Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo | Tibetan Buddhist Altar

Seeing As The Buddha Sees

August 8, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

From The Spiritual Path: A Compilation of Teachings by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

You do not see as the Buddha sees, with a mind that is natural, uncontrived, and relaxed. You do not know the natural state—your own Nature that is beneath the conceptualizations you force upon it. In essence you are the same as the Buddha. Why does He see Buddhas and Bodhisattvas without number, and you do not? Why is the Buddha’s mind free of action and reaction? The difference is one thing only: the concept of self to which you cling.

The concept of self is the effortful contrivance that results in all forms of suffering. Once your “self” is established, it is vulnerable to termination. It now has a beginning; therefore it will die. A tension arises. As a baby, you cried when you were hungry, and your mother probably responded. If she did not do so immediately, you sensed a threat to your survival. If you smiled and cooed, perhaps your mother paid more attention. You tried to protect the fabric of self. You began the long process of learning to attract, to have power over, other people. You developed tendencies to dominate, to be submissive, or to survive in other ways.

These habitual tendencies take time and effort to perfect. They become part of the fabric of our being. We call them our individuality and take pride in them. These subtle, habitual tendencies will stay with us over many lifetimes—unless they are somehow purified from the mindstream. In fact, the longer we accumulate assumptions about the self, the more deep-seated and complicated these subtle tendencies become. Ironically, those who pride themselves on their uniqueness and individuality are often in the most trouble. For even though the brain and the personality end at death, the karma remains. In fact, every moment of the perception of self has within it enough seeds for eons of cyclic existence. And these seeds have only to be watered by certain kinds of activity to ripen.

The original tightness or tension that accompanies the concept of “I-ness” is desire. This is why the Buddha taught that the basic cause for all suffering is desire. Some think that because they have learned not to desire a mate or a car or money or beauty, they have become true renunciates. They think they have overcome desire. They could not be further from the truth. Desire is simply too pervasive. It is what holds the concept of “I-ness” together. This concept becomes as invisible and familiar as the air we breathe. Everything we do supports and maintains our ego. It is only in the enlightened, realized state, with natural, uncontrived view, that activity is spontaneous, free of conceptualization, and therefore free of tension.

You, however, cling to your contrived thoughts, and the odd thing is—you love them. You are fascinated with the activity of your brain. You enjoy being opinionated. You love the excitement—so you think—of the tension that surrounds conceptualization. Every perception you have is made of tension born of desire.

Why is it so difficult to annihilate desire from your mindstream? You desire desire. Otherwise, you could snap your fingers and say, “I am through with it.” Why do you desire? Because you have so much investment, such a strong belief in your “I-ness” that your primary religion is not Buddhism but the preservation of your ego. That is your gut-level religion. You make offerings to it every moment. You take refuge in it every moment. The preservation of your ego and all the assumptions that go with it have been the love of your life, your soul mate.

How then can you even conceive of being free of desire, much less manage it? You may hear the teachings of the Buddha and want to be free, but another part of you is absolutely in love with yourself. And you love to be in love, so you are helpless. This is why the powerful Vajrayana path is so necessary and efficient. It would take extremely long to purify your mindstream by progressively renouncing every thought, every activity that increases desire, until you are basically doing nothing but watching your breath and annihilating every assumption and tension as it comes up in your mind. The Vajrayana path will do that, but it has another dimension: you purify your entire view. The five senses are purified through generation-stage practice. In it, you are not imagining a deity; you are not pretending it is there; you are not even visualizing. Certainly that may be where you start, but when it is done correctly and the skill of concentration is fully developed, you are actually disassembling and re-manufacturing the incorrect perceptions that permeate your every thought, word, and deed.

Examining Cause and Effect in Real Life

August 7, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Bringing Virtue Into Life”

You may have been born rich, or perhaps during the course of your life it has been relatively easy for you to make money, gain riches. Or perhaps during the course of your life, at some point you have inherited riches. And you wonder to yourself, “How is it that I hear about the starving poor and yet I, who wasn’t even hungry in the first place, have inherited this money, or I have this money? How is it? It would seem as though I am completely undeserving. How has that happened?” You wonder about that. “Why is it easy for me to make money?” Well, the reason why it is easy for you to inherit that money or to make that money is because some time in the past you have earned it; and the way that you have earned it is by engaging in virtuous activity concerned with generosity toward others. If you have given food to others, in this life you always have enough to eat, and more. In fact, the problem is not eating too much.

