Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A vivid medical analogy — doctor as Buddha, medicine as Dharma, nurse as Sangha — runs through this 97-minute Lam Rim session with Khensur Rinpoche, pressing home the point that no outside power liberates you unless you take the prescription and actually practise. The session centres on equalizing and exchanging self with others, drawing on the Guru Puja and Śāntideva’s Engaging in the Bodhisattva Way of Life. Rinpoche explains the three types of suffering, unpacks jikten (“basis of destruction”) as a description of saṃsāra, and traces all suffering to self-cherishing while tracing all happiness to cherishing others. He also presents Geshe Langri Thangpa’s instruction to take loss and offer others the victory, explaining why self-cherishing makes you your own worst enemy. Suited to practitioners familiar with the Guru Puja.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 15 LR 2000 04 04.mp3
UUID: 07b7a9e6-c513-4f30-912e-f4b0576595d8
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Lam Rim (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 2000-04-04
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 96.9 minutes
Words: ~4,306
Soon forgot to bring the yellow star. Yeah. That another thing. Well, first of all, the bodhicitta are set up for motivation of altruistic intention and do a short meditation for a few minutes. So, currently we are onto the subject of developing equanimity and also equalizing self from others.
The equanimity, which means that both no matter what kind of sentient beings they are, but all are in one. They’re wanting happiness and do not wish suffering. We do have happiness, but that happiness is the contaminated happiness. What we lack here is we lack the ultimate happiness, which is the happiness without suffering.
And now, as those entire sentient beings seek the ultimate happiness or happiness without sufferings, shall he develop the special insight of compassion that wishing both oneself and others to have that unchangeable happiness and wishing them to be free from the unchangeable sufferings and its causes. And then at this stage, those sentient beings are tortured by three types of sufferings, the suffering of suffering, suffering of change, and suffering of pervasive conditioning. So as they are tortured by all these sorts of sufferings, in order to free them from all these sufferings should here develop a special insight of compassion that wanting all the sentient beings be free from all the sufferings and their causes? During meditation, if one meditates upon those two, the special insight of love and compassion, it is very, very beneficial, and one can cultivate a great deal of merit. So, in all the time, we always lack and can’t attain to that wishing happiness and being under the torture of one’s own.
So in order to free, so during their meditation should perform one’s meditation with wishing that in order to free both oneself and others from that others from that unwanted sufferings and let them have the wishing happiness, which is unchangeable happiness, I shall engage in the practices to overcome all the negativities and attain entire good qualities. By doing this, one cultivates bodhicitta or altruistic intention. So, at this stage, we are not fully familiarized or acquainted with those special insight, love, compassion, and the bodhicitta, but by doing it very often, even if all those love, compassion, and bodhicitta fails to occur effortlessly within oneself, but if it comes, if all those comes with the effort, that’s still okay, which implies that one has achieved not the actual bodhicitta, but the type of bodhicitta has been generated. Doing a meditation on this, about five minutes, is very, very helpful and one can cultivate lots of merit even for five minutes. And then by maintaining that meditation and familiarizing one’s mind with that meditation very often.
For the time being, in a certain time, one will be able to have that mind of altruism, able to develop that mind of altruism within oneself without any effort. It just comes by, yeah, without any effort, just by seeing a sentient being, one can develop that altruistic intention easily. Whenever that happens, then one has attained an actual bodhicitta. So whenever one develops that kind of mind, one becomes a bodhisattva. So, if one attains that mind, the altruistic intention, then any action one performs, walking, sleeping, eating, whatever one does, one still cultivates once actions become positive, then cultivate a huge amount of virtues.
And by developing that altruistic intention, then one will bring all this unwanted sufferings into end or to cease and can easily obtain the wishing happiness. So should he develop the motivation that in order to accomplish such, I shall here listen to this, listen, contemplate, and meditate on this Lamrim teaching. So, as we are onto the topic of how to train one’s mind by equalizing and exchanging self in others, As everyone, we all practice the Guru Puja. Guru Puja practice, the practice of changing, equalizing, and exchanging self and others has been set forth in the Guru Puja. So, I thought it is good to go briefly through the Guru Puja about the topic of cultivating the equanimity and also the higher equanimity refers towards equalizing and exchanging self from others, which is even more intense than the equanimity which we dealt in the previous classes.
