December 11, Late Evening

Questions and Answers

[Mandala offering]

Maybe there is a question? Half a question? Something that enlightens you?

Student: If everything depends on karma, then what is the role of free will?

Rinpoche: I know that is a big thing in the West! Yes, generally it is up to karma. It is up to karma, but you can change the karma. If you want to have free will, real free will, unmistaken free will, you can change the karma. I gave you the example of the geshe who asked the Seventh Dalai Lama where he was going to be born and he was told he would be born as a buffalo with blue horns. Then he asked how it was possible, because first the father and mother had to be copulate, then the consciousness had to get attached to the sperm and egg, then you stayed nine months in the womb, then you came out. It took so much time to get born as an ox with blue horns. So His Holiness laughed and laughed. He was so happy because the geshe talked straight.

After that, His Holiness said he would now be born as a monk and around His Holiness, but the monk said that he hadn’t purified anything and hadn’t collected any merit, so how was that possible? His Holiness didn’t say, “I’m Chenrezig,” but, “I’m a special being blessed by Chenrezig.” Because he made His Holiness happy, right away, by pleasing His Holiness, he purified his negative karma to born as an animal and created the karma to be born as a monk and around His Holiness. That is free will. With unmistaken free will you can change karma and become free from the lower realms, attain the path, become free from samsara and achieve nirvana and enlightenment. That is not wrong free will, but unmistaken free will.

If an obstacle year happens and you don’t do anything and heavy negative karma ripens, meaning you are going to die, you can ask some high lama, somebody who can tell you what practice to do. By giving advice that makes you purify the negative karma that would cause you to die now, this week, that can change your life, you get better and have a long life. That is very common. That is unmistaken free will, not only free will but unmistaken free will. You can have unmistaken free will. Whether you do that or not is totally up to you. If it were up to God, you wouldn’t have any freedom at all. What could you do if it were all up to God? It’s not sure what happens to your life. It’s like, “Oh, it is up to karma, there is nothing I can do.” It is like that. “Oh, I have no freedom, I can’t do anything. I just lie down and sleep. I don’t go to work, I don’t study, I just go to sleep.” It would be like that but it is not like that at all. That is why you came here. That is the main purpose.

Student: My question is how the merely labeled I relates to subtle consciousness, like the most subtle consciousness that travels from life to life, if my understanding is correct?

Rinpoche: How it is connected?

Student: Because the merely labeled I, as I understand, is a product of our obscurations, our ignorance, but subtle consciousness is what gets all the imprints of whatever karma we do and travels. What is the connection between the merely labeled I and the subtle consciousness that travels from life to life?

Rinpoche: As long as there is consciousness, merely labeled there, since consciousness exists, there is merely labeled there, that merely labeled is there, whether it is gross and subtle. It doesn’t matter whether it is gross or subtle, that which is merely labeled is there. That is what I think. Go on.

Student: I have a question about compassion and omniscience.

Rinpoche: Compassion and omniscience?

Student: I read in a book that compassion is the root of omniscience. It is not clear to me the connection between those two. Can you explain to me, based on your own example? If today you are more compassionate than yesterday does that mean you are more omniscient than yesterday?

Rinpoche: The last part I didn’t understand.

Student: If we assume you are more compassionate today than yesterday, does that also mean you are more omniscient today than yesterday?

Rinpoche: I thought in English “omniscient mind” means understanding every single phenomenon, not just understanding, directly seeing every single existent, directly seeing past, present and future existence at the same time. Every second of omniscience can see all the past, at the same time can see the future and at the same time can see the present.

Once you achieve omniscience it is forever. Once you achieve omniscience it can never happen that obscurations come again and the omniscience degenerates. No, there is no degeneration. Omniscience is the result of having totally ceased not only the gross obscurations but also the subtle obscurations. Then, you achieve omniscience. Therefore, nothing can degenerate omniscience. Once you achieve omniscience it is forever. Compassion is what causes you to achieve omniscience. Compassion and bodhicitta, yes. So if you are able to practice that, it will cause you to achieve omniscience, then you are able to do perfect work for sentient beings. OK, thank you. Is that clear?

