Alyce Zeoli | Tibetan Buddhist Altar

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?

The Way Out

March 22, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Faults of Cyclic Existence”

According to the Buddha’s teaching, the only end to the sufferings of cyclic existence in a permanent way is the cessation of cyclic existence. There is no intermediate or impermanent means that can accomplish the end of suffering that we experience in cyclic existence. Only the termination of the causes by which we are reborn in cyclic existence actually produces the end of suffering.

So the fault of cyclic existence is that there is suffering, and even happiness is impermanent; that it is unpredictable, and that its causes and effects are so interdependent that it is inescapable. The means by which one can escape cyclic existence is the miraculous intention of the enlightened mind, kind of penetrating into cyclic existence as a light being would penetrate into a tunnel and give us the means to go out of the tunnel. There is nothing about the tunnel, or the darkness in the tunnel that brings about the end of the tunnel. It is the light at the end of tunnel that brings about the end; and it is toward that light that we walk. In the same way, it is the practicing of a pure path, such as the Buddhadharma that brings about the cessation of the causes of being entrapped in cyclic existence. That is the cessation of desire, the cessation of the belief in self nature as being inherently real through meditation and practice. These things are actually the ones that bring about the end of the tunnel, or the end of cyclic existence and its sufferings.

It is necessary for us to examine the faults of cyclic existence. I believe that. Even if our intention is so kind, even if we have extreme kindness, even if we are so completely tuned into the suffering of the world that we are willing, at least initially, to practice til the end of our lives until we accomplish Dharma for the sake of sentient beings. And we should hold to that practice. I have taught again and again and again that our hearts need to be on fire with that love. I have tried to describe that fire as being the only allowable passion, the one that should warm you and should sustain you in every way. Still we must also discipline ourselves, really, or cause ourselves, or allow ourselves to experience what the faults of cyclic existence truly are. We must have an understanding of that in order to gain a firm foundation in our practice.

If we do not understand that all the joys of cyclic existence are impermanent, as well as the sufferings, that all of the circumstances are constantly changing and unpredictable, and if we do not understand that cause and effect are never ending and inescapable, we may not understand that nothing that we do in an intermediate way will really help the situation. And we will continue to do what we are doing now which is to try to solve our problems by moving things around a lot.

You know how we manipulate the circumstances of our lives. We will change our job, or we will find a new loved one or find a new boyfriend or girlfriend, and have another baby, or take ourselves out or go on vacation. These things are great. You should do them all. I don’t care. Have ten million babies. Have a hundred thousand lovers. Do whatever you want to. I don’t mean any of that. You will find out that ultimately all of these are very impermanent; and at that point we have to understand that it doesn’t matter how we manipulate the circumstances of our lives. Ultimately we have to understand that cause and effect relationships continue to cause cause and effect that continues and perpetuates cyclic existence. That’s it. The only way to really end suffering, to really bring about the cessation of suffering, is through accomplishing enlightenment. Nothing intermediate can work. In fact it tends to bring about more disappointment.

Haven’t you ever understood or seen yourself when you experience great happiness? Say you do have the boyfriend or girlfriend, and say you do have that new baby, and you do find yourself on vacation, almost afraid to experience how happy you are at that moment because you know that pretty soon that happiness will be terminated. There is almost a superstition that we have that if we are too happy right now that pretty soon that happiness will wear off real quick. And you know there is something to that in that if we think of that happiness as the end of suffering, we will be disappointed. You should allow yourself to be happy. Every moment that you can have a moment of happiness, by golly, be happy. Don’t worry, be happy just like the song says. One of my favorite songs. However, while you are not worrying and while you are being happy, please understand the faults of cyclic existence. Please understand that in order to accomplish the end of suffering truly and completely and permanently, and in order to be in a place and to be at a level of wisdom and understanding that you yourself can actually bring about the end of suffering for all sentient beings, that you yourself can experience the competency and the qualities necessary to bring about the end of suffering for all sentient beings, in order for that to occur, you must understand the faults of cyclic existence.