So then, if you have a lot of money and things have been pretty comfortable for you, then sometime in the past you must have been very generous toward others, and your big problem in this lifetime is not how to make money but how to spend it, or not spend it. In that case, you deserve everything that you get. You deserve all of it.

Now, in this lifetime, if you just take that money and express through it no acts of generosity,… Let’s say maybe you keep it in your family to make sure that your children are provided for. Well, that’s a kind of generosity. You did give some to your children, but that isn’t real generosity, because children are kind of like an extension of our own ego. We think of them as part of us. We don’t think of them as being separate from us. We like our children to be rich because it’s a good reflection on us and it makes us die happy.

But let’s say in this lifetime, although you have lots of money, you haven’t really given any to benefit others. You haven’t helped others not to be hungry. You haven’t given it to children that don’t get any toys as Christmas. You haven’t made any offerings to the temple where you receive all your spiritual benefit. You haven’t done anything with your money. If you think then that you’re going to somehow be able to legally make it happen that they’ll find you in your next incarnation and give you back that money,… Au contraire, monsieur. You can’t take it with you. It’s not going to appear again in your next life. Forget it! It’s not going to happen. But in your next life you will probably be born much poorer because, even though you had the money before, you were not very generous.

So it’s very, very clear that cause and effect are interconnected. In fact, the Buddha teaches us that they arise interdependently: When the cause arises, the effect arises at the same time, but in seed form. Think about that. Think about that the next time you have non-virtuous behavior. One of the reasons why it’s so easy to be non-virtuous is because you think, “Well, O.K., I’m being non-virtuous now, but I don’t see the effect rising yet. So maybe they…(Who are they anyway? We don’t know.) they’ll forget about it. “ You know, the guys with the x’s and the checks. They’re up there. They’re sitting on the throne. You know, the guy with long beard. Maybe he’ll forget about it by then. But in fact the Buddha teaches that, number one, there is nobody with a book up there, or a beard. And number two, when you give rise to the cause, the effect is already born, and you will experience it. You will experience it.

A Teaching on the Four Immeasurables

August 3, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is respectfully taken from “How to Follow a Spiritual Master” edited by Ngagyur Nyingma Institute.

The following story of King Tsangpa Lha (Brahma Deva) and his son Gyaltshab Dhampa provides insights into the way bygone great practitioners have followed and practiced with their own Masters. The Prince was seeking dharma teachings but could not find any, feeling very saddened. Indra, the King of Gods knew clairvoyantly the mind of the Prince and assumed the guise of a Brahmin. He came to sit near the gate of the palace announcing he could give teachings. The Prince came to hear about it and requested them. The Brahmin answered that he would give teachings if the Prince were to jump into a deep fire pit and then make offerings.

The Prince accepted without hesitation and set about digging the fire pit at the dismay of the The King, Queen, Ministers and courtiers. Yet the Brahmin maintained his condition and the Prince his resolve so all was set for the Prince to jump. All his subjects requested him to abandon the idea to which the Prince replied, “I have been born in Samsara countless times and taken rebirth in higher realm of God and humans. There I have suffered under desire, in the lower realm I had undergone immense suffering. All to no avail and further I have never sacrificed my life in order to receive Teachings. Now I am going to offer this impure body. Please do not hold me back and alter this pure motivation in order to achieve enlightenment. I will give you the Teachings as soon as I have gained enlightenment. The subjects saw that the Prince was very determined and they could not press the matter further.

The Prince was ready to jump staying close to the pit as he spoke to Brahmin. O great Teacher! Please give me the teachings now as I may die and not be able to receive them from you. Then the Brahmin gave the following teachings on the Four Immeasurable,

Practice loving kindness,
Abandon anger
Protect the beings through great compassion
Shed tears of Compassion
With all sentient beings never to be separated from happiness
and the causes of happiness
By protecting all the beings through great compassion
You will become a genuine Bodhisattva

As soon as he finished these teachings, the Prince jumped into the fire pit. Both Indra and Brahma held him back holding him on both sides from falling into the pit. They said, “You are the Protector of beings who is very kind and compassionate. What will happen to your subjects if you jump now? It will be like the death of our parent.” The Prince replied, “Don’t hold me back from entering the path to Buddhahood, and all became silent as the Prince jumped into the firepit.

