Calling the Lama from Afar,124 written by Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo, is very effective for the mind as it combines guru yoga practice and lamrim. It is a very effective way to do direct meditation on the three principal paths and the two stages of Highest Yoga Tantra because this prayer came from Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo’s own experiences. Everything in this prayer has deep meaning.
I liked this prayer so much that I especially requested the oral transmission of it from my root guru, His Holiness Trijang Rinpoche. I received the oral transmission on my own in His Holiness’s room in Dharamsala, two or three years before Kyabje Rinpoche passed away. I think this must have been the last teaching I received from His Holiness.
The full title of this prayer is Calling the Lama from Afar: A Tormented Wail Quickly Drawing Forth the Blessing of the Lama, the Inseparable Three Kayas. Tormented by samsaric sufferings, one is expressing unsurpassable devotion to the guru through seeing what the guru is and understanding his kindness. Unbearable devotion is expressed in this prayer and this devotion quickly brings the blessings of the guru, who is the inseparable three kayas.
When you recite Calling the Lama from Afar, visualize your root guru on your crown or in front of you as the embodiment of all gurus, Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, and then do the medi-tations as described in the verses of the prayer. The very essence of the meditation is to concentrate on the guru as the absolute guru, the dharmakaya, the holy mind of all the buddhas, the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness. The absolute guru manifests in all the numberless different aspects of buddha to guide us sentient beings and also takes ordinary forms to reveal the teachings. Each of our gurus is all the buddhas and all the buddhas are each of our gurus.
Lama, think of me.
Lama, think of me.
Lama, think of me.
When we recite this—lama khyen, lama khyen, lama khyen in Tibetan—we are appealing to the guru for help. We are asking the guru to pay attention to us, to think of us. The word lama can be used in various ways, but here it means our own personal lama, with whom we have had Dharma contact with the recognition of a guru-disciple relationship.
With your root guru visualized on your crown, be aware of the real meaning of guru. Remember in your heart that the guru is the absolute guru, the dharmakaya, the holy mind of all the buddhas. The absolute guru, or all the buddhas, is working through the ordinary aspect of the conventional guru, just as the sun must shine through a magnifying glass to burn dry grass. All the buddhas work through this ordinary manifestation, whose appearance accords with the quality of your own mind. Through giving oral transmissions, initiations, commentaries, vows, teaching the alphabet and so forth, the guru completely burns all your delusions, all the faults of your mind; then, by actualizing the path, you are guided to enlightenment.
The wisdom of great bliss of all buddhas, one taste with the dharmakaya, is itself the ultimate nature of all kind lamas. I beseech you, Lama, dharmakaya, please look after me always without separation, in this life, future lives and the bardo.
While this is the translation that you might be accustomed to, I prefer to translate this verse in the following way:
The transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas, one taste in the great bliss dharmakaya, is only the kind guru, the ultimate nature of all. To the Lama, dharmakaya, from my heart I request: please guide me in this life, future lives and the intermediate state, without separation.
Instead of linking bliss to wisdom, I have joined it to dharmakaya, because it is describing what the dharmakaya is. However, I’m not saying that wisdom is not great bliss. Here ultimate nature of all means of all the buddhas; the kind guru is the ultimate nature of all the buddhas. This is the way to meditate to realize that the holy mind of the guru is dharmakaya. Generally, guide means to take someone to the place they wish to be for their happiness, so here it refers to bringing us to enlightenment.
When we can recognize the object to be refuted as false and empty, we can develop complete faith that ignorance and the wrong concept¬ions arising from ignorance can be eliminated. This is how we develop definite faith that it is possible for us to achieve enlightenment. In a similar way, by understanding the four kayas as explained in the Highest Yoga Tantra path, we gain faith that enlightenment is possible. By understanding clearly the two stages of the Highest Yoga Tantra path, especially the second one, the completion stage, we understand much more clearly and have much more faith in how it is possible to achieve the result of the four kayas. We then have much more faith when we recite Calling the Lama from Afar.
