Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Kyabje Rinpoche opens with a bold reframing of suffering: not as something to escape into meditation, but as the very fuel that ignites genuine spiritual yearning. Drawing on Śāntideva, he separates physical suffering (cold, hunger) from mental suffering (anger, jealousy, desire), arguing only the latter awakens true renunciation. He traces all afflictions back to egoism and teaches forbearance—true patience as the deliberate refusal to retaliate even when you have power, not weakness. He walks through guarding the senses via recollection and vigilance, maintaining alignment between meditation sessions and daily conduct, and responds to questions on faith, disappointment, and ego. For serious practitioners studying the Lamrim path.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2012-11-07 – KR.mp3
UUID: 589cfa0d-8485-444d-8e09-5088716e3f29
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Awakening Heart
Date: 2012-11-07
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~4,714
You have very wonderful weather, Geshe-la says. Today is the weather very nice. Is what? It’s not. It’s exactly it.
Oh, yeah. In India, on the other hand, it’s winter now. And from November onwards, it’s fairly cold for India. In South India? Delhi, it’s quite cold.
Very cold. Oh, it’s okay. They’re the old ones, he They’re gonna confuse him. They dumped him in there. As Śāntideva says in his Bodhicaryāvatāra, suffering has one quality.
From suffering arises renunciation or definite emergence. Now this is something we can see for ourselves. We can see as well that within this world of ours, both suffering and happiness are present. Clearly, suffering predominates. And the second verse of this quote, without suffering, there is no renunciation or no definite emergence must be understood correctly.
It is important to understand the full import of this quote to differentiate between the two types of suffering, physical and mental suffering. Here, we are not talking of physical suffering but of mental suffering. Specifically, it is difficult to generate a mind wishing to definitely emerge from cyclic existence, in dependence on physical suffering alone. For instance, if we look at the four sufferings of hunger, thirst, heat, and cold, clearly, the result of hunger, if it is extreme, is death. Thirst leads to being parched.
Extreme heat at a certain point leads us to just divesting ourselves whereas great cold, let’s say below zero forces us to dress differently. But it is different difficult for these physical sufferings alone to give rise to definite emergence. In Tibet, as you can well imagine, the suffering of heat is rare. In the true Tibetan summer, the highest Celsius I think people ever see in terms of temperature is perhaps 20 degrees at most. Whereas in the winter, the temperatures plummet well below zero.
Therefore, the greatest suffering from the standpoint of weather in Tibet is the suffering of cold weather. People have to dress up. They light huge fires in in in their houses, starting the fire with wood and then fueling it with dung, cow dung specifically, which tends to make the whole house very smoky and as Geshe-la says, very cozy. Most of Tibet is constituted of villages and obviously in the cities like Lhasa, the situation is different. Therefore in Śāntideva’s quote, without suffering no definite emergence, the suffering which is referred to is mental suffering.
And, here, this mental suffering, which is what we have to struggle against, is something which we understand full well. It arises from the afflictions, specifically from anger, from desire, from afflicted pride, from jealousy, and so forth. In every single case, these give rise to desire, to suffering. Excuse And we all understand clearly that when mental suffering arises, we cannot eliminate it through eating. We cannot eliminate it through drinking, through putting on or taking off clothes.
And while it might seem that alcohol would enable us to reduce or eliminate mental suffering, we all know firsthand that upon drinking, the potency of alcohol is effective for a while and then when its potency wanes, the suffering returns with a vengeance. Therefore, none of these means are effective to eliminate mental suffering. So while physical suffering can be eliminated through physical effort and this is something we all understand quite well, mental suffering cannot be eliminated in this way. It can only be eliminated through thinking. What therefore can eliminate mental suffering?
Only the spiritual traditions can and within them, there is an uncommon depth in the Buddhist presentation of how to eliminate mental Then experiencing ourselves the suffering which arises from anger, from extremely coarse desire, from jealousy, from envy, we will if we reflect, we think about this, ask the question, where does this suffering come from? And try to find a way to be rid of it. And it is at this point that we can connect fully with Śāntideva’s famous passage, without suffering there is no renunciation which was taught out of experience and in which we can have 100% confidence. All of us have direct experience for instance of the suffering which jealousy and envy inflict on us. And for instance, when we are overwhelmed with jealousy or with envy, Our tea, food is tasteless.