So in Guru Puja set forth that both oneself and others are same, that do not bear or want a slight do not wish or do not take even a slightest or very tiny little sufferings and never been satisfied with happiness. So in that case, as they are saying wanting happiness and do not wish sufferings, even the slightest suffering, I shall may others have all the happiness. So which shows that as by seeing both oneself and others as same, this is the reason that one does not feel happy when receiving happiness for oneself. One should offer happiness for others all the time and feel and rejoice and feel happy by offering happiness to others. It is because others are the source of all the good qualities and should not feel happy for one’s own happiness because oneself is the source of all miserables.
So, it says they should not feel happy for one’s own happiness because if one rejoiced not rejoiced, if one feels happy for one’s own happiness, that helps to develop a self-cherishing attitude. By developing that self-cherishing attitude, that self-cherishing attitude look for a method to attain happiness with itself. By having this, then it wants to involve or produce many non virtues or negative actions to have happiness for the self. By performing all those bad actions, which will cause one to open a door to all the sufferings, which also becomes the source of all the foundation or base for the unhappiness to grow. In order to prove this, the hero, the great master Śāntideva had set forth in his text, engaging in the bodhisattva way of life, saying that all the sufferings of cyclic existence comes from wishing happiness for self, which means here the cyclic existence or saṃsāra, it’s been said for the two types, the external and the internal saṃsāra, which means the external samsaras are all these shelters, buildings, water, trees, and so forth.
Internal cyclic existence are the beings who live, the inhabitants, like any kinds of sentient beings, fish, animals, human beings, humans, and so forth. So, yes, humans and so forth. And the inhabitants have been called the saṃsāra or cyclic existence. The inverted word, in Tibetan word, is called jikten, so I think it’s good to say this first. The jikten means the basis of destruction, which means that they are not the permanent.
There always changes rapidly or it’s a momentary. The changes never stays one. Both the external cyclic existence and the internal are or comes out of the collections of substances, elements, so forth for that reason and so forth. They are not permanent in the nature of momentary the rapid change. Due to this, are called the saṃsāra or jikten, which is the basis of destruction.
So, they are being called the basis of destruction because both the internal and the external, the cyclic existence, based on the destructions or rely on something which is not stable for the external objects, the trees and so forth, or depends on the substances element and so forth. As the substances elements are used as a base for the subtle existence to maintain, due to this, they are not reliable, also momentary, as well as the internal cyclic existence which is sentient beings. For any kind of sentient beings, whether it’s a form or the formless sentient beings, they are also based on the changeable or destructive nature of the destructive nature. For example, for instance, we take the sentient beings with the firm sentient beings who have the form and based or depend on the five aggregates. All those five aggregates are not reliable based, which are in the nature of the change as well.
They both depend on the destructive nature of base. Yeah, so here, as we explained about the internal and external saṃsāra or cyclic existence, so when the great master master says the suffering of the cyclic existence, that the cyclic existence does not refer to as the external one because the external cyclic existence do not have any feelings. Which refers to the sentient beings who are inside, the internal saṃsāra or sentient beings. All the sufferings of this, where do all the sufferings of sentient beings come from? They said that it’s been clearly stated that the sufferings of the sentient beings comes from wishing, from wanting happiness for self.
So this is the reason that one should not wish for self happiness. All the suffering comes from that self wishing wanting self happiness or wishing yeah. And and and the should work for for for the for others’ happiness. And then also Geshe Langri Thangpa, in his Eight Points Thought Transformation or mind training, he said that if others abuse, exaggerate, or blame me out of jealousy. I shall still offer victory and I shall still offer victory towards them and should take the loss.
So if asked why we why we need to offer victory to others and take a loss for oneself, it is because oneself is one’s enemy and others are one’s dear ones or be friends or the relative. For that reason, as to self oneself is one’s enemy, one should always offer a loss towards the enemy and give the victory to the dear ones or a close one. So how one becomes one’s own enemy? One becomes one’s enemy because of that self-cherishing attitude. By cherishing oneself and through this, one cultivates all those because of holding oneself very dear and cherishing oneself very strongly.
