What is the focus of the clearest mind? Is it true existence? All that disappears, gone. There is nothing to hold on to, it is gone. That shows it is not true. There is nothing to hold on to; there is no I to hold on to, it disappears.
When this happens, then we have entered into the path pleasing all the buddhas. Please understand, this is the real, real, real, real, real, refuge, the ultimate refuge, like taking food or whatever. Not that I have realized emptiness at all, but due to blessing of the guru, I just have some understanding of that meaning. According to my view, this is the real, true refuge.
No matter how many people—learned people, meditators—in the world say that Lama Tsongkhapa is wrong, that his teachings are wrong, I cannot accept that. When we have tasted the food, the teachings—when we have some taste, even if other learned people say this is wrong, we don’t just follow the words that they say. Our proof is in our own experience. I just want to tell you that, so you can remember in the future.
Now, you can see White Lotus is merely labeled by your mind. As a second or a minute goes by, then you think the real White Lotus exists from its own side. If you analyze how you got this view that it exists from its own side, did it come from your mind? [You think] not only that it is not merely labeled by your mind, but even that it is not labeled by your mind; even that it never came from your mind.
In the Middle Way Autonomy view, Svatantrika Madhyamaka [Tib: u ma rang gyü], things are labeled by the mind. The I or whatever, is labeled by the mind, but not merely labeled by the mind, because it exists from its own side. This Madhyamaka School believes things exist from their own side. So therefore, they can’t accept “merely labeled by your mind”. For them, “merely labeled by the mind” doesn’t exist. It is just as if you cut up a bunch of papers and call it a billion dollars, a zillion dollars. You label it then you go shopping, thinking, “Oh, this is a billion dollars. I have a billion dollars!” The supermarket won’t accept that. They will think you are crazy, and then they send you to prison! Rang gyü means not existing from its own side, not at all. That is gag-cha [the object to be refuted].
According to the Middle Way Consequence School [Prasangika Madhyamaka] it is gag-cha. What the Middle Way Autonomy School believes is correct, that is gag-cha according to the Prasangika School. Nothing exists from its own side. So you have the hallucination that the I, or White Lotus, exists from its own side; that it is not merely labeled by the mind but exists from its own side—even if you agree that it is labeled by the mind, you think it exists from its own side.
Then besides the hallucination, you have White Lotus or I existing from its own side, without depending on the “seventh consciousness” [mind-basis-of-all] according to the Mind Only School. Everything that exists, by leaving an imprint on that, it then manifests as subject and object; it manifests as the mind and object together. Like the colour blue and the mind, the sensory consciousness which perceives blue and the blue object both appear at the same time due to the imprint left on the “seventh consciousness”. Without depending on the imprint on the “seventh consciousness”, we have the view that things just exist from their own side. We believe that what we call White Lotus or the I exists from its own side. We have that wrong view.
Then on top of that, seeing the I as self-sufficient, without depending on the aggregates. Having the view of what we call the child, White Lotus, as self-sufficient, seeing the I as self-sufficient. The Mind Only School, the Sutra School, and the Vaibashika School [have the view that] the I is self-sufficient—the wrong view is there. [This view is] too gross, it is unbelievably gross.
On top of that, Hindus believe that the I is permanent; they believe that there is atman, existing alone without cause or conditions. Hindus believe the I is permanent. We have that view of the I as permanent also; without depending on causes and conditions, existing alone. Also Hindus have the wrong view of the I existing independently, without depending on parts. This is an extremely, extremely, extremely, extremely gross wrong view.
In Buddhism, there are four schools: Vaibashika School [Great Exposition], Sutra School [Sautrantika], Mind Only School [Cittamatra] and Madhyamaka School [Middle Way]. All the schools say the I is impermanent—the I, the self, the person, is impermanent in nature. The I is not permanent, it is impermanent; it is under the control of causes and conditions, not existing alone. It is depending on causes and conditions, not existing independently because of depending on the parts. There is an I that has continuity, that has parts, that doesn’t exist independently; it is dependent, not independent. This is reality. In our view, all those wrong views we have because of how we perceive the I are incredibly, incredibly gross.
After we label White Lotus, as time goes by—after a second, a minute, an hour—we have no idea that the mind has labeled the child. Right after we label, we have an idea our mind has labeled; we believe it exists from its own side. Then that belief, which is a hallucination projected by ignorance, becomes stronger and stronger.
