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The wisdom of kindness

by VASANA CHINVARAKORN, Bangkok Post, Jan 28, 2007

 

Despite spending most of her life pursuing enlightenment, Ani Tenzin Palmo, one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist nun, gives remarkably straightforward advice

Bangkok, Thailand -- This scene could be a projection of the mind - a cut from an on-going movie that has been recycled again and again. But to have Ani Tenzin Palmo playing a role in it, with an immaculately clean kitchen filled with nuns and lay women at Suan Mokkh forest monastery as the setting, makes this a scenario no film director could have conceived or even dreamed of.

<< Tenzin Palmo

And yet here she is, sitting snugly on a plastic chair, chatting, gesturing and laughing her hearty, joyous laugh.

Although there are differences in language and robe colour of the "cast", the 63-year-old Tibetan Buddhist nun seems to be mingling well with her new Thai friends. This is not surprising given these friends share Tenzin Palmo's gender and, more importantly, her aspiration to attain enlightenment - if not in this lifetime then in one of the numerous sequels they believe are likely follow.

That's exactly the message that the venerable bhikkuni (female monk) repeated throughout her recent whirl-wind tour of Thailand. "Don't waste your time," she urged the different groups she spoke to, be they Thais or foreigners meditating at Suan Mokkh, business people in Bangkok, Mae Chi students at Mahapajapati Buddhist College for nuns in Nakhon Ratchasima or the general public at retreats held in Nakhon Nayok and Chiang Mai. To all she stressed the importance of nurturing a constant state of mindfulness.

"Don't waste your human birth, for if you do, the opportunity may not come again for many, many lifetimes.

"When I discovered the Buddha-dharma through a course [which was] actually on Thai Buddhism, when I was 18, I recognised immediately that this is the only thing in the world that is important. Therefore, I decided I should try to lead a life that would not distract me from the main point of Buddha-dharma: To attain enlightenment as much as one can in one's lifetime in order to benefit others, because what else could matter?"

Tenzin Palmo has lived her life in pursuit of what she now teaches. In 1964, aged 20, she left her home in London to undertake a spiritual journey in India. A year later, shortly after meeting her Tibetan guru, the late eighth Khamtrul Rinpoche, Tenzin Palmo was ordained as a novice. (She received full bhikkuni ordination in 1973.) In the following years she diligently studied both Tibetan Buddhist philosophy and the myriad rituals and meditation techniques of Vajrayana Buddhism. At one time, she was the only nun practicing at a temple of 100 monks.

Her journey has been far from easy. Cave in the Snow, Tenzin Palmo's biography, written by journalist Vicki Mackenzie, details the patriarchal atmosphere within the Tibetan monastic community (a situation found in many Buddhist countries). In 1970, she received permission from her guru to move to another temple in the Himalayan valley of Lahaul.

After spending six years at that snow-bound land, Tenzin Palmo took a radical step on her quest for enlightenment: She began a solitary retreat in a cave 4,000 metres above sea level. For 12 years, the final three in strict isolation, she led a rugged, precarious existence surviving on basic foods in the sparsest conditions while enduring the extreme weather of the Himalayas.

Now, in the dimmed light of the kitchen at Suan Mokkh, such a legendary feat seems a lifetime away. But is it really? The topics of Tenzin Palmo's chats with the nuns and upasikas (lay practitioners) here range from Hollywood movies like Groundhog Day (she thinks it's a very Buddhist film) and The Matrix (much too violent), to how to achieve a balance between spiritual retreats and community work and whether living in a cave really helps get rid of one's ego.

Tenzin Palmo's serene, light-hearted persona belies her incredible internal strength. Despite her frail health and the packed schedule of her recent visit - almost every day she had to travel, give dharma lectures and answer difficult questions on spirituality - Tenzin Palmo maintains her lucid sharpness. And her immense kindness also. Every now and then, when she senses anguish or a need for solace, she approaches one of the women she's chatting with and gives them a bear hug. This motherly embrace is the manifestation of kalayanamitta (true friendship).

"That's why you need a female monk," she says after hugging a woman in tears. "Because [male] monks can't do that."

In serenity there is liveliness - Tibetan    >>
Buddhist nun Tenzin Palmo stresses that the true, original nature of the mind is `luminous, vast and cognitive'. The realisation of this truth, she says, will enlighten one to the interconnectedness of life and to the value of putting others before oneself.

This casual giving of love is mixed with an indescribable sense of non-attachment, an awareness of space that enables Tenzin Palmo to accommodate others but never cling to them. During her lecture at Suan Mokkh (where she was offered the prestigious speaker's seat once occupied by the monastery's late founder, Buddhadasa Bhikkhu), Tenzin Palmo told a story about her mother's love as an example of a love that does not bind.

"When I was 19 years old, I wanted to go to India to find a spiritual teacher. Finally, I got an invitation letter. I remember running along the road to meet my mother as she was coming from work and saying to her 'I'm going to India!' And she replied 'Oh yes dear, when are you leaving?' Because she loved me, she was happy for me to leave her."

She went on to explain the moral of the story. "We mistake love and attachment. We think they are the same thing, but actually, they are opposites. Love is 'I want you to be happy.' Attachment is 'I want you to make me happy."'

Tenzin Palmo's dharma talks are simple yet moving because every word she says is tinged with sincerity. As she speaks, her words seem to spring from within through a process as natural as breathing. In a way she is like a tree, sucking in pollution and harm and releasing it as positive energy.

