A pure land and its residents are created by mind. It’s subjective. That creation of a pure land and pure beings must be taking place in our lives.  Where else?  We spend most of our time in our daily life, where else are we going to be creating a pure land with pure residents?  That creation must be taking place with a patient mind. Otherwise we will never be able to create it, it will never be a pure land for us.

There is no objectively existent pure land, with pure beings inhabiting it.  We push away a deluded being, they remain a deluded being.  If we push away deluded beings, which is what we do if anger comes up, they remain for us a deluded being. They remain a deluded being. Where is the Bodhichitta in that?  We will never transform that person into an enlightened being, never. A pure being can never appear in their place. So where is the Bodhichitta?  There can be no Bodhichitta without patient acceptance, pushing no one away, welcoming wholeheartedly everyone without exception. Everyone.

What is a pure land like? In a pure land, everything appears as a Dharma lesson, every moment is an opportunity to practice Dharma, and we have no problems. What is the mind of patient acceptance like? Because we are able to accept everything, everything teaches us some lesson of Dharma. Indeed, it is our ability to transform everything into a lesson of Dharma that enables us to accept everything. Further, with a mind of patience acceptance, no matter what happens, no matter how difficult the circumstance, everything is viewed as an opportunity to train our mind. We don’t need to push away anything or anyone because they are all viewed by the mind of patience as an opportunity to practice Dharma. With a mind of patient acceptance, we may still experience all sorts of unpleasant and indeed painful situations, but for us, none of it will be a problem because we can wholeheartedly welcome everything as an opportunity to train or purify our mind. So from a practical, experiential point of view, there is essentially no difference between being in a pure land and the mind of patience. With both, everything is a Dharma lesson, every moment is an opportunity to practice Dharma, and nothing is a problem.

In Transform your Life, Geshe-la says, “We underestimate the value of patience. It is possible that people might sometimes interrupt our meditation sessions or Dharma study, but they can never take away our opportunity to train in inner virtues such as patience. It is this mental training rather than outer virtuous activities that is the essence of Dharma practice. If we truly understand the value of patience, we shall never resent an opportunity to practise it. Even if we never found the opportunity to sit down to study and meditate throughout our entire life, but we truly learnt to practise patient acceptance every moment of the day, we would make vast progress on the path to enlightenment. On the other hand, if we spent our whole life studying and meditating, but we never practised patience, our spiritual practice would remain superficial and inauthentic.”

Speechless. There is no virtue greater than patience. So if we really want to make progress ourselves and help others, we must take every opportunity to practice patience. Who gives us those opportunities? We need to start seeing the difficult people in our life as the most precious.

Here, in the chapter on patience, Shantideva is highlighting the connection between the worldly concerns and our anger.  We need to abandon the worldly concerns as triggers of our anger.  Who helps us to overcome our attachment to worldly concerns?  Of course, we can say our spiritual guide, holy beings, enlightened beings, Buddhas, Bodhisattvas. True. True.  But what about those who obstruct our worldly happiness? Those who obstruct our worldly happiness, those who damage our good reputation, those who do not acknowledge us in any way, or when they do speak to us they criticize us: these are the people we need in our lives. They help us as spiritual practitioners to overcome our attachment to worldly concerns.  So we should develop deep appreciation for them.   

Please read the section in 8SH where Geshe-la gives the commentary to the verse “Even if someone I have helped, and of whom I had great hopes, nevertheless harms me without any reason, may I see him as my holy spiritual guide.”  These people are like Buddhas teaching us the spiritual path.  We should see them as such.  They are emanations of my Spiritual Guide.  Geshe-la gives several examples of people acting like Buddha, supreme spiritual guide, blessing our mind to purify our negative karma, blessing our mind to develop renunciation, blessing our mind to increase our patience, yeah, and in this way leading us along liberating paths.  It is mainly the difficult people in our life that will help us to become holy beings.  The people who are kind to us, who are always happy and never make problems are actually generally only helpful for feeding our worldly concerns; it is the difficult people in our life who are our real spiritual benefactors.  They basically force us to practice, and if we are honest, without them pushing us as they do, we would quickly become lazy and practice much, much less.  They will help us become the perfect teachers that our spiritual guide wants us to be.   Rather than getting angry with them, why cannot we learn to appreciate them? Why cannot we learn to appreciate how important, how necessary they are for our spiritual development.

(6.102) “Don’t they obstruct your virtuous practice?”
No! There is no virtuous practice greater than patience;
Therefore, I will never get angry
With those who cause me suffering.

