Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 48-minute teaching from the Compendium of Valid Cognition series, Kyabje Rinpoche opens with a guided meditation on the awakening heart — the aspiration to free all beings from suffering. He demonstrates how repeated meditation reduces effort through habituation, using Dharmakīrti’s analogy of dry wood catching fire and burning continuously without reignition. The core teaching positions compassion as the root of the bodhisattva path: essential at the beginning (like a seed), middle (like watering), and end (like ripening the harvest). He then distinguishes analytic meditation — using reasoning to penetrate an object’s nature, such as emptiness — from stabilizing meditation, which rests single-pointedly on established conclusions. A cautionary example warns against meditating on objects unrelated to liberation. He concludes with breath meditation as a practical method for settling discursive thought. For practitioners with Buddhist background.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1993-09-17 – 19A – KR.mp3
UUID: 98d75d19-69e2-4405-9276-376e7a0e2bde
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Compendium of Valid Cognition
Date: 1993-09-17
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~2,610
So meditate for ten minutes, cultivating the kind hearted attitude of the awakening heart. Beginning with love and compassion expressed in the thoughts that I myself must I will free all living beings, including myself, from all of their suffering and lead them to complete happiness. In order to lead all living beings to such a happiness divorced from all suffering which is completely stable, that if I myself do not free myself from suffering and achieve complete happiness, then there is no way I can bring this about. In order to free myself from my suffering and to find complete happiness, I must eliminate all the various faults and bring to consummation all my excellent qualities through the training of my mind. And in order that my mind training progress well, I must first listen to the various teachings on the methods of practice, what is to be avoided, what is to be, practiced, and thereby gain the wisdom arising from listening.
And reflecting upon that meaning, examining it, then I will gain the wisdom arising from reflection. And then again and again, taking what I have understood to mind, gain the wisdom arising from meditation. In order to achieve that, I will meditate well. Quoting from a verse by Dharmakīrti. He is citing the fact that in the course of meditation that the power of mind is, increases from subsequent to from from previous to subsequent accustomed familiarization through this process that we one can if meditating today and then tomorrow and then the next day that there is an increasing habituation to what is being familiarized with such that it becomes there’s a continuity which becomes less and less effort is needed to be made to gain the same understandings.
And this is made clear through an example, an analogy. It’s just like dry wood. When it is set on fire, then it will burn continuously and there’s no further effort which needs to be made, in reigniting it. It will continue to burn.
So whatever we may be meditating, whether it be the awakening heart or compassion for example, initially it’s quite difficult to meditate upon but and also same would be true in meditation upon selflessness and the development of wisdom that initially they are difficult to meditate on. But in through continuous meditation and consistent meditation, these become effortless. Just like the initial igniting of the wood and it will burn burn continuously without needing to be the effort of reigniting it. So we can, through meditating again and again on compassion, it becomes a it begins to arise effortlessly. And that is the root of the path of the universal vehicle.
If if we if we possess compassion, we can generate the awakening heart. If we do not possess compassion, there we cannot generate the awakening heart. So it is necessary to make, again make effort in generating again and again compassion. So it is said that compassion is extremely important in the initially, in the middle, and finally at the end. It is the it is like the seed of all the excellent qualities of the universal vehicle.
It is like if we’re going to grow a crop, then initially we have to sow the field, have to plant seed. So it is the seeds from which all the universal vehicle qualities are generated. In the middle, it is necessary that we again and again cultivate compassion so as not to allow our awakening heart to degenerate. And finally, it is important in the end. Compassion is is important in in the beginning because it is like the seed from which all other other excellent from which the crop will eventually arise.
It is like the seed from which the excellent qualities of the universal vehicle will be generated from. In the middling, it it is compassion is extremely important because it is like the water having planted the seed is necessary to again water and water to again and again water the field to to so that the sprouts will not wither. And this is that is to say that to necessary to cultivate compassion again and again so as not to allow the awakened heart to wither or to degenerate. And then finally, it is necessary in the end in order to to ripen the crop to to gain a bountiful harvest. And likewise, it is necessary to again and again cultivate the compassion even in the end because it is what will bring about well-being and happiness for both oneself and others.