Student: [inaudible]

Rinpoche: I think gradually you will understand by more studying. Read lamrim books, study and practice, and you will gradually understand. It is just a question of learning. You especially need to study all the philosophy contained in the lamrim. You can study that, then you can also study the other philosophical texts. There are short ones and elaborate ones, so as much as you study that, it will help you understand lamrim.

Student: I read in Pabongka Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand that there is acquired karma without having done any action. Can you explain what is meant by that?

Rinpoche: You create karma without having done action?

Student: There are other types of karma including karma that is accumulated without doing anything.

Rinpoche: You create karma without doing anything? That sounds like you create karma without creating karma. But I have to know what context, I have to know more. Maybe there are more things.

Student: Do you want me to read them?

Rinpoche: I think that is not enough. Read more.

Student: It says, “There are other types of karma: karma one is obliged to undergo, karma one is not obliged to undergo, karma one has accumulated through some action, actions done that accumulated no karma, karma that one accumulated without doing anything.”²⁷

Rinpoche: Ah? [Someone explains in Tibetan] Maybe it is talking about indifferent karma, not done by the virtuous thought, not done by the nonvirtuous thought. Maybe like that. Maybe that is what he is talking about.

Student: ...Neutral karma, without action of negative, without positive or negative action.

Student: Rinpoche, I have a question about bodhicitta and drug addiction. I did a stupid thing. I took drugs with my girlfriend. Now I have real difficulty dealing with drug addiction. When I try to do single-pointed concentration, it stays in my mind, if I try to practice tonglen, bodhicitta, with the person who taught me about drugs. I have to separate. How do you practice bodhicitta when two people who do drugs maybe do it out of love and stupidity?

Ven. Ailsa: His girlfriend introduced him to taking drugs, so now in his mind, she is addicted to drugs. How to develop compassion and bodhicitta because when they are together they need to take drugs.

Rinpoche: When they are together they take drugs, so how does that relate to bodhicitta and compassion?

Ven. Ailsa: How does he generate bodhicitta or compassion.

Rinpoche: She takes or he takes drugs? Who takes drugs?

Ven. Ailsa: They both take drugs.

Rinpoche: Your taking drugs, that may not be helping compassion or bodhicitta to develop, but you can generate compassion for her because she takes drugs, because, like I said before, it blocks free will. That’s what I want to say. [To the first student] What’s your name?

Student: Yuida.

Rinpoche: Yuida says that it breaks free will; it doesn’t allow free will to function. It blocks the mind developing and it also blocks the physical channels’ potential from functioning. So, you can generate compassion for her because that is what it does, it blocks her free will, it blocks her from developing correct free will, to be not reborn in the lower realms, to be free from samsara, and to achieve enlightenment. It blocks that.

Student: What is the strongest antidote to attachment that manifests as addiction? What is the strongest way to abandon addiction?

Rinpoche: First of all, you can generate compassion for her. It blocks her from developing free will in her mind to benefit not only herself but to benefit numberless sentient beings. It blocks her developing wisdom and compassion to benefit all sentient beings. So generate compassion for her. That is just kind of an easy way to explain it.

Then, it destroys your life. It makes you take more and more, and because it makes you get more and more involved, you can’t even do normal work, even a normal job. You not only can’t do Dharma but even normal things that other people do. Then, it makes life so expensive because drugs cost lots of money. So, you steal from your parents and other people. The thought to steal comes because you are attached to pleasure, so you steal from your parents, from friends, even from unknown people, and then you get involved in many heavy negative karmas.

That is because of not thinking much about the shortcomings of taking drugs, only thinking of the pleasure with a very limited mind. There are so many unbelievable, unbelievable shortcomings but you don’t think of them. Then you get attached. That is the small mind attached to pleasure.

Then you get into problems. You have so many problems in life, where you could have had so much peace and happiness, especially living in satisfaction, living in less desire, as I talked the other day. Less desire, small desire, dochung chogshe, satisfaction. Whether you meditate or not, if you live your life in that, then more and more peace and happiness comes. You become mentally and physically healthier and healthier.

