this happening, there is no cause, I don’t emptiness, because the way ego is, “grasping understand it, why me, what did I do to at the self-existent me” – this is the label for deserve it”. Would you agree this is the way it – is the one of thinking there’s no cause, we think about suffering now? That is thinking it’s not my fault, thinking “poor me” coming from the philosophy of “I didn’t ask and therefore the panic and the fear and the to get born”. That’s coming from the rage and the guilt and the shame and all the philosophy of “no cause and effect”, of “no junk that arises when bad things happen. karma”, of being an “innocent victim”. That’s Does it make sense a bit? the philosophy of the world. That’s why we And so finally, after years and years of suffer so terribly in the face of bad things much analysis and logic and thinking and happening. meditating, one finally gets the direct insight If you have the view of karma, it causes into emptiness. That’s when we finally have you to own responsibility for this thing that’s seen directly the absence of this fantasy “I” happening: you’ve made your bed and now that we’ve been clinging to for so long. That’s you’re lying on it; which means there’s no when you cut the root of delusions. Because fear, which means you’re confronting it, there’s no longer the misconception of the I. which means you’re accepting it, and then it Therefore there’s no longer fear, no longer even means you can have compassion, like anger, no longer attachment. We have a way those nuns. to go before we completely finish it all and So that’s a very different way of become a buddha, but we’ve made this major interpreting a situation, isn’t it? And all of shift when we’ve realized emptiness. this is implying: therefore this is not existing That’s the real purification. That’s when from its own side, therefore it isn’t causeless. we cut the root of suffering and its causes. Because the way we have ego now, it’s all causeless. “Why is this happening?” and panic and fear. And that’s because we are grasping primordially at “innocent victim me” who didn’t ask to get born. That’s a way of expressing emotionally how it feels to have ego; whereas if you have this other one, it’s more spacious. You recognize why. You know you did it. It’s more spacious and it’s linked to interdependence, which is the flipside of emptiness. One has to think about it again and again and again. It’s a practical thing, you know. It sounds so abstract, to hear about “understand emptiness”. It really means to see interdependence, and karma is

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15. DEDICATION DEDICATE IN EMPTINESS PRAYERS Due to all the past, present and future merits Collected by me, buddhas, bodhisattvas and all other sentient beings – which are totally non-existent from their own side – May the I – which is also totally nonexistent from its own side – As a result of the three-times’ merits of Achieve Guru Shakyamuni Buddha’s myself and others, enlightenment – which is also totally non- May bodhichitta – from which the happiness existent from its own side – of all sentient beings comes – And lead all sentient beings – who are also Be generated in the minds of self and other totally non-existent from their own side – sentient beings without delay, even for To that enlightenment – which is also totally one second. non-existent from its own side – And that which has been generated, may it By myself alone – which is also totally non- increase. existent from its own side.

As a result of the three-times’ merits of Prayers translated or written by Lama myself and others, Zopa Rinpoche. May emptiness be generated in the minds of self and others sentient beings, without delay, even for one second. And that which has been generated, may it increase.

Whatever dedication the Victorious Ones Gone to Bliss Of the three times have admired as best, I shall also perfectly dedicate in the same way all these roots of virtue So that I may perform good works.

Because of the past, present, and future merit Created by me and by the Buddhas, Bodhisattvas and sentient beings, May I, my family, students, and all sentient beings Be able to actualize completely in this very lifetime Lama Tsong Khapa’s path of unified sutra and tantra, Which is pure like refined gold. May this pure teaching of Lama Tsong Khapa Spread in all directions and flourish forever.

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