A Pure Life: Do not Steal

Kadampa Ryan Precept Days

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

The object of stealing is anything that someone else regards as their own.  This includes other living beings.  If we take something that no one claims to possess, the action of stealing is not complete.  Like with killing, the intention must include a correct identification of the object of stealing, a determination to steal, and our mind must be influenced by delusion, usually desirous attachment, but sometimes out of hatred of wishing to harm our enemy.  It can also sometimes be out of ignorance thinking such stealing is justified such as not paying taxes or fines, or stealing from our employer, downloading pirated music or videos, etc.  Stealing also requires preparation.  It may be done secretly or openly, using methods such as bribery, blackmail, or emotional manipulation.  Finally, it must also include completion.  The action is complete when we think to ourself ‘this object is now mine.’

In modern life we have countless opportunities to steal and we often take advantage of most of them.  Common examples include not giving money back when we have been given too much change at the store, accidentally walking out with some good we didn’t purchase and not making an effort to go back and pay for it, stealing work supplies from work for our personal use, stealing our employers time by doing personal things on company time beyond what is conventionally acceptable in your work place (most work environments allow you a limited amount of personal administrative time.  The point is do not go beyond what is intended by your employer).  Another very common form of stealing is lying on our taxes so that we pay less arguing our government is wasteful.  We come up with all sorts of justifications for why this is OK, but it is still stealing. 

Stealing can also include saying certain clever things to cause something to come to us when it would otherwise normally go to somebody else.  One of the most common forms of stealing these days is downloading pirated music or videos, or copying and using software we didn’t pay for.  Again, our rationalizations for such behavior know no limits, but it is still stealing.  The test for whether we are stealing or not is very simple:  if we asked the other person would they say its legitimately ours?  If not, it was stealing.

Stealing is incredibly short-sighted.  Anybody who feels tempted to steal should take a few hours driving through a really poor neighborhood or they should go visit a very poor country or watch a documentary on global poverty.  You can find plenty of material just on YouTube.  When we see these things, we should remind ourselves that this is our future if we steal.  When we steal, we create the causes to have nothing in the future.  Giving is the cause of wealth, taking is the cause of poverty.  It is as simple as that.  Why are Bill Gates and Warren Buffet so rich?  Because they have the mental habits on their mind to give away everything.  Because they did this in the past, they became incredibly rich in this life.  Because they are again giving away all of their wealth, in future lives they will again be incredibly rich.  Just as they are external philanthropists, a Bodhisattva is an inner philanthropist.  We seek vast inner wealth so that we can have even more to give away.

There are also many subtle forms of stealing that occur due to the way we have structured our economy. As many of you know I am in economist by training. I very much believe in free markets as the least bad way of organizing an economy. However, the optimal effects of the market only occur when there is what is called perfect competition. When there is perfect competition, excess profits are competed away and both consumers and producers are as good off as they could possibly be on the aggregate. But when markets are not perfectly competitive, markets do not produce optimal results. For example, if a company has a monopoly on the sale of a certain good that everybody needs, it can charge extraordinarily high prices and people will be forced to pay. The company intentionally restricts production to drive the prices higher than would otherwise exist in a perfectly competitive market. As a result, they extract a surplus in profit not due to the quality of their product, but rather by virtue of their market power. Extracting this surplus profit is a form of stealing from the consumers and also from society as a whole because not as much of the good is produced as would otherwise be the case.  It is beyond the scope of this blog to outline them, but there are many examples of market power being used for selfish purposes. 

At a personal level, the point is we need to be aware of the situations in which we have some form of market power over others and to not take advantage of our more powerful position to extract greater profits then we are justifiably due. If we fail to do this, it is a form of stealing. Likewise, if we live in a society in which corporations have disproportionate power and enjoy political protection for their monopolistic behavior, if we vote for or lend political support for such policy knowing that it is a form of stealing, then we are also engaged in a subtle form of stealing. The point is this, we live in a society and we have a say in how that society is run. If we use our political power for selfish purposes or to support those who do so, then are these not karmic actions that have karmic effects? This is not mixing Dharma with politics; this is understanding that the actions we engage in have effects on those around us and we must take that into account when choosing our actions.  I would not say that all of this is a violation of our Mahayana precept to abandon stealing, but it is once again a directional question. Are our actions moving in the direction of stealing or are they moving in the direction of not stealing. That is the question.

Modern Bodhisattva’s Way of Life: Why compassion doesn’t hurt

Kadampa Ryan 2. Modern Bodhisattva's Way of Life

Shantideva goes on to say:

(8.92) The suffering I experience
Does not harm others,
But I find it hard to bear
Because I cherish myself.

(8.93) Likewise, the suffering of others
Does not harm me,
But, if I cherish others,
I shall find their suffering hard to bear.

This is a very clever line of reasoning.  To understand it, we need to make a clear distinction between “being harmed” and “finding something unbearable.”  Sometimes people think compassion means we are equally harmed by the suffering of others, and to find their suffering unbearable means we find it equally painful.  If this was the case, who would ever want to generate compassion since it would be a cause of infinite suffering.  Surely it would be better to remain in different to the suffering of others than to experience all suffering.  Therefore, making this distinction is crucial.

From a conventional point of view, if I break my arm, it harms me and not others.  If find this harm both painful and unbearable.  It is painful because it was my arm that was broken.  It is unbearable because I cherish my own happiness and well-being as being important.  It is perfectly possible for me to find this experience painful (since it is my arm that was broken), but perfectly bearable because I don’t consider my well-being to be particularly important. 

Now imagine somebody else breaks their arm.  From a conventionally point of view, this does not harm me, but it does harm others.  It is harmful to them because it is painful to them.  Their pain is not my pain.  Their pain does not harm me.  Everyone knows this.  If I do not care about their well-being, then their pain will also be perfectly bearable for me.  It is not my problem.  For them, however, this experience is definitely painful because it is their arm that is broken.  It may or may not be bearable for them depending on whether they cherish themselves or not.  If I do care about their well-being, and I consider it to be important, then their pain will not be harmful to me, but it will be unbearable. 

Pain, or harm, is a function of whether we are imputing our I onto an aggregate of feeling of something that is harmed.  Bearability is function of whether we consider the happiness and well-being of that person to be important. 

But unbearability does not necessarily mean we suffer from it.  Whether we suffer from the unbearability of other’s suffering depends upon whether we have attachment to others well being or whether we are free from such attachment.  To be attached to others’ well-being means we think our own happiness depends upon them not suffering.  That’s what attachment to anything means – we think our happiness depends upon some external factor.  If we have attachment to this person not suffering, their breaking their arm will be both unbearable to us AND it will be experienced by us as suffering.

Therefore, for compassion – finding others suffering to be unbearable – to NOT be suffering for us, our mind must be free from attachment to other people suffering.  If we have attachment, we will suffer from their suffering.  If our mind is free from such attachment, we will still find their suffering unbearable (because we consider their happiness and well being to be important), but we won’t experience that unbearability as suffering.  How will we experience it, then?  To be unbearable means we can’t just sit there and do nothing about it.  We feel compelled to do something because it is unbearable. 

