To rely sincerely upon our Spiritual Guide.

Since all the attainments of Secret Mantra depend upon receiving the blessings of our Vajra Master, relying sincerely upon him or her is the most important practice for Secret Mantra practitioners.  Therefore, we have a commitment to remember our Spiritual guide at least six times every day so as to increase our faith in him or her.

Gen-la Losang said in reality there is only one spiritual practice, and that is reliance upon the Spiritual Guide.  All of our other practices are actually just different aspects of our main practice of reliance.  According to Sutra, we can understand this on a couple of different levels.  First, every instruction we practice comes from the Spiritual Guide, so by relying upon them we are relying upon the Spiritual Guide.  Second, we rely upon the Spiritual Guide’s blessings to be able to realize within our mind the different realizations of Dharma.

According to Tantra, our reliance on the Spiritual Guide is much more robust and profound.  The simplest way of understanding it is in Sutra, it is like we are trying to create a Buddha from scratch by gradually building up within our mind all of a Buddha’s qualities through our own effort.  In Tantra, we say, “the Spiritual Guide has already attained enlightenment, all we need to do is ‘download’ his enlightened mind into our own mind, and then we ‘install’ that enlightened mind into our own mental operating system.  Downloading his mind into our mind is accomplished through the generation of the deity with faith within our mind, and we install his mind in our mind through our training in divine pride of imputing our I onto the pure aggregates we have generated.  The software on the server and the software on our computer are exactly the same, just operating on two different computers.  In the same way, the software of the Guru’s enlightenment in the server of his mind and the software of his mind in the computer of our own mind are exactly the same, just operating in two different mental continuums.  Where did the Guru get his enlightenment?  By downloading it from his Guru’s mind, and so forth back to Buddha Shakyamuni and Buddha Vajradhara.

In Sutra, when we train in lamrim we go through all sorts of different contemplations to bring our own mind to the conclusions of the lamrim, and then we try hold these conclusions for as long as possible to consolidate them within our mind.  In Tantra, we say that every realization of the path, from the realization of our precious human life up to the Mahamudra realization of meaning clear light, are all different aspects, or parts of, our Guru’s enlightened mind.  And when we train in Lamrim, what we are actually doing is making manifest within our mind this aspect of our guru’s mind.  Just as we can download the deity body and mandala, so too we can download in the same way our guru’s realizations of the lamrim.

In Sutra, when we meditate we do so with our own powers of mindfulness, alertness, concentration and discriminating wisdom.  But these are extremely weak and ineffective tools.  In Tantra, we realize we can literally meditate with our Guru’s powers of mindfulness, alertness, concentration and discriminating wisdom.  These are like nuclear enriched power tools for realizing the stages of the path.

In Sutra, as we go about our day, we try to be like the Buddhas, trying to be patient, giving, compassionate and so forth.  In Tantra, we try to become an empty conduit through which the Buddhas work through us in this world, helping living beings, giving perfectly reliable advice and spreading love.  Just as there is no point where we can say the sun stops and its rays begin, in the same way for the Tantric practitioner, there is no point where we can say the Guru stops and his rays of his actions working through us begin.  Eventually, we lose any sense of there being an “us” he is working through – there is just him working in this world, and we are him and he is us, and both are true simultaneously and without contradiction.  We become completely non-dual with him.  Viewed in this way, our enlightenment is quite simply the culmination of our practice of reliance.

To generate ourself as the Deity. 

To overcome ordinary appearances and conceptions, which are the root of samsara, Vajradhara gave us a commitment to generate ourself as our Deity six times every day.  Ideally we should maintain divine pride and clear appearance 24 hours a day.  We should always do this with a bodhichitta motivation.

In Sutra, we say that the root of samsara is self-grasping ignorance.  Self-grasping ignorance is believing an object is one with its inherent existence.  The inherent existence of the object appears in the aspect of the object.  In Tantra, we say that the root of samsara is ordinary appearances and ordinary conceptions.  These are usually best defined in the negative.  Ordinary appearances is any appearance other than seeing the object as a karmic reflection of the emptiness of our mind of great bliss.  Ordinary conceptions is any conception of the object other than conceiving the object as a karmic reflection of the emptiness of our mind of great bliss.  Because we see things in an ordinary way, we generate delusions, which we then act on, creating contaminated karma, which then gives rise to ordinary appearance of things.  In this way, samsara continues without interruption.

To counter this, we train in pure appearances and pure conceptions.  A pure appearance is an appearance that appears to us directly to be a karmic reflection of the emptiness of our mind of great bliss.  A pure conception is conceiving of observed objects as karmic reflections of the emptiness of our mind of great bliss.  Because we see things in a pure way, we generate pure minds, which we then act on, creating pure karma, which then gives rise to pure appearance of things.  In this way, our enlightenment continues without interruption.

