Disharmony at the Center

Disharmony at the Center

How to Bring Harmony to the Center
Date of Advice:
July 2018
Date Posted:
August 2019

Rinpoche sent this letter to a center director with suggestions for bringing harmony to the Dharma center. Rinpoche also explained what it means to be a Buddhist.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche in a coffee shop in Tonasket, USA, September 2016. Photo: Lobsang Sherab.

My most dear, most precious, most kind, wish-fulfilling one, and also your assistants and people who are helping you and helping the center,

How are you? I want to say thank you from my heart a billion, zillion, trillion times, to you and to all the helpers at the center, all the assistants, the SPC and so forth.

I heard that you and the assistants and those working at the center are helping support the Sangha in doing pujas and practices in the morning and evening. That is really needed; it is very, very good to be united. Then the nuns will have more inspiration to do the practices, which also become like pujas for the center because the dedication is done for that.

You were talking about how to have more harmony when I was there but I didn’t get to mention this to you. One suggestion for harmony is in the way of speaking, communicating with others. Basically, for common people this means communicating compassionately and being respectful to others. I know you are doing this very sincerely from your heart; each time you speak it is really coming from the heart. That’s very nice, very nice.

I have written one advice mainly for the director of a center where many people got upset because the director talked in a very scolding and rough way. So I gave this advice on how to speak to others [How to Make Your Life Most Beneficial for Other Beings, Even With Your Speech.] This is because other people’s happiness depends on us; it depends on how we act and how we speak. Our way of speaking can be either disrespectful or respectful. One way of speaking brings problems to others and to ourselves; the other way of speaking is in a nice, respectful way that brings happiness to others and to ourselves.

The advice is not only for you but for all the people helping at the center. It is for anybody—even those not working at the center still need it; even if they are living alone. Everyone needs this advice if they want happiness and don’t want suffering.

When other people are suffering and disturbed and we see them complaining, then we become unhappy. However, when we are able to do something with the motivation of compassion and help others in a nice, respectful way then it brings them happiness. And when we see others happy, it brings us happiness.

This is mainly talking about avoiding suffering and experiencing happiness for oneself, but actually others, who are numberless, are most important. I’m sure you know how others’ happiness totally depends on you. It depends on how you think and how you act every day, and that’s why it’s important to have respectful manners.

Another way to bring harmony is by having a picture of the four harmonious brothers around the center, in the office and a few different places. You can make this picture of the four harmonious brothers bigger or even have one painted. This helps to bring harmony.

The eight auspicious signs are also a very good way to stop inauspicious, bad things happening and to bring auspiciousness and success. It is very good to hang these in the office and in other places.

I heard you are not a Buddhist, which is interesting, but I want to know what you think the definition of being a Buddhist is.

Some people think being a Buddhist means doing prayers, reciting mantras and so forth. Some people think that because you don’t do that, then you are not a Buddhist. But that alone doesn’t define being Buddhist. There are many non-Buddhists doing mantras, prayers and chanting because they are interested in chanting, and there are some people who can even explain sutra and tantra without being Buddhist, for example, a professor who is not Buddhist. Not being Buddhist means not having refuge in one’s mind in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

There are Buddhists who don’t do prayers and are not much involved in those things, but who have very strong reliance on Buddha, Dharma and Sangha by understanding that they have the power and qualities [to lead us to happiness, liberation and enlightenment.]

The Buddha, by showing us the path, is like the doctor giving us medicine.

Dharma is like the actual medicine healing the disease. Dharma heals the cause of suffering—delusion and karma—and also heals the suffering of death, old age, sickness, birth and all our dissatisfaction. This includes the second kind of suffering—the suffering of change, which is how we label all the samsaric pleasures. These pleasures are not like Dharma happiness, which we can continue, develop and then complete when we achieve liberation from samsara and especially when we achieve buddhahood, the total cessation of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations.

