Reciting the Vajrasattva mantra is such a powerful practice.
It purifies not only that day’s negative karma, but also the karma created from the time you were born and in all your previous lives as well.

You must recite the Vajrasattva mantra every day

Every night, before you go to bed, in order to prevent whatever negative karma you created that day from multiplying, you should recite the Vajrasattva mantra. If you don’t purify in this way, your negative karma will keep doubling and re-doubling day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year, up to the end of your life. Even one day’s negative karma will become as huge and heavy as a mountain—in time, even one atom of unpurified negative karma can swell to the size of the Earth.

Even though you may not necessarily create particularly heavy negative karmas, since unpurified negative karma increases exponentially, even one small negative action can cause you to be reborn in the lower realms and experience great suffering for many eons. And because in the lower realms you continually create more and more negative karma, it is extremely difficult to be reborn back into the upper realms, thus making it almost impossible for you to practice Dharma. So, you must purify your negative karma every day.

Vajrasattva is such a powerful practice. It not only purifies that day’s negative karma, thus preventing it from multiplying, it also purifies the karma created from the time you were born and in all your previous lives as well. This means you won’t have to experience again and again without end the four suffering results (see later) that arise from each unpurified negative karma. Purifying negative karma therefore makes it so much easier to attain liberation and actualize the path to enlightenment.

In the short term, it makes your life very light and easy and keeps you happy and peaceful—in your heart, your inner life. It decreases your suffering and any obstacles that might arise.

The conclusion is that even if you have completed the preliminary practice of reciting one hundred thousand Vajrasattva mantras, you can’t just stop, relax, and say, “I’ve finished my Vajrasattva preliminary practice. Now I don’t have to recite that mantra anymore.” You need to keep doing the long Vajrasattva mantra at least twenty-one times or the short one at least twenty-eight times every day in order to keep purifying your negative karma and prevent it from multiplying.

How to purify negative karma with the four opponent powers

You can practice Vajrasattva at the end of the day in the context of the four opponent powers.

1. The power of reliance

When you think about the negative actions you’ve done in the past, the teachings say you’ll feel as if you have swallowed a deadly poison. If there’s poison in your stomach, you’ll immediately do everything you can to get rid of it, so you need to rely upon a doctor and a nurse. We also call this the power of reliance, or the power of the object.

(a) Rely upon Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. By relying upon the doctor and nurse, you can recover from your suffering and the danger of death. In this sense you rely upon and take refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

We have accumulated negative karma in relation to the holy objects of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, so we purify those negative karmas by relying upon Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

(b) Rely upon sentient beings. The second thing is to generate loving kindness, compassion and bodhicitta for the sentient beings you have harmed, thus purifying the negative karma that you have accumulated in relationship to sentient beings.

When we fall down onto the ground, that is the very ground that we depend on to stand up. We create negative karma with sentient beings, so we purify by relying upon sentient beings.

2. The power of regret

When you think about the suffering results of the poison, you’ll immediately regret having taken it. In the same way here, you’ll deeply regret all the negative actions that you’ve done in the past—today, yesterday, earlier in this life, in past lives—and you won’t want to wait even one second to purify them because you do not want the four suffering results—(1) lower realm rebirth, (2) the habit to keep doing the action, (3) the experience of the action happening to you and (4) the environmental result.

Since death can happen at any moment, you must purify your negative actions; it’s unbearable to delay for even a moment.

3. The power of the remedy

Reciting the Vajrasattva mantra, while visualizing Vajrasattva, is the medicine you take as the antidote to the poison, the remedy. As the patient in danger of death, you are so happy to take the medicine, you enjoy the remedy. By seeing the benefits, you enjoy reciting the mantra.

In Tibetan we also call it the power of always enjoying or the power of always conducting or doing.

Or you can do other practices such as prostrations or reciting the holy names of the Thirty-five Buddhas of Confession. Generally, any virtue that you accumulate is this power of the remedy, this power of always enjoying.

4. The power of resolve

Having taken the poison and having strong regret because we realize all the problems and suffering that we’d experience, we now resolve, make a strong determination, to never take that poison again, to not do those negative actions again.