This first verse holds the key to guru devotion. It is the essence, the very heart of the teaching on guru devotion, and all the rest of the prayer is an elaboration of this. Without understanding this verse, there is no way to understand such quotations as Buddhajñana’s, “Before what is called ‘guru,’ there is not even the name ‘buddha.’” When we understand this verse we will also understand why Namo gurubhya rather than Namo buddhaya comes first when we recite the refuge section in Guru Puja. We will also understand why we say guru-buddha and not buddha-guru. When we understand this verse we’ll understand why the guru comes first. It’s not just because the guru is kinder than buddha, which is true but only part of the reason.
In the early times at Kopan, Lama Yeshe used to do examinations of the Western Sangha. One monk or nun, with no prior knowledge of the day’s subject, would be singled out to sit below the throne. All the students, including the thirty or forty Kopan monks, sat in the gompa as that Sangha member was questioned by Lama. Once, when Lama and I stayed a long time in Tushita Retreat Centre in Dharamsala, Jhampa Zangpo was questioned. I think I put the question, “Why does the guru come first?” One geshe helped Jhampa answer by saying, “Because the guru is kinder than the buddhas.” There is a much deeper reason and I’m sure the geshe understood that but didn’t get to complete the answer. This verse gives the reason.
The point expressed in the first verse of Calling the Lama from Afar, that the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas is of one taste in the great bliss of dharmakaya, is the ultimate secret of tantra. To hear the explanation of what the dharmakaya is you really need to have received a Highest Yoga Tantra initiation. By introducing the ultimate guru, this verse talks about the very essence, the very meaning, of guru, and what we ultimately have to realize.
During teachings he gave in Mongolia, Kyabje Denma Lochö Rinpoche mentioned that Pabongka Rinpoche gives the clearest explanation of how all the buddhas are one in essence. No other lama has explained it so clearly. Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo said, “All sentient beings become one in essence when they become enlightened.”
As I’ve already explained, in Ornament of Mahayana Sutras Maitreya Buddha uses the example of how the innumerable beams of the sun mix together and always engage in the one activity of illuminating the world to show how the innumerable buddhas mix in the dharmakaya to perform the one activity of illuminating the minds of sentient beings.
All the buddhas are one in the dharmakaya and from the dharmakaya, like innumerable beams emitting from a single sun to engage in one activity, numberless forms of buddhas, all the different nirmanakaya and sambhogakaya aspects, manifest to guide sentient beings. Since at the moment, with our obscured minds, we can’t see the nirmanakaya and sambhogakaya aspects and receive direct guidance from them, the buddhas also manifest in ordinary forms to work for our benefit. With various methods, but especially by revealing Dharma, these manifestations cause us to engage in virtue and thus enjoy happiness.
The other example that Maitreya Buddha uses in Ornament of Mahayana Sutras is water from various different sources flowing into an ocean, where it mixes to become one. Before entering the ocean, different bodies of water are in different places and perform different functions. Some of the water is in springs, rivers, waterfalls, ponds, under the ground and even in swimming pools. This is like sentient beings, who before enlightenment had separate minds but when they become enlightened, they become one, like all the water flowing into the ocean. This means all the water is in one place, the water itself becomes one, and its function also becomes one. In the dharmakaya, which is like an ocean, the holy minds of all the buddhas mix to become one in essence—and that is the absolute guru.
Before we enter enlightenment we have a separate body and a separate mind and our individual activities are also separate. Because we are separate beings in separate bodies, our activities are different. Also, before we enter enlightenment, the work that we do for sentient beings is limited.
We should apply this example to understand the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas, one taste in the great bliss dharmakaya. After sentient beings enter enlightenment, there is no separate body and no separate mind, just as there are no separate streams once they have entered an ocean.
When you put one drop of water into an ocean, it becomes one with all the rest of the water. After the drop has gone into the ocean, there is no way that you can discriminate the drop from the ocean. In a similar way, after sentient beings have entered enlightenment, there are no separate bodies, no separate minds and no separate activities.
The mind has three levels: gross, subtle and extremely subtle. It is in terms of the extremely subtle mind and wind that the point of the example of the drop of water and of this verse becomes clear. This extremely subtle wind-mind doesn’t have any resistance, and because of that it pervades all existence. If there were resistance, there could be separation. Since the drop of water in the ocean doesn’t have any resistance to keep it separate from the ocean, it becomes one with all that large ocean. In a similar way, the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas is of one taste in the dharmakaya.
