Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Geshe Pema Tsering opens this 33-minute commentary with a striking image: samsaric happiness is like a dream of a hundred prosperous years that leaves nothing on waking — vivid but substanceless. Working through the Bodhisattva Way of Life, he argues that non-virtuous actions committed for any reason — for loved ones, to appease enemies, to protect wealth — are futile, because at death one travels entirely alone, carrying only one’s karma. He cites Nāgārjuna’s Letter to a Friend and Ārya Asaṇga to press the point that lower-realm suffering is the direct fruit of negative actions. The session closes with a Q&A in which Geshe Pema Tsering clarifies a common misconception: long-life initiations and pujas do not extend one’s karmic lifespan but remove obstacles that might cut it short.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 16 Guide.mp3
UUID: c8d993e5-504d-4b95-8f58-2ad6abd5e180
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Bodhisattva Way of Life 2002 Month 01-03 (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2002 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 33.5 minutes
Words: ~2,053
So yeah. And one should confess and purify the non virtuous actions. It is because the Lord of Death will never tell you or warns you, gives you the advance warning. Say, oh, you haven’t done this positive actions yet. I will wait for you.
Or you haven’t confessed or purified the negative actions so I will wait. He never does it. He or she never does it. And so so therefore, one should purify all the non virtuous actions. If not, one knows that if one just indulge in the happiness of the cyclic existence or the cyclic existence and later on one will have one will undergo through the suffering of aging, death, sick illness and harms from the enemies and so forth.
And finally dies and at that moment dies through great regret and great suffering. So therefore, so by knowing all these sufferings one will and one one has faced and one will undergo through. By knowing so, and if one still does not and confess one sorry, purify all purify one’s non virtuous action, and such person is is is very say say such such person is called a very fool person or a foolish person. So therefore, one should not cultivate any type of non virtuous actions neither for one’s own purposes nor for the others, like for the benefit of parents, relatives, or through fear of enemies, you know, causing harms and so forth. One should not cultivate any kind of non virtuous actions because relative enemies are the are the are very temporary and say they’re occasional.
You know, time to time they are relatives, time to time they are not. So it’s just and but therefore one should not. They will never stay as one’s relatives in all the lifetime. It’s momentarily. And therefore one should not cultivate any kind of non virtuous action because their changes sometimes relative, sometimes not.
But means we never stay with one all the time. Whereas negative actions or non virtuous actions one cultivates is always with you. So by knowing so, should not cultivate any type of non virtuous actions. And not only that, you know, so not only all those relatives of all changes or enemies changes, even the ones and so one has to travel by oneself, one’s relatives, one’s dear ones, one’s wealth and so forth. One day there will be a day that one has to leave individually or just by one own, leaving everything back.
So therefore by knowing this, one should realize now onward that up till now one has cultivated all these numbers of non virtuous actions by not understanding such what we have just said. Now today, this is the moment I understood or I understand that I will be the only person to travel by my own at the very end. So by knowing this now onward, I will not cultivate any kind of non virtuous actions either for my own purpose or others and so forth. Yeah. So and up till now one has cultivated all those numbers of non virtuous actions, unknowingly or with lack of understanding.
And now one should feel regret that one has done because and by knowing, I want you to understand or realize here that all those non virtuous actions that one has cultivated, either for oneself or for others, like relatives or for enemies, or for one’s wealth and so forth. And now I want you to know that because at the time of death, none of those will help one or support one. One will be the one who undergoes through what one has done and one will take all the non virtuous actions what one has cultivated. So by and they are not at all they’re not they will not help one at all. By knowing this, one should regret for the non virtuous actions.
So and so so, yeah, one should not cultivate any kind of non virtuous actions just due to or because for for the happiness of temporary happiness or worldly happiness because it has no use and it has no essence. It is like because at the time of death one can take nothing with one one can take nothing. It is like, say one had a wonderful or fantastic dream, and in the dream one has one lived for hundred years. And always within this hundred years, you know, have happy all the time and great wealth and enjoyment and so forth. And in the very morning when one wakes up and there’s nothing they want, first thing for sure one hasn’t lived for hundred years.
Secondly, all this happiness or wealth, what one has in one dream, is not there. So it is like that and there is no essence at all. So should not cultivate any non virtuous actions for just to attain the worldly or temporary happiness. Because all those are like the same as same like the dream because in the past, in the previous lives, one has one own parent, partner, or husband, wife, children, relatives, so forth. But at this stage, it’s like a dream.
In this life, one can’t recognize where are they and they are not with you. So it’s more it’s it’s it’s the same as the dream one. Just we demonstrated. So all these are like a like the dream, you know, like like the previous parents’ relatives, like a dream now. This life, you don’t have it.