This is where our wisdom comes in.  What do we feel compelled to do?  If we lack wisdom, we might get mad at the other person for whatever it is they did to break their arm, hoping that our anger will deter them from making similar mistakes again in the future.  Maybe that will help, but most likely not.  But what will help?  Us becoming a Buddha.  If we become a Buddha, then we can gradually help others change the basis of imputation of their I onto an enlightened being whose arms never break.  We see the only lasting solution to their suffering is for them to attain liberation and enlightenment themselves.  How can we bring that about?  By we ourselves first attaining enlightenment for their benefit – we attain enlightenment with the express purpose of being able to in the future lead these people to freedom.  The strong feeling of unbearability, that is free from attachment to them not suffering, and that possesses the wisdom that actually knows what is beneficial to others is the pure mind of compassion that is the substantial cause of a qualified bodhichitta.  This unbearability will push us to become a Buddha.  If we have attachment or we lack wisdom knowing what can actually help, this unbearability could lead to ourself suffering at best and us feeling the need to control others at worst. 

The key here is understanding we don’t have to be harmed by suffering to find suffering unbearable. We are harmed by suffering, we find suffering then unbearable, but we do not have to be harmed by suffering in order to find suffering unbearable.  If we have wisdom and are free from attachment to others not suffering, finding the suffering of others unbearable naturally leads to love, compassion and virtuous actions, which creates the causes for our future happiness. 

But what do we do about our own suffering?  We may still be harmed because we are in samsara, but if we do not cherish ourself at all, then we will find the suffering we experience to be entirely bearable.  It will not be important, just as the suffering of others is unimportant to us now.  Indeed, when we let go of thinking that our own experience is important, we find whatever pain we are experiencing to be eminently more bearable, and this creates the space within our mind to actually be able to transform our suffering into something useful for the spiritual path.  Then, not only will it be bearable, we will start to understand Shantideva when he says “suffering has many good qualities.”  For us, it will still be painful, but so beneficial.  Then, others suffering will not be our problem.  Our suffering won’t be our problem.  Others’ suffering will be a cause of our enlightenment.  Our suffering will be a cause of our enlightenment.  Perfect!

But if we cherish only others, won’t we suffer from the suffering of everybody?  No, because we do not experience their suffering.  So by cherishing others, we do not experience their suffering, but we find it unbearable and so we are lead into spiriutal paths.  And by not cherishing ourselves, we find our own suffering entirely bearable, so it is not a problem for us at all.  In short, we put our cherishing where it can’t be harmed – others.  Shantideva’s wisdom is unparalleled.

Happy Tsog Day: Putting Others First in Thought and Deed

Kadampa Ryan Tsog Days

In order to remember and mark our tsog days, holy days on the Kadampa calendar, I am sharing my understanding of the practice of Offering to the Spiritual Guide with tsog.  This is part 31 of a 44-part series.

Exchanging self with others

In short, since the childish are concerned for themselves alone,
Whereas Buddhas work solely for the sake of others,
I seek your blessings to distinguish the faults and benefits,
And Thus, be able to exchange myself with others.

Since cherishing myself is the door to all faults
And cherishing mother beings is the foundation of all good qualities,
I seek your blessings to take as my essential practice
The yoga of exchanging self with others.

To exchange our self with others means to cherish only other living beings. This mind is the natural conclusion of the previous contemplations. If there is no advantage and only suffering that comes from cherishing ourselves and only advantages and happiness that comes from cherishing others, it follows that we should not cherish ourselves at all and cherish only others.

We might object, “if we do not cherish ourselves at all then who will take care of us?” The answer is we do not need to cherish ourselves to take care of ourselves. It is perfectly possible to take care of ourselves – feed our body, get adequate rest, and meet all our other needs – for the sake of cherishing others. For example, if we starve or become sick because we are not caring for ourselves, then we are not able to help others. Indeed, the mind of bodhichitta, which we will discuss later, seeks to acquire every good quality for the sake of others. There is no contradiction whatsoever between improving ourselves, taking care of ourselves, and cherishing only others.

How can we generate the mind of exchanging self with others? As with abandoning self-cherishing and cherishing others, it suffices for us to contemplate the advantages of doing so and then make the determination to cherish only others. The more familiarity we gain with this determination, the more our behavior will become consistent with it. Fundamentally it is simply a question of familiarity. We need to make effort every day, month after month, life after life, to come to cherish only others. With familiarity this mind will come. Once it does, as explained before, enlightenment will naturally follow.

In chapter eight of Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, Shantideva explains a special method for generating the mind of exchanging self with others. He encourages us to identify with people who we normally generate pride, competitiveness, or jealousy towards. We put ourselves in their shoes and look back upon our old self. For example, we usually generate pride towards someone who we think is inferior to us in some way. When we put ourselves in their shoes and look back at our arrogant old self, we can see very clearly our selfish and deluded behavior and can realize what the other the person needs from us. Seeing ourselves from the perspective of others is a powerful way for undermining and ultimately destroying our self-cherishing attitude.

According to Highest Yoga Tantra, we can exchange self with others by simply imputing our “I” onto all living beings thinking that we are now them. And then we can impute “other” onto our old self. On the basis of these new imputations, we cherish our new self and can completely neglect our old self. All these practices can give rise to misinterpretations of what it means, but if we put the instructions into practice sincerely and try approach it in the way it was intended, we can naturally overcome these doubts and hesitations.

Taking and giving

Therefore, O Compassionate, Venerable Guru, I seek your blessings
So that all the suffering, negativities, and obstructions of mother sentient beings
Will ripen upon me right now;
And through my giving my happiness and virtue to others,
May all migrating beings be happy.  (3x)

This is the only verse in the practice of Offering to the Spiritual Guide that has five lines. Geshe-la explains in Great Treasury of Merit this is to indicate the special importance of this practice. In Universal Compassion, Geshe-la explains that the practice of taking and giving is the synthesis of our Lojong trainings. All the previous meditations on exchanging self with others, great compassion, and wishing love all find their final conclusion in the practice of taking and giving.

The practice here is quite simple: first we generate a mind of compassion for all living beings, and then we generate the superior intention to ourselves protect others from their suffering. With this mind, we then imagine we take on all the suffering of others in the form of black smoke which comes to our heart and destroys our self-cherishing mind completely. We then generate a mind of wishing love, wishing that others experience only pure happiness, and we once again generate a superior intention to assume personal responsibility to help others be happy. We then imagine that from our heart infinite light rays radiate out in all directions bestowing upon all living beings pure and everlasting happiness. Imagining that we have taken away all their suffering and bestowed upon them perfect happiness, we then generate a mind of joy strongly believing that we have done so.

The doubt may arise that we have not actually taken on the suffering of others or given them happiness. This doubt then prevents us from generating joy, feeling that we have not engaged in the practice. There are several lines of thought we can use to overcome this doubt. First, others do not inherently exist. They are not inherently suffering, nor are they inherently unhappy. That is simply how they are appearing to us based upon our past karma with them. The practice of taking and giving is similar to our tantric practices of bringing the result into the path. Engaging in the practice of taking and giving creates a new karma which causes the beings of our karmic dream to appear to be free from suffering and experiencing everlasting happiness. This is a way of karmically reconstructing the empty beings of our dream. Second, we do not generate joy believing others have been freed from their suffering and so forth because we believe they inherently have, rather we generate joy because strongly believing we have done this is how we complete the mental action of taking and giving. In other words, generating the mind of joy believing we have taken on their suffering and bestowed upon them happiness is how we complete the mental action of taking and giving, which then gives us all the karmic benefits of the practice.