Tantric practice can be divided into two main stages, generation stage and completion stage.  Generation stage is like making the outline of our enlightenment, and completion stage is like filling in all of the color.  In generation stage, our main practice is self-generation of ourself as a deity.  Self-generation practice opposes both ordinary appearances and ordinary conceptions.  It opposes ordinary appearances by generating within our mind pure appearances of ourself as the deity, our environment as the pure land, and all beings as Heroes and Heroines.  It opposes ordinary conceptions by mentally recalling that these things are the emptiness of our mind of great bliss in the aspect of the self-generated mandala.  These very simple recognitions cut right to the heart of samsara.

During the meditation break, we likewise constantly try to maintain pure appearance and pure conceptions.  This is a bit more difficult because an ordinary world still appears to us.  The way we can train correctly can be understood as follows.  I was in Frankfurt once and I went to the Modern Art Museum there.  One of the exhibits was a room and what was being projected onto all of the walls were images a perfectly calm and pleasant tropical beach.  So if you only looked, you would think you were on a beach.  But the sound that was playing in the room was that of a terrible and destructive hurricane.  So if you only listened, you would think you were in the middle of a great storm.  The two together created a very peculiar feeling, but due to our mind’s power to naturally integrate our different awarenesses into one experience, the sights and sounds somehow fused into one experience.  In exactly the same way, during the meditation break what will appear to our sense awarenesses will be the world that we normally see, but with our mental awareness we will be generating, and thus seeing with our mind’s eye, pure appearances and conceptions.  Yet since both are happening at the same time, the power of our mind will somehow integrate the two together into a wisdom experience of the world.  For me, it feels like I am centered in the pure world appearing to my mind, but I am moving and operating in another layer of reality that is appearing to the beings of that other layer of reality as the ordinary world appearing to my sense awarenesses.  It is like I see everything as pure, but I simultaneously see how my activities are appearing to everyone else within the realms of samsara.  Another analogy is it is like I am an undercover Buddha operating in the world, and my disguise is my ordinary appearance of myself.  I am in this world, but I am not of it.

Some people misunderstand generation of ourself as a deity as like the crazy person who thinks he is Jesus returned.  Others confusedly think it is an exercise in supremely arrogant pretension.  In reality, it is none of these things.  Proper self-generation is not a Jesus complex because the reason why we self-generate is because we are fully aware of the limitations of our ordinary body and mind, and so we dissolve it completely into emptiness and generate anew a new pure version of ourself.  It is not supremely arrogant pretension because we don’t think we actually are already the deity, rather we train in being the deity by trying to live up to that role.  Our motivation for engaging in self-generation is aspirational, we wish to become a Buddha because we realize we are not, but we know by training in being like one we will gradually become one.  While it is subtle to understand, we do mentally choose to believe we are the deity not because we grasp at ourself as inherently being so, but rather because the mental action of believing we are the deity completes the karma which will ripen in the future in the form of us becoming one.  The same karmic logic applies to our practice of taking and giving, for example.

To keep a bell to remind us of emptiness.  There are two types of bell:  outer and inner.  To remind us of the meaning of the wisdom directly realizing emptiness we are advised to keep an outer bell, or a picture of one.  Through gradually training in great bliss and emptiness, eventually we shall attain the union of great bliss and emptiness, which is the very essence of Secret Mantra.  The bell also symbolizes the practitioner’s personal deity and mandala.  Realizing this we should regard it as an object of the field of merit and make offerings to it. Just as with the vajra, the real meaning of this vow is to attain the inner bell, which is the realization of emptiness.

A bell is helpful for reminding us of emptiness because just as a bell’s sounds arise from echo like waves moving through space, so too all phenomena are echo-like karmic waves moving through emptiness. Sounds also remind us of emptiness because although they appear to our ear awareness, they do not truly exist and cannot be found anywhere.

While of course the logical reasoning establishing emptiness is necessary to realize it, sometimes people mistakenly understanding training in emptiness to be some exercise in philosophical abstraction.  Our training in emptiness is actually quite different from this.  During our meditation sessions, we do all sorts of different visualizations.

As we do these visualizations, I find it most helpful to view things in one of two ways.  The first is to view everything I am visualizing as mental holograms generated in the space of emptiness.  There is nothing actually there other than the mental holograms I am generating.  I can generate this awareness by thinking, “though it appears, it does not truly exist.”  I have programmed my mind where when I recall these words, I am able to see my visualizations in this light.  It is like I take a step back out of the world of appearances and instead view the appearances from the perspective of emptiness.  Yet, I am still aware that they have been generated intentionally by my mind through effort.

The second way is I view the emptiness of my mind like a giant clear light play dough, and when I do the different visualizations, I feel as if I am molding the play dough of my mind into the aspect of the different visualizations.  Physical yoga is a process of putting our body in all sorts of strange physical shapes and positions, and we cycle through different positions in a defined sequence, and doing so functions to untie the knots and obstructions in our body.  Tantric practices are often called “yogas.”  The meaning here is the same.  Through engaging in the sadhana, we cycle our mind through different mental positions in a defined sequence, and doing so functions to untie the knots and obstructions in our subtle body and mind.  By engaging in different visualizations, we are putting and holding our mind in different mental positions.  We are literally reshaping our mind, and by doing so we karmically reshape the world.