And then these relatives and parents so forth are like like the dream as well. But in the next life, one will not know who are they, where are they. So therefore one should not cultivate any kind of non virtuous action because of them. Because at the time of death one passes, one travels by one’s own or single and none of them can’t and will not come with you. And what happens, what one will have is what all the actions one has cultivated.
All those non virtuous actions one has cultivated will be with you for all the time. So yep. So in order to prove that, the great master Ārya Nāgārjuna, in his letter to a friend, which was a text written as a letter to a friend who was a king. And he stated that the king, you should not cultivate any non virtuous actions, Any non virtuous actions on behalf of your ministers, your guests, your wife, your son, fellow citizens, or your fellow citizens, so forth. Because because you will be the only one who who will undergoes through the suffering of all those non virtuous actions, and none of them will go.
So it is you who will face the suffering in future that therefore should not cultivate any kind of non virtuous actions just because of those people. So and also the great the master, Ārya Asaṇga, has stated that that that the Buddha, all the sufferings, all the unbearable sufferings of of bad migrations are the result of one’s negative actions, which was stated by the Buddha. So and not committing or cultivating any non virtuous actions even at the cost of life is the the action of the bodhisattvas or if deed of the bodhisattvas. This is what the great master Ārya Asaṇga stated. The sufferings like lower in the lower realms, one have in the hell have the suffering of hot and cold, hungry ghosts suffering of hungry ghosts, and the animals have confusion, so forth.
So all these are the results of non virtuous actions which are stated by the Buddha. And this one? So in in all the time one should think that one shouldn’t be cultivating any kind of non virtuous actions because up till now without understanding or you know, without knowingly, you know, and one cultivates, one has cultivated numbers of non virtuous actions through confusion or ignorance, attachment, and hatred. And now I have realized that should not, I should not, I should not cultivate non virtuous actions because since from the day one was born, one has not stopped for a moment or remained without changing. So that each and every moment from the date of birth, one goes through transitions and changes momentarily every second.
And then later on, and one goes through transitions or changes and one older and older and one can there is no way that one can add or prolong one’s lifespan. So therefore, because one does not stays even for a moment, stays the same even for a moment and goes through transitions every second and gradually reach the time of death. So therefore therefore, I should one should realize that I or one should not cultivate any sorts of non virtuous actions. And and the Buddha’s in his the sūtra the Agama sutras has said has stated that the samsaric existence is like the autumn cloud never stays same, always moves and changes. And the birth and the death of the sentient beings is like watching a play.
Know? In the play, dancing changes in new costume. Every second it changes and so forth. So birth and the death of the sentient beings are like watching a play. And the life of the sentient beings is like the lightning in the sky.
And it and it quickly passes or like a flash. It quickly travels very fast or quickly travels like the the stone thrown from the cliff. This one? No. So and also Sūtra stated that even even a great man and the very strong, brave man who has a like a legendary man.
You know? And and may feel I’m strong, brave, great fighter, so forth. I can’t do this. I, you know, can’t be defeated and so forth. But whatever strong or great person he or she may be, but at the end can’t have any excuses and will get in the hands of Lord of Death.
So we’ll stop here today. Any questions, shall we? We’ll take a few questions. Pardon? What kind of Yeah.
Because it depends on one’s projecting karma. So we are the result of projected in this life by our projecting karma. It entirely depends on the strength or the power of that projecting karma. If you have a projecting karma that leads you to have for one month. You will stay for a month.
And if you have a projecting karma that leads you that will last for a hundred years, and you will stay for a hundred years. So therefore, it entirely depends on one’s causes. So if one have cultivated in previous life to have a karma to stay for hundred years, one will stay hundred years. This is how that one can add on one’s life. This one.
No. You know? But but but we do, like, receive the long life initiations or long life pujas and so forth. But those these practices don’t mean that one’s extending or prolonging one’s life or extending one’s lifespan. What it does is because if one has a karma to live for fifty years, one has already cultivated that karma, but between those last fifty years lifespan, what certain obstacles come through like being in a war, get shot, get stabbed, killed, so ill, so forth.
That could happen. So one may like one stay for forty years and started to die and can’t stay, missing those ten years. So receiving all these empowerments, the long life empowerments, practice long life pujas, so forth is to get rid of the obstacles and making sure that one will stay for fifty years as one’s karma. No. So yeah.
And through if one is able to do pure practices and receive, you know, the long life initiations and long life pujas and cultivate and all this lead to lead a proper practices, one may be able to stay or have a life span according to one’s karma. Say, for example, was to live for fifty years. But if one fails to have a proper practice, can still fail to live for fifty years, may die before that. That can be possible. What what what exactly was your question?
Yeah. Finish. Yeah. Yeah.