How does she maintain this crisp state of awareness? To be "in" but not "of" the world? One analogy Tenzin Palmo often uses is to compare one's existence to a movie. Most people let themselves become completely immersed in the drama that is their life. But if you take a step back, you can see a completely different picture.

"What you've got, really, is just a projector of light and in front of that light are little transparent frames that are moving very, very fast. And that projects what looks like reality. When we see that it's just a movie, we can still enjoy it, but we don't have to take it so seriously."

The cultivation of mindfulness, she says, can enable us to see "through" the rapid movement of those "frames of thought". Once we master this practice, the "mind moments" will become remarkably slower, slow enough for us to catch the gaps between each frame.

And what lies beneath the illusory "truth" of the mind? Tenzin Palmo describes the presence of the true, original mind ("Buddha nature") as the sky stripped of clouds or a mirror without dirt. Something clear, luminous, and infinite. "It's always there, it belongs to everybody. There is no 'I', no centre."

But for most of us most of the time, we are trapped in our relative mind. A mind that "naturally makes a division between the thinker and everyone outside the thinker. That thinks in terms of past, present and future.

"The point is to get some glimpses of the clear blue sky behind the clouds or the mirror beneath the dirt. So even though there's thick layers of clouds or dirt, you know that it's not the real thing and that there's something beyond that.

"When we are completely in this state of naked primordial awareness all the time, 24 hours a day, whether we are awake or asleep, we become Buddha. Until then, we are still on the path."

But do we all have to cocoon ourselves in a cave in order to seek enlightenment? From her experience, Tenzin Palmo describes intense solitary retreat as a "a pressure cooker. It gives you the chance to really look inwards." But, if the practitioner becomes addicted to the quiet atmosphere or thinks they have become superior to others, then "the practice has gone wrong", she says.

For Tenzin Palmo, true dharma is found in daily life. It is the ability to "be here and now and put others before oneself. This helps us to overcome our innate selfishness and our innate concern with only me, me, me."

One story she often shares tells of an invaluable piece of advice she received from a Catholic priest. Asked if he thought Tenzin Palmo should resume her retreat or undertake the far more formidable task of starting a nunnery , the priest straight away recommended the second option.

"He said we are like rough pieces of wood. If we rub ourselves with silk or velvet, it may be nice, but it won't make us smooth. To become smooth, we need sandpaper."

Minutes pass into hours. At some point, Tenzin Palmo closed her eyes while still sitting in the same plastic chair. It has been an exhaustingly long day for her. But is the venerable monk sleeping? Or is she meditating like she did for most of her time in the mountains 20 years ago? The two frames of possibility almost merge, almost transcend the boundaries of space and time. Which is real? And which is just a projection from the perpetually rolling film of the mind?

DISCOVERING OUR TRUE BUDDHA NATURE

VENERABLE TENZIN PALMO'S TEACHINGS DISCOVERING OUR TRUE BUDDHA NATURE

(Part 1)Edited Dharma talk given by Ani Tenzin PalmoCambridge Zen Center, Cambridge, U.S.A., 1st June, 1997

We own our Minds As I'm sure you know the essence of the Buddhist path is mind training, which in the West is known as meditation.  In the Buddhadharma it takes the central place, everything else revolves around it.  And this is as it should be because in one way the mind is the only thing we have.  Apart from it, we cannot experience anything either within ourselves or without.  If the consciousness goes, we're like a log, we're just a corpse, or a vegetable if our heart is still beating.The essential problem in our lives is our own Minds.It is very important to appreciate that the essential problem in our lives is our own minds.  As long as we are always blaming things on the outside - our upbringing and our parents, our environment, our workplace, our spouse, or the district or the country or the world, or Samsara, we will always be going outwards, trying to mend little bits here and there, applying stickers and Band-Aids over our problems.  But the basic dissatisfaction, the basic problems, don't go away no matter how hard we try.We try so hard to arrange things on the outside, so that they fit in with our ideas of what would make us happy and content.  But it doesn't work.  We are like that proverbial rodent on the wheel, just going round and round and round, exhausting ourselves and going nowhere.  Sooner or later we realize this.  Then we start looking for answers to our problems.  Why are we dissatisfied?  Why are we not happy?  That is when people begin to turn inward and look for an inner answer to their problems.  As soon as we do this, as soon as we turn our attention away from all the external problems and turn it into ourselves and see that basically our problems stem from our own responses to life, then we should feel enormous relief.  After all, if all the problems come from the outside, or if all the problems stem from our infancy, which, after all, is gone and irrevocable, then there's not much hope.  But if the real answer lies in the present, right now, within us, then there's enormous hope.  Therefore Dharma practitioners should always be very joyful and not look so solemn!We need to tame and cultivate our own minds.Shantideva, an Indian scholar and practitioner of the 7th century, points out that the world is covered with thorns and thistles and stones and pebbles and that if we walk barefoot across that kind of path, we will always be stubbing our toes and hurting ourselves.  So what are we going to do?  Are we going to carpet the earth?  That's not possible.  But if we take just two pieces of leather and put them under our feet as sandals, or shoes then we can walk anywhere and we are protected.  But like trying to carpet the earth, if we try to make the whole world, our entire external environment, perfect and smooth and without conflict, we'll find that's impossible too.  We are always going to meet people who annoy us.  We are always going to meet situations that don't come up to our expectations.  This is the way things are.  And if we hope that we can somehow create an external environment which will always come up to our expectations, then we are always going to be sadly disappointed.  But we don't need to do that because if we learn how to tame and cultivate our own mind, then we can deal with everything outside.We can change Ourselves!This is wonderfully good news because we do own our minds.  We cannot always change the external environment.  We certainly cannot change many or most of the people we encounter.  But we can change ourselves and once we are changed, everything changes.  Things are still going to happen to us that we can't prevent, but how we respond to those situations that we can deal with will then profoundly influence the results of whatever situation we are in.  This is so important because how we respond to situations will not only change those situations but also create our future.  Our lives are basically in our own hands.  We have so much responsibility but this is a wonderful thing - our life in our own hands.  We don't have to give it away to anyone else.  We don't have to blame anyone else.  We don't have to blame ourselves either.  How we respond moment to moment to moment creates our life for us.  This is why different people meeting with very much the same kind of situation react differently - some are broken, some are exalted.  Same situation, different mindset.

