Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The story of Geshe Ben — a Kadampa master who kept two piles of stones to count his positive and negative thoughts each day, congratulating or scolding himself at day’s end — anchors Khensur Rinpoche’s 95-minute Lam Rim commentary. He opens by reviewing the meaning of going for refuge, illustrated by an analogy of a criminal pleading before a powerful official who offers help only on the condition of changed conduct. He then explains what refuge requires in practice: abandoning the ten unskillful actions and cultivating the ten skillful ones, with mind — not body or speech — as the true foundation of Dharma. A short Q&A closes the session with practical guidance on applying antidotes to afflictive emotions and using awareness as an internal monitor of thought.
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File: 05 LR 1991 03 09.mp3
UUID: a3981a58-f2d7-4007-8f41-ef52c4b31793
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Lam Rim (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1991-03-09
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 95.4 minutes
Words: ~5,811
Begin by adjusting our motivation, cultivating the awakening heart for three minutes. Begin by rejoicing in the fact that we’ve found this human life by means of which we can practice the Dharma. This human life is extremely precious because what we want is to eliminate our suffering and we want to find happiness. The method by means of which we can achieve that in is through the practice of Dharma. We must ensure that by means of the practice of the Dharma that we arrive at some great benefit, that there is some great result, a vast consequence of our having practiced.
How can we ensure that our practice will bring a vast result, that it will be beneficial? This is in dependence upon our motivation for our practice. Depending upon a healthy attitude towards our practice, by means of the power of our motivation, we can assure that what we do practice will be of benefit and will have the desirable result. And as far as motivations for practice, there is no greater motivation, a healthier type of motivation, than the awakening heart. What do we mean by the awakening heart?
Understanding that I am one single individual and others are many. And holding others more dear than our own self, and holding them more dear, seeking to lead them out of their suffering and to bring them happiness. Desiring this in the wishing to eliminate others’ suffering and to bring them happiness, to establish them in a type of happiness bereft of all suffering. Though I may wish, how can I actually in fact do this? And going on in our understanding that in order to actually achieve this in fact, that I must rid myself of all my various faults, mainly the fault of unknowing or ignorance.
Thereby, by means, in order to achieve that, to bring to consummation my wisdom. If I can bring to fulfillment my own wisdom as an individual, then this will give me the ability to bring about vast benefits to sentient beings. So for the next three minutes, cultivate the healthy attitude of the awakening heart. And why is that? Because it should be expressed in terms of that I must develop my wisdom, my understanding.
I must overcome my various faults and my various delusions. And in order to achieve that end, I have to listen to the teachings on the Dharma. Why? Because I must understand the Dharma in order to actually practice it. It is through the practice of Dharma that I will actually be empowered to be a benefit to others.
Therefore, my motivation for listening to this present teaching is ultimately to benefit others. Cultivate such a motivation for the next three minutes. So, previously in the previous teaching we discussed the going for refuge, and now we’re going to discuss the training in going for refuge. We’ve had an infinite number of previous rebirths, and during the course of these previous rebirths, the opportunity to practice the Dharma has been very few. That is to say, the opportunity to carry on skillful types of practices.
The occasions when we were involved in unskillful types of modes of conduct were much more predominant than those of a skillful type. So, majority of our time up to this point has been spent in unskillful modes of conduct. So our situation is that we have a short opportunity whereby to put into practice spiritual methods. This is an extremely short interval of time that we possess to carry on healthy types of conduct. Whereas up to this point in the past, we have, the majority of our time, been involved in situations where we were not able to on, to put into practice spiritual methods.
We simply didn’t have that opportunity. So if we were just to look at the course of our present life, we can see that the vast majority of our time is spent in situations and conducts which are not of a spiritual nature. Can just look over the course of a single day, Most of our time is spent in non spiritual pursuits. Those times when we’re actually applying ourselves to various spiritual methods are extremely short in the course of one day. So if we were to look over the course of our normal everyday activities, we can see that the vast majority of our time and energy is expended in pursuits of secular activities and even more so, non spiritual types of pursuits.
