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25 November, am

As I remember now, I think I would just like to clarify regarding the suffering of change. I don’t think it is that much of a problem for those who have had many teachings. As Buddha said in the sutra teachings, “One suffering stopped and another suffering came. One suffering action stopped and one suffering action started—that is how the recognition of happiness or pleasure happened. That is recognized as pleasure.” It is said like this in the sutra teaching, and it is like this in our experience.

All these sufferings, the true cause of suffering and the true path, all these four noble truths are very scientific, if you check. If you have intelligence and you check, if you analyze, they are like this. This is not something to do with blind faith, something which is not real, so that you just need to have mere belief, blind faith, and nothing to do with reality, nothing to do with our experience. It is not like that. If you have intelligence, if you have wisdom you can understand. If you study the teachings and put them into action then you can see whether it is something that you can actualize. You can see whether the path that is explained in the teachings is something that it is possible to have in your mind. You can see for yourself whether it is possible to have the path that is explained in the books and in the scriptures in your mind. If one has correct understanding, as one practices correctly, one’s own experience is proof.

If it is similar with medicine that has been taken by many people and helped to cure many people’s diseases. Generally speaking, if you take it and you have the same disease as the others had, there is a possibility that it will remove the disease. Of course, you should check before taking it, but if you live with doubt, doubting everything without checking more deeply, then nothing happens. Also, maybe you don’t know how to check. If you have doubt you check more deeply, you study more. Actually, you may not get a real, clear proof without putting it into action. Just from study you may get some idea, but not real, clear proof.

Similar to the example of the medicine—if others have taken the path by which you hope to gain inner peace or ultimate happiness, the complete cessation of problems, if there have been others who have gone on this path, who have accomplished it, who practiced this path and have achieved the result that you are seeking, then since they have the same potential of mind as you, if you enter that path and practice it, you will get the result you are seeking.

This is not to put them down, but even some geshe-las and monks who have studied debate for a lifetime sometimes see pleasure as pure happiness, as if it were not labeled on suffering. According to them if it is suffering it has to be the suffering of suffering.

Indifferent feeling, the feeling which is suffering, and the feeling which is pleasure—namely the changing suffering or the samsaric pleasures—all have to be suffering. But although it is suffering, it shouldn’t be confused with the suffering of suffering and the feeling that is suffering. One doesn’t need to confuse the three types of feeling, which are all in the same nature of suffering. [Note: the three feelings—suffering feeling, happy feeling, and indifferent feeling—are often related to the three sufferings: suffering of suffering, changeable suffering and all-pervasive suffering respectively—Editor.]

Even though it is suffering, it doesn’t have to be the suffering of suffering, the feeling that we recognize as suffering. If we think in our mind of the pleasures that come from various actions that we do during the day, like sleeping or eating, when we don’t analyze them, they look like truly existing pleasures. When we talk about them, we say, “Oh, I had a good time!” When we think of that comfort, when we talk about it, or when we remember future or past pleasures, when we don’t analyze the nature of these things, it looks like they are truly existent pleasures. They seem to be pleasure from their own side, a truly existent pleasure, pure happiness that is not labeled on suffering.

If it were not labeled on suffering, it would be contradictory to what we usually talk about in our everyday life. As I said before, when a problem becomes much smaller, or when one’s disease or sickness becomes much smaller, we say, “Now I am very happy, very comfortable.” However, this thing that we normally label happiness or comfort contradicts what worldly people usually talk about, besides what Guru Shakyamuni Buddha said in the teachings. As I mentioned before, with that quotation, when we analyze we find that it is suffering.

Thinking of these things as pure pleasure does not help your renunciation. You think that it is pure happiness, but if it really were pure happiness, then, as I mentioned before, as you carry on doing the action longer and longer, the pleasure should increase. If it is pure happiness, and not something that is labeled on suffering, this would be true. That wrong thinking does not help you to generate the thought of renunciation of samsara, or to generate bodhicitta. So it is more effective to see the reality of the nature of pleasure, the samsaric pleasures, as suffering. It is better and more effective for the mind to think of the nature (of pleasure). It helps to make the confusion less.

Real happiness is achieved when you are free from the third suffering, the pervasive compounding suffering. What we call the “comfort” or the “happiness of life” is when the suffering of suffering becomes smaller.

In one family there are five members. There is one person who is completely free from the pervading, compounding suffering. Then there is one who doesn’t have the suffering of suffering but who has the changing suffering, and another one who has the pervading compounding suffering. One number of the family doesn’t have suffering of suffering. The rest of the family have different levels of sufferings of suffering. One has the greatest problem, the heaviest suffering of suffering. The sufferings of the others are lighter than that. The others have much smaller sufferings of sufferings. Among these three people, the first one has the heaviest problem; the second person has more comfort or more happiness than the first; the third one, who has the smallest problem, is happier than the second person. Because he doesn’t have the suffering of suffering, that person is happier than the others. Then we have the person who is free from the pervading compounding suffering, and that person has achieved the real happiness, the everlasting happiness or the ultimate happiness. That person has it.

There should be one more person; I left out the person who doesn’t have the changing suffering but has the pervading compounding suffering. So there are six members in this family. We judge how much happiness there is in the life of a person in dependence upon how few problems there are in the life of that person.

Let me just clarify, one little point with regards to meditation on kindness. One question might arise. For example, I didn’t see my father. I don’t remember having seen my father. Probably he was alive when I came out of the mother’s womb but I have no mental picture of my father, I don’t know how to visualize him. Even though I did not see him, even though I don’t remember him in this life as being physically present and helping me, still like the mother he has been kind. He has been kind because if he did not create the karma to give birth to me and to give me this body, then by now I would not have this precious human body, qualified with the eight freedoms and the ten richnesses. Just this became the great foundation that is so important, the very first thing to start. Even just considering this one thing makes him extremely kind.

I remember that my mother suffered so much. I think before when my father was at home they were not so wealthy, though a little bit better off than other families who are regarded as poor. A little bit wealthy. We had many possessions but I think that according to Western standard of life we should be rich in garbage, with a collection of garbage in the house. But in that country it was regarded as being a little bit better off. Anyway, my father was able to read the scriptures. I don’t remember whether he was ever a monk or not before, but there are stories that he was very good at reading scriptures and doing pujas for other people.

Recently I found out how my father died. I asked my mother because I was very interested to find out how he died. He was sick for some time, I think he died at the fireplace—not in the fire! My mother went to work outside in the field, and the other children, my sister and the elder ones were not at the house, they were outside. One day she came back from the field and as she came in she saw the father sitting by the fireplace. (Usually the Sherpas sit around the fireplace when they eat. In the West you sit around the table, but Sherpas sit around the fireplace when they have food. The families always sit around the fireplace and also it keeps them warm.) So, anyway, one day after working in the field, when she returned home during one of the break times she saw my father sitting at the fireplace and she called his name. She called, “Father, do you need anything?” But he did not reply. He was sitting by the fireside, and his body was upright, it had not fallen down, it was not lying down. I think my mother did not understand. It is very possible that he was in the meditation state at the time of death, but I think my mother didn’t realize this. She thought that he was still alive because he was sitting like this at the fireplace. He was very quiet, so then she asked, “Do you want anything?” She was just coming back during one of the break times and asked did he need any help. He didn’t give any answer. Then she went outside to tell her friends and other people. They didn’t know what to do. They didn’t go to ask a lama what to do. That is what she should have done, but I think probably my mother might have had a quite limited understanding. So she went to spread the message among some of her friends, some other mothers, and then they told her to take the body outside and burn it.

She didn’t go to the cremation. I don’t know so much about it, maybe it is not their custom. I think maybe the day the body was taken out he was not actually dead, that the mind had not yet separated from the body. The people who took the body out and burned it, they were so surprised. They told my mother, “He looks so alive.” They told her that he looked very good, he did not look dead.

You see, when a person is in the meditation state, until the meditation session is over, things do not change. The color of the skin doesn’t change. There is no bad small. If there are bad smells it means that the person is not in the meditation state. The main thing to examine is the smell and not so much the way the body is sitting. The more reliable thing would be not having any smell during those three, four, five days—however long the person stays in meditation. But I don’t mean that one should put it in the refrigerator! Some meditators, especially at the time of death, look more glorious than normal. Much more magnificent, much more glorious. Also they give out scented smells. Instead of giving out bad smells (upsetting) the environment for others—very deep bad smells around the house and in the room so that when other people come to see it is kind of scary, very fearful to touch the body—instead of that they give out the smell of moral conduct, the scented smell of having achieved bodhicitta, having great compassion, and the thought of loving kindness that covers all sentient beings. I have seen high lamas passing away like that and also ordinary people who died in front of my lap. Also, I went to the pujas where there were dead people.

There are so many stories. However, I don’t think I am going to carry on talking on this subject, because then I won’t make it to the Bodhicaryavatara.

So, I think my mother didn’t check with the lamas that were familiar with tantra teachings, those who are familiar and who know how to guide and how to deal with these kind of problems. Probably they burned him before he had finished the meditation.

At Pashupatinath, the Nepalese bring their bodies to be burnt. It is one of their places, one of the most famous Hindu temples. Many times I went there and watched the dead bodies that had been brought. There was one body that I think was not finished. I don’t think that the mind had separated from the body yet. Probably it was unconscious just for a while, due to some wind disease or something. Maybe it became unconscious for a while but if there had been some people who knew the right method maybe they could have revived that person.