There are a couple of different methods we can use to combine bliss and emptiness together in our meditation.  First, Kadam Bjorn said, “bliss is what emptiness feels like.”  In other words, when our aggregate of discrimination realizes emptiness, our aggregate of feeling naturally “feels” bliss.  These two together then combine into a single primary mind of bliss and emptiness in the same way that our ear awareness and our eye awareness combine into a single experience of a bird chirping.

Second, using the play dough analogy, we can feel as if the emptiness if our mind is like our body of bliss, and we shape it into the aspect of our visualization.  It is like a liquid metallic creature from some Hollywood movie, where the substance is the liquid metal (of bliss), but the aspect is the shape of the creature (or deity). During the meditation break, we can train in emptiness by viewing everything as a karmic dream, or like a karmic movie unfolding in the space of the emptiness of our mind.  We don’t need to do elaborate logical syllogisms, just view the world through the wisdom glasses of seeing everything as a karmic dream.

We can consider any number of other analogies, such as karmic waves on the ocean of our mind, or karmic echoes moving through the space of emptiness, mental holograms dancing around us.  It suffices to just recall one of these analogies, and then choose to “view” or “see” the world through this lens.  When we do so, we are able to easily recall emptiness and carry our realization of it with us throughout the day.  We can combine bliss and emptiness during the meditation break in the same way explained above that we do for the meditation session.

To keep a vajra to remind us of great bliss. 

There are two types of vajra:  outer and inner.  To remind us that the development of the inner vajra of great bliss is our main practice we keep an outer vajra (a metal ritual object, or at least a picture of one).  The vajra also symbolizes the attainment of the five omniscient wisdoms of the five Buddha families.  Realizing this we should regard it as an object of the field of merit and make offerings to it.

The point of this vow is not to go to the Dharma shop in our local center, buy a vajra and put it on our shrine.  While of course we need to do so, the real point is to remember the vajra of great bliss all of the time.  The actual physical vajra is merely an external representation to help us remember.

People sometimes get very confused about great bliss.  Because our only basis for the experience of bliss is sexual orgasm, most of society equates Tantric practice with strange sexual practices.  Open any newspaper, and you can find a menu of options to choose from in terms of “Tantra classes” and the only requirement for attending them is loose fitting pants.  Needless to say, this is not what is meant by qualified Tantric practice.

The essential point of tantra is to generate the most powerful, subtle mind possible, and then to use that mind to mediate on the most powerful, subtle object of meditation possible.  If we do this, we will attain enlightenment the most quickly possible.  Our mind has three levels to it, gross, subtle and very subtle.  Roughly speaking, our gross mind refers to the level of mind we normally have while we are awake; our subtle mind refers to the level of mind we normally have when we are dreaming; and our very subtle mind refers to the level of mind we normally have at the last moment of death, when all the appearances of this world completely re-absorb.  All of our gross minds originate from our subtle minds, and all of our subtle minds originate from our very subtle mind.  Our very subtle mind, our root mind, and the mind of great bliss are synonymous.

The fundamental mechanism by which Dharma works is by placing the wisdom of Dharma deeper within our mind than the delusions we suffer from.  If we can do so, we effectively uproot and remove that particular delusion from our mind.  To use arbitrary numbers to illustrate the point, if we have a delusion which reaches down to level 4 in our mind, and we only place the Dharma down to level 3, then the Dharma will cut off the tops of the delusion but it won’t remove the roots of the delusion, and it is just a question of time before the delusion grows back.  It is like pulling weeds, but not doing so by their roots.  If instead we place the Dharma down to level 5 within our mind, then the Dharma will completely uproot and remove that particular delusion within our mind.  Meditation, quite simply, is a method for planting the Dharma more deeply within our mind.  The more powerful our meditating mind, the deeper we plant the Dharma.  The deepest level of mind of all is our very subtle mind.  If we can place the Dharma at that level of our mind, then it literally gets underneath all of our delusions, and indeed their past karmic imprints, and uproots all of them directly and simultaneously.  The most powerful mind is the very subtle mind of great bliss, and the most powerful object is ultimate truth emptiness.  But we do not seek to just realize emptiness with our very subtle mind, we seek to realize all of the lamrim meditations with this mind.

How do we actually generate the mind of great bliss?  To answer this, we must first know what is a qualified mind of great bliss.  Sexual bliss is an agitated, grasping mind.  Great bliss is completely different.  The best way of understanding it is take a feeling of inner peace that comes from your lamrim practice, then take that feeling of peace to its ultimate extreme – a mind so peaceful, it feels blissful.  It is a fully satiated mind that lacks and wants for nothing.  It is a feeling of sublime calm that radiates from the inside out, melting everything into a supreme contented joy.  The primary means by which we generate this mind is, through the force of meditation and assisted by blessings, we cause our inner winds to gather, dissolve and absorb into our central channel, in particular at our heart.  All of our tantric meditations of generation and completion stage are, in fact, methods for gathering our inner winds (and removing the obstructions to them gathering).  The more they gather, the more our mind becomes peaceful, and the more peaceful it becomes, the more blissful it becomes.  Pursuing this experience day and night is the real meaning of the vow.

