Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Using a fruit tree — planted for fruit but yielding trunk and leaves besides — Geshe Pema Tsering illustrates why aiming at Buddhahood automatically covers lesser goals along the way. In this 45-minute Lamrim session, he moves past last week’s human miseries to the sufferings of subtler realms: asuras in perpetual warfare, desire-realm gods whose death-anguish is said to exceed even the hells, and formless-realm beings who carry a latent pervasive suffering — like a disease not yet felt. He then sets out the three higher trainings — ethics, meditation, wisdom — with refuge as their qualifying base, and uses a wry exchange about working toward a doctorate to show why renunciation must arise spontaneously rather than by constant argument. The session ends on ethics as the foundation of all three, with mindfulness, regret, and targeted antidotes as the practical remedy when standards slip.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 23 2004 05 18 RG.mp3
UUID: a56387a5-2913-4985-8f08-53d479a2c262
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Essence of Refined Gold (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2004-05-18
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.1 minutes
Words: ~3,593
Mhmm. So we don’t want to experience suffering. We want to experience happiness. So this means that we should try and create the causes for happiness as opposed to trying to create the causes for suffering. But as we don’t realize this and as we continually abide in saṃsāra, it means that instead of creating the causes for true happiness, we create the cause for suffering through our ignorance, and that is we continually create the cause for saṃsāra.
So, as beginners, the thing that we need to focus on in the main is trying to create the causes for happiness and stop the causes for suffering. This actually comes down to abandoning or getting rid of the ten negative actions and practicing the ten positive actions. What we need to do in order to be able to do this is, however, to know what we’re doing, and we have to be aware of what we’re doing. We have to be mindful enough to be able to understand what it is that we’re doing. By practicing mindfulness, we can know whether we’re performing the ten negative actions or the ten positive actions.
In this way, we can be aware of whether we re creating the causes for suffering or happiness. So this means that we need to follow this process. We need to take every opportunity we can, where afforded, to learn what it is that we need to get rid of and what it is that we need to practice. If we don’t know what it is that we need to practice and what it is that we need to abandon, then we can’t create causes for happiness and get rid of the causes for suffering. First of all, we need to know what we’re doing.
Once we’ve learned what it is that we need to do, we then need to be mindful that we are actually doing it. We need to be aware of what we’re doing to make sure that we’re doing it. If we do this, if we watch what we’re doing and our knowledge is developed so we know what we’re doing, we can create the causes for the experience of nirvana instead of continuing to create the causes for saṃsāra because we don’t know what’s going on and we aren’t aware of what we’re doing.
We also need to know the reason that we’re doing this. The reason is that we want to be happy and we don’t want to experience suffering, so we need to know what it is that will create the causes for happiness and what creates the causes for suffering so we can get rid of this. In order to bring this about, we actually need to know what happiness is. If we don’t know what we’re working towards, then we can’t achieve it. This happiness that we’re talking about is true happiness or happiness by definition.
The only that is the only things that are happiness by definition is achievement of liberation and the achievement of Buddhahood. They’re the only things that are ultimate happiness or true happiness as opposed to something that we perceive as happiness by definition. So out of these two different types of happiness, then the happiness or the pleasure of a Buddha is said to be the final or the ultimate happiness as opposed to the personal liberation, which is happiness as well, s true happiness as well. But by becoming a Buddha, we re not only focused on our own happiness, and a Buddha doesn t experience anything but happiness, true happiness, but we re also focused on the happiness of others, and we have the ability to lead others to their experience of happiness, their individual experience of happiness. In this way, becoming a Buddha, the happiness of a Buddha is fulfilling their goals or their purpose of self and others.
In this way, it’s said to be a much greater happiness than the happiness of someone who’s achieved nirvana. And then in order to achieve, Buddhahood, in order for us to achieve this final goal of self and others, then we need the right base from which to do that with. The right base from which to do that with is a human body endowed with the leisures and opportunity to practice Dharma. This is something that we need in order to become a Buddha. If we’re focusing on becoming a Buddha, we don’t necessarily need to focus also on achieving a good rebirth in our next lifetime because that comes along with the package.