So many times the people in the family do not know or do not recognize the possibilities. They do not know the method. They do not really understand and cannot recognize when the person is actually dead. There is a possibility that after some time the person might be able to revive, that the consciousness could come back and after some time the person could get better.

One day the body of one Nepalese man was brought there. They performed the whole ceremony, putting the body over the piles of wood and putting on the grass. First they wash the feet of the dead body in the river, which they think is kind of holy. This is meant to be purifying so that there is no trouble. They put the body over the wood and then they put burning grass, a burning cloth, or something like that dipped in kerosene on the head first. They carry the body three times around the firewood, then they put it on top and then they put the fire on top of the heart. One day one person’s body was put there. They put the wood on top and the fire at the heart. Then this person came back—he moved his limbs when they put the fire on his heart. (It is similar to when in the West you give electric shocks as the very last method. The very final determining factor is the electric shock. If that doesn’t do anything then, dead.) This person probably had wind disease or something, or some spirit harm. He was not actually dead. So this dead person was moving his limbs. He started to speak, saying, “I am not dead.”

These people who were standing around thought it was very inauspicious. They had never heard about a person coming back from the cemetery. If there have been many stories then of course it becomes a normal thing. It becomes something usual and it would not be regarded as bad or inauspicious. These people were standing around, the relatives and maybe the sons. (I think that usually it is the men who burn the dead bodies. I didn’t see any women there doing the burning. Also in Delhi and here it is the same thing, only men were working.)

I went two or three times to watch at one of the cemeteries, the cremation places in Delhi. I was standing there for hours and hours watching the different classes of people coming there for the burning. There are different kinds of burning. There is the rich way where many pictures are taken of the dead bodies. (Now my conversation is getting longer!) When one rich person’s body came the wife and so many wealthy people gathered round—thirty or forty on motorcycles and in cars. So many gathered round and everybody was looking at the body. I didn’t try to get near because maybe they would not like it. They were taking pictures of the face and taking blessings—they were not actually touching the dead body, but the ground nearby and putting that on the forehead.

For the rich person’s body there is a special wood, very dry pieces. Of course they may have to pay more. It burns very easily. The old, very poor people are brought by two people or three people. The rich people have lots of flowers, lots of decorations. The poor ones, hardly anything. Usually they have some flowers and then two or three people bring the body there and they get very old, big wood. Then they burn the body. I think it takes more time, somehow, some are difficult to burn. Anyway, there was nobody taking pictures of that poor person. I stayed there for hours and hours, so the Indians thought that I was doing some kind of study of people’s lives. They called it something but I have forgotten what. I told them that I came to do puja.

When people come to a cremation, the relatives and all those who come there experience a great change. When something happens to another person’s life it has a great effect. The mind is kind of upset when some great change happens to the life of a person in the family. So if one talks about Dharma during that time, I think the mind would be very suitable.

However, to finish this—about that person who spoke, saying, “I am not dead!” He started to move his limbs, trying to get up. Then all the relatives and all the other people beat him with sticks. He was trying to get up from the funeral pyre saying, “I am not dead,” while everybody gathered round beating him with the firewood. Together everybody beat him and made him burn in the fire. They put wood on the top.

So like this, you see, what can you do? This is another example of karma. The idea is unbelievable. Before when he was alive among his family it would be, “my this, my that,” “my father” or my this and that, something. And then—could you stand it if you put yourself in the place of that person? Even though you say, “I am not dead,” it doesn’t help.

Many times there is heat at the heart but there is no heat on the rest of the body. The very last place the heat absorbs is at the heart. Maybe it starts to absorb from the head. There are differences—with somebody who dies with virtuous thoughts, who has accumulated much virtue, the heat starts to absorb from the feet. For those who die with non-virtuous thoughts, who accumulated much non-virtue in that life, the heat starts to absorb from the head. There is a difference like this. The last thing is that all the heat contracts at the heart. If there is heat at the person’s heart that is also one thing showing that the person is not dead, even though the body is extremely cold and the feet and the hands like wood.

After my father died many people from other families took the possessions away by force. I think my mother was in great debt. She didn’t have the money to pay and I remember when I was so small many times people came to ask for money. They came there and she offered those expensive wines, the strongest, made from potatoes, and the ordinary wine, made of rice, barley, and all those things. When the person sat down at the table she offered wine and put the container with wine in front of that person. Then he asked her to give him this and that. Maybe she said, “Come another time,” or maybe she said, “I don’t have it.” Anyway, I don’t remember exactly, but what I do remember is what she did after the man left. That I remember. After the person who came to get money left and went downstairs, when he was about to go out the downstairs door my mother started to criticize and say wrong prayers. She would throw dust, picking up the dust between the planks and throwing it after the person saying: “May he die soon,” and this and that. That I remember very clearly.

She had great difficulties, especially after I was born. I think I gave a lot of trouble. The other children were okay. There were several other children. One child had one crown here, sort of a pinnacle, but it didn’t live long. I must have been a very evil person because after I was born so many of the animals died. The family had many yaks—not exactly yak but the mother; normally we say yak butter and cheese, but “yak” is related to the father; I don’t know what you call the female in English, it looks quite similar to the yak but it is not “yak,” but the female. In Scotland they have them, I think, or some other Western country. However, so many of them died gradually after I was born, so many of them. And many goats and sheep died.

In the family there was only one person who could help—the sister who was a little bit older than the others. Between her and myself there was another girl who died. She had a tiny tail in the back. She was another example of karma. If you don’t agree, if you think it is impossible, it is my experience. She died when I was in Tibet. She was in my mother’s lap. She had diarrhea and while my mother was holding her the girl died. And then there was another younger brother who was completely useless, completely useless. He did nothing but disturb the mother, breaking things that she rented in the house.

She (the mother) was the one who had to take care of all the outside work in the fields and then go to the forest to get the firewood. We just played. It took many hours, it was not that easy. I don’t know how strict it was at that time but you could cut only dried wood. So it took several hours. She came back home very late at night, sometimes even after dark, after the moon had risen. We would wait, just small children. We were kind of scared of the house. There was no light, there was no kerosene lamp, there was no electricity—of course there is no electricity even now. So we went outside the house and sat by the door and then we waited for mother. We didn’t get any food. It would be very late. Then after some time she came with a huge load of firewood. When she came back home she was sick. She had a headache. Inside the house we just looked at her as the lay down by the fireplace, screaming because of much pain. That I remember clearly, we just did nothing, nothing. When mother screamed we would just look at her, just sit there and look at the mother, that is all.

There was no fire in the fireplace because mother was sick. When she was sick she would scream for her mother, calling her mother. Usually when somebody who knows better is sick or something he calls his guru, he calls the lama for whom he has devotion, but at that time she called her mother. Maybe now it is different. I think she is different now. Now she is a nun. She took ordination from His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s tutor, His Holiness Ling Rinpoche, with many other nuns and monks at Bodhgaya.

We ate the food that she made, then all day we just played in the field with stones and with pieces of wood. When I was very small I had one friend, one dumb boy. One boy who could not speak. He was my best friend. Every day we would play. He liked to play ritual things and I also liked to play ritual things when I was very small. So sometimes I would sit on the throne and they would be like listeners. (I think I am still playing now actually!) We played many other rituals like doing pujas. I didn’t know one single word. I was just imitating with this dumb boy, this mute boy. Some boys did the pujas, they made noise and played the cymbals. Some boys were the benefactors, they served things, but the material that they offered was sand. They put sand on the stones and made it wet with water, then pretended that it was vegetables or soup, they passed it to each boy. However, that is useless.

When I was small I read Milarepa’s life story three or four, several times, just as a practice for reading, mainly for practice in reading Tibetan letters. Somehow at that time it was so clear, more clear than now even. I had a great desire to be a really good practitioner by finding a guru like Marpa, an infallible guru. However, without talking much, I liked very much the monk’s life. I was interested in the monk’s life. So my mother sent me with some relatives to a monastery, to one of my uncles who was a monk, in order to learn the alphabet. One syllable was a little bit difficult but I think that maybe (I don’t remember one hundred percent certain), but I might have learned it in one day. I was very naughty also at that time, so I didn’t stay in the monastery. My uncle used to teach me the alphabet outside on the balcony; and when he went inside to the kitchen to cook food I ran away, I escaped to my mother’s house. It was not far from the monastery, maybe half a mile or something. Several times I escaped.

Then my mother sent me to another place to another uncle who was a monk. There I spent seven years and completed reading and memorizing and all those things. My uncles and the lamas from whom I received initiations were of the Nyingmapa sect. However, whether I received them or not I was there as a small child on the lap of other people. Their sect was Nyingmapa. I memorized their prayers and the meditation prayers during those times.

So all that up until now I have been able to study and able to understand, I owe to her kindness. That I am able to extract that much meaning from reading, by seeing these incredible, profound, secret, infallible scriptures, I owe to her kindness. All this, the tiny bit, the few words that I can speak, that I am speaking to you now, that is all due to her kindness. But I haven’t done anything back. I haven’t done anything. There is nothing that I can think of that I did to benefit her in return.

I think I stop here.