I think it’s good to imagine actually what transformation would take place in our mind if we stopped pushing things away out of anger or hatred, if we stopped pushing things out of our mind.  Imagine what transformation would take place if we stopped distancing ourselves, separating ourselves from objects of anger, objects of hatred.  What transformation would take place if we were to accept wholeheartedly everything we presently find difficult. Welcoming into our heart not just the good but the bad too. Equally. We can imagine and then we could ask ourselves, what do I need to protect myself from? I think now we can understand how it really does function to weaken our self-cherishing, to weaken our self-grasping. What would we need to protect ourselves from? Self-cherishing serves to protect our I.

Can you imagine if we were to welcome wholeheartedly, welcome into our heart without any hesitation, without any resistance, all things that we presently find difficult? So how can there be any virtuous practice greater than patience?  “Therefore I will never get angry with those who cause me suffering but I will welcome them.”

When people are worried about something bad happening, the normal reaction is for people to say, “that is unlikely to happen” as a way of consoling ourselves or others.  It is true, all worry and all anger tend to exaggerate the so-called bad, and part of that often involves exaggerating the probability of something bad happening.  Different people process risk in different ways, and for some, even a 1% chance of something happening is experienced as if it is a 100% certainty to happen.  To helping reduce the perceived likelihood of something bad happening does indeed lessen our worry.  There is nothing wrong with that.

But is that good enough?  No, because we still think, “but it might happen,” and worry.  Why do we still worry?  Because we are still grasping at the thing we are worried about as being inherently bad – if this happens, it would be “bad.”  Patient acceptance is the opposite way of thinking.  It stares straight into the abyss saying, “even if XYZ happened, it is not only not bad, it is something I would welcome wholeheartedly.”  We can welcome it wholeheartedly, we feel no need to push it away, because we know we will be able to transform its arising into a cause of our own or others’ enlightenment.  It is not a bad thing, it is rocket fuel for our spiritual progress.  So we don’t fear it happening, we can accept it wholeheartedly without feeling any need to push it away.  If we have this mind, then all worry disappears.  Yes, it might happen, but that is OK too.  No problem.  We fear nothing. 

(6.98) Praise and so forth distract me from virtue,
Weaken my disillusionment with samsara,
Cause me to envy others’ good qualities,
And undermine everything that is beneficial.

(6.99) Therefore, those who conspire
To prevent me from being praised
Are really acting to prevent me
From falling into the lower realms!

(6.100) I, who seek liberation, have no need for wealth or a good reputation
For they only keep me bound in samsara;
So why should I get angry
With those who free me from this bondage?

(6.101) Those who cause me suffering
Are like Buddhas bestowing their blessings.
Since they lead me to liberating paths,
Why should I get angry with them?

At present, we do not yet have equanimity about the eight worldly concerns (or at least I don’t).  We know we prefer happiness to suffering. We prefer wealth to poverty. We prefer praise to criticism. We prefer a good reputation to a bad reputation. Who doesn’t?  What is the result of this preference in our mind? We remain worldly. As was mentioned in an earlier post, as long as we’re concerned with such things our Dharma practice will not be a pure Dharma practice. We will be distracted from spiritual paths, pure spiritual paths. We won’t really be interested in liberation.  Rather, we will continue to make or try to make our daily samsaric life work better.  We’ll invest the majority (if not all) of our energy trying to make it enjoyable and comfortable, to get on the right side of the worldly concerns, and continue to push away and reject our suffering.  As long as we have preference for worldly concerns, we are not going to get out of samsara, instead we will seek to make ourselves more comfortable in it.  A Bodhisattva doesn’t need to do this because they can transform and embrace their suffering.  They have no preference for a happy day, because they realize that happy days are deceptive and difficult days are blessings.

We need to train gradually over a long period of time to develop genuine equanimity with respect to each of the eight worldly concerns.  But we need to be clear what this means.  At present, we prefer happiness, wealth, praise, and a good reputation, viewing all of these as causes of our happiness.  We then hear we need to have equanimity towards the eight worldly concerns, and we think about how we can transform suffering, poverty, criticism, and a bad reputation into the spiritual path.  Assuming we can do so, have we actually developed genuine equanimity with respect to the eight worldly concerns at that point?  Shantideva with these verses clearly tells us no.  Equanimity doesn’t mean we still have attachment towards the “good” stuff, and transform into the spiritual path the “bad” stuff, we need to equally transform both the “good” and the “bad” stuff into the spiritual path to have genuine equanimity towards the eight worldly concerns. 