If we’re focused on becoming a Buddha, we need a good human rebirth, so that just comes along with our initial motivation. Also having a good situation in this lifetime in which we can practice Dharma comes along with that. So an example of how this works is that if we wanna grow fruit, right, then we plant the seeds for a fruit tree, but fruit isn’t the only thing that comes about because of that seed. We also get, if it’s a tree, we get leaves, we get branches, we get a trunk, and we get all these things, not just fruit as a result, even though our initial purpose for planting a fruit seed, a fruit tree seed, was to get the fruit.
So this is the way that positive karma works. We may be focused on achieving one thing, but in order to achieve that one thing, that end goal, then other conditions need to be brought to bear. That means that if we’re focused on achieving something and if that’s the reason we’re doing something, then not only do we achieve that, but there are many other things that come along with that, the way of karma. This means that whatever we’re doing, whether we’re listening to teachings on the graduated path like we are this morning, or we’re meditating or we’re doing some other kind of religious thing or some other thing that’s of benefit, then we should think that we’re doing that in order to attain Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings or for the sake of all other beings. Oh, it’s new It’s kind of far as I’m getting.
Oh, yeah. So if we have that as our goal, then our motivation becomes incredibly vast. It’s the it’s the most the most vast motivation that we can have, so it means that the the intention has much more power behind Okay. So this means that we should try and develop the motivation for listening to this text, listening to the explanation of this text by thinking that this positive action that we are about to do, may that be a cause for me to attain Buddhahood. But also, if we can imagine that that one positive action is mixed with all the positive actions performed by Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, Arhats, solitary realizers and ordinary beings, all the positive actions that have ever been done.
So imagine that they’re all mixed together and we have a very great happiness in the fact that all of those things have been done, and then we dedicate the merit for that happiness, which is a vast amount of merit or vast amount of positive karma. We think, may that be a cause for me to become a Buddha in order to establish all sentient beings in a state beyond sorrow. So we’re thinking, I want to become a Buddha, but the reason for that is to benefit others. So we should have that idea of being the reason for us listening to this teaching today. Mhmm.
So if we can meditate on that for a few minutes. So last week we talked about the sufferings of being a human because we’re going through the stages of trying to develop a renunciation from Samsāra. And so the sufferings of being a human we went through, and we finished that last week. And now we’re on to the particular sufferings of the beings who live in a more subtle existences or more happy existences than humans. The first of these types said to be beings called asuras or demigods or demigods they’re sometimes called as well.
So these are beings who don’t quite have the the blissed out existence of the gods, and they don’t have the same suffering either. They’re somewhere in between them. So these beings are said to be in a constant state of war or a constant state of intrigue, and therefore, have to suffer the blows of those wars. They have a lot of power and they have a lot of ability that they use it to continually be at war with each other. I think the I don’t have another translation for but it’s a bit like the titans of Greek mythology.
Yeah, yeah. Okay, I still haven’t finished. Anyway, then, so that’s a kind of suffering that these beings experience. There’s also other types of gods that are said to be in a blissful existence, which is still in the desire realm. Now, these gods don’t suffer anything during their lifetime, but at the time of their death, their suffering is said to be greater than the suffering of the hells.
Now, reason that this suffering they experienced before death is greater than the suffering of the hells is that they realize that bliss experience that they’ve been having is coming to an end, so they realize what’s gonna happen to the next so that they suffer intensely from realizing what’s gonna happen to the next. They’re ostracized from their friends. They have to live separately from all the other deities because the other deities don’t want to see their state, and they lose their luster or their shininess. So that marks them as being someone who’s going to die. So even in more refined states than the desire realm gods, other beings that exist in a state of mental concentration, so they exist in either very subtle physical elements, or they exist as pure consciousness in a state of bliss because they develop their mental concentration to such levels.