25 November, pm

This morning the very first thing I was trying to explain was this: I used as an example the fact that I didn’t have any mental picture of my father. It is similar if you have never seen your mother. I don’t mean that you grew up in a bottle or something, under the heat, however, maybe your mother ran away from your father after you were born, or you don’t remember that she took care of you when you were a child. Sometimes there was not even a father, both parents died, so you were actually brought up or taken care of by somebody else’s mother or somebody else’s father. So then one doesn’t remember that this present life’s mother took care of ones. She gave birth but you don’t remember that she took care of you afterwards. In that case it is not necessary to push aside the mother; the whole point is for you to have an example of somebody who was kind to you. The main point is that you can remember somebody who was kind to you in this life, not necessarily your mother or your father but one person, one sentient being who was very kind to you. That is the main point.

We need an example for the purpose of meditating on kindness in order to be able to generate the principal cause of the omniscient mind, bodhicitta, in order to complete the extensive works for all sentient beings. To be able to generate the realizations of bodhicitta within our mind depends on being able to generate its root, great compassion for all sentient beings, and also great love for all sentient beings.

A son or daughter is someone who usually has much respect for his or her parents. They feel that their mother and father are so kind, so precious, that automatically the thought of loving kindness arises towards them. If you feel that a person gave a lot of help when you had many problems with your means of living, when you had a hard life, that someone helped you solve your problems when you had trouble and a very hard time, you see that person in the light of loving kindness. Knowing that they are so kind, you wish them to be free from problems, like a son or daughter. The more you feel their kindness, the more compassion you have for them, particularly when they have disease or when there is some problem in their mind. There is that much compassion wishing them to be separated from the problems and also there is a great wish, the thought of loving kindness, wishing that kind person to have the happiness that he is seeking. You wish for his happiness very much and also you want to help this kind person to fulfill his wishes. You know and feel deeply that this person is kind, and as a result automatically greater compassion, greater thoughts of loving kindness arise towards him.

We need an example in order to understand kindness. We need to use it in order to see that all other sentient beings—besides the friend and those who are kind and helpful now, also the stranger, the enemy and all the rest of the sentient beings—have also been kind in the past. So if for you, the kindest person has been your mother, then by using her as an example you apply that to all sentient beings—all sentient beings have been your mother and have been kind. If it is your father whose kindness is the greatest, that you can remember that and use his kindness as an example—just like him all sentient beings have been kind.

It is best if you are able to recognize the kindness of the enemy who is harming you. This is especially the most important thing for one’s own mind development, for the development of patience, and for the development of the good heart. If you recognize this, you can see the kindness of the enemy, and I would think that is the best example. Then when you look at all sentient beings in this way, you will not find any sentient being that gives harm or has given harm.

There are two pieces of advice when training the mind in bodhicitta. One is training the mind in bodhicitta through the seven techniques of the Mahayana cause and effect. With this technique, you try to realize that sentient beings are extremely kind through using the example of the extreme kindness of the mother in this present life. In this way you try to realize how sentient beings are precious and extremely kind.

Then there is the other more profound advice on training the mind in bodhicitta: equalizing with and exchanging oneself for others. The way of equalizing oneself with others is the lama’s meditation technique and comes from understanding conventional truth or all-obscuring truth, and absolute truth. There are six reasons for equalizing oneself with others, and three of these reasons are because of the absolute truth. However, the essence is that oneself and other sentient beings are exactly equal.

The most important object to meditate on is the enemy. I, myself, and the enemy who is harming me are exactly equal, not desiring even the smallest suffering, not even the unhappiness experienced in a dream. In this we are exactly equal, both desiring even the smallest comfort, even the smallest happiness experienced in a dream. I, myself, and the enemy are exactly equal. This is the very root, the fundamental reason for equalizing. The conclusion is that there is not the slightest reason that I should be more important than him, that what I want is more important, that my happiness should be more important than his—the enemy, the person who is disturbing me. There is not the slightest reason that what one wishes or one’s own happiness should be more important than that of others. Because of this, there is no reason at all to cherish the “I” or to cherish myself and renounce others. There is not the slightest reason that I should cherish myself more than others. There are unbelievable reasons for cherishing others and renouncing oneself. One cannot finish explaining the reasons, the benefits. The reasons, the benefits are endless.

When renouncing others and cherishing oneself, instead of receiving benefits, one only receives harm. Besides, it hinders one from generating the graduated path to enlightenment, especially bodhicitta, which means that it prevents one from achieving the state of omniscient mind to be able to complete extensive benefits for all sentient beings. It is so harmful that it doesn’t let one accomplish extensive benefits, freeing each and every sentient being from suffering and leading them to the state of omniscient mind. It doesn’t allow this, it is the greatest disturbance. Even in everyday life, if you follow a selfish attitude there is no realization, no peace in the mind today. The amount of hours each day of the life that one follows and keeps the selfish attitude becomes the base that brings so many problems. It is like the poisonous root—the polluter, or the poisonous plant. It brings so many undesirable problems for the many people around us.

So one should think of the kindness as it is explained in the teachings. You should think also of the kindness of those others that you can see—not only of the kindness of those other sentient beings who were kind in the past as your mother. Not only that, but also the everyday life kindness of those whom you can see with your eyes—thinking how in everyday life every single happiness and enjoyment came from them, the ones that you can see, without needing to depend on quotations from Buddha. This is something that you can feel immediately, that you can recognize just by explaining. It is not difficult to understand, like the fact that in the past life we accumulated virtue so that in this life we can now experience the result, happiness. Simply by recognizing this kindness of other sentient beings we can apply it to all sentient beings. By relying on the kindness of the sentient beings from whom one has received all the enjoyment and comfort each day of our life, one is able to be a human being each day, able to be alive, able to be a human being. All this is by the kindness of those sentient beings. We can apply this to all the rest of the sentient beings thinking that they also have been kind like this. We think of their kindness when they were our mother and of the others’ kindnesses. One thinks of how all of one’s three times happiness came from sentient beings, and is dependent on the kindness of sentient beings. In this way the kindness of other sentient beings is much more extensive, much deeper.

Since all the sufferings came from the self and all the happiness and perfections came from others, what should one do, if what one wishes is happiness and what one does not wish is suffering? What one should practice to fulfill this wish is to renounce the self, from where all the sufferings come, and to cherish others, from where all the happiness comes. In this way there are no hindrances. All the hindrances to the fulfillment of this wish are stopped and so are the hindrances to eliminating one’s own suffering and obtaining happiness. All the happiness that one wishes to achieve is immediately fulfilled without any hindrance.

By thinking of the greater kindness, a deeper and greater compassion and love are generated. From this root one is able to generate very strong love and compassion, and then one is able to generate a stronger bodhicitta.

Already you might have meditated a little bit on this way of realizing how others are so precious and so important. So precious and extremely kind. A little bit of talk on this might come again and again. If you are among the highly intelligent ones or among those for whose mind this way of training the mind in kindness and bodhicitta is more effective, namely equalizing and exchanging oneself with others, if it benefits, it is more effective to generate the great compassion and thought of loving kindness more easily and quickly, and then train the mind in this way. And if the other way, thinking of the kindness of the mother, is easier and more effective for the mind, generating great love and compassion more quickly, then train the mind in bodhicitta that way—the second technique of Mahayana cause and effect.

The point is this: the whole meditation is done to accomplish the final goal. The main purpose is to accomplish the work for all sentient beings. To accomplish the ultimate aim, training the mind in bodhicitta, this work subduing and changing the mind is done.

The mother has been extremely kind all the time. If she could give more than enlightenment, if she had the power to give more than enlightenment, she would give it to us. She has been kind in so many ways, always wishing, if there was the choice, for herself to be sick and not the child. She would choose for herself to get sick rather than the child, for herself to die rather than the child.

It is very good to remember that the mother has created so much negative karma in order to take care of you. So much harm she did to many other sentient beings. She gave so much harm to creatures and to human beings in order to obtain the comfort and pleasure of food and clothing for us. So many times she told lies to others people, even trying to hide our mistakes as much as possible. Even if we were so violent, so cruel to our mother, she would hide it. She doesn’t want us to have a bad reputation. She tries everything, even though we don’t have a good personality, don’t do any good actions, don’t have such an education—she tells lies to other people about how my son or daughter is intelligent and beautiful and this and that. If there is one small good thing, if we did just one small good thing, like when we started to speak as a child, when we started to say one word, “mummy” or something like that, if one day she saw one word coming out, something, then she was so happy, so blissful, and announced it to everybody and she exaggerated. She made it sound much better.

Even if the son or daughter has spoken very rude words, unbelievably painful, rude words, even beating the mother, she hides it. What the child did is so painful for her mind, but she hides such a bad characteristic, such an evil characteristic, never telling it to other people because of the worry of bad reputation. When she took care of us she fought others in order to obtain comfort and reputation for us. She harmed those who disturbed us. With anger and with ill will she harmed, she fought, and she spoke rude words. In so many different ways she created so much negative karma. In spite of all these hardships, in spite of creating those negative actions, killing others, all those things, the mother guided us and took care of us by giving the enjoyments.

The conclusion is that this present mother has been extremely kind, giving this body to me. This is not the first time that she has given me a body. She has been kind, giving me a body numberless times in past lives. First you feel this, you feel the depthless kindness. She has been kind in giving me this body because now I won’t be late in making preparations for the practice of Dharma for future happiness. If the mother had given me, for example, the body of a scorpion when she was a scorpion it wouldn’t have been too surprising, but having given me a human body is so very kind because with a human body there is more opportunity to experience pleasure and also to practice the holy Dharma, as I have mentioned many times.