We can engage in the practice of taking and giving at any time. One powerful way of doing this is to mount the practice of taking giving upon the breath. As we inhale, we imagine that we take on all the suffering of living beings. And as we exhale, we imagine that we bestow upon others everlasting happiness. There is a close relationship between our breath and our mind. If we mount the virtuous practice of taking giving upon our breath, it will function to purify our inner energy winds. If our inner energy winds are purified, then our mind will naturally also become purified.

Happy Tara Day: Tara can dispel all outer and inner obstacles

Kadampa Ryan How to Rely Upon Tara, Tara Days

This is the sixth installment of the 12-part series sharing my understanding of the practice Liberation from Sorrow.

Praising Tara by her divine actions of dispelling conflicts and bad dreams

Homage to you who are honoured by the kings of the hosts of gods,
And the gods and the kinnaras.
Through your joyful and shining pervasive armour
All conflicts and bad dreams are dispelled.

These are particularly practical ways we can rely upon Tara.  We all, from time to time, experience conflict and bad dreams in our life.  Every time we find ourself in some sort of conflict, we can recall Tara’s swift ability to dispel conflicts, and recite her mantra with strong faith requesting that she do so.  Ultimately, all conflict is sustained by anger, attachment, and self-grasping – in either ourself of those we are in a conflict with (usually both).  When we recite her mantra, we should request that she dispel the inner causes of our conflict from all concerned.  For myself, much of my work revolves around the U.S.-China relationship, which is obviously plagued by different types of conflict.  To help dispel this conflict, I try generate pure view of the Consulate I work for and my boss as emanations of Tara and request that through them both, all conflict between China and the United States can be dispelled. 

Tara is also helpful for dispelling bad dreams.  When I was very young, I had a few particularly scary bad dreams, and became terrified of having more.  Every night when I would go to sleep, I would pray, “please please please please (repeated millions of times) protect me from bad dreams.”  It actually worked, and after I started praying like this when I went to bed, I had very few bad dreams.  Later, when I became a father myself, my kids started having bad dreams, and I taught them Tara’s mantra and gave them small Tara statues to hold in their hand as they went to sleep to protect them against bad dreams.  Their bad dreams became much less afterwards, almost without fail.

Praising Tara by her divine actions of dispelling diseases

Homage to you whose two eyes, like the sun or the full moon,
Radiate a pure, clear light.
Saying HARA twice and TUTTARA,
You dispel the most violent, infectious diseases.

When the Coronavirus first broke out, Geshe-la advised Kadampas around the world to do Tara practice due to her power to dispel violent, infectious diseases.  Some centers did 24-hour Tara pujas on Tara day every month for some time.  The way these work is every four hours, one engages in the Liberation from Sorrow sadhana, and recites the praises to the twenty-one Taras seven times each session.  While it is true the coronavirus still spread all over the world, but we cannot say it would not have spread worse if such actions were not performed.  If we have faith in Tara, there is no doubt that such actions help and perhaps saved many, many lives. 

Praising Tara by her divine actions of subduing evil spirits and zombies

Homage to you who have the perfect power of pacifying
Through your blessing of the three thatnesses;
Subduer of the hosts of evil spirits, zombies and givers of harm,
O TURE, most excellent and supreme!

In many ways, this verse is like the summary of all of the previous verses.  It refers to her power to pacify, bestow blessings (in particular of the wisdom realizing emptiness, or thatness), and subdue outer and inner obstructions.  She truly is most excellent and supreme!

This concludes the praise of the root mantra
And the twenty-one homages.

Normally, we talk of these praises as to the twenthy-one Taras, but here we are also reminded that these are also praises of Tara’s mantra.  In Buddhism, we often describe things as existing at gross, subtle, and very subtle levels.  Green Tara is the gross deity, her mantra is like a subtle emanation of Tara, and the Dharmakaya is the very subtle version of Tara.  In this way, we can understand the mantra as like a bridge between the Tara we normally know and definitive Tara.  With sufficient faith in and understanding the nature of the mantra, reciting the mantra has exactly the same function and power as reciting the twenty-one homages. 

Benefits of recitation of this Sutra

The wise who recite this with strong faith
And perfect devotion to the Goddess,
In the evening and upon arising at dawn,
Will be granted complete fearlessness by remembering her.

A qualified mind of refuge has two main parts, fear of samsara and faith in the three jewels.  Normally, we don’t have much difficulty generating faith, but for our faith to have any meaning, it must be informed by an appropriate fear of samsara.  Without this, our Dharma practice just becomes feel-goodism.  But with healthy wisdom fears of samsara and faith in the three jewels, we are pushed to engage in Dharma practices, such as replying upon Mother Tara.  Through this we attain fearlessness in two ways.  First, because we will have a powerful protector at our side; and second, because we will gain inner Dharma realizations, which provide us with permanent protection from all suffering.  In particular, we need the wisdom that knows how to transform adversity into the path to enlightenment.  Normally we fear things that can harm us.  Most of samsara’s sufferings can harm us only because we don’t know how to transform experiencing them into causes of our enlightenment.  But through relying upon Tara, we can gain this wisdom, and then we will have nothing to fear.  We receive this protection merely “by remembering her” because wherever you imagine a Buddha, a Buddha actually goes; and wherever a Buddha goes, they perform their function, which is to bestow blessings.  In other words, by merely remembering Tara, she comes swiftly to our side and then blesses our mind to gain wisdom realizations.  The sadhana says we need to rely upon her with perfect devotion.  What does that mean practically?  It means we move beyond simply having faith in her to actively working to accomplish her wishes in the world.  Somebody who is devoted moves beyond inner faith to practical action.  Tara’s main wish is for the pure Kadam Lamrim of Atisha flourish throughout the world, both externally and internally.  If we are to enjoy complete fearlessness, we need to not only rely upon her, but to actively devote ourselves to realizing her pure wishes.

Through the complete purification of all negativity
They will destroy all paths to the lower realms.
They will swiftly be granted empowerment
By the seventy million Conquerors.

The cause of lower rebirth is negative karma on our mind.  The quality of mind we generate at the moment of our death determines the quality of our next rebirth – a negative mind will activate negative karma resulting in a lower rebirth, a positive mind will active virtuous karma resulting in an upper rebirth, and a pure mind will active pure karma resulting in a rebirth outside of samsara.  Avoiding a negative mind at the time of death will help protect us from a lower rebirth, but the only way to destroy all paths to the lower realms is through the complete purification of all our negative karma.  If we have no negative karma remaining on our mind, even if we generate a negative mind at the time of death, there will be no negative throwing karma to activate and it will be impossible for us to take lower rebirth.  Tara’s blessings can help us purify swiftly all of our negative karma, and we can recite her mantra as a practice of purification similar to Vajrasattva practice. 

Relying upon Tara also creates the causes for us to receive the empowerments of all the Buddhas.  What is an empowerment?  During an empowerment, our Spiritual Guide places within our mental continuum a personalized emanation of the deity who will remain with us between now and our eventual attainment of that deity.  This emanation is our personal yidam, or personal deity.  By virtue of this emanation, we can gradually learn to identify with the pure body and mind of the deity and gain the ability to use these as if they were our own.  Tara is the mother of all Buddhas, and all Buddhas respect and are devoted to their mother.  When we rely upon Tara, all of her children – the Buddhas – then come into action to help fulfill their mother’s wish for us.  They do so by granting us empowerment.

