Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 25-minute talk, Jampa Kaldan reflects on lessons learned during years at a Tibetan Buddhist monastery and their relevance for Western practitioners. He identifies five key principles: the critical role of using intellect and rigorous study rather than passive spirituality; the necessity of an enlightenment community as foundation before solitary practice; seeing all of life as spiritual practice rather than compartmentalising meditation separately; sustaining long-term steady effort rather than expecting quick results; and creating deliberate space from distraction and busyness. He closes with thoughts on Buddhism’s future in the West, arguing that Western practitioners must integrate Buddhist teachings with scientific thinking and contemporary understanding while preserving the essential focus on cultivating compassion for self and others and intelligent awareness of interdependence—principles he traces back through Tsongkhapa and even to the Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 03 Thoughts 2002 02 17.mp3
UUID: bb6f8840-2ccc-4c30-a510-4175fb422ac1
Teacher: Jampa Kaldan
Collection: Thoughts from a 21st Century Monastery (Jampa Kaldan)
Date: 2002-02-17
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Words: ~3,284
I mean, it’s just utterly confusing. You know, you’re looking at a new age book, and there’s about fifty different answers to life, the universe, and everything presented there. Where does one start? And I think it’s only by doing some serious investigation and study that we can make some sense of it all. Otherwise, we’ll just really we’ll probably we we may well end up just getting lost in something that that may not be of particular long term benefit for us.
And also because the process of self transformation is a difficult task I think it’s important to harness this wonderful human capacity of our intelligence, to harness that and use it as part of the part of the work, spiritual work. And just as we do that in the service of so many other things we undertake in our lives, we harness our intellect to make sure things go well. And this and Tibetan Buddhism says that’s exactly what we should do, not just sit in the corner and go all spacey and airy fairy, you know, but use our intellect just like we do to succeed in anything else in life. And I think also that we’re now in a very well educated world. We’re in an incredibly highly sophisticated educated world and therefore any serious spirituality I think has to be in that context.
And and I think that an approach of having this value of studying that we see embodied at Sera Monastery has a very clear message not necessarily the same version but some appropriate version of it for here as a very clear and important message for a western practitioner I think. Secondly the central role of the spiritual community. I mentioned before that the monastery has an enlightenment community where practitioners can be immersed in this powerful supportive context for many years as a foundation for them then being able to meditate in more solitary ways later on in their spiritual career. And often we Westerners discover something like Buddhism and think, oh, you know, I wanna be a great yogi. I’ve now been to six classes.
I will now go away into the wilderness and meditate on my own. And the traditional way of doing it is so different to that, where you you belong to an integrated community for a long time before you go off on your own and do anything. And you build this incredible and powerful platform in who you are as a person that then allows you to make to do the solitary work skillfully and effectively rather than just making a big mess, which you do if you go off and try and do it too quickly by yourself and just being counterproductive because it won’t go well. It won’t go well. There’s no doubt about that.
Except maybe for one in several maybe one in a million human beings does have a very immediate extraordinary capacity, the teachers tell us. But for the vast majority of it, it’s not like that. And I think that this sort of work and for example, my teacher, Kensur Imbashe, it was only in his fifties after thirty thirty five years of immersion in this sort of a culture that he did a solitary retreat for three years. And I think this is one of the key functions of a center like Buddha house, providing a western version of an enlightenment community so that in a sense the building and the participating in a place like this here is a critical component for the spiritual progress of an individual. We can’t do this work alone.
It is utterly impossible despite what our our our western hankering to wanna do it alone despite what that tells us. And especially so in a culture in a culture where the whole context of everything is quite clearly rushing in many ways in the opposite direction to which we might want to walk on a spiritual path. In other words, the business of taming our minds. Our culture is not into the taming of the mind. What it is into is stirring it up as much as possible.
And thirdly seeing life as practice. In the monastic culture one’s whole life is practiced and this was one of the things that really struck me as over the first few years I was there. That one is there undertaking a career of trying to wake up as a human being and it’s just everything you do all the time is is a part of that. And it can be very hard for us to develop this sense of the seamless web of our lives all built around one focal point because there’s considerable pressure on us to compartmentalize you know there’s work here and that’s a sealed compartment and there’s family life there and there’s my hobbies and recreation here. To sort of survive the complexity and the pressure, I think this we tend to compartmentalize a lot like that in our life or can do.
And so when we do something explicitly spiritual like sitting meditation, it’s very hard for us to see that that is just a part of my whole life, which is all a spiritual practice. So I think the work of trying to find a mindful presence in the whole of our lives and see our life is like a seamless tapestry that we’re trying to weave. All the bits of it are just like a tapestry we’re trying to weave. No matter what we’re doing is an important message that came home to me in watching the the life at the monastery. Then fourthly, the long term constant effort to get results.