All of us here are a good example. Now even many Western people have met the Buddhadharma that was not in the West before. Not like in India or Tibet. Previously it had not spread to the West but now there are so many Westerners involved. Even though one did not come from the West with the particular idea to study Buddhadharma and to practice it, somehow the conditions gather and somehow it happens. At one place all the conditions gather, somehow, like this, and one meets the holy Dharma. One starts to practice because one finds that it is practical for immediately solving the problems of life. All this did not happen without a cause. The cause was arranged or prepared in many past lives. Mainly with the human body.

So first you try to feel the depthless kindness of the mother, how she kindly given me a body numberless times in past lives. And protection. This is not the first time that she protected my life from dangers such as hunger, thirst, hot, and cold by giving me the enjoyments, clothing, food, the place, and the house. This is not the first time that she has been extremely kind. Think that she has been kind in protecting my life from danger numberless times in past lives, and place the mind on this kindness, feeling the depthless kindness of this. This is not the first time that she has led me in the path of the world. “In the path of the world” means taught me how to walk, how to talk, and all those other educations with which she helped. This is not the first time she has been kind to me leading me in the path of the world—she did so numberless times in past lives. Again, look back and feel her depthless kindness in leading me in the path of the world.

(Can you hear, you who are at the door, at the edge? Can you hear? Maybe I’ll try to speak also through the nose—I am joking!)

This is not the first time she bore hardships or suffered for me to obtain happiness. Each time she was my mother she suffered so much. If you remember some examples of how this person, my mother, was somebody who took care of me and bore much hardship, then you think that this is not the first time she has been kind to me, bearing numberless hardships for me. For example, when I was born to her in past lives she was unable to give birth. I couldn’t come out and so she died. Even just those bodies in her past lives in which she died because of me, in which she suffered so much incredible pain and finally died—if just these bodies were collected, there wouldn’t be any space left. In order to take care of me, while fighting others, she was injured and her limbs cut off, getting killed, all these things. If all these bodies had been collected there wouldn’t be any space left. It is the same thing with the milk that she fed me. If all the milk that came from her and with which she fed me with the loving thought in past lives had been collected, there wouldn’t be any space left! Not just the Atlantic. So much.

One should think in a similar way with other things. Like the medicines that she gave when one was sick. Think in a similar way with everything, feeling the depthless kindness, and apply the same thing to the father.

Before mentioning that, I’ll explain the reason that in this technique we particularly mention the kindness of the mother. That is because normally you don’t find so many who feel closer to the father. Normally if you ask, “Who do you like more?” they say, “Mother.” So because one feels closer to the mother it is easier to realize the kindness of the mother. In the same way the father has been kind, like the mother, numberless times in past lives. You think of those four ways of kindness and you think that the stranger and all the rest of the Dharma friends who are here have also been extremely kind in these four ways. You feel that each of them, each human being has been kind like this. Then you think of the sentient beings who are in other realms, the suras and asuras, then the animals, each creature, such as snakes and tigers, fleas, lice and mosquitoes, especially those that one hates, that make one get angry. Especially with those, think that each of them has been kind numberless times in past lives in these four ways. Feel the depthless kindness of each one. Then, each of the narak beings and each of the preta beings. It is very good for those who think that a spirit is harming them, for those who believe this, to remember and to feel the depthless kindness of these spirits, the four ways of kindness, and in this way to generate great compassion and the thought of loving kindness. In this way it benefits—you are not depressed, not aggressive, not worried, not scared. It helps to develop one’s own good heart, and to subdue one’s own mind. Also it benefits the spirit.

The kindness of all sentient beings, being mother, and those four ways of being kind is so much that even Buddha’s omniscient mind cannot see a beginning, cannot find a beginning to the kindness that they showed us. So when you look at the mother, you meditate on her kindness. Even if you saw the mother as terribly ugly, as an undesirable object, so that as soon as you remembered her face you got angry, now you remember her kindness more and more, and then as a result you see her in beauty, in the aspect of beauty, the beauty of love.

Similarly with all sentient beings. In Tibetan it is called drin.dren. As you think more and more of the kindness of all these sentient beings, you see them more and more in beauty, in warmth. I think the expression might be “warmth.” You see a person who has a very kindly heart, who is very warm. Remember how it appears to you when a person who is extremely kind to you comes with a lot of people who are the enemy, whom you dislike, whom you hate. When he comes with the enemy and with a bunch of other people, with strangers, how do you see the differences between him and the others? What feelings do you get? You see him in the beauty of love. You don’t feel this with the strangers and you don’t feel this with the enemy.

I think I stop here.

26 November, pm

By thinking of the kindness of our mother, the kindness that we remember, that we have seen in this life—even though we don’t remember the kindness of this present mother in our past lives, even though we cannot remember how other sentient beings were our mothers and kind—we can remember the kindness of this present mother. Even though we didn’t notice it before, even though we hadn’t thought about it so far, now, if we look at it as it is explained in the teachings of Buddha, if we look back, from the time of birth until now the mother has been extremely kind.

But what did we do from our side? She gave so much incredible benefit, happiness, and perfection to us. What she has done is so much. I mentioned briefly yesterday the four ways of recognizing and remembering the kindness. But what did we do? What benefit did we offer the mother? What did we do in return? Only caused trouble. As a child, as a baby we gave kaka and peepee. When we were a baby it was kaka and peepee all the time, so many times a day, making our mother’s hands dirty, making the place filthy. Even at night time, when she was supposed to have a comfortable sleep, we did not allow her to sleep. During the day she couldn’t relax, she couldn’t have a good time, and at night she was supposed to have a good sleep. But at night we would cry, not even letting her have a good sleep. For hours and hours we would not let her sleep. Also during the day we didn’t give her any peace, screaming for hours and hours, bothering her so much by crying, asking, “I want this and that.” All the time disturbing her and being a nuisance.

“Nuisance?” I think I learned that word before. Actually, I memorized so much vocabulary, but I lived in a place where there was no one who spoke the language. There were 1,500 monks. I tried to memorize many words from Time magazine, because it looked interesting. Of course there were many that were very hard to understand, but it was interesting. Somehow Time magazine is better, offers more interesting reading than the other papers, Indian newspapers. There were so many words. I make a kind of small dictionary and memorized so many piles of words. Then I forgot them because there was no place to use them—just with Indian officials. Sometimes I would say a few words that I could remember to them. Like, “How are you?” “Good morning,” all these things. Then mostly in everyday life I was talking to Tibetan monks, so it was of no benefit, however many words I had memorized.

Afterwards, Lama Yeshe and I met the first Western student, Zina. She had a title. I think her father had the title of King, so probably for important letters she would write her name as Princess Rachevsky. After some time, we came to Nepal with her, staying at Kopan. For a few years I had much interest in learning English, but I didn’t learn English the skillful way, the proper way. Then after some time of reading more lam-rim teachings or the graduated path to enlightenment, I lost interest. That is why I still have broken English, as the old students know very well.

So, what one did in return, what one did for the parents, for the mother, was to make a nuisance of oneself. As a child, one gave all this trouble, and as a grown-up one got more education, and then came the time when you were able to support yourself—all this by the kindness of the mother. For what you received, instead of being kind to your mother, instead of repaying her by remembering her kindness, what you do in return is to say very hasty words. To beat her if you can. If you are able to beat her, you beat her. You try to use your mother, your mother becomes a person for you to use. Instead of yourself becoming useful to the mother, she becomes someone for you to use.

What you give in return is fear, worry, and upset, instead of bringing more and more peace by being a good example and by having the thought of loving kindness. If after all this, after they worked so hard and gave you your body, being so kind, if after all this you don’t make use of this body to take the essence, then there can be nothing more foolish then this. If, after your body has been fed and taken care of with so much hardship by the parents, you don’t make it the cause to be able to take the essence, utilizing this precious human body for practicing holy Dharma, there can be nothing more ignorant than this. If, in this life, in this body, we cannot make ourselves take the essence, utilizing this and practicing the holy Dharma, it is very foolish. If possible, in this life, with this body, we should make ourselves have bodhicitta in our minds, while we have this body, this present human body. If we cannot do that before the time of death, what we should do is at least make ourselves able to see the absolute nature of the self—at least. The main thing to try to have in our minds is the utmost need of cutting off and eradicating the root of samsara, ignorance. If you can’t do that, then at least try to have the realization, the thought renouncing samsara in your mind before death. Take the essence; we should be able to take the essence of this body, at least having generated the realization, the thought to renounce samsara. Even if one does not enter the Mahayana path, one should have entered the lesser vehicle path, the path to nirvana. One should be able to enter the path to the blissful state of peace. If this is not possible—if the three fundamental principals of the path to enlightenment cannot be completed with this body received from the present parents, by their kindness—then on the basis of the three principal path, these fundamental realizations, we should at least begin the realization in our minds, even though we cannot accomplish the whole path, up to the omniscient mind, in this life.

Even though we cannot accomplish the second stage, the illusory and clear light, the second stage of the graduated path of accomplishment, we can at least begin the realizations in our mind.

