Training the Mind in Lamrim

Student:

Dear Lama Zopa,
I wanted to send you my best wishes for the year 2008, but I didn’t have your address with me. Anyway, I hope this year will bring peace to the world—friendship between races (the possible new US premier is the demonstration of that!!!), peace and love in our families, countries, and especially in our hearts, peace for Tibet, better care of mother nature, with less pollution, and more bread for everybody.

My mother, after a difficult period of radiotherapy, is getting better. I recite every day Tara and Medicine Buddha mantras etc. for her, my father, my kids, my lover, my friends, and everybody. I do a lot of mantras and praying for people with AIDS, drug and alcohol addicts, etc.

Please bless that puja to help my friend and all people who have fallen into alcohol or drug addiction, or are now fighting to overcome their problems, also people with AIDS.

Rinpoche's Response:

My very dear Laurence,
Thank you very much for your kind letter.

You gave detailed information in this letter, but what is most beneficial for you and all sentient beings is to live life with the bodhicitta motivation. You do everything with the bodhicitta motivation, so eating, sleeping, working, everything is done with this motivation, with the thought to benefit all sentient beings. “All sentient beings” includes your enemies, those who you hate or who hate you, so you do everything with the thought to benefit them by freeing them from oceans of samsaric suffering. As much as possible, you live with the thought to benefit others—no matter how much difficulty there is in life, or how much excitement, the thought is to benefit others.

I have two points of advice for you:

1. The most important thing is to meditate on the lamrim.
2. Study one lamrim text from beginning to end, then any questions you have, you can write down in a notebook, then you can discuss them with an elder, someone with more experience than you, like that.

Meditate every day on guru devotion until you have stable meditation every day and see all the gurus as Buddhas and all the Buddhas as gurus. Once you have stable meditation from your heart, if you achieve the realization, then you just think a little bit of the topic rather than going deeply into meditation on the specific topic.

Train in the graduated path for one year until you have realization in your heart. Take one topic each month. For instance, start with the path of the lower capable being and meditate on the precious human rebirth, death and impermanence, the suffering of the lower realms, and karma—one month for each topic. You can meditate on death and impermanence for three months. Then, move on to the path of the middle capable being and meditate on those topics for one year. Then, move on to the path of the higher capable being. Meditate on this for one year, like this: one year on bodhicitta, alternating between one month on the seven-point cause and effect instructions and one month on the method of exchanging oneself with others, to develop bodhicitta. Then, meditate for one year on emptiness.

If you don’t have realizations, you do these over and over again. Put your main effort into having realizations of renunciation, bodhicitta, and emptiness, and then move on to tantra. If you have a realization of bodhicitta, then you can spend most of your time on tantra.

This is my main advice for you. Whether there is more difficulty in life or more excitement, keeping the mind on Dharma is the most important thing, not money or friends. Without Dharma, you can’t benefit sentient beings. Without the good heart, you can’t benefit others. Also, you need Dharma wisdom to benefit others. Without Dharma wisdom, you don’t know how to benefit others. So, please develop compassion.

Thank you very much.

With love and prayer...

My dear one,
I understand your questions. Yes, definitely have a break. I understand very well your concerns and the feelings that you express. Regarding the boyfriend, I can’t really say, but generally it doesn’t really work out the way we expect. I think, mostly, it doesn’t really work out. So, I can’t really comment on the boyfriend part. I think you should try to do your best with this one.

Regarding the center, when the mind isn’t able to keep in the lamrim meditation, maybe because it wasn’t strong enough in the beginning, then it isn’t easy, even if you are at a Dharma center. There are many difficulties, financial difficulties, a small number of people helping (not enough people), so, with the stress of these things happening all the time for a long time, this is what happens with our students in the centers. Their minds become filled with problems, meditation on the lamrim becomes less and less, the feeling of the lamrim becomes less, then there is less compassion and feeling, less guru devotion, less bodhicitta. With this, the feelings becoming less and less, and then, of course, one becomes distant or feels distant from the Dharma. Even one’s commitments become dry words. One’s heart is distant, one’s heart is like being in a very hot desert, where there is no water, or in an extremely hot room with no air conditioning, so it becomes difficult to feel the Dharma.

I really appreciate your thinking to meditate on the lamrim and to bring Dharma back in your heart. So, I think your plan is a good one. So, definitely take a break and try to bring Dharma into your heart through the lamrim.

You are in my prayers every day, as you were in the past.

With much love and prayers...

My very dear Tim,
How are you? I hope you are very well. Please chant some OM MANI PADME HUM mantras and do some Medicine Buddha practice.

Read the lamrim, the stages of the path to enlightenment. This always leaves positive imprints of the whole path to enlightenment. This life, which is a human life, is the most precious life, where you can achieve all happiness, including liberation from samsara and enlightenment. So, please take the opportunity to practice Dharma every day, every minute, every second, as much as possible.

With much love and prayers...

Please read well the different lamrim texts such as Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, the Lamrim Chenmo, and the different lamrim texts that His Holiness the Dalai Lama has written on.