Due to this, one performs ten non virtuous actions which will give the result of the sufferings. As it gives the suffering and because of this, it produces suffering to oneself, and one do not wish sufferings and one which offers unwanted suffering to oneself is the enemy. This is how one becomes one’s enemy. So that’s how one becomes one’s own enemy. For example, we set forth those the self grasping attitude, disturbing emotions are our enemy because they give us the suffering.
Even for general speaking in our normal life, we always come to someone as one’s enemy when the person gives or let you undergo through the sufferings or who brings suffering to you. So likewise, in the spiritual, even in spiritual, we do have enemies. Consider that one which produces suffering to us is our enemy. This is how we have labeled for the arhat, the liberated beings. In Tibetan words, it’s called the dachamba for the arhat, and dachamba which means the destroyer of enemy.
So, they’ve been called the destroyer of enemy and the enemy refers towards the disturbing emotions. Both the master Geshe Langri Thangpa and Śāntideva has stated that one’s self is one’s enemy. They said that one is one’s enemy because they said it by taking Buddha Śākyamūni as an account because the Buddha Śākyamūni has set forth that one is one’s own enemy and who else can become one’s enemy? One is one’s own dear ones and who else can become one’s dear ones? What it means is that if you know how to direct your way of thinking and know how to perform the action, then one becomes one’s own friend or dear ones.
If you do not know how to direct your mind and perform the actions, you become your enemy. Lord Buddha Śākyamūni has said that one is one’s own enemy and there’s no other enemies than oneself. Is of having that self grasping attitude and the self-cherishing attitude, and these two, the self grasping attitude influence influence the self-cherishing attitude to produce or perform the actions. That self-cherishing attitude cultivates all those ten non virtuous actions and causes harm to others. Through this, one accumulates the lots of non virtuous actions and the negativities.
As a result, one faces the sufferings through taking birth in the lower realms like hungry ghosts, animals, and so forth. During that period, the life of that period in those realms, one goes through the huge sufferings. There is no there is no such external enemies because the other sentient beings are one’s dear ones and one’s relative and one’s friends, and one’s friends can’t be one’s. Can’t. So your friends cannot be your your your enemy.
And so one we we we do have go we do go through the sufferings of heed and so forth, and that is more likely from the external thing of the changes of the season or elements. But originally, it is also cultivated by oneself that internally one establishes or one cultivates the karma and that karma encountered with the conditions. And because of that karma and conditions collected or the meeting of this karma and the conditions, one goes through the suffering of heat, cold and so forth. Basically, the main source is you yourself are the main source of all the suffering. Internally you cultivate all the actions.
Don’t go. I I’m I’m lost with my short notes now. We said, Lord Buddha Śākyamūni has said for that you yourself as your master or your friend or your protector, and who else can become your friend, master, and protector? It is set forth because in order to free oneself from the lower rebirths, from if one wants to free from the suffering of lower rebirths, one has to work for it. Nobody can free you from all those except oneself.
And if you want to free yourself from all those sufferings of the lower rebirth, you should not cultivate or abandon those ten non virtuous actions, and one will have one one can free yours one can free, Sorry. Excuse me. Just keep messing up with oneself and yourself. So so you can free yourself from the the the sufferings of lower rebirth, and and and you have you did it, and no one else did it except no one else did it for you. Also, if you want to go to the better, like a happy rebirth migration, sorry, happy migrations, you should practice ethical discipline, perfections, the patience.
By practicing all these, you will let yourself into the good migrations. Others cannot put you into the good migration unless you do it for yourself. If you want to become a Buddha, practice love and compassion, seek perfections and so forth, and by practicing this, you will attain to the Buddhahood and become Buddha. If you do not practice, this is what it says, that no one can’t be your protector because if you do not practice, then you will not be able to attain any free yourself from the sufferings of all the sufferings and cannot attain the higher rebirths and the rebirths. The Buddha Dharma Sangha has a great deal of power.
