Responsibility Begins With Recognition

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Neurotic Interaction to Guru Yoga”

Responsibility begins with recognition.  Simply that.  Recognition.  There are some fundamental truths that must be recognized here in order to stop the game of projecting your own neuroses onto yet another external object.  Because that is not the practice of Dharma.  That is not going to lead you to liberation.  That will continue to lead you to more and more neuroses.  So you must play the game correctly.  The first thing that happens is recognition.  It begins with the recognition of the fundamental foundational truth that we call turning the mind toward Dharma—the faults of cyclic existence, cause and effect relationships, impermanence, these kinds of thoughts, and then the realization that in all the six realms of cyclic existence there is suffering.  Then the recognition that there is the appearance of the Buddha, which brings the element of enlightenment and supreme realization and the visage or face of our own primordial wisdom nature, and  puts that into the world.  That’s the Buddha, the Dharma, which is the Buddha’s method, inseparable from the Buddha like the rays are inseparable from the sun, and the result, which is enlightenment, also inseparable from the Buddha.  You begin to recognize that this has in fact happened.

In the world there is the Buddha.  There is the Dharma.  There is the Sangha, and there is the Lama as the condensed essence of all three.  That recognition alone puts you into position where you have to choose between continuing in samsara and neurotic redundancy which is what samsara really is.  Isn’t that a great term?  Neurotic redundancy.  Don’t you just love that?  Neurotic redundancy,.Or you can choose Buddha, and Dharma, and Sangha—this three-legged stool, or chariot we should say, by which we travel through the door of liberation into enlightenment, into realization, the precious awakened state that the Buddha named.

So we’re in a position now where we make that choice.  That choice is based on this recognition.  You can’t make that choice on an emotional level.  Big mistake!  And some people try to do that.  They come to the temple and they say, “I like this stuff!  It’s all weird.  I like the colors.  I like the shape.  I like the material over there.  Look how they built that up there.  Isn’t that cute?  Those books… You know, I like that they don’t turn this way.  I like that they turn this way.  It’s so exotic.  I think it’s really cool, don’t you?  And then all the statues and crystals!  Look at this!  This is really cool to be with the crystals!” Really I’m describing a silly mindstate, but many students, when they first begin, will come here and say, “Oh this stuff is so cool.  I really want to do this.  O.K., you’re my teacher.”  So on that emotional level, really not much has happened.  Or they might come in and have an emotional reaction.  I’ve seen that happen too.

In fact, this is another story that you’ll be amazed at.  This is an amazing story. A woman once walked into the bookstore.  I happened to be there, checking out the earrings as usual!  So I was in the bookstore and she turned around.  She got immediately who I was.  She had never been around Dharma before, knew nothing about Dharma, knew nothing about anything like that and she just was entranced.  She was transfixed.  She looked at me and then she did three perfect prostrations. Then when she got up she said “I don’t know what that is.  I don’t know what I just did.”  No idea what happened there, no idea.  And then I never saw her again.  And she was crying, crying, just like “My teacher.  My teacher at last!  My teacher!”  Crying.  Big emotional thing, and I never saw her again.

What happened there was unfortunate.  I would call that an obstacle to her practice.  She obviously had enough inner purity to remember a former relationship with her teacher.  Something bled through and yet the obstacle was that she could only, in that moment of meeting, relate on a purely emotional level.  She could not lay down the foundation.  She could not make any connecting thought.  Really, as beautiful as that story is, it broke my heart that she never came back.  It really did.  I love you all, but I have to tell you I have many stories about the ones that got away!  You see, she could have been very close to me and it broke my heart that she didn’t come back.  But what you’re seeing there is just purely an obstacle.  She was only able to relate on this emotional level, and really, it’s not that much different from what you see your dog do when your dog barks to go out or sits there looking at the door.  It is an immediate emotional hit that you’re just overwhelmed with.  It’s not that different from what animals do.  But animals can’t practice Dharma, because what’s needed here is to make these connecting thoughts, these cause and effect thoughts, by creating the kinds of awareness and thinking that causes you to move into a deeper level on the path, and causes you to get the lay of the land, to really get what’s going on here.

This is what’s necessary.  She was not able to, at that time, to think of the faults of cyclic existence, to think of impermanence and that this opportunity might not come again.  She was not able to think “Now that I’ve found my teacher, I have found a way to travel the path of Dharma and pass through the door of liberation.”  Just not able to think like that.  This is a big obstacle that arose in her path at the same time as the blessing of meeting with her teacher again.  So this is the difficulty that we all have, but now we are here and we are in a learning and teaching situation.  We’re in a situation where we have time to think.  We have the leisure to think.  We have the ability to put two and two together, and this is how we have to approach the path.  This is how we have to do this.