There are two stages of tantra, the path of the secret mantra. Within the path of the secret mantra, there are the path of generation and the path of accomplishment. Even if we cannot make it, even if we cannot have the realization of the second path, the illusory body and clear light, before death happens, we should start the realization of the graduated path of generation.

Maybe we cannot be what is called a bodhisattva, which is so much admired in the Mahayana sutra teachings—in those teachings given by Guru Shakyamuni Buddha and in those written by pandits and Tibetan lamas, with commentaries by Tibetan lamas, the bodhicitta which is so much admired, which is ... (I think some spirit is putting in the wrong words). Anyway, there is so much benefit, as it is explained in the first chapter of the Bodhicaryavatara, in these teachings, in generating bodhicitta, the realization which is called the ultimate good heart, bodhicitta. Maybe we cannot manage to generate bodhicitta in our minds in this present life. We cannot be the fortunate person, the fortunate practitioner who is called a bodhisattva. It may not be possible in this life to become a bodhisattva, receiving the label, the name of bodhisattva, the holy being.

Of course, those who haven’t met the teachings of the graduated path to enlightenment, the complete path to enlightenment with nothing missing, the path to achieve omniscient mind; those who haven’t met the Buddhadharma and the virtuous friend who reveals the methods to subdue the mind—what can they do? Those people have not met the method and have not met the virtuous friend who reveals that method, so what can they do? They don’t have the freedom that we have to practice. It is so difficult, what can they do? Not having freedom or richness. We have met this particular teaching which contains the complete advice, the path to enlightenment. We have met the virtuous friend who revealed the teachings and from our side we have received the precious human body, qualified with the eight freedoms and ten richnesses, Now, if you don’t try, if you don’t practice, if you don’t try to have some change in the mind by applying the method and the advice; if you don’t try to make any progress in this mind in this life, while you have this perfect human body, while you have received this perfect, precious human body qualified with the eight freedom and ten richnesses, it is very upsetting.

If you have received the perfect teachings with nothing missing, such as these teachings on the graduated path to enlightenment, and if you have met the virtuous friend who reveals it, then if you never practice, never change the mind, always constantly following anger and the selfish attitude, always letting yourself be under the control of such strong attachment and ignorance, it is very poor. If, instead of utilizing this perfect human body to accumulate virtue, the cause of happiness of the life beyond this, we utilize this perfect human body only to accumulate non-virtue, the cause of the suffering in this life and the life beyond, if it is used as the cause for oneself to become the firewood of the naraks, then it is very poor, it is very upsetting.

First of all we give so much trouble to our parents and are unable to repay their kindness, giving them so many problems, so much fear and worry. Secondly, if we can’t make any preparation for the happiness of the future life while there is incredible freedom, with every necessary condition gathered together, then we are much more ignorant, much more foolish than those people who haven’t heard Dharma teachings to subdue the mind and make preparations for the happiness of future lives. We are much more foolish, much more ignorant than those who haven’t heard them at all. Much more so even than the mute animals, the pigs, the turtles. (What is that one? One animal that lives in the mud, that has a pointed nose? It has a huge body. That is right, rhinoceros. It sleeps in the mud. “Rhinoceros” sounds a little bit like “renunciation.”) You see, you cannot criticize them, saying that they are not practicing Dharma. Also snakes. Because of the body that they have taken, the pigs, the rhinoceros, and the crocodiles—what can they do? Nothing. Because of their body, since the body that is called “animal” has been taken, there is nothing they can do. They didn’t receive even just a precious human body, let alone a perfect human body and the opportunity to meet the virtuous friend and the ability to hear all the complete teachings.

So now, if we don’t try to change—having heard and listened to the Buddhadharma, and particularly to the teachings on the graduated path to enlightenment and the Mahayana teachings on bodhicitta—after having listened to such precious teachings, if we don’t try to change the mind, if we don’t do something to change the mind, we are more ignorant than those animals.

There has been no change since beginningless life. From beginningless rebirths until now there has been no change in the mind. None of these disturbing thoughts have decreased. Just thinking that it did not have a beginning is something very fearful, something that cracks the heart—thinking that this ignorance, this anger and attachment, these things, the disturbing thoughts that give you problems all the time, didn’t have any beginning. There was no beginning to these disturbing thoughts and the selfish attitude that harms us, tortures us. Even just thinking that it didn’t have a beginning, about how much it has tortured us and given us problems, is something that we cannot keep for even a minute, even a second in our hearts. It is like fire sparks that spring onto the flesh of the body, onto the skin, and that you have to throw away immediately—you can’t stand it to be there for even a few seconds.

Due to ignorance we don’t remember all the past harms that were given by the disturbing thoughts, and even now you are not aware how it is harming, not letting you have peace in the mind. We are much more foolish, much more ignorant actually than those very ignorant animals who are regarded as deeply ignorant—we who have all this. We, who have heard all these precious teachings, especially the teachings on bodhicitta. If we don’t get any practice done, don’t get some change, some progression in the mind in this life, there is nothing more ignorant, there is nothing more foolish than this.

As the great bodhisattva Shantideva says in the Bodhicaryavatara (I don’t remember the first word, however, the essence is this), “After having found the perfect human body, not utilizing it to practice, not training the mind in virtue—there is nothing more ignorant than this. There is nothing more foolish than this...” I don’t remember it exactly word by word, but Shantideva expressed it something like this. Then also, after having found such a body having this freedom, if I don’t train in virtue, when I become a suffering transmigrating being experiencing and being overwhelmed by suffering, deeply ignorant, at that time, what can I do?

There are more quotations. However, in short the conclusion is that by putting the teachings that one has understood from reading, from listening, and from the notes that one made into action, one should, if possible, have less anger tomorrow than today. Day by day, if possible, even between two days, we should try to make some progression, we should be able to have some little bit of progression. Even if that is not possible, then month by month. Next month—better, less dissatisfactory mind, less anger, less pride. Even if you cannot do this with all the disturbing thoughts, at least make some change with anger, which is like having hot red coals inside your body, inside your chest, in the heart. Like the coal in the fire, so painful. At least, if you cannot make some change, if you cannot decrease other disturbing thoughts, at least you work with anger, so that it becomes smaller next month, and you have more patience than before. Even such progression as this, from month to month, from year to year.

If possible, do the same with all the rest of the disturbing thoughts by applying the lam-rim teachings. At least make it less, try to have less anger when somebody disturbs you, when somebody bothers you and disturbs your happiness, when somebody disturbs your peace. Try to have peace in your mind at that time. You see, it is easy to practice when there are no problems, it is easy to talk about practicing Dharma. But when there is a problem, when somebody is disturbing your happiness and your desire, when somebody is not letting you be successful—if at those times you can remember and put this into action, applying these teachings, methods, and meditations—if instead of rising anger you can establish peace and happiness by practicing patience, then you are brave, you are the real hero.

When death comes it should at least be like this: even though you don’t have other realizations, whenever death shows up, one morning, one night, while you are sleeping, while you are eating, while you are traveling, or while you are having a party, whatever it is, even in a meditation session, because you have been trying to face the disturbing thoughts, trying to control the negative mind, you don’t feel upset, because this stops you from accumulating any heavy negative karma. Whenever death shows up, suddenly comes upon you and you start to experience it, there is no worry, no upset. Like thinking, “Oh, I haven’t done any practice. Oh, I have done such and such negative karma, I gave such and such a harm to others.” This fear and worry doesn’t come. When death comes there is less fear and worry, without the need to be born in the realm of the suffering transmigrating beings. From this perfect human body of the happy transmigrating being, you go to another happy body. Then you do better practice. Like this, you go from happiness to happiness. From life to life you go from happiness to happiness, you go on the path of happiness to enlightenment. If you work, trying to subdue the mind at least like this, then there is such a possibility.

Otherwise, after all this hard work done by your parents with great loving thought, taking care of you, giving you whatever education you have—that whole thing has been used to create the cause for the lower realms. Instead of taking the body of the happy transmigrating being, we take the suffering body of the miserable transmigrating being. In that way, then, we were born just to suffer, we were born just to cause suffering to our parents. If we don’t get some progression in our mind in this life, we were born just to give trouble to others. We were born to the parents just to give them trouble, to cause problems for the parents and for other sentient beings. It is like that.

I didn’t mean to speak so much like this, but again, it just happened. So this is something to keep in mind, especially when you question the meaning of life.

27 November, am

Maybe you think that sentient beings are not kind now. They were kind, they benefited before, they were our mothers before in other lives, but they are not kind now. In that case, you should remember that your own mother didn’t give you your body today, she gave birth to you a long time ago. If you are over eighty—I don’t know if there is any person here who is over eighty, who has reached that age—however, if you are over 100, even though the mother didn’t give birth to you today, she is still your mother. Even though it was that many years ago, that many months and days ago, she is still your mother, she is still kind.

In relation to the person who was very kind, who gave us food when we were very hungry yesterday, or the person who guided and protected us when we were in danger of falling down the precipices, “Oh yes, he was very kind yesterday, but not today.” If you say that the sentient beings are not kind because of the time, because it was in other lifetimes, if you use that as a reason for saying that they are not kind, then that should be the same thing, the same reason. Today we remember it so much, we tell other people, all our friends—I am not sure about telling the enemy or not—to all the people we say how he is such a kind person, we admire and we talk about that person. For me, he is very kind. The parents and those people who helped in the past, who have protected us from life dangers and from problems, we think they are very kind because we remember these things. It is only because of not remembering that other sentient beings have been our mother and kind at other times, it is only due to ignorance that we don’t feel the same way towards them.