Even these beings experience suffering. There s all these different levels of concentration that they can develop and therefore be reborn into. There s beings that are up to the immeasurable plane, the first three levels of the formless realm, which is where their meditative abilities haven’t necessarily developed so much that they can exist just as consciousness, but they still take on a subtle type of form. Up until that level, they still experience manifest suffering. Now, that is the suffering of change.
Now, after that, on the higher levels, they don’t actually experience manifest suffering. But because they haven’t severed the cause of saṃsāra, then they still experience what’s called pervasive suffering. So they don’t experience this idea of manifest suffering like we do. They don’t have the idea of things changing from happiness into suffering, but they still, because of their existence as a being in saṃsāra, are pervaded by this pervasive suffering that their very existence is going to cause them suffering at some stage in the future. And this is likened to a disease that’s about to happen, an unexperienced disease that may be present in their being.
So this means that no matter where we go in Samsāra, even if we end up in the most subtle realms in a very blissed out state, that unless we get rid of the cause of saṃsāra, unless we get rid of that which binds us to saṃsāra, then we’re always going to experience suffering at some stage. We’re all still pervaded by suffering by our very existence. This one. So this means that we need to establish the causes and conditions for us to achieve nirvana as opposed to going around in saṃsāra and achieving different levels of of rebirth and experiencing different levels of saṃsāra happiness that aren’t going to stay the same. We need to establish the causes and conditions for us to actually achieve nirvana or liberation instead of having saṃsāra continue.
So the causes and the conditions for achieving a nirvana are said to be what s called the three higher trainings. That is the higher training in ethics, the higher training in meditation, and the higher training in wisdom. So the thing that puts the higher in these higher trainings is a refuge. If there’s no refuge as a base for practicing meditation, for practicing ethics, and for practicing wisdom, then what we’re doing may be a training, but it’s not a higher training. So it only becomes a higher training when refuge is used as its base.
So with the idea of refuge, with the feeling of refuge, if we then practice meditation, wisdom, or ethics, then it becomes a higher training in in either any of these. So with this refuge as a base, with this idea of refuge in Buddhism we need to develop an idea of what nirvana or liberation is. If we have an idea of what nirvana or liberation is, then it’s something that we’re going to want work towards. So we need to understand that nirvana or liberation is the complete dissolution or the complete obliteration of any kind of suffering because all the causes have been gotten rid of. So liberation is an experience of complete happiness, and it s what s called ultimate happiness in that it can be relied on and it s not something that changes into suffering.
We need to develop this mind of thinking, okay, that’s what I want. I want to achieve liberation. I want to achieve that kind of happiness. So developing this idea of striving for liberation is actually something that’s very difficult to do in an unfabricated manner, in an uncontrived manner, so that comes about spontaneously, something that we have a lot of trouble with. What it means to wish for something uncontrivedly or without any conceptuality, it means that it’s something that comes about spontaneously at all times.
Most of the things that we actually have come about in our mind stream, which are spontaneous wishes, refer to things that we can get in this lifetime or things that can make us happy in this lifetime. Like, for example, if we get a wage of one hundred dollars a week, then When we’re working that whole week, we have this thought in our head that the reason we’re working is so we get a hundred dollars at the end of the week. It’s not something that we keep having to generate or keep having to focus on or keep having to come up with reasons for, right? It’s just something that happens. We think we’re working, we’re working to get a hundred dollars, we’re working to get a hundred dollars.
So, I was just thinking I wouldn’t be working that hard for a hundred dollars. Anyway, so there’s a we’re working we work with this idea of getting the money at the end of the week, something that comes about spontaneously. Yeah? And so, this development of renunciation of working towards the liberation is something that we need to develop in that way. At the moment, we don’t have that idea.
It doesn’t come about spontaneously and we actually find that most of the things we think about are how to make ourselves happy in the short term. So, if we have this idea of liberation, we’re thinking about, I need some food to eat because I’m hungry. We’re not thinking about necessarily, I need a drink or I want some new clothes or I want this or this or that to make me happy in the short term. Our whole focus is on achieving liberation. Everything comes about spontaneously.