VENERABLE TENZIN PALMO'S TEACHINGSDISCOVERING OUR TRUE BUDDHA NATURE

(Part 2 of 3)Edited Dharma talk given by Ani Tenzin PalmoCambridge Zen Center, Cambridge, U.S.A., 1st June, 1997

Our Untamed Mind is Causing us MiserySo the Buddhadharma says that all things are mind. What it means by this is not that there is no external reality, but that we cannot know that external reality except through our minds. Even our senses - our eyes, our nose, our ears, our taste, and our touch - are conditioned by our human body. Everything that we see is only how it is brought into us through our senses and then interpreted to us by our minds. Beyond that we cannot know anything. Even modem physics says that everything that appears so extremely solid is really mostly space with just a few little atoms whirling around in it. In just one cell, the distance between the nucleus and the rest of the neutrons and electrons moving around is the same as the distance between the planets and the stars - a vast amount of space with very, very little in it. Yet to us things are very solid. If I hit somebody with something, that person would certainly feel it. So it's not that it's all our illusion on that level. Nevertheless, how something is and how it appears to us are two different things. Therefore we should learn not to take things so concretely.We tend to think everything is so real. The people that we meet also seem so real. We ourselves are so real, and along with that, our thoughts and our emotions are so real. They seem so solid. So when we think something, when we have an idea, we absolutely believe it. We think that it is really true because it's what we believe. It doesn't matter that everyone else is telling us we're crazy. I know because this is my thought. The same is so with our emotions. We believe so deeply in our happiness, our sorrows, our anger, our greed, our jealousies, and our joys. We think they are really true. When we're down, we're down, and we're going to be down forever. When we're up, we're up and that's it - we're never coming down again. We're completely encased in our thoughts and our emotions. It's as though there's no distance, as though we're completely suffocated. It's like being in the middle of a big ocean and the waves rolling over us are our emotions, our thoughts and our beliefs. And there's no separation. This is me. That's why people are suffering. Even when we remember something that happened when we were children and caused us a lot of distress, we totally identify with it - even to the present day. We cannot drop it. We think this is me, this is who I am. And it causes us so much grief. Presumably many of you have realized this and that is why you are all sitting here now because we realize that the mind, untamed and untrained, is causing at least 98 percent of our misery. We'll give a little two percent to the external environment but if our minds were really together, we would be able to deal with that too.How much Attention do we Give our Minds?When we look at our mind, what do we have? Usually it's utter chaos. We all sit here looking very much like a lot of Arahats and Bodhisattvas but I wonder, if we had a microphone attached and everybody could hear through a loudspeaker what we were thinking, wouldn't it be a revelation? And wouldn't we have an incentive to train our minds?So the problem is that we give so much time and attention in our culture to taking care of our bodies, to training them, to making sure we're very healthy and that we eat the right kinds of food and keep ourselves clean and decently dressed. Of course, in itself it's important but how much attention do we give to the mind? How much exercise do we do for the mind? How much cleansing? Do we adorn the mind with beautiful thoughts? If we could open up our mind, would it look like a beautiful palace or temple, or would it look like a junk heap? Only each one of us can know how it is. And if we wouldn't want to live in a garbage site, we should realize that as long as our minds are untrained, that is exactly where we are living because the closest thing we have, the only place where we can actually live, is within our mind. That's our home. It doesn't matter if you're living here in Cambridge or if you go to India or Korea or Japan or wherever. It doesn't matter what external environment you have, the one thing you take with you is your mind. How much attention do we give to that?Integrate Practice into our Daily LivesSo, then, you come here and you sit. And while you are sitting you are able to see what is going on inside. Most people don't even have a clue what is going on. They've never even asked. So already you have a wonderful advantage in that you at least have the desire to look inside, because that's the last place most people would want to look. So I congratulate you on that. However, as I'm sure you're all very aware, merely coming together every day to sit is not enough. It's not enough because the Buddhist path is a path of transformation. It's about taking our untamed, unenlightened minds and turning them into our genuine Buddha nature. There are many other things that need to be done in order to create this inner transformation. Now, there are many, many things one could say about this but I'll limit myself to two main points. One is that it is essential to have a practice that completely integrates one's sitting and one's everyday life.One of the things which is extremely admirable about the Zen tradition - one among many things - is that it has this appreciation that everyday life is practice. This is so important, to realize that every single action we do throughout the day, if done in a state of presence, of really being totally with the action in the moment, being completely aware in a non-conceptual presence, is the essence of the practice. Therefore, whatever one is doing, if one does it with this non-conceptual awareness, it is the