Happy Turning the Wheel of Dharma Day: Taking our Place in the Lineage

Kadampa Ryan 7. Kadampa meaning of special days

Today is Turning the Wheel of Dharma Day when we celebrate and remember Buddha’s kindness in teaching Dharma to the beings of this world.  Today is a particularly blessed day when the karma we create is multiplied by ten million times, so it is a good idea to make every second count.  As Kadampas, June 4th is also Venerable Geshe-la’s birthday.  Of course it is, what other day would he be born on?  To mark this day, I would like to share my thoughts on why it is important to pray for Geshe-la’s long life, how we can appreciate Buddha’s kindness in turning the Wheel of Dharma, what it means to turn the Wheel of Dharma over time, and the many different ways we can choose to take our place in the lineage.

Understanding How Holy Days Work

There are certain days of the year which are karmically more powerful than others, and the karmic effect of our actions on these days is multiplied by a factor of ten million!  These are called “ten million multiplying days.”  In practice, what this means is every action we engage in on these special days is karmically equivalent to us engaging in that same action ten million times.  This is true for both our virtuous and non-virtuous actions, so not only is it a particularly incredible opportunity for creating vast merit, but it is also an extremely dangerous time for engaging in negative actions.  There are four of these days every year:  Buddha’s Englightenment Day (April 15), Turning the Wheel of Dharma Day (June 4), Buddha’s Return from Heaven Day (September 22), and Je Tsongkhapa Day (October 25).  Heruka and Vajrayogini Month (January 3-31), NKT Day (1st Saturday of April), and International Temple’s Day (first Saturday of November) are the other major Days that complete the Kadampa calendar. 

A question may arise, why are the karmic effect of our actions greater on certain days than others?  We can think of these days as a spiritual pulsar that at periodic intervals sends out an incredibly powerful burst of spiritual energy or wind.  On such days, if we lift the sails of our practice, these gushes of spiritual winds push us a great spiritual distance.  Why are these specific days so powerful?  Because in the past on these days particularly spiritually significant events occurred which altered the fundamental trajectory of the karma of the people of this world.  Just as calling out in a valley reverberates back to us, so too these days are like the karmic echoes of those past events.  Another way of understanding this is by considering the different types of ocean tides.  Normally, high and low tide on any given day occurs due to the gravity of the moon pulling water towards it as the earth rotates.  But a “Spring tide” occurs when the earth, moon, and Sun are all in alignment, pulling the water not just towards the moon as normal, but also towards the much more massive sun.  Our holy days are like spiritual Spring tides.

Why it is Important to Pray for Geshe-la’s Long Life

Not only is today important because it is Turning the Wheel of Dharma Day, but also because today is Geshe-la’s birthday.  At Kadampa Festivals, special events, and perhaps also in our daily practice, we frequently pray for the long life of our precious spiritual guide, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso.  Sometimes, if we are honest with ourselves, we are tired towards the end of these long teaching or meditation sessions, and so we internally groan a bit at the thought of doing the long-life prayers because we want the session to end, etc.  There is nothing wrong with admitting these thoughts arise in our mind, what matters is that when they do, we recognize them as deceptive and recall why it is important to pray for Geshe-la’s long life.

The Spiritual Guide plays an indispensable role in our spiritual life.  It is helpful to consider why different realms appear to different beings.  Generally speaking, with the exception of humans, animals, and some gods, beings of one realm can’t see beings of other realms.  Why is this?  Because the world that appears to any one being depends upon that person’s karma.  Hell beings don’t see other realms because their minds are so impure they only see impurity.  We do not see god realms for the same reason.  The world of the Buddhas is completely pure, and so utterly beyond our scope of appearance.  As a result, even though pure lands pervade everywhere, we are completely blind to them and the teachings and enlightened actions of the Buddhas are essentially beyond our reach.  But the spiritual guide bridges the pure world of the Buddhas and our impure human world.  Despite their mind being in the pure land, they are nonetheless able to appear in our world and to our minds.  Through developing a relationship with the spiritual guide, we are able to learn about and ultimately gain access to the pure lands and all the blessings of the Buddhas.  Without the spiritual guide appearing in our world, and more specifically in our lives, we would have no idea about the existence of pure worlds, much less the paths for reaching them. 

In Great Treasury of Merit, Geshe-la says:

“It is very important to keep a pure view of our Spiritual Guide’s outer aspect and not to be misled into thinking that just because he appears as an ordinary being he is an ordinary being. We must always remember that his apparent ordinariness is itself a manifestation of his enlightened qualities. If he were to display extraordinary qualities and miracle powers these would not benefit us in the least, but by appearing in a form to which we can relate and giving us unmistaken advice he gives us immeasurable help. Indeed, it is this very ability to appear in an ordinary form while performing the actions of a Buddha that reveals his real miracle powers and skilful means.”

It is also important to remember that the spiritual guide appearing in our life is a dependent-arising.  If we do not create the causes for him to appear in our life, he simply won’t.  There are billions of people on earth who have no idea who Geshe-la is, much less having him appear directly in their lives.  The difference is we have created the karma for him to appear in our lives and others have not.

I once asked Geshe-la, “I realize that if I continue to find you in all of my future lives without interruption, my eventual enlightenment is guaranteed.  Please give me a method to 100% guarantee that I meet you in all of my future lives without interruption.”  He replied, “concentrate on practicing Dharma and always keep faith.”  The Dharma we practice comes from his instructions.  When we put it into practice, we do two things.  First, we create a closer karmic relationship with him because every instruction functions to take us closer to its origin.  Second, we actually mix our mind with his.  His instructions are not separate from his mind but are rather aspects of his mind.  When we put his instructions into practice, we quite literally are bringing his mind into our mind, or more precisely, we are making his mind manifest in our own.  Geshe-la’s answer also says we need to keep faith.  It is not enough to meet him again in our future lives, but we also need to continue to have faith in him.  Keeping faith now creates the tendencies in our mind to continue to have faith in him when we meet him again in our future lives.

But the supreme method for having him appear in our life is to pray for his long life.  Why?  When we pray for his long life, we are requesting him to continue to appear in this world and that he continues to turn the wheel of Dharma for ourselves and all others.  This mental action directly creates the cause for him to appear in our life.  There are two levels at which we can engage in the long-life prayers – for ourselves and for others. 

For ourselves, we can consider without him appearing in our life, we would have no spiritual life at all.  We wish for that to continue and so we pray that he remains in this world forever.  We might think, “Geshe-la is already appearing in my life and he isn’t teaching any more, so it really doesn’t make much difference whether he continues to live a long life – he is not teaching anyways!”  Such a way of thinking is completely wrong.  Many people enter the path, but then their enthusiasm for practicing wanes until eventually what was the passion of their life becomes a hobby and eventually becomes something they did before.  Some people even generate negative minds towards Geshe-la or the NKT and then lose everything.  In this way, he ceases to appear in their lives and they lose all faith.  Sincerely praying for his long life is like a spiritual insurance policy against such an outcome.  Further, even if we continue to have deep faith in him, our praying for him to remain in this world forever creates the causes for him to be reborn in this world and for us to find him again in our future lives so we can pick up where we left off. 

For others, we can think, “it is not enough for him to appear in my life, but he needs to remain forever in this world for the sake of others.”  We have already found him and we know what a difference that has made in our lives, we wish him to continue to appear in this world so he can bring similar benefit to others.  Look at how many hundreds of thousands of people Geshe-la has touched in just his time in the West.  Now imagine him remaining until samsara ends.  As long as he remains in this world, he will tirelessly work to lead others to enter into, progress along, and complete the path to enlightenment.  This is how they can escape their samsaric suffering.  Not only do such prayers help others, but by praying that he appears for them, we also create the karma for him to appear in all of our future lives because whatever we pray for others, we create the causes to obtain also for ourselves. 