Otherwise, if you only think of pleasure, if you don’t think of all the vast shortcomings, then your life gets more and more sunk in the mud. The problems in your life go on and on. You can’t even do what normal people can do. Your parents worry, your friends and other people who know you worry. Those who are close to you worry for you. You only think of the pleasure, you don’t think of past and future, just now. It causes your parents and many people to worry about you.

So, it is very important to think of the shortcomings as much as possible. There are many people in prison for drugs and things like that. Even the government finds it difficult. There are so many prisons in countries like the United States. [Thinking about the shortcomings] is so important.

Whether it is drugs or whatever object of attachment, think of the shortcomings. The more you think of the shortcomings, the more you see the suffering. If you think about the shortcomings you see more and more that you are totally cheating yourself. You see no essence.

It’s the same with alcohol, you think of the pleasure, you don’t think of all the shortcomings of alcohol. It breaks relationships with your wife or husband and your children. It makes your life unnecessarily expensive. You become mad and you become intoxicated and break things in the house. When you fight, throwing things and beating your wife or husband—probably more likely your wife—they have to call the police. They have no choice because their life is in danger. Then you go to prison.

Similarly, with many things, think of the shortcomings as much as possible. That is the main meditation. Analyze, look at the world, and then also look at your experience. That is one thing.

But, even though you know the meditations well, you know what to do—of course it will help some people—if your mind is not controlled, you still go looking for drugs. So, if you can go to a place where there are no drugs for a while, I think that helps very much, not only for drugs but generally that controls attachment. Meditation is one thing, as I said. Look at the many shortcomings, how it destroys your life, how it not only harms you, it harms your family and others.

I have a brother, Pema, who now lives somewhere near here. He was married to a French lady. They were well; they had two or three girls. Their business was a bakery. All day long they made bread, but he is a Sherpa and Sherpas drink wine. That is kind of their main thing. So, he didn’t control his mind. He drank a lot and then he threw things in the house, he broke things, and he was dangerous for the family. She had to call the police who put him in prison. Then they divorced and he left the West to live back in the East. I didn’t get to ask him about his life in the East. Like that, it is a very sad life. You destroy yourself; you are no benefit to yourself and no benefit to others. There is so much negative karma, such unbelievable fear.

For some people, meditation is OK, but for many people who have very strong habituation, it is not enough. It is better to get away from the object of desire. That is best. Without meditation, however, without understanding the methods, even if you are away from the object, what happens is that physically you are away but mentally you are not away, so the mind suffers. You are physically away but if you don’t have meditation the mind suffers. So, you need both meditation and, if you have an uncontrolled mind, it is better to be away from the object of desire. Meditation and being away from the object of addiction can help each other. That is my advice, my suggestion. You have to try very hard, then gradually it will happen.

Some young Tibetan people get very involved in drugs. There was one Lama Gyupa who tried to help them. He made a movie of people who stopped taking drugs then did jobs to help others. I didn’t see it but he made a video. What happens is that, while taking drugs is one thing, when they stop the drugs it is very difficult to find a job. First is the drugs, then second, it’s very difficult to find a job or you can’t do well, something like that. I forget exactly the second problem. He had to find a job for them to do, that was the second thing. To stop drugs is not enough, so he came to ask me to help him. I don’t remember what we talked about. You need good organization for that but he didn’t have good organization, so I think maybe I helped him with some money. It was some years ago. There is the same problem with the young people in Bhutan.

Student: Rinpoche, was there any moment in your life that somehow changed your mind, some experience or some realization that was very important for you? Like for many people the mind changes when parents die or they have a car accident, suddenly their whole life changes. Did you have some experience that changed your life?

Rinpoche: Yes, there have been different times. Yes, you are right. It does happen. More and more you discover. From time to time you discover.

Student: Can you share what it was? What kind of story was behind it?

Rinpoche: I’m totally blank. There have been different things. Like I told you, in Solu Khumbu when I was building the monastery, reading that text changed my attitude. It cleaned the garbage a little bit from my mind, so when I began the retreat it was very good. I mentioned that. When people came to see me in the cave and made offerings of potatoes and rice, these are the offerings in Solu Khumbu, then I got scared. So yeah, like that.

