Happy Vajrayogini Day: Becoming the Vajra Queen

Kadampa Ryan 3. Tantra, 7. Kadampa meaning of special days , , , ,

Today is Vajrayogini Day, which takes place every year on the first tsog day of Heruka and Vajrayogini Month.  On this day, we can remember her amazing good qualities and try to ripen them within ourselves.  By doing so, we can draw closer to her and eventually become her.

Our Vajra Queen

Within the Kadampa tradition, our highest yoga tantra deities are Heruka and Vajrayogini.  Heruka is great bliss inseparable from emptiness and Vajrayogini is emptiness inseparable from great bliss.  Ultimately, they are the same person, differing only in aspect and emphasis.  Practically, they are our spiritual guide’s truth body inseparable from our own pure potential.  By relying upon Heruka and Vajrayogini, we can quickly ripen our Buddha nature and attain union with their enlightened state.  Our highest yoga tantra deity is also known as our “yidam,” which essentially means it is the actual Buddha we want to become.  Gen Tharchin explains we design our own enlightenment by the specific type of bodhichitta we generate.  In our tradition, we take Heruka and Vajrayogini as our yidam. 

Vajrayogini is known as the Vajra Queen because she is the highest of all the female enlightened deities for us.  Many people, both in movies and in real life, develop tremendous loyalty and respect for their political queen, willing to dedicate their lives to fulfilling the wishes of their noble queen.  How much more respect and devotion should we feel towards our Vajra Queen who leads us beyond samsara?

Understanding our Partner as an Emanation of Heruka and Vajrayogini

Sometimes, people can get confused about viewing their spouse or partner as an emanation of Heruka or Vajrayogini. Does that mean we should do whatever they say? Does that mean we should ignore their appearing faults and harmful behavior, pretending they are not appearing? Does that mean we can never modify or end the relationship if it becomes unhealthy for us or our partner? It means none of these things. Conventionally, we relate to conventional appearances exactly as normal. Emanations that take the form of conventionally normal people should be related to exactly as is conventionally normal. They are appearing in a normal aspect to teach us how to relate to conventionally normal forms in Dharma ways.

But at a deeper level, Heruka or Vajrayogini are our eternal partners. Sometimes they appear as the person we are married to (or are with). Sometimes our relationship with the appearance of our ordinary partner ends, but our relationship with Heruka or Vajrayogini does not end with that. It continues, just in different aspects. It is like before and after Venerable Geshe-la passed away. Prior to his passing, we tended to think our spiritual guide was Venerable Geshe-la, but when he passed he revealed clearly to all of us that our spiritual guide was never the appearance of Venerable Geshe-la, it was Guru Sumati Buddha Heruka all along. He was just temporarily appearing as Venerable Geshe-la so we could develop a relationship with him. But when Venerable Geshe-la passed, we realized we don’t need the appearance of Venerable Geshe-la to preserve our daily living relationship with our spiritual guide because Guru Sumati Buddha Heruka is still with us. In the same way, we thought our partner was the person we married, but in truth our partner has been Heruka or Vajrayogini all along. They appeared temporarily as our partner so we could develop a relationship with them.

Sometimes our relationship with the person we thought was our partner ends (they die, the relationship ends, etc.), but that’s just the karma of that appearance exhausting itself. Our relationship with Heruka or Vajrayogini as our partner continues. It is eternal.  Sometimes it will remanifest as some other ordinary appearance and sometimes it will shift into an internal relationship like the one we now have with Guru Sumati Buddha Heruka. It is hard to say. But the point is Heruka and Vajrayogini have always been and always will be our eternal partner. What that looks like according to conventional appearance and where the locus of our relationship is with them may shift, but this fact is always true. In the end, we will find ourselves with them in Keajra and realize in truth we have been there with them all along – we were just mistakenly seeing what has always been. When we realize this, we will have a great laugh with them and reminisce about all the adventures (both good and bad) we had along the way, but we will see it all as exactly what we needed at different points along our path to Keajra. It’s all good, we just haven’t woken up to it yet, but we’re getting there. 

So even if our relationship with somebody who we thought was an emanation of Vajrayogini for us ends, it doesn’t mean that they weren’t Vajrayogini for us then and it also doesn’t mean they are not still Vajrayogini for us. They still are, but their conventional appearance is pushing us in a different direction. Just as the appearance of Venerable Geshe-la passed, so too the appearance of a specific person as our partner in this life can pass.  But our partner has always been Varjayogini and always will be.  She appeared in the form we needed for the time we were together and now she is appearing in different ways, but she remains an emanation for us – just encouraging us to practice in different ways. The fact that our relationship with them may be over doesn’t mean they weren’t an emanation of Vajrayogini for us.  They brought us to where we are now, and our relationship with Vajrayogini continues, just now in a different form.

Perhaps a new conventional emanation will appear as our partner or perhaps our relationship with her will become primarily internal like it is with Guru Sumati Buddha Heruka, we don’t know our karma. We learned so much being with our partner and that is all due to the blessings of Vajrayogini.  The fact that our partnership with the mistaken appearance of the conventionally appearing emanation may have ended doesn’t change who has always been and who always will be our partner – namely Vajrayogini. 

And the deeper truth is this: Vajrayogini has come for us, even if we haven’t recognized her yet. She came for us the first time we received the empowerment. In Guide to Dakini Land, Venerable Geshe-la describes how after having engaged in extensive mantra recitation and having received certain signs, we can put sindhura powder on our forehead and go out in the world until the powder transfers to some woman, who we should then have no doubt is an emanation of Vajrayogini who has come for us. That’s one way it can happen. For me, and this is a true story, I was sitting in a Panda Express eating my Beijing Beef and I was suddenly hit with an unmistakeable feeling that Vajrayogini had come for me, right then, right there. I felt her in everything around me, even the Chinese noodles. I started crying with release and joy. There was this six year old kid staring at me wondering why this middle-aged man was crying in the corner eating his lunch! Ever since that day, I have had the feeling that Vajrayogini is with me. She appears in various ways in my life, but I feel her presence daily – not just externally, but internally. I’m learning to allow her to take me by the hand and escort me home to Keajra where we will always be together, sharing our great bliss with all living beings, guiding them home.

Heruka and Vajrayogini’s love for one another is eternal. They are not an ordinary couple. They can enter into any couple and love each other through the field of their karma. When two pure Kadampas who share the same lineage, empowerments, and view come together, Heruka and Vajrayogini’s love for one another can flow very powerfully and we get a sense of what it means that enlightenment can be attained in one lifetime through the Ganden Oral Lineage instructions. Our job is simple: get out of the way and let them love each other through us. There will be hiccups along the way, but that is due to our negative or contaminated karma interfering with the natural flow of love between them. But we don’t need to worry, their love can heal it all. We just need unwavering faith, a pure bodhichitta motivation, and a qualified understanding of pure view. Pure view does not try say that everything the other person does is somehow perfect from the side of the object. No, that is grasping at inherently existent pure view. Pure view exists on the side of the mind. It knows how to receive perfect benefit from whatever the other person does. Even when they seem to act in deluded ways, it serves as a powerful teaching or opportunity for us to identify the delusions within our own mind and work on them. Wonderful. We can then say that the person is an emanation of Vajrayogini appearing in seemingly deluded ways to give us an opportunity to train in the Lamrim of Sutra and Tantra. Then, there are no problems.

Vajrayogini’s Uncommon Qualities

Vajrayogini practice has many uncommon qualities that surpass even Heruka practice.  First, her three-OM mantra is the king of all mantras.  Geshe-la explains in Guide to Dakini Land:

“By reciting this mantra we can help others to fulfill their wishes and gain peace, good health, long life, and prosperity. We gain the ability to avert others’ diseases, such as cancer, strokes, and paralysis, as well as all physical pain and dangers from fire, water, earth, and wind.  Some practitioners who have a strong karmic link with Vajrayogini, through their daily practice or by merely reciting this mantra attain outer Dakini Land before their death, sometimes even without engaging in close retreats or intense meditation. Some attain Dakini Land in the bardo by remembering as if in a dream their daily recitation of the mantra, thereby enabling Vajrayogini to lead them to her Pure Land. In Dakini Land these practitioners are cared for by Heruka and Vajrayogini and, without ever having to undergo uncontrolled death again, they attain enlightenment during that life. It is for these reasons that the three-OM mantra of Vajrayogini is called the `king of all mantras’.”