That in fact we are compared relatively involved in bringing harm to ourselves and others, that is to say creating causes of suffering through various types of unskillful actions. And those parts of our day which are spent in healthy types of conducts, that is to say creating the causes of happiness, are in fact extremely rare. We have to appreciate the fact that our present situation today is that we have a type of embodiment by means of which we can carry on a practice of Dharma. That we have all the necessary companions to support us in our practice. That we have the actual spiritual practices of the Dharma.
That we have a teacher teaching setting up the spiritual practice. We have all the various supportive conditions, material conditions and non material conditions to help us to carry on a successful practice of Dharma. So we have this wonderful opportunity whereby to finally eliminate our suffering, to find a complete type of happiness, and this is brought about through implementing the various practices by training of the mind. But the fact is that this opportunity is not going to last forever, that we are impermanent and this opportunity is going to be quickly lost. When this opportunity is lost, when we’ve come do we in fact simply become nonexistent?
The fact is that we simply do not we simply are not annihilated. So, we are not simply going to be annihilated, our continuum of our life will go on. And what can we expect in the future? That in dependence upon skillful types of conduct, skillful actions, we can expect happiness. But then on the other hand, if we haven’t tried to implement very skillful types of actions in the course of our life, if we’ve involved ourselves in unskillful actions, then we can expect a resultant suffering to rise out of this.
And what in fact is predominant in our life. What types of actions, skillful or unskillful? Most probably unskillful actions that generally we have spent very little time in terms of developing ourselves in terms of spiritual pursuit. And the vast majority of our time is spent in creating various destructive and unskillful types of actions. If we were to weigh these up, then we would find that the predominance of our actions are unskillful as opposed to skillful actions.
So, you know, when we use a balance beam, a scale, we don’t expect that which is the lightest to pull the scale downward. We expect that which is the heaviest to do so. No, so that which is heaviest is going to pull down the pan of the scale and weigh it down. So if we were to simply weigh out the quality of our conduct over the course of our life and begin to look at it in terms of constructive actions versus destructive actions, we’re probably going to find that the destructive actions outweigh the positive constructive actions. And we simply aren’t in control of, as humans, we don’t have the, we’re not going to be annihilated at death, that in fact we’re going to continue on.
And the control of where we will eventually come into existence, where we will take rebirth, is not in our control. It’s dependent upon these various types of actions that we have created. And therefore, if the predominance of our actions are destructive, then we can only expect out of the result of that a destructive quality of rebirth, and that is to say a negative type of rebirth or a bad migration. So, if the vast majority of our actions are destructive and resultant quality of the destructive actions is some type of negative experience that we can expect that not being annihilated upon the resultant future existence that it’s going to be of a nature which is worse than our present situation. That it’s going be a type of has qualities of many problems, many troubles, suffering.
That our type of embodiment will be of a lesser quality. It will be such that it will be difficult for us to tolerate it. And thinking in this way, there arises a sense of anxiety or a dread about future possibilities. So, out of this dread, we begin to question, well, what methods can I use to ensure that this will not eventuate, that I won’t have to experience these qualities of the future types of existence, that I won’t fall to these difficult situations? What can actually protect me from this future possibility?
And it’s necessary to begin to understand that it is what the Three Jewels, that is the Buddha, the Dharma, the spiritual community which have the ability to protect one, which is the method to ensure that we won’t fall to such a situation in the future. Out of this sense of dread and gaining the assurity that the Three Jewels are able to protect us from the objects of our dread, that we give ourselves over to a request and say that I don’t have anyone else that I can depend upon. There’s nothing else I can depend upon to help me to alleviate this dread of these future negative types of existences. Please, can you help me out and protect me? And this actually, this is the actual going for refuge.
This requesting help in assuring that one’s future dreads will not be eventuated is what we mean by refuge. And in answer to this request of asking for refuge, then the refuge actually consists, and having gone for refuge, then it’s necessary that this entails something on our part. If we’re going to be protected, then we have to do something on our part. And this involves the trainings which will actually protect us. Having asked for refuge, then in answer to that, we must engage in various trainings.
In order to engage in these trainings, we must listen to what they are, in fact, are. So I’ll present, so to help you understand, I’ll present an analogy. So the analogy to help us understand the intention here is that someone has performed an extremely negative act and the consequences of having performed this act, their life was threatened, that there’s a possibility that they could be executed for committing a particular type of crime. And they have to go to, they’re going to appear in court, But they seek some kind of assistance out of this fear of the consequences of their action. And they go to a high official and they plead with the high official to help them out, that there’s nobody else that they can turn to.