The earth shook and the Gods in the sky lamented shedding a shower of tears like rainfall transforming the firepit into a lake at the center of which the Prince stood on a lotus and the Gods showered flowers to praise him.

The Path: Are We There Yet?

July 31, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

An excerpt from a teaching called The Seed of Your Buddha Nature Within by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

When one begins to understand some of the ideas that are presented in Dharma, one realizes that the goal that we are engaged in “moving toward,” if you’ll forgive that bad choice of words, is actually Buddha Nature itself. We tend to consider that the path is like a thing that goes from here to there, like a movement toward, and it’s very hard not to conceptualize it in that way. But, in fact, when one practices Dharma, the ability to practice Dharma is actually based on the understanding of the innate Nature. If we did not have within us right now the seed of Enlightenment, if we did not have within us the potential to actualize ourselves as the Buddha, there would be no point of practice. The very basis for practice is that understanding. This is what the Buddha himself taught – that all sentient beings have within them the seed of Buddha Nature, that that Nature is their true Nature, in fact. However, they have not awakened to that Nature and so, in order awaken to that Nature, one engages in the path.

The path should not be considered a ‘thing’, a straight line that connects from here to there. The path should be understood as a method that one uses in order to awaken to that Nature which is already our Nature; which is complete, unchanging, and will never get any bigger or any smaller. One should understand that Dharma is actually an activity that is meant to awaken that potential. But the ultimate goal that one wishes for when one engages in Dharma, is, of course, Enlightenment itself.

Changing Habits

July 29, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

An excerpt from a teaching called How Buddhism Differs from Other Religions by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Many people have gone to teachers and said, “What was I in my past life? What kind of being am I?” thinking that they are different somehow and that this is important. It’s really not the case. We are all exactly the same. But a lot of times the people will go to the teacher and ask questions like that. Buddha Shakyamuni’s answer was, “If you want to know who you were in your past life, look in the mirror.” Not necessarily at your physical appearance, and how your mascara is and that sort of thing. Look at who you are. Look at your life. Look at what you’ve accomplished. Not what you’re spinning in your head that you’re going to accomplish, but what you have accomplished. Then you can begin a certain analysis.

Let’s say that you are chronically poor. You tend to work wage jobs, and can’t get the big jobs, and just can’t make the money thing work. It’s a chronic condition. Most people think that the best thing to do is to go looking for the fabulous job or meet the fabulous man with the big money or something like that so you can get rich. That kind of thinking will keep you in exactly the same position you’ve always been in, and it will never change.

If you find yourself in a state of chronic poverty, you must understand that cause and effect relationships are operating here. You are now reaping the result of a cause that was created maybe early in this lifetime, more likely in another lifetime. This is why it’s so hard, because you can’t see it. We don’t know what happened in our last life or ten lifetimes ago. We really don’t know what the cause is.

Again the Buddha says that this is where analysis is very useful. So, we look and we say, “Well, I’ve always been poor. It’s always been an issue. So, what can I do to solve this problem?” Is hoping for a rich person or a rich job to come along really the solution? Actually, not. What you should start doing if you are chronically poor, is to give all you can to the poor. The shirt off your back if you have to. Now, people will try that and they’ll come back to me and say it didn’t work. How long did you try it? It took you lifetimes to get this habitual. You’ve got to work at it awhile. You can’t expect to just be kind for a couple of weeks, and then boom! We’re home and dry. It’s not like that. You have to actually take the grasping energy that you’re feeling, “I want the money. I want the money. I want the money.” And turn it around into “I give what I can give.” If it’s a quarter, if it’s twenty cents, if it’s a penny, if it’s a hug, if it’s some extra clothes to people who don’t have clothes, or a warm blanket in the wintertime. Anything. It doesn’t have to be big bucks, but you develop the habit of generosity to the degree that it outweighs that graspiness that says, “When am I gonna get rich? When am I gonna get rich? When am I gonna get rich?” By the time you’ve changed that habit, things are changing in your life. But until you change the habit, nothing will change. It’s all about our habitual tendencies. There is nobody that knows this better than a recovering alcoholic.

I think recovering alcoholics make the best students, because they understand what habitual tendency is all about. And they understand what addiction is all about too, including the addiction to “gimme, gimme, gimme. I want it. I want it. I want it. More, more, more.” That’s an addiction.