Vajrayogini’s body mandala is also unequaled.  Again, Geshe-la explains in Guide to Dakini Land:

“In the practice of Heruka’s body mandala, Deities are generated at the outer tips of the twenty-four channels, at the twenty-four inner places. In Vajrayogini’s body mandala, however, the Deities are generated at the inner tips of the twenty-four channels, inside the central channel at the heart channel wheel. This is the main reason why Vajrayogini’s body mandala is more profound than those of other Yidams.”

Finally, Vajrayogini practice has an uncommon yoga of inconceivability, which is the most profound practice of self-powa in existence, enabling us to transfer our consciousness to the pure land where we can complete our spiritual training without ever having to take another samsaric rebirth.  Through this practice, Geshe-la explains:

“The uncommon yoga of inconceivability is a special method, unique to the practice of Vajrayogini, whereby we can attain Pure Dakini Land within this life without abandoning our present body.”

By contemplating these incredible benefits of Vajrayogini practice, we can generate a strong faithful wish to rely upon her in this and all our future lives.

How we can activate Vajrayogini’s good qualities in our life

We do not consider the good qualities of Vajrayogini to simply think how amazing she is, the goal is for us to generate wishing faith, wishing to acquire these good qualities ourselves.  At first, it can seem like her good qualities are so far away that knowledge of them is more academic than anything else.  But there is a method for activating her good qualities within us right now, where we quite literally start to become her and fulfill her function in the world.  How?  Through faithful recitation of the Eight Lines of Praise to the Mother.

Becoming Vajrayogini is not like an on-off switch but is rather like a volume knob – the more we rely upon her, the more we come to embody her good qualities until eventually we gradually become her.  In our practice of divine pride, we train in imputing our “I” onto Vajrayogini, thinking, “I am Vajrayogini.”  If we impute “I am Vajrayogini” onto our ordinary samsaric body and mind, this is not only a mistaken imputation, it might land us in a psychiatric hospital!  For an imputation to be valid, the basis of imputation must be valid.  For an imputation to be valid, the name, aspect, and function must all be in alignment.  A tennis racket may be used to strain spaghetti noodles, but we would not call it a strainer.  In the context of Vajrayogini practice, her aspect is the beautiful red Dakini, her function is to bestow the qualities of her mind, and her name is Vajrayogini.  If we impute our I onto these three – her name, aspect, and function – we can validly say we are Vajrayogini.

Oftentimes, especially in our early years of Vajrayogini practice, we tend to place primary emphasis on the “aspect” of Vajrayogini, imputing our “I” onto this mere image.  But this rarely works to generate much feeling of actually being Vajrayogini.  In contrast, when we feel like this aspect is performing the function of Vajrayogini in our mind, then when we impute our I onto Vajrayogini engaging in her enlightened deeds, it is very easy to generate a qualified feeling of divine pride being Vajrayogini leading all beings to freedom. 

For me at least, the supreme method for generating a feeling of Vajrayogini accomplishing her function is using the Eight Lines of Praise as an invocation for her to accomplish her special function through us.  When we do this, we will feel her enter us and accomplish these eight special functions through us; and on this basis, it is easy to generate a qualified divine pride.

We can understand how to do this as follows:

OM I prostrate to Vajravarahi, the Blessed Mother HUM HUM PHAT

To prostrate means to wish to become, it is a form of wishing faith.  Vajravarahi refers to her function of destroying ignorance, recognizing her as the essence of the perfection of wisdom that destroys ignorance.  Blessed Mother means she is the mother of all the Buddhas, both in the sense of all Buddhas are born from bliss and emptiness (definitive Vajrayogini), but also in the sense of the actual mother of all the Buddhas in that they arise from her.  In this sense, she is simply the highest yoga tantra version of Mother Tara.  When we recite this line, we imagine we invoke this power to destroy the ignorance of all living beings and give birth to all the Buddhas, requesting that this function be accomplished within our mind.

OM To the Superior and powerful Knowledge Lady unconquered by the three realms HUM HUM PHAT

Superior means she can see directly the ultimate nature of all phenomena; powerful Knowledge Lady means she has the power to bestow great bliss; and unconquered by the three realms means she has the power to overcome all delusions of the desire, form, and formless realm.  When we recite this line, we imagine we invoke her to bestow bliss on ourselves and all living beings, which bestows a direct realization of emptiness on the minds of all, enabling them to completely abandon all the delusions of the three realms.  We feel as if this is actually happening inside our mind.

OM To you who destroy all fears of evil spirits with your great vajra HUM HUM PHAT

Nobody is an evil spirit from their own side, they only become evil spirits for us if we relate to them in deluded ways.  It is our delusions that create all evil spirits in our life, and we can say from one perspective all evil spirits are really just our delusions so condense that they take on a life or personality of their own and function like they are an “evil spirit.”  But through Vajrayogini’s blessings, we can come to experience all beings and all phenomena as manifestations of her mind of bliss and emptiness.  In this way, what was previously experienced as an evil spirit in our life is now experienced as the dance of bliss and emptiness.  Instead of harming us, we receive blessings.  All fear is destroyed because they are now seen as bliss and emptiness, and indeed we can say all “evil spirits” themselves are destroyed, not in the sense of they are killed, but in the sense that there is no longer a valid basis for imputing “evil spirit.”  When we recite this line, we imagine that we come to see all phenomena as manifestations of bliss and emptiness, and so we fear nothing and nobody has the power to harm us in any way.  We strongly believe our view of everything has changed and now we fear nothing because we experience it all as great bliss.

OM To you with controlling eyes who remain as the vajra seat unconquered by others HUM HUM PHAT

Vajra seat here means she is always in union with Heruka who is eternally filling her with great bliss as she bestows the realization of emptiness on his mind.  Her controlling eyes can subdue negative behavior simply by looking at others, much in the way a mother’s firm stare brings her children in line without saying a word.   When we recite this verse, we imagine that while in union with Heruka – being filled with bliss and bestowing upon him the realization of emptiness – we can look out onto all living beings subduing all of their negative behavior in an instant.  We feel this compassionate power coursing through us and that this function is actually being accomplished.

OM To you whose wrathful fierce form desiccates Brahma HUM HUM PHAT

This refers to Vajrayogini’s ability to subdue the pride of all living beings, even the highest gods.  Geshe-la explains that pride is the death of all spiritual learning.  If we are free from pride, we can use the Dharma to overcome all our other faults; but if we are consumed by pride, we cannot overcome any of our faults.  Subduing our pride is, in this sense, a prerequisite for all spiritual progress.  Vajrayogini does not merely subdue our pride, she desiccates it, which means to drain of emotional or intellectual vitality.  We generate pride when we observe some uncommon characteristic we have and then think that somehow makes us better than others.  Perhaps a candle in a dark room provides some light but standing next to the blazing of the sun its luminescence is humbled.  In the same way, we may think we are special in some way, but standing before the Vajra Queen we are stripped away of all pretension and are drained of any emotional or intellectual basis for thinking we are special in any way.  Vajrayogini’s mere presence has this humbling effect on all living beings, opening their mind to generate faith in the spiritual path.  When we recite this line, we feel as if the pride of ourselves and all living beings has been thoroughly desiccated and everyone now bows down with humble faith in her magnificence, ready to learn from her.

OM To you who terrify and dry up demons, conquering those in other directions HUM HUM PHAT

This refers to the ability of her wisdom blessings to burn up the inner demons of ordinary appearances and ordinary conceptions of all living beings.  According to Sutra, the root of samsara is self-grasping ignorance, but according to Tantra, the root is ordinary appearances and conceptions.  Ordinary appearances are, essentially, the things that we normally see – all of which appear to exist from their own side, independent of our mind.  They appear to have some objective existence that we believe our mind merely observes accurately.  Ordinary conceptions are believing these appearances to be true.  We think everything really does exist in the way that it appears.  Due to ordinary appearances and ordinary conceptions, we remain trapped in the nightmare of samsara, and the same is true for all other living beings.  The fire of Vajrayogini’s wisdom blessings has the power to burn through all ordinary appearances and conceptions like the fire at the end of the aeon, stripping away samsara from everyone and enabling them to see directly pure worlds.  Samsara is nothing more than a dream that need not be.  Vajrayogini has the power to burn it all away.  When we recite this verse, we imagine we invoke the fire of her wisdom blessings to radiate out like a spherical burst in all directions stripping away the ordinary appearances and conceptions of all living beings, and then we strongly believe that as a result of this enlightened action all beings are now able to see directly her pure world, Keajra Pure Land.