We have this idea that comes up the same way that we have the idea that comes up in our mind at the moment to have samsaric happiness. So that gets changed around, and we’re focusing on nirvana instead. Really? Oh, Oh, good. Oh.
So Geshe-la said, okay. So you’re not impressed by the hundred dollars a week. Well, then he said, Well, you seem to be doing a lot of work towards getting like a degree, like working towards getting a degree. And he said, And you’re doing a lot of work to get that and you’re not necessarily thinking you’re not necessarily thinking about you don’t have to keep generating the idea of why it’s a good idea to get that degree. You’re working towards it because you want it and you don’t have to keep convincing yourself of that.
It spontaneously comes up and you put in a lot of work to get that degree. So, it’s the same thing as like that. We work towards things because we can see how they can benefit us, but because we don’t see how liberation benefits us, because we have doubts about how good liberation is or how good nirvana is, we don’t work towards it in the same way. So then Geshe-la said, so you can see the benefits of getting this doctorate, but can you see the benefits of achieving nirvana just as clearly? And he said, can you?
And I’m like, no. I said, so most people are like that. So if we have this uncontrived idea of working towards nirvana or working towards liberation and we don’t have any doubts about the qualities of liberation and we can focus on it in this way without getting distracted by anything that’s in Samsāra because we see the total qualities of nirvana, then that means that our practice of the three higher trainings, our practice in ethics, our practice in meditation and our practice in wisdom will be completed, will be focused on those completely as opposed to focusing on anything else and getting distracted. The same way as you would work towards a goal of achieving something in life that you can see its benefits of clearly, then you’d be working towards liberation because you could see its benefits clearly. You wouldn’t have any doubts about it and you’d put in a lot of work in the in wisdom, meditation, and ethics in order to bring it about.
So even from amongst these three higher trainings, then the trainings of the other two of wisdom and of meditation actually take as their basis the higher training in ethics. If we don’t have the higher training in ethics, then it’s impossible for us to develop higher trainings in wisdom or in meditation. So the essence or the heart of the other two trainings is the training in ethics. So that’s what we need to focus on and understand in order to bring the other two about. So because the training in ethics is the basis for our training in meditation and wisdom, then we need to be very careful about our ethics.
The way that we can lose our ethics, or they can fall down a little bit, our standards can fall a little bit, is through three different ways: through not knowing what it is that we’re doing, not understanding what we’re doing through becoming overcome by destructive emotions or negative ways of thinking And the third one is by being careless. So we can be unknowing, we can be overcome by destructive emotions, or we can be careless. And so the way to prevent ourselves from coming under the influence of any of these three things that can destroy the standards of our ethics is to be aware, to practice awareness, to practice mindfulness. So this doesn’t mean that this isn’t gonna happen, that we’re going to be able to practice mindfulness perfectly and never make any mistakes. We’re gonna make mistakes, so what we should do is not get too upset when we make mistakes and we lose our temper or we do something like that, but when we’ve done it, then we should think, Oh, I made a mistake.
We should regret what we did, and that regret helps to purify it and resolve to try not to do it in the future. So it’s not a matter of just switch just switching over and becoming mindful of the process. So what this means is that we have to be vigilant with our mind. And when we when we discover that we have had these experiences that we are being we got angry or we we got jealous or we didn t understand something so we did something stupid, then we need to purify those actions by thinking, I regret this and I try not to do it in the future. Then from there, we also try and apply the antidotes to the specific afflictions that we have encountered, so the antidote to anger and the antidote to attachment and so forth.
Therefore, by applying these antidotes, develop the ability not to have as many setbacks on our path to try and be ethical. We should try and be consistent in that whatever we do does not contradict the teachings of the Buddha. So the Buddha explained that to try and behave ethically and try and stop doing anything negative that’s going to harm anyone is the way forward. So we should try and to to behave like this, we should try and behave in accordance with the Buddha’s teachings and be consistent in our effort to do that. This one.
This.