For example, when we look at these scarves—the yellow and red scarves—we see the colors as existing from their own side, or when we look at the light, we see the light as existing from its own side. We don’t see things as merely labeled by the mind. That is reality, but we think there is real light from its own side. The colors of the brocade in the thangka—yellow, blue, red—we believe everything exists from its own side.
When you look at me, Lama Zopa, you think I am existing from my own side, and when I look at you, you exist from your own side, real. All this is a hallucination projected by ignorance, completely, from this morning until tonight. Things don’t exist at all as they appear. The real one, existing from its own side, does not exist at all from its own side. Also, from birth until death, nothing exists from its own side.
Whatever appears, appear as real. I, action, object, the six sense objects, nothing exists from its own side—everything is totally empty. I am not saying things don’t exist. They exist in mere name, merely labeled by the mind. From beginningless rebirth until enlightenment, whatever appears as real from its own side —I, action, object—from beginningless rebirth until enlightenment, nothing exists. Whatever appears as real, what we believe as real, does not exist at all, in reality. When we realize emptiness, that is what we see. That is what happens.
I, action and object are empty from the beginning; they never become real at any time, but they appear as hallucinations. The projections of our ignorance appear real, we believe things are real, and due to that ignorance we have been suffering in samsara from beginningless rebirth.
We have to be reborn in samsara again and again from beginningless rebirth because of ignorance. We haven’t realized emptiness, we haven’t ceased ignorance, the root of samsara. We hold the I as real, the aggregates as real. We haven’t ceased the root of samsara, ignorance.
Why do we experience old age? It is because of ignorance. We haven’t ceased ignorance; we are under the control of ignorance.
Why do we have to die? It is because of ignorance, the root of samsara, the ignorance believing things are real when they are not and never have been, now and in the future. Why we have to die is because of ignorance.
Why do we get sick? The reason is because of ignorance. The root of suffering is ignorance. That is the mother of disease. That is the greatest disease, the chronic disease—ignorance, the root of samsara. This is our wrong concepts.
We have the five aggregates—form, feeling, cognition [discriminative awareness], compounded aggregates [conditioning factors] and consciousness. By depending on these aggregates, with the mind focused on the base of the aggregates, the mind merely imputes I. When the I is merely imputed, right after that merely imputed I, the big problem is: the I is merely imputed by the mind right now, but when it appears back it doesn’t appear in that way. To us, when it appears, it doesn’t appear as merely imputed by the mind, which is reality. It appears back as totally the opposite; it appears to exist from its own side, real. What ordinary people in the world see as real, truly existent, the I appears like that.
We don’t have to believe that, like those who have realized emptiness—arya beings when not in equipoise meditation have the appearance of the truly dualistic appearance, but they don’t believe it is real. They have direct perception of emptiness, so they don’t believe the appearance is real. They see it is like a mirage, like a dream, like an illusion.
We believe it is real. The big problem is the big believe. We believe it is real. We believe! That creates the biggest problem in life. That is what we have to discover. That is the basic problem. That is why we have to die, why we have to be reborn, why we have old age, this and that; why we have the suffering of pain, and the suffering of change—even the samsaric pleasures—the pleasure of food, the pleasure of music, the pleasure of sex, whatever pleasure, riding on the waves, surfing, pleasure in the sky [skydiving].
When you go by aeroplane, you carry a rucksack and then in the sky—in America, I don’t think in Singapore—you hold each person’s hand and then you go around. Sometimes, people drop! You try anything for pleasure for the real I, but it is not there. To achieve happiness, you will do anything. You become a bullet in the machine [cannon], which shoots you to the other side. I saw that in a movie. People do anything for pleasure, for the real I which is not there, very interesting, which you cannot find. It’s not there.
Things appear as real from their own side, one hundred percent, no question. We trust that, we believe that one hundred percent. We do everything for the merely labeled I, the truly existent I, which is not there, everything!
Some people have collected a million dollars, a trillion dollars, a zillion dollars, for the real I which is not there. A billion, zillion, trillion dollars, can you imagine? Then trusting or believing the I is real, that concept becomes the root of samsara. That is the root from which we experience death. We have to die, get reborn, and experience old age, sickness, all those pleasures, and suffering, the suffering of change. We experience all that. Then we experience pervasive compounding suffering. True suffering comes from pervasive compounding suffering. These aggregates are under the control of karma and delusions, so that is why they are pervaded by suffering. This is the nature of suffering, karma and delusions.