After the drop of water goes into the ocean, does the drop exist or not? All the water becomes one after it goes into the ocean. It’s not that the water—whether you call it a stream, waterfall or drop—doesn’t exist. It does exist, the continuation of that water does exist, but as a whole ocean. Like this, the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas is of one taste in the great bliss of dharmakaya.
When a sentient being becomes enlightened, it’s not that the continuation of its consciousness is stopped; the continuity of its consciousness is still there. The separate, or individual, identity is not there but the continuation of consciousness is there, but as a whole. Just as the drop becomes of one taste with the ocean, the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas becomes of one taste with the dharmakaya. This is what is called “guru.” When we think of the guru, when we hear or say the word “guru,” when we see the guru, when we meditate on the guru, it should be this one, the transcendental wisdom of all the buddhas of one taste in the dharmakaya. This is the understanding that should immediately come in our mind when we recite prayers about the guru or think about, see or meditate on the guru. This is how the realization comes that all the buddhas are the guru and that all the gurus are buddha.
The verse concludes, please guide me in this life, future lives and the intermediate state, without separation. How does the guru look after, or guide, us? At the moment we ourselves cannot mentally see the guru in the dharmakaya. We also can’t see the guru in sambhogakaya and nirmanakaya aspects. We don’t have the karma to see the guru in the aspect of a buddha. We have the karma to meet and receive teachings and guidance from an ordinary person with samsaric aggregates, with delusions and with the sufferings of rebirth, old age, sickness and death. We are being guided by that aspect, by that ordinary form.
The water in the ocean evaporates from the ocean to again become springs, waterfalls and ponds, to go into fields to grow crops, and to perform many other activities. In a similar way, the absolute guru—the wisdom of all the buddhas that is of one taste with the great bliss of dharmakaya—manifests in the conventional guru and through that form then guides sentient beings. It also manifests in various other forms, including the numberless aspects of buddhas; it immediately appears in whatever form is necessary to guide each sentient being. As a sentient being’s karma ripens, the absolute guru spontaneously manifests without even a second’s delay, then guides that sentient being.
Now, with this recognition of what the guru is, with this understanding of the absolute guru, it is easy to relate to all the buddhas of the ten directions. No matter how many different external aspects there are—male, female, two arms or a thousand—they are all manifestations of the guru, and the guru is all those buddhas. This is the very essence of the following verses in Calling the Lama from Afar, which relate to how the guru is various deities, the Triple Gem and so forth:
Wisdom’s own illusory appearance, the conqueror with seven branches,125 is itself the ultimate basis of emanation of all kind lamas. I beseech you, Lama, sambhogakaya, please look after me always without separation, in this life, future lives and the bardo.
This verse relates to the sambhogakaya, or the holy body of complete enjoyment. Why is it called complete enjoyment? Because the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness has nothing more to develop in terms of enjoyment. Great bliss is ultimate enjoyment.
The term translated here as seven branches is sometimes translated as “seven kisses,” but that looks as if it refers to kissing seven times, which is wrong. The sambhogakaya manifests a goddess with a similar aspect and they abide in the manner of facing each other in sexual union. It is actually one being, not two separate beings. It shows that the mind is always experiencing great bliss, that method and wisdom are unified.
Experiencing great bliss through union with the goddess is the second branch, or characteristic. The third is that this great bliss is unceasing; there is no way it can be exhausted. The being is perfect and complete, which means it has no delusions. It exists in this form as long as samsara exists. The holy body of the sambhogakaya doesn’t exist by nature; it doesn’t have a truly existent nature. This sambhogakaya is dependent on causes and conditions. It always has non-objectifying great compassion. Then, while it is impermanent, the sambhogakaya, the holy body of complete enjoyment, effortlessly grants all wishes. It works unceasingly for sentient beings. It is not that this sambhogakaya sometimes has energy to work for sentient beings and sometimes is lazy about working for them. The sambhogakaya works unceasingly for sentient beings, immediately appearing wherever there is a fortunate sentient being who is an object to be subdued.