Copyright © Jetsunma Ahkon Norbu Lhamo.  All rights reserved

No Short Cuts

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Antidoting the Mantra of Samsara”

As a part of Ngondro, we have to accomplish 100,000 repetitions of a short version of the Bodhisattva Vow,  the Bodhicitta mantra. Do you think to yourself, “Well what’s the goal here?  See, I’m trying to be compassionate. O.k. so from now on I’m just going to be nice.”  Have you ever tried to make that decision?  From now on you’re going to be nice?  Have you ever tried to do that?  How long did it last?  Maybe five minutes if you’re lucky!  I think the all-time world record for a woman is 28 days!  And that goes for her husband also!  So it really can’t be done. You can’t just decide you’re going to be compassionate. And why is that?  Because you still have the weight of these ancient habitual tendencies and deluded perceptions.

The Buddha teaches us that what’s needed here is to recite the Bodhicitta mantra at least 100,000 times with the correct absorption, correct mental concentration, mental imaging, and mental visualization, just as you are taught by the Buddha. Don’t make up your own religion now. Don’t do that!  Practice what the Buddha has taught you just like the Buddha says, and that will change that. Rather than thinking “Oh, let me see if I can rewrite this religion to make it a little easier,” which you guys have all tried to do, haven’t you?  Yes, we know that. So, instead of rewriting the religion, we actually practice it the way that it was given. But we’re thinking, “Wouldn’t it be nice, instead of this 100,000 business, why don’t we sort of do it the new way?  This is a new age isn’t it?  We’ll just think positive all of the time.” Anybody ever tried to think positive all the time?  That’s another fun one. The world record for that is also 28 days.

So we have to understand that what’s recommended here is not arbitrary. Some Buddhist person didn’t show up a long time ago and say “Let’s see, when it gets to be about 1996, how are we going to torture these people?”  It wasn’t like that at all. These practices are meant to antidote your particular situation. You must understand that these were not given to us by ordinary sentient beings. These were not authored by someone who felt that they had an answer the way many of our New Age wisdoms are. You know, nowadays we hear people coming up with wisdom all the time, all kinds of wisdom.They came up with it two years ago, five years ago—how to dream, how to vision. Everybody’s got some wisdom.

But this stuff that comes from the Buddha is different. What actually occurred here is that the very mind of enlightenment appeared in the world as the perfected Buddha. This was not an ordinary sentient being. This is the Buddha nature appearing in the world in a form that we can see with our eyes. And from the mind of that nature, from the mind of that one, from that, directly from the Buddha nature itself, this antidotal process was given. It’s not the same as some mom and pop wisdom somebody cooked up nowadays. So it’s not going to sound like, “Let’s put a bandaid on an ulcer.” It’s not going to sound like “O.k. you’ve been alive since time out of mind creating lots of nonvirtue. Just think positive. Everything will be fine.”  It’s not going to sound like that.

It’s going to sound like what it is. The necessary solution for what ails you according to what you actually are, not according to your over-simplified understanding of yourself. So the Buddha has given a very deep, very extensive, very profound method for a very deep, extensive and profound problem. And there are no shortcuts.

Copyright © Jetsunma Ahkon Norbu Lhamo.  All rights reserved

 

Prayer to The Guru

The following prayer is from “The Great Perfection: Buddha in the Palm of the Hand

PAL DEN TSA WA’I LAMA RINPOCHE

Glorious, precious root guru,

DAG GI NYING GA PEMA’I ZE’U DRU LA

Upon the pollen heart of the lotus in my heart,

DREL WA MED PA TAG PAR ZHUG NE KYANG

Without ever separating, always remaining,

KA DRIN CHEN PO’I GO NE JE ZUNG NE

Hold me fast with your great kindness.

KU SUNG THUG KYI NGÖ DRUB TSAL DU SÖL

Pray, bestow the spiritual attainments of body, speech and mind.

PAL DEN LAMA’I NAM PAR THAR PA LA

Towards the way of life and activities of the glorious guru

KED CHIG TSAM YANG LOG TA MI KYE ZHING

May incorrect view never arise, not even for an instant.

CHI DZED CHÖ SU THONG WA’I MÖ GÜ KYI

With fervent regard, may I view all (the guru’s) actions as Dharma activity.

LAMA’I CHIN LAB SEM LA JUG PAR SHOG

May the guru’s blessings enter my mind!

KYE ZHING KYE WA DAG NI THAM CHED DU

In this and in all of my future lifetimes

RIG ZANG LO SEL NGA GYAL MED PA DANG

May I be born of excellent parents, with a clear mind,

free from pride,

NYING JE CHE ZHING LAMA LA GÜ DEN

Possessing great compassion and respectfully relying

upon the guru.

PAL DEN LAMA’I DAM TSHIG LA NE SHOG

May my samaya with the glorious guru always remain firm!

KYE WA KÜN TU YANG DAG LAMA DANG

In all lifetimes, may I never be separated from a perfectly

pure guru.

DREL MED CHÖ KYI PAL LA LONG CHÖD CHING

Utilizing the glorious Dharma to its utmost,

SA DANG LAM GYI YÖN TEN RAB DZOG NE

And by excellently perfecting all pure qualities on the stages

and paths,

DORJE CHANG GI GO PHANG NYUR THOB SHOG

May I swiftly achieve the state of Vajradharahood!

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