We begin to break our habitual tendencies and turn them around, and we change the addiction. At that point, we begin giving. When you start giving to others, generally, you give to people who have less than you. And one of the first things it does is make you realize how much you actually have. Because we don’t generally realize how much we actually have. Impoverishment is in here. So, when we begin to act kindly and generously towards others and give what little we have, the grasping hand turns around and becomes a giving hand. The mind relaxes about the issue of having. And that clears the way for the ripening of virtuous karma. Virtuous karma will bring us happiness, joy, money, whatever it’s tuned into. Whatever it is the result of. But it’s the graspy neediness that keeps us from giving and makes us so unhappy.

The “Chicken Suit”

July 28, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

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

It seems you have these strong habitual tendencies and project them onto an environment stimulated by just about anything. And when the stimulation looks like it’s even on the same continent as a predetermined habitual karmic scenario that you have been going through cyclically, you’ll do it again. So many people do not have a good or honest or true relationship with their teacher because they are basically having a relationship with their own neuroses. That’s the truth! That’s the truth! They’re having it with their own neuroses. But you see here again is a mystery, something beautiful that you really need to understand. I’m using a very western way of explaining this so that you will understand better. That’s part of the gift of having a teacher. It’s part of the gift, because the teacher will show you your own mind, will mirror something. There’ll be that little bounce-back phenomena there so that when you have a meeting with the teacher, and something begins, you begin to feel like, “What’s happening here? I’m beginning to feel a little itchy twitchy. Now wait a minute, I’m seeing some authority figure stuff come out.” Or, “Oh God, that reminds me of my mother!!”

Or men are like, ALL women do that!! I hate that!! So that will start to happen, and when that starts to happen, what the student doesn’t realize is that is a perfect opportunity to look at your mind. It’s a gift. Of course, you can make this gift happen anywhere in your life and actually this is the best way to practice Guru Yoga. There is a lot of poetry and a lot of very profound Dharma text written about seeing the Guru’s face everywhere—in every person, in every situation, in every hardship, in every joy, in everything that comes to you one way or the other—seeing the Guru’s face, and therefore turning adversity into felicity. Using the practice of seeing that the teacher’s face, the Guru’s face is everywhere. Therefore I turn all adversity into felicity because I honor that blessing, you see. So that would be a great way to practice.

But what happens instead is that we project our own neuroses onto the teacher. Now as a teacher I’ll tell you that oftentimes what happens is that you have to hang back and just let the student do that thing they’re going to do. Just let them spin around and do whatever it is they have to do. Go on, knock yourself out. You kind of watch them go through their little freak out. They’re smooth. They kind of do their little neurotic thing, and they’ll freak in their response to this and their reaction to that and so forth. After a while the student will kind of calm down. What they’ll find is that it will come in their face so much that they’ll have to work some of it out. And they’ll also notice that, pretty much, the teacher’s not playing. You know, the teacher just doesn’t play the game with you.

Once in a while a student has been so locked in that confusion that (I’ve had to do this too) I’ve seen teachers kind of put on the chicken suit and go in there and dance with the student a little bit, because they need to make some kind of connection. They feel kind of out in space somewhere and they need to make some kind of connection. So even if there aren’t honest and true, disciplined and pure student-teacher relationship responses happening, there is the introduction to that which is the student and teacher kind of dancing around a little bit. But you must understand the teacher is dancing with your neuroses. That’s what’s happening.

In order to practice Guru Yoga well, here’s the trick: Most people think that Guru Yoga is about giving up your will. Now you don’t have to think any more, you have a teacher. Wonderful! Mazel tov! This is terrific! In fact, when you have a teacher, what that means is that you have to take responsibility. It means more responsibility, not less. The teacher is not here to blow your nose for you. The teacher is not here to take responsibility for you. If the teacher were here to take responsibility for you, the teacher could also have your enlightenment. And since that’s not what she wants because the teacher has already got their own situation handled hopefully, then you must understand that the responsibility is yours.