One time, I went to Dharamsala, where His Holiness is, and looked back at my life. I had some dogs in the old gompa. The first one, a Lhasa Apso, was a present from my mother, called Drolma, an unbelievable wonderful dog. In seven years, I never saw her make kaka or pipi. Sometimes she was locked in a room for a long time, but she had incredible conduct. It was unbelievable. If you put food in front of her, while other dogs gulped it down, trying to get it down as quickly as possible, she looked like she was making offerings. She stopped, she didn’t eat immediately but waited and then ate slowly. She was like that all the time.

[My mother gave me the dog when I returned to Nepal.] For many years we lived in the old gompa, sorry, not gompa, in the king’s astrologer’s house. It was built in the British time. You can’t see it from the outside because it is surrounded by trees; you can only see it if you come down the mountain a little bit. We lived there for many years. We were doing a puja led by Lama. There was also another geshe who did a three-year Heruka retreat in Pharping. His attendant was there and some students who came from a monastery on the hill. Only after seven years I saw her make pipi. Then at the end, her karmic connection was with me; she was my mother’s present after I lived three years in Tibet and eight years in Buxa, where Mahatma Gandhi-ji and Prime Minister Nehru were imprisoned in British times.

It was Lama Yeshe’s decision [that we lived on Kopan hill]. We were supposed to go to Sri Lanka. The first student, Zina Rachevsky, from Russia—her father revolted in Russia then went to France—was living there and we were supposed to go there to start a Mahayana center. We went to see His Holiness to get advice from his religious office. At that time, India and Russia did not have good relations, so somehow it didn’t happen to go to Sri Lanka at that time. It was Lama’s idea to go to Nepal so we came here.

Then, for less than a year, we lived in the Gelug monastery in Lama Tsongkhapa’s tradition in Boudha, built by a Mongolian lama. The monks living there were from Kyirong in Tibet. The caretaker of the stupa, Chimé Lama, had three sons, and we lived in two different sons’ houses for a long time after that.

Anyway, that dog was my mother’s present after coming back to Nepal. Of the twelve animals in the astrological calendar, it was the year of the monkey, the time each twelve years when people come from very far to make pilgrimage in Nepal. Because I had been away for a long time, my whole family came down, including my two alphabet teachers. One, who lived in the aspect of a monk, carved mantras on rocks in Solu Khumbu when people requested him, which people then circumambulated. The elder one passed away; he was a monk before but later changed aspect. This dog was mother’s present but in the end it was bitten by a big dog.

She was in bathroom making a big noise. When I went to her, she stopped the noise but when I went away she made the big noise again, then she died. Then, there were two other dogs that Lama brought down from the mountains. Mommy Max went to the mountains, to Junbesi, and brought two dogs. One was Lama’s. I think maybe that dog had more karma with me so it stayed with me, on the cushion where I was, sitting on top of the cushion. I think maybe it was the incarnation of my mother’s dog, I’m not sure.

One time, when I did retreat in Tushita, I thought about the dogs I had a long time ago. It was up to the cook whether they got food or not. I didn’t really take care of them well, so during the retreat I realized I felt sorry I didn’t take care of the dogs well in early times. I needed to pay attention. I needed to take care of them well. In reality, they are the same as your family. We are all family. Many times they could be recent family, those who died. There have been different things like that.

Do you understand what I’m saying? I have no memory of past lives like many other reincarnate lamas have, but certain thoughts arise and I believe that I did meditate in my past life because of that. But I have no memory of past life stories. That is my reason. OK? That is all. Finished. Sorry.

Tonglen

I just want to talk about tonglen, in case you would like to do that meditation. It is the best. It makes life most beneficial for every single sentient being and allows you to achieve enlightenment quickly. It is the best practice, the strongest purification and the most extensive way to collect merit. I’ll first explain the meditation.

When you do the tonglen practice, you first take other sentient beings’ sufferings and the cause of sufferings. You do that by generating compassion for sentient beings.

What sentient beings like is happiness and what they don’t like is suffering. However, no matter how much they don’t want to suffer, due to ignorance, day and night, they keep totally busy creating suffering, as busy as ants, day and night keeping so busy creating the cause of suffering. Living life with ignorance, anger, attachment, like that, the karma they create is only nonvirtue.