There is nothing in cyclic existence that brings about the end of suffering. It is the cessation of desire and of all causes that trap us in cyclic existence. These things brought to an end will bring about the end of suffering. And the name of the end of suffering is enlightenment. It is the only name of the end of suffering. There is no other way to look at it. Anything else is impermanent. It is okay, but it is merely phenomena. The end of suffering is enlightenment.

Please hold that in your mind as you catch yourself manipulating your life. Use that manipulation as you catch yourself trying to make yourself happy through intermediate ways or through holding on to instant gratification or doing all the things that we do so habitually. I don’t expect that we will change overnight, but use those situations as a catalyst to motivate yourself, to really hold on to and accomplish a true path. Use these things as a means to make your understanding move in the direction of a true path so that you can begin to establish a firm foundation or motivation in order to accomplish enlightenment. This is really the end of suffering, and in fact the only one.

So I hope that you will take these things to heart and use them. They are no good if you don’t use them. It doesn’t do you a bit of good if you just come here to listen. You really have to use these insights and try to develop for yourself a way to bring about your own enlightenment.

Meditation Instruction: Tonglen

March 21, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo:

I would like to show you one more technique that you can use. This is a very common technique. It’s a sending and receiving, but with a slight variation.

The first time that I met His Holiness Penor Rinpoche, this was the first thing he told me to do. His Holiness asked me, “Do you wish there to be no more suffering?”

“Of course! Of course, this is my only wish.”

Then he said, “As a Bodhisattva, will you take on the suffering of others, if you have the opportunity?”

I said, “Of course!”

And then he said, “Do you think if you do, that it will harm you?”

I said, “No, of course not. How can love harm somebody? That’s ridiculous!”

And he said, “Well, I’ll tell you, when you have faith in the Three Precious Jewels, the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha, and you align yourself with the great purpose of the Bodhisattvas, then you have nothing to fear.” And he said, “In that case, let me teach you how to practice.” He said, “Every breath that you take, every moment that you walk around, your breath is a cycle of OM, AH, HUNG.”

OM. We take in the suffering, no matter what it is, of all sentient beings, no matter who they are. We breathe it in. OM.

AH —is the space between the inhale and the exhale. AH is an immediate meditation on non-duality with the Three Precious Jewels, an immediate meditation on the nature as it is—inseparable, indivisible, free of concept. So there’s that meditation. AH.

And then, HUNG. Breathe out all of the virtue and merit that you and all practitioners have accomplished in the past, in the present and in the future. (This is like a spiritual credit card deal. You get to borrow on what you hope you’re going to do later).

So it’s OM, I take in the suffering of all sentient beings. I’m not separate. AH, I rely on the Three Precious Jewels. I am inseparable from the Three Precious Jewels. I rely on the strength of the Three Precious Jewels. And I am that. HUNG, I offer all of my virtue and merit, all the good I have ever accomplished in the past, present, and future, for the liberation and salvation of all sentient beings, every breath.

To walk past poor people, different colored people, people of different religions, and breathe in their suffering, breathe it in, really breathe it in. Hold your place, hold the line. Hold your place as a representative of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas on this earth with confidence, vajra courage. Then breathe out to them all of the virtue and merit that you have accomplished in the three times. Every breath of your life. It’s very, very hard to do at first because you get a little obsessive. OM-AH-HUNG, OM-AH-HUNG. People that have practiced watching the breath realize that once you start watching the breath, the breath starts acting weird. But little by little, you practice and you get through that. It becomes a very natural, sincere and very deep intention. Freely, I take on. Spontaneously, I abide naturally. Freely, I offer what I have. In a way, you become like a circle, inseparable from all that is, inseparable from others. You have the sense, eventually, of breathing for them, of inhaling and exhaling for them, of carrying them, of being completely inseparable from them. In that meditation, you find yourself just singing, ‘I love you.’. Is it okay for a Buddhist to say something, oh I don’t know, gushy? Yes it is. Because although the Buddha used different words, like compassion, in the west we are more familiar with the word ‘love.’ And so, to hold ‘all that is’ within you and from that place of mystical awareness, instead of painting a picture, ‘I love you,’or an affirmation, ‘I love you,’ to know from the depth of your being, ’I love you,’ it will change your life. And it will change our community if we begin to practice in that way.