AA and Buddhism

March 29, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “AA and Buddhism”

In our teaching today, strangely enough, I’m going to talk about alcoholism and addiction; but I’m not going to talk about alcoholism and addiction in a way that specifically is meant to treat or help a person who is addicted to a substance. What I’d like to do is examine addiction, examine the idea of substance addiction or alcoholism and see how very much it actually is like the condition that we all find ourselves in in samsara. Although I myself have never been involved in the program, I know people who have and some of my best students actually have. I have been fascinated with the program that is used by Alcoholics Anonymous, the 12 Step Program, fascinated by it in that I can hardly believe the more I learn about it how completely compatible it is with the Buddha’s teaching, how completely compatible it is with Buddhist thought.

Now I can’t even say that about other religions. I myself saw His Holiness the Dalai Lama speak to the highest Episcopal bishops in the country, and heard these bishops say to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, ‘Well we’re all one religion anyway and we basically believe the same thing.’Now you must understand this is a man who is the head of a theistic religion talking to a man who is the head of a non-theistic philosophy. So, of course, His Holiness the Dalai Lama said, ‘While I appreciate that there are certain things that we hold in common, such as the wish to benefit sentient beings, the wish to act compassionately, and these are the important things that we have in common, still I must say your religion and my religion are not the same. And it betrays both of them to pretend that they are.’ Because, in fact, the heart of Buddhist philosophy is the awareness of the primordial empty state and that is not the heart of Christianity. The heart of Christianity is different than that and the way that it‘s practiced is different than that. The technology is different than that. So there are some common denominators. But I can say that far more than other religions, a program like Alcoholics Anonymous is very, very similar to Buddhism, and I find that fascinating. I’m really quite taken with that.

The reason why I want to bring this up at all is because of the way, personally, I view samsara, or the cycle of death and rebirth, and the way that I have been taught to view samsara by my teachers. Also, I’m bringing it up because of the similarity in a certain point or inner posture that one has to get to, that each one of us has to get to, in order to go further in either program. Whether it be Buddhism or Alcoholics Anonymous, there is a certain point that one has to get to. That point is the recognition of the condition. That point is the recognition of one’s state, the condition that one finds one’s self in. Now, again, I know very little about Alcoholics Anonymous, and any of you who wish to argue with me or contribute to what I’m saying are free to do so. But one thing I do understand is that generally it’s considered that an alcoholic is not help-able, is really beyond help, until they bottom out. That means they get to a point where they are just disgusted. They see that their life is really falling apart and there is literally nowhere to go other than forward or up. There is a bottom that’s reached. And many times during the history of an alcoholic, they’ll reach low points certainly, but they will not reach a point at which they bottom out. And it isn’t until they reach that point that they are help-able. They have to basically find themselves stripped down to a point where there is no other useful or beneficial or pleasant way to go. It’s just the bottom. How else can you describe the bottom? It is the bottom. And it is at that point that alcoholics are help-able, that they can begin to help themselves. Am I right, any of you guys who know about this? OK.

So from that point of view, when an alcoholic’s or an addict’s life becomes bottomed out like that, they are at the first good point they’ve been at for a long time. It may not feel like that to the alcoholic. To the alcoholic it is the most deluded and confusing time. It is the most helpless of times. It is the time in which they have almost no skills, no resources, and they are quite helpless. But it is the first time where any benefit can actually happen.

Experiencing Practice

March 28, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo offered during a “Good Heart Retreat”

When I start to talk about all of this, it seems like I’m saying, “Okay, go do this, and go do that.” Please don’t hear it that way. I wish that there was some way you could not hear so much with your ears, so that they go in two different channels and you have all those voices in your head arguing with you. But instead hear it with your heart and really kind of vibes with the spirit of the message that I’m putting out here. Again I’m encouraging you not to keep your practice outside as this isolated separate little phenomena that you do in your prayer room. But remember I’m asking you to integrate your faith into your life. To make it real. If we are talking about impartiality, equanimity, and purifying the poisons, then we are talking about abolishing hatred, greed, ignorance, jealousy, and pridefulness. We are talking about making the world a better place—to see as the Buddha has taught us. Really see it. Really get it. In our nature, we are the same. This is what the Buddha has said. In our nature we are the same. To really get that. You can’t do that by simply running around doing all these things that I’m telling you to do. Make a foundation, collect some soup, you know, buy a couple of Christmas presents. That’s not how it’s going to happen.