The four commitments of the family of Buddha Akshobya

The difference between a Buddha and a samsaric being is the basis of imputation for their “I.”  A samsaric being imputes their “I” onto the contaminated body and mind of a samsaric being, and a Buddha imputes their “I” onto the pure body and mind of an enlightened being.  The body and mind of a being can likewise be thought of as “the five aggregates.”  The body of a being is the “form” aggregate, and the mind of a being is the remaining four aggregates of consciousness, discrimination, feeling and compositional factors.  Each of the five Buddha families corresponds to one of the five aggregates.  Buddha Vairochana corresponds to the completely purified form aggregate, and Buddha Akshobya corresponds to the completely purified aggregate of consciousness.  Therefore, the practice of the four commitments of Buddha Akshobya primarily function to generate within our mind the completely pure aggregate of consciousness of a Buddha.  The consciousness aggregate essentially has two main functions, the first is to “know” and the second is to serve as a storehouse for our karmic potentialities.

A contaminated aggregate of consciousness “knows” contaminated objects and stores contaminated karmic potentialities.  An object is contaminated if it is seen to be one with its inherent existence, and a karmic potentiality is contaminated if its generating mental action was a delusion.  A pure aggregate of consciousness only knows pure objects and stores only pure karmic potentialities.  A pure object is one that is seen as one with the emptiness of the very subtle mind of great bliss realizing it.  A karmic potentiality is pure if its generating mental action was a pure mind, free from grasping at inherent existence.  The training in the four commitments of Buddha Akshobya, therefore, function to uproot and cleanse our consciousness of all of the contaminated karmic potentialities stored there so that it can without obstruction know all objects of knowledge directly and simultaneously.

The moral discipline of benefiting other sentient beings. 

The meaning of this vow is we should help sentient beings whenever possible in the most appropriate way.  To understand this, we must look carefully at the meanings of “whenever possible” and “most appropriate way.”

Practically speaking, “whenever possible” means whenever others are willing to receive our help.  Ronald Reagan once famously quipped, “the most feared words in the English language are, ‘I’m with the Federal Government, and I am here to help.’”  While I disagree with the politics of Ronald Reagan on almost every count, this line does reveal a very important point, namely if we don’t want somebody’s help, we reject what is on offer.  A Bodhisattva is somebody who literally strives to be the savior of all.  But it is obviously completely counter-productive for us to walk into every situation proclaiming, “your Savior has arrived, stand aside.”  It is because we want to actually help people (as opposed to feel like we are a savior) that we only directly help those who are asking for our help.  If people reject the help we offer, who have we really helped?  Nobody.  Since the help we offer is Dharma advice, if they reject the help we offer they are actually creating the karma to reject the Dharma, which will harm them not only in this life, but in all of their future lives.  As a general rule, if people are not asking for your advice, don’t give it.  If people are not asking you to mediate their disputes, don’t do it.  If people are not seeking help, don’t provide it.  Sometimes the best way we can help people is by letting them do things themselves.  If a mother always picks up after her children, how will they ever learn to do so themselves?

We should not, however, take this too far.  Someone does not have to directly, verbally ask us for help before we should come to their aid.  We need wisdom to read a situation and know when somebody is willing to receive our help, even if they are not explicitly asking for it.  Oftentimes, the best way to help somebody is to do so anonymously.  This not only removes our attachment to receiving some form of recognition for our kind deeds, it also makes it easier for others to accept help.  Even better is helping others in such a way that it seems as if the good things just happen on its own, without anybody having helped out behind the scenes.  Then, people think they did it on their own, and their confidence grows.  The person who first got me interested in spiritual pursuits was a very close friend in college.  He gave me a copy of a book he was reading at the time on the mind of the ninja – not the ninja of Hollywood, but the deep inner philosophy of the ancient ninja masters.  In one phrase, the ninja “operates from the shadows.”  The meaning of this is quite deep, in fact it is no different than the Taoist concept of having all of our actions originate from the Tao or, closer to home, have all of our actions emerge from the clear light emptiness.  By staying centered in emptiness, correct conventional actions arise spontaneously.

At a more practical level, when acting in the world, the Tantric Bodhisattva likewise operates from the shadows.  No one sees what they do, yet they change everything.  Scientists now are discovering that the unseen scaffolding of the universe is elaborate lattices of dark matter and dark energy.  We only see the visible universe, but what holds it all together and provides its structure is unseen.  It is the same with the true spiritual masters of this world, they are like the dark matter holding everything together.  Venerable Tharchin once said something to the effect of, “it only takes 10 or so true spiritual masters in a country to make that country a source of peace in this world.”  We can understand this from the section on Cherishing Others in Eight Steps to Happiness where Geshe-la describes how somebody who cherishes others is a like a magic crystal with the power to transform any community.  We don’t need to be public about what we are doing, in fact it is usually better if we are not, but quietly, without anybody noticing, we work from the shadows bringing love to the world.