They suffer now, in this life, and they suffer at death, without talking about future lives, about the suffering in the lower realms, as a hell being, a hungry ghost, an animal, without talking about the karma [of being trapped there] even for eons. Then, even when they are born again as a human being, due to another negative karma, there is still so much suffering.

As I explained before, due to the habit of negative karma of stealing in a past life, you do the action of stealing again. Then you get what you did in the past, how you treated others in a negative way in the past. In this life, when you are human being, you receive harm from others, which is experiencing the result similar to the cause, and so it goes on and on. So, people are busy all day. No matter how much they don’t like suffering, their life is always kept busy creating negative karma, the cause of suffering. As I told you before, you have to experience the suffering result of one negative karma for five hundred lifetimes.

And with one good karma, benefiting somebody like an insect or a human being just once, the result is happiness and success for five hundred lifetimes. It can be even more if the action is stronger.

Not knowing karma, people totally live their whole life with ignorance. Even if they know Dharma intellectually, they don’t practice it. Some people are experts intellectually, but they don’t practice. They are so busy their whole life; so busy they look like ants. Then, no matter how much they like happiness, they always destroy the cause of happiness due to ignorance.

Even if you give them teachings, talking very sincerely, people don’t have the karma to understand. They’re afraid, they run away. Even if you explain with compassion, they run away because they don’t have the karma. Like that, it’s so difficult. However much they like and want happiness, they always destroy the cause of happiness, virtue, and due to anger or heresy they even destroy merits they collected in the past.

First of all, it is very difficult for the actions you do in life to become Dharma. And even if you practice Dharma, it doesn’t become Dharma, like the example I gave you. It is so difficult to become pure Dharma. And in case some pure Dharma happens, then anger or heresy or ill will arise and destroy the merits. Even if there are some merits collected in the past, they are destroyed. And even if some merits are created, there is no dedication to achieve enlightenment.

With tonglen, by generating compassion, you take others’ suffering and the cause of suffering, delusion and karma. You take the sufferings of the six realms, as we went through. Not only that, out of compassion you even take the conditions, the totally unfavorable negative place, in your heart.

You can do this with the in-breath, but take it inside your heart. Not this heart, this bumping heart, but the heart where emotions like anger, patience and loving kindness come. It’s that one, here. You give it to the self-cherishing thought. As I mentioned to you already, the self-cherishing thought is the great demon, your enemy where all the obstacles to practicing Dharma come from.

All the suffering you have experienced in samsara from beginningless rebirths, you are experiencing now and will experience in the future—endlessly—all that comes from your self-cherishing thought. Take others’ suffering in your heart and give it to the self-cherishing thought, your enemy, and it is totally destroyed, totally eliminated. When that is eliminated, the real I is also destroyed. It is the object of ignorance, den dzin ma rig pa, the ignorance holding the I as real while it is not. It has never existed from the beginning, but it appears and you totally hold this wrong I, this false I. So, not only is the self-cherishing thought destroyed but also ignorance, the real I that is not there. Then, you see it is empty. You see empty, as it is empty.

You Create Infinite Merit

You can stay there as long you want. Then generate loving kindness. There are numberless sentient beings. If you take the suffering and its cause from just one person or from one insect, just by doing that sincerely you create unbelievable merit and purification. Now, there are numberless sentient beings in the hell realms, and the realms of the hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, suras and asuras. So taking the suffering from everyone is such an unbelievable practice. You collect more than skies of merits.

Can you imagine making extensive offerings to even ordinary bodhisattvas? Now, you make extensive offerings to the buddhas. I told you already, didn’t I? I thought some time ago I taught how one tiny grain of rice or one tiny flower offered to one picture or statue of the Buddha, no matter how small or big it is, purifies past negative karma, the cause of lower realms, and creates the cause of a higher rebirth. That is the first thing.

Second, and this is very important to keep it in mind, it creates the cause to experience as much happiness in the future as you have experienced from beginningless rebirths. However much happiness you have already experienced from beginningless rebirths up to now, that much will be experienced in the future. The second benefit is you create that much. Don’t forget. It is in the Sutra of Piled Flowers (Metog Tsegpai Do) if you want to learn.