OM To you who conquer all those who make us dull, rigid, and confused HUM HUM PHAT

This refers to her ability to protect us from evil spirits who would interfere with our spiritual practice by making our minds dull, rigid, or confused.  There are countless evil spirits who would interfere with our practice, and we have all experienced the effects of their interference in our practice.  Vajrayogini can subdue these spirits in four ways, the first of which was already explained above by viewing them as manifestations of bliss and emptiness.  The second is just as would-be attackers are deterred through knowing they are outmatched, so too evil spirits know they stand no chance against Vajrayogini and so they keep their distance.  The third is through the wisdom fire of her protection circle, the basis for any negativity is burned away as it approaches, and thus cannot even enter like a magical shield that disarms all those who would enter her realm.  Negativity simply can’t get through.  The fourth way is through the power of her love and compassion for evil spirits who would do harm.  Just as Buddha Shakyamuni under the Bodhi tree defeated all the spirits through the power of his love, so too Vajrayogini’s unconditional love defeats the evil intentions of all those who would interfere with our practice.  As Geshe-la famously said, love is the real nuclear bomb that destroys all enemies.  When we recite this verse, we imagine we invoke Vajrayogini to dispel all interference from evil spirits in these four ways, and strongly believe as a result all interference is permanently subdued.

OM I bow to Vajravarahi, the Great Mother, the Dakini consort who fulfills all desires HUM HUM PHAT

This refers to Vajrayogini’s ability to fulfill all the pure wishes of living beings.  Buddhas do not fulfill our worldly wishes – nothing can since samsara is by nature contaminated.  But they can fulfill all our pure wishes.  Like a loving mother who helps fulfill all the pure wishes of her children, Vajrayogini works tirelessly to fulfill all the pure wishes of all living beings.  What are pure wishes?  They are spiritual wishes, such as wishing to abandon lower rebirth, escape from samsara, and gain the ability to lead all beings to enlightenment.  They also include any wish to overcome our delusions, purify our negative karma, or gain any of the realizations of the stages of the path.  Vajrayogini is the real wish-fulfilling jewel who possesses the power to fulfill all the pure wishes of all living beings.  When we recite this verse, we strongly imagine that she does so in an instant and everyone is spontaneously born into the pure land. 

We can recite these Eight Verses anytime, both in meditation and out of meditation.  We can also recite specific lines of the eight verses as targeted prayers for specific situations we find ourselves in.  The effectiveness of our recitations depends primarily upon the purity of our motivation, the depth of our faith, the degree of our single-pointed concentration, and the extent of our realization of emptiness of all phenomena.  The more we improve these four conditions, the more we will begin to feel Vajraygoini entering into us and accomplishing her function through us in the world.  With deeper experience, it will almost feel like she takes on a life of her own inside of us, spontaneously accomplishing her function in this world.  Once we have a taste of this experience, generating qualified divine pride both in and out of meditation is easy.

May we all come under Vajrayogini’s loving care and behold her sublime face.  May we become empty vessels through which she may accomplish her enlightened deeds in this world, bringing benefit and happiness to ourselves and all living beings in the process.  May she burn away all ordinary appearance and conception until we see ourselves directly as the Vajra Queen.

Vows, commitments, and modern life:  Not retaliating, but not being a doormat either.

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

 Do not retaliate to verbal abuse. 

If someone speaks to us harshly or criticizes us we should never respond with sarcasm or anger.  Sometimes it is justified to respond, but never with anger.  If we do not get angry in return, we can help the other person calm down, but if we get angry in return we just inflame the situation.

In today’s world, it is very rare for people to physically harm us.  From this perspective, we can say that the world we live in is far less hostile and violent than it was in the past.  But we have replaced our physical violence towards others with increased verbal violence towards others.  If we go on-line to non-Kadampa discussion groups, usually what we find is a bunch of people with anonymous names speaking rudely to one another.  We would never talk like this in person with people, but online we get sucked into all sorts of inane verbal battles with people we have never met.  When we are “live” with other people, we will rarely be rude to others directly, but once the person has left our presence we talk behind their back, saying all sorts of disparaging and nasty things.  Since we do this to others, of course others are doing the same towards us.  So we seek our verbal revenge.

Why do people say bad things about us?  Why do people verbally assault us?  The answer is simple:  we did the same to others in the past.  We may be good in this life, but that doesn’t change the fact that we have aeons of karmic nastiness just waiting to ripen.  Everything others do to us is what we did to others in the past.  If we retaliate, we keep the karmic cycle going and it never ends.  If instead, we learn to accept such verbal abuse, we can break the cycle once and for all. 

It is important, however, to make a clear distinction between “not retaliating” and “allowing others to abuse us.”  Sometimes people mistakenly think they should do nothing when others are abusive towards us, viewing it as our opportunity to repay some karmic debt.  Not wanting to get angry, they then allow others to mistreat us.  This is wrong.  We do not help others by allowing them to abuse us because the other person creates terrible karma for themselves for the future.  So of course we should use all the virtuous means at our disposal to prevent others from abusing us.  We just don’t retaliate in kind. 

The most effective way to disarm somebody else’s abuse is to simply sit down with them and try to work through your difference with a constructive attitude.  Apologize if you have wronged them in some way.  Genuinely seek to try understand their point of view and why they find you so objectionable.  Doing so will often reveal things about us we never knew.  Most people attack us out of some feeling of insecurity.  If you take the time to understand the basis for their feelings of insecurity and you address those, then often times their attacks will simply disappear.  Geshe-la famously said at the Toronto Fall Festival, “Love is the real nuclear bomb that destroys all enemies.”  If the other person no longer views you as a threat because you have demonstrated to them you only seek to help, then their anger towards you will be “destroyed” and they will no longer be your enemy.  Sometimes, however, people aren’t interested in resolving their differences with you.  We need to accept this to.  In such a case, the best strategy is usually to say, “when you are ready and willing to work through our differences, my door is always open.”  But until that time arrives, it is generally best to just break off contact and avoid them.  This protects them from creating negative karma towards you.

New Years for a Kadampa

Kadampa Ryan Uncategorized

New Year’s Day is of course preceded by New Year’s Eve.  The evening before is usually when friends get together to celebrate the coming of the new year.  Sometimes Kadampas become a social cynic, looking down on parties like this, finding them meaningless and inherently samsaric.  They mistakenly think it is somehow a fault to enjoy life and enjoy cultural traditions.  This is wrong.

If we are invited to a New Year’s party, we should go without thinking it is inherently meaningless.  Geshe-la wants us to attain the union of Kadampa Buddhism and modern life.  New Year’s Eve parties are part of modern life, so our job is to bring the Dharma into them.  Venerable Tharchin said that our ability to help others depends upon two things:  the depth of our Dharma realizations and the strength of our karmic connections with living beings.  Doing things with friends as friends helps build those karmic bonds.  Even if we are unable to discuss any Dharma, at the very least, we can view such evenings as the time to cultivate our close karmic bonds with people.  Later, in dependence upon these bonds, we will be able to help them.

One question that often comes up at most New Year’s Eve parties is what to do about the fact that most everyone else is drinking or consuming other intoxicants.  Most of us have Pratimoksha vows, so this can create a problem or some awkward moments for ourself or for the person who is throwing the party.  Best, of course, is if you have an open and accepting relationship with your friends where you can say, “you can do whatever you want, but I am not going to.”  It’s important that we don’t adopt a judgmental attitude towards others who might drink, etc.  We each make our own choices and it is not up to us to judge anyone else.  We might even make ourselves the annual “designated driver.”  Somebody has to be, so it might as well be the Buddhist!