You know, I’m paying all my hopes on you and whatever you say, I’ll do. And I commit myself, I promise that I’ll listen to what you want me to do and I’ll carry it out. Just please help me. I’ll try to do my best. And so, high official will explain to what he must do in order that his sentence not be carried out.
And that the person from their side must commit themselves to this advice, this training. So, when you go to someone to help us out, out of some kind of difficulty, and this person says, Well I can help you if you’ll do such and such. And if you simply don’t listen to them, but you go on doing exactly what you did before, would this person who has the power to help you, would they continue to help you? In fact, can they help you if you simply continue to conduct yourself as you did before? You simply don’t listen to what they have to tell you which is necessary for you to do.
They wouldn’t you wouldn’t act in that way, would you? So we’re very much in the same position that we have created a great deal of negative actions, the consequences of which will be future sufferings. And we simply don’t want to undergo the future sufferings. And we go for help to someone to guard us against these future sufferings, to protect us. And we initially go for help, for protection to the Buddha.
So, going for refuge to the Buddha is to say, asking for some means of protection from future suffering consequences, then just as the official sets some kind of condition whereby they will help, it is necessary for you to change, to act in a more constructive way, that you have to begin to cease these destructive actions, these unskillful actions. Hearing this, it is necessary that one commits oneself to practice in accordance with this training. It’s just as in the case of having gone to this high official asking them for some sort of assistance and help and protection, just help you save your life, And then committing yourself to whatever their advice that they suggest that you must follow in order to save your life. Likewise, going for refuge to the Buddha asking for protection from future possible sufferings. But it’s necessary that we practice in accordance with the teachings.
Out of this can come a complete freedom from any type of dread or fear, this anxiety about future possibilities of bad migrations, of all types of future sufferings. If we do practice in accordance with the teachings set forth, then there’s no need to fear about the future possible sufferings. If we don’t, then that’s another question. There is reason to fear. So, it’s very much these trainings, translated as advices.
I very much like the advice that the parents would give a child. Out of their caring for the child, they want to bring about the welfare of the child. So, instruct the child to, know, don’t act in this way. This is very destructive. It’s not going get you anywhere.
Try to act in this way. This is a very positive, constructive way. It’s going to help you in the future in the long run. And when you study, you know, don’t study haphazardly. It’s of no use to you.
Study well and this is going to benefit you. So these types of advices in order to promote the welfare of the person they care for. So this is in the case where one would seek temporary guidance from one’s parents. Temporary would seek guidance as a means of temporarily protecting oneself from the possibility of future negative results if one didn’t adjust one’s conduct. Likewise, the Buddha is analogous to the parents, in that we have some anxiety about continued suffering within cyclic existence, and it’s necessary that we seek advice, seek to put into practice.
Having gone for refuge, for protection, we seek to put in the advice or the training set forth by the Buddha that in terms of what is to be abandoned, what is to be cultivated. The Buddha sets forth, well this is a positive type of action and this is a negative type of action. This is constructive to do. This is destructive to do. This will help you to eliminate, to bring about the cessation of your various faults.
This will help you to develop excellent qualities. So the actual way we’re protecting ourselves is by committing ourselves to this process of what is to be adopted, what is to be rejected. So, this is in the case of a child. If the child were to conduct himself in accordance with the advice of his parents, was given out of the caring of the parents, motivated by caring of the parents, then things would go well for the child in the future. Likewise, it is said that the Buddha’s caring, compassion for sentient beings is even greater than that of a parent for a child, for their child.
But not only that, advice which is given is unerring. They don’t make mistakes and it will definitely be a benefit. So if we were to put in practice these advices, these trainings, the various conducts which are yet to be abandoned, the various conducts which are to be cultivated, then we definitely will be able to attain a happiness which is completely divorced of any suffering. So, the advices of the Buddha, these trainings, are what we mean by the advices of going for refuge. These trainings of having gone for refuge, the types of conduct that we are committing ourselves to and the various practices.
