Rinpoche: How is your friend now?

Student: My friend is practicing patience and not fighting with her husband and children.

Rinpoche: That is good they don’t fight any more. It's best not to fight and instead to practice patience—that is the real Dharma, please tell her.

Now it is an eclipse of the sun, so it’s an important time to meditate on rejoicing or bodhicitta or emptiness, to read the Diamond Cutter Sutra, and to do self-initiation—those who have done retreat on Highest Yoga Tantra can do even the short self-initiation—because today whatever merit we collect is multiplied one hundred million times, for the next few hours.

Practicing patience doesn’t mean that if someone asks us to immediately kill a gigantic lady the size of Mount Meru or the size of louse, then to do everything that the person asks. It is not like that. What it means is in our heart we feel or think that this person is the most kind, the most precious, the most dear one. This is what the Guru-Buddha has taught.

We need to practice patience with somebody, because the person who is called the enemy—the one who has anger towards us—if we practice patience towards that person and do not get angry back, then that person gives us the most precious thing, enlightenment, the state of omniscient mind. Think, “With that person I can bring the numberless sentient beings to enlightenment, to free them from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to full enlightenment.” So this becomes the reason to practice patience. We have to be skillful in answering the other person, therefore we have to have wisdom. That shows we need to learn Dharma.

You can give this advice as a present to any person. I am saying you can give this, I am not saying you should.

Also without practicing patience, then with anger we completely destroy the precious merits, if they have not been dedicated for enlightenment and sealed with emptiness. If the merits are not dedicated for enlightenment, with emptiness, then even if we did retreat for many years, if we did many virtuous things, many strong extensive virtuous actions, nothing would happen, there would be no realizations and no change to the mind.

Hahahahahahaha! Please send this message to your friend. Thank you.

Student: Thank you so much. I will send these precious words.

Rinpoche: Sending this to her is more precious than all the wish-fulfilling jewels, more than one billion dollars or the sky filled with wish-granting jewels.

Thank you,
Zopa

Student: You’re so precious, Rinpoche. I cannot find a precious jewel like you in any other place in the world; so precious, so holy. Thank you so much for your precious words and taking time to talk to someone like me. I will also try my best to tame my mind and now I humbly bow at your feet, Rinpoche.

Rinpoche: I am not, but you are. Thank you, see you soon.