If we are at a party where we can’t be open about being a Buddhist, which can happen depending upon our karmic circumstance, what I usually do is drink orange juice or coke for most of the night, but then at midnight when they pass around the glasses of Champagne I just take one, and without a fuss when it comes time, I just put it to my lips like I am drinking but I am not actually doing so.  If we don’t make an issue out of it, nobody will notice.  Why is this important?  Because when we say we don’t drink, they will ask why.  Then we say because we are a Buddhist.  Implicitly, others can take our answer to mean we are saying we think it is immoral to drink, so others might feel judged. When they do, they then reject Buddhism, and create the karma of doing so. We may feel “right,” but we have in fact harmed those around us. What is the most moral thing to do depends largely upon our circumstance. It goes without saying that others are far more likely to feel judged by us if in fact we are judging everyone around us! We all need to get off our high horse and just love others with an accepting attitude.

Fortunately, most Kadampa centers now host a New Year’s Eve party.  This is ideal.  If our center doesn’t, then ask to host one yourself at the center.  This gives our Sangha friends an alternative to the usual New Year’s parties.  We can get together at the center, have a meal together, do a puja together and just hang out together as friends.  We are people too, not just Dharma practitioners, so it is important to be “exactly as normal.”  If our New Year’s party is a lot of fun, then people will want to come again and again; and perhaps even invite their friends along.  It is not uncommon to do either a Tara practice or an Amitayus practice.   Sometimes centers organize a retreat weekend course over New Year’s weekend.  For several years in Geneva, we would do Tara practice in six sessions at the house of a Sangha member.  The point is, try make it time together with your Sangha family.  Christmas is often with our regular family, New Year’s can be with our spiritual family.

But it is equally worth pointing out there is absolutely nothing wrong with spending a quiet evening at home alone, or with a few friends or members of your family. Just because everybody else is making a big deal out of it and going to parties doesn’t mean we should feel any pressure to do the same. I personally have never enjoyed them party scene, even when others are not getting drunk, etc. I much prefer a quiet evening or a solitary retreat. There is nothing wrong with this, and if that is how we prefer to bring in the New Year, we should do so without guilt or hesitation.

What I used to do (and really should start doing again), is around New Years I would take the time to go through all the 250+ vows and commitments of Kadampa Buddhism and reflect upon how I was doing.  I would try look back on the past year and identify the different ways I broke each vow, and I would try make plans for doing better next year.  If you are really enthusiastic about this, you can make a chart in Excel where you rank on a scale of 1 to 10 how well you did on each vow, and then keep track of this over the years.  Geshe-la advises that we work gradually with our vows over a long period of time, slowly improving the quality with which we keep them.  Keeping track with a self-graded score is a very effective way of doing this.  New Years is a perfect time for reflecting on this.

Ultimately, New Year’s Day itself is no different than any other.  It is very easy to see how its meaning is merely imputed by mind.  But that doesn’t mean it is not meaningful, ultimately everything is imputed by mind.  The good thing about New Year’s Day is everyone agrees it marks the possibility for a new beginning.  It is customary for people to make New Year’s Resolutions, things they plan on doing differently in the coming year.  Unfortunately, it is also quite common for people’s New Year’s Resolutions to not last very long.

But at Kadampas, we can be different.  The teachings on impermanence remind us that “nothing remains for even a moment” and that the entire world is completely recreated anew every moment.  New Year’s Day is a good day for recalling impermanence.  Everything that happened in the previous year, we can just let it go and realize we are moving into a new year and a new beginning.  We should make our New Year’s resolutions spiritual ones.  It is best, though, to make small changes that you make a real effort to keep than large ones that you know won’t last long.  Pick one or two things you are going to do differently this year.  Make it concrete and make sure it is doable.  A former student of mine would pick one thing that she said she was going to make her priority for the coming year, and then throughout the year she would focus on that practice. I think this is perfect. Another Sangha friend of mine would every year ask for special advice about what they should work on in the coming year. This is also perfect.

When you make a determination, make sure you know why you are doing it and the wisdom reasons in favor of the change are solid in your mind.  On that basis, you will be able to keep them.  Making promises that you later break creates terrible karma for ourselves which makes it harder and harder to make promises in the future. We create the habit of never following through, and that makes the practice of moral discipline harder and harder.

Just because we are a Kadampa does not mean we can’t have fun like everyone else on New Year’s Eve.  It is an opportunity to build close karmic bonds with others, especially our spiritual family.  We can reflect upon our behavior over the previous year and make determinations about how we will do better in the year to come.

I pray that all of your pure wishes in the coming year be fulfilled, and that all of the suffering you experience become a powerful cause of your enlightenment.  I pray that all beings may find a qualified spiritual path and thereby find meaning in their life.  I also pray that nobody die tonight from drunk driving, but everyone makes it home safe.  Since that is unlikely to come true, I pray that Avalokiteshvara swiftly take all those who die to the pure land where they may enjoy everlasting joy.

Happy Protector Day: May the Doctrine of Losang Dragpa Flourish Forevermore

Kadampa Ryan 5. Reliance upon Dorje Shugden, Protector Days, Reliance upon Dorje Shugden

The 29th of every month is Protector Day.  This is the last part of a 12-part series aimed at helping us remember our Dharma Protector Dorje Shugden and increase our faith in him on these special days.

The most effective way of increasing the power of our reliance is to engage in sincere dedication prayers.  When we dedicate the merit we have accumulated it is like putting our spiritual savings in the bank where they can never be destroyed and they can earn spiritual interest.  Each sadhana has a different dedication prayer which summarizes the main function of the spiritual practice.  In the case or Dorje Shugden, the dedication prayers are as follows:

By this virtue may I quickly
Attain the enlightened state of the Guru,
And then lead every living being
Without exception to that ground.

This is the first effect of this practice.  This is the explicit strategy of Je Tsongkhapa’s tradition for emptying samsara.  Je Tsongkhapa is a spiritual guide who trains others to also become spiritual guides.  These new spiritual guides then train others still and so on.  In this way, generation after generation, the beneficial effects of Je Tsongkhapa’s deeds continue forever.  This is the “great wave of Je Tsongkhapa’s deeds.” 

The person who got me into spirituality was a close friend in college.  He opened the door for me and encouraged me to step through.  After several years of practicing, I thought back to the fact that without the kindness and encouragement of this one friend I would not have a spiritual life at all.  When I later saw him, I asked him, “how can I pay you back?”  His answer was a very powerful teaching:  he said, “do the same for others.  And when others ask you how they can pay you back, give them the same answer.  In this way, the kindness keeps going forever.”  Venerable Tharchin says that the highest spiritual goal to aspire to is to take our place in the lineage.  At some point, we will be the lineage guru whose responsibility it is to carry forward the lineage.  We must prepare ourselves for that responsibility in much the same way people prepare themselves for big missions or assignments.

Through my virtues from practising with pure motivation,
May all living beings throughout all their lives
Never be parted from peaceful and wrathful Manjushri,
But always come under their care.

This is the second effect of this practice.  If beings are never separated from peaceful and wrathful Manjushri, in other words Je Tsongkhapa and Dorje Shugden, then their enlightenment is just a question of time.

The following two verses, known as the Prayers for the Virtuous Traditon, were actually written by a previous incarnation of Dorje Shugden, and we recite them after every practice. 

So that the tradition of Je Tsongkhapa,
The King of the Dharma, may flourish,
May all obstacles be pacified
And may all favourable conditions abound.

This should be fairly self-explanatory by now.  It is the essential meaning of the entire Dorje Shugden part.

Through the two collections of myself and others
Gathered throughout the three times,
May the doctrine of Conqueror Losang Dragpa
Flourish for evermore.

The two collections are the collections of merit and wisdom, and the three times are the past, present and future.  In other words, we mentally invest all of the merit every accumulated into the flourishing of Je Tsongkhapa’s Dharma (Losang Dragpa is another name for Je Tsongkhapa). 