And the first is involved in karma as causes and their results. karma or actions as causes and their results. So, with respect to each of the refuges, there is setting forth of what is prohibited, what is to be refrained from, and what is to be cultivated, various practices. But mainly in going for refuge, it is the training of prohibitions and practices of the Dharma, the Dharma jewel which we are to mainly commit ourselves to, which are the main advices or trainings which we are to engage in. Those are the jewel of Dharma.
They’re prohibitions and practices or cultivations in terms of the jewel of the Dharma. So it is mainly the Dharma which is the Dharma jewel, the training of the Dharma jewel which is the center of our practice. What does this entail, these various commitments and prohibitions? Essentially the Dharma is that which benefits sentient beings. And the way it benefits sentient beings is that it serves as the method whereby to eliminate our various faults and thereby the sufferings which arise out of these faults.
And it helps us to develop the potential of our excellent qualities thereby helps us to bring about the happiness which arises out of these excellent qualities. So the dharma is likened to medicine. If someone has a severe chronic illness, It requires a corresponding type of medicine which is very effective. Now in the course of getting well, it’s necessary that we have a doctor. It’s necessary that we have nurses.
But that which actually does the direct eliminating of the illness is the medicine itself. And likewise, analogous to the doctor, the medicine and the nurse, The doctor is the Buddha, the medicine is the Dharma and the nurses are the spiritual community. And just as was in the case of alleviating a physical illness, that which does the actual direct eliminating of the illness is the medicine. Likewise, it is the Dharma which eliminates the ills of the mind. So, we can say that most fundamentally the practice of Dharma involves the benefit of others.
The Buddha Dharma has as its roots love and compassion. Its nature is love and compassion, and therefore its quality must in some way benefit others. So the Buddhadharma is something which is to be practiced. And this practice meets back to the most fundamental training of what it means to practice the Dharma. And this is simply what type involves committing ourselves to abandoning various types of destructive actions, cultivating various types of constructive actions.
There’s no other special practice than this, than the practices of abandoning various types of conduct, cultivating various other types of positive conducts. So as we said, the fundamental, the foundation of the Buddhadharma is love and compassion. And out of this, types of conduct are prescribed. Things which it is preferable not to do, things which it is preferable to do. What is the basis?
What is the determining factor? What reason can we give for saying this is good to do, this is not good to do? It is simply based upon the fact that if we do this type of action, we will experience suffering. We will experience the undesired and we will experience fear. Whereas these other types of conducts, we will not experience suffering.
We will not experience the undesired. We will not experience fear. So, this is born out compassion in the sense that not wanting us to suffer, wanting us to be happy. So, the foundation determining quality of what the reasoning which determines the quality of the practices is simply in terms of what is going to make us happy, what is going to make us suffer. So, just in the same way that a parent becomes unhappy when they see their child suffering wishing out of their compassion and their caring for their child, wishing their child not to suffer, then they give advices and say, This would be a good way to act and things will go well.
If you act in this way, things will not go well. They do this out of a sense of compassion, not wanting their own child to suffer. Likewise, the Buddha in his sense of caring has set forth various types of trainings or set up in their advices as to what is to be cultivated, what is to be practiced out of a sense of wanting things to go well for us. The Buddha, out of his sense of compassion, has set forth various types of actions, various types of trainings. And why is it that we are to involve ourselves in these constructive types of actions?
Is the need for this? What is the reason? It is simply that if we act in this way then we will experience happiness, that we will not experience suffering both in terms of temporal happiness and our ultimate happiness. So, it’s just that in this way, in things going well for us, the Buddha is as if befriending us. Just as a parent, through the training, through the guidance of the parent, the child eventually grows up to have some good qualities and out of these good qualities the child is made happy.
And this is way that we can befriend. We can befriend. The child assists or befriends their children. The parent befriends their children in this way. So, what does it mean to practice the Dharma?
We mentioned that it was in terms of two factors. One, those types of conducts which are to be abandoned, those types of conducts which are to be cultivated. The Buddha taught extremely extensively on these subjects. But if we were to simply abbreviate and condense all of these various teachings that he gave into the essence, and this was set forth by Vasubandhu when he said, The essence of that which is to be abandoned and that which is be cultivated. There are ten practices to be abandoned, ten which are to be cultivated.