To do that, we need to transform happiness, wealth, praise, and a good reputation from being objects of attachment into objects of lamrim.  In many ways, this is harder than transforming the unpleasant side of the worldly concerns into the path because we want to transform suffering into the path to make it tolerable, we don’t want to transform pleasant things into the path because we are worried we will then lose our enjoyment of these things in the process – and we don’t want to do that.  With these verses, Shantideva helps us shatter our attachment to these things by showing how each one of them – if related to as an object of attachment – is actually a cause of lower rebirth, not happiness.  In many ways, as long as our mind is controlled by attachment, these things are actually dangerous!

We need to be crystal clear, pleasant feelings, wealth, praise, and a good reputation in and of themselves are neutral (technically, they are nothing in and of themselves).  They are not intrinsically good, bad, objects of attachment, or objects of lamrim.  What they are for us depends entirely upon our mind.  Geshe-la explains in Heart Jewel that Great Wisdom is understanding clearly and unmistakenly what are the objects to be abandoned and what are the objects to be attained.  Such wisdom can distinguish between wealth as an object of attachment and wealth as an object of lamrim.  Wealth is not an object of abandonment, but wealth as an object of attachment is.

So how do we transform each of these “good” things into objects of lamrim?  We can view each thing through the lens of initial scope, intermediate scope, great scope, and tantric practice.  If we use wealth as an example, attachment to wealth can cause us to engage in all sorts of negative actions, which propel us into lower rebirth.  Attachment to wealth can prevent us from becoming disillusioned with samsaric existence, and thus apply no effort to get out.  Attachment to our wealth can make us miserly and selfish, thus interfering with developing the mind of giving – one of the six perfections.  Attachment to wealth makes us grasp at inherently existent causes of happiness, thus strengthening our ordinary appearances and ordinary conceptions (the main objects of abandonment on the tantric path).  All of these show the disadvantages of attachment to wealth.  But how can we view wealth in a virtuous way? Wealth can however also be very helpful because with it we feel less need to steal.  We can use our wealth to fund engaging in our Dharma practice or retreats to escape ourselves from samsara.  Wealth can be used to engage in the practice of giving, including to spiritual causes, such as funding Dharma centers.  Wealth can also be viewed as an offering to ourselves or others generated as the deity.  We can use the same way of reasoning to understand how happiness, praise, and a good reputation can be transformed from being objects of attachment to objects of lamrim.

(6.92) For the sake of fame and reputation,
People give away their wealth and even sacrifice their lives;
But what good can a few dry words do when we die?
To whom can they bring any pleasure?

(6.93) When people lose their reputation,
They become despondent, like a child
Who cries when the sandcastle he has built
Is washed away by the tide.

Who cares if we have a good reputation or not? We do.  We’re very concerned, aren’t we, about what others think of us. It matters, a good reputation matters to us.  Why?  We need to check what our reasons are to see if they are good reasons.  There are two extremes when it comes to what others think of us:  We are attached to what they think of us.  We think our happiness depends on others liking us and thinking/feeling good about us.  Then, we become obsessed with what they think, etc.  There is so much suffering with this.  The other extreme is not caring at all what others think.  Whatever they think is their problem.  This also leads to many problems, because then we may act in all sorts of unpleasant ways, say things others aren’t ready to hear, cause others to lose faith in us, etc.  The middle way is care what others think for valid Dharma reasons, but not be attached to what anybody thinks.  There are many valid reasons for wanting others to think good of us, so we need to be careful to manage our reputation.  We want others to be pleasantly disposed towards us so that they respect what we have to say and seek out our advice.  We want people to rely upon us to escape from samsara, and they won’t do so if think poorly of us.  But ultimately, our own personal happiness, should not depend in any way on what others think of us.  We know how to transform whatever others appear to be thinking about us into the path.  The best way to ensure that others think well of us is for ourselves to always think well of others.

There are valid reasons for being ‘interested’ in having a good reputation, namely our ability to help people.  So we should make an effort to be on good terms with everybody and try to be understood as a good person. 