To summarize, the practice of Dorje Shugden can be reduced to the following:

  1. We renew our motivation as a spiritual being – we realize that the only thing that matters is the causes we create because they are the only things we can take with us.
  2. We request with infinite faith that Dorje Shugden provide us with perfect conditions for our swiftest possible enlightenment.
  3. We then accept with infinite faith that whatever subsequently arises is the perfect conditions for our practice that we requested.
  4. We then practice in these conditions to the best of our ability.  It doesn’t matter what appears, what matters is how we respond.  So we try to respond well.

If we do these four things, I guarrantee that we will be gradually lead to enlightenment.  It will just be a question of time.

There is much much more to say about the practice of Heart Jewel, but I wanted to keep things simple.  I strongly encourage everyone to read again and again the book Heart Jewel, which Geshe-la has said is his most important book.  We should also take advantage of the opportunity to speak with some senior practitioners about how to establish a daily practice and we should request teachings and empowerments on this practice from our local teacher.

I dedicate any merit I accumulated from doing this series of posts so that every living being joyfully establishes a daily practice of Dorje Shugden.  I pray that everything that happens to every living being is perfect for their swiftest possible enlightenment.  I request the wisdom to be able to understand how whatever happens to anybody is perfect for their enlightenment and I request that all of the conditions be arranged for me to share this perspective with others in a way that they can accept it.  In this way, we can all happily accept everything that happens in our life and swiftly make progress to enlightenment.  OM VAJRA WIKI WITRANA SOHA!

Vows, commitments, and modern life:  Accepting ourself, not our delusions

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

Do not follow delusions. 

 This means that we should not tolerate our delusions, such as anger, ignorance, and attachment.   We should realize that delusions are our real enemy, and as soon as one emerges to abandon it immediately, and not allow it to fester in our mind.

Geshe-la once explained, the only function of delusions is to deceive us.  This is worth considering deeply.  Something is deceptive if it promises one thing, but in fact delivers the opposite.  If we check carefully, all delusions do exactly this.  Attachment promises us happiness, but leaves us thirsting for more.  Anger promises us vindication, but just creates more conflict.  Ignorance of self-grasping promises us a path to “objective truth” but instead leaves us blind to subjective reality.  Jealousy promises us continued possession of our loved ones, but in the end it drives them away.  Doubt promises to protect us from believing something that is not true, but it actually prevents us from believing anything and thus making any progress along the path impossible.  Self-cherishing promises us the fulfillment of our wishes, but in the end frustrates them all. 

Delusions are, quite simply, the spam of our mind.  All spam has a common function:  to deceive us in some way.  We are promised millions from the Nigerian government official, but find our bank accounts drained after we hand over our banking details. Spam can only harm us if we believe the lies.  No, we didn’t really win some lottery.  If we recognize its deceptive nature, we just delete it from our inbox without giving it another thought.  It is exactly the same with our delusions.  They can only harm us if we believe their deceptive lies.  But if we see directly their deception, then they have no power over us and we ignore them.  The power of delusions in our mind is directly related to how much we believe them.  If we don’t believe them, they may still arise and be present within the inbox of our mind, but they will have no power over us at all. 

Many people “battle their delusions” for years, struggling against them with heroic effort.  Such an approach is not only wrong, it is counter-productive.  When we battle with our delusions, we are implicitly giving them power.  We grasp at them having some validity, but we struggle against these deluded tendencies by trying to believe other things are more important.  An ordained person still wants to have sex, but battles against this saying their ordination is more important.  When we practice in this way, what we really wind up often doing is just repressing our delusions.  When we do this, they grow in power until eventually they overwhelm us. 

We are told to “never accept our delusions.”  We take this to mean we should not tolerate the presence of delusions in our mind even for a second, and when they arise we quickly try to shove them back down beneath the surface.  This is a recipe for guaranteed spiritual disaster.  Kadam Morten says instead we should “accept the existence of delusions in our mind, but not their validity.”  Yes, we are still deluded beings.  Delusions still flare up in our mind, and that is entirely normal.  We need not beat ourselves up over this nor think we are somehow a bad person because of it.  Instead, what we do is when they arise is we “see through their lies.”  Our focus should be on “identifying the deception” of the given delusion.  What is the delusion promising?  How, if I followed the advice of the delusion, would it in fact give me the opposite of what is promised?  If we see this clearly, then we see the delusion for what it is:  a deceptive lie.  When we see the lie, it will be like in the Wizard of Oz after the curtain had been pulled back by Toto – the delusion may still huff and puff, but all its power will have vanished.  We will see through the lies and the delusion will have no power over us.  This enables us to “accept ourself, but be vicious with our delusions.” 

To not follow our delusions does not mean to repress them when they arise, rather it means to see through their lies.  If we do this, we keep this vow.  If we allow ourselves to be deceived, then we do not.

Christmas for a Kadampa

Kadampa Ryan 7. Kadampa meaning of special days

For those of us who live in the West, or come from Western families, Christmas is often considered the most important holiday of the year.  Ostensibly, Christmas is about the birth of Christ, and for some it is.  For most, however, it is about exchanging gifts, spending time with family and watching football.  Or it’s just about out of control consumerism, depending on your view.  Kadampas can sometimes feel a bit confused during Christmas time.  It used to be our favorite holiday as kids, but now we are Buddhists, so how are we supposed to relate to it?

It’s true, Christmas time has degenerated into a frenzy of buying things we don’t need.  It is easy to criticize Christmas on such grounds.  Of course, as Kadampas, we can be aware of this and realize its meaninglessness.  We can correctly identify the attachment and realize it’s wrong.  But certainly being a Kadampa means more than being a cynic and a scrooge.  Instead, we should rejoice in all the acts of giving.  Giving is a virtue, even if what people are giving is not very meaningful.  There is more giving that occurs in the Christmas season than any other time of the year.  Yes, the motivations for giving might be mixed with worldly concerns, but we can still rejoice in the giving part.  Rejoice in all of it, don’t be a cynic.

Likewise, I think we should celebrate with all our heart the birth of Christ into this world.  Why not?  Our heart commitment is to follow one tradition purely while appreciating and respecting all other traditions.  Instead of getting on our arrogant high horse mocking those who believe in an inherently existent God, why don’t we celebrate the birth of arguably the greatest practitioner of taking and giving to have ever walked the face of the earth?  The entire basis of Christianity is Christ took on all of the sins of all living beings, and by generating faith in him, believing he did so to save us, we open our mind to receive his special blessings which function to take our sins upon him.  He is, in this respect, quite similar to a Buddha of purification.  By generating faith in him, his followers can purify all of their negative karma.

Further, he is a doorway to heaven (his pure land).  If his followers remember him with faith at the time of their death, they will receive his powerful blessings and be transported to the pure land.  In this sense, he is very similar to Avalokiteshvara.  Christ taught extensively on being humble, working for the sake of the poor, and reaching out to those in the greatest of need.  Think of all the people he has inspired with his example.  Sure, there are some people who distort his teachings for political purposes, but that doesn’t make his original intent and meaning wrong.  In many ways, one can say he gave tantric teachings on maintaining pure view, and bringing the Kingdom of Heaven into this world.  Who can read the Sermon on the Mount and not be moved?  Who can read the prayers of his later followers, such as Saint Francis of Assisi, and not be inspired?  Think of Pope Francis.  You don’t have to be Catholic to appreciate his positive effect on this world and the church.  All of these things we can rejoice in and be inspired by.  A Bodhisattva seeks to practice all virtue, and there is much in Jesus’ example worth emulating.  Trying to be more “Christ-like” in our behavior is not mixing.  If we can see somebody in our daily lives engaging in virtue and be inspired to be more like them, then why can we not also do so for one of the greatest Saints in the history of the world?  Rejoicing in and copying virtue is an essential component of the Kadampa path.

Geshe-la has said on many occasions that Buddhas appear in this world in Buddhist and non-Buddhist form.  Is it that hard to imagine that Christ too was a Buddha who appeared in a particular form in a particular place in human history for the sake of billions?  Surely all the holy beings get along just fine with one another, since they are ultimately of one nature.  It is only humans who create divisions and problems.  Geshe-la said we do believe in “God,” it is just different people have a different understanding of what that means.  Christians have their understanding, we have ours, but we can all respect and appreciate one another.