same as if one is sitting in meditation.Be Aware of the Presence of our MindsThe essence of the practice is to develop a mind which is totally present, totally vast, spacious and conscious, instead of our ordinary, untrained mind, which is just chatter, chatter, chatter. Unless you are really very well trained, normally what happens is that when you are doing one thing you are thinking about a hundred other things. The one thing you are usually not thinking about is what you are really doing. This is why people always have this sense of frustration about the state that they can get into while they're sitting and then their everyday life. Sometimes the deeper the practice of sitting, the further one seems to be from the practice of our everyday consciousness. The only way to link the two is by carrying, as much as possible, that sense of presence into everything we do.This kind of presence does not need to be very tight and narrow. There are times when our attention needs to be one-pointed. When one is driving, for example, one has to concentrate to a certain extent on what one is doing. When one is doing anything very, very precise - for example, a surgeon who is operating - one needs to be very, very one-pointed. The surgeon does not need at the point of operating to have a very panoramic awareness. Nonetheless, for much of the time, it is important to know how to develop this very spacious mind - not a tight, hard kind of mind which at the end of the day would lead one to feel completely exhausted, but a mind which is very open but completely aware, completely poised and attentive. It looks very casual, very relaxed even, but it's very precise.I think it was Suzuki Roshi who said that the way to control your cow is to give it a vast pasture You don't have to put a rope on it and tether it with about two feet of space. Give it a wide pasture and why would it go? Likewise, if we try to keep the mind too tight it's going to rebel or get exhausted and stressed. But if we allow our mind to become very vast but we are nonetheless aware of what the mind is doing in any moment, then the mind becomes naturally relaxed and quiet. It quietens down, but we are present with what we are doing in the moment.The example that comes to mind about this is the following. When I was living in India, I lived up in the Himalayas at about 12,0000 feet in a small cave. In the summertime, sometimes a shepherd would go by with his flocks. He would just go by, there was a meadow below the cave. One day a teenaged boy came up. He had obviously never been with the sheep before so he was terrified of losing even a single one, especially the goats, which were always running off. He was very, very nervous. He knew that if he lost any sheep he'd get a big beating when he got back, so he was keeping them tightly together in the flock. All day long, whenever I looked out, he was sending them over here and he was sending them over there, keeping them very tightly together, with the result that at the end of the day the sheep were extremely nervous. They hadn't really had anything to eat and the boy was completely exhausted. The next day the regular shepherd came back up. He was an old guy and he did what he always did which was to take the sheep down to the meadow, leave them alone, go and sit up on the little hillock, lie out there with his bottle of beer, and just watch them. So, of course, the sheep wandered about and there was plenty to eat, so they ate. Then, after a while, they just sat down. The shepherd spent the whole day just watching them, keeping an eye on them. At the end of the day he rounded them up and took them back down and everyone was happy.Keep a Relaxed and Mindful Mind This is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. If we try to keep our minds too rigid, too controlled, all that happens is that we get very stressed and uptight. I'm sure you've seen that happening. People try so hard to be perfect and good and not lose anything and keep their minds the way they're supposed to, but all that happens is that they end up with a kind of nervous condition in the body that the Tibetans call Rlung, where the prana in the body, the energy or Qi, goes completely crazy. It's because we try too hard, and all that happens is that we end up very nervous. Instead, what we should try to do is keep the mind very relaxed, very spacious. Not relaxed, spacious, half asleep and losing it, or just chattering away and loose, but a very spacious mind in which the central awareness is absolutely poised so that whatever is going on in the body, with the feeling, in the mind, or in the environment, we know. We're not lost in our memories of what was happening yesterday or last year or when we were children. We're not lost in our thoughts and anticipations of what's going to happen next or tomorrow or next year. We're not commenting, we're not judging. We're not carrying on our usual fantasies and mental chatter. We are with what is happening in the moment, just with it, that is all.Now, if our minds can sustain that presence then whatever happens we have the space to deal with it. Whatever comes into the mind, we recognize it, we accept it and we let it go. We don't hold onto it. We don't identify with it because, coming back to what I said before, our problem is that we try to identify. We identify with our memories, our thoughts, our feelings, our emotions. We think this is me, and therefore we suffer. We need to see that memories are just mental states, emotions are just states, feelings are just states, the thoughts that come into our minds are just mental states. They're like bubbles. They arise, they expand and they burst, to be replaced by other bubbles. This is not who we are.

VENERABLE TENZIN PALMO'S TEACHINGSDISCOVERING OUR TRUE BUDDHA NATURE

(Part 3 of 3)Edited Dharma talk given by Ani Tenzin PalmoCambridge Zen Center, Cambridge, U.S.A., 1st June, 1997