When we when we first discover the spiritual path, there can be like a wonderful honeymoon period about it with new insights and perspectives open up and revealing a world of undreamed of possibilities. And we can find many useful and immediately beneficial ways of thinking and behaving but if we’re to continue the work there’s a need for this sustained and long term ongoing effort and that’s exactly what I see my colleagues doing at Sarah year after year after year. They take a very steady and patient approach to the work they’re doing so it’s not something that they get excited about. They just like going to work every day to do what they need to do. And this is quite hard for us because of our increasing addiction to things coming easily and quickly.
And we talked a bit about that before. Fifthly, space from distractions. And I think this is also obvious having a space from distractions is really the essence of monastic life and it’s used to counteract the quite obvious fact that we just love to be distracted. We love it And the western world has perfected this into a fine art never before seen in human culture, I think. But but we beginners cannot think and contemplate and work on the transformation of ourselves without some space for all this.
So we need to construct within our lives here some places of space from this maelstrom of busyness. Some time to read and study, to meditate, to do some retreats from time to time. And this is different to our taking of holidays because so often our taking of holidays we just continue our habit of busily consuming new experiences. It doesn’t really give us any space at all. So we need to make deliberate choices on unbusying ourselves a little and stepping away from our friend consumption.
And perhaps the inward word for describing that at this stage is voluntary simplification of our lives. So a few comments. It’s five o’clock. It’s been a long session, but I’ll just make a few comments. If anyone has to leave, please don’t feel that you’re embarrassed.
If you have to go to something, please go. But a few comments about finish off with about the future of Buddhism in the West. There’s been an explosion of interest in Buddhism in the West in the last thirty years, and much has already been written and spoken about this. But just a couple of thoughts. The essence of Buddhist spirituality is about realizing for ourselves within the context of our lived experience the meaning of what it is that the many Buddhist scriptures are talking about.
But given the reality of this cultural divide about which we’ve been speaking, this is not an easy task and it’s no wonder that the Dalai Lama encourages people simply to stay with their home religion. But I believe that this work of integrating the strengths of these two great streams of human culture can be of enormous benefit for the future of humanity. And we need to find a way of doing this in the generations to come. Not only for the West, but but also for the Buddhist cultures, which I suspect rapidly abandoning their simple if they’ve still got it, it hasn’t been destroyed by others for them as happened in China. They’re rapidly abandoning their simple Buddhist faith.
And just as our culture abandoned its simple faith over the last several hundred years. So I’m not at all certain that monasteries such as where I live are going to survive the onslaught of Western culture, which even in remote rural India where Sarah is is blowing like a bit of a an approaching hurricane. You can feel it there. And new monks are only coming from the uneducated and undeveloped parts of Tibet, The wealthy Tibetans and the young ones from India, they all wanna become westerners as fast as they can. And like most people in the third world, they will wanna go and even in America if they possibly can.
And who can blame them? Would any of you like to change places with them? So we will build our own version of monastic. I wonder, are we going to build our own versions of spiritual communities like Buddha House and maybe some sort of monastic communities for ordained practitioners like we’re just starting to experiment with? Or I wonder if Western Buddhism will continue to be primarily as of now a practice of a lay practice rather than an ordained practice in complete contrast with the whole history of Buddhism up to now, which has always been centered around the practice of the ordained.
And if such monasteries were to emerge, I wonder if they will be able to meaningfully continue with as some sort of replica of what has been recreated at Sarah in the last thirty years with its emphasis on the study of these ancient texts which are embedded in an equally ancient worldview. I’m not sure about that. Perhaps not. I’d like to read a quote from again, from the Dalai Lama from my notes of his teachings last year in at Sera Monastery. The Buddha’s teachings are based on the truth.
Thus the more you investigate, the more it will be confirmed. This is like science investigating reality which currently focuses mainly on the physical world, but its range of investigation is constantly expanding. As yet however, we are not seeking the answer to suffering. But the two methods of searching for the object are similar as in Buddhism and science, his holiness is saying. Scientists however are not concerned with what’s to be adopted and what’s to be abandoned.
In other words, they’re not interested in a practice of how you should live skillfully, to make make a difference to yourself and to transform yourself. Science will continue to make much advance, but some areas they do not understand and can learn from Buddhism. Like they did at Nālānda monastery, and this was the the massive university monastery in, you know, in the center in northern on plain up until the destruction of Buddhism in India that was really like the heart, the seed of learning for Asian culture for hundreds of years called Nālānda Monastery, just near the present day Rajgir in Bihar. Like they did at Nālānda Monastery, that is trying to study all of the non-Buddhist schools of thought, today we must study the scientific way of thinking. There has been a superficial acceptance of religious practice in the Tibetan society instead of understanding its essence.
Thus if you can study science it will be good for developing a full understanding of your religion. Quite a radical statement for his holiness to make. For a Buddhist practitioner to explain the origin of the world in accordance with science will help the faith of many people. I support science not due to my favoring of it but because the Buddha said that we must investigate reality. Thus, if we want to teach Buddhadharma, then it must be in accordance with reality as it is discovered.