I have another revolutionary idea. Supposing, once again, you were to really get into your path in such a way as to get into the mysticism of your path. Not simply by visualizing properly, not simply by memorizing the entire Celestial Palace Mandala, so that you have every little bit of it just right. I don’t mean that. If you can do that, it’s great. But in the meantime while you’re doing that, let’s also do something else. Let’s have a mystical experience, shall we? I mean how hard can it be? We’re Buddhists. We’re supposed to be mystical. So rather than talking about the end of ethnic prejudice, the end of hatred, the end of pride, the end of greediness, instead of talking about it, what if we really practiced it and felt it in our practice. Supposing we could kick off this grand idea of being a spiritual community in the world by actually feeling it, by actually doing it in our practice and in our prayers. Supposing we together as a Sangha were to gather periodically and do a meditation. Oh, wow! It’s not written down in the Buddhist books! That’s okay. It’s not a sin to do this. I mean, you know, it’s a funny thing. We have this idea that since we’ve become Buddhist and our prayers are written down in here, we don’t get to say any others. You only get to say those, in Tibetan. Like the Buddhas are up there and they don’t understand anything but Tibetan. If you talk to them, they aren’t really listening, they only talk to the Asians. That’s ridiculous, isn’t it? That’s impossible.

So supposing that we, as Buddhist practitioners had meditations. These are meditations that I like to do by myself. What if we did these as a group together? What if we sat in meditation, simply watching the breath as we do in Vipassana meditation or in shiney meditation, simply gentle meditation with no particular visualization. In our meditation we would relax the mind and abide naturally in the natural state, simply watching the breath as the Buddha has taught. But from that point, what if in this meditation, abiding gently in the nature, we were to expand our view to include first, everyone that we were praying with, to celebrate in meditation, in practice, and in truth, one nature, to meditate gently and abide naturally together. If it’s possible for one, it’s got to be possible for all of us. Supposing after that, we were to reach out, gently, and in that natural state, abiding spontaneously, embrace or include the community around us. Supposing we could recognize that in essence, our breath is the same. Literally, it is. That our breath is the same. Supposing we could understand that in our nature, there’s no place where I end and you begin. Supposing we could do away with those ideas of separation, and in our meditation, expand and embrace till we are meditating as one people. Supposing we could go a little further and meditate as one nation. And what if we could go a little further still and meditate as one world.

Supposing we got so good at this, that in our meditation, we would begin to awaken to the equality and the sameness of all that lives, just like the Buddha said. Supposing in our meditation, we could feel our oneness, our sameness with everybody in Africa, everybody in India, everybody in China, everybody in Europe, everybody everywhere. Supposing we went beyond that to include, as inseparable from that nature, beings who are other species, like the animal kingdom. Supposing we got so good at this that we knew that we were one and could begin to live it. How hard can it be? Nobody’s asking you to work out or anything. All you got to do is sit there and do that. How hard can it be?

And then supposing beyond that we could think about those great pictures they’re sending back from the Hubble telescope. Hmm? We could think about this galaxy and what it looks like. We could think about all the galaxies, those beautiful pictures of all those galaxies in deep space. Have you seen any of those? Oh, breath taking! What if all of that were inseparable from you? What if all of that were inside of you?

Cultivating a Good Heart

March 27, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo during a “Good Heart Retreat”

Seriously, I do feel that there’s something wrong with the way we’re practicing religion. I really do feel that it is the job of spiritual people, who have as a centerpiece in their religion the idea of compassion, to really move forward towards ending suffering. A great first step is a good, hot meal for someone who’s hungry; some nice warm clothes for someone that doesn’t have enough; to know for sure that there is no child in your community who doesn’t get a Christmas present, a good one, not just left over crap, a good one.

Last year I remember when I was doing a little Christmas shopping, I think it was at Borders Bookstore, that I had this great, terrific little plan. I like to buy my daughter a lot of books. She’s a big reader and they keep her really quiet, when she’s not listening to Alanis Morrisette. So anyway, I buy her a lot of books and she’s very much a lover of books. When I went in there to buy a stack of books for her Christmas present, there was this great idea. It was a Christmas tree, and the Christmas tree had kids’ names on it and what grade they were in, what sex they were. You could pick one of the ornaments with the kids’ names off of the tree and you could buy them a book right there. I bought about ten books that day. How much more trouble is it to make it 11 or 12? It was a great idea. It was just a great idea. If we really started to brainstorm and think like that, we would come up with similar ideas.