The sambhogakaya doesn’t have cessation; it always abides, without passing into the sorrowless state. When we request the guru to have stable life until samsara ends, we make that request to the nirmanakaya, because it is the one that shows the action of passing into the sorrowless state.
The play of various emanations, suiting the dispositions of the many to be subdued, is itself the behavior of the sambhogakaya of the kind lamas. I beseech you, Lama, nirmanakaya, please look after me always without separation, in this life, future lives and the bardo.
This ultimate transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness manifests in the holy body adorned with the thirty-two signs and the eighty exemplifications. That one is the holy body of nirmanakaya.
A later verse says,
Thinking of how you show the excellent unmistaken path to me, an unfortunate wretched being, abandoned by all the buddhas—reminds me of you, Lama.
Here abandoned by all the buddhas refers to the buddhas before Shakyamuni Buddha. We didn’t have the merit, or fortune, to be subdued by the three buddhas who descended in this world before Shakyamuni Buddha. And with Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, Manjushri, Maitreya, Asanga, Nagarjuna and the other pandits and yogis in India and Tibet, we still didn’t have the merit to be their direct disciples and be guided by them. Numberless buddhas, bodhisattvas and holy beings have appeared in this world in the past but we didn’t have the merit to be directly guided by them.
What is the excellent unmistaken path that reminds us of the guru? Here, it specifically refers to Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings, not just the general teachings of Buddhadharma. The excellent unmistaken pure path of Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings, which unify sutra and tantra, have the clearest explanation of what Buddha taught. Without talking about liberating other sentient beings, even liberating yourself from the oceans of samsaric suffering depends on cutting the root of samsara, ignorance, and this can happen only by realizing the Prasangika Madhyamaka view of emptiness, which leads to the understanding of subtle dependent arising, that things exist in mere name, merely imputed by mind. Lama Tsongkhapa put special effort into presenting the Prasangika school’s view very clearly; it is the clearest explanation. That is a main aspect of the excellent unmistaken path.
Another aspect is Lama Tsongkhapa’s clear teachings on calm abiding, especially on subtle sinking thought, which it seems is not always clearly explained in other traditions. Such a clear explanation makes it easy to achieve calm abiding. Guided by Lama Tsongkhapa’s clear explanation, you first gain a correct intellectual understanding of the practice; then you put it into practice and achieve correct realization. It doesn’t take very long and isn’t very difficult because the teaching is very clear.
Lama Tsongkhapa also clearly explained all the special techniques to achieve bodhicitta. With respect to tantra, Lama Tsongkhapa gives the clearest explanation on how to achieve the illusory body, the direct cause of the rupakaya.
Though there are many others, these are the main examples of Lama Tsongkhapa showing the pure unmistaken path in the clearest way, so that there is no danger of being misled, of being led to suffering rather than to liberation and thus wasting one’s life.
It is important to relate this verse to Lama Tsongkhapa’s excellent unmistaken path, because you will then feel how fortunate you are in this life. First of all, the number of Buddhists in this world is small when compared to the number of non-Buddhists; among Buddhists, the number of Mahayanists is very small; and among Mahayanists, those who meet Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings, which contain pure conduct and pure view, are even fewer.
Then, reminds me of you, Lama means that thinking of how you have received all this reminds you of your guru. It means not just remembering your guru but remembering his kindness and practicing and actualizing the teachings he has given you as well.
The word Lama is related more to your root guru, the aspect that you are meditating on. You can relate the verse to your other gurus, but keep your mind one-pointedly on the aspect of your root guru. Otherwise, you could say Lamas.
Thinking of this excellent body, highly meaningful and difficult to obtain, and wishing to take its essence with unerring choice between gain and loss, happiness and suffering—reminds me of you, Lama.
We receive a perfect human rebirth, which is difficult to find and has great meaning, by the kindness of the guru. All the eight freedoms and ten richnesses, each of which is extremely rare, are received by the kindness of the guru. Such a body, which will be extremely difficult to find again, has been found this time by the kindness of the guru; and with this perfect human body, we can achieve the three great meanings, also by the kindness of the guru.