Dharma ceases the cause of suffering, delusion and karma, which comes from the negative imprints. Due to our own realizations, our own mind, we can be totally liberated from the suffering of pain, the suffering of change and pervasive compounded suffering—the fundamental suffering from which the other two sufferings arise.

The aggregates are under the control of karma and delusion and because of that, they are pervaded by suffering. The contaminated seeds of delusion and karma arise and from these seeds the delusions arise again and the suffering of this life and future lives arises again. However, this can be ceased. We can become totally free forever from this—from the third suffering—and we can achieve the blissful state of peace for ourselves. Of course there is also great liberation, buddhahood, which itself is Dharma.

Then there are the Sangha, who help us to actualize the Dharma.

With much love and prayers. If there is something, please, you can always contact me

Center Disharmony and Theft
Date Posted:
April 2011

Rinpoche gave the following advice to a center director when there was disharmony at the center, involving students stealing from the center.

My very dear one,
What has happened at the center is an incredible teaching for us, not just a teaching by words, but a teaching by experience, which reminds us to practice. It reminds us how Buddha practiced what he taught, especially in the sense that you have received only harm from those whom you have benefited so much. For this reason we should have even greater compassion.

In a recent experience we had the same kind of teaching. We bought land to build a large statue. We paid the money for the land and then found out later that the person who helped us buy the land, supposedly out of devotion, actually made a huge profit for themselves through us. Here is a similar situation, and I am trying to practice kindness and bodhicitta with these people. I am trying to remember their kindness. It is the same for you. You need to remember their kindness and how precious they are, and use this for your practice, with the understanding that they are helping you to finish past negative karma. They are persuading us to practice.

Then we need to make charity of whatever they took from the center. In our minds we offer sincerely to them, for the benefit of all sentient beings. Then we pray to free them from all sufferings, as well as all sentient beings, and bring them to highest enlightenment by ourselves achieving enlightenment.

In this way they are extremely kind, helping us to achieve enlightenment quicker. Also it encourages us to practice the paramita of patience. It helps us to overcome the inner enemy: anger, which in turn helps us to not have any outer enemy from whom we receive harm.

So many times we make prayers to receive the suffering of others and to be free of all obstacles. Now we can think how fortunate it is that our prayers have been answered. Obstacles have ripened in the form of them breaking in, breaking windows, stealing money, etc., so now we have had small success with our prayers.

It says in the Lama Chöpa: “May I receive all the negative karmas; may they ripen on me right now; may I give away all my happiness and virtue to others; and may all sentient beings have happiness. Please bless me to achieve this right now.”

So, now please rejoice as we have succeeded in our prayers.

With much love and prayers ...

Difficulties in Dharma Center
Date Posted:
July 2009

A center director was experiencing obstacles and disharmony in a Dharma center. Rinpoche checked and advised him to do the following practices.

Dear one,
Thank you for your email. I am still doing prayers for the person who died at the center. I am sending you a special protection to wear and you should also recite this sutra and mantra every day. Recite it especially before having meetings that may be difficult or meeting anyone that may disagree with you:

Mantra
SAYADAYA THEDÄN / DZINI / GHRINI / SARVA ARTHA SAADHANI / SHASHINI ALAKSHMINI / SENAA SHAYA SIDDHAYANTU MANTRA BADAAH SVAHA

OM BHRI KUTI BARAMA SU BHAGE SVAHA (3x)

You should also recite the practice called Vajra Claws for the next few months. When you recite it you have to recite it aloud.

This is my advice. Please keep in touch and let me know how things are going.

Practice to do:

The Sutra of the Exalted Great Glorified Female Being

In the language of India: Arya Mahalakshinii Sutra
In the language of Tibet: Phagpa päl chhenmoi do
In the language English: The Sutra of the Exalted Great Glorified Female Being

Prostration to all the buddhas and bodhisattvas.