Try to actualize the realizations step by step. First, realize the gradual path of the lower capability being, then the gradual path of the middle capability being, and then the gradual path of the higher capability being. No matter how long it takes, meditate on and try to actualize this.

If you do this as much as you can, you will become more pure and more experienced, and then you can better teach others. Your benefit becomes greater. Otherwise, even if you are a scholar, your teachings are only empty words. Like a husk, they will be empty inside. They will have no weight, and people will not be inspired by them to practice.

My very dear Gillian,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. Please find attached the practices that come out best for your quickest enlightenment.

For you it seems the main practice is social service, to help wherever you can and to practice the lamrim. Then, each year you can do some retreat. Every day do some preliminary practices, especially lamrim meditation.

First, study completely the lamrim and practice the meditations until you achieve realizations. Start with renunciation of samsara. First, train the mind in meditating on the perfect human rebirth and karma until you have stable realizations, then train the mind in how samsara is in the nature of suffering, impermanence, the six types of suffering, the four types of suffering, and the suffering of each of the six realms, until you have a stable renunciation of samsara, so that it lasts a long time. Then, train the mind in bodhicitta, then emptiness. Meditate on each section of the lamrim each day until your realizations are stable.

You can practice lamrim meditation anywhere, not just in your shrine room. You can practice at the beach, wherever you are, whenever you find time. Also, you can do lamrim meditation when you’re at work, talking to people, when people are scolding you, etc. Actually, that is the most important time to meditate on the lamrim, on patience, compassion, emptiness, impermanence, and death, because death can happen at any moment. This also helps and becomes the practice of patience, and also you don’t get angry. Then, things don’t make the mind unhappy. Even if a person gets angry with you, you can practice patience, thinking that this is your virtuous friend. Maybe they don’t teach Dharma, but actually they are giving you the opportunity to put the teachings into practice. Also, you can use this to meditate on kindness; the other person is giving you an opportunity to overcome anger, to complete the paramita of patience, and to achieve enlightenment and be able to enlighten all sentient beings. This person is giving you this opportunity, so he or she is the most precious, kind one. Practicing patience in this way makes your mind so happy, and you are so happy with that person.

In this way, whatever you are doing in your life, walking, talking, shopping, sightseeing, etc., practice lamrim meditations, especially in the break times from sitting meditation. Practicing this way is more useful and effective, and is very important. Most of the time we don’t sit in meditation, we are doing other activities. If we are able to keep our mind in the lamrim while we are busy, then that is excellent. You are taking the essence of your life and really making it fulfilling. You are continuously creating the causes of happiness, happiness in future lives, liberation, and ultimate happiness. If you are practicing with bodhicitta, then you are continuously creating the causes for enlightenment. This then causes you to enlighten all sentient beings, bringing happiness to all sentient beings.

Before going to bed, recite a mala or 21 long Vajrasattva mantras with the four powers (you should read what the four powers are and discuss them with the monk at your Dharma center).

Whenever you are able, please recite the King of Prayers, the prayer to be reborn in the blissful realm of Sukhavati, or the prayer to Maitreya Buddha.

Good luck, and love and prayers to you.
Thank you very much.
Lama Zopa

Practices Suggested

• Dorje Khadro (burning offering): 10,000
• Guru Yoga: 60,000 Lama Tsongkhapa (recitations of “migme” mantra)
• Nyung Nä retreat: slowly try to do 100 Nyung Näs. You don’t have to do them all at the same time, you can do some each year if it is convenient.
• The graduated path of lower scope: two months
• The graduated path of intermediate scope: four months
• The graduated path of highest scope: bodhicitta: four months; emptiness: five months
• Main deity: Secret Hayagriva—for your quickest enlightenment
• Other deities: Hevajra
• If you feel more of a connection with Hevajra, you can practice that more.

My very dear Linda,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. It is amazing all the practices that you are able to do, and that since you have taken the initiation you have never missed practicing the sadhana, and that you do it every day. All your sincerity and openness, your kind heart – especially that you feel connected with all beings – is amazing. I would think that a bodhisattva who has bodhicitta would feel this way, without any barrier of any kind, feeling connected with all human beings, whether they be Muslim, Hindu, Christian, Jewish, Ven. Wongmo (who is sitting here), George Bush, Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, anyone, all those people that other people do not like, such as Mao Tse Tung, etc. When you feel like that, it shows the sign of a good heart, then, the thought to benefit everyone without partiality will come and also the feeling of being connected not only with human beings, but with all animals, cockroaches, rats, poisonous snakes, slugs, mosquitoes, tigers, crocodiles, octopi, etc.

According to my observations, it wouldn’t be good to go to the place you mentioned. It wouldn’t be most beneficial. Your work as a cranio-sacral therapist is good; working as a children’s therapist would also be good. Working in Universal Education wouldn’t be as good. Anyway, you shouldn’t have too much of a permanent, fixed mind for life. Just do whatever is beneficial each year, from time to time, like that. Having too much of a fixed idea, of something concrete for your whole life, brings trouble. Whatever and whenever you find something beneficial, then at that time, at that place, do it. The only thing that should be fixed is Dharma practice. What I mean by Dharma practice is developing the mind in the path, meditating on lamrim, and doing the preliminary practices.