So, this is subsumed within the teaching of karma, that is actions and their results. And by karma or actions, we can talk about two types of karma, or two types of actions, negative types and positive types of actions. And these have a corresponding result that out of negative actions arises a resultant unhappiness. Out of positive actions arises a resultant happiness. So, karma or actions are the cause.
There are two types. There are positive and negative. Out of these actions comes about a consequence, which are the results. There are two types of results corresponding to the two types of causes. So, the commitments in terms of the practice of Dharma, the various trainings in having gone for refuge to the Dharma, are categorized in terms of what is prohibited and what is to be implemented.
And what is prohibited — the types of training which are to be abandoned — are the ten unskillful actions. And those which are to be implemented, that which is to be cultivated, are the ten skillful actions. In Nāgārjuna’s Precious Garland, he states we should not commit negative actions. And why is that? Because out of negative actions all the various types of sufferings arise along with the various types of bad migrations such as those of hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals.
And he goes on to say that we should commit positive actions. Why is that? Because all happiness, happiness is arising out of positive actions along with rebirth and the happy migrations such as those of humans and gods. So out of positive actions arises all our various happiness, but this happiness will increase and increase higher and higher until we achieve the happiness of liberation and enlightenment. So in the lam rim or the graduated path, it’s really a wonderful setting out of the means of practice.
It’s extremely kind to us and it’s very precious and beneficial and useful. So, we might think, for example, I’m quite a good person. Here I am practicing Dharma. I do all these various types of meditation, carrying on practice. So I think I’m pretty wonderful.
So this is where the Lam Rim or the graduated path is extremely kind to us because we can check up to see if we are as wonderful as we really think we are. We can take our thinking in terms of what we’re doing and take as our measure the system of practice as set out in the graduated path and see if there’s a correspondence. So, can examine for ourselves whether we’re just fooling ourselves or actually carrying on a positive, a real practice. We can look within the graduated path, for example, in terms of the various trainings set forth by the Buddha and the foundation of which is to abandon the ten negative actions and to cultivate the ten positive actions. We can examine for ourselves, am I actually doing this or not in my everyday life?
So, we can make a realistic judgment of whether in fact we are practicing the Dharma well or not. In terms of, for example, the very foundation of practice is simply: are we cultivating the ten positive actions or are we abandoning the ten negative, unskillful actions? And we can see. We can see if I’m actually practicing. If I am implementing the ten skillful actions, I’m as best as possible abandoning the ten negative actions and then you say, Ah, I’m doing okay. I’m practicing well.
I’m good. On the other hand, if we are, we can say, Well, this is the way the Buddha practiced and this is the way he set it forth, and I’m acting in accordance with that therefore I am practicing well. On the other hand, if we aren’t, then I am no good. I am no good. I am no good.
The Buddhadharma, though in general we can say that we have these, what are called the three doors of body, speech and mind. That Buddhadharma is mainly dependent upon mind. Our conducts of speech and body are auxiliary. The practice of Dharma is mainly founded upon the mind itself. So, as Śāntideva says, we don’t have to examine ourselves a great deal in order to determine whether we’re practicing the Dharma or not.
We just have to look at our mind. That though in fact we’re performing various actions with our body and speech, It is mainly the quality of our mind. What types of thoughts are we thinking? The general quality of our thinking. Is it positive or is it negative?
And this is determined whether we’re practicing the Dharma or not. And there was one previously, one great Kadampa master by the name of Geshe Ben carrying on his practice. In the course of examining his mind in meditation, he would begin to add up. He had black and white stones and for every negative thought, he would put a stone in that pile. For every positive thought, he would put a stone in that pile.
At the end of the evening, he’d take a look and add up to see which was higher. In the beginning, there were very few white stones, a big pile of black stones. Slowly as he cultivated his mind, the black stones began to decrease and the white stones began to increase. And, at the end of the evening, when he would take a look at the differences in the piles of stones, and if the pile of white stones was larger than the black, then he would shake his own hand and congratulate himself and say, You’re a fine fellow, Geshe Ben. It’s very good.
So, on the other hand, if the black pile was bigger than the white pile, he would scold himself. And he said, You’re no good, you’re no good. I’m not going to give you any food tomorrow if you keep this up. So this is the place that we carry on our practice within our own mind and this is the place to examine as to whether we’re practicing or not. Aboriginal.