Most of the lack that we experience, most of the poverty that we profess to have is merely conceptual. You know, it kind of goes like this: You say, ‘Gee, you know, it’s Sunday night and I’d really like to go out to eat, but I already went out to eat on Friday night and my budget only let’s me go out to eat once a week. So I can’t go out to eat tonight, but I’d really like to. Well, maybe I’ll just kind of mosey on over to a very cheap place, and I’ll get a very cheap thing.’ So you go to “Eat at Joe’s” or something, and it may not be the best food in the whole world, but you’re getting to eat out tonight. That means no dishes, so this is great. So you sit down at this place and you think, ‘All right now, I’m sticking to my budget, so I’d better get a cheap thing.’ You look at the cheap things and you go, ‘Well, you know, for just $2 more I could have a nice thing. And for $1 more than that I could have a salad too.’ So pretty soon, you kind of warm up to the idea that $2 or $3 extra’s not so bad. You know? Well, that kind of thinking can be encouraged in other ways also, because that extra $2 or $3 or that thing that you did by going out to eat and treating yourself is not going to break the bank. You have a concept that it’s going to break the bank, but it’s not going to break the bank.

So what if we were able to think that way ourselves. Like for instance, what about when we go grocery shopping? Supposing when we go grocery shopping, we have to spend $150, some families $200. Hey it happens, right? When was the last time you walked out of the grocery store with less than $100 worth of food? So, let’s say we walk in there and we think to ourselves, ‘Well, I’m going in to buy $100 worth of food, $150 worth of food.’ Would it really kill us if it cost us an extra 10% this time? Maybe $15 worth of canned goods or some food that we could share with our community. How painful is that? How painful is that when we see ourselves going up and down the Keeblers little elves aisle thinking which one of these gizmos do I want, because I can have them all. Or we go by the deli and think, ‘What deli thing must I have today?’ You know, we are an affluent society and we do that. And that’s fine, that’s fine. But supposing while we’re doing that, we could also buy some food that we could share with the community.

It’s not so unimaginable. Okay, maybe you don’t have that extra 10%, or don’t think you do. Start with 5%; start with one can. Start by asking somebody else if they have a can to lend you. But start, anywhere. I mean this is something that’s just easy to do. No one in our community has to go hungry. Even if we’re living here in Montgomery County and there’s not so much hunger here. If we can’t find any here, cross the line folks. There’s plenty in D.C.. What’s wrong with that? How hard is it? It’s not hard at all. So maybe this week you get Bartlett pears rather than exotic pears, and with that extra money you can buy a can of soup for somebody. That’s okay. You’ll live.

What I’m asking you to do now is to begin to formulate how as a community we are going to move into the world. As I explained earlier in the retreat, we are to some degree following a monastic format that was presented to us in Tibet. We have our ordained community. We have our lay community. But it’s never going to fly in that format here. In Tibet, the monasteries were isolated and separate. They experienced a whole different world which did not interface with the community very much. That’s not going to work here. The majority of Buddhists are probably not going to be ordained. So Buddhists have to get involved with the lives of householders. That has to be part of the Buddhist community in as respected and as strong a way as the ordained Sangha. So it would seem to me that while we are searching for a way to express the Buddha’s teachings in our society without fear and hesitation, with compassion and equanimity, let’s also toy with the idea of, as a Sangha, as a spiritual family, as a community, being a visible presence in our world. There should be a place to go to, and someone you can count on, but mostly a good heart in our community.

Commitment: From “The Way of The Bodhisattva” by Shantideva

March 26, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is respectfully quoted from “The Way of the Bodhisattva” by Shantideva as translated by the Padmakara Translation Group and published by Shambhala:

Commitment

1.
With joy I celebrate
The virtue that relieves all beings
From the sorrows of the states of loss,
And places those who languish in the realms of bliss.

2.
And I rejoice in virtue that creates the cause
Of gaining the enlightened state,
And celebrate the freedom won
By living beings from the round of pain.

3.
And in the buddhahood of the protectors I delight
And in the stages of the buddha’s offspring.

4.
The intention, ocean of great good,
That seeks to place all beings in the state of bliss,
And every action for the benefit of all:
Such is my delight and all my joy.

5.
And so I join my hands and pray
The buddhas who reside in every quarter:
Kindle now the Dharma’s light
For those who grope, bewildered in the dark of suffering!