Here we are asking for recognition. Not just saying the words. Not just doing the practice. But recognition. This is a different step. If we are going to be potent in our spiritual lives, and if Buddhism is going to be a potent force in this world, that’s where it has to start. And the great thing about spiritual practice is that there is no time better to start it than right this minute. I’d like to invite you to participate in that.

Now you know my everlasting practice. This is what I do all the time, because my teacher told me to, and I wish to repay his kindness. So I’m doing that all the time. I also find that when I meditate in a mystical way, and experience, accept and awaken to the inseparability and non-duality of all that lives—the sameness, the equality of all that lives—I’m always inspired, because there’s nothing else but to offer all that I have—my feet, my legs, my torso, my arms, my neck, my head, everything—for the liberation and salvation of all sentient beings. This is how to be moved by your practice, to be deep in your practice. This is why you’re wearing the robes, because you are ministers. It’s hard for us to understand because of the cultural change, but you are ministers. Make circumambulation around the Stupa. Pray to Guru Rinpoche as sincerely as you can that this pact that you have made is sealed. Pray that you will accomplish this. Pray that you will be a spiritual voice in a world that is longing to hear such a voice.

Inescapable Cause and Effect: The Importance of Buddhist Teaching

March 20, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Inescapable Cause and Effect”

Each of us has really difficult karma, tremendous obstacles, and each of us also has the karma for tremendous bliss. We cannot ripen them all in one lifetime. However, when one leaves this lifetime it is up for grabs what ripens in the next incarnation; and there are many factors that are a catalyst for the ripening in the next incarnation. Some of them are the condition under which you die; the thoughts that are in your mind as you die; the mind state that you have as you die; the ability to be able to negotiate the consciousness after the death state; the ability to remain aware, to not faint, to remain aware and with it during the after-death state, which almost no one has. The desire that you have experienced in this lifetime will act as a catalyst to ripen the events for the next lifetime. Everything that you have done in this lifetime will act as a catalyst to ripen the events for the next lifetime and in all future lifetimes. So according to the Buddha’s teachings, it is not necessarily a linear progression in that it is not possible to account for all the ripening karma in the course of one lifetime, and even in the course of the next lifetime and the next lifetime.

So you can actually be reborn under any circumstances. This is one of the main faults of cyclic existence. Even though we have a circumstance here that seems relatively bearable in that we are not very hungry, we are not very ugly, we are not very sick, and we are okay, still we will experience death in order to take rebirth at another time. Not knowing what the conditions of that rebirth will be can be considered an unbearable circumstance. I want to know where I am going. I find it unbearable to think that I wouldn’t know where my next incarnation would be: To not have the option to prepare for the next incarnation; to not be able to know that I would not be reborn in some other life form that is offensive to me or that is ugly to me or is not at all pleasing to me; or to be reborn as a human being where I would experience intense suffering. These things I find not bearable. So if we understand that cyclic existence is structured in that way, or seems to occur in that way, we might find that even the idea that we might take rebirth becomes something that we can use as a motivation to practice.