This rebirth gives us the freedom in this life to choose between profit and loss, between happiness and suffering. In every moment, we can choose enlightenment or hell. We have the freedom to choose now, during this life, this year, this month, this week, this day, this hour, this minute, even this second. We can choose to achieve hell or enlightenment, samsara or liberation, the realm of a suffering migratory being or the realm of a happy migratory being. Even in each moment we have the freedom to choose to take the unmistaken essence.
How do we take the unmistaken essence? By meditating that our own mind, the guru’s mind and the deity’s mind are one. Our own mind is one with our own special deity’s mind, the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness, which is the absolute guru. Seeing all these three as one should be our meditation in daily life. Twenty-four hours a day we should see ourselves, the deity and the guru as one.
With this guru yoga practice, from morning until night, all our enjoyments become the means of accumulating the most extensive merit. With this meditation, every single sense pleasure—eating, drinking, washing—rather than becoming negative karma naturally becomes a method of accumulating the most extensive merit. Since we are seeing all three as one, every sense pleasure becomes an offering and develops bliss and voidness, the essence of the Highest Yoga Tantra path, within us. In this way, drinking a mouthful of tea or eating a mouthful of food collects much more merit than making offerings to all the buddhas. Eating and drinking then make our life extremely rich and meaningful. And it is the same with all our other enjoyments; washing, wearing clothes, and everything else become only the means to accumulate the most extensive merit.
If we make offerings in this way, everything helps us to develop the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness, and meditation on emptiness naturally has to come with every enjoyment. Every enjoyment experienced with awareness of emptiness becomes a remedy to cut the root of samsara. All the sense objects we enjoy are also manifestations of the dharmakaya, the absolute guru, the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness. Everything we do becomes guru yoga practice. Living our life in this way is the way to become enlightened in one brief lifetime of a degenerate time. Those yogis who became enlightened in one life did so because they practiced guru yoga in this way, seeing all three—their own mind, the deity’s holy mind and the guru’s holy mind—as one. This is what enabled them to achieve enlightenment within one life, or within even a few years.
Since these actions are also done with bodhicitta, they are again causes of enlightenment. First of all, by the power of the guru-deity, everything becomes a cause of enlightenment. Second, since the practice is done with bodhicitta, it again becomes a cause of enlightenment. It makes our life beneficial for all sentient beings.
Our own mind is dharmakaya, the deity’s holy mind and the guru’s holy mind. How is that experienced? We see everything as empty, oneness with bliss. There is this pure appearance. No ordinary things appear to this dharmakaya, only pure things, and everything appears as empty of existing from its own side.
What obliges us to do all these practices of guru yoga, bliss and voidness and bodhicitta and thus make our life most meaningful is awareness of impermanence and death, awareness that we are going to die and that our death could happen at any time, even today. This stops the concept of permanence. It cuts distractions and gives us the energy and perseverance to continue the other practices. It enables us not to be born in hell and to achieve enlightenment. It enables us to be free from samsara, to achieve liberation from true suffering and true cause of suffering. Even if we don’t become enlightened in this life, it helps us not to be born in the lower realms and to be born as a deva or a human in our next life. This is the very essence of the lamrim, the three principal paths.
Thinking of the experience of not knowing what to do when the great fear of death suddenly descends upon me—reminds me of you, Lama.
I think it’s very good to meditate on this verse. If death suddenly happens upon you, what are you going to do? Of course, how much success you have at the time of death, which means being able to meditate well, depends on how much merit you have collected. In other words, it really depends on how well you have devoted yourself to your virtuous friend. If death were to happen right now, what would you do? Here Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo is reminding you to prepare for death. Even if you have done extensive study of the five root philosophical texts and the Indian and Tibetan commentaries as well, even if you are a famous lharampa geshe, if you didn’t practice Dharma, if you didn’t practice the lamrim, and suddenly death comes, you won’t know what to do. You will suddenly be lost and overwhelmed by fear. You will have no time to practice as there is no way to postpone death.
Thinking of the experience of just now suddenly separating from the perfections of this life and going on alone—reminds me of you, Lama.
When this happens, there is nothing to rely upon except the guru. That’s why it reminds you of the guru.