Thus I have heard at one time. The Bhagavan (Destroyer-Qualified Gone Beyond One) was abiding in the Blissful Realm. Then, the bodhisattva mahasattva, the Arya Compassionate Eye Looking One Enriched with Qualities, went to the place where the Bhagavan was, prostrated his head at the feet of the Bhagavan, circumambulated the Bhagavan three times, and sat down to one side. Then, the Bhagavan looked at the Great Glorified Female Being and proclaimed to the Arya Compassionate Eye Looking One Enriched with Qualities as follows:

These twelve holy names of the Great Glorified Female Being, anyone – bikshus (virtue beggar), bikshunis (female virtue beggars), upasakas (male nearing virtue), and upasikas (female nearing virtue) – and none other than those – who knows of this, keeps this text, reads it, writes it, leads others in writing it; this one will eliminate poverty and will become wealthy.

Then, all the assembly of yakshas (jungpo) assented saying, “May it be so.”

Then, the Bhagavan proclaimed, “The twelve holy names of the Great Glorified Female Being are as follows:”

The Twelve Holy Names of the Great Glorified Female Being:

Pälden ma  -  Glorified Female One
Trashi ma  -   Auspicious Female One
Padmäi trengwa chän  -  One Having Lotus Garlands
Norgyi dagmo  -   Female Owner of Wealth
Karmo  -  White Female One
Tragpa chhenmo  -  Female Great Famous One
Padmäi chän  -  Eye of the Lotus
Jepa mo  -  Female Performing One
Ö chhenmo  -  Female Great Light
Zä jinma  -  Female Giving Food
Rinpochhe rabtu jinma  -  Female Extremely Generous Jewel
Päl chhenmo  -  Female Great Glorified One

Mantra
SAYADAYA THEDÄN / DZINI / GHRINI / SARVA ARTHA SAADHANI / SHASHINI ALAKSHMINI / SENAA SHAYA SIDDHAYANTU MANTRA BADAAH SVAHA

OM BHRI KUTI BARAMA SU BHAGE SVAHA (3x)

For anyone who recites this three times, all opposing forces will perish and you will become the fortunate one. You will have good fortune and you will have unceasing wealth. When you recite this and then go to see someone, that person will regard you as his/her child, will be happy, and will do exactly as he/she is asked.

If you recite this unceasingly, even if Brahma and the Brahmins do violent activities to bring harm, you won’t be affected. It also becomes as if having made offering to many buddhas. The Bhagavan has proclaimed it like that.

Then the Bodhisattva Compassionate Eye Looking One Endowed with Qualities rejoiced and highly praised the teaching of the Bhagavan.

The Sutra of the Exalted Great Glorified Female One is completed.

Original colophon:
Translated, revised, and recorded by the Indian Abbot Jinamitra, and Zhu Chhen, the translator, Bende Yeshe De.

Colophon for English translation:
Translated from the Tibetan by Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche at Buddha Amitabha Pure Land, Washington, April 16, 2006. Scribed by Venerable Thubten Wongmo and Kendall Magnussen. Lightly edited by Kendall Magnussen.

Problems at a Dharma Center
Date Posted:
October 2005

There were problems at a Dharma center between the director and his assistant. Sometimes the problems were heavy, sometimes light. The director was contemplating asking the assistant to leave. Rinpoche wrote the following to him.

Dear George,
One way you can look at the situation is to think that the center just cannot exist without these difficulties. There is collective karma, and without these difficulties, it would not be able to offer extensive benefits to so many sentient beings every year, giving Dharma education in sutra and tantra, and planting the seed of the four kayas, liberation, and enlightenment, and leading sentient beings to a good rebirth in their next life.

The center offers unbelievable benefits. The geshe, translator, director, assistant, secretary, bookkeeper, cook, and cleaner’s main function is to bring the teachings to others, making the center available for sentient beings to come there to practice, collect merit, and plant the seed of enlightenment. All the members of the center are offering this benefit to sentient beings. This cannot happen without collective karma. Problems occur because collective negative karma ripens and individual karma ripens, so we experience these things while we are offering extensive benefit to others.