Besides celebrating Christ, Christmas is an excellent time for ourself to practice virtue.  Not just giving, but also patience with our loved ones, cherishing others, training in love and so forth.  It is not always easy to spend time with our families.  The members of our family have their fair share of delusions, and it is easy to develop judgmental attitudes towards them for it.  It is not uncommon for some of the worst family fights to happen during the holiday season.  Christmas time gives us an opportunity to counter all of these delusions and bad attitudes, and learn to accept and love everyone just as they are.

When I was a boy, Christmas was both my favorite time of year and my worst time of year.  My favorite time of year because I loved the lights, the songs and of course the presents.  It was the worst time of the year because my mother had an unrealistic expectation that just because it was Christmas, everything was supposed to work out perfectly and nothing was supposed to go wrong.  This created tremendous pressure on everyone in the house, and when the slightest thing would go wrong, she would become very upset and ruin the day for everyone.  This is not uncommon at all.  People’s expectations shoot through the roof during the Christmas season, and especially on Christmas day.  These higher expectations then cause us to be more judgmental, to more easily feel slighted, and to be quicker to anger.  We can view this time as an excellent opportunity to understand the nature of samsara is for things to go wrong, and the best answer to that fact is patient acceptance and a good laugh.

As I have grown older, Christmas has given rise to new delusions for me to overcome.  When I was little, I used to get lots of presents.  Now, I get a tie.  Not the same, and it always leaves me feeling a bit let down.  I give presents to everyone, yet nobody seems to give me any.  As a parent, I cannot help but have hopes and expectations that my kids will like their presents, but then when they don’t I realize my attachment to gratitude and recognition.  During Christmas, even though I am supposed to be giving, I find myself worrying about money and feeling miserly.  I find myself quick to judge my in-laws or other members of my family if they don’t act in the way I want them to.  Since I live abroad, far away from any family, I start to feel jealous of the pictures I see on Facebook of my other family members all together and seeming to have a good time while we are alone and forgotten on the other side of the planet.  When kids open presents, they are often like rabid dogs, going from one thing to the next without appreciating anything and I can’t help but feel I have failed as a parent.  Trying to get good pictures is always a nightmare, and getting the kids to express gratitude to the aunts and grandmas is always a struggle.  The more time we spend with our family, the more we become frustrated with them and secretly we can’t wait until school starts again and we can go back to work.  None of these are uncommon reactions, and these sorts of situations give rise to a pantheon of delusions.  But all of them give us a chance to practice training our mind and cultivating new, more virtuous, habits of mind.

Christmas is also a time in which we can reach out to those who are alone.  Suicide and depression rates are the highest during the holiday season.  People see everyone else happy, but they find themselves alone and unloved.  Why can we not invite these people to our home and let them know we care?  Make them feel part of our family.  There are also plenty of opportunities to volunteer to help out the poor and the needy, such as giving our time at or clothes to homeless shelters.  People in hospitals, especially the old and dying, suffer from great loneliness and sadness during the Christmas season.  We can go spend time with them, hear their stories, and give them our love.

Culturally, many of us are Christian.  People in the West, by and large, live in a Christian culture.  Geshe-la has gone to great lengths to present the Dharma in such a way that we do not have to abandon our culture to understand the Dharma.  Externally, culturally, we can remain Christian; while internally, spiritually we are 100% Kadampa.  There is no contradiction between these two.  On the whole, Christmas time gives us ample opportunities to create virtue, rejoice in goodness and battle our delusions.  For a Kadampa, this is perfect.

Happy Tsog Day: Making the Actual Tsog Offering

Kadampa Ryan Tsog Days

In order to remember and mark our tsog days, holy days on the Kadampa calendar, I am sharing my understanding of the practice of Offering to the Spiritual Guide with tsog.  This is part 22 of a 44-part series.

Making the tsog offering

HO This ocean of tsog offering of uncontaminated nectar,
Blessed by concentration, mantra, and mudra,
I offer to please the assembly of root and lineage Gurus.
OM AH HUM
Delighted by enjoying these magnificent objects of desire,
EH MA HO
Please bestow a great rain of blessings.

When we make the tsog offering itself we do so in successive rounds to the different parts of the field of merit. In this verse we make the tsog offering to the assembly of root and lineages Gurus. With the first line, we recall the outer aspect of the offerings we previously blessed. With the second line, we recall their cause, namely our concentration on emptiness, the mantra of all the Buddhas OM AH HUM, and our hand mudras performed during the blessing of the offerings. With the third line, we should imagine that countless offering goddesses holding skull cups scoop up the nectar of our offerings and fly to the assembly of root and lineages Gurus. With the fourth line we should imagine that the root and lineages Gurus partake of the offering through straws of wisdom light. With the fifth line we imagine that the root and lineages Gurus experience great bliss in dependence upon enjoying the offerings. With the sixth line we recall that ourselves, the offerings, the deities, and their experience of great bliss all lack inherent existence and are of one nature, like water mixed with water, or like different waves on the ocean of bliss and emptiness. With the last line, we request the root and lineages Gurus to perform their primary function, which is to bestow a great rain of blessings to realize all the stages of the path to enlightenment. Venerable Tharchin explains that a blessing is like a subtle infusion of the Buddha’s mind into our own. In modern terms, it is like we are downloading the Guru’s realizations into our own mind. By requesting that we receive the Guru’s blessings, we create the causes to do so. We should then strongly imagine that light rays and nectars descend from all the root and lineages Gurus and dissolve into our root mind at our heart.

HO This ocean of tsog offering of uncontaminated nectar,
Blessed by concentration, mantra, and mudra,
I offer to please the divine assembly of Yidams and their retinues.
OM AH HUM
Delighted by enjoying these magnificent objects of desire,
EH MA HO
Please bestow a great rain of attainments.

Here, we are making the tsog offerings to the assembly of Yidams and their retinues. The first, second, fourth, fifth, and sixth lines can be understood in exactly the same way as the first verse above. With the last line, we request the Yidams to perform their specific function which is to bestow a great rain of attainments.

There are a few different types of attainments that the Yidams bestow upon us. The first is according to the types of enlightened actions that a Buddha engages in, namely pacifying, increasing, controlling, and wrathful actions. The ability to engage in these types of actions are four different types of attainment.

A second set of attainments is mundane and super mundane attainments. Mundane attainments are the ability to accomplish things in this life. These are important because the more effective we are in this world, the greater the benefit we can bring causing the Dharma to flourish. Geshe-la explains in Joyful Path of Good Fortune the eight attributes of a fully endowed human life. These are: long life, beauty, high status, wealth and resources, persuasive speech, power and influence, freedom and independence, a strong mind, and a strong body. These eight mundane attainments all help us accomplish the ultimate purpose of human life, namely to attain enlightenment and to lead others to the same state. Geshe-la explains these attainments provide us “the very best opportunity to attain liberation and enlightenment in one lifetime.” A long life gives us the time we need to complete our Dharma practice. Beauty helps us attract disciples and makes it easier for them to generate faith in us. High status makes people more inclined to listen to our advice. Wealth and resources provide us with the means of benefiting living beings and Dharma centers in material ways. Persuasive speech makes others trust what we have to say so that our good advice is taken to heart. Power and influence enables us to operate at a higher scale and therefore bring greater benefit in all our actions. Freedom and independence enables us to be free from interferences with our Dharma practice. A strong mind enables us to easily understand the Dharma and help others do so as well. A strong body enables us to be healthy and also to live a long life.

The supermundane attainments are the realizations of the stages of the path, namely renunciation, bodhicitta, the correct view of emptiness, generation stage, and completion stage of Highest Yoga Tantra. All the supermundane attainments can be understood from the explanation of the stages of the path that follows.

HO This ocean of tsog offering of uncontaminated nectar,
Blessed by concentration, mantra, and mudra,
I offer to please the assembly of Three Precious Jewels.
OM AH HUM
Delighted by enjoying these magnificent objects of desire,
EH MA HO
Please bestow a great rain of sacred Dharmas.