This is the most important point. If you don’t make the decision to not take the poison again, taking all the medicine in a pharmacy won’t help. If you are not careful in your actions, if you don’t stop creating those negative actions, the suffering will go on and on.

Each of the four opponent powers purifies one of the four suffering results of negative karma

1. The power of reliance purifies the environmental result

The environmental, or possessed, result of killing, for example, is to be reborn in an undesirable place, a dirty place where there are a lot of diseases, or where there are many problems. You will be harmed by the elements: fire, floods, earthquakes, hurricanes, avalanches and so forth. There will be a lot of danger to your life. Germs, bacteria and even medicines and food that are meant to help you will cause death or make you sick. Or the building you live in, which is meant to protect you, can collapse and kill you.

The power of reliance, the power of the object—relying upon both the Three Rare Sublime Ones (by taking refuge in them) and sentient beings (by having compassion for them and wishing to benefit them)—stops the environmental result.

2. The power of regret purifies the experience of the action happening to you

With this result, the experience similar to the cause, you will now experience yourself the actions you have done to others in the past. From killing, for example, you will be killed by others, or have a short life, or you will be harmed by people or animals or by the elements.

Even when you are born as a human being, which is the result of virtue, you will experience these suffering results.

With the power of regret, you purify them.

3. The power of the remedy purifies lower realm rebirth

The result of a complete negative action—the ripened aspect or fully ripened result—is rebirth in the lower realms, such as animal, preta or hell being. The power of the remedy particularly stops this result.

By strongly practicing Vajrasattva, for example, you will not be reborn in the lower realms—you will not need to experience those heavy sufferings.

If you are born in the lower realms, you will also continue to create the causes for all four suffering results again and again by killing and so forth. The suffering goes on and on without end.

4. The power of resolve purifies the habit to keep doing the action

The power of resolve—making the determination to not create negative karma again—particularly stops the habit of doing the same negative action again and again, the action similar to the cause.

This is the most terrifying result. If you don’t purify the negative habits—killing, stealing, lying etc.—if you just leave them, you will continue to kill, steal and lie, thus creating complete negative actions again and again, which again brings the four suffering results. It causes endless sufferings, endless hells, endless human beings’ suffering, all these problems—which, of course, you don’t want!

So, you can see, from one negative karma you experience endless suffering results. This is what happens if you don’t purify that negative karma as quickly as possible and well, with the practice of the four opponent powers.

As I mentioned, this is the most terrifying result. If you stop the habit, you stop all the four suffering results.

The Wheel of Sharp Weapons

You could read The Wheel of Sharp Weapons—the sharp wheel to cut your self-cherishing thought. Read it again and again—you can even make a song with it! Do this over and over. This is the best practice for you. It is exactly what you need.

Be happy to purify!

Even though you may feel upset and repentant thinking about how you have lived your life, creating so much negative karma, you should feel great happiness when you think that there is such an extraordinary method of purification.

Think: “I have the opportunity to purify so that I don’t have to experience this negative karma at all. I am very fortunate. I should not waste my time; I should not waste my life. I must take this opportunity.”

The long Vajrasattva mantra

OM VAJRASATVA SAMAYA / MANUPALAYA / VAJRASATVA TVENOPATHISTHA / DRIDHO ME BHAVA / SUTOSHYO ME BHAVA / SUPOSHYO ME BHAVA / ANURAKTO ME BHAVA / SARVASIDDHIM ME PRAYACCHHA / SARVA KARMASU CHA ME / CHITTAM SHRIYAM KURU HUM / HA HA HA HA HOH / BHAGAVAN SARVATATHAGATA / VAJRA MA ME MUNCHA / VAJRI BHAVA / MAHA SAMAYASATVA AH HUM PHAT

The short Vajrasattva mantra

OM VAJRASATVA HUM

Remember

• Reciting the Vajrasattva mantra every day stops negative karma from multiplying.
• Without purification, negative karma multiplies hugely.
• Practicing the four opponent powers purifies the four ways that karma ripens.
• In the short term, purification makes our life peaceful.
• In the long term, purification makes it easier to achieve liberation and enlightenment.