General Practice Advice from Rinpoche

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Thank you for your kind email. Start your practice now with Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga. Discuss with elder Sangha anything that isn’t clear about the practice, but here, start doing it now. Just do it. That’s the most important thing—just do it. It’s like when you are hungry you eat food, although, of course you also need to share the food. So do it, then the result, freedom from hunger, will come.

In your life, try to do one hundred nyung näs. This is an important Chenrezig practice to purify negative karma collected since beginningless rebirth.

Also recite Chenrezig mantra every day. This should be one main practice. I used to tell students even the mosquitoes, spiders and maggots, if possible, should all recite the Compassion Buddha mantra and the Medicine Buddha mantra. Medicine Buddha is for success, and the highest success is for yourself to achieve the total cessation of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations, buddhahood, and to free the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to full enlightenment.

This means success for yourself to be free from the oceans of samsaric suffering  and in future lives to meet Buddhadharma and to meet a perfectly qualified Mahayana guru, so to be able to practice Dharma.  By the way it brings success in this life, by the way, even though that’s what should be renounced, to not have attachment for it, but it happens by the way, while you are working for enlightenment for sentient beings. Even the works of this life, for this life’s success, this happens by the way, because of what you are doing, which is creating merits and avoiding negative karma. This is the cause of enlightenment.

Also each week, if you can, recite Arya Sanghata Sutra. This is the way to collect the most extensive merits, and the more extensive merits you collect, the more you will have success.

If you can, also try to recite Chanting the Names of Manjrushri every day. If you don’t finish it sometimes it doesn’t matter; you can finish what you didn’t finish the next day. If you can, try that; so if you can, get familiar with reciting that every day.

You must be doing very well, as not many preliminary practices came out for you to do, so you must be doing very well. Please continue.

This is one opportunity, it is just one time you have received a perfect human rebirth, so this is just one time. Like people climbing Mount Everest, they spend probably many millions of dollars, I don’t know how much. They think this is just one opportunity to climb Mount Everest, but that is nothing—it doesn’t purify negative karma and it doesn’t free you from the lower realms.

[Negative karma] is what makes you to be reborn in the lower realms and climbing the mountain doesn’t purify that. It doesn’t make you to be reborn as a human being, as a deva or in a pure land, it doesn’t achieve that. It doesn’t liberate you from samsara forever, it doesn’t help you to achieve full enlightenment for others, for the numberless sentient beings, even though you go through so much danger climbing the mountain and it costs so much to go up the mountain, so here, Dharma practice. In the past from beginningless rebirths we haven’t died bearing hardships for Dharma, but we have died numberless times bearing hardships to create the cause of samsara, the cause of the lower realms, so please understand this.

You can think about being a good monk in the future, but that’s up to you. First you have to understand and realize the shortcomings of not being a monk, and the unbelievable, unbelievable advantages of being a monk for sentient beings.

Thank you.

With much love and prayers...

My very dear one,
Thank you very much for your email, even though you sent it one year ago. I am very sorry for the delay.

As you know, Dharma is the most important one, more important than a job or money in the world. The most important thing is Dharma. A job and money comes from Dharma, from good karma, and all the suffering comes from negative karma. Happiness comes from Dharma, so that means Dharma is the most important thing in your life, more important than anything else.

Please read books by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, also by myself and Lama Yeshe.

With much love and prayers...

My most dear one,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. You often think of me and pray to me, whether I can help or not, so you are keeping good samaya and that is good, keeping the mind in the correct path to enlightenment, lamrim. That is the most important because it is the root of the path to enlightenment and without that it’s not possible [to achieve enlightenment.] Even if you have a good connection with other gurus, if one guru is left out and you have negative samaya with one guru, then it affects the others.

During a great initiation, when the transcendental wisdom of the deity is invoked, at that time amongst the disciples who receive the wisdom, one of the signs is speaking languages, Sanskrit or something like that. That’s a sign of receiving the speech, then receiving the holy body is suddenly jumping and maybe the holy mind is seeing past, present and future. It’s supposed to happen during initiation. It could happen at other times, so maybe it could be like that.

What you are reciting is Palden Lhamo mantra, you recite that a few times, then the five deities mantra, then maybe some other mantras, perhaps Sanskrit, but I don’t understand it all. So generally like that. It can be a good sign, but just leave it. Don’t bother; don’t take it as something very important or as something very bad. Keep it like wind passing through the hair. As long as it’s not harmful to you.

Continue your great devotion to the Guru, Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Live your life with bodhicitta on the basis of compassion to all sentient beings.

Thank you very much.

Count the Thirty-five Buddhas or Vajrasattva mantras many times during that time.

You can also do other prayers, Vajra Cutter Sutra, Sutra of Golden Light and Arya Sanghata Sutra. However, you should mainly do the Thirty-five Buddhas or Vajrasattva.

• Lama Tsongkhapa did so many prostrations, then realizations came like rainfall. You should do 400,000 prostrations to the Thirty-five Buddhas. Do these as much as you can, you don’t have to be strict. These are very important.
• Migtsema: 300,000. As you have time, do the secret visualization.
• Vajrasattva mantra: 400,000.
• Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand: study this book five times. This means read it five times and think about it. As well, read the Lam rim Chen mo three times.
• After doing these practices, do effortful meditation on lamrim, following the outline. The guide book for this is The Essential Nectar. Do this cycle four times, then do effortless meditation.

My most dear, most kind, most precious wish-fulfilling Luke,
Thank you for your messages, I read them. I am very sorry for the long delay in replying, so sorry. So please do daily morning meditation practice, it is very good for you to do this.

Regarding your request for me to be your guru, so I am very happy. You try your best and I will try my best.

If you can, practice Guru Puja [Lama Chöpa]. There is the lamrim prayer at the end with special instructions on how to transform problems into the path to enlightenment, so this is very special for you to understand and practice, and then there is also tantra in that, so that leaves an imprint on the mind.

Without realizations on guru devotion, bodhicitta and emptiness, then tantric realizations can’t happen, so until then just recite this to generate the realizations, to plant the seed. Of course, the whole reason to recite mindfully is to plant the seed now and to have realizations. So if you can do Lama Chöpa it is so good, then later you can take Highest Yoga Tantra initiation and then if you are able to, receive commentary on the practice.

You must have good karma, so slowly you can try like this. Then also it comes out very good for you to read Manjushi’s sayings [Chanting the Names of Manjushri]. That would be so good for you. It includes all the four classes of tantra as well as Kalachakra and to recite it is great, great, great purification and a way of collecting merits.

Please recite the Chenrezig mantra, OM MANI PADME HUM. That is the main mantra for you to recite.

Please live your life with bodhicitta night and day, and with every action that you do.

With much love and prayers...