It is worth considering ultimately what are others thinking about us?  The answer is ‘nothing.’  There is no other person there thinking anything.  It is just our dream arising from our karma.  There is a mere appearance of others thinking something about us, but ultimately there is no one there thinking anything.  Conventionally speaking, though, yes, there is an appearance of what others think and this does have an effect on our conventional existence.  So what are others conventionally thinking about us?  What they are karmically determined to do.  What they think of us is a karmic echo of how we have thought about others in the past.  If we are surrounded by people who think poorly of us it is because in the past we have thought poorly of everyone else.  If we want to change what they think about us, we need to change our karma.  We can think only good things about others, and gradually others will think only good things about us.  We can imagine that when others see us they think Buddha, in this way we can provide real benefit to them. 

We should be concerned simply with improving ourself by practicing Dharma purely, and thereby helping others to improve themselves by practicing Dharma.  Then we will become a holy being who is naturally respected. We know such people have some power, but we will be using that power in such beneficial ways.  We will be helping ourselves. We can improve the quality of our spiritual life, we can improve the quality of others’ lives, spiritual lives, and we can help to further our tradition, this pure tradition that flourishes throughout the world.

(6.91) Transient pleasures, such as drinking and playing meaningless games,
Are deceptive.
If I understand the real meaning of a human life,
Such things will have no value for me.

We need to personally look at our worldly concerns for happiness, wealth, reputation, praise and so forth and think about how we can reduce, finally destroy such concerns.  Our attachment to worldly pleasure prevents us from striving for the happiness of future lives, happiness of liberation, happiness of enlightenment. We’re more concerned for temporary, immediate happiness. And so we waste our human life. We waste our precious human life. We are no different from animals.  It matters to us, doesn’t it, that we are able to experience pleasure daily. It’s important to us.  A pure Dharma practitioner is only concerned about what causes they are creating.  What effects they are experiencing is just the context in which they can create causes. 

We distract ourselves with worldly enjoyments. Sometimes Dharma practitioners feel they can’t enjoy themselves as much as they used to or we feel guilty when we do worldly things. We must be skillful – we cannot drop immediately all worldly concerns so that tomorrow we find ourselves with none.  That is unrealistic. We must be skillful with how we approach worldly concerns.  The correct model should be a child outgrowing their toys.  Because we have found better things within our mind, we gradually lose interest in our old things.  They don’t work for us because we have seen through their illusion.  The trick to abandoning any attachment is to realize how it is in fact harmful to us.  How it pretends to be beneficial, but with Dharma wisdom we understand it is harmful.  Then we will naturally not be as interested in it anymore until eventually we abandon it. 

But at the same time, if we’re ever going to stop we have to make effort and try find our happiness from a different source, our enjoyment from a different source – from our pure mind.  If we can do this, then we can enjoy everything.  The more we build up the alternative, the more it becomes effortless to become a spiritual being and to abandon our attachments.  But to get to this point, we need to make an effort.  If we don’t, we will never get there and we will always be struggling with ourselves.  The main point of renunciation is we realize that there is nothing for us in the non-existent dream, and we don’t look for it because we know it is not there.  Rather we look in a different source, the development of pure minds.  This doesn’t mean we don’t still go out to dinner or movies, or play games with our friends or on the computer, it means we try do so emphasizing our pure reasons for doing so and minimizing our worldly reasons for doing so.  Eventually, some activities will fall by the wayside, others will continue.  No problem, very natural.  Again, as Geshe Checkhawa ways, “remain natural while changing your aspiration.

Now Shantideva introduces once again worldly concerns with the phrase:

(6.90) Praise, fame, and good reputation
Will not increase my merit or extend my life,
Nor will they give me strength, freedom from illness,
Or any form of physical pleasure.

We’ve seen already we can easily become angry when faced with the threat of losing our reputation, wealth and so forth.  I would say that the more we seek happiness, wealth, praise, reputation, and the more we try to avoid suffering, poverty, criticism, bad reputation, the more we will suffer from anger, and the more we will find ourselves retaliating.  In many ways, our worldly concerns are at the root of all of our anger.  Therefore, it is of utmost importance that as Dharma practitioners we make effort to destroy such worldly concerns.  

We will never achieve the goals of spiritual training as long as we possess such worldly concerns. In Joyful Path, Geshe-la explains the difference between pure and impure Dharma practice is identified by looking at which life we are practicing for:  this life or our future lives.  Of course Dharma will help us be happy in this life, and there is nothing wrong with that, but for our Dharma practice to be spiritual practice, our motivation must be at least the happiness of future lives.  But even among those who practice only for the sake of this life, there are two types:  those who use the Dharma to oppose their delusions in this life to be happy in this life and those who use the Dharma to secure their worldly desires, such as fame, a good reputation, high status, and even wealth. 