This is a direct result of the suffering of jealousy and of envy. Now clearly, it is not when we are overwhelmed, when we are controlled by jealousy and envy that we should reflect on the thoughts of jealousy and envy because we will be unable to do so. We will be under the power of this emotion. It is at present that we should try to do so reflecting on past instances of jealousy and envy and future instances of jealousy and envy and understanding fully their faults so that we can prepare ourselves for the time when jealousy and envy arise. So it is through reflecting in this way on the thoughts of envy, jealousy, jealousy, and anger that we actually will understand their faults and get some sense of what renunciation or definite emergence is.
Otherwise, for the likes of us, beginners like us, it is very difficult to do this. For beginners like us, it is much more helpful to think of defects and faults than of qualities. And specifically, it is much more helpful for us to look at our own minds and to see that in our minds there are indeed anger and jealousy. And to realize the suffering these causes and try to find a means to get rid of them and start in this very, very small and incremental way on the path. Then to start from the beginning by observing the great goals, the goal of full enlightenment and its qualities which we don’t have.
The three principles of the path which lead to full enlightenment, which are renunciation, bodhicitta and the correct view which we do not have. All of the qualities leading to renunciation which we do not have and at a certain point be overwhelmed at the idea of the length of the path and crushed by laziness and indolence. All of us are in the same boat in this matter. All of us have direct experience of jealousy, of envy, and of anger. Then it is extraordinarily beneficial for us to look at the suffering this has caused in our lives, not in the abstract, in the lives of others, but in our own lives and to generate a strong wish to eliminate this.
This is one of the benefits of studying in this way. Then if we practice like this, we will derive immediate benefit. So this is very clearly explained by Geshe Chekawa in his seven points of Mind Training. To take the example of how to eliminate a very powerful, very forceful anger, Geshe-la has explained that the antidote to anger is forbearance or patience. Then what do we mean here by forbearance?
When someone harms us physically or mentally and we ourselves experience this harm, forbearance or patience is not to abstain from retaliating because we are unable to do so. We are too weak to do so. That is not patience and that is not forbearance. Lots. It’s taught.. Geshe-la explained this many times.
He taught this a lot. Because it’s an important point, Geshe-la is going to go over it again and again. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has said that the true practice of patience or forbearance is when we are harmed physically or mentally by another and we have the power, we have the capacity to respond forcefully to refuse to do so, to abstain from doing so, understanding fully the force of anger. This is a true practice of patience and forbearance. Do you understand?
So this practice of forbearance or patience is shared by all of the vehicles, that of the hearers, the solitary realizers and the bodhisattvas. So the hearers and the solitary realizers have a practice of patience which is not a practice of the perfection of patience, but of mere patience. Bodhisattvas on the other hand alone practice the perfection of patients. And the difference is that a Bodhisattva practitioner, when he trains in patients, trains this with the motivation of not retaliating to the harm another has done to him out of a wish to benefit that person. As Geshe Chekawa says in the seven points of mind training, transform in this age of the degenerations, the afflictions into the path to full enlightenment.
Here, the age of the degenerations refers to the age of the five degenerations, a general degeneration of the times, of life, of the view, of beings in general and of afflictions which are uncommonly degenerated. In such an age, it is the advice of Geshe Chekawa to use these evil circumstances in the path and to transform them into the path to full enlightenment. This for us is very difficult and therefore for us instead of thinking of the goal which is full enlightenment, it is preferable to think of our present state and its faults which is our suffering due to the afflictions. For this reason, the seven points of Geshe Chekawa which focus on countering self-cherishing or egoism and on developing altruism or cherishing others begin with the verse, take revenge on the one guilty of all faults. Here, the one guilty of on of all faults on whom we have to take revenge is egoism, And we can clearly see if we analyze that the greater the egoism, the greater the desire, the greater the anger and so forth.
So clearly egoism underlies anger, desire and so forth. And this is why Śāntideva says in his Bodhicaryāvatāra, in this world of ours, all sufferings irrespective of which they are are rooted in egoism or self-cherishing. This is something which is difficult for us to understand at present. But if we check our own experience and we analyze, we will see that all of the suffering due to the afflictions such as anger, desire, and so forth is actually rooted in egoism. Then for us to, sharply reduce our egoism or self-cherishing at present is very difficult, perhaps impossible.
But we have to loosen it a little bit. And if we can reduce it just a little bit, we will see immediately an improvement in our mental well-being because all of the afflictions, anger, and so forth are actually rooted in egoism. Then this is something we can check for ourselves. The greater the egoism, the greater the suffering. Isn’t that the case?