“Most appropriate way” means in such a way that it functions to cause people to engage in virtue from their own side.  As a general rule, we should help people in every way possible.  Sometimes people make the mistake of thinking, “because helping people by giving them Dharma advice is the best way to help others, every other way is somehow bad.”  This is wrong, and a classic example of making the best the enemy of the good.  Oftentimes, it is by helping people with their mundane problems that we can develop a closer karmic relationship with the person through which we can later help them in spiritual ways.  It is true, as Dharma practitioners, we primarily seek to help people solve their inner problem, but that does not mean we can’t and shouldn’t also try help people solve their outer problems too.  Most people are completely convinced that their problems are their external situation, so when they hear Dharma advice on how to change their mind they think, “that’s nice, but it does nothing to help me solve my problem.”  Given this, when somebody comes to us with a problem, it is usually more skillful to first try help them solve their outer problem, and then when they see solutions exist to their outer problem, their mind opens to possibilities for how to also solve their inner problem.

Sometimes Dharma teachers fear giving people advice about how to solve their outer problems because if the advice doesn’t work, then the person might come to blame the Dharma teacher for the bad advice, and as a result come to reject the Dharma.  Of course, there is a risk of this.  But there is likewise a risk that somebody, still convinced that their problem is an external one, will not come to the Dharma teacher at all viewing them as having nothing useful for them.  While of course we want to help people primarily with their inner problem, it is better we help people with their outer problems than to not help them at all.  Through the closer karmic connection we create with them by helping them with their outer problems, we can in the future help them also with their inner problem.  Protecting the other person from rejecting the Dharma if our external advice turns out to be bad advice is straightforward enough:  we just present our outer advice saying, “I have no idea if this will work, but you could try …” or “this doesn’t always work, but when I was in a similar situation I did …” or “this may be completely wrong, but it seems to me you could …” or “please feel completely free to ignore this, but if I were you I would …”  Couching our outer advice in caveats such as these protects the other person from thinking our outer advice is gospel and leave us free to try help in every way we can.

The moral discipline of gathering virtuous Dharmas.

I have a good friend who is a very successful businessman.  No matter where you go with him, whether it is to a restaurant, a golf course, even an amusement park, no matter where he looks he “sees” the business opportunities around him.  He can analyze every dish, or every ride, and calculate roughly the profit margins and how the company could make even more money if only they did XYZ.  In today’s modern economy, the greatest rewards go not to those who make things, but to those who invent new things or discover new or different ways of doing things.  It goes to those who can see and know how to realize opportunities to make money.

Of course as Buddhists, we tend to look down on such people, thinking them they have been seized by samsara, and we scoff, “if only they put as much effort into attaining enlightenment as they do in conducting business, they would be enlightened by now.”  Yet, let’s look at this statement from a personal perspective.  Put another way, “if only we put as much effort into attaining enlightenment as they do in conducting business, we would be enlightened by now.”  In fact, we can say these successful businesspeople are showing us a perfect example of how we should be as we go about our daily life – the only difference is we have a different bottom line.  We do not seek to maximize our outer wealth (though we don’t shun it either), rather we seek to maximize our inner wealth of virtuous karma and Dharma realizations.  Just like my friend, we should constantly be on the lookout for different ways of making inner wealth, and maximizing our virtues.  The difference between an entrepreneur and a Business School Professor is the entrepreneur acts on what they see, they don’t merely identify the opportunities.  In the same way, the difference between a Dharma practitioner and a Dharma scholar is the practitioner acts on the virtuous opportunities they see.

We may object, “but isn’t that a selfish way of looking at the spiritual path.  It just seems so crass to put it that way.”  This objection comes from a failure to make two crucial distinctions.  The first is the distinction between a way of doing things and what is being done, the second is between a selfish reason for doing something and a selfless reason for doing the same thing.  The way of doing things by the successful businessperson, politician or Olympic athlete is perfect.  They are “all in.”  They hold nothing back.  They leave no stone unturned, no task undone.  They push themselves 115% all of the time.  They are single-pointed in their quest to accomplish their objectives.  Everything they do, directly or indirectly, acts to move them closer to the accomplishment of their goal.  They never succumb to laziness, nor complacency with what they have already accomplished.  This is how we need to be with our Dharma practice.