Discover the True Nature of Our MindsThe nature of the mind is like the vast sky, like a huge, blue endless sky, very clear, very, very deep and stretching in all directions. It's vast and infinite and clear and empty and transparent and luminous. That is the nature of the mind. Our thoughts and feelings and memories are the clouds appearing in the sky. Sometimes the clouds are white and fluffy and we're happy. Sometimes they're big and black and there's thunder and lightning and we're utterly distraught. But either way, they don't affect the nature of the sky. However black they are, the sky is not solid. However light and pretty they are, the sky is not any more beautified. You cannot make the sky any purer or dirtier. The sky is just something that is, and it's transparent and luminous and clear. So why not identify with the sky rather than with the transitory clouds? If we realized that all the thoughts and emotions that come up in our minds are just the play of the mind and that the mind is a vast ocean, to use another metaphor, and that these thoughts and feelings are just waves that rise and sink back into the ocean again, we would realize that we should not take them too seriously.When you sit and meditate, if you sit with sincerity, then you are definitely able to at least glimpse this transparent nature of the mind and from that, at least, touch who you truly are which is something infinite and vast. Usually, because we identify with the transitory personalities we happen to be assuming in this lifetime, we seem to be such little solid masses, one against the other. It's me and everything that is non-me. Everyone else is out there, and then there's me. Everyone is thinking me, me, me. But when we touch the nature of the mind, which is our true nature, our Buddha nature, then we see that, of course, we are actually all completely connected. The sky is not one sky and then there's another sky and then another. There's just sky, and it is infinite and vast. It is not my sky versus your sky. It is not my Buddha nature versus your Buddha nature. It's just Buddha nature. There's just mind. Therefore, we are all very intricately interconnected with each other.When we realize this, then we realize that just as we wish only to receive kindness, respect and love from others, so also others would like to receive these things from us because others are us at a very profound level. Which brings me to the second point which is that it is very important in our practice to not simply develop through the head, through the intellect, to learn how to clarify the mind, but also to learn how to open up the heart.Buddhahood consists of the unity of wisdom and compassion, wisdom and love. Wisdom alone is not enough. It's like the two wings of a bird. You cannot have one wing without the other wing. You need both wings in order to fly. When our minds become a little settled, a little more peaceful, a little clearer, then we are able to see things more clearly, with less confusion, with less self-reference. We begin to see things as they really are. And when we begin to see things as they really are, one of the first things of which we become aware is the pain of others.Now, most of us go around - successfully or unsuccessfully - putting on a brave front, trying to be as cheerful and look as competent as we can. But scratch the surface a little and you come across this enormous mass of confusion and pain and uncertainty and hurt which so many people carry around and don't know what to do with. Now, just as we, when we are suffering, need someone to at least look at us with kindness, so all beings want that. It's not that we all want to immediately rush off and join Mother Teresa. But at least in our lives, in our everyday lives, meeting the people with whom we meet, we should treat each one with respect and kindness. Is that too much to ask? Again and again, one finds that when people take up a Buddhist practice, they become very cold. I wonder why. There is so much talk about compassion. But often it ends up being rather intellectual. It doesn't seem sometimes to percolate down into people's hearts. So people are not spontaneously kinder, are not necessarily the sorts of people that one would actually go to with one's problems. Even in Sanghas, people are polite with one another, but are they kind? After all, if you are in a Sangha, you are each other's family. If you're not nice to each other, then to whom can you be nice?When we talk about our practice we say that we are practicing the Bodhisattva path and the Bodhisattva path is to save all sentient beings. But just who are these sentient beings? I mean, it's nice and easy to sit on one's carpet and say, 'Well, I'm going to save all sentient beings.' It's very comfortable to feel altruistic and think that. But then you go home and you meet your husband or your wife or your mother or your father or whomever and they do something to annoy you and you completely blow up. The fact is that for all our talk about love and compassion, we must look at ourselves and say, 'Are we actually nicer people for all this? Have we actually become kinder? Is our heart really warmer than it was when we started?' If it is, then very good, keep going. If it isn't, then we're in trouble.Our practice has to be from the heart. If our practice isn't from the heart, it has no validity. The head is the computer, but the genuine mind is at a much profounder level than that. When we talk about mind in Buddhism, we don't just mean the intellectual side of it but the whole emotional part, the intuitive, the very deep level of our being which does not reside up in the head. So if our sitting practice is all up in this computer part of the brain there will never be any very profound transformation. We have to bring our practice downwards. It has to permeate through our whole body, every cell of our body. This is a very, very crucial point.We are very head-oriented in the West. Those of you who have been meditating for any length of time have, I'm sure, experienced moments when the mind, or the computer, fell away and you were in another state of consciousness, one much clearer and vaster than our normal state of consciousness. This is the consciousness we have to connect with. When we connect with this consciousness our hearts open up and genuine love and compassion appear. When we have this genuine profound insight  which is completely linked and combined with spontaneous love and compassion - even if only for just a short time - then we know we are genuinely on the Buddhist path. Until then, as long as our practice is still basically theoretical, or basically still head-oriented, we have quite a long way to go. Once we genuinely reach to the profound levels of our Buddha nature then we can really start to meditate.Of course, insight into our true nature is not the end of the path; it's the beginning. Therefore, while it's important, and wonderful, to sit every day, it's also important to bring that quality of mind as much as possible into your everyday life. At the same time, cultivate a softness, a kindness, realizing that every being in front of you is trapped just as you are in Samsara, and like yourself, needs a little kindness. If you cannot manage that much, then why are you saying that you are doing this for all sentient beings? Those beings include your family, your colleagues, people that you meet in your everyday lives, when going to work and in your social lives. It is very important that you realize that each person in front of you is unique and uniquely important because they are the one person in front of you. Therefore, they are, at that moment, your Dharma practice. Where else is your Dharma practice?-