The thing about cyclic existence is that it is unpredictable. You must know this by now; and this should give you a clue as to how we hide these things from ourselves. But I know that you know this by now because all of you have had experiences, I have certainly, where, , things will be going along just fine in a way that looks like everything is under control and it looks as though you have what you need. You have the relationships that you need, the money that you need; you are doing okay. It looks like things are progressing nicely. And then suddenly something will hit you right out of the blue, whether it is a terrible mood or whether it is a circumstance or whether it is a death, somebody that you know, or a loss of some kind, some experience that will seem as though it came from nowhere. And if only this hadn’t happened everything would be just fine. We have at least a million of, ‘Oh, if this only hadn’t happened,’ in our lives and we don’t see where they come from. And so cyclic existence is extremely unpredictable and there are always things that can ripen in an instant way and bring about change that is unbearable to us.

Another fault of cyclic existence is that there is nothing in cyclic existence that brings about the end of cyclic existence. That is hard to understand. And if you examine it yourself, you will find that you think that if you just keep playing along with it eventually it will work itself out. We think that if we just kind of live through our lives it will just sort of guide its way through or naturally flow in such a way that we will reach a threshold of wisdom, and suddenly all of our problems will be solved. This is Western thought. This is what we are brought up to believe. We are taught, however, by the Buddha, who has experienced both cyclic existence and also the awakening called supreme enlightenment, that this is not true. There is nothing inherent in cyclic existence that will bring about its end. Cyclic existence is simply that, cyclic.

In cyclic existence there are the root causes such as the belief in self nature as being inherently real and the clinging to ego that bring the perception of self and other and the constant compulsion to reinforce the perception of self and other, that bring about desire. And desire is the root cause of all suffering. But from those root causes are begun the next level of root causes which are hatred, greed and ignorance. And hatred, greed and ignorance, we constantly experience to some degree or another. We constantly need to reinforce ourselves by putting down someone else or experiencing a negative feeling toward someone else. We need to judge something in some way in order to understand our own nature. We constantly have the experience of not realizing the profound nature of enlightenment or the nature of primordial wisdom, and that we call ignorance. We constantly experience greed and we constantly need to define ourselves by what we have. We constantly need that and from these points come the other forms that continue cause and effect relationships, continually experiencing one cause begetting an effect, begetting another cause and begetting an effect. We experience that constantly and consistently. According to the Buddha’s teaching, whenever we experience a moment of hatred or whenever we experience a moment of anger…. Anger. Who among you has not experienced anger? How many times a day? According to the Buddha’s teaching, even when we experience even a moment of anger it has within it the potential for worlds of karmic interaction.

One cause continually creates, always and always. There is never any exception. Cause will create effect. There is no cause that does not create effect; and effect will actually act as another cause. If someone, for instance, strikes you, that must have a cause. You may not know what the cause for that is, but it didn’t just happen. It has a cause. And if you get angry when that person strikes you, then that continues and that is an effect from the striking, but it is also another cause and it will begin new circumstances. This relationship of cause and effect constantly perpetuating itself is called interdependent origination. It is such an interdependence it is almost like the weaving of a fabric; and cyclic existence is actually made of this fabric that is woven together, a constant cause and effect. There is no circumstance within cyclic existence that brings about the end of cyclic existence.

The exception to that—it isn’t really an exception—is that within cyclic existence one can begin to strive to purify the mind. One can begin to strive to practice in such a way that one’s own pure nature is realized. One can begin, very importantly, to accomplish compassionate activity to purify the mind through kindness, to begin to experience loving kindness and compassion. And through that, cause and effect will happen so that one can meet a pure path; and a pure path is the means by which one can exit cyclic existence. There is nothing within cyclic existence itself that will naturally begin the end of cyclic existence, that will actually bring about the end of cyclic existence. But in fact one can actually begin to purify the mind in such a way that you can meet with a pure path. And the pure path is actually considered an emanation, the miraculous intention of the Buddha, or the mind of enlightenment. It intersects with cyclic existence in such a way that one can practice this pure path, and having practiced this pure path can thereby exit cyclic existence and accomplish enlightenment.