Likewise, it may seem selfish to be in constant pursuit of inner wealth, but we can do so for selfish reasons or for selfish reasons.  The great philanthropists, like Bill Gates, have worked very hard to accumulate tremendous amounts of outer wealth, but their purpose in doing so is to have more resources with which they can help others.  Bill Gates alone has done more to help the people of this world than virtually all but the biggest countries, and you can even argue that he does so for a more altruistic motivation since most foreign aid has little to do with helping other countries and more to do with bringing those countries within one’s sphere of influence.  Bodhisattvas are spiritual philanthropists.  They work very hard to accumulate tremendous amounts of inner wealth of virtuous karma and Dharma realizations, and their purpose in doing so is to have more inner resources with which they can help others.  The goal of a Bodhisattva is take on the hard tasks so others don’t have to.  They learn how to do things to make it easier for others.  They gain realizations so that their own mind becomes a source of peace and stability for others in this world.  They acquire wisdom to be able to share it with others.

While there are countless different ways one can accumulate virtues, from one perspective they can all be classified under two categories:  making offerings and doing prostrations.  To make offerings, in the broadest possible terms, means to give away what we have that is valuable.  Whether we are giving to samsaric beings or enlightened ones, the mind of giving away what is valuable is the same.  Quite simple, giving creates the karmic causes to receive what we give.  Giving with a bodhichitta motivation functions to multiply the power of our giving by the number of beings upon whose behalf we give, in this case countless.  The only reason we have something to give now is because we gave in the past.  Giving to enlightened beings is a special form of giving.  We may wonder, “if enlightened beings already lack nothing, what is the sense in giving them things?”  The answer is we give enlightened beings what we have because we know they will use it in the most beneficial way for all living beings.  If you had money to invest, does it not make sense to give it to the most successful money manager?  In the same way, if we have virtuous karma to invest, it makes sense to give it to those who know how to make the most of it.  Every day, I offer my body, my mind, my time, all of my money, all of my family and the U.S. foreign policy establishment (all things I touch in some way) to Dorje Shugden, and I request him, “please fully use these things for the enlightenment of all beings.”  My first teacher, Gen Lekma, said, “Dorje Shugden wastes nothing.”  So while it might not be immediately obvious to me how all of these things can be used exclusively for the enlightenment of all beings, I can know with certainty that if my intention in offering them and my faith in Dorje Shugden are sufficient, it is guaranteed that eventually this will come true.

Prostrations, here, does not simply mean folding our hands together and putting our forehead on the ground in front of some Buddha.  The physical act of prostration, while in and of itself virtuous, is not the real act of prostration.  The mental act of prostration is “applying effort to cultivate within ourself the good qualities we prostrate to.”  We are normally completely blind to the good qualities of others, and instead only see their faults.  But those who seek to gather virtuous Dharmas have the opposite mental habit.  Venerable Tharchin explains that rejoicing in the good qualities of others creates the causes for ourselves to acquire those same qualities; and that criticizing the faults of others creates the causes for ourselves to acquire those same faults.  This is worth contemplating deeply and checking against our own habits of mind.  Normally, driven by our insecurity, we try knock down in some way those we perceive to be better than us and we generate disdain for those we see as less than us.  Such is the pathway to servitude.  Instead, we need to make a point of identifying, appreciating and then striving to emulate the good qualities we see in others.  If we do, we will make rapid progress towards enlightenment.  This is the essential meaning of prostration.

Putting the two together, we “prostrate” to the good qualities we see in others, acquire such good qualities ourselves, and then we give them away in the form of offerings to others.

To refrain from non-virtue. 

This commitment advises us to avoid all negative actions, especially transgressions of our refuge, pratimoksha, bodhisattva and tantric vows.

The reason for this is simple:  all non-virtuous actions are harmful in some way, either to ourself or to others; and all of a Buddha’s actions are beneficial in some way, either to ourself or to others.  So non-virtuous actions and a Buddha’s actions are completely opposite of one another.  When we train in Tantra, we are in effect bringing the future result of being a Buddha into the path right now.  Basically, by applying effort to act like a Buddha now we will more quickly actually become one in the future.  Christians sometimes wear these bracelets which say, “what would Jesus do?” and they use this as a constant reminder of how they should act in their daily life.  Tantric practice is essentially the same.

It was explained earlier that a Buddha’s form body is the karmic result of the Commitments of Buddha Vairochana (the ones discussed over the last several posts).  A Buddha’s form body is like a machine in this world that only engages in virtue and which functions to ripen and liberate all around us.  Abandoning all non-virtue is the method by which we bring ourselves into alignment with this liberating power.  We sometimes think becoming a Buddha means we take everything on ourselves.  But in reality, it is more an issue of putting ourselves into alignment with the Buddhas already doing this work in this world.  Their enlightened actions flow through our karmic relationships to eventually liberate all living beings.

There are more than 240 different Kadampa vows and commitments, so it is sometimes very hard to know how to practice them all.  That is why Geshe-la provides us with the “essential meanings” of the vows.  The essential meaning of our pratimoksha vows is “do no harm.”  The essential meaning of our refuge vows is “rely upon Buddha, Dharma and Sangha to change your mind.”  The essential meaning of our bodhisattva vows is, “put others first.”  And the essential meaning of our Tantric vows is, “maintain pure view out of compassion.”  If we just do these things, then we are practicing the essential meaning of all of our vows, everything else is just more specific applications/implications of these general principles.  To avoid non-virtue, then, is to do our best to live our life consistent with these basic moral precepts.