I encourage everyone to take advantage of this holy day by engaging sincerely in Geshe-la’s long-life prayers.  If we don’t have them or we don’t know them, we can download them for free.  We can also download for free a special prayer called Request to the Holy Spiritual Guide Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche from his Faithful Disciples that accomplishes similar functions.  What better way to mark his birthday than to pray for him to remain in this world forever turning the Wheel of Dharma?

Appreciating Buddha’s Kindness in Turning the Wheel of Dharma

When Prince Siddhartha left the palace, he promised his parents that he would return to share with them what he learned for how to overcome birth, aging, sickness, and death.  He could have just attained liberation for himself and enjoyed eternal peace, but instead, he decided to attain full enlightenment so he could lead all living beings – including ourselves – to the same state.  In other words, he had us specifically in mind when he attained enlightenment.  He did so for us.  It is for us that he came out of meditative equipoise and began teaching.

If Buddha hadn’t turned the Wheel of Dharma, nobody in this world would have ever even heard of Buddhism, much less had the opportunity to practice it.  How many billions of people over thousands of years have been beneficially touched by his decision to come out of meditation and teach for the rest of us. 

When we consider these things, we need to make it personal.  We need to take the time to imagine what our life would be like if we had never met the Dharma – if Buddha hadn’t turned the Wheel of Dharma.  For me personally, life has been one extremely difficult episode after another, but because I have met the Dharma, I have been able to transform all of these experiences into a rewarding spiritual journey.  When we see how our own lives have been transformed, and how those who are close to us have benefited from our having found the Dharma, we can begin to personally internalize Buddha’s great kindness.  With a feeling of personal appreciation, we can then consider we are just one being, he has done the same for billions.

What does it Mean to Turn the Wheel of Dharma Over Time?

Conventionally speaking, we say there were four turnings of the Wheel of Dharma by Buddha.  As it explains on the Kadampa website: 

“Forty-nine days after Buddha attained enlightenment, as a result of requests he rose from meditation and taught the first Wheel of Dharma. These teachings, which include the Sutra of the Four Noble Truths and other discourses, are the principal source of the Hinayana, or Lesser Vehicle, of Buddhism.  Later, Buddha taught the second and third Wheels of Dharma, which include the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras and the Sutra Discriminating the Intention, respectively. These teachings are the source of the Mahayana, or Great Vehicle, of Buddhism.”

In the Kadampa Play, which takes place at the end of the Summer Festival every year, we are shown that there was a fourth turning of the Wheel of Dharma when Buddha taught the Vajrayana teachings or the Tantric quick path to enlightenment.  These four turnings of the Wheel of Dharma set Buddhism in motion in this world.

But the turning of the Wheel of Dharma is not limited to just Buddha’s lifetime.  We can also understand the turning of the Wheel of Dharma from a most cosmic scale.  Each founder Buddha engages in the Twelve Deeds of a Buddha, from descent from a pure land, through birth, attaining enlightenment, turning the Wheel of Dharma, and eventually dying.  Our world is just one world and Buddha Shakyamuni was just one founder Buddha.  There are countless worlds and countless founder Buddhas doing the same thing.  It is said in this fortunate aeon, there will be 1,000 founder Buddhas who come in cycles to reestablish the Dharma after it fades from the previous founder Buddha.  All of these are different turnings of the Wheel of Dharma.  On this day, we can rejoice in all of this and create literally infinite merit.

Within just this current cycle of the Dharma of Buddha Shakyamuni in this world, we can also identify very clear major re-turnings of the Wheel of Dharma.  These are special times when new energy and new momentum was created to push the Dharma forward into future generations.  For example, Atisha (980-1054 AD) was viewed by many as the Second Buddha, and his teaching of the Lamrim reignited the Dharma in this world by founding the Kadampa tradition.  Later Je Tsongkhapa (1357-1419 AD) united the Dharma of Sutra and Tantra and founded the New Kadampa Tradition.  And most recently, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso (1931 – present) represented the teachings of Je Tsongkhapa for the modern world.  These great masters also engaged in major turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, each in their own way.  And this is just within the Kadampa lineage – there are countless other Buddhist lineages, such as Theravada, Zen, and so forth.  No doubt each of these lineages has its own major turning points.  We can rejoice in all of these major turnings of the Wheel of Dharma.

But the turning of the Wheel of Dharma is not limited to these seminal masters, but to each and every lineage guru along the way.  Since Je Tsongkhapa alone, there has been an unbroken lineage of 37 different lineage gurus, who each kept the lineage alive – turning the Wheel of Dharma for future generations.  Why is lineage important?  Buddha’s blessings only transmit through lived experience, not mere intellectual understanding of his teachings.  A lineage is considered a “living lineage” if there is an unbroken series of gurus who have personally realized all of the teachings of that lineage.  When we are part of a living lineage, the lineage gurus serve as an intact pipeline for the unobstructed flow of blessings from Buddha Shakyamuni straight into our heart.  Through the immeasurable kindness of Venerable Geshe-la, the Kadampa lineage remains intact and alive in this world.  This means we can gain direct access to the lineage blessings of our precious instructions, making realizing them infinitely easier. 

Taking Our Place in the Lineage

It is good to rejoice in all of the past turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, but it is not good enough to stop there.  We ourselves need to realize we have a personal responsibility to carry forward the Kadampa lineage for future generations.  If we do not do so, who will?  If we do not do so, this precious lineage that has been kept alive for thousands of years will die in this world.  It is our personal responsibility to carry this lineage forward.  In short, we must each assume our personal place in the lineage.

Venerable Tharchin said when somebody new comes into the Dharma center, he views them as “a future holder of the lineage,” and cherishes and respects them accordingly.  When we consider the “great wave” of Je Tsongkhapa’s deeds, we realize that his basic strategy for eventually liberating all living beings is to form new spiritual guides, who in turn form the next generation of spiritual guides, and so forth until eventually every living being has been touched by them.  We are currently on the receiving end of Venerable Geshe-la’s turning of the Wheel of Dharma.  But we ourselves need to assume our place in the lineage.

At first, we might think this is not our job – we have Gen-la Dekyong, Gen-la Khyenrab, Gen-la Jampa, and Gen-la Thubten for that.  We are not going to become a lineage guru ourselves, so this doesn’t mean anything for us personally.  We can rejoice in their deeds, but we have no personal responsibility to carry forward the lineage ourselves.  This way of thinking is completely wrong.  Geshe-la said in one of his last teachings before he retired that, “you are all lineage gurus now.”  How can we understand this? 

At one level, we can say even if we are not likely to be a lineage guru in this life (though, we never know…), at some point in our future lives it will be our turn to assume our place in the lineage.  Just as Venerable Tharchin views us, so too we should view ourselves as future holders of the lineage and orient the trajectory of our mental continuum towards assuming that role.  Venerable Tharchin also says we have the ability to design our own enlightenment by virtue of the type of bodhichitta we develop as bodhisattvas.  Why is Avalokiteshvara the Buddha of Compassion and Manjushri the Buddha of Wisdom?  Because as bodhisattvas they generated the specific intention to become that type of Buddha.  I have a dear friend who wants to become a deity in Dorje Shugden’s mandala.  Venerable Tharchin said he wants to be a Buddha specifically capable of helping the beings in the hell realms because that is where most living beings reside.  We should think about what sort of Buddha we want to become, and begin our long march to assuming our place in the lineage with those special abilities.