They can help you, but if you do not practice, then the power of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha are in no use unless you practice. Unless you practice. You are the one who can free yourself from all those sufferings and take you to the good migration, attain higher rebirth, Buddhism becomes Buddha and so forth. If you not practice, then the Buddha, Dharma, Buddha, bodhisattva, all these things are no no no. So the Buddha do help you, and Buddha are the conditions to help you.
And he shows the teachings and teach you the methods of freeing yourself, freeing yourself from freeing yourself from the sufferings and the lower rebirths. But if you do not put all the teachings into the practice, then they can do nothing. Their powers are of no use. Like the main thing is it’s entirely up to you. If you work, you will.
For example, there’s no car and you want to climb that mountain or travel towards a distance. If you do not walk, then you can’t reach there. Suppose you have a car and if you do not drive, you can’t be there. Nowhere around you to drive you. Likewise, the good doctor prescribed you, consult the|consult that doctor, and the doctor is a very good doctor, prescribes you very good medicines.
If you do not take the medicines, then the doctors can do nothing. This proves that it’s entirely up to you, and you yourself, you are your own master friends, and this is a refuge or a protector. The doctoral medicine Sangha are taken as an example of Buddhadharma and Sangha. Sorry. The doctor or medicine and the sister or nurse are taken as an example of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.
The doctors are like Buddha. What doctors do is they see the patient and examine the patient and figure out the main problem, what disease the patient has. Then by recognizing the problem or the disease of the patient, the doctor will prescribe the medicine. Likewise, the Buddha are the one who teaches you what are the causes of all the sufferings and the causes of the liberations and the happiness. The Buddha gave the teachings.
The medicine is like a teaching. By eating that medicine, then the which will relieve the patient from the illness or the diseases, and likewise putting all the advice, the teachings of Buddhas into practice, then that helps one to cut the doors of the disturbing emotions and all the sufferings. The sisters help the patient to eat medicines on the right time. Likewise, Sangha helps the disciple to in disciple in his or her practice. Also, you can copy or take the spiritual community as a role model and whom you watch and how to practice and so forth, and keeping you company in your practice through this, the sistro or the spiritual community, the sangho, helps.
Even though the doctoral medicine and the scissors help the patient to relieve from his or her illness, but the medicine is the one which actually relieves the patient from the disease. So likewise, the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha all help you to free from the sufferings and attain liberation, the actual one is the Dharma, which actually prevents all the sufferings, disturbing emotions and so forth, and lets you attain the liberation. So even though the dharma is the main, it also entirely depends on yourself. If the patient didn’t take a medicine, no matter how powerful, how good a doctor, how good a nurse is, and how powerful the medicine is, the patient can never be free from illness. Likewise, if you do not put all the teachings into practice or if you do not practice, then the powers or the potentiality of all those Buddhadharma and Sanghas are of no use and one can never be free from sufferings.
This is how one becomes one’s own master and if one practices, one can bring one into liberation. If one does not, then one will not be free from the sufferings. So, the doctors are taking as an example or analogy of Buddhas, but there are huge differences between doctor and the Buddhist. The Buddhas are very special objects that they have great knowledge, omniscience, and so forth. Just by having strong devotion and faith in Buddhists will help ones to attain the good rebirth or higher rebirths for once or twice.
But just the mere fate is not good enough to attain the ultimate or the ultimate liberation or ultimate happiness. So it’s been said that making prostrations, developing faith, and making offerings towards the Buddhas will cultivate huge amount of merit, and that can help ones to attain good rebirths. But without performing, without doing just by that, one cannot yeah, so one can attain the good rewards just by doing a good prostration, developing faith and offerings. But in order to gain a special insight, realizations in path and grounds, attain liberation or arhathood, as well as buddhahood, you need You need to practice and just by a strong faith in Buddhists, will not able to generate or develop the realization of the paths and grounds, liberation, and attain Buddhahood. Yeah, Guru Puja has also stated in Guru Puja, It’s been said in Guru Puja that one should see this chronic disease of self-cherishing attitude as the main cause main source, or main source of unwanted sufferings.