When people quite literally put you on a throne, prostrate at your feet, and are encouraged to view you as an emanation of a Buddha, it is very hard for our pride to not sneak in and corrupt the whole process.  We can even start to do so for seemingly virtuous reasons, thinking it is good that others view us as Buddhas because then they receive greater blessings, but in reality it is our pride that is enjoying it.  Getting sucked into this vortex is extremely dangerous because then the Dharma teacher starts to pretend that they don’t have any delusions or faults.  When they do that with others, it creates a cult-like atmosphere in the Dharma center.  When they do that with themselves, it leads to repression and eventual meltdown of our spiritual life. 

Our whole lives can get wrapped up in our worldly concerns that any threat to them becomes a “justified” cause of anger.  Again, our worldly concerns can hijack our Dharma understanding to justify our grasping at these things – we need wealth and high status so we can spread the Dharma, etc. – but in our heart, it is just worldly concerns leading to ordinary anger. 

Results come from pure Dharma activities.  Pure Dharma activities are when we have a spontaneous realization of ‘it doesn’t matter’ for everything, and the only thing that matters to us is creating good causes for future lives.  I’m not saying that we do not need wealth and a good reputation, but that problems come for ourself, others, and our tradition when our concern for these things is a worldly concern.  We must begin to sort this out right now. We must make strong effort to destroy any worldly concerns that we have so that things can be unblocked and can grow.

(6.86) It is bad enough that you, mind, have no remorse
For the non-virtues you have committed;
But why do you compound it
By being jealous with those who practise virtue?

Rejoicing is probably the easiest virtue we can engage in.  All we need to do is be happy for others, and especially when they create the causes of happiness, namely engage in virtue.  When we rejoice in others virtues, we get a similitude of the karma they create from engaging in the virtue.  Rejoicing in others’ virtue also inspires us to engage in more virtue ourselves because we are seeing it as something good and worthwhile.

But often, when we see others engage in virtue, we start to feel competitive thinking that we are better than that other person or we find a way to criticize the virtue of others as being mixed with worldly concerns or selfish intent or is unskillful, or whatever.  Where do such minds come from?  I think they come from a toxic combination of guilt about our own weak virtues and jealousy of others being better than us.  These two get together and then make us find fault when instead we should be rejoicing. 

(6.87) The thought that wishes for our enemy to suffer
Harms only us, through creating non-virtue;
Understanding this, we should not develop harmful thoughts
Towards anyone, including our enemies.

(6.88) And even if your enemy did suffer as you wish,
How would that benefit you?
If you say, “Well, at least it would give me some satisfaction”,
How can there be a mind lower than that?

(6.89) Such thoughts are like unbearably sharp hooks
Cast by the fishermen of the delusions, such as anger.
Once caught on them, we shall definitely be boiled alive
In the terrifying cauldrons of the guardians of hell.

Harmful thoughts themselves can only bring suffering upon ourself. They can never make us happy even if they come true.  

About a year after 9/11, I was visiting my family in my childhood home.  My brother comes to me and says he has something he wants to show me.  He then begins a video of a U.S. military strike of some base in Afghanistan.  Apparently, the United States has these superfortresses that can basically hover above an area, and they use laser guided targeting to shoot individual people.  So first, a missile came in and destroyed the main building.  Then, people started fleeing out of the wreckage and surrounding buildings, and the video showed the computer locking in on individual people, then shooting them; then it would turn to the next person, shoot them, and so on until all on the scene were dead.  While this was going on, the gunner in the plane could be heard with a crazed sound in his voice of, “got him,” and “take that,” and “woohooo.”  I then looked over at my other brother who was watching with us, and he was also making faces each time somebody would be shot like, “yes!” 

I felt absolutely nauseated.  I was reminded of what Gen Tharchin once said, “when people read the newspaper about battle reports and rejoice in all those killed, they create basically the same karma as if it had been them pulling the trigger.”  We live in incredibly politically polarized times, and feel great joy when we hear about how our political “enemies” suffer some kind of defeat – we want them to suffer in the ways they have caused others to suffer.  Lately, a trend in the media has been to report on how the family of certain government leaders feel ashamed of their children or uncles serving under Trump, and instead of imagining how that must emotionally hurt to the person being written about, we feel self-righteous about how even their families hate them for what they are doing.  When violence breaks out at protests, we become enraged when somebody from our side gets killed, but think they had it coming when somebody from the other side gets hurt. 