One must investigate the texts and not just must accept them. And then his important final point, and train the mind well in the preliminary practices. His Holiness says that we need to be teaching the Buddhadharma in the context of our understanding of the world. And I think this will require much careful work in the years ahead, preserving all the essential points about dealing with our human condition that have been discovered assessed and refined through two and a half thousand years of practice. That is training the mind well in the preliminary practices and at the end of the day I think at the end of it it comes back to you and me doing this preliminary practice well if there’s going to be a Western Buddhism and that means firstly living with compassion for ourselves finding more skillful ways to live in other words, so we don’t keep getting ourselves into the same habitual problems over and over, and secondly to whatever degree we are able having compassion for others and our beautiful world.
And thirdly all of this done in a context of the opening up of our understanding to the reality of the interconnected and dependent arising nature of everything in the world. Tsongkhapa, the great founder of the Gelug tradition, in concisely summarizing the whole teachings of the Buddha and all the subsequent masters called these three activities that I’ve just mentioned, the three fundamentals of spiritual practice. And I think six hundred later, these three dimensions of spirituality, self compassion, compassion for others, and the intelligent awareness of the world around us. I think these are perhaps more important than ever. And this view, strange as it may seem, is not a view in foreign to our culture.
And I I was amazed to see Marcus Aurelius, a Roman emperor from the second century wrote he was this great stoic spiritual practitioner. And in his book called Meditations, he made the following comment about what our work is as human beings. And it’s I was amazed. It’s almost the same as those three fundamentals of the spiritual path as as explained by Tsongkhapa. Marcus Aurelius had this to say, a man’s true delight is to do the things he was made for.
And what was he made for? He starts with the second point that I mentioned. He was made to show goodwill to his kind. Secondly, and now he makes the first point, to rise above the promptings of his senses. In other words, out of compassion for ourselves, some more skillful ways than just following the old habits over and over.
And thirdly, to distinguish appearances from realities, to pursue the study of universal nature in her works. This business of looking at the way things are and as a result finding more skillful ways of living. I was quite astounded to to see those three points being made by a thinker who was who’s and the stoic thought was so influential on much of the thinking of Western culture. So please engage your everyday life with a realistic assessment of where you’re at at the moment, but don’t underestimate your capacity for growth and change because this is a part of the rich reality of what we are. And I’d like to say you for the opportunity to be able to share these thoughts with you.
And I’d also like to say thanks to a couple of other people who make it possible for me to be here, my parents and their kindness, my wonderful teacher, Kensur Imbashe, who stands as a practical embodiment. There can be another way. Thank you to Buddha House. Without which this conversation, this talk wouldn’t have happened. And, also, I’d like to say thanks to all of the very kindly people who are supporting me in a very practical ongoing way so that I can embark on the adventure that I’m in, especially to Helen and George who are supporting me whilst I’m staying here on this visit so well.
So So I hope that the way that you each go about this adventure, the adventure of spiritual path, I hope that it brings great benefit to you and to others. Thanks. Does anyone have another question? If if anyone wants it’s already quarter past five, but if anyone has another question, happy to answer. Sponsorship of the monks there, and maybe talking about a central funding agency that isn’t available to Tibetans, like from a human rights point of view about those people, at Sera, and also Well, certainly, there are a number of very practical ways that that a that a Western person who was wanting to be generous in some way could give money to support various activities that’s happening in monasteries and the nunneries there.
Are schemes such as the scheme that’s advertised in the hallway here for supporting monks. There are schemes which will be quite easy to find out about either through the office here or on the internet about specifically supporting nuns. There are the FPMT has a program of seeking support to be able to support Western ordained people, a fund, the Lama Yeshe Sangha fund, so donations could be made to that to support Western ordained people. And we are incredibly fortunate that this the particular project of this house at Sera Monastery for Westerners, because of the extraordinary generosity of of many people has now been fully paid for and completed. And but there is also one could look at the website there and and make contributions to the ongoing life of that community that will grow over the years to come.
So I think there’s and there are also programs for supporting simply the Tibetans in India who aren’t with the lay Tibetans who also have quite difficult circumstances in some of the camps. And they are easily found out about either here or on the Internet. Does that answer the question, Helen? Yeah. Yeah.
That’s pretty helpful. Western support, especially in the last twenty years. Yeah. Enormous amount. The whole Sera Je School has has got to the point of being a a registered school in in the Indian system and provides for India quite a sophisticated schooling, and that’s all come from massive support from overseas.
It’s quite a fancy school now and especially from some people in Switzerland. And the health service at the monastery similarly has gradually is getting better and better from as a result of very kind generosity from some western sponsors. So there are there are many opportunities, and it’s very quite easy to find out how to access those if if you wish. Does anyone else have another Okay. Thanks very much.