With this verse we make the tsog offering to the three precious jewels. After making the tsog offering to the three precious jewels, we request them to accomplish their specific function which is to bestow a great rain of sacred Dharmas. The Buddhas bestow Dharma jewels through their teachings and blessings. Sangha bestow Dharma jewels through their good example and wise advice. The Dharma itself is both the teachings and also, more importantly, the actual realizations of the stages of the path inside our mind. In Joyful Path of Good Fortune, Geshe-la explains there are two types of refuge: simple and special. Simple refuge is simply requesting blessings that the three jewels help us. Special refuge is our actual refuge in the form of the realizations of the stages of the path within our mind. These realizations protect us from lower rebirth, rebirth in samsara, or becoming trapped in the solitary peace of a Hinayana Foe Destroyer.

HO This ocean of tsog offering of uncontaminated nectar,
Blessed by concentration, mantra, and mudra,
I offer to please the assembly of Dakinis and Dharma Protectors.
OM AH HUM
Delighted by enjoying these magnificent objects of desire,
EH MA HO
Please bestow a great rain of virtuous deeds.

In this verse we make off the tsog offering to the assembly of Dakinis and Dharma protectors, and we request them to accomplish their specific function, which is to bestow a great rain of virtuous deeds. As explained above, the Dakinis refer primarily to the deities of Heruka’s and Vajrayogini’s body mandala. These deities attained enlightenment for the express purpose of healing the subtle body of living beings in order to help them engage in completion stage practices. Our subtle body is comprised of channels, drops, and winds. At present our subtle body is a mangled mess with blockages and imperfections everywhere. As a result, our drops and winds are not able to flow freely and unobstructedly throughout our subtle body.

When blockages in our subtle body occur, we develop both outer and inner sicknesses. Outer sickness can take the form of things like cancer, infections, and other diseases. Inner sickness includes developing different types of delusions. When we heal our subtle body, our drops and inner energy winds can flow effortlessly without obstruction, resulting in the healing of both outer and inner sickness. Additionally, by virtue of healing our subtle body, when we engage in completion stage practices, all our inner energy winds can gather, absorb, and dissolve into our central channel at our heart. It is only through causing our winds to dissolve into our central channel that we can experience the eight dissolutions culminating in a qualified experience of clear light. Once we have generated the mind of clear light, we can then meditate on emptiness and quickly purify our mind of all delusions and their karmic imprints, thereby attaining enlightenment.

The Dharma Protector’s job is to arrange all the outer, inner, and secret conditions necessary for our swiftest possible enlightenment. Buddhas can only work with the karma on our mind. Their blessings can function to activate different karmic potentialities on our mind in specific ways that are conducive to our enlightenment. The principal Dharma protector of the New Kadampa Tradition is Dorje Shugden. He is a manifestation of the wisdom Buddha Manjushri. In dependence upon receiving his blessings, we come to see how whatever karma ripens is perfect for our spiritual training. There is no such thing as an inherently existent obstacle to our Dharma practice. Everything can be a condition for training our mind. Because we are currently strongly attached to certain things and averse to others, we think somethings are good for our practice and other things are obstacles. This is ignorance. Dorje Shugden’s blessings enable us to understand how everything is perfect for our training, therefore nothing is an obstacle to our Dharma practice. Things may still be a problem for our worldly concerns, but they are not a problem for our spiritual path. In this way, he removes all obstacles. Understanding this, we request him to perform this function for our self and for all living beings.

Vows, commitments, and modern life:  Not becoming neurotic about the Dharma

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

Abandon poisonous food. 

Here poisonous food refers to virtuous actions contaminated with self-grasping and self-cherishing.  This commitment advises us to not perform actions contaminated by these, which we have been doing since beginningless time.

It is very easy for us to misunderstand this vow.  On the surface, it seems to imply that we should not perform virtuous actions if they are mixed with self-cherishing and self-grasping, so we think it is somehow “bad” to do so.  This indicates a very important point in the Dharma:  when it comes to Dharma practice, there is no “bad”, there is only “good” and “even better.”  Engaging in virtuous actions mixed with self-grasping and self-cherishing is “good,” doing so without these contaminations is “even better.”  Just because there is an “even better” does not mean the “good” is somehow bad.  In short, we need to not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Unfortunately, this is a mistake we make all the time with our Dharma practice, and many people develop all sorts of “dharma neuroses” because of it.  Let’s say we do the offerings on the shrine at our center, but we do it all wrong.  Is this good or bad?  It is good.  Of course, it is better to do it correctly, but just because there is this “better” doesn’t mean what we did is “bad.”  The same logic applies to all our Dharma practices.  Basically, we currently do everything all “wrong.”  We do nothing correctly.  But that does not mean our practice is “bad” or that we are doing anything wrong.  There are always “even better” ways of doing our practices, but we should never feel bad or guilty because we are not doing things perfectly.  Many people beat themselves up and become very guilty about the imperfections in their Dharma practice.  Some unskillful teachers focus only on what their students are doing wrong as opposed to what they are doing correctly.  This kills all joy in Dharma practice and just makes people anxious and worried about doing things incorrectly.  It is very important that we counter such attitudes and tendencies in our Dharma centers.  Our Dharma centers should be places where we learn to laugh, not become neurotic!

A good example is when it comes to cherishing others.  If we are honest, most of our cherishing of others right now is done with a mixed motivation.  Part of us cherishes others because we genuinely want them to be happy, but there is also part of our mind that cherishes others because we see how this will benefit us!  In other words, our cherishing of others is mixed with self-cherishing.  This is entirely normal and not a problem.  It is “good.”  We don’t not cherish others because we can’t do so with a perfectly selfless motivation.  If we adopted such an attitude, we would never cherish others at all.  Instead, we happily accept where we are at, but we do not remain satisfied with where we are at.  This is a subtle distinction.  We strive to do better and better, to cherish others with increasingly pure motivations, but we nonetheless remain perfectly happy with the fact that we are doing things only partially correctly.  Once again, there is no “bad”, there is only “good” and “even better.”  If we can maintain this attitude, then we will keep joy in our practice.  Without joy, there is no actual effort. 

A Pure Life: Abandoning Meaningless Activities

Kadampa Ryan Precept Days

This is the last part of a 12-part series on how to skillfully train in the Eight Mahayana Precepts.  The 15th of every month is Precepts Day, when Kadampa practitioners around the world typically take and observe the Precepts.

The actual precept here is to abandon wearing ornaments, perfume, etc, and singing and dancing and so forth. Like with the precept about not eating after lunch, the purpose of this practice is not to say wearing ornaments, perfume and so forth are inherently negative, rather it is an opportunity for us to recall all of the negative karma we have accumulated with respect to pursuit of these things and to view our training in the precept as a practice of purification for that negative karma.  More broadly, this precept is advising us to abandon all meaningless activities.

What sort of negative karma have we created with respect to wearing ornaments? This refers more broadly to the negative karma we have created in the pursuit of wealth. Attachment to wealth and resources is one of the eight worldly concerns. Beings in samsara create all sorts of negative karma in pursuit of wealth. For example, the vast majority of wars are directly or indirectly related to the pursuit of resources. In business, people lie and cheat all the time in an effort to get more wealth from others. Criminals lie and steal trying to get wealth. Wealthy people who are jealous of other wealthy people engage in all sorts of divisive and hurtful speech towards those they are jealous of.  The demigod realm and the hungry ghost realm are both pervaded by negative actions engaged in in pursuit of wealth.  We ourselves have created all of this negative karma and it still remains on our mind unpurified.

We have also engaged in all sorts of negative actions with respect to wearing perfume.  This can be interpreted more broadly as negative actions we have engaged in with respect to pursuit of our sexual attachment. People wear perfume to make themselves more attractive to others, which is quite frequently motivated by an underlying sexual attachment. Sexual attachment is one of the primary causes of negative actions. Once again, people lie, cheat, steal, say hurtful things, or divisive things, they covet other people’s partners, etc, etc, etc. Look at how many spiritual or political leaders have lost everything due to some sort of sex scandal. We see similar behavior in the animal realm and the demigod realms. Once again, all of this negative karma remains on our mind because we have not purified it.