And clearly, we can see that altruism is the opponent force. It is the opposite of egoism. The greater the altruism, the more egoism is reduced. Now here when we speak of training in altruism in cherishing others, we are not saying that we have to give away our house, our wife, our children, all our possessions. This would be extraordinarily difficult for us at present, but we have to train our minds in this.
That is possible, isn’t it? That is right. And let us therefore think for some two minutes on how we can reduce egoism or self-cherishing through applying the development of altruism and how in so doing the afflictions, anger, desire, and so forth will be reduced. This is why Śāntideva says in his Bodhicaryāvatāra, put aside for the time being Buddhahood and focus on training for this life. This is a very profound statement because Buddhahood is very far removed for us.
And indeed, when we train in bodhicitta, in forbearance, in definite emergence and so forth, we would eventually attain Buddhahood. But more importantly, we will be happy in this life and all of us do want to be happy in this life, don’t we? Regarding Lily’s question last time, Lily asked whether faith in a creator for those religious traditions which accept a creator can be called faith since from a Buddhist standpoint, there is no such thing as a creator god. Then Geshe-la thought about it and he says basically, when out of deep reverence for the creator thinking God has created this universe, I am but a creature. One has this extraordinary experience of faith in God.
Then clearly this is faith. There is no question about this. However, from the standpoint of Buddhist texts, since from the Buddhist standpoint under analysis, there is no such thing as a creator god or we can say this is faith, we have to say that its object is non existent. Now here the differentiation must be made in terms of the view. Geshe-la would like to point out that even within the Buddhist tradition, there are different views. The Buddhists are not unanimous in their view. So here, this is definitely faith, but it does not have an object. Now regarding the Lamrim in particular, which is our topic, we have to make a distinction between sessions and the period between sessions. Whatever the meditation we engage in during sessions, whether it may be a meditation on bodhicitta, on definite emergence, or on any of the perfections we are trying to realize, how should we behave between the meditative sessions? Clearly, between the meditative sessions, we may engage in deeds such as eating, drinking, going hither and coming back.
But if the deeds we engage with during the meditative, during the period between the meditative sessions and our meditations during the meditation sessions are totally incompatible, then this is not suitable. We can see that if during the meditative session, our meditation goes well and our mind becomes quite stable, quite solid on the topic. And then during the period between the meditative sessions, we are scattered and engaged in something completely different. This is quite a bad sign for the success of our practice. In the case of desire, for instance, desire can arise with respect to any of these sense objects, the visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile.
If we take the case of the visual objects, objects which we can see, obviously, we cannot somehow put an end to everything we see. It is not a matter of cutting that. It is a matter of preventing our minds from being attracted by visual objects. And for this, we do need the two mental factors which were explained in the context of the teachings on calm abiding which are recollection and vigilance. This is why it is said in Bodhicaryāvatāra, whatever activities of body and mind you engage in, examine them carefully.
Here, whether we are walking somewhere, going somewhere, or speaking with friends, or thinking, we should systematically examine our deeds of motion, speech, and thought with recollection and vigilance. To give an example, we can clearly understand that if we have a house with only two doors and we can solidly defend both doors, preventing intrusion, no thief can penetrate in the house. Likewise, in our cases, there are three doors, our body, our speech, and our mind. If we defend or protect body, speech, and mind, then we will not engage in the coarse afflictions. As Atisha said in a very profound piece of advice, the benighted are preoccupied with deeds, the wise with the mind.
We can see this in our own lives. If we take a very simple example such as daily conversation, if we are quite casual with the way we speak with others, we run the very big risk to be misunderstood and to give unwittingly offense to another person without knowing this. Then this offense which we have given unwittingly may turn against us. Sometimes when people listen to dharma, their face goes like this. And this is advice for life, Geshe-la gives you.
So he hopes it will be of help in your life. We can see for ourselves when we speak to people that we easily engage indeed such as lying, divisive speech, harsh words, and even idle talk. And we have to be very wary of these especially of lying, divisive speech, and harsh words. And Atisha has said, when in company, observe your speech. When alone, observe your mind.
This is indeed profound advice and it is one we should engage in in our daily lives. Now when we are alone, for instance, when we are studying, we know from firsthand experience that precisely because our minds are untrained, we have little or no concentration. And our mind cannot stay, for instance, on the text we are studying for more than a minute. It wanders off and if we are not careful, are unable to bring it back. So we must at once bring it back with a force of recollection or memory and focus it again on the text.
