Hearing Loss

Hearing Loss

Date Posted:
November 2011

A student wrote to ask Rinpoche for advice about his brother’s loss of hearing, which had become worse. His brother was hearing impaired, with almost no hearing in his right ear and about 60 percent hearing in his left ear, which he augmented using a hearing aid. He had experienced a dramatic drop in hearing in his good ear, which effectively made him deaf, so he had difficulty performing his job and talking on the phone. He also had earache and a ringing that only stopped when he slept. The doctor gave him a two-week course of Western medicine, after which they would recheck his hearing to see if it was a permanent loss. He became quite depressed and scared, and this worried the rest of the family. The student asked Rinpoche to check if anything could be done to help improve his situation.

Dear Jim,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. I am terribly sorry that it has taken such a long time to answer, due to my always traveling, not being very long in any place, and doing this for a long time.

I am sorry to hear of your brother’s condition of ringing in the ears. You should boil ginger in hot water, not cold but hot, then holding the ginger in both hands (as hot as can be tolerated), press it on his back at waist level. If he can do this again and again, this will stop the ringing in his ears.

At the __ center, Geshe-la can be requested to do Chab Trul puja for purification. This could be beneficial. Also, he can be requested to do one small puja, Giving Lu (body), using tsampa to make the dough in the shape of the body and giving it to the spirits, for them to not harm.

Also, you can chant Most Secret Hayagriva mantra. Find the picture for your brother and he can look at it while reciting the mantra. Visualize and make requests to purify disease, spirit harms, negative karma and obscurations. Visualize white light for purification, then chant the mantra with that visualization, half for purifying and half for generating the qualities of omniscience, compassion and power. Do this for half an hour, half for each visualization, or for one hour, or one mala each for purifying and generating qualities, if not, do half a mala for each, but try at least to do one mala.

I will also do a short puja for him.

With much love and prayers...