The Foundation of Compassion

February 2, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “The Foundation of Bodhicitta”

You have to understand the faults of cyclic existence in order to practice the ultimate bodhicitta. One must truly come to understand and be able to make the commitment that there is a cessation to suffering, but it is not found in revolving endlessly in cyclic existence. It is found in achieving enlightenment. In the state of enlightenment, having abandoned the faults of cyclic existence, the hatred, greed and ignorance and all of those qualities that produce the suffering of cyclic existence, one has effectively ended their involvement with cyclic existence and can come back by choice as a returner in order to be of benefit to others. This is the ultimate bodhicitta, the ultimate kindness.

I think about my teachers and I cannot believe their kindness. . For instance, when I was recognized as a reincarnate lama,people asked me how I felt about my own recognition.

I said to them, “There are days when I’m not too thrilled with it. To tell you the truth, I wish it could have some other way. It is not what it is cracked up to be.” When I think about my recognition, I think about one thing that amazes me. I think about my guru. How in the world did he pull the strings to make it happen? I had never heard of him before. He comes from the other side of the world, from India, into my living room and recognizes me. How did he find me? How did he do that? What kind of compassion would make that possible?

The story that I hear is that when he was a little boy and a young lama engaging in certain practices in the temple in Tibet, he actually said prayers that he could find this incarnation because he witnessed one of the relics from the predecessor of this incarnation. Just due to that prayer because he has such enlightenment, this amazing thing happened. How could I have met him? How could that have happened? It’s a miracle. I think about the kindness of such an effort as that. I think of this incredible kindness to be of such a mind that can do something in such an effortless way and have it benefit sentient beings. What practice he must have engaged in! How pure that mind must be! How amazing that he would go through the trouble—ultimate compassion, incredible, ultimate compassion. Unbelievable. He is the only one that could have done that, and he didn’t fault on that responsibility. He did that. That is what I think about that recognition: It is proof of his kindness. Only with the mind of enlightenment can we affect cyclic existence in such a way as to produce enlightenment for others. That is the kind of kindness that I wish to emulate. I wish to throw myself into that. I hope that you do. I hope that you can see the value of that.

This doesn’t mean that you have to wear robes or hole yourself up in a cave somewhere. You practice as you can, the best way that you can. Just give it your best shot. But in order to make your decision you must first understand the faults of cyclic existence. You must understand how cyclic existence develops. And you must understand what the end of suffering actually is and the meaning of ultimate bodhicitta. It means the end of all of it. It means the end of all the cause and effect relationships that create this phenomena.

Force and Energy of the Buddhas

January 1, 2015 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching offered by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo during a Phowa retreat:

The wrathful deities are the same pure, holy, primordial wisdom nature that is your nature. They’re fully awakened. They are just as terrific as the guys that sit around looking fancy in their robes. But these deities, when you see them, will look terrifying, because what you are seeing is a visual display, or a visual indication of the quality that they are displaying. That is the quality that they are displaying registering in your eyes. That and none other—it is your eyes that do the interpreting. Now when we see them artfully drawn for our purposes, we see them in a way that we can interpret. We see them with skull necklaces and we see them with animal skins on them. We see them with a mala or necklace of dead skulls, and then we see some of them with necklaces of freshly severed heads. I mean, really, what an outfit! Myself, I wouldn’t mix gold and silver, and I wouldn’t mix dead heads with fresh heads, just seems inappropriate to me. But anyway, that’s different! Anybody listening? Or is it thunder outside, huh? So, they appear to us in a form that we can understand. We are to understand, for instance, that the mala of freshly killed heads indicates the death of ego. I mean, he didn’t run around and chop off heads and make a necklace. This is an indication of the death of ego, you see. So a functional display is what that is.