When you do the meditation, after you have generated the very strong feeling remembering or feeling the kindness of the present mother from the depth of the heart, as it is explained in the teaching, those four main ways, then, after analyzing, you can do a little bit of fixed, single-pointed meditation, without the mind being distracted, continuously thinking that she is incredibly kind. Then you do the same thing for the sentient beings in each realm.

After doing the analyzing meditation, you think that they, each of the sentient beings, have been kind, extremely kind in these four ways, and then you do single-pointed meditation placing the mind on that great kindness. Just keep repeating that they are extremely kind, that they are extremely kind, like this. Do single-pointed meditation on the narak beings, the preta beings, and the animal beings—how they have been kind in the four ways.

What these kind mother sentient beings wish for is happiness and what they do not wish for is suffering, but they are ignorant about the cause of suffering and the cause of happiness. So, repaying their kindness by giving them food and clothing, the temporal needs, and benefiting them by giving material possessions is not the best solution for them, it is not the best way to repay their kindness. In past lives they were millionaires many times. Numberless times were American millionaires, English millionaires, French millionaires—I am not sure about Nepalese millionaires. Anyway, numberless times they have been kings, with so much power and so many possessions. They were even kings of the deva realms, where the worldly gods live, where there are incredible enjoyments. Compared to the deva world, compared to the devas’ material perfections and wealth, we in the human world are like beggars, like those in primitive places in Tibet, Nepal, or India, or in some of the African countries. No matter how wealthy, how rich the human being, this is nothing compared to the deva realms, compared to their wealth and their enjoyment. Numberless times they were even kings, such as Indra or Brahma, the possessors of those devas realms’ perfections and great powers, hut even though they has all this, it still didn’t help them be free from samsara. So this is not the best way. This is not the best solution to benefit others. It is not the peerless, incomparable action for benefiting others.

Since what they need is happiness and what they do not wish for is suffering, in order to benefit them we should help them to create the cause for ultimate happiness and be free from the true cause of sufferings. Liberating them from suffering, guiding sentient beings in this way, is the best way to repay the kindness of all sentient beings. If you are considering repaying the kindness of this present life’s parents or repaying anybody who is kind, anybody whom you think is extremely kind to you, this way of repaying them is the best.

The mother sentient beings are separated from the leader of the blind [Rinpoche calls it the “blind leader”], the virtuous friend. They don’t have the dharma wisdom eye, knowing the right thing to be done, the cause of happiness, and what is the wrong thing, the cause of suffering that has to renounced. Each minute, each second they step over the precipices, put their feet over the precipices of the lower realms by creating non-virtuous actions. Either with the body or with the speech or with the mind, all the time, like this. So if one wishes to help and to benefit them, if one wishes to repay them, as I explained before, one can. There is an opportunity if from one’s own side one does something. There is the capability, there is the opportunity. Oneself has met the leader of the blind, the virtuous friend. One has met the teachings and has that much dharma wisdom to discriminate what is the right thing to practice and what is the wrong thing, the thing that should be renounced. There is a great opportunity from one’s own side to repay them, to liberate all sentient beings from all their sufferings and to lead them into ultimate happiness.

If one has no concern for them or for repaying their kindness constantly day and night, all the time one thinks, “When can I be happy? How wonderful if I were this and that. How greatly happy I would be!” All the time, keeping nothing else in the mind, in the heart—only my happiness, only me, only I and my happiness. One only has I, my happiness, in the heart—nothing else, day and night, all the time, completely working for that. Even other sentient beings are used for that, creatures and human beings. So many other sentient beings are used for one person’s happiness, one’s own happiness. It is like when the mother is being attacked by tigers—one tiger attacking in front, one tiger attacking from behind, one tiger attacking from the side, and she is in the middle, while you are in the top of the trees. You are sitting in the top of the tree singing while she, the kind mother, is suffering so much. The daughter or the son to whom she has been very kind is satisfied that, “I am not in danger.” You are free from the danger of the tigers, and satisfied because you are happy, not having to meet these dangers. You are singing, without any concern for helping the mother. How that is upsetting! How that attitude is selfish and hurtful for the mother.

The minds of kind mother sentient beings, who have been extremely kind to oneself, are exactly like this: crazy or possessed by the spirit or the mara, the poisonous mind and the disturbing thoughts, anger, ignorance, and attachment. They are constantly seeking the three types of sufferings: the pervasive and compounding suffering, the changing suffering, and the suffering of suffering, again and again. So, like the example, if you are satisfied that only you are happy, without any concern or thought for others, if you don’t attempt to repay their kindness, you are incredibly selfish. It is very upsetting—a characteristic such as this is very hurting, very upsetting.

I used the wrong word before, I think. It should be “leader of the blind,” not the leader who is blind. I mean the opposite, the leader of the blind person—I don’t mean that the person who leads has to be blind.

When you realize that the sentient beings have been your mothers and are kind, and you want to repay their kindness, you see them in the aspect of beauty, as in the example that I gave before. Those who realize that the mother is extremely kind see the mother—with the enemy, stranger, or other people—in the aspect of beauty. It is the same with someone who has been extremely kind. You don’t see them in the same way as the enemy and the stranger. This is not the beauty that comes in the newspapers, where there are articles to sell things, advertisements. It is not the beauty that comes in the advertisements, with pictures of the materials. Instead, mainly by remembering and realizing the kindness, you get a warm feeling. In that aspect of beauty. Thinking of them generates the beauty of love, realizing that they have been the mother and have been kind. Also, we reflect on the thought of repaying their kindness. Then after this, the great thought of loving kindness is generated. The object of our thought of loving kindness is not only human beings, not only animal beings, not only physical beings, those who have a body, not only those whom we can see now, not only the worldly gods, the suras and asuras, or the formless gods, those who are in the realm of the happy transmigrating beings—but also those other suffering transmigrating beings, those whom we don’t see now, spirits or narak beings. All sentient beings, including arhats and bodhisattvas, who have not attained the state of omniscient mind, are the object of our thought of loving kindness. The object is the enemy, the friend, and the stranger, as well as all the rest of the sentient beings.

“Sentient being” generally means somebody having a mind. Buddha would also be a sentient being in that general sense, just generally having consciousness, by that definition. But in this case, for whom we are going to accomplish the state of omniscient mind, for whom we are going to practice the holy dharma, for whom do we live life, for whom we our actions in everyday life—”sentient beings” means those who are not freed from obscurations, who have not completed the excellences of the complete realizations. It is the same thing when it says in the teachings the “sentient beings,” the sem.chen.tha.cha—”all sentient beings.” That is labeled on these sentient beings, on these types of living beings.

If there is one sentient being, one enemy, left out from your thought of loving kindness, if the person who disturbs your happiness is left out from the object of your love, or from your thought of loving kindness, it is not great, it doesn’t receive the name “great.” It is a thought of loving kindness, but it is not the great one.

Not only that. Not only is the object all sentient beings who have the aspect of being devoid of happiness, such as the suffering transmigrating beings, who are devoid of temporal happiness, but also, even those beings in the higher realms, even those happy transmigrating beings, those who have temporal pleasures, are devoid of ultimate happiness. What they wish, what they are seeking is happiness. What they believe that they are working for is the cause of happiness, but actually, in practice, they are constantly destroying the cause of happiness, as if it were their enemy. Even when somebody explains or somebody gives teachings, saying that these are the causes of happiness, the way of creating the causes for happiness, they are scared to understand, not giving themselves the opportunity to create the cause of happiness, to understand and to create the cause of happiness. Even the little that has been created is destroyed. They destroy it by the enemy, by rising anger, like this. There are even those who have the understanding of the cause of happiness but who are too lazy to create the cause of happiness. Even those who are not ignorant, who have the understanding, are too lazy to accomplish the cause of happiness.

Looking at sentient beings and how they are devoid of temporal and ultimate happiness, think, “In their actions, what do they do?” They do the opposite. In practice, they only make mistakes. Then think, how wonderful it would be if they had happiness and the cause of happiness. And I will cause that to happen. Then think that you are not only wishing them happiness, not only concentrating or focusing on the object, the sentient beings who are in the aspect of being devoid of happiness, that you are not only wishing them to have happiness, but, “I want, I will cause them to have this happiness.” This is the great thought of loving kindness, the Mahayana thought of loving kindness.

It is the same thing with great compassion, Mahayana compassion. The object is everybody—friend, enemy, stranger, and all the rest of the sentient beings. Again, if the enemy is left out it doesn’t become Mahayana compassion, great compassion, the compassion of the great vehicle—it doesn’t become the compassion of the great vehicle. The object of compassion is the enemy, the friend, the stranger and all the rest of the sentient beings—it covers and focuses upon them. Their aspect is that they are suffering. The way to think is that what they do not wish, what they do not like, is suffering, but in practice, what they do is always run and create the cause of suffering. Always they keep themselves busy, day and night, to create the cause for suffering. Even having worry and fear of not having accomplished enough causes of suffering, they want even more, even heavier. If you look at them, if you watch sentient beings, it is like this.