When we do this [Rinpoche presses his arm], we feel pain. This pain proves reincarnation and karma. Our aggregates are under the control of karma and delusions, so there is pain. If we are free from karma and delusions, then there is no pain. We don’t experience pain. If our aggregates are free from karma and delusions, there is no pain. Then we don’t experience rebirth, old age, sickness and death. All the samsaric pleasures are in the nature of suffering—the suffering of change. If we are free from delusion and karma—the cause of suffering—then we don’t experience pervasive compounded suffering, which is where those true sufferings arise from.
The second meaning of pervasive compounding suffering is that our aggregates are the contaminated seed of delusions. That is why they are also in the nature of suffering. There is compounding suffering because the consciousness continues from our past life. From this life, the consciousness goes to the next life, carrying imprints from past lives. Then we experience suffering because of that past negative karma. These aggregates compound suffering.
Not only that, in daily life we meet desirable objects, beautiful objects, ugly objects and indifferent objects. Because the seed is there, when we meet a beautiful object, attachment arises; when we meet an ugly object, anger arises, and when we meet an indifferent object, ignorance arises. That is the suffering of suffering. If we check the nature of the mind at that time, when there is attachment or anger, there is negative karma, and this leaves imprints on the mind. From these imprints, suffering arises—compounding suffering of this life and of future lives. These imprints then throw us into future lives’ rebirth, future lives’ suffering. It compounds the aggregates—this life’s suffering and future life’s suffering. This is specific to Buddhism. What we have to understand, what we have to realize, is the nature of suffering and to have a genuine wish to be free from this.
As long as we are living in pervasive compounding suffering, we are not free from that. It is like being in the centre of a fire, living in the centre of a red-hot fire. There is not one second of pure happiness; there is not even one second of not suffering. There is not even one second for us. So from beginningless rebirth up till now, there is no break from suffering. We didn’t even have one second’s break from the suffering of samsara, from beginningless rebirth up till now. There is constant suffering, especially this pervasive compounding suffering.
What we should be free from is this one. Please understand that there is the suffering of pain and the suffering of change, which is all the temporary samsaric pleasures. Those two come from pervasive compounding suffering. As I said, it is like living in the centre of a fire, constantly burning. The suffering from beginningless rebirth until now is unbelievable. We should generate the wish to be free from this, to achieve the cessation of this, by generating the true path, especially the wisdom directly perceiving emptiness, to cease the seed of delusions. Then we become free from this pervasive compounding suffering. The cessation of this is nirvana, the blissful state of peace for oneself.
With the wisdom realizing emptiness, a process supported by bodhicitta, we achieve peerless happiness, full enlightenment. We achieve the complete cessation of all the mistakes of the mind, gross and subtle, and total realization—there is nothing more to realise, nothing more to understand. Then we can do perfect work for sentient beings. Only then can we do perfect work for sentient beings, naturally, simultaneously, without any mistakes.
So, why do we take refuge? To be free from pervasive compounding suffering, from where the suffering of pain and the suffering of change arises—to be totally free from that, forever.
To be able to help sentient beings, we have to be free from suffering. For example, if we are drowning in mud, how can we help others? If we are drowning in water, how can we help others? If we have no arms, how can we save others? To free ourselves from this suffering is not to achieve blissful peace for ourselves, but to help other sentient beings. The most important thing is to be able to help other sentient beings. We need to be free from suffering to do this.
Just to be free from the lower realms, we don’t need to take refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. We don’t need these three. Even if we just remember a monk or nun—somebody we have devotion to—when we die, we will never get reborn in the lower realms at the time of death. Even if we remember one Sangha to whom we feel devotion, or if we think of the Heart Sutra, for example, or some mantra or prayer that we remember, we will never get reborn in lower realms.
But to be free from samsara —from the pervasive compounding suffering —we need to take refuge. We need to take refuge in Buddha who revealed the path, who revealed the teaching, and the actual refuge. Buddha is like the doctor and Dharma is like the medicine. The actual refuge is Dharma, like the medicine for sickness. Then, the Sangha is like the nurse. The Sangha becomes an example, helping us actualize refuge, Dharma, within our heart. That is Sangha. We need all three to have refuge, to be free from the pervasive compounding suffering from where true suffering arises. Until we are free from this, we suffer in samsara constantly, endlessly, from beginningless rebirth. We can’t help sentient beings perfectly; we cannot help others perfectly without mistakes.