Thinking of the experience of my naked body falling into the terrifying fires of hell and being unable to bear it—reminds me of you, Lama.
Here, when it comes to the suffering of the lower realms, it’s good to make this request: “Please, guru, protect me right now from the unbearable suffering of the hell realms.” Since there is no other object of refuge for you, you take refuge in your guru. Even though there are numberless buddhas and bodhisattvas, the best, most powerful refuge is the guru. As I mentioned before, the guru is the origin of all the other objects of refuge, of all the buddhas, Dharma and Sangha.
It’s also very good to relate to this suffering by thinking, “When I fall into the hell realms, may I experience the sufferings of hell of all sentient beings.” You remember your guru and request to be able to use the suffering of rebirth in the lower realms to practice bodhicitta. You can think this at the end of the verse. By praying like this now, when you are born in hell, you will be able to remember bodhicitta and take on yourself all the hell beings’ sufferings at that time. You also allow other sentient beings to take all your happiness up to enlightenment.
To think in either of these two ways is good.
Thinking of how the suffering of hunger and thirst, without a drop of water, is directly experienced in the unfortunate preta realm—reminds me of you, Lama.
Pretas are unable to find even a drop of water or a spoonful of food for thousands of years and experience only suffering. On top of that, they create negative karma. It is a most unbearable life. Thinking, “I have no other method except to take refuge in my guru,” you remember your guru and again ask him to protect you.
You can also generate bodhicitta, thinking that when you are reborn there in the preta realm you will experience the preta sufferings of all sentient beings.
Thinking of how very repulsive and wretched it is to become a foolish stupid animal and what it would be like to experience it myself—reminds me of you, Lama.
Here it is talking about animals in general, but it is more effective to relate this verse to specific animals that you have seen because, as ordinary people, we don’t have clairvoyance; we don’t see how much animals suffer. Some people, whose minds are very obscured, don’t even think animals have a mind; they think of them as plants. Relate this verse to specific animals whose suffering you can remember. Not only are animals suffering but they are also continuously creating negative karma because it is very difficult for an animal to generate a virtuous thought.
As a hell being, preta or animal, no matter how much unbearable suffering you are experiencing, it doesn’t stop; you don’t die. Because of your heavy karma, obstacles have gathered, and no matter how difficult your life is, you don’t die until that karma is exhausted.
Thinking of a refuge to protect me from this, since I am now about to fall into the wretched states of bad migration—reminds me of you, Lama.
This is also a very powerful meditation. Think, “Anything could have happened to me by this afternoon or tonight. I could be in a terrifying hell realm or reborn as a millipede, a worm or some other creature. In an hour, or even a minute, I could be in the lower realms.” Reflect on the sufferings of the lower realms. They are unbearable but you have to experience them until the karma finishes. You have no choice. That experience of the sufferings of the lower realms could appear even in the next minute.
This is a powerful meditation on impermanence, on how nothing is definite. Thinking to look for refuge, for protection from being born in the lower realms, you see that there is none other than your guru. Relying upon your guru, taking refuge in your guru, is the best protection.
Thinking of how white and black actions are experienced and of how to practice thorough and precise engagement and restraint—reminds me of you, Lama.
Reflect on karma and delusions, the causes of suffering, particularly the suffering of the lower realms. Think of the negative karma you have collected during beginningless rebirths and which you continue to collect every day with motivations of anger and attachment clinging to this life. All the results of unbearable suffering from the numberless causes you have created are waiting to be experienced. You could fall down into the lower realms and experience that suffering right now—not just today but even in an hour, a minute or a few seconds from now. You could breathe out and not breathe in again and suddenly a hell realm could appear to your mind.
There is no object of refuge other than the guru, the ultimate object of refuge. As described in the first verse, the holy minds of all the buddhas become one in the dharmakaya, like all the different rivers flowing into the ocean. Think of that meaning of the guru as the ultimate object of refuge, origin of all the numberless past, present and future buddhas, the Dharma and the Sangha.
Thinking of a method to escape this prison of endless existences, the source of all suffering—reminds me of you, Lama.
Thinking of the guru immediately protects you from having to experience rebirth in the lower realms. Remembering the guru liberates you from that suffering. Remembering the ultimate object of refuge, the guru, you don’t need to be afraid.