Ideally, when we are studying, it is no more than one or two seconds which should pass before the mind is brought back if it wanders. Put it back in. Back on the text. So in our cases, this is difficult because we have no experience of either recollection or vigilance. However, we have to start training and then reflecting on their qualities and perhaps keeping our mind focused at 100% on a text is difficult, but we should keep it focused at 70% on the text.
Then Geshe-la says he’s not unaware of the fact that saying that he’s also saying the mind wanders 30% of the time. It is probably Geshe Chekawa, one of the great Kadampa Geshe’s who plastered on the walls of his hut little pieces of paper on which he had written, mind do not wander. This is very powerful practice, isn’t it? Yesterday, I guess I was noticing you have a lot of tattoos. Maybe it’s the same thing.
He wonders. As I said in the eight verses of my mind training, at all times examine your behavior when unsuitable reflecting it is inappropriate for self and others, forcefully abandon it. Here examining systematically one’s own behavior whenever one notices this behavior is harmful, realizing it is harmful for both oneself and others, one must forcefully abandon it. In other words, apply forcefully the antidotes. And as the son of the conquerors, Tokme Zangpo, said, if I do not notice my erroneous behavior, who will?
Therefore, it is the behavior of the sons of the conquerors to abandon erroneous behavior. If we take, for instance, the monastic robes which Geshe-la is wearing, the chögu, the outer robe, and the shamtab, the lower robe, are robes which are worn in all the Buddhist traditions, whereas the tongak is a specifically Tibetan robe which is worn because of the cold. But the two lower robes are worn for which reason. It’s not for cultural or sociological reasons. It is to foster memory and recollection.
The recollection that one is ordained. Unfortunately, here, a side effect when one wears a shamtab and chögu is that when one goes for a walk, people look at one a bit strangely and think he’s A very important piece of advice is given in the Lamrim in the context of meditation. As you know, when one engages in retreats, one places a stone outside the retreat hut which indicates to would be visitors that the inhabitant of the hut is in a retreat and should not be disturbed. And the Lamrim says, it is not enough for the body to be in retreat. The mind must be in retreat too.
And the minds being in retreat depends on recollection and vigilance. As is said, with the rope of recollection, the hook of vigilance subdue the wild elephant of the mind, thereby eradicating all fear and fostering all virtue. This stanza refers to training one’s mind with recollection and vigilance as mentioned. And if we do this, then most definitely this very life of ours will become meaningful and becoming meaningful will enable us to practice virtue. Even if we are unable to practice virtue in this life, nonetheless, we will have created good conditions to be contented in this life and as Śāntideva said, put Buddhahood aside and focus on this life, meaning focus first on practicing in this life.
And we will stop here for today and if you have questions, Geshe-la will take questions at present. What is being said here is not to discard the idea of full enlightenment, but to make it subsidiary or auxiliary and to focus on what can be achieved in the here and now as Je Tsongkhapa himself says in Lamrim Chenmo, it is not the case that the one that one doesn’t think of other topics but one focuses mainly on one’s own welfare. Yes, please. So I understand that the practice of altruism minimizes self-cherishing. I wondered if it also assisted with the realisation of nonself or if that was something that was only generated through insight practices.
So through cherishing others, one gives rise to love and compassion and then in turn through engaging in in giving and taking, one generates bodhicitta. So the main goal of self-cherishing is to give rise to bodhicitta. However, having generated bodhicitta, the actual object of bodhicitta will have to be the view. So cherishing others, altruism, does lead to the view. Just in relation to what Geschela said earlier about faith and Lily’s question with Christians, my thought would be that, a lot of Christians would have faith in Jesus and Jesus existed.
And I’ve even heard some Buddhists say that Jesus was a bodhisattva. And so they would have faith in Jesus just in the way that many Buddhists have faith in the Buddha. So could Geshe-la comment on that, please? Geshe-la is not saying that Jesus does not exist. Jesus did come to this world two thousand years ago and it’s perfectly legitimate to have faith in Jesus whether a Christian or not.
The question is who sent Jesus? Then a Christian would assert that Jesus was sent by the father and the father is the creator. Having faith in that father from a Buddhist standpoint, world faith is faith in an object which does not exist. Yes, definitely. If one is in a situation where one’s family or one’s parents need one’s help and instead of helping them, one focuses egotistically on one’s own practice, then this is a clear case of self-cherishing or egotism.