Lama Atisha was one highly realized pandit who raised the Buddhadharma in Tibet. He was the originator of the Kadampa lineage, the lineage of the Kadampa advice. His closest disciple Dromtonpa asked this question to his guru, Lama Atisha, “What would be the result of only seeking happiness for this life?” Lama Atisha answered that the result would be the narak, preta, or animal realms. The ripening aspect would be taking this birth. Actions done with the mind not possessed by attachment, anger, or ignorance would result in rebirth among the happy transmigrating beings.

Now look at all the creatures in the ocean. You just look at all the creatures who are in the ocean, those fish, from the great ones, who have the largest bodies, the whales, with bodies like the size of a mountain, down to the tiniest creatures that you can see only through machines. They all are under the ocean, keeping so busy, running day and night. Their attitude is seeking only this life, “Oh, if only I could be happy!” That is all, keeping busy. Those creatures under the ground, same thing. Those creatures who are crawling over the ground, who are keeping so busy, those ants, those creatures who are over the ground and in the bushes. Those birds flying in the sky, those tiny ones, those tiny flies, all these—the attitude that they have is seeking only this life, nothing else, “If only I could be happy!” Day and night, they keep busy, flying back and forth.

Now look at the human beings who live in the city or those who live in a primitive place, in underdeveloped countries, or in developed countries. Those who live in the richest apartments and those who live in huts. Those who are running in the car—not “running in the car,” you cannot run in the car!—those who travel by vehicles and those who go by ship or who travel by airplane. Look at their attitude. First you look at their life, at their outside appearance, then you look at their attitude. Poor and rich, all those things. The outside appearance and then the attitude. You see, even though they have a different body called “human being,” the attitude is exactly the same, seeking only this life, “If only I could be happy!” All these actions, all these works are possessed by the non-virtuous thought, the attachment seeking only the happiness of this life.

As Lama Atisha answered Lama Dromtonpa: the result of all these non-virtuous actions of all the worldly dharmas is the rebirth of suffering transmigrating beings. Day and night they are constantly running, keeping busy in order to create the cause of suffering, the mind being completely ignorant of the cause of the suffering. Even those who know the cause, who have an understanding of the cause of suffering, are lazy about eliminating the cause.

When you generate the great thought of loving kindness, think even of those arhats and bodhisattvas who are devoid of the sublime happiness, enlightenment. Similarly, think of those who have the knowing obscurations, the obscurations to achieving omniscient mind. Then think how wonderful it would be if they were free from all sufferings and all the causes of sufferings. Do not only wish them to be free, but determine, “I will cause them to separate from suffering and the cause of suffering.” This is great compassion, the compassion of the great vehicle.

I think I stop here.

27 November, pm

There are animals like the one that I heard about (I didn’t see it with my own eyes but other people saw it, it was their experience, so I shouldn’t contradict them completely).

The place where I lived for about eight years, Buxa, where 1,500 monks lived, at that place there were many leeches outside in the summer time. Even if you went for peepee outside, when you came back inside you had leeches. The Bhutanese or the Indian and Nepalese workers, the laborers, when they had leeches they put them on a stone and then they crushed them, and chopped them like chili. I heard from the other monks that the skin dries up, it becomes dry pieces and then when the rain comes, somehow the consciousness takes place on those, so that each one becomes a living being. That piece of the body has a consciousness, the consciousness takes place on that, like on a fertilized egg. Similar to what is called “entering rebirth.” Similar to the consciousness that takes place inside the fruit. Sometimes it is possible that the worm goes in from the outside—with the physical body it makes a hole and goes inside. But also, there are worms that are born inside the fruit without there being any holes. In Tibet there are rocks where you don’t see any holes, but when the laborers who cut stones crack the rock open, they find frogs or other animals inside.

Also at the same place, Buxa, all the monks’ beds were made out of bamboo. They went into the forest to cut it. It is a very hot place, and especially in the summer time you cannot wear all your clothes. During the pujas they had to wear them, but otherwise it was so hot that many monks lived without wearing the outside robes. Inside the house they just wear the underskirt. Many monks washed every day. They have a bath every day, then every two days, three days, like that. Anyway, I am not going to carry on with that story. What I was talking about was the bamboo.

Those buildings were used as a prison or a concentration camp during the British times for the prime minister Nehru, and Gandhi. There is a very long building that has very strong doors with a lot of bars, and all the windows were covered with barbed wire. Also outside the house. Between the windows there were many holes for guns or whatever it is, small holes. Indira Gandhi’s’ father and the prime minister Nehru’s prison was turned into our college, into Sera’s puja and meditation hall after the monks came from Lhasa. Then Gandhi’s prison was turned into a nunnery. So many monks lived in one hall. There were no walls between them. The different groups of college monks wanted to have quiet, or to do their own practice. They wanted to have walls, so gradually because it was so crowded inside the monks went to the forest, collected bamboo, and made small huts or small rooms for themselves as they found a place outside. Afterwards as the years went by wherever there was a space it would be completely filled with small rooms made of bamboo. One monk brought bamboo. I think it was one monk who lived near the house, maybe in the same house. For the rooms they made curtains, sometimes out of cloth or out of bamboo, things like that. He told me that he had gone and brought bamboo from the forest. Then at the house when he was cutting the bamboo (there were no holes in it at all), he found a snake inside. In a similar way, when there are worms inside the stomach, they did not necessarily come with the food so that it is the mistake of the cook. The worms did not necessarily come with the food or something. If there is the condition inside the stomach and one has created the karma, and also the worm has created this karma, the consciousness takes place in the stomach from the intermediate stage. It doesn’t have to come from somebody talking to you, somebody breathing on you, somebody presenting it to you through his breath. It doesn’t have to be like that. I could mention more amazing things.

In Tibet, when they carry a load they have a leather strap. Those who have been to the mountains for trekking, like in Solu-Khumbu, might have noticed that when the porters are carrying things they use this leather strap so much. In the center it is wide to cover the head, and then it goes finer and finer like this, and sometimes also it is wet. One person used to travel each year, and he needed this leather strap. Because it was kept inside the house it became completely dry and unusable. I think maybe he was preparing to go somewhere so he put the dried leather strap in the water stream for a few days, maybe seven days, something like that, so it became very soft. He put one stone on top so that it wouldn’t get lost in the water. After seven days when he came down to check, the strap had become an animal. The wider side became the face, and two eyes came out. I think on one end was a ring to tighten the string, and that ring came exactly in the mouth. The ring somehow got stuck in the mouth of the animal. It had two eyes, and the narrowest part became the tail. This is dependent on the sentient beings’ karma and also the conditions. This is how we should think about these things.

For example, say some people are trekking or crossing over the snow peaks, those dangerous mountains from where stones come falling down, and an avalanche comes and some people completely disappear, while others are left on top. This couldn’t be explained exactly, one couldn’t say the cause exactly. When they are in the same group, in the same line, some people completely disappear and some people are left. When some people come, an avalanche happens, when somebody else comes to the same place, nothing happens. Also, when crossing this dangerous mountain from which the stones fall down, when one person passes through nothing happens; no noise, nothing, no distraction, no disturbance, nothing; but when some other people come, a stone falls down and hits them over the fingers, or they are completely killed under the stones.

We have mountains like this in Solu Khumbu when crossing from one village to another. In the place called Thangme, where I was born, if you want to go from that village to the other side of the Sherpa country, to the valley of Roling, you have to cross the snow peaks. There are many different places, different villages of the Sherpas. If you cross, when you come to the side of Solu Khumbu, Thangme, and Namche Bazaar, you have to cross these snow peaks and those are very dangerous trails.

I went back and forth four times, but of course I didn’t walk with my feet. I was very small the first time, especially the first times—anyway, all the time I was carried on the top of a basket. First by one person, then the other times I was carried by my second teacher who taught me the alphabet. He carried me on top of his blankets. Then the food, and fire-wood, and then grass to put down at night when you sleep in the caves—that keeps you warm, and also we can put it in the shoes. They have no socks, so in the place of socks you put grass, dry grass. The bottom is leather, then on top is woolen cloth. It is very cold, especially when the snow makes it very wet. So you put grass inside, and it keeps the feet very warm, and then when it gets wet, after some time it gets very cold, so again you change. You throw that grass away, and change. My teacher carried all this, our food and everything, and on top he was carrying me. He fed me with the food that he had brought from the house. He passed it on like this, back to me.

Just on the flat snow, the snow fell down many times. I don’t remember so much with my teacher, but with the other person, it fell down many times. Not completely into the cracks, but just a little bit, it slipped. I crossed this dangerous mountain four times, I think, but nothing ever happened. It is very strange—usually the Sherpas stop before they cross this very dangerous mountain. It doesn’t take very long, but it is so dangerous. So they stop here and drink wine, very strong alcohol, made from potatoes. This is collected from the drops of vapor that come from cooking potatoes. It is collected for many hours drop by drop, into a small pot. It is not necessary to talk about the details of this. When they make this wine it looks like a stupa. It looks like they are building a stupa on top of the fireplace because there is one huge pot, then a smaller one, then a smaller one, and then on the very top there is one small one. They cook the small potatoes that are normally given to the animals, which people don’t eat. They cook them inside the pot with lots of water. Then they put another small pot inside, and the vapor goes way up there, and the drops leak inside the small pot. By collecting one drop, two drops, like this, it becomes potato alcohol.