6.
I join my hands, beseeching the enlightened ones
Who wish to pass beyond the bonds of sorrow:
Do not leave us in our ignorance;
Remain among us for unnumbered ages!

7.
And through these actions now performed,
By all the virtue I have just amassed,
May all the pain of every living being
Be wholly scattered and destroyed!

8.
For all those ailing in the world,
Until their every sickness has been healed,
May I myself become for them
The doctor, nurse, the medicine itself.

9.
Raining down a flood of food and drink,
May I dispel the ills of thirst and famine.
And in the ages marked by scarcity and want,
May I myself appear as drink and sustenance.

10.
For sentient beings, poor and destitute,
May I become a treasure ever plentiful,
And lie before them closely in their reach,
A varied source of all that they might need.

11.
My body, thus, and all my good besides,
And all my merits gained and to be gained,
I give them all away withholding nothing
To bring about the benefit of beings.

12.
Nirvāna is attained by giving all,
Nirvāna the objective of my striving.
Everything therefore must be abandoned,
And it is best to give it all to others.

13.
This body I have given up
To serve the pleasure of all living beings.
Let them kill and beat and slander it,
And do to it whatever they desire.

14.
And though they treat it like a toy,
Or make of it the butt of every mockery,
My body has been given up to them–
There’s no use, now, to make so much of it.

15.
And so let beings do to me
Whatever does not bring them injury.
Whenever they catch sight of me,
Let his not fail to bring them benefit.

16.
If those who see me entertain
A thought of anger or devotion,
May these states supply the cause
Whereby their good and wishes are fulfilled.

17.
All those who slight me to my face,
Or do me any other evil,
Even if they blame or slander me,
May they attain the fortune of enlightenment!

18.
May I be a guard for those who are protector less,
A guide for those who journey on the road.
For those who wish to go across water,
May I be a boat, a raft, a bridge.

19.
May I be an isle for those who yearn for landfall,
And a lamp for those who long for light;
For those who need a resting place, a bed;
For all who need a servant, may I be their slave.

20.
May I be the wishing jewel, the vase of plenty,
A word of power and the supreme healing;
May I be the tree of miracles,
And for every being the abundant cow.

21.
Like the earth and the pervading elements,
Enduring as the sky itself endures,
For boundless multitudes of living beings,
May I be their ground and sustenance.

22.
Thus for everything that lives,
As far as are the limits of the sky,
May I provide their livelihood and nourishment
Until they pass beyond the bonds of suffering.

23.
Just as all the buddhas of the past
Embraced the awakened attitude of mind,
And in the precepts of the bodhisattvas
Step by step abode and trained,

24.
Just so, and for the benefit of beings,
I will also have this attitude of mind,
And in those precepts, step by step,
I will abide and train myself.

25.
That this the most pure and spotless state of mind
Might be embraced and constantly increase,
The prudent who have cultivated it
Should praise it highly in such words as these:

26.
“Today my life has given fruit.
This human state has now been well assumed.
Today I take my birth in Buddha’s line,
And have become the buddhas’ child and heir.

27.
“In every way, then, I will undertake
Activities befitting such a rank.
And I will do no act to mar
Or compromise this high and faultless lineage.

28.
“For I am like a blind man who has found
A precious gem within a mound of filth.
Exactly so, as if by some strange chance,
The enlightened mind has come to birth in me.

29.
“This is the draft of immortality,
That slays the Lord of Death, the slaughterer of beings,
The rich unfailing treasure-mine
To heal the poverty of wanderers.

30.
“It is the sovereign remedy,
That perfectly allays all maladies.
It is the wishing tree bestowing rest
On those who wander wearily the pathways of existence.

31.
“It is the universal vehicle that saves
All wandering beings from the states of loss–
The rising moon of the enlightened mind
That soothes the sorrows born of the afflictions.

32.
“It is a mighty sun that utterly dispels
The gloom and ignorance of wandering beings,
The creamy butter, rich and full,
All churned from milk of holy Teaching.

33.
“Living beings! Wayfarers upon life’s paths,
Who wish to taste the riches of contentment,
Here before you is the supreme bliss–
Here, O ceaseless wanderers, is your fulfillment!

34.
“And so, within the sight of all protectors,
I summon every being, calling them to buddhahood–
And till that state is reached, to every earthly joy!
May gods and demigods, and all the rest, rejoice!”