At another level, we can say we have internalized a degree of the lineage even if we haven’t realized all of it.  Therefore, we do have the ability to pass on what we have personally realized.  Kadam Bjorn said if two teachers gave the exact same teaching – word for word with exactly the same intonation and everything – but one of the teachers had personal experience of their truth and the other did not, the lineage blessings would only flow through the one who had personal experience, and so those listening would receive infinitely more benefit from the teaching.  Ultimately, he said, teachings are only as powerful as the blessings passing through the person delivering it.  How many blessings pass depends primarily upon the pure view of those listening, but also on the degree of personal experience of the person transmitting the wisdom.  We see this same phenomenon in daily life – those who “speak from experience” are so much more powerful than those who do not.  Each one of us has a degree of personal experience, which means we have the ability to pass on at least those portions of the lineage to the next generation.  Passing on the lineage can occur through many forms, not just formal teachings.  Merely setting a good example is a method for passing on the lineage.

At a much deeper level, we can consider a much broader understanding of a Buddha’s body, speech, and mind.  Normally, we think these are limited to the individual human being who was Buddha or to a specific deity or lineage guru.  Geshe-la once said, “I am the NKT.”  His meaning of course is not Louis XIV-style “l’etat c’est moi,” but that his actual body is not just the cute little Tibetan we all know and love, but all of our bodies.  His speech is not just the words that come out of his mouth or written in his books, but all of our Dharma speech in this world.  His mind is not just the thoughts within him, but all of our Dharma thoughts in our minds.  The spiritual guide is so much more vast than one Tibetan monk, but he is working through all of us every day.  He is turning the Wheel of Dharma through our every Dharma action of body, speech, and mind.  When we see our body, speech, and mind as an extension of his in this world, then we can start to see how we are – at this very moment – assuming our place in the lineage.  The closer we draw towards him, the more we emulate him, the more we come into alignment with his enlightened actions in this world.  His impact in turning the Wheel of Dharma depends, fundamentally, on us.  This is why he thanks us every time he sees us and says without us helping him fulfill his vision, he is almost nothing. 

Buddha’s turning the Wheel of Dharma Day is our opportunity to not only celebrate Geshe-la’s birthday, recall Buddha’s kindness, or even that of the lineage gurus, but an opportunity to also see ourselves as an indispensable part of the lineage, and see our spiritual lives as part of the turning of the Wheel of Dharma, not only in this life but for generations to come.  In this way, we ourselves become part of the very Wheel of Dharma the enlightened beings turn. 

Modern Bodhisattva’s Way of Life: We are responsible for everyone’s happiness

Kadampa Ryan 2. Modern Bodhisattva's Way of Life

In the last several posts, I explained what Shantideva means by exchanging self with others – namely, imputing our “self” onto others, and “others” onto our old self.  With this background, we can now start looking at the actual practice of exchanging self with others. 

(8.89) Thus, having contemplated
The good qualities of solitude,
I should completely pacify all disturbing conceptions
And meditate on bodhichitta.

(8.90) First, I should apply myself to meditation
On the equality of self and others.
Because we are all equal in wanting to experience happiness and avoid suffering,
I should cherish all beings as I do myself.

(8.91) Although there are many different parts of the body, such as the arms and the legs,
We protect all these parts as equally as we protect the body itself.
In a similar way, although there are many different living beings,
I should cherish them all as equally as I cherish myself.

Why should I cherish others, protect others from their suffering just as I cherish myself?  We are not affected by others’ suffering in the same way that we are presently affected by our own suffering.  Because we are not affected by the suffering of others, we have no strong wish to alleviate the suffering of others.  We are deeply affected by our own suffering, and at all times we have a strong wish to alleviate it.  We consider their suffering to be theirs, not our own. We can even think that the problem is their own and it is not mine. How many times, even now, do we think when someone is experiencing a problem, it is their problem?  

From a conventional perspective, this is completely true and frankly important to keep in mind.  Each being is responsible for their own experience in life, and we each need to assume responsibility for our own suffering.  Conventionally, it is correct to say their problem is not “our problem.”  Our problem is the deluded mental reaction we have to their suffering.  Perhaps we do not care.  Perhaps we are attached to them not suffering and averse to their suffering.  Attachment to others not suffering and compassion are quite similar in many respects.  But if we have the former, we will be crushed by the suffering of others; if we have the latter, we will quickly be propelled to enlightenment.  Thinking we are responsible for others well-being and it is our fault if they suffer can quickly lead to all sorts of co-dependency issues which actually disempower others to assume responsibility for themselves.  If they don’t assume responsibility for themselves and start creating the karma that will lead them to enlightenment, from their perspective, it will never come. 

But let’s set aside all of that and look at things from the perspective of emptiness.  What difference would it make anyway simply wishing to alleviate the suffering of others?  When we think of all the suffering in the world, how many people in this world suffer, what difference would it make merely wishing to alleviate the suffering of others, all others? Wishing to alleviate does not alleviate their suffering, does it?  In Eight Steps to Happiness, Venerable Geshe-la says compassion – the wish to alleviate the suffering of others – purifies our mind, and when our mind is pure, its objects also become pure.   When our mind is pure, its objects become pure. What happens then to deluded suffering beings?

From the perspective of ultimate truth, the problem is definitely ours.  We think the problem is theirs, not mine – no, the problem is mine.  If suffering living beings had no relationship with us whatsoever, then there would be nothing that we could do to help them. Nothing. Even if we possessed a pure compassion, it would make no difference. There would be nothing we could do to help.  Shantideva is explaining here that the parts of our body are not separate from or unrelated to the body itself. They have a definite relationship with the body.  So too, there is a relationship between living beings who are suffering, other living beings who are suffering, and we ourselves who are suffering.  The relationship between other living beings who are suffering and we ourselves who are suffering is clear – we are all part of the body of suffering living beings.

There exists suffering in this world. Venerable Geshe-la says again and again this is a world of suffering?  This world is a subjective world. A suffering world does not exist as an objective truth for anyone. For everyone, a suffering world is a subjective world.  It is as Geshe-la says in Eight Steps to Happiness, it is a personal world. The world in which we live is our own personal world.  Other than people’s personal world, there is no other world existing as an objective truth. Other than the personal world, there is no other world.  Our world is a world in which people suffer. Our own subjective world, our own personal world, is a world in which people suffer.  People who are part of our world suffer. Those people, those suffering living beings are part of our world, are they not? They are part of our own subjective or personal world.  From the perspective of ultimate truth, how can we say then that these people, these other suffering people, have nothing to do with me? How can we say that these people and their suffering are unrelated to me?

In truth, it is because we believe that living beings and their suffering has nothing to do with us – that their suffering is entirely unrelated – that we suffer.  Grasping at this wrong belief is why we live in a suffering world.  This is why we suffer and why we live in a world of suffering.  If we understand and gain experience of this training of equalizing and exchanging self with others, we can develop such a special profound love for others as well as wisdom of dependent relationship.

Reflections on my years in Shenyang

Kadampa Ryan 1. Reflections on doing this website/blog, 4. Practicing in Daily Life

Hello all,

At the end of each tour of my work, I update the page “my journey so far.”