At that time they stop to drink this and then they rub their hands to generate heat (I don’t know why they generate heat because to cross this danger heat doesn’t help). Everybody carries huge loads, three or four of these butter tins, these huge, square tins that you see in the Nepalese shops. Also they take animals, yaks. There is no real road, you have to walk over stones. They push these animals—they don’t walk so they have to push them. It is amazing how hard the life of a Sherpa is.

I don’t remember when I first crossed this way, but all four times that I crossed, each time, when our group had completed the track, when the last person of our group had reached there from across the dangerous trail, the stones came. It happened several times—whenever we reached the other side there would be a lot of noise like thundering, a noise like when huge stones fall down and then small ones come down. When the huge ones come, “drin, drin, drin,” it makes an incredibly huge noise, and then the small ones, they come, “schirr,” like this, then they hit down below on the rocks and it makes a lot of noise. It is very terrifying. I was kind of worried that maybe something would happen to the last person but everybody finished. I think that also Westerners and some Sherpas got killed there. My first alphabet teacher, one of his fingers was curved so the story was that when he was crossing this place, one tiny stone fell down and hit this finger.

While you are driving the car, for example, a stone or a tree falls down onto a car. There are so many cars going, but it falls down over that car and that person gets killed or injured or whatever. Why? The question is, why? There are so many cars, so why did it happen particularly to that person’s car? There is a reason created from the side of the person. That condition is not truly existent, that condition doesn’t exist from its own side. We say, “Without any reason,” however, it is that person’s creation, even though the person is not aware of it. The evolution of that disaster, that the tree fell down over him and injured him, the reason that happened particularly to him is because it is that person’s creation, the creation of his unsubdued mind and karma. That appearance, the tree falling down and him getting injured, that appearance or that disaster came from his unsubdued mind. That is also an appearance, and that fearful, suffering appearance came from the unsubdued mind.

Similarly, with deformed or handicapped children, it is not the fault of the parents that the child was born handicapped like that. As the scientists explain it there is something missing or something wrong with the egg or the blood, or in the sperm that came from the father. There is something missing, maybe in the atoms that form that part of the limbs, the leg, arm or whatever it is. They explain the physical conditions, but they haven’t explained the inner ones yet. They explain it from the physical side, from the side of the physical conditions and the physical cause, but they haven’t explained anything from the side of the one who created that kind of physical condition.

According to the parents’ wish they want their child, every child—even if they make one hundred children—to be the most beautiful child in the world, more beautiful than any of those other children who are living in this world. They haven’t purposely arranged for it to have missing limbs or to have blind eyes. So there is no answer. The parents didn’t arrange it that way on purpose. If they had prayed they would have prayed for it to have perfect organs, to be a beautiful child.

Because there is no understanding of karma and no understanding of the inner cause, there is no answer to the question of why, when this child was born, he was born handicapped. Perhaps someone might give the answer, “Because of time.” But then, what was caused the child to born at that particular time? What caused the child to be born at the time when there was an imperfect egg? There is no answer, you see. Has it got an answer? In the past we discussed this, but it collapsed after a time, we didn’t find any answer. Is there something to say, is there any answer to why the person was born at such a time? What would you say?

Answer: Karma!

Rinpoche: But the scientists wouldn’t say “Karma.” Anyway, we’ll forget it. It is very important to check and not be satisfied with the answer of time. If you stop there it is kind of foolish. “Because of time”—that is no proof. That is uncomfortable. If you stop there it is not comfortable. It is just hanging in space. Without talking much, the creation of that imperfect egg and the particular person’s consciousness taking that place is the creation of that child’s unsubdued mind, the karma that was accumulated in the past with the unsubdued mind. What the parents wish is beautiful, perfect organs, but what actually came out in front of their eyes is the opposite of what they like—a freak, a mutation, something kind of unbelievable came out. The parents have something that they didn’t expect and that they did not wish for, like finding that the child has imperfect organs, and that appearance also came from their unsubdued mind, and is a creation of their unsubdued mind.

It is similar to when you put hairs in water. If some sentient beings have created the karma to take a hair as their body, then, that consciousness would take that hair in its wetness. The conditions gather like that, the consciousness takes place on that—so it becomes a sentient being. Before it was a hair, later it became a sentient being. There are many similar things, like with the leather. Before it was just leather, it wasn’t a sentient being, but later it became a sentient being. Similarly with tsampa or flour. If you keep it long, if you don’t eat it very fast (I’m joking), if you keep it for a long time (because if you eat it fast you won’t find such delicious tsampa again), anyway, as it gets older and the conditions are created, if there are sentient beings who have created the karma in the intermediate state to reincarnate in tsampa the consciousness will take place in the tsampa. Then it becomes full of mother sentient beings.

You cannot generalize. When the body or the limbs of some animals are cut the consciousness does not necessarily stay in every piece of the body. I would say that the consciousness would probably be in the main part of the body, probably not in the limbs. If the limbs are cut and separated from the main body, then, unless the consciousness immediately leaves the body, it may remain in the main part, at the heart. When you get angry, where does the anger come from? The anger does not come from the legs. The anger does not arise from the toes or from inside the fingers; the anger or attachment do not come from there. Where do you feel it when the anger arises? Where do you think the anger is? When the anger arises, where do you think it is or from where do you think it arises? Where do you feel the pain when the anger comes? Or the fear? Does fear come from the head? Do you feel fear in the head, or where?

Answer: Here!
Rinpoche: Yes? I see, in the chest; not in the head, not in the brain? The anger is not in the brain, but in the chest? Is it the same thing with anger and fear, they are not in the brain?
Answer: If I think I am scared it is in the brain. If I look at all the conditions I gather, all the information in my brain, that helps create fear in my ...... (fades out).
Rinpoche: If you create all the conditions it helps to bring up fear in the heart? Isn’t the brain the main place of the mind? So in the brain there is not anger or fear at all? Heh? How much is the anger able to spread? How much does it cover?
Answer: The whole body.
Rinpoche: Yeah? Without talking much—in the heart, when strong attachment rises that is where you feel pain. When strong anger or pride rises, where do you feel the pain? There, I am in the heart.

Usually it is possible that the consciousness is there, it might be abiding there if it had not immediately split from the body. According to the being’s karma it might gather, it might abide there. You cannot say it is one hundred percent certain concerning human beings or animals; generally it is like this. But as far as narak beings are concerned we have a good point to discuss. If you turn the discussion to the narak beings’ particular sufferings you have a good point. If an animal’s body is cut it could be difficult to say with a hundred percent certainty that there is no consciousness suffering in the other parts of the body.

[Tom asks if amoebas are sentient beings.]

Rinpoche: I can’t say one hundred percent certain if it is a sentient being or not a sentient being. There is probably no particular name in Tibetan with the connotation that it is a sentient being. If it just has life I cannot say for sure whether it is a sentient being or not. So what you should do is to ask Buddha, ask somebody who has reliable clairvoyance. You ask and he might give the answer. I think that in Tibetan medicine the doctors do talk about it and also in the teachings they talk about very tiny creatures that you cannot see with the eye, so tiny that they run through the cells or the blood. I think this is a kind of infection, things that itch or spread. I myself would say according to experience, when there is an infection in a sensitive place I think it looks like they are tiny creatures. But I don’t know whether other monks would say the same thing.

There was one question about lamas and laminis? There are lamas, so somebody asked a question about “laminis.” There are many laminis. I don’t know why the name has not come out. Maybe you should try. One who has omniscient mind—the complete quality of the cessation, the purity, and the realization—is a lama. That is a lama, that is the highest lama. The higher bodhisattvas who are free from disturbing thoughts are also lamas. Then the bodhisattva who has bodhicitta and who has accomplished the second stage of tantra, of the graduated path of accomplishment; who has those experiences, whose mind has approached the highest stages of tantra, having accomplished the illusory body and clear light on the basis of the three principal paths of enlightenment: renunciation, bodhicitta, and the wisdom realizing voidness—that is also a lama. Then the arhat, who is liberated from samsara, is also a lama. Even those who have bodhicitta are lama, they are that much lama. So why not laminis? It is just a matter of having these qualities and these realizations. It is just a matter of being able to lessen the disturbing thoughts and obscurations. When you have these realizations you can publicize them. (I have forgotten the word, when you show something that you have to sell in the newspaper, a property or something, you advertise it.) If you have these realizations and you are female you can advertise it through television and in the newspapers: “Lamini .......!”

It is good to think of those who have the title “lama” as having these realizations and to regard them as holy beings. It is good, it is helpful for one’s own mind. But generally in the monasteries, like in the tantric college, they also use “lama”“ according to the job or rank and the responsibilities. There is the abbot, there is the lama umtse, and the person who is the leader of the monastery, who recites the sutras when they do confession and when they do the Vinaya practice of summer retreat. The senior monk who recites the sutra and who has the place of a representative of Guru Shakyamuni Buddha is called “the lama of the place.” Generally, they are lamas according to the jobs they do, the responsibilities they have, and the Dharma activities they do in the monasteries. But when they say “my lama,” that is the virtuous friend, one’s own guru. That means someone with whom one has made the relationship of oneself being the disciple and the other the virtuous friend, either by taking teachings or by making the guru-disciple relationship. So that is something to relate to oneself. Other people may not call him “lama,” but that is “lama” from your side. That is all.

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