You can make an analogy with the body and ornaments on the body. These difficulties are the ornaments. This means you can use these difficulties to overcome your own delusions, ego, and self-cherishing thought. These difficulties destroy one’s delusions and ego, like in chöd practice. In chöd, you invoke spirits to create violence, a disturbing violent environment, and that makes the thought of self-cherishing stronger, the feeling that something is going to happen to me, to the “I.” The main thing is to see the emotional “I,” the false “I,” the object to be refuted, the “I” which is a hallucination, the “I” which doesn’t exist, as the object of the root of samsara—the concept of inherent existence. The minute you recognize it is the minute to realize emptiness. Why this is so important, such a big deal, and is talked about so much in the teachings of Buddha is that without this realization of emptiness, you have no way to escape the ocean of suffering. Humans, asura, sura, hell beings, animals, and pretas have all been reincarnating in these realms up to now, from beginningless time, because of delusion and karma. We are still wandering in the six realms, and suffer without end. That means we can’t liberate other sentient beings from the suffering of samsara, the suffering of contaminated aggregates.

All the problems of the center are the same as in chöd practice. Here, without your putting effort into it, it just happens, the disturbed violent environment arises. So, it is a very good opportunity to realize emptiness and destroy the ego, the self-cherishing thought.

It is the same as in the text the Wheel of Sharp Weapons, when you use difficulties to cut the demon of your self-cherishing thought. It is also mentioned in A Guide to the Bodhisattva Way of Life that when people have scars from having fought in a war, they see those scars not as something ugly, but as an ornament, a special sign that they have been brave. They are proud of those scars. So, like that, you can use the problems in the center as a challenge to vanquish the self-cherishing thought and ignorance, the concept of true existence, the unknowing mind.

These ornaments, your problems, can be used as weapons that you always keep with you to destroy the real enemies, those which prevent all good things from happening to you, including enlightenment. The real enemies are the ones that stop you from benefiting all sentient beings, giving them happiness in their day-to-day life, up to liberation and enlightenment. They harm you and make you harm all living beings.

Use the problems as an ornament, seeing them as extremely precious, because they make you achieve enlightenment quickly, by getting you to achieve bodhicitta. Experience these problems on behalf of all sentient beings, giving all happiness to sentient beings. This is the ornament.

Just accepting the problems, as I said in the beginning, makes the mind calm down. And without problems and obstacles at the center, the center cannot exist. For example, a rose bush can’t have roses without thorns. Look at it like that.

Also, we should purify karma that brings problems, and stop creating a similar cause again. Practice the ten virtuous actions. For those who have taken pratimoksha, bodhicitta, and tantric vows, these are the guidelines to follow so you don’t create similar karma again. The foundation is living in the ten virtues. This is the solution. The second solution so as not to have problems is to purify karma, as I often say. The real solution to any problem—never to have AIDS, cancer, sicknesses, relationship problems, and failure in business—comes if these two things are done—purifying negative karma and never committing it again, and living in vows helps with this.

So, now you can see, without Dharma, you can’t solve the problems in your life, no matter how much medicine, food, exercise, organizations, and meetings you have. That is why, even though people have an operation and cut away a cancer, if the karma is not purified, the cancer keeps coming back until the person dies. That is a good example.

Performing pujas and practices is one way to try to purify the cause so that you do not create it again. Then, try to prevent difficult external conditions as best you can. If you have tried to remedy the situation, you will not feel much regret. If you don’t try, then you will feel regret. Since you have met the Buddhadharma, sutra, and especially tantra, you know there are so many ways, so many deep solutions. This helps the mind to not get freaked out, whether you are living in a meditation center, with your family, or with others.

In this way, the mind can enjoy life. There is peace and happiness. There is so much space in your mind, space for love and compassion for others, so you can benefit others continuously.