Now you will see the wrathful deities in the bardo also with a similar functional display; and it may look exactly the way the thangkas look, or it may look slightly different according to your individual interpretation. But guaranteed, when you see the wrathful deities, the first tendency will be to run and be frightened because you are looking at the activity of the Buddhas. If we were to jump up and down in our ordinary bodies and make as much noise as we possibly could, we would still be only gathering together samsaric powers. You see what I’m saying? We’d only be using what we have right now to use, and that’s not even all of our brains, let alone all of our nature. We’re not even awake to our nature. So we’d only be able to use this kind of power. And yet we could make a fearsome din if we really tried, couldn’t we? Well, think about, then, the wrathful deities. They are expounding all of the forcefulness of the Buddha nature as it transforms ignorance into bliss, and it’s being displayed. Well, it’s going to be noisy, it’s going to be really dramatic, it’s going to be impressive, it’s going to be colorful, and it’s going to be unusual as hell! Because there is nothing usual or ordinary that we have ever seen that can, in fact, pop us from ignorance into bliss. So you must prepare yourself for the seeing of the wrathful deities.

Those of you who practice Vajrakilaya and have taken the time to purify your minds through the actual visualization of Vajrakilaya, will then become familiar, even if you do not recognize Vajrakilaya per se, which may happen, because in the bardo state one of the things that you’re fighting is the same thing you’re fighting when you’re sleepy in practice. To the degree that you are able to overcome sleepiness in practice and while you are receiving teachings, to that degree you will have clarity in the bardo. Doesn’t that scare you! To the degree that you have the dullness and the lethargy and the inability to stay awake during class and the inability to stay awake during practice, you have in the bardo a funny kind of… Y know how it is when you’re either practicing or just waking up during the practice, when you try to remember what the visualization is and your mind kind of slides off of it? You know what I’m talking about? You sort of get the visualization and suddenly it’s almost like you fell off. It’s slippery almost, and you find yourself someplace else. Well, you’re kind of half in and out of the bardo of dreaming there, believe it or not; not too well in the bardo of concentration or meditation. You’re kind of half in the bardo of dreaming, and the mind has this slip-slidey kind of funniness, a jelly-like quality that sort of runs everywhere. Well it’s the same thing in the bardo. So you may look at Vajrakilaya and if your practice has not been that good you may not actually truly recognize Vajrakilaya and what that is. But you may be able to center on one small object, like, let’s say, the phurba that Vajrakilaya holds. That may key you and you just recognize the hand implement. All you have to do is take refuge in the hand implement. That is the first step, and it will lead to liberation in the bardo. Recognizing the meaning of the hand implement, thinking to yourself, “That is the very phurba that will pierce the ignorance of my mind. I see that, I want that.” The devotion comes up, like ‘that is the phurba that will pierce the veil.’ You look at that phurba and with the force of your own inner awareness that you still have in the bardo state, you will go toward that phurba. And that is liberation through recognition.

That is the kind of thing that happens with the blessing of generation stage practice, but, remember, you have to be prepared and forewarned for the movement, dynamism, the dramatic display of the wrathful deities. They are the force and activity of the Buddhas. What do you think that’s going to look like! That’s a big deal. That’s a big deal. That is equal to the force that it takes to liberate all sentient beings. It’s got to be more forceful then Hiroshima, any bomb that we have ever seen, the biggest bombs that we can imagine. It must be more forceful than that. Therefore, prepare yourself to recognize the blessing of the wrathful energy of the Buddhas.

The Appearance of the Wrathful Deities

December 31, 2014 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo offered during a Phowa retreat:

So, you are training; you are preparing. You know what to expect. You know that you will go into a state that is unfamiliar to you, with senses that act differently than your senses act now, although they will be similar in some ways. You know that you will have many choices. You know you will see things that are uncomfortable for you and unfamiliar; you will see things that are more familiar. You are beginning to understand that there are things that you should look for and things you should go toward, but mostly, you have heard the most precious piece of information. You will hear it again and again and again. And that is that these things that you see in the bardo are not to be feared. They are displays and emanations of your own mind. No matter what they look like, no matter what you see, no matter how unfamiliar you are. From the very brightest lights to the very most confused and deluding negative lights… The lights that emanate from the hell realm are things that are an expression of some particular aspect of your own nature—whether it is your nature in a state of defilement, or the samsaric elements of your nature, or whether it is your nature in this most pure form, which is your ultimate primordial Buddha nature. Everything that you see in the bardo will be you. There is nothing to run from; it is childish and stupid to run. You cannot run away from yourself; it will pursue you. As you will see in the bardo, there are cycles of coming back and trying to choose again, coming back and trying to choose again. You’ll see that as we move on. So let’s move on.