Any sufferings one face sees then, one should understand all the sufferings one encounter comes from the self-cherishing attitude. Therefore, I shall abandon that self-cherishing attitude, which means that the self-cherishing attitude is like a chronic disease or a very severe disease that can’t be cured. As that self-cherishing attitude, see that as the main source for all the entire which produces or gives you all the unwanted sufferings. So any sufferings you face, physical any difficulties, any sufferings you face, even from a bite from the mosquito or mosses and or little insects, even small sufferings of just the part of the insects, see that and take that suffering as the result of the self-cherishing attitude. Because of self-cherishing attitude, you have committed the actions that we have committed or cultivated the action that you will face a problem of suffering from the bite of the insects.
So in any kind of suffering, just think that which are the result of self-cherishing attitude, and by seeing the disadvantages of all these sufferings because of their self-cherishing attitude, should abandon the self-cherishing attitude from its root. And also when Guru Puja has said that Guru Puja also said that As we said in the early, the Guru Puja versus the one should feel happy for others’ happiness. Also, the great master Śāntideva, in his Engaging in the bodhisattva Sphere of Life, said that the happiness of the cyclic existence, which we have explained of the sentient beings, that the happiness of these sentient beings comes from the All the happiness of the sentient beings comes from wishing happiness for others. Also in Guru Puja, stated that one should develop the mind which cherishes the entire sentient beings as one’s mother. By seeing all the sentient beings, one should develop a mind which sees that the cherishing of other sentient beings as one’s mother is a source to cultivate the numberless or immeasurable good qualities and hold any sentient beings and behold the sentient beings as dear as one’s, even more dear than one’s own life.
So, which implies that the self-cherishing attitude is the main source of all the sufferings and to cherish others are the source of all the happiness. By seeing the disadvantages of a self-cherishing attitude and the advantages of cherishing others, one should exchange self and others. Others. All those, the translation of the verses from the Guru Puja text, I recite, is just a brief one quickly. You can go through the text.
So we need to exchange self and others. One should check within oneself, can one exchange self and others or not? The point here that the happiness comes from the cherishing others, and the sufferings come from the self-cherishing attitude. One needs to think about it. So if one tries to exchange self and others, one can exchange self and others.
One can do this practice because in the Guru Puja text, brief, the child worked for his own purpose and the Buddha worked for others. Examining this, what happened to the child working for his own purpose, the self-cherishing attitude? What happened to Buddha by working or cherishing others? By knowing this, one should Because Because of self-cherishing attitude, the child or infantile goes through all these sufferings and whereas Buddha, by cherishing, practicing, changing self and others and cherishing others more important than himself. As a result, the benefit of doing so, he does not need to come back circles in cyclic existence, does not need to go through any sufferings and live and have happiness forever.
These are the benefits of cherishing others. If one tries, one can exchange self from others. We can easily see the example or a role model for these practices. Example is Buddha Śākyamūni. So here we demonstrate the Buddha Śākyamūni, but there have been billions of numberless Buddhas, and all these Buddhas have abandoned the self-cherishing attitude.
They cherish others more important than themselves, and as a result they have been attained to all the happiness and they are free from samsaric existence. Also the great master Śāntideva has stated that in the numbers, in the billions and billions of eons. In the billions and billions of eons, the billions of Buddhas have been There been numberless of Buddhas, but none of them have been able to teach me. The result are still none of them were being able to teach me because of downfalls or the negativities which obscured me to receive the teachings, which means that the Buddha has no closeness or never distinguished the people from the closeness and the distance. They are willingly to teach anyone.
But because of your own negativity and obscurations, you’re being not able to because of one’s obscurations of the negativity, self-cherishing attitudes, and so forth, one has never received the teachings from the Buddhists, no? I’m thinking very much. So it’s going to be here or there? So we’ll start by class here and also taking fifteen minutes extra. We’re not doing a long Lam Rim.
We’re just doing a short dedication please. Jerry has brought the cake, and we have chai. Rinpoche said, If you prefer to have a chai here, just have a chai here, and if you want to go in the lounge room, you’re most welcome to go.