Venerable Tenzin Palmo was raised in London and while in her teens she became a Buddhist. In 1964, at the age of twenty, she decided to go to India to pursue her spiritual path. There she met her Guru, His Eminence the eighth Khamtrul Rinpoche and became one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist nun. She remained with Khamtrul Rinpoche and his community in Himachal Pradesh, northern India, for six years and then he directed her to the Himalayan valley of Lahaul in order to undertake more intensive practice. Tenzin Palmo stayed in a small monastery there for several years, remaining in retreat during the long winter months. Then, seeking for more seclusion and better conditions for practice, she found a nearby cave where she remained for another 12 years, the last 3 years in strict retreat. She left India in 1988 and went to stay in Italy where she taught at various Dharma centres. Before H.E. Khamtrul Rinpoche passed away in 1980, he had on several occasions requested Tenzin Palmo to start a nunnery. In 1993, the Lamas of the Khampagar monastery at Tashi Jong in Himachal Pradesh again made this request. This time Tenzin Palmo was ready to take on the formidable task and committed herself to this project. Tenzin Palmo now lives for most of the year at Tashi Jong where she has established Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery in temporary accommodation until the building of the nunnery nearby is completed. She travels for 3 months each year to teach and raise funds for the nunnery project.

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What does it mean to be on the road?

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The film is a personal record of what it means to be on the road. It depicts the special state of mind that only arises in those who travel for the sake of travelling. This heightened state of awareness, the ‘joie de vivre’ which is so dynamically described in the classic novel ‘On the Road’ by Jack Kerouac forms the source of inspiration.


The filmmaker travelled  through the US, visiting Detroit, Chicago, Denver, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, examining whether the unbiased and adventurous way of life that characterizes the novel still exist in today’s America, it’s spirit in modern times.
In line with that the Beat Generation’s attitude towards life and the Buddhist views on life were examined.  Just like in ‘On the Road’, very little was determined before filming, and as much as possible was left to chance and intuition during the proces. 


Director/camera: Rob Smits
With: Ed White, Mark Sink, 40 Love-rapper Hazel, Kero, Genpo Roshi, artists “Picture Plane”, James Poppitz.
Commissioning editor: Babeth M. VanLoo
Sound: Mark Witte
Editing: Rob Smits / Chris van Oers
Producer: Airport Film / BOS
Music: Don Funcken
© 2009 a Buddhist Broadcasting Foundation production

THE THREE PRINCIPAL ASPECTS OF THE PATH

THE THREE PRINCIPAL ASPECTS OF THE PATH

Je Tsongkhapa

Tibetan title: lam gyi gtso bo rnam pa gsum

Homage to the most venerable teachers!
1
I shall explain here to the best of my ability:
The essential points of all the scriptures of the Conqueror;
The path acclaimed by all excellent bodhisattvas;
The gateway for the fortunate ones aspiring for liberation.
2
Those who are not attached to the joys of cyclic existence,
Who strive to make meaningful this life of leisure and opportunity,
And who place their trust in the path that pleases the Conquerors -
O fortunate ones, listen with an open heart.
3
Without pure renunciation there is no means to pacify
The yearning for the joys and fruits of samsaric ocean;
And as craving for existence chain us thoroughly,
At first search for a true renunciation.
4
By cultivating in mind that this human life is so hard to find
Yet has no time to spare, preoccupations with this life will cease;
By contemplating repeatedly the truth of karma and samsaric suffering,
Preoccupations with next life will come to cease.
5
As you habituate in this way and when not even an instant
Of admiration arises for the prosperities of cyclic existence,
And when the thought aspiring for liberation arises day and night,
At this point true renunciation has arisen.
6
Such renunciation too if it is not sustained
By pure awakening mind it will not become a cause
Of the perfect bliss of unexcelled enlightenment;
Therefore O intelligent ones, generate the excellent awakening mind.
7
They’re being swept away constantly by four powerful rivers;
They’re bound tightly with fetters of karma most difficult to escape;
They’re trapped inside the iron mesh of self-grasping;
They're enveloped from everywhere by thick mists of ignorance;
8
They take birth within cyclic existence that has no end,
Where they’re endlessly tormented by the three sufferings.
By reflecting on all your mothers who suffer such conditions,
Please generate the supreme awakening mind.
9
If you do not have the wisdom realising the ultimate nature,
Even if you gain familiarity with renunciation and awakening mind,
You will not be able to cut the root of samsaric existence;
So strive in the means of realizing dependent origination.
10
When with respect to all phenomena of samsara and nirvana,
You see that cause and effects never deceive their laws,
And when you have dismantled the focus of objectification,
At that point you have entered the path that pleases the Buddhas.
11
So long as the two understandings - of appearance,
Which is undeceiving dependent origination,
And emptiness devoid of all theses - remain separate,
So long you have not realized the intent of the Sage.
12
However at some point when, without alternation but at once,
The instant you see that dependent origination is undeceiving,
If the entire object of grasping at certitude is dismantled,
At that point your analysis of the view has culminated.
13
Furthermore when appearance dispels the extreme of existence,
And when emptiness dispels the extreme of non-existence,
And if you understand how emptiness arises as cause and effect,
You will never be captivated by views grasping at extremes.
14
Thus when you have understood as they are
The essentials of the three principal aspects of the path,
O son, seek solitude and by enhancing the power of perseverance,
Swiftly accomplish your ultimate aspiration.

This advice was given by the monk Lobsang Drakpai Pal to Ngawang
Drakpa, a leading person of Tsakho region.

© English translation. Geshe Thupten Jinpa, 2003.