Now we have come to the part of the bardo where the peaceful Buddhas have finished appearing. In order for you to be continuing in the bardo now, this means that the peaceful Buddhas have appeared. You have seen your nature in all its different elements and displays;. You have seen the displays of the qualities of your nature, but you did not recognize them, and you did not follow them. Fortunately, you also saw the displays that are sort of vibrational showings or displays, and also ways to enter the different six realms of cyclic existence, and so far you have not entered those either, for whatever reason.

It is hard to say what the reasons are. It can be that habitually you are a person of extreme caution and are unwilling to do anything without a great deal of examining. Of course that won’t work, because if you have not been trained, you are examining bardo with the same, if not more, delusion than the delusion that you have in life, when you could not examine enough to be able to get yourself out of samsara anyway. So that kind of examination will not serve you. It is this training and devotion to one’s spiritual mentor that will save you. That is what actually works. But somehow you’ve managed not to go into rebirth at this time. You are still in the bardo. Now at this time, the wrathful deities appear.

When the wrathful deities appear, they do so singularly and they do so en masse. They appear to you in different ways—it’s a very dynamic kind of presentation. It is also with the peaceful Buddhas, but with the wrathful Buddhas it is even more so. The reason why is that the wrathful Buddhas—you’ve seen pictures of them, or the next time you go into the Prayer Room you should look at some of the wrathful Buddhas and you will see—they are downright spooky looking. And you ask yourself, “Whoa, what, are they like Guido and Raoul, the hit men from New York?” What is it? When the good guys can’t talk you into it, the bad guys beat you into it? You must wonder what the wrathful deities are. The wrathful deities actually are symbolic and are meant to display the aspect of enlightened compassion and method that is forceful, dominating, expanding, progressing, purifying. These are all very active words, aren’t they? They’re very dynamic and active words. There are, of course, displays and expressions of one’s Buddha nature that appear as absolute stillness and absolute emptiness, and very peaceful kind of display. Of course, that is the wisdom aspect of one’s own nature. But what is the method aspect of one’s own nature? If wisdom and method are non-dual and completely inseparable, as they are, looking at them from the purely awakened state, then it must also be, just as much, if stillness is your nature, then movement is your nature. They are the same and indistinguishable. If emptiness is your nature, then fullness is your nature, because in truth, in the awakened state, emptiness and fullness cannot be distinguished. They are not only inseparable, they are not distinguishable. It is only we that separate emptiness from fullness and peacefulness from aggression or activity.

So, as in the case of Vajrakilaya, which many of you here practice, Vajrakilaya is the very wrathful display of Vajrasattva. Vajrasattva. Who could be more peaceful than that deity who is meant to purify all of our samsaric afflictions, who has the capacity to purify all of our “sins,” all of our afflictions, all of our ego clingings, our hatred, our greed, and our ignorance? Who is more forgiving and more peaceful than that? And yet the wrathful display of Vajrasattva is Vajrakilaya. Does that mean that Vajrasattva has PMS and on a monthly basis emerges as Vajrakilaya in a real bad mood? Do you think that’s what it is? No, that’s not what it is; of course it’s not. It is the same nature. It is the same. Vajrakilaya is completely indistinguishable from Vajrasattva. They are the same in their function. They are the same in their capacity. They are the same in their enlightenment. But they are different in the display of method. That is all.