Singing and dancing in this context refers more broadly to engaging in meaningless activities. This is not to say that singing and dancing per se are meaningless or negative activities.  An activity becomes meaningless if we engage in it with a meaningless mind. If we engage in singing and dancing with a virtuous motivation, then such actions are virtuous; but if we engage in them out of attachment, then such actions and activities are meaningless. What is wrong with engaging in meaningless activities? Fundamentally, doing so creates the habits of failing to seize and appreciate our precious human life. It is like idle chatter amongst the 10 non virtuous actions. Idle chatter is not a terribly non virtuous action, but if engage in it repeatedly, it can become a habit and then we wind up wasting our precious human life. We would all find it to be an incredible waste to use $100 bills to build a bonfire. Using the moments of our precious human life in a meaningless way is even more wasteful, and for this reason, it is non-virtuous.

When we take the precepts, we are in essence making the promise to abandon all negative actions associated with the pursuit of wealth, sexual attachment, or meaningless activities. When the temptation arises in our mind to do these things, we can recall all of the negative karma we have created with respect to these activities, and use our training in the precept as our opponent forced to purify this negative karma. We then promise to no longer engage in such activities in the future. In this way, we can purify the negative karma we have created with respect to these activities.

In short, the training in the eight Mahayana precepts is not simply a promise to refrain from engaging in these eight specific sorts of activities, but rather it is a more general promise to refrain from any form of negative action. By learning how to spend an entire day without engaging in any negative actions, we can counter the deluded tendencies on our mind that want to engage in negative karma and thereby weaken them so they have less hold over us in the future. We likewise create tendencies similar to the cause of believing in the wisdom of living a pure life. This karma will gradually build up momentum within our mind until eventually we refrain from non-virtuous actions and engage in virtuous actions not simply one day of the month, but every day of the month, every month of the year, every year of our life.

To avoid lower rebirth, we must purify all the negative karma that remains on our mind and engage only in virtuous actions in the future. If we do this, it is karmically guaranteed we will avoid a lower rebirth. This is important not simply because lower rebirth is so horrific, but rather we do not want to take the risk of losing the continuum of our spiritual practice.  If we fall into the lower realms, it will be almost impossible for us to engage in the spiritual path and we can quickly become lost for countless eons. But if we can maintain the continuum of our precious human life, in life after life, there is great hope that we will soon escape from samsara. Our training in the eight Mahayana precepts, therefore, as an indispensable friend ensuring that we remain on an uninterrupted path out of samsara.

I dedicate all of the merit that I have accumulated by writing this series of posts so that all living beings may become determined to purify all of their negative karma and engage only in virtuous actions. May they realize that non-virtue is the cause of suffering and virtue is the cause of happiness, and therefore realize if they wish to be happy they must embark upon a pure life.

Vows, commitments, and modern life:  Abandon any hope for results. 

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

This advises us to not wish for results from our practice for ourself alone, but we should dedicate all our merit to others.  It also advises us to not use Lojong for worldly goals.

In my experience, the biggest problem of those between year 1 and year 10 of Dharma practice is attachment to results.  This is the number one thing that creates problems for us in our practice.  Generally speaking, those who have been practicing for more than 10 years gave up on expecting results long ago.  They have realized it is a long slog, and each year that goes by they increasingly feel they haven’t really started practicing yet.  This is a good thing – it means we stabilize ourself in the mind of a beginner.

When we have attachment to results, several problems arise.  First, it takes away all the fun of practice.  If we enjoy our practice, results will naturally come, and then we will relish the opportunity to practice more.  If we are attached to results, then our practice is a source of constant frustration when they don’t come.  When we are concerned about results, we start having things like “good meditations” and “bad meditations,” where the former is one where things came easily and the latter is where we struggled the whole time.  When we let go of attachment to results, our assessment of what constitutes a “good meditation” completely reverses.  The one where we struggle is the better meditation because we know we are working through much more in our mind than when things come easily.  This doesn’t mean a formerly “good meditation” where lots of results ripen is a bad thing.  For a pure practitioner, it is equally good as the “bad” meditation, but just for different reasons.  It is not good because of the good results, it is good because with the new insight we can later go on to struggle with something deeper.

Attachment to results creates great tension in our mind as the gap between our intellectual understanding and our actual ability to practice grows.  When we expect results, we can quickly develop a Dharma neurosis where the more we learn about how we “should” be the more frustrated we become with “how we actually are.”  We think just because we know how a Buddha thinks and would respond that we are somehow supposed to already be capable of doing so.  The more we intellectually know, the more we judge our practice as faulty and inadequate and we quickly become frustrated.  But when we let go of attachment to results, the more we intellectually understand the better we get at practicing right where we are at.  We accept where we are at and therefore attend to improving the quality with which we practice. 

With attachment to results, we can easily grow discouraged and lose faith in our practices if results do not come right away.  We have countless aeons worth of bad habits built up in our mind.  It is completely unrealistic to assume just because we have been practicing for a few months, years, or even decades that we should somehow be able to respond in completely different ways.  When we can’t, we conclude the Dharma doesn’t work and we abandon our practice.  A pure practitioner is unconcerned with such things.  Their sole concern is the quality of their effort, not the results they attain.  They know that if the cause is created, the future result is guaranteed, so they worry not about results and instead care only about creating good causes for the future.

The function of attachment is to separate you from whatever you are attached to, so the more we become attached to results, the further we will remove ourself from them.  This is the cruel truth of attachment.  It is because we want to have results that we must completely let go of attachment to them.  When we do let go, then results start falling into our lap naturally.  And if they don’t, it is not a problem because we are focused on creating causes.  In the end, it is very simple:  if you want to experience a result, then you need to create the cause.  So there is no sense in grasping at results, only sense in focusing on creating its cause.

The opponent to all attachment to results is learning to be content to try.  We need to learn to enjoy practicing itself, independent of any results.  Probably the purest practitioner I have ever met was somebody who had spent the last 15 years in a mental hospital.  He had terrible psychotic tendencies which often manifested in psychotic thoughts towards the three jewels and especially towards Geshe-la.  Every day, he would be assailed literally hundreds of times with deeply negative thoughts.  Most people would either kill themselves or drug themselves into a stupor.  But his view was completely different.  He made a distinction between “the ripening of past negative tendencies” and “the new creation of good causes.”  When a psychotic thought arises in his mind, he recognizes it as the ripening of a past tendency.  In and of itself, this thought is only harmful if he assents to it – in other words he believes it to be true.  But if instead he trains in “not believing” and “not assenting” to it, then he is not only not creating new negative karma, he is actually creating incredibly powerful virtue.  It is said that one action of moral discipline of restraint is enough to create the cause for a higher rebirth.  In his view, if he had 50 negative thoughts in an hour, and he practiced not assenting to them 50 times, then he just created for himself the causes for 50 future precious human lives.  Who needs money when you can create karma like this?  For him, the ripening of deluded tendencies was simply an essential condition for him to train his mind.  Far from being discouraged, he thanked his protector for giving him continued opportunities to practice.  He would say, “we are living in increasingly degenerate times.  It will not be long before everybody has a mind like mine.  I have been given this mind now so that I can learn how to practice in the face of such an onslaught.  By learning this now, I will prepare myself to be the most helpful to others when times are at their most degenerate.”  I am not making this up.  This is a real person.  His name was Taro, and he was one of the most amazing practitioners I have ever met.  He was a shining example of what it means to practice without attachment to results.  Regrettably, he died in Summer 2021.

When we practice we should do so for the sake of others.  Our job is to learn how to control our mind so that we can teach others how to do the same thing.  Kadam Lucy once said to Geshe-la that her main job is to cause the Dharma to flourish, and Geshe-la sternly corrected her saying that her main job was to practice Dharma, and our ability to cause the Dharma to flourish flows directly from that.  Any other benefit we receive from our practice is a side effect of our main aim, which is to serve others.  We do receive benefit, but that is not why we are practicing.

Training in Dharma will actually make us more successful in all our activities.  Practically speaking, our productivity is directly proportional to our ability to focus on the task at hand.  Of course we should not use the Dharma for accomplishing worldly success.  Dharma is like internal physics, it is just how things work.  So it is possible to study Dhamra with a worldly motivation and use its science to succeed in our worldly aims.  This is like using hundred dollar bills for toilet paper.  This does not mean, however, that we shouldn’t use Dharma to solve our daily problems.  Of course we should.  The issue here is we learn how to use Dharma to overcome all samsaric problems for the sake of getting ourselves and others out!