Tibetan Buddhist Altar » Alyce Zeoli

Only You Can Awaken Bodhicitta Within: Full Length Video Teaching

Jetsunma — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 13:30:41 +0000

The following is a full length video teaching offered by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo in Sedona Arizona:

Shown 9/20/09. Given just after the 9/11 tragedy, Jetsunma encourages us to look within and reinvigorate our practice within. She also explains the imbalance at this time between the male and female. As women are defiled, so Tara is defiled and it’s up to us to uphold her.

The Dharma

Jetsunma — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:37:03 +0000

The following is from a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

The Dharma is as vast as samsara, and is also as stable, as long as there is samsara there will also be Dharma.

As long as there is Dharma there will also be Samsara, because the Dharma is natural, uncontrived and would not exist without Samsara.

The Mind as Your Guru Part 1 of 3: Full Length Video Teaching

Jetsunma — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:48:01 +0000

The following is a full length video teaching offered by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo at Kunzang Palyul Choling:

In order to practice Spiritual Fidelity – being true to your own nature you need to understand what that nature is. Also, understand what it isn’t. This involves studying the faults of cyclic existence, so we can avoid those faults and stay directly focused on enlightenment to benefit all beings.

Today

Jetsunma — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:04:34 +0000

The following is from a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

We are women
We are delicate and fragile
And inconceivably strong
Worlds are born from us
We are sacred
We are the oceans of the Earth
Seducing and touching the sand
This is our time

Realize Your Natural State: Full Length Video Teaching

Jetsunma — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 16:25:43 +0000

The following is a full length video teaching offered by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

Developing concepts based on the teachings of the Buddha is a good first step. But then one must apply the antidotes to purify perception to really realize the natural state of luminosity and compassion. Don’t mistake the concept for the actuality.

How to Generate Meritorious Activity

Jetsunma — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 16:17:46 +0000

The following is a full length teaching offered by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

Every religion has a concept of what is considered compassionate or virtuous. What we find is that often we “look” compassionate instead of deepeing in our practice of Vajrayana. This generates the ultimate result of enlightenment.

Relax Your Mind

Jetsunma — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 13:30:45 +0000

An excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called Turning Adversity Into Felicity

Many people experience fear. Confidence in your practice and confidence in your prayers to the guru, these things relax the mind and subdue fears. So my suggestion is to practice in that way and to begin to cultivate the kind of confidence necessary to have the mind be more relaxed and calmer. Everything about us, everything about our practice and everything about our lives in general tends to go better if the mind is not tense and tightly constricted. If it is more spacious and relaxed, all of our perceptual processes, every aspect of our lives tends to go better.

We can take this understanding one step further. If in our lives we meet with a frightening obstacle—a health obstacle, an obstacle to our finances or to our living situation or something like that—our tendency, of course, is to tighten up and become tense and constricted. Actually, you should know that when obstacles are rising, if our minds become tight and tense and constricted, the obstacles tend to rise with more venom, and to be much more difficult to handle.

In a way, if our minds are tense like that, it’s as though we are leaving ourselves open for obstacles to arise and bring all their friends with them. It’s simply that when the mind is churned up it makes everything very fluid, and when obstacles are rising, that fluidity may not be the best thing. That fluidity tends to make things ripen and catalyze very quickly.

The best thing to do instead, is to allow the mind to perceive the empty nature of all circumstances, to meditate on emptiness, and to see misfortune and fortune as being inherently the same in their nature. That doesn’t mean you have to like misfortune as much as you like fortune. Nobody likes it as much, and nobody feels that way. But still, if you can begin to take steps towards meditating on the inherently empty nature of both phenomena, there is a lightness and a spaciousness that occurs within the mind that allows things to relax, that allows whatever obstacles that are arising to dissipate naturally.

When you begin to learn a little bit more about the nature of mind, you will come to understand that our perceptual process, our minds and the ego structure that reacts to any kind of fortune or misfortune—are all inherently empty in their nature. As we begin to give rise to that awareness and meditate on that, the nature of experience actually begins to change. Clearly, in times of great trouble many, many practitioners have found that if they avoid the temptation to say, “Now I’m having problems, best I get busy trying to correct them,” and become more active, but instead, go more deeply into practice and actually rely on meditation as a solution, sometimes just backing off from the situation and relaxing the mind will cause the situation to arise much differently. And that’s including, and even especially, physical sickness.