Many people mistakenly view moral discipline as a constraint or a limitation on their freedom.  In fact, it is the exact opposite.  We are currently completely unfree because we are controlled by our delusions, but it is by restricting the freedom of our delusions through our practice of moral discipline that we set ourselves free.  It is by indulging in our delusions that we actually restrict our freedom.

To go for refuge to Sangha. 

Geshe-la explains the essential meaning of going for refuge to Sangha is to apply effort to seek Sangha’s help.  All of us face difficulties in life, and when we do, we quite naturally turn to others for help and guidance on how to respond.  This is natural and normal.  Since we have two types of problem – outer and inner – it is also entirely natural that we turn to two different types of help.  For our outer problems, we can and should continue to turn to the external experts exactly the same as everybody else.  There is nothing about being a Dharma practitioner that means we shouldn’t rely upon external help for external problems.  What being a Dharma practitioner does mean is that in addition to turning to external sources of help for our external problems, we also turn to Sangha for help with our inner problems of delusions and negative minds about what is happening in our life, and our inner problems of uncontrolled death and rebirth.

To keep things simple, we go for refuge to Buddhas when within our mind we pray to them and request their blessings.  We go for refuge to Sangha when we turn to any aspect of our tradition in this world.  Sangha is comprised of all of our Gen-la’s, our Resident Teachers, our center administrators, all of our Sangha friends, and even the various on-line Kadampa groups on Facebook, etc.  In a practical sense, to go for refuge to Sangha means (1) we acknowledge that we have an inner problem of delusion, (2) we have faith and confidence in our Sangha friends that they can help us resolve our inner problem, and (3) we have enough humility to be willing to ask for help.  All three of these are necessary, and each one individually represents a good deal of inner work.

To acknowledge that we have an inner problem means we are mentally clear on the difference between our outer problem and our inner problem.  Our outer problem is the outer circumstance, such as a controlling boss, an angry spouse, a lack of money, a bad reputation, etc.  Normally, we are completely convinced that this outer problem is the cause of our unhappiness, and because we wish to be happy, we apply great effort to change our outer circumstance.  Believing that certain external conditions are necessary for our happiness is the delusion called “attachment.”  Believing that certain external conditions are causes of our unhappiness is the delusion called “aversion.”  The fundamental point of departure on the spiritual path is the clear recognition that our happiness is completely independent of our external circumstance and is entirely dependent upon how our mind relates to that external circumstance.  Our external circumstance can be awful, but internally we have just the right attitude towards it, and not only will our awful external circumstance not be a problem for us, it will be viewed as a blessing pushing us towards enlightenment.  Likewise our external circumstance can be fantastic, but internally we have just the wrong attitude towards it, and not only will our external circumstance not lift our spirits, but it will even become a source of further misery.  This clearly shows that our experience of our circumstance depends entirely upon changing our mental attitude and reaction towards it.  This is our inner problem we turn to Sangha to overcome.

Having faith and confidence in our Sangha friends that they can help us overcome our inner problem means we trust that our Sangha friends will give us good advice based on their own experience.  We all have people in our life who we turn to for advice.  We also all have people who we don’t turn to because we know their advice is not good.  Some people think of faith as a bit like Cupid who shoots us with the love arrow, either we feel it or we don’t.  This is wrong.  Faith, like love, is something that can and should be cultivated with effort.  So we need to apply effort to cultivate faith in our Sangha friends.  Faith does not mean we turn a blind eye to the faults of that which we have faith in, rather faith is a wisdom mind that knows how to receive benefit from whatever qualities or faults appear to our mind.  Some people, not understanding this, generate faith when they think the object of their faith appears perfect, but then they become crushed when the object of their faith appears to make mistakes.  This is not faith, this is just a form of attachment to spiritual people.  It is not complicated to receive benefit from the mistakes of our Sangha friends, we just view their mistakes as lessons in what not to do.  It is important, also, that we make effort to be on good terms with everybody in the Sangha.  This is not easy, but it is worth our while.  We can view each member of the Sangha as revealing to us some aspect of our own mind, and by learning how to be on good terms with each member of the Sangha, we are working on that part of our mind.  But faulty appearing Sangha members aside, we should also cultivate close mentor-mentee style relationships with those teachers and senior Sangha members who particularly inspire us.  Different people have different experience and presentations of the Dharma, so it is normal that some teacher’s explanations will work for us better than others.  But it is not enough to just attend the teachings, we need to develop a close relationship with the person where we allow them to know of our faults and delusions fully and openly in complete trust that they are only there to help.  They know us better than we know ourselves, and sometimes that is threatening to us, but we accept this just like we accept our Doctor knowing the ways in which we are sick.

