Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 95-minute session, Khensur Rinpoche opens with Śāntideva’s image of a substance that transmutes iron into gold — his analogy for how bodhicitta (the awakened heart) turns even a crumb offered to a dog into a cause for Buddhahood. He establishes why bodhicitta is the trunk supporting all Mahāyāna practice, distinguishes the universal vehicle from the lesser vehicle by the scope of motivation, and argues that the quality of mind determines the quality of every physical and verbal action. He then walks through Tsongkhapa’s combined eleven-part Lamrim method for generating bodhicitta: an equanimity meditation visualising a friend, an enemy, and a stranger; recognising all beings as one’s mother; remembering their kindness; and building toward tonglen and the exceptional resolve to attain Buddhahood. A brief Q&A closes with advice on unintentional harm and applying Vajrasattva mantra to purify it.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 02 MM 1996 11 12.mp3
UUID: a4c9f9cd-b8e9-4d72-8031-cd4733145f95
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Mahāmudrā 1996-97 (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1996-11-12
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 95.0 minutes
Words: ~5,242
So according to a verse by the great Indian master Śāntideva, where he says that the moment they generate the awakened heart, those tortured by bonds in the prison of cyclic existence are called children of those gone to bliss, that is to say the Buddhas, and become objects of homage of both humans and worldly gods. Śāntideva is trying to get across the very preciousness of this quality of the awakened heart. That whosoever amongst the six types of migrating beings generates such a mind is worthy of homage by both humans and worldly gods, and that they become like the rays of the moon and are practitioners of the universal vehicle. So it is this precious quality of the awakened heart that once generated determines whether one is a practitioner of the universal vehicle or not. If one has developed this awakened heart bodhicitta, then one is a practitioner of the universal vehicle.
If one has not, no matter what other excellent qualities one may in fact have, one is not a practitioner of the universal vehicle. So this precious mind of the awakened heart is likened to the trunk of a tree. The trunk is that which supports the rest of the tree, including its limbs, its leaves, its fruit and flowers. And likewise, with respect to the universal vehicle, it is the trunk of the awakened heart, bodhicitta, which supports all of the wonderful qualities which can be developed through the vehicle universal vehicle, all can bring to consummation all of one’s vast qualities. They’re all dependent upon this trunk of the awakened heart.
This precious mind of the awakened heart is extremely beneficial. And how is that? Whatever negative actions one may have accumulated in the past by the development of the awakened heart are purified, but not only that, in the future one will no longer commit negative actions. Also, this precious mind of the awakened heart, it transforms the various practices into the practices of the six perfections, as practices of the perfection of generosity, ethics, tolerance, effort, meditative stabilization, and wisdom. By being under the influence of the awakened heart, they could become the six perfections.
With the motivation of the awakened heart, even giving a crumb of bread to a dog accumulates a skillful action, that is a virtue, equal to space is extremely vast. And not only that, that acts as a cause whereby one will attain Buddhahood, that it becomes a means of eliminating all of one’s various faults and bringing to consummation all of one’s excellent qualities, if even that slight offering can have those effects, what to say of greater offerings. Previously, was a substance which was able to transform iron into gold. Despite rubbing this substance on the iron, even tons of gold could be tons of iron could be transformed into gold. So likewise, it is the substance of the awakened heart, which has the power of transforming even insignificant skillful actions, that is their virtues, into those virtues, those skillful actions which will bring about and act as causes for the attainment of Buddhahood.
That by the mere influence of the awakened heart, even these minor virtues can bring about Buddhahood. So this is mentioned in a verse by Śāntideva where he talks about this substance which is able to transmute iron into gold. In the Guide to the bodhisattva’s Way of Life. Not only that, but in general, the skillful actions that we accumulate, I just say the virtues, when they ripen and a result is experienced, then that virtue is exhausted. But under the influence of the awakened heart, the various skillful actions that we create become inexhaustible, that they continue to bring about, to bear positive types of fruit and bring about this benefit to ourselves.
Śāntideva, in a verse in his text, mentions a type of tree, which I believe is called a plantain tree, a type of banana tree, but a special variety, which only bears fruit once. And this is likened or analogous to our usual types of skillful actions or virtues. Once they ripen into a result, then they are finished, they’re exhausted. But compared to this, those types of skillful actions which are accumulated under the influence of the awakened heart, they are like a perennial tree which bears fruit year after year after year inexhaustibly. So let’s look at this word that which is being translated as the awakened heart.
Quite often it’s translated as the mind of enlightenment. In Sanskrit, it’s bodhicitta. And in Tibetan, it’s Jang Chub Ki Sem. Jang Chub is quite often translated as enlightenment. I translate it as awakening.
It has two syllables: jang and chub. Jang means to have purified or eliminated all the various faults. Chub means to have brought to consummation all excellent qualities. So this is the state of awakening or enlightenment, and one who does that is an awakened one, that is to say a Buddha. So, again, in the Tibetan language, the word which is translated in Sanskrit as bodhicitta, we explained what but there’s also the word and is generally translated as mind, I’m translating it as heart.
And what it means here is that there is an aspiration towards something, that is to say, one is aspiring to awakening or enlightenment or, let us say, to become a Buddha for the welfare of both oneself and others. So again and again, bringing this to mind, having the mindfulness of aspiring to bring about the ultimate welfare of both oneself and others by the achievement of Buddha or enlightenment is what we mean by this term. So an analogous example which is being gotten out here by the term sem or this is that if you see something that you really appreciate very much, that you have a great liking for, and you think again and again in your mind, Oh, I want that, I need that, I want that, I want that. And one aspires to attain that object. And this is the same quality of aspiring to attain this object that is being spoken of here.
So there is a this term is supplemented by another word, sometimes is translated as mind generation, I translate it as an open heart. And here the word kye, as Rinpoche mentioned, means to arise or generate. It has the idea of opening out or extending, so extending one’s mind, opening one’s heart. So what do we mean by this mind having extended or the heart has been opened? The mind is very vast in its conception.
That one begins to develop a resolve that in order to bring about the complete welfare of myself and others, to eliminate all the suffering of both myself and others and to establish myself and others in happiness, that I resolve to attain Buddhahood. So it is this vast conception or this aspiration which is the opening of the mind. So this mind or heart that that we’re extending or an opening of the heart is a type of motivation