There are numerous forms of egoism. There is a egoism which arises from a belief in permanence, the egoism which arises from believing in a self, and so forth. Can Geshe-la please give some practical advice on dealing with the disappointment that arises after failing when there’s chance to practice. So for example, when we’re faced with a chance to practice patients in a workplace environment or in a family home and we fail, an intense disappointment arises in our own mind for for want of having done better. How do we diffuse that disappointment?
Is that is it a matter of transforming that through purification using that regret as a basis of purification, or is is there another approach? Far from trying to dispel it, you should enhance it because that is not a non virtuous state of mind, it is a virtuous state of mind of regret which recognizes, let us say, the anger which arose as anger. This is very good at the end of the day before reciting whatever we recite like manis or whatever to check our day and to see whether our our day has basically been virtuous or has unfortunately been non virtuous and then to apply the four forces in this context. Geshe-la says in regards to patience, when we have the power to retaliate and we refuse to do so, this is the true act of patience or forbearance. Does this apply to say the affliction of desire?
So having maybe having the power to act on the desire for a food or a person and we decide to refuse to engage in our desire, is this the practice of patience because we and out of a wish to want to not pull that person into a state of desire is this patient. No. Wall, if you have the power to counter desire and you counter it that is virtue, it is not forbearance. It’s not patience. Geshe-la just spoke of egoism and different kinds of egoism.
Can that be explained, please? Numerous forms of egoism, three certainly we can we can give. The first is the egoism which grasps at permanence, the permanence of things. The second is the egoism which grasps at a self. The third is the egoism, which wishes to attain the state of an arhat for one’s own sake alone, liberation for one’s own sake alone.
I find it difficult to, We’re not saying not to practice for attaining full enlightenment, but in keeping with the quote from Je Tsongkhapa which Geshe-la gave, while not ceasing to see to think other thoughts, focus on your own welfare, we practice at the level we are at at present. And even though our ultimate goal is full enlightenment, we realize for that we need the preliminary practices of renunciation, bodhicitta and the correct view. And for these we need even further preliminary practices. This brings us back to where we are now. Just a couple of announcements.
Next week will be the last teaching and we will be offering body, speech and mind. It is the same with next Sunday, it will be the last Sunday and we will also be offering body, speech and mind because not everybody comes to both teachings. So you are welcome to make a small offering, offer a kata. Following that, we will be starting to study together the teachings, Mind Training Like the Rays of the Sun on Sunday morning and Patience Chapter six from Śāntideva’s Way of Life that Geshe-la taught recently and the commentary thanks to Jill and the volunteer team of transcribers is available to purchase donation very cheaply up there. Last, Tenzin would be here, but he’s got an eye infection unfortunately, so he would be spruiking the Friday night the sixteenth the Tibetan night, so in solidarity with the Tibetan people.
There was an email that was sent around. If you didn’t get it, then just maybe ask at the office. And oh, remarkable healing. Sorry. On the sixteenth, Friday night, we have a Tibetan talk, and the Sarah Hanson-Young will be there, and the Australia Tibet Council will be there.
And it’s entry ticket is only $10, and bring your own plate. And what I was, you know, planning here is that those who are from TBI, if we can book, you know, table, be easier that, you know, you can ring here in office and pay, you know, And that would be a fantastic night, you know, I would think. And there would be a a music and, you know, complimentary munchies. You know? And, yeah, I think I really strongly think is that we will have a great night so that, you know, quickly register now.
I’m going to sing one. No. Joking. No. No.
We have a very our own group, you know, Rising Lotus. Yeah. So the Deborah Gibson and her team, and there will be other Tibetans as well. So yeah. And you can ring up in office and book.
Okay? Good to see you’ve made making good recovery, Denzel. And I I also meant to say before that that there is a puja, a regular puja on Friday at five. And, also, if you haven’t caught the interview with Ilia on channel forty four, the community station, it will be on again on on Friday at half past four. And maybe I’ve I’ve managed to record it.
So so, anyway, that’s that’s that. Have some chai. Thank you. Bring up every day. Bring a text in our new cabinet, and welcome.
Yeah. No order. Just last one last thing. Nadine’s thongs have gone walkabout perhaps on the wrong feet. So if anybody has a pair of thongs that they shouldn’t have, then the owner is over here.