That is incredible. Now the next one is that it is the real cause of success in life. Normally people think success comes from a school education, from university, but even though many people have degrees they still can’t find a job. For instance, even if they learned economics in university, they have so many problems in business; they don’t succeed in business. There are people who have no education but also no worries; they are wealthy. I know there are many people where everything positive happens. What about that?

The next benefit is that it causes you to be free from samsara. Samsara has no beginning, but this causes it to end. That is so important, so important. Just by offering one grain of rice or one tiny flower, and we’re not talking about offering to a living buddha but to a picture or statue of the Buddha, no matter how small it is.

After that, it causes you to achieve great nirvana, buddhahood, the total cessation of obscurations and completion of realizations, to achieve that for sentient beings. Still, after you have achieved enlightenment, buddhahood, the merits have not finished. After that, you not only free the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, but also bring them to buddhahood, to peerless happiness, everyone, the numberless hell beings, the numberless human beings and so forth. Only when everyone is brought to buddhahood by you, only at that time, are the merits completed of offering a tiny grain of rice or a tiny flower to a statue of the Buddha, no matter how small the offering. Only at that time are the merits completed. There is another benefit but there is no time.

Now, this one is so important. If you want realization, if you want enlightenment, you have to put effort into this one. You have to be alert, mindful. This is how to have success in the life, life to life up to enlightenment. Making offerings to the Buddha is like that. Now thinking to benefit somebody, an insect or person, is much greater merit than making extensive offerings to the buddhas. That is what I explained before. Then, if that is so, just merely thinking to benefit, then what about actually doing it? When you actually engage in benefiting others? Therefore, even benefiting one is unbelievable, but now there are numberless, and from each one you receive the greatest purification and collect the most extensive merits. Unbelievable.

Nagarjuna said in the Jewel Garland that by generating bodhicitta to benefit sentient beings, if the benefit is materialized the whole sky would be filled up, and even more than that, if it is materialized it would be more than the sky. This is said by the Buddha.²⁸ Even logically, sentient beings are limitless, so your thought to benefit them is also limitless. Talking about how important bodhicitta is, Lama Atisha in the Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment referred to a quotation that the Buddha explained to somebody called Paljin,²⁹

If someone were to fill with jewels
As many buddha fields as there are grains
Of sand in the Ganges
To offer to the Protector of the World,

This would be surpassed by
The gift of folding one’s hands
And inclining one’s mind to enlightenment,
For such is limitless.³⁰

He compares the benefits to the number of sand grains of the River Ganga, the Indian River Ganga. It is very long and very wide. I remember Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche explained when it talks about the benefits of bodhicitta, it is not the River Ganga, it is the Pacific Ocean. He took this from his notes of the teachings when he received a commentary on A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life from his guru. It refers to the number of sand grains of the Pacific Ocean. That many worlds, that many buddha fields, all that is filled with seven types of jewels, totally filled up, like a container filled with rice, that many worlds, equaling number of sand grains of Pacific Ocean, you offer to the Buddha. The “Protector of the World” means the Buddha. Compared to somebody who puts their palms together and generates bodhicitta, saying “May I achieve enlightenment for sentient beings by practicing charity and so forth,” the merits of this are so much greater than that. The merits are so much greater they have no end. They are limitless compared to the sand grains of the Pacific Ocean, that many buddha worlds totally filled with the seven different types of jewels and offered to the buddhas. Can you imagine?

Before I talked about one grain of rice or one tiny flower, but actually when somebody generates bodhicitta the benefits are so much greater than that, than the previous ones. Just by generating bodhicitta the benefits have no limits, dedicating the merits to achieve enlightenment for the numberless sentient beings. I didn’t finish but then there is giving away your body, enjoyments, merits and all the happiness with loving kindness. I will explain that tomorrow.

I want to suggest this to you. If your doctor tells you that you have cancer, then do this meditation, taking all sentient beings’ suffering, and in particular the cancer, on yourself, destroying the ego, the source you received all the suffering from and not only that, the root of samsara, ignorance. If you can do that, it’s the best. Then, the cancer is nothing. The cancer has made you practice pure Dharma, the Mahayana teachings, the bodhicitta practice, and that makes you achieve enlightenment quickly. Your cancer makes you quickly be free from samsara and achieve enlightenment. What more do you need than that? Can you have anything greater than that?