The way not to be born in the lower realms is to protect karma: to abandon both gross and subtle negative karmas and to practice gross and even subtle good karmas. Being able to do this depends on the guru giving teachings to you and your then practicing those teachings. You then purify the causes of the lower realms already collected and don’t create any more. The way to get out of samsara is to follow the guru’s teachings and advice. This is also related to the kindness of the guru.
This samsaric prison is the origin of all suffering, which has no beginning because the continuity of mind has no beginning and delusion, the cause of samsara, has no beginning. Not only does delusion have no beginning but it is also difficult to see its end. Again, when you think of ending the oceans of samsaric suffering, the continuity of which has no beginning, there is no better means than by relying upon the guru, taking refuge in the guru. The guru protects and guides you, liberating you from samsara by revealing the teachings to you and enabling you to practice them and thus accomplish his advice. This is what is contained in the words reminds me of you, Lama. Thinking of a means of protection and liberation, reminds me of you, Lama.
Thinking of the plight of my pitiful old mothers, pervasive as space, fallen amidst the fearful ocean of samsara and tormented there—reminds me of you, Lama.
Remember how each sentient being has been your mother numberless times and kind in the four ways. Your present mother was kind in giving you life, enabling you to practice Dharma and attain not only temporary but ultimate happiness. She protected you from hundreds of dangers to your life each day and underwent many physical and mental hardships for your wellbeing, often creating much negative karma in doing so, thereby creating the causes of much more suffering for herself in samsara. She provided you with all temporal needs, not only in this life but in beginningless lives in samsara. And she educated you in the ways of the world.
All sentient beings have been kind to you in these four ways numberless times and they are now suffering as hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, humans, asuras, suras and intermediate state beings. It is not just one mother sentient being that is suffering. In each of the six realms numberless of them are experiencing sufferings, one after another. Not only are they dying and being reborn in the six realms and experiencing unbearable suffering but because of their ignorance and other hallucinated minds, they are creating further negative karma. This is unbearable. Without choice, they are suffering unbearably but can’t do anything until their karma finishes. No matter how many eons it takes, they have to go through that suffering.
This is a source of inspiration for you to quickly achieve enlightenment by developing compassion, the special attitude126 and bodhicitta. You need to actualize the three principal paths and the two stages of tantra as a means to help liberate sentient beings from the ocean of samsaric sufferings and bring them to enlightenment.
In the following nine verses, you request very strongly to be granted all the realizations of the path to enlightenment without even a second’s delay. The final verse is then:
In short, please abide inseparably in the center of my heart until the great enlightenment and mercifully bless me, the child, to follow after you, the father.
You are requesting to be able to achieve enlightenment as Guru Shakyamuni Buddha did, by developing renunciation and entering the path. You, the spiritual child, wish to follow the father, the guru, with recognition of what the guru really is as expressed in the very first verse of Calling the Lama from Afar. The meditation is done with understanding of that state.
At this point you do the meditation of the guru entering your heart, with your own body, speech and mind becoming one with the guru’s holy body, holy speech and holy mind.
Lama, think of me.
Lama, think of me.
Lama, think of me.
You can then conclude by reciting the following prayers.
In whatever way you appear, glorious guru,
With whatever retinue, lifespan and pure land,
Whatever noble and holy name you take,
May I and others attain only these.May I never arise heresy even for a second
In the actions of the glorious guru.
May I regard whatever actions are done as pure.
[With this devotion] may I receive the blessings of the guru
in my heart.Magnificent and precious root guru,
Please abide on the lotus and moon seat at my heart.
Guide me with your great kindness,
And grant me the realizations ofyour holy body, speech and mind
Notes
124 The English translation of Calling the Lama from Afar has been updated since Heart of the Path was first published. Rinpoche’s commentary in this chapter refers to a previous translation. [Return to text]
125 The seven branches are complete enjoyment, union, great bliss, non-inherent existence, great compassion, uninterrupted continuity and non-cessation. [Return to text]
126 This is the special intention that assumes personal responsibility for leading all sentient beings to enlightenment. [Return to text]