And it is important as in the yin it’s a great benefit because a Buddha is one that has, for the sake of others and oneself, eliminated all their various faults and brought to consummation all of their excellent qualities. And this thus far has been brought about through the force of their compassion. And they go on to bring about out of the force of their compassion to bring about the welfare of others through their emanations, the taking of rebirth, through their teaching of the Dharma, in accordance with whatever is the disposition of the living beings, if they and whatever they desire or if they desire liberation or if they desire Buddhahood to teach teaching them the Dharma in accordance with their desires and teaching them what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected. And all of these activities, bringing about the welfare of of others, is motivated by the wake by the by compassion. .
So all of the excellent qualities of the universal vehicle, have as their root great compassion. So generally, we like to meditate. And what should be the object of our meditation? It should be something which is beneficial, something which brings about a beneficial result for both oneself and others, both temporal and ultimate wealth benefit. If we meditate on such objects, then this meditation will be really beneficial, really useful.
So what is meditation? Meditation is something which occurs within the mind as though a way of thinking. It is not something though we’re done with the body. We sit in a straight posture, but then the body is left. So how we’re how do we go about how do we proceed in our meditation?
In general, there are two types of meditation. There is are analytic meditations and stabilizing meditations. So in meditative in analytic meditation, first we establish the object that we’re going to meditate on. Then, having established that object, we begin to analyze its nature. We, again and again, making use of reasoning, reflecting upon penetrating into the object, reflecting upon its nature, the use of reasoning, we are continually investigating the object.
For example, if we were to meditate on emptiness, we might, we might choose as the establish as our object of of our meditation one’s own aggregates, one’s own mind. And then we proceed with reasoned analysis. For example, with respect to the mind is that the mind is empty of true existence and we supply reasons. We say because of reason that it is dependent arising or that it arises in dependence upon causes and conditions through, in all these various ways, examining the nature of the mind in terms of its being empty of true existence. So having proceeded through with a reason analysis and come in to an analyzed conclusion that the mind is empty of true existence.
When that appears well to the mind, that the object, that the mind is empty of object of negation. When that dawns to the mind, one comes to a conclusion as to that, then one would then abide single pointedly upon that established conclusion. This abiding single pointedly upon that established conclusion would be stabilizing meditation. So having done so, our mind will not continuously abide upon that object, and from time to time the object will be lost.
So from time to time it’s again it’s a it’s a it’s necessary to again to make use of a reasoned analysis until again the the object of negation, the emptiness, the object of negation, appears to the mind. And then again applying meditative, I mean stabilizing meditation. So it is, there is a course of the meditation, is a combination of both analytic meditation and stabilizing meditation. In this way we can bring about the realization of emptiness. So in meditation the subject is the mind meditating upon its object.
And the mind this object might be different objects such as emptiness or selflessness, etc. So there is the subject which is the mind, which is meditating upon the various types of objects. Meditation? In the meditation as we’ve been describing, if we were to realize emptiness, then we could abandon grasping at true existence and thereby abandon all the afflictive emotions. Having abandoned all the afflictive emotions, we could achieve liberation.
So this is gained through the realization of emptiness which arises through meditation. Meditation, we have described meditation in terms of its object, in terms of various objects, and the subject being the mind which is realizing those various objects. But there is another type of meditation, which is that it is the subject itself, that is the mind itself, which is transformed in its entity. And such types of meditation as meditation on love and compassion and the awakening heart. Here, it is not, we are not meditating on an object but we are trying as it were in the previous examples but we that a part of the mind is generated in the entity of compassion.
A part of the mind is generated in the entity or the nature of love. A part of the mind is generated in the entity or or nature of the awakening heart. If if one generates one part of one’s own mind in the entity of compassion, then one’s mind is in the nature is in a skillful nature state. Through that, then one’s own mind as a whole is in an extremely healthy state. And one accumulates a vast accumulates a vast greater potential.