I’m now at the end of my two-year tour in Shenyang, China near the North Korean border.  What a wild two years it has been, but incredibly spiritually fruitful.  In many ways, I feel like the last two years have been a major turning point in my professional, family, and spiritual life.  These last two years marked the final chapters of a major book in my life.  I’m now ready to begin the next book, which will likely last the next ten years.

If you’d like to read more, click here. It tells my whole story, including the latest additions from the last two years.

Ryan

Happy Protector Day: The nature and function of Dorje Shugden

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

The 29th of every month is Protector Day.  This is part 5 of a 12-part series aimed at helping us remember our Dharma Protector Dorje Shugden and increase our faith in him on these special days.

In this post, I will explain the nature and function of Dorje Shugden.  In the subsequent posts I will explain how to rely upon him outside of formal meditation and then I will explain how to rely upon him during the formal meditation session. 

What is the nature and function of Dorje Shugden?  In short, his nature is the same as our Spiritual Guide, but in particular he is by nature the Wisdom Buddha Manjushri.  Manjushri assumes two forms, Je Tsongkhapa to lead us along the path and Dorje Shugden to arrange the conditions for our practice of the path.  His function is to arrange all the outer, inner and secret conditions necessary for our swiftest possible enlightenment.

To understand this in more detail, we can consider the meaning of the invitation prayer to Dorje Shugden that we recite every day in the context of our Heart Jewel practice.  The Sadhana beings by saying,

HUM, I have the clarity of the Yidam.

With HUM we dissolve everything into the clear light Dharmakaya and recall that the definitive nature of Dorje Shugden is the Truth Body of our Spiritual Guide.  ‘I have the clarity of the Yidam’ means we engage in our Dorje Shugden practice self-generated as our personal deity.  We do this for two reasons.  First, it is more effective.  Heruka is much closer to Dorje Shugden than we are, so by requesting Dorje Shugden as Heruka we tap into their close karmic connection.  It is similar to knowing somebody who knows somebody very powerful.  We may not know the powerful person ourselves, but if we know somebody who does know them, if they ask the powerful person to fulfill our wishes on our behalf, it is far more likely we will get the response we want.  The second reason why we do this is the practice of Dorje Shugden can be engaged in for the sake of ourself or for the sake of others.  When we eventually become Buddha Heruka our work is not finished – we will still need to lead all other beings to enlightenment.  At that time, we will need powerful allies who can help living beings, such as Dorje Shugden.  Training in the practice of Dorje Shugden while maintaining divine pride of being the deity is a very powerful method for having Dorje Shugden accomplish his function for all those that we love.

Before me in the center of red and black fire and wind.

Here, we imagine that encircling all the living beings we are visualizing around us is a large proection circle of Dorje Shugden made out of five-colored wisdom fires.  It is like a giant sphere which completely envelopes all of these beings and the entire universe.  I like to imagine that all living beings are now inside of the protection circle and everything that happens to them is perfect for their swiftest possible enlightenment. 

On a lotus and sun trampeling demons and obstructors is a terrifying lion powerful and alert.

The function of Dorje Shugden’s lion is to dispel all fear.  It is a bit like in the movie Narnia, when people were in the presence of Aslan, they knew they were safe and they had nothing to fear.  If ever we are in a situation where we are afraid, we can remember the protection circle of Dorje Shugden and we can remember his lion and strongly believe that we are protected and that we receive his blessings which pacify all of our fear. 

Upon this sits the Great King Dorje Shugden, the supreme heart jewel of Dharma protectors.

Dorje Shugden is the principal deity of the visualization.  There are a couple of different analogies we can consider to get a feeling for who he is.  He is our karma manager.  Rich people give their money to money managers to manage their money in an optimal way.  In the same way, Dorje Shugden is the supreme karma manager.  He will manage our karma in an optimal way for our swiftest possible enlightenment.  He is also our personal spiritual trainer.  When people want to get their bodies in shape, they go to a personal physical trainer who gives them the specific exercises they need to get in the peak of physical health.  In the same way, Dorje Shugden is our personal spiritual trainer who gives us the specific exercises we need to put ourselves in the peak of spiritual health, full enlightenment.  He is our spiritual father.  Our father protects us from danger and provides us with everything we need.  In the same way, Dorje Shugden is our spiritual father, who will protect us from all danger and provide for us everything we need to accomplish our spiritual goals.  He is the director of our spiritual life.  When people make movies or plays, there is a director who organizes and puts together all the appearances.  In the same way, Dorje Shugden is the director of our spiritual life, who will create a play of appearances around us for the rest of our life that are perfect for our spiritual path.  In a future post, I will explain how he has the power to help us not just in this life and right now, but in all our past and future lives as well.  Yes, we can go back within our past and transform what happened into a cause of our enlightenment!

His body is clothed in the garments of a monk.

This symbolizes his power to assist us with our practice of moral discipline.  We all have bad habits we are trying to abandon, such as smoking, getting angry at people, and so forth; and vows we are trying to keep, such as our refuge, pratimoksha, bodhisattva, and tantric vows, but we are not very successful in doing so.  Dorje Shugden can give us the strength and wisdom we need to abandon these bad habits.  Whenever we feel tempted to break our moral discipline, we can recall Dorje Shugden in front of us dressed in the garments of a monk and request his special blessings to give us the strength to keep our moral discipline. 

Modern Bodhisattva’s Way of Life: The mind that takes us to enlightenment

Kadampa Ryan 2. Modern Bodhisattva's Way of Life

If we exchange self with others in the way Shantideva explains, several things will happen.  We will close the gaps between ourselves and others.  We know that is what people want in their heart, it’s what they need, actually – to remove all the gaps.  If they can give and receive love then they will come to know themselves.  Then that fear of separation will go, the attachment will go, and as the love grows, pure love grows, they will feel more and more close not just to one person, to two people, but to everybody.

In this way, we are able to show the inner aspects of being a Kadampa.  It is our inner aspect of pure love that draws others to us.  Then, people will be drawn very much into the Buddhadharma so that they too can learn to give love and to receive love without any sense of separation with others.  It is so unusual for people to be able to receive pure love from somebody else.  A genuine selfless, unconditional, inseparable love is so unusual in this world, but actually receiving such love is even more rare still.  We can do that.  We can be that beacon of love in the life of others.  And then really things can take off for them, can’t they?  If they feel that they can receive our unconditional love.

Kadam Bjorn said the way we really feel the love of our spiritual guide for us is by turning around and loving others as he loves us.  Then, his love not only pours into us, but through us to others.  We become a conduit for his love into our own karmic world.  Once people get pulled into the orbit of this, they never want to leave.  Indeed, they want to learn how to do it themselves.  On the basis of such a foundation, we can really then set an example that inspires others to enter the Buddhadharma. And that attraction comes from how we are.  Geshe-la describes in Eight Steps to Happiness that we transform ourselves into a magic crystal that has the power to gradually purify the whole world, indeed the entire universe. Finally, that separation between themselves and the whole universe will disappear, and they will experience the purest, the purest kind of happiness imaginable. Wonderful.

The mind that wants to be with all beings all the time will take us to enlightenment.  This wish to be with and cherish others all the time is a mind that will take us all the way to enlightenment.  The wish to be with others all the time is a mind that wishes to be with them so we can love and care for them.  For us, we find our happiness in the action of loving them.  The more we love them, the more our mind is virtuous and the happier we are.  Our goal is to love them more and more, deeper and deeper, until our love is brought to full fruition.  This wish to be with others all the time is informed by a wisdom of how it is possible.  As Venerable Tharchin explains, when we see how the path is doable, effort becomes effortless.  This joyful mind of love will take us all the way to enlightenment. 