At work we take great delight hearing about how those who are creating problems for us or are standing in the way of our wishes face setbacks, and on Facebook we cheer when those we disagree with get “owned.”  So much of modern life is people rejoicing in other’s misery. 

If we are honest we become pleased when a person who has harmed us suffers some misfortune.  We become pleased thinking perhaps they deserve what has come to them.  The karmic consequences of rejoicing in the misfortune of others is as Shantideva explains.  We must avoid this at all costs unless we want to be boiled alive.

Jealousy, in particular of towards those we dislike, is a common cause of our anger.  Now Shantideva suggests how we can rejoice in their good fortune instead.

(6.84) People become angry when someone benefits their enemy,
But, whether their enemy receives benefit or not,
It is the enemy’s own anger that urges him to attack;
So it is that anger which is to blame, not the benefactor.

We become angry when somebody helps our enemy, even if it is not helping them to harm us.  If somebody is engaging in a virtuous action towards another, we need to rejoice in that person’s action, not become angry at them!  If we see somebody enjoying themselves with our enemy, we become angry at them.  When we see people happy, we need to rejoice in that happiness, not become angry with them.  In any case, the friend of the enemy has done nothing wrong, so there is no reason to have any bad feelings towards him.  And why is the other person viewed as our enemy in the first place?  The person him/herself is our kind mother, it is their present or past delusions which propelled them to harm us at some point.  To get angry with somebody who has helped our kind mother surely makes no sense.  If we are going to direct our frustration towards anything, it should be the anger in our “enemy’s” mind.  Our objective should be to dispel their anger through healing the relationship.

(6.85) Why, by getting angry, do we throw away our merit,
The faith others have in us, and our other good qualities?
Would it not be better to get angry with anger itself,
For it brings no benefit to us or to others?

We hear this a lot in the Dharma teachings – it’s OK to get angry at the delusion of anger.  But what exactly does that mean and how do we practically put it into practice.  Anger views something as a cause of our suffering and then seeks to harm that cause.  Deluded anger views something external (and inherently existent) as a cause of our suffering, exaggerates the harm we have received, and then seeks to harm the object of our anger in some way.  Wisdom anger (anger directed against delusions) views delusions as the cause of our suffering and seeks to harm them as much as possible.  These are very different things.

The first main difference is the object of blame – an inherently existent external object or a delusion.  The second main difference is the method of harming.  Deluded anger typically retaliates through either mentally “hating/greatly disliking” the other person, grasping at them as a real cause of our suffering; verbally, by saying hurtful or divisive words; or even physically, by harming or even killing the other person.  Wisdom anger harms delusions by identifying them clearly, reducing them through applying Dharma opponents, and finally eliminating them altogether with the wisdom realizing emptiness. 

Wisdom anger can be directed at our own delusions or against the delusions of others.  The process is basically the same.  When we direct it against others, we first identify clearly that the reason why our so-called “enemy” harms us is because they are under the influence of their delusions, and thereby we make a distinction between the person (for whom we have compassion) and the sickness of delusion within their mind (which we want to heal).  To apply opponents to others delusions can take many forms.  The most common form is simply setting a good example.  This we can always do regardless of whether the other person is seeking our advice or not.  When we set a good example, we should do so completely free from any attachment to the other person changing and we should avoid making a point of “showing a good example” as some obvious attempt to shame the other person or show them that what they are doing is wrong.  Additionally, we can pray that those who suffer from delusions receive powerful blessings to pacify the delusions in their mind.  Our prayers will be effective in proportion to the closeness of our karmic connection with the other person, the purity of our motivation in praying for them, and the degree of our faith in the Buddha we are praying to. 

Sometimes we are able to apply the opponents to other’s delusions by offering Dharma advice or Dharma teachings.  But we must be careful here.  Giving unsolicited advice almost always backfires.  If the other person is not genuinely asking us for our advice or we are not highly certain that they have sufficient faith that they will be open to receiving our advice, then we should probably refrain from offering it.  When we offer correct advice to somebody who doesn’t want it, all we do is create the conditions for them to engage in the negative action of rejecting wisdom and grasping even more tightly to their wrong views.  We may feel self-righteous for the great advice we have offered, but in truth we have done harm to the other person by doing so. 