Change your Mind Change your Brain: The Inner Conditions for Authentic Happiness

Commentary on the Teaching of bardo

   

by Joseph Kerrick The similarity of some parts of the bardo experience to the modern Western accounts of the near-death experience are obvious; others are less so, and still others seem to be very different. The most striking similarity is the common description of what happens at the moment of death: the person sees a Clear Light, a White Light, or perhaps a Clear White Light. In both cases, this Light is identified as the ultimate embodiment of Godhood or Godhead as understood by the two cultures. The encounters with the Peaceful Deities in the second bardo are also clearly parallel to near-death experience reports of meeting God, Jesus, angels, saints, and other high and beatific entities AFTER the initial experience of the Light.  (If any such person had attained liberation and gone into the Light for good, presumably the "near" part of the near-death experience would have terminated, and they would not have come back to tell the tale.) But what of the Wrathful Deities? We would expect that, in a predominantly Christian culture, the parallel here would be seeing the Devil, devils, and/or demons, and visiting Hell or perhaps Purgatory. In fact there are such accounts associated with near-death experiences, but they are a small minority compared to the reports of positive experiences. What might be the reasons for this apparent discrepancy? Are modern-day people qualitatively more virtuous than those who lived in earlier eras? Or could it be that all the old doctrines of heavenly rewards are true, while the corresponding beliefs in hellish punishments and suffering were false? Is everyone automatically entitled to a life of eternal bliss, no matter what the state of their soul?  There are some believers who would countenance such theories, but I am not among them; and so I look for what I feel would be more likely explanations. Kimberly Clark Sharp worked for many years as a social worker in a busy urban emergency ward.  This brought her in contact with many people who had near-death experiences while being operated on or following near-fatal accidents. She was totally sympathetic because her own life had been dramatically changed by a near-death experience at an early age; she collected the stories and told many of them in her book After the Light. In one chapter she talks about the many people she met under such circumstances who told her of negative near-death experiences; in one striking account, a man described being carried in terror toward Hell by devils. While still a minority of all her cases, the proportion was much higher than generally reported in public media offerings. She ventures the explanation that even in the new atmosphere of acceptance and support for near-death experience, there is still a grave stigma attached to talking about negative near-death experiences - and thus there may be a large residue of unreported cases. I give a lot of weight to this hypothesis. And now the Tibetan Book of the Dead offers us another one, which may not be at all contradictory. According to this ancient source, the basic pattern experienced after death is that the glorious, positive events come first; then these wonderful, exquisite experiences begin to diminish the further one gets into the after-death realm, and the more time goes by since the moment of death. And the really nasty stuff usually doesn't even start until more than a week after the person has died. So in this model, we can see that anyone who has had a near death experience simply hadn't been dead long enough  to meet the Wrathful Deities. It is at least a hypothesis. A major difference between the two models - that of the modern West with its culture rooted in Christianity, and that of ancient Tibetan Buddhism - is the nature of the deities and other beings encountered in the after-death state. I have pointed out the parallels, in which the differences are minor and can be explained by the variations of culture and religious imagery, with presumably an underlying common spiritual denominator. But in the "Bardo Thodol", what are we postmodern Westerners to make of the assertion that all the phenomena and beings encountered by the soul after death are illusory, and are projections from the person's own mind? In the summary above, I mentioned that this claim was made of the Wrathful Deities, because it is stressed much more strongly in that part of the text; but in fact even the Peaceful Deities are held to be aspects of the dead person's own consciousness. The appearance of each deity as an external being is said to be illusory, and it is the recognition of this fact that leads to liberation. Does this mean that the entire after-death experience is a hallucination generated by the damaged cells of a dying brain, as materialistic debunkers of the near-death experience claim? Is the vaunted "liberation" just a philosophical acceptance after death? The answer is no, for this is an even more serious misunderstanding of Buddhism and the Eastern mind by Western skeptics anxious to validate their own narrow worldview. The true context of the statements in the "Bardo Thodol" is the Buddhist doctrine that all of material life is itself an illusion. In other words, when it says in the "Bardo Thodol" that the Peaceful and Wrathful Deities are illusions generated by your own mind - paralleling Jesus and the angels and devils in Western near-death experiences - it's in the same sense that all the people you see surrounding you here on earth in the material world are also "illusions generated by your own mind." In fact, that the entire material universe is nothing but a grand illusion generated by your own consciousness - because liberation ultimately consists comes from the realization that you are the Dharmakaya - in Western terms, that you are God. This perspective was recognized by Carl Jung in his "Psychological Commentary" on the Tibetan Book of the Dead, when he said: "Not only the 'wrathful'  but also the 'peaceful' deities are conceived as ... projections of the human psyche, an idea that seems all too obvious to the 'enlightened' European, because it reminds him of his own banal (materialistic) simplifications. But though the European can easily explain away these deities as projections, he would be quite incapable of positing them at the same time as real. The "Bardo Thodol", (however), can do (exactly) that ... " The final evidence that this is the correct interpretation of the bardo teachings is that in this matrix of Tibetan Buddhism, there is actually a total of six bardos. The other three are experienced not in death but in life;  the first is normal waking consciousness, the second is the state experienced in dreaming sleep, and the third is the high state experienced in meditation.  All these states are considered to be of the same basic nature as those experienced after death - that is, ultimately illusory. What we are confronted with is a perspective in which all the events and entities encountered after death are just as real as those met in life - or just as unreal. If your wife and children, your mother-in-law, your next-door neighbors, and the President of the United States are real, then so is your dead Aunt Harriet, your great-great-great-great grandfather, Jesus Christ and his mother Mary, the fallen angel Lucifer/Satan, Gautama the Buddha, the supreme Tibetan Abvatar Chenrazee, the Wrathful Deities, and the Lord of the Dead. All of these are real, or none of them is real. And, strange as it seems to the Western mind, the Buddhist perspective is that none of them is real.  All are an illusion except the consciousness of God, which is unitary and all-inclusive. This means that it's identical to our own consciousness. Lastly, it may be asked how the information in the Bardo Thodol was obtained. The translator of the book, himself a Tibetan Lama, answers this in his forward. He mentions the skeptical Western notion that no one can talk conclusively about what happens after death because no one has ever returned from death.  Then he explains the Tibetan Buddhist perspective that everyone has returned from death - that is, through reincarnation. Westerners do not believe this because they don't remember their past lives; but, the Lama points out, neither do they remember being born, yet none of them doubt that they were born. If our normal memory does not reach back as far as birth, there is no reason to expect that it would reach into past lives - and no reason, on that ground, to doubt the reality of past lives. The authors of the Tibetan Book of the Dead, as the Lama tells us, were highly advanced adepts of yoga and metapsychological practices by which they were able to attain full, continuous memory of their last incarnation, their death, and their complete passage through the bardos to their rebirth into their current life. Living adepts are able to confirm the accuracy of the information by means of their own memory of the bardo. Because of the near-death experience phenomenon, many Westerners now accept that it's possible to come back at least from the early stages of death. The "Bardo Thodol"  offers a large further step in this direction: that it's possible to go all the way through the stages of death and emerge on the other side, reborn into material life. Thus we can understand the Buddhist premise that the "afterlife" is really the "Intermediate State" - that is, the bardo.

Contemplation

Enjoy my movie Contemplation. Contemplate the words of the Buddha !

Thoughts from the Yung Drung Bon Tradition

Lama's thought of the month

Beloved Human beings, don't try to change your religion out of expectations, misinterpretations and ignorance as if there is something wrong with your faith. But it is essential to change your mind which is obscured. Your conceptual mind (driven by anger, jealousy, pride, attachment and ignorance) must be transformed/changed to non-conceptual wisdom mind. That Mind is Divine or God! You should know that, from no beginning, you are Divine/God, God within! And you must know that there is only one GOD, like the sun with countless rays & light illuminating Universe, God too emanates in to countless teachers to illuminate sentient beings including humans mind. Don't let dogmatic religions divide human beings thus turning humans against humans. Have an open approach to explore other faiths in better understanding & enhancing your own faith. How wonderful and sublime it is to discover that Divine in yourself under the guidance of an Authentic Master who has already discovered it. Each and every human being is a potential Awakened One. It is very important that each one of us tries to live up to the teachings taught in our respective faiths rather than parroting it. When you don't try to live up to even a single religious act, how could you call yourself a religious person? If you are a true religious person, are you practicing any of these acts, such as tolerance, patience, non-judgment, genuine compassion and forgiveness? Are you practicing acts such as abstaining from killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, telling lies, causing friction, using harsh words, idle gossip, evil thoughts, negative intentions and repudiation of enlightened teachings etc? If you have not, you had better start from today. It is hard - but always possible. Don't live withouth doing it up until the last moment of your life - which will be not clever at all! "Human Life is incomplete without taking spiritual path, no matter how famous, rich, successful or powerful you may be known as and called". Do not waste this potential Buddha life on distractions by chasing rainbows every day of life and then die without any preparation for the never dying consciousness! What happens to the consciousness when ones' mortal body dies? Come and learn about Bardo (The state of mind between death and re-birth) teaching and Phowa (The great Yoga for transference of consciousness to the state of Enlightenment)!!! Lama Khemsar

PRAYER OF INDISCRIMINATE LOVE:
May all the sentient beings that are encompassed by the SKY
be enriched with happiness and the cause of happiness!
May all the sentient beings be parted from suffering and the causes of suffering!
May all sentient beings never be separated from the happiness
of the Eternal state of consciousness!
May the minds of all sentient beings abide in the state
of equipoise, in which there exists neither happiness nor unhappiness!

Lama Khemsar

Yungdrungbon

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Metta Loving kindness

Metta means loving-kindness. THE METTA SUTTA The Buddha's Teaching on Loving-kindness This is what should be done By one who is skilled in goodness, And who knows the path of peace: Let them be able and upright, Straightforward and gentle in speech. Humble and not conceited, Contented and easily satisfied. Unburdened with duties and frugal in their ways. Peaceful and calm, and wise and skilful, Not proud and demanding in nature. Let them not do the slightest thing That the wise would later reprove. Wishing: In gladness and in safety, May all beings be at ease. Whatever living beings there may be; Whether they are weak or strong, omitting none, The great or the mighty, medium, short or small, The seen and the unseen, Those living near and far away, Those born and to-be-born, May all beings be at ease! Let none deceive another, Or despise any being in any state. Let none through anger or ill-will Wish harm upon another. Even as a mother protects with her life Her child, her only child, So with a boundless heart Should one cherish all living beings: Radiating kindness over the entire world Spreading upwards to the skies, And downwards to the depths; Outwards and unbounded, Freed from hatred and ill-will. Whether standing or walking, seated or lying down Free from drowsiness, One should sustain this recollection. This is said to be the sublime abiding. By not holding to fixed views, The pure-hearted one, having clarity of vision, Being freed from all sense desires, Is not born again into this world.

Dharmadhatu on YouTube

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