Very often when we are busy and feeling overwhelmed and over-worked, when people come to us asking for help, we think “oh no, not another demand on my time.”  We wish they wouldn’t ask.  We wish they could take care of themselves.  They are just adding one more burden onto us, and we wish we didn’t have to help.  This is exactly wrong, and a missed opportunity.  The correct mind should be, “I would want to help you, I would want to be there for you, but unfortunately I can’t right now.”  But inside we think the reason why we can’t is because we are not yet a Buddha.  This wanting to be there for others combined with a realization of why we can’t be there with them then is just a whisker away from the precious mind of bodhichitta.  We then think, I must become a Buddha so that I can be with you all the time, so that I can love you all the time.  Therefore, I will train in the stages of the path to be able to do so.

Shantideva’s explanation of exchanging self with others in Chapter 8 of his Guide is not just to help us generate the precious mind of bodhichitta, but because this explanation creates the perfect mental environment for being able to meditate on emptiness in Chapter 9.  His presentation of exchanging self with others completely breaks down our conception of self, and helps lay the foundation for viewing everything validly as part of ourselves.  This is like shattering the concrete of our ignorance before removing it completely with the wisdom realizing emptiness. 

Happy Tsog Day: The benefits of cherishing others

Kadampa Ryan Tsog Days

In order to remember and mark our tsog days, holy days on the Kadampa calendar, I am sharing my understanding of the practice of Offering to the Spiritual Guide with tsog.  This is part 30 of a 44-part series.

Seeing that the mind that cherishes mother beings and would secure their happiness
Is the gateway that leads to infinite good qualities,
I seek your blessings to cherish these beings more than my life,
Even if they rise up against me as my enemies.

Just as self-cherishing is the root cause of all our suffering, the mind that cherishes others is the root cause of all our happiness. The logic is exactly the same. All our happiness comes from virtuous actions, and all virtuous actions come from the mind that cherishes other living beings and considers their happiness to be important. All virtuous actions begin by considering that others’ happiness and well-being matters, and therefore works to secure it.

Just as we need to gather all blame into one, so two we need to give all credit to one – namely the mind of cherishing others. Geshe-la explains in Eight Steps to Happiness that the path to enlightenment is very simple: all we need to do is change the object of our cherishing from ourselves to others, and all the other stages of the path to enlightenment will naturally flow from this. Enlightenment depends upon the mind of bodhicitta, the wish to become a Buddha for the sake of others. Bodhicitta depends upon the mind of great compassion, which wishes to protect all living beings from all forms of suffering for all their lives. The mind of great compassion only arises when we consider the suffering of those we love. If we do not love somebody, and we consider their suffering, we do not feel any compassion and we may even feel delight. But when we love somebody, and we see that they are suffering, the mind of compassion naturally arises. There are three types of love: affectionate love, cherishing love, and wishing love. Affectionate love is delighted merely to think or see other living beings, like a loving grandmother seeing her grandchildren. Cherishing love considers the happiness and well-being of others to be important to us, something worth working towards. Wishing love aims to give others happiness. The mind of great compassion depends upon having cherishing love for all living beings. Thus, enlightenment naturally follows simply from the mind that cherishes others.

How do we generate the mind of cherishing others? In this verse and in Eight Steps to Happiness, Geshe-la explains it is sufficient to simply contemplate the benefits of cherishing others and then make the firm determination to do so. We can likewise consider the analogy of viewing all living beings as the body of life. Of course we should cherish every part of our body because it is part of our body; in the same way, of course we should cherish all living beings because they are all part of the body of life. Atisha explains in Advice from Atisha’s Heart that the actual root of cherishing others is learning to appreciate their good qualities and to stop inappropriate attention on their faults. Because we focus on others’ faults, we generate aversion and even hatred towards others, and with such a focus it is impossible to generate the mind that considers what happens to them to be important. But when we focus our attention on the good qualities of others and choose to not pay attention to their faults, then we naturally start to see them as precious and, on this basis, it is easy to then cherish them.

We might object, “but if I do not see their faults then I am not seeing things objectively and they could even harm me.” This is a wrong conclusion. First, there is a difference between not seeing others’ faults and having inappropriate attention towards their faults. Inappropriate attention exaggerates the appearance of faults, and therefore is a mind that is not objective. Second, we need to make a distinction between the person and their delusions. The person is not their delusions, rather their delusions are like clouds in the sky of their mind. Because we make a distinction between the person and their faults, we are able to see the faults for what they are, but not see them as faults of the person and therefore still be able to cherish them. Third, when we see others’ faults and relate to them as faulty, it functions to draw out their worst aspects and it creates self-fulfilling prophecies. Every teacher and every parent can confirm whatever we pay attention to is what we draw out in others. Thus, even if they have faults, it is better for us to focus on their good qualities to help draw them out. Fourth, Venerable Tharchin explains that any fault we see in others is in fact a reflection of that same fault within our own mind. It is only because we have that fault in our mind that we can perceive it in others. This is true because others are fundamentally empty – they are mere projections or reflections of our own mind. Thus, when we see faults in others, we should see them as a mirror reflecting back to us faults that we have within ourselves. He goes on to explain that if we eliminate the fault within our self, it will begin to disappear in others almost like magic. Finally, we can view the appearance of faults in others as a supremely skillful teaching of an emanation of our spiritual guide. Buddhas can emanate all sorts of forms to reveal to us the truth of Dharma. People behaving in faulty ways teaches us to not act in those ways, and therefore they provide us with powerful teachings. Who is to say they are not emanations of Buddha teaching us these lessons? Even if that is not in fact the case, it is still a beneficial way of viewing things, and so we can still perceive the fault, defend ourselves against it, and nonetheless not see any fault in others.

In the sadhana it says that we should cherish others even if they rise up against us as our enemies. There are several reasons for this. First, by cherishing them despite them harming us we are able to purify the negative karma associated with them harming us in some way. If instead we retaliated, we would create once again new negative karma ensuring that others harm us again in the future. Cherishing those who harm us is therefore a way of ending the karmic cycles that we have been trapped in since beginning last time. This is not different than what Jesus advised to turn the other cheek.

Second, Geshe-la once famously explained in Toronto that love is the real nuclear bomb that destroys all enemies. If we cherish our enemies, they will come to view us as their friends, and therefore no longer view us as their enemy. Yes, this process may take time before we bring about a change in their perspective of us, but if we are patient with the process and willing to accept the karmic consequences of our past behavior of viewing them as an enemy, gradually we will turn our relationship around with them. We should be careful though to not misinterpret this to mean that we should cooperate with others’ dysfunctional or abusive behavior. It does not help others for us to enable them and allow them to engage in abuse towards us. Therefore, it can be an act of cherishing others to no longer cooperate with their delusions.

Third, others are only our enemies by mere imputation. If we viewed others as emanations of our spiritual guide, for example, then they would no longer be our enemy, but instead we would see them as our kind teacher. Atisha once had a cook who was very disrespectful towards Atisha. Atisha’s other disciples wondered why Atisha keep kept this cook around when there were so many other disciples who would be more than happy to serve their spiritual guide. Atisha said this disrespectful assistant was in fact very kind to him because this person gave him the opportunity to train in patience, and there’s no virtue greater than patience.