In terms of applying the antidote of the wisdom realizing emptiness to other’s delusions, we can again do so through giving wisdom advice that shows people it is how they mentally relate to things that is the problem, or even give teachings on emptiness itself (again, assuming they are open to receiving our advice).  We can likewise meditate on the emptiness of all phenomena ourself.  The other person’s mind is also empty of inherent existence, which means the delusions that appear to us to be arising in their mind are also empty and mere appearances to our mind.  Anytime we meditate on the emptiness of any phenomena, we purify the contaminated karma giving rise to that appearance.  When we meditate on the emptiness of other’s delusions, we purify the contaminated karma for such delusions to appear.  This is a very profound point. 

In my very first meeting with Gen Tharchin, more than 20 years ago, I was explaining all of the different delusions I saw in my then girlfriend.  He looked me straight in the eye, and then said, “the faults she appears to have are actually mirror-like reflections of the faults within your own mind.  If you purge these faults from your own mind they will, like magic, gradually disappear from her.”  He then leaned closer and said, “and never forget, she is an emanation of Vajrayogini (followed by a knowing wink of the eye).”  This is ultimately how Buddhas ripen and liberate us.  They have realized directly the emptiness of all our faults, this realization functions to gradually bless our mind to reduce and finally eliminate all of our faults.  By seeing us as already enlightened beings, they ripen our pure potential and draw out our own good qualities.  By mixing our mind with their minds, we come to adopt their view of us, first seeing the emptiness of our faults and eventually seeing ourselves as fully enlightened beings.  This very brief encounter with the uncomparable Gen Tharchin reveals the very essence of a wisdom Bodhisattva’s way of life.  

(6.78) Those who are not concerned with others’ happiness
And do not want them to be happy,
Are like someone who stops paying wages to those who work for him,
Who then experiences many problems.

One thing’s for sure – if we’re not concerned with the happiness of others, then we won’t get anything from them other than problems. Sooner or later, problems will come for us.  We may feel, we may say, “I am concerned. I am concerned for others’ happiness. Why else would I be practicing Dharma and doing all that I do.”  Ours is not yet a perfectly altruistic, selfless motivation. It is still to a large extent it is a selfish one. We have a problem of self-cherishing.  This is not an attack, it is a diagnosis, but one that we each individually need to make about ourselves.  The truth is we often help others for our own selfish reasons.

Seeing this can sometimes lead to a degree of paralysis.  We see that our motivation is mixed, and we then think it is wrong for us to cherish the other person with a mixed motivation, so we hold ourselves back from engaging in virtue!  Clearly that is wrong.  We should still engage in the cherishing action, even if our motivation is mixed, because our motivation is still partly good and the action is still partly virtuous.  Some virtue is better than none.  If we wait until we can do things completely purely, we would have to wait until we attain enlightenment.  But how are we supposed to attain enlightenment if we never start engaging in virtuous actions in the first place because our motivation is mixed?  Clearly that is absurd.  Instead, we can engage in the virtue, but become aware where our motivation is mixed.  Then, we gradually try to purify our motivation so that it is becomes increasingly pure.  As Geshe Chekawa says, we should “remain natural while changing our aspiration.”

(6.79) When my own good qualities are praised,
I want others to rejoice in me;
So why, when others’ good qualities are praised,
Should I not want to rejoice in them?

If I want others to rejoice, then I should join them in rejoicing.

(6.80) Having generated the bodhichitta motivation
Wishing for all living beings to be happy,
Why on Earth do we not rejoice
When others find some happiness for themselves?

(6.81) If I really wish for living beings to become Buddhas,
Who are worshipped throughout all worlds,
Why do I dislike it so
When others receive a little mundane respect now?

(6.82) If someone I was looking after
And providing for in different ways
Were to find his own source of livelihood,
Surely I would be happy, not upset.

(6.83) If I begrudge living beings even this,
How can I wish for them to attain enlightenment?
Where is the bodhichitta in one who is not happy
When others receive something good?

Good question. So when someone experiences some happiness in their generally miserable life, why can’t we be happy about that?  Every day we wish, don’t we, every day we wish for all living beings, all living beings without exception to experience the perfect happiness of enlightenment.  So why can’t we be happy when they find some happiness now?  Perhaps we do not rejoice when we see others’ happiness coming from non-Dharma activities.  But where does the happiness come from? What is the main cause of happiness? Their past virtue.