Sometimes it is nothing but there is pain with cancer or other diseases, but with tonglen—maybe when you are not even actually doing it but starting to think about it—the pain completely goes away. That is the power of bodhicitta. Even if you didn’t actually start but you are just thinking of that, it can be like that.

When you have pain in the eye, even you don’t actually start the practice but the mind intends to, it eliminates the pain. You can apply this to any problem in life. For relationship problems and many other things, it is the best one. Many times your friend or a parent or somebody you know is very sick, in great pain. When you go to your room and do tonglen practice on the bed, you take that person’s unbelievable pain on you and it destroys your ego and self-cherishing thought, ignorance. Many times it can be a very helpful method to cure that person. That has happened. There are many stories about that. Then, it also helps your bodhicitta. It develops your bodhicitta and makes it quicker to achieve enlightenment. It is the best practice.

I’ll stop here. I’ll explain the rest tomorrow, hopefully. I think that is all.

Please understand that lojong, thought transformation, is not to stop the suffering that you have, the problems that you have. It is not for that. Whatever sickness or problem you have, while you are experiencing it, you utilize it on the path to enlightenment, to achieve enlightenment for all sentient beings; it is not to stop your problems. But I’m saying if you do that, these things happen, but the main reason is not to stop the problems. So I’ll stop here.

Jang chhub sem chhog…

When you do this, sometimes the other person gets totally better and you get the sickness! But according to the practice, that is the greatest success. The ordinary mind, the self-cherishing thought, thinks that is terrible, but in the practice, in the view of bodhicitta, that is the greatest success. That other person gets better and you get sick, because you have taken the suffering. There is nothing definite but it has happened many times.

There was a Kadampa geshe, I forget his name, possibly Langri Tangpa. When a dog was beaten by somebody with a stick, because of his bodhicitta, his compassion, he got the mark of the stick. The person didn’t hit him at all, he hit the dog, but because of his bodhicitta, his compassion, he got the mark of the stick on his body.

Ge wa di yi…

Do this meditation when an earthquake happens or when you are in an airplane and bad weather happens and there is danger. My practice was political. During the very big earthquake here in Nepal³¹—there were more than six or something—in my big room all the buddha statues fell down. Sangpo came in with very intense face, saying “HRIH VAJRA KHRODHA HAYAGRIVA HULU HULU HUM PHAT,”³² holding my table and saying, “Rinpoche, HRIH VAJRA KHRODHA HAYAGRIVA HULU HULU HUM PHAT.” I think it was not pure practice but because I knew some thought transformation words, I tried to remember them, I did like this, I tried to remember Nagarjuna’s words that I mentioned:

DRO WÄI DUG NGÄL GANGCHI RUNG
   Whatever suffering transmigratory beings experience,
DE KÜN DAG LA MIN GYUR CHIG
   May it all ripen on me.
DAG GI DE GE CHI SAG PA
   Whatever happiness and virtue I accumulate,
DE KÜN ZHÄN LA MIN GYUR CHIG
   May it all ripen on others.

It was very strange; there was no fear at all. I think it was political; my practice was political. It was like that.

Then, when I came out, there were some boys. One had learned how to behave [in an earthquake.] You have to sit down. Then Jinpa, the disciplinary monk, and Sangpo carried me to the steps and then outside. We spent maybe two weeks outside? Something like that. Then, every day there were many small earthquakes. On the second day there were more than five, even the trees went like this. [Rinpoche indicates trees shaking] I was outside. The earthquakes lasted one month or two months? Anyway. That is all. Thank you very much.

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Notes

²⁷ Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, p. 413. [Return to text]

²⁸ See also Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment, v. 15. [Return to text]

²⁹ This is the Sutra Requested by Viradatta, cited in v. 14 of Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment. [Return to text]

³⁰ Vv. 16 & 17. [Return to text]

³¹ Rinpoche is referring to the devastating earthquake on April 25, 2015. [Return to text]

³² This is the Most Secret Hayagriva mantra. [Return to text]