Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 107-minute teaching, Geshe Kyab explores patience through the lens of Buddhist ethics and compassion. He begins with the foundation of bodhicitta—the commitment to abandon harming others and benefit all sentient beings, drawing on Śāntideva’s reasoning. He walks through why patience matters: practicing patience rather than seeking revenge becomes both a personal and spiritual investment, directly cultivating conditions for future Buddhahood, present-life happiness, renown, and longevity. A key reflection: recognising that beings who harm us were once like us, wanting only happiness and wanting to avoid suffering—a perspective that undercuts the impulse to retaliate. He emphasises that all attainments, temporary and ultimate, flow from pleasing and serving sentient beings. Suited for practitioners familiar with Śāntideva’s ethics and the role of patience in the path.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2017 08 24.mp3
UUID: 45b42ab8-c500-4da6-b813-54f6299b5284
Teacher: Geshe Kyab
Collection: Thursday Patience (Geshe Kyab)
Date: 2017-08-24
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 107.1 minutes
Words: ~688
Thank you. Okay so this teaching is all about the how to protect these issues and one of the of the words mentioned which is Ārya verse and spiritual lines which is very important so object of compassion in Buddhism for all sentient beings so that’s why the Buddha generated the bodhicitta for the first time, bodhicitta because of his great compassion and also this is what perfectly accomplishes my own aims as well, just this is what benefits all beings too, therefore let it be so that I that I always forsake people do not harm them back even if they are evil. Let’s say the king sent you some of his guards to harm the people but people cannot harm back because of the even though they may able to harm back but they cannot because of the power of the king. For that one acting like that’s called prayer because the prayers are mostly to help us to reminding us to practice for instance we do say this daily prayer not just I teach this chapter Even if such a thing were to become angry, it could be a cause of hell which is the thought is I would have to experience, if we harm sentient beings then we are going to go to lower lives, other than that it just keeps harming us or harming oneself, he is vulnerable, he committed the negative karma, he was the one who committed negative karma, I am not committing negative karma.
Here we see. Why do I not see? Why do I not see that my future attainment of Buddhahood as well as glory, renown and happiness in this very life all comes from pleasing sentient beings. And happiness in this very life not only just future life attainment even though within this lifetime also glory as well as renown and happiness so we will be you know get all these results, all comes from pleasing sentient beings so point here is in making this being if or wealth also you know so in this lifetime also we will be more happiness glory and renown helping other sentient beings but all the causes are really helping and benefiting others so that’s enough this particular one is saying why do I not see so now why do I not see that my future attainment of Buddhahood as well as glory, renown and happiness in this very life all come from pleasing sentient beings? So again Śāntideva was really making the point not take revenge, the question is why we really need to harm back why not practice patience if you don’t practice now then when then when??
This is a great opportunity to practice patience especially then they do it so one big problem is the people who are going through what is called saṃsāra. cyclic existence patience causes beauty, health and renown because of this I shall live for a very long time and bring the extensive pleasure of the Universal Chakra Qi. So, everything’s from the patience. And temporarily happy and ultimately achieve enlightenment. See?
Just practicing this single patience, so then eventually there is the pleasure of a Universal Chakra King. I don’t know how we generate it,, we can shift that also know try to understand when somebody harm you and so that person is really harming now but in the previous lifetime he or she was also like you, same wanting happiness, not wanting suffering. So that means, if you look at the oneself, I don’t want any harm from the others. If somebody harm me, I wouldn’t be feel good, I wouldn’t be happy because I really don’t want any kind of insulting, I want happiness, so this conception but but then there are some people they have this status and power and then misuse I think they misuse, they misuse means then they within this power when that person is having some problem, if you feel a little ease, that is also harmful. Somebody you dislike, let’s say I’m just giving you an example, somebody you dislike Thank you very much.