Rejoicing when other people are happy is one of the best opportunities we have to make a connection with them at such times.  If they sense that we’re unhappy when they’re experiencing happiness, they won’t want to draw very close to us. We can come across as disapproving.  We must be extremely careful. Even if someone has done a negative action, we mustn’t be disapproving. It is very important that we don’t come across as disapproving, judgmental, critical. For a long time people engage in worldly enjoyments for their happiness. We still do. So who are we to judge?

If we really love someone and we see that they’re happy, doesn’t that make us happy?  If we’re not happy, perhaps that’s a sign indicating we need to love them more.  We need to love them as they are, not who we want them to be. Just love them as they are.  We shouldn’t have the attitude of, “if you were a real spiritual practitioner and stopped engaging in worldly enjoyments and so forth, then I’ll really love you.”  We should really love them now! We need to accept and love everyone wherever they are at. We do this with people we are not close to reasonably well, but for those who are closest to us – our families, our work colleagues, our Sangha friends – we expect more, and we get mad at them when they fail to be less than perfect.

It is especially important to be happy for people when they have worked hard at something and accomplished something, even if for us it is something little. For example, when somebody is working hard at something, it is important to really praise them.  If they are really happy about what they have accomplished, and we belittle it, it is devastating for them and it results in discouragement and they don’t try anything.  If we are happy for them, genuinely happy, this will give them encouragement to keep trying.  The only thing we have to do to attain enlightenment is never give up trying.  If people are taking a long time, we need to be patient.  A Bodhisattva works with people over lifetimes and lifetimes.  We go as far with people as we can, and be happy with whatever they have accomplished.  

Now Shantideva explains how jealousy and envy can also lead to anger. 

(6.76) If someone else develops a mind of joy
Through praising another’s good qualities,
Why, mind, do you not praise him too
And experience the same kind of joy?

Our normal reaction when others experience some sort of good fortune is jealousy or envy.  We think about how the other person doesn’t deserve that good fortune, or we simply wish we were experiencing it but are frustrated that we are not.  It is quite common for some people to work very hard and they never seem to catch a break, whereas others hardly work at all, yet good things just naturally fall into their lap.  This usually leaves us feeling jealous and discouraged, and then we go looking for others to blame for our plight, leading to anger.

We all wish to experience joy, happiness in our lives and whenever there is an opportunity to do so, we take it.  So why not rejoice in others’ good qualities, happiness, and so forth, rejoice when others are being praised?  The only reason for a difference in our reaction is because we are still influenced by the wrong view that our happiness is somehow more important than theirs, or their happiness is somehow not important.  The key to developing a robust practice of rejoicing, therefore, is the meditation on equalizing self and others.  Once we have some experience of considering the happiness of each and every living being as being equally important, then rejoicing will come easily.  Once rejoicing comes easily, we will be able to accumulate merit all of the time – we merely need think of those who are experiencing some good fortune, and we can rejoice.

We should also take an opportunity to share in the happiness experienced by the one who is giving praise.  As we go through our daily life, we will sometimes hear one person praising another.  Our normal reaction when this happens is externally we may nod in apparent agreement, but internally we then quickly going on to point out some fault that we have noticed in the person who is being praised.  There is always a ‘yeah, but’ in our mind.  We see only faults.  But when we see somebody praising another it is a particularly good time to practice rejoicing, because we can rejoice both in the person receiving the praise and the person giving the praise. 

As Dharma practitioners we must rejoice in one another’s good qualities, we must rejoice in one another’s activities, virtuous activities. We need to not just observe, but also admire them and rejoice in them.  We need to admire and rejoice in their skillful means. And then we will be inspired to follow the example others are setting for us.  And as well we must rejoice in the joyful effort of others. Whenever they try, we must make a point of rejoicing in their efforts, and talk to others of the good qualities that we see in them.  And we should also rejoice when others understand things that we don’t.  

The benefits of rejoicing are almost limitless.  First, rejoicing creates the cause to acquire the qualities you rejoice in.

(6.77) I should always rejoice in others’ happiness and virtue.
This joy causes my virtues to increase.
Moreover, it is the cause of delighting the holy beings
And the supreme method for benefiting others.

Rejoicing I think is one of the best ways of accomplishing results.  We’re so concerned with results! If we really want results, rejoice. It is the best way of accomplishing both internal and external results.  Rejoicing creates the causes to acquire what we are rejoicing in.  If a teacher and students are rejoicing a lot, then even if mistakes are being made at their Center, progress is being made, both internal and external.  No doubt that holy beings easily, powerfully can help progress in such a joyful, harmonious environment.