So, Geshe Ben used to say that his main work was, the moment that an afflictive emotion showed its head, to throw a spear at it. This would, that is to say, apply an antidote the moment an afflicted emotion arose. And he would, if the enemy of afflictive emotions backed off, then he would back off. But if it advanced, he would advance towards it. Previously, in Tibet, the Kadampa masters were unimaginably great practitioners of dharma.
So the mind is the forerunner: if an afflictive emotion arises in the mind, then under the influence of the quality of one’s own mind, one will engage in various verbal and physical negative actions, whether the types of negative actions such as physical negative actions of killing, stealing, sexual impropriety, verbal negative actions such as lying, divisive speech, harsh speech, and idle gossip. It is the mind which is the foundation of these various actions itself. So, our practice is initially out of a sense of dread of future possible sufferings to seek protection. That is to say, we go for refuge. But we simply do not leave it at that.
It’s necessary to implement the trainings of having gone for refuge. And this involves the abandonment of the ten unskillful actions and cultivation of the ten skillful actions. If we do this, if we act in accordance with this way, then it’s definite that eventually we will achieve a happiness bereft of all suffering. But on the other hand, this is to say, this is the practice of Dharma, that is to implement the various trainings as set forth by the Buddha. If we do not do this, then no matter what we may do, it’s not a practice of Dharma.
Today we will explain very roughly the trainings in going for refuge, the trainings as set forth by the Buddha, and in the future, since these are extremely important, we’re going to explain these in more detail. But we’re going to stop there. If you have some questions? Q: Q: So it’s not necessary that you have questions. If you have questions which are based on some kind of doubts that you may have, they are very good.
We didn’t have this tradition in Tibet of having questions after teaching. And the general format that was used was the teacher would give an extremely detailed extensive teaching on the subject. Having done that, then the teacher would then go on to give a brief explanation of that same teaching and having done that then the teacher would give the essence of what was just talked about. There would be question session after that. It’s good if you have questions, but it’s not necessary that you do.
We used to go for a long time in our teaching sessions and each session would last three or four hours in Tibet. Yvonne? So, each of the various afflictive emotions has a counterpart antidote. And just by way of example, if anger were to arise in our mind, then we should cultivate tolerance and love as an antidote to that anger. So there’s an antidote to which it corresponds to each of the various types of negative afflictive emotion.
Anger is an attitude which seeks to harm others. Whereas, on the other hand, love is an attitude which seeks to benefit others. And these two are incompatible, these two attitudes. But moreover, anger is a wrong conception whereas love is a correct conception as to the nature of the object. Langdorf, Langdonier, How to practice, would you rephrase that?
So the quality of awareness is very much like a police person. It looks at — checks out the area as to whether there are any criminals around or not. If someone’s acting badly, they arrest the person. Likewise, the factor of awareness is a factor which examines the state of the mind, examining us to see the quality of our thoughts — whether negative thoughts are arising or positive thoughts are arising. If for example anger were arising, through the power of awareness one would know that anger was arising in the mind and then one would cultivate love at that moment.
So, awareness is very much like this police person inspecting the state of the mind. The method whereby we can increase awareness is as set forth by Śāntideva, where he said through the power of mindfulness we are again and again to examine the state of our body, speech and mind. That if we are continually being mindful, looking toward what are we doing physically, what are we saying verbally, and types of thoughts are we thinking, then this in itself will increase the power of our awareness. We’ll become more and more aware of the states of our body, speech and mind.
So just continually again and again examine. In general, there is a saying of the Kadampa masters that in general, when we’re with others, we should watch our speech. When we’re by ourselves, we should watch our mind. That if we don’t watch what when we get together with others, if we’re not careful with our speech, then we can cause a great deal of harm to ourselves and others through negligence in what we’re talking about and the way we talk. And at other times when we’re by ourselves, then we should pay special attention to what is the quality of our mind.
If we aren’t careful with our mind, then we can create a great deal of negative thoughts will quite naturally arise, unskillful types of thoughts, and we can create a great deal of suffering for ourselves just by not being aware of the state of our mind.