It is said that the Spiritual Guide is kinder than all the Buddhas because he helps us directly when we are at our most deluded.  By the same logic, we can perhaps say that our Sangha friends are kinder still, because they help us every day.  Sangha does not just help us by providing advice, but also by providing us with living examples of people doing their best to change themselves with the Dharma.  Their example and their experience are often greater teachers for us than even the highest master’s perfect discourses.  In many ways, we can say that our Sangha friends are the most precious people for us in the whole world.

To go for refuge to Dharma

It is not enough to wish to become an enlightened being, we must know how to do it.  Dharma usually has two different non-contradictory meanings.  The first is the Dharma is the set of instructions given by Buddha explaining to us, step by step, how we transform our mind from its current deluded state into that of a Buddha.  It teaches us how to identify within ourselves the states of mind we need to abandon and explains how to do so.  It also reveals to us the inner qualities we need to cultivate and provides methods for doing so.  It is a complete path that connects each and every mind to the final destination of enlightenment without any gaps or obstructions.  Just as all roads lead to Rome, so too all Dharma paths eventually lead to enlightenment.

The second meaning of Dharma is the realizations of the truth of Dharma within our own minds.  In other words, Dharma is not just the instructions for how to gain realizations, but it is also the realizations itself.  Because all of our suffering comes from our delusions and negativity, Dharma is our real refuge because it protects us from these things.  If we have a realization of patience, it protects us from the harms of anger.  If we have a realization of love, it protects us from the dangers of self-cherishing.  If we have a realization of our precious human life, it protects us from wasting it on meaningless things.  Tantric realizations protect us from ordinary appearance and ordinary conceptions.  This is our actual refuge, and all other forms of refuge are ultimately aimed at building within our own mind the definitive refuge of our Dharma realizations.

The root of refuge is understanding the nature of our inner problem.  Doctors say 85% of good medicine is correct diagnosis of the problem.  When the problem is correctly diagnosed, then the treatment becomes obvious.  Our fundamental problem is we are confused about the nature of our problem.  We are convinced our problem is what is happening externally, with some things being good and other things being bad.  So we put all of our effort into changing our external circumstance and it seems to us that the Dharma is useless at best since it does nothing to solve what we perceive to be our problem.  Due to not understanding the nature of our problem, we gradually have less time and energy for Dharma because we are absorbed with other things.  But when we are very clear about the nature of our problem, the need to go for refuge to the Dharma becomes obvious.  If our problem is an internal one, it is clear that external things won’t help us solve our problem.  We will then look at different internal solutions, and investigate their different qualities, and eventually we come to see that the Dharma is the solution.  In particular, when we come to understand our problem is our mind is plagued by the wisdom grasping at inherent existence, we realize that only the Dharma can provide us with a solution because only it teaches emptiness.

Since Dharma itself has two meanings, to go for refuge to Dharma, therefore also has two meanings.  The first is to make effort to seek out Dharma instructions and to improve our understanding of what we need to do to actually train our mind.  Fortunately, Geshe-la makes this very easy for us.  He has given us a complete set of books that meticulously go over every stage of the path from our first steps all the way to the final goal.  He has struck the perfect balance of giving us everything we need and nothing we don’t need.  Likewise, he has established for us Dharma centers throughout the world so that we can receive teachings directly.  Having books is great, but having somebody we can go to and receive individually tailored instructions is invaluable.

The second way of going for refuge is to make the pursuit of the inner wealth of Dharma realizations our life purpose.  We see that our problem is our mind, and we make effort to actually change our mind in the direction the Dharma teaches.  If what we want out of life is to increase our realizations, then we suddenly develop a genuine equanimity with respect to life’s ups and downs.  It really doesn’t matter what happens because we know how to use everything to train our mind.  Since every situation is equally empty, we realize every circumstance is equally good in terms of the opportunity it affords us to train our mind.  The driving force of business people is making money, and motivated by this wish they work incredibly long hours and devote tremendous energy.  With the same vigor, we pursue the inner wealth of Dharma realizations.  They are our bottom line.  If the pursuit of inner wealth is our life’s purpose, it doesn’t matter if we are young or old, rich or poor, powerful or not, sick or healthy, in every circumstance we can practice.  Nothing can interfere with us doing what we wish.  Because we know we are building for a better future we get something more fulfilling than temporary pleasure, we get inner contentment and confidence knowing we are on the right track.

But we should not fool ourselves.  Training in Dharma is not easy, in fact sometimes it can be very hard.  We have literally eons worth of bad habits built up, and these do not change over night – they scarcely change even after decades of practice.  But they do change, and because we have correct methods, if we never give up, it is guaranteed we will get there in the end.  In sports, we say “no pain, no gain,” meaning if it isn’t hurting, you are probably not making any progress.  It is the same with our Dharma practice.  When we actually try go against the grain of our delusions, in particular our attachment, it can be really difficult, even sometimes painful.  But like a rebel soldier fighting for a good cause, we gladly assume the difficulty because we know our cause is just and it is worth it in the end.