Advice on Educating a Child

Advice on Educating a Child

Date Posted:
June 2013

A letter about the qualities to teach a child, sent to a student who was having a baby.

My very dearest, very precious one,
I have read your letter. Actually, Roger informed me what you have written in your letter. I was very happy that you wanted to explain to me your life changes, what happened. I must tell you, express to you, that I was very, very happy to meet you at the house. My heart is with you, in your heart. I am extremely sorry for the long delay in writing or talking to you. My heart is with you.

It is very good you have received the child with him. You should always pray that the child will be most beneficial to sentient beings—to numberless hell beings, pretas, animals, humans and asuras—like Buddha Shakyamuni, or like His Holiness the Dalai Lama; like Tara, like the Medicine Buddha; like Chenrezig, the embodiment of all the Buddha’s compassion; like Vajrapani, the embodiment of all the Buddha’s power; like Manjushri, the embodiment of all the Buddha’s wisdom. [Pray that the child will not give] the slightest harm, so he won’t generate harmful thoughts to himself or to others at all; [pray that] he will generate loving kindness, bodhicitta, loving others, which is the cause of happiness for this and future lives. [Pray that he will attain] liberation from samsara, enlightenment, peerless happiness, cessation of all the mistaken minds, even the subtle ones, and the completion of all the realizations.

As a parent, you have to be a good example for the child, as he will copy the life from you. You must educate the child in those things which are not taught in school, college or university, unless there are Buddhist teachings. This is the most important thing in life.

The only thing for you to do is to create positive karma, which results only in happiness, so this life is filled with only happiness, so that much of your wishes get fulfilled in your life. This is the best advice and the best business so that your wishes will be fulfilled. The best thing is that your wishes are fulfilled, not only for this life, but also for future lives, and for ultimate happiness, liberation from the ocean of suffering, and peerless enlightenment.

These are the things to educate your child in:

Kindness
Kindness to others, not only to human beings, but also to animals, and even to the spirits, day and night.

Rejoicing
Rejoice every time you hear or see good things happening to others—if somebody has a good car, is rich, has a beautiful body, beautiful friends, or any of the good things that others have. So that good karma naturally becomes the cause to fulfill your wishes; it works dependently.  Rejoicing does two things: it brings happiness to others and it brings happiness to you, in this life and in future lives.

Practice patience
Train your mind in practicing patience, instead of allowing anger to arise, which can blow up your life and the lives of others; it can even blow up the world. As you know, historically one man killed many millions of people in the world. We don’t want this to happen to our children and to ourselves. It is the lack of practice of patience that causes all these problems.

Practice contentment
That means inner peace and satisfaction with the life; that is the answer. Most people in the world who do not practice Dharma try to change the outside world, but those who practice Dharma can change their own mind. When we let go, we receive happiness; but when we cling, we don’t get happiness. This is extremely important. Of course, we want to cause happiness for others, to cause everything to become limitless happiness, wealth. This is always good. When we do that, even if we don’t have attachment to our own needs, we receive [happiness] even without thinking.

Forgiveness
Whenever others get angry at us, cheat us or say nasty words, immediately we generate forgiveness, otherwise we give harm back and we create negative karma, and this is the cause of receiving harm from others. So if we generate forgiveness, the result is only happiness. Practicing forgiveness becomes a cause to fulfill our wishes, now and in the future.

Apologize
In daily life, if we give harm or say harmful words, immediately apologize, so it brings harmony to ourselves and others. It brings peace to the world, like this, from person to person. It is very important to train the mind in this way.

Courage
If you feel discouraged, think the human mind has so much potential. As the great bodhisattva Shantideva said in the Bodhicaryavatara, “If you get upset, there is no point to be worried; there is no meaning to worry. If it is something you can change or you can do, there is no point to worry. Just achieve it, do it.”

For example, if you want a huge mountain to be made of gold, or if you want the sky to become gold, this doesn’t make sense, so just let go. So there is no reason to be worried; just accept and let go. If there is something you can do, there is no need to worry about it; just do it. Like that, this quotation is extremely good when we are experiencing problems or creating problems with our mind. This is very, very important for the education of children.

I love you, with much prayer to you...