The most important thing is the continuity of developing your mind in the lamrim, the stages of the path to enlightenment. It doesn’t matter if you are in Africa, Tibet, on the moon, in Iraq, etc. – whether you are rich or poor, whatever – continue to develop your mind in the lamrim. That is the most important thing.

So, after you have read the whole lamrim, like Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand or the Middling Lamrim, and you have some idea, then practice guru devotion meditation every day. How long you spend on it is up to you; even if it is just ten or fifteen minutes you should do it, until you see the guru as all the buddhas and one buddha as all the gurus, with a very stable feeling, 100% without question, from the bottom of your heart. This is a stable realization that lasts not just for a few days or hours, but continues for months and years.

Then, train the mind in the graduated path of the lower capable being, no matter how many months or years it takes, even lifetimes, until you achieve the realization of each meditation, from perfect human rebirth – how it is found just once and how difficult it is to find again – through impermanence, death, suffering of the lower realms, refuge, and karma.

After that, train the mind in the middle capable being’s path. Then, train the mind in the graduated path of the highest capable being. By training the mind in the path of the lower capable being, your mind becomes totally detached from this life. The best quality of the realization of the first lamrim is that you are able to equalize praise and criticism, a bad reputation and good reputation, receiving material things and not receiving material things, pleasure and difficulties (problems). When these things happen, you are able to equalize them. This is the best definition of achieving the first lamrim: renunciation of this life.

The middle lamrim is total detachment from samsara and samsaric pleasures – total renunciation. You see human beings and also devas’ bodies as only in the nature of suffering, like looking at kaka as kaka, and not nectar. While looking at the samsaric body, which is only in the nature of suffering (even though it might be looked at by some as something very pleasant), you realize it is only suffering. If you see a person as nectar, then you are cheated completely. You die from eating that nectar. If you realize poison as poison, then you abandon it, so it doesn’t harm you. You are protected. You see the samsaric body, pleasure – everything – is in the nature of suffering. So, you have aversion to this, not attraction. Attraction does not arise for even one second. Even in dreams, there is only aversion. You want to be free from samsara every second of every minute. You realize renunciation of samsara by meditating on the suffering of samsara: the suffering of the deva realm, human realm, true sufferings, and the true causes of suffering – all the shortcomings of the delusions. You have aversion to delusions and karma.

Then, you develop the realization of bodhicitta, the higher capable being’s path. You have unlimited compassion toward all sentient beings and their suffering, and you want to cause them to be free from all sufferings, by yourself. You also want to cause them happiness – and to do it completely by yourself alone. Then, in order to be successful in that, the thought seeking enlightenment arises 24 hours a day, spontaneously, without any effort. As you see each sentient being, you feel this spontaneously. This means you have the realization of bodhicitta.

Therefore, you should develop the mind step-by-step, like this. First, the lower capable being’s path, then the middle path, and then the higher path. The other important thing is emptiness. You should do some meditation on emptiness every day. You can use different techniques from different teachings, whichever you find inspiring. To know if your understanding, your realization, of emptiness is correct or not, check if you find a contradiction between emptiness and dependent-arising. If you are able to unify these two on one object, on the “I,” or on any phenomenon – that while the object is empty, it exists in mere name, is merely imputed by mind, that while it is existing, it is empty of existing from its own side – then that is the definition that what you realize as emptiness is correct. If it doesn’t come to that point, then the conclusion is that your understanding is incorrect.

So, until you achieve bodhicitta, put your main effort into lamrim. Secondly, do tantric practice, but spend more time on the lamrim than on tantric meditation. Then, after realizing bodhicitta, spend more time on tantra, the generation stage, and do some meditation on the completion stage.

At the moment, the best place for you to do your three-year retreat would be Land of Calm Abiding in the U.S. That would be good. However, when you are prepared, there may be other places that you can think about.

You have mentioned that you need guidance in your life and you feel insecure. For this, mind training in the lamrim is the main thing that you should do in this life. If you don’t complete the path in this life, then you continue in the next life.

Whatever other activities you do in this life, in the break from sitting meditation, do not make it a break time from lamrim meditation and Dharma practice. Rather, when you do your job or other things, try to do them with bodhicitta. Live life with bodhicitta. Also, you can relate to the meditation that you do in the morning; you can live the rest of your life that day with that feeling. In this way, whatever activity you do becomes Dharma, especially with bodhicitta. Everything becomes the cause of enlightenment and happiness for all sentient beings.

So, for the moment, that is all. Again, thank you very much for all your dedication, your life dedicated to Dharma and sentient beings. Please dedicate the merits and pray for us to receive all the funding for the 500-foot Maitreya statue. Also, please pray for all the projects offering service to the Sangha, to the FPMT Sangha, all the monasteries and Sangha in the world; for the holy objects in the world to be able to enlighten all sentient beings quickly; for all the social service projects in the world to be most beneficial; for Dharma centers to get help with their finances, debts, and difficulties, and for every center to be of most benefit for the Buddha’s teaching, in particular, Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings; and to attain enlightenment as quickly as possible.

With much love and prayer...