And because of having accumulated this vast creative potential or merit, one upon reflecting upon or thinking about emptiness is able to generate the wisdom realizing emptiness. And one also in dependence upon such accumulation one can generate the determination to awaken renunciation and the awakening heart. And once we’ve generated the awakening heart, then we have generated the root of all the excellent qualities, both minor and major, of the universal vehicle. And then our various practices that we engage in, such as generosity, ethics, tolerance, etcetera, all become tremendously powerful and one quickly, by this means, achieves Buddhahood. If we if we if we meditate in this way, then we can bring about there is tremendous benefit.
Why? Because through this means of meditation we can bring about the final elimination of unwanted suffering and the achievement of happiness. In 1980, I was staying in Delhi at Tuśita Dharma Center. And I gave a teaching similar to what I taught the Dharma there and we used to have questions and answers. But also we had interviews like we do on Mondays here.
People can come for private interviews and one person came and asked me questions and I asked him the question, What is we’re talking about meditation. I asked him, What does he meditate on? And he says, I meditate on earth and fire and water and atoms. Think I think it’s it’s rather strange actually. I I really wonder how much benefit there is in meditating on objects.
I mean to reflect upon earth or to meditate on water or form, I don’t see how it can bring about the end of one’s suffering, how it can eliminate one’s suffering and serve as a means to find happiness. So it’s a good thing to meditate, but we have to know what to meditate on. We have to know first what the benefits are of our meditation. Then we can expect some kind of results. Otherwise, there is a danger that we’re just simply wasting our time.
So we should know how to proceed in meditation. First off, our object of meditation should be something which is worthwhile. Then then we have a healthy healthy motivation for our meditation. And then we should know how to proceed in our meditation in an appropriate fashion. Example, is a meditation on objects which tend to generate attachment.
If we were we if we think again and again about a beautiful object, something with a beautiful shape, color, design, then our attachment toward through this meditation, that is to say habituation or accustoming, our attachment will grow greater and greater. So, you know, if we were to think again and again about an object and think how we could thinking about how wonderful it was, how in in supplying all various types of reasons, in all ways how attractive it was, then our our our attachment would grow greater and greater toward that object. That is a form of meditation. And the same would hold true from the point of view of something that we don’t like if we reflect using various reasons about thinking, and this person did this last year, then they did this this year, then they did this to my family, they did this to my friends, thinking again and again in that way, then we’re going to develop tremendous anger. So we could get to the point where if that person came to the place where we’re at, we’d hit them. So these are our ways of meditation, the various ways that we’ve just described.
But in the same it holds true for in terms of meditation in the context of Dharma. We again think about the nature of the object supplying various reasons about and through hearing about the object and reflecting upon it using various reasons, again and again we develop a we generate various states in relationship to that object which eventually become effortless in in their their generation, their their development. There are some people who who meditate on light. Like, they meditate on and so we have to look to see, well, is that of any use? The meditation on the breath, I think, is really useful because, you know, we are our minds are every moment they’re generating conceptions, thoughts.
Thoughts are continually arising and they they, this thinking process and causes a great deal of trouble. If we if we follow the the inhalation and exhalation and not allow our minds to to drift to other objects, that we completely abide upon the, for example, the white light going out with the exhalation or black light going out with the exhalation or white light coming in with the inhalation, then our mind is we have a single mind and all other minds are blocked. So if our mind is abiding only upon the inhalation and exhalation of the breath, then all of these various thoughts and conceptions are blocked, and the mind is able to abide in a very relaxed manner, and this brings happiness. Analogy would be, you know, the the people stay at Buddha House, when there there are those times when Buddha there are many people coming here and they’re they’re they’re walking around and things become very busy and it’s not there it’s not very perhaps very pleasant for them. But then when everybody leaves, then it’s a very relaxed time.
I know I stayed here for three years.