All sufferings have their roots in cause and effect, and most can be immediately traced to the way that we perceive and the way that we react. Although it doesn’t seem like that when circumstances are really slapping us in the face, if we can sit quietly and meditate and have confidence in our practice, have confidence in the blessing of the Guru, have confidence in the blessings of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, then in this way many of the obstacles in our lives naturally begin to dissipate. Many people have worked through tremendous personal obstacles by relying completely on their meditation, and they come out ever so much stronger.

Your Life Demonstrates the Result

Jetsunma — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 02:40:28 +0000

The following is from a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

You can only know the result of the path when you have actually accomplished the path. Your life demonstrates result. The mirror.

It is easy to be deluded by the circus in one’s head. Awakening is inexplicable, too many words aren’t needed.

A foundation must be well laid before the house can actually be even dreamed of.

When the three accomplishments are complete, ground, path and fruit, then all are known as a great primordial spontaneous array.

That is the way.

The Ultimate Technology

Jetsunma — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 13:30:39 +0000

An excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called Compassion is the Only Lasting Antidote to Suffering

We were raised to believe that reality can be manipulated. Our libraries are filled with books of great American success stories. These tend to be about material successes. But the spiritual aspirant must ask: Will this success last? Even if it lasts for an entire life, will it survive death? If we had the power to bring peace to the world, to disarm nations and maintain order and harmony, would that peace last beyond our lifetime? Many leaders have exhausted their lives forging great nations and empires only to have them destroyed shortly after their deaths.

To provide beings with the ultimate benefit of freedom from all suffering, one must apply the ultimate technology. The aspiration to be of benefit to beings, the cultivation of pure intention, the continued observance of human kindness, the making of wishing prayers, and constantly hoping from the core of one’s mind and heart to be of lasting benefit to others, are practices to develop compassion. Yet at some point the ultimate step must be taken. This begins with the realization that temporary happiness is not enough, that feeding and clothing people, along with other acts of kindness, are not enough. These things cannot undo the certainty of death, which puts people beyond our reach. How can we follow them into future incarnations to ensure their safety?

There is only one way to cease the ripening of the seeds of suffering: enlightenment, which dissolves the belief in ego, pacifies all cause-and-effect relationships or karma, and reveals one’s true primordial nature. The Diamond Path utilizes many techniques to purify the five senses and the mindstream itself. When these practices are engaged in, not only for one’s own benefit but also to purify the karma and suffering of others, the practical aspect of the Awakening Mind — practical compassion — is engaged. This is “practical” because it is the technology to completely rid oneself and others of the causes for suffering. Buddhists view this type of compassion as the act of ultimate kindness.

While ordinary kindness is a valid undertaking and should be part of the activity of every spiritual aspirant, one must address the question of ultimate benefit, of eliminating suffering at its roots.

We should take to heart what the great Indian Buddhist Shantideva wrote a thousand years ago. “May I act as the mighty earth or like the free and open skies to support and provide the space whereby I and all others may grow. Until every being afflicted by pain has reached to nirvana’s shores, may I serve only as a condition that encourages progress and joy.”

Do What It Takes!

Jetsunma — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:54:27 +0000

The following is from a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

Looks like I may be on the move again. I do listen to my experts. And I am still transforming into my own superhero.

Evidently it ain’t over yet, too bad for us all. But I am braver and stronger.

When you disappear to avoid a stalker, they often go quiet. But they never forget. Neither should we. Feel safe by taking care of you.

It’s all I can say. Leave your life or work. Whatever, you have the right to save yourself. Survival is necessary to do anyone any good.

I believe in the rights of women and family – period. No one will take care of you like you. No proper laws are in place. No one considers women as important as men. Even if the woman contributes to society and the man is a total creep. She still loses. But she will always have the power to get it back.

In fact if we change the law we can change the world. Think of it – fair to women. No beatings. No stalking. No men who impregnate women and leave them with no help. No living in fear, rape, incest – world worth living in. It’s up to us. No one else gives a rat’s ass about women’s safety. Certainly not Judge Titus. How does he look at his family and know other families are at risk?

Dunno. Just know I can’t. I now advocate for women. Those who are upright and real, not goldbrickers. I don’t know how to afford this running life. But it will be OK somehow. I know because I feed homeless, rescue animals, feed and house birds, etc, the 99%.

So merit and karma prevail. And love. Love prevails, always, like water rushing over rock.
I’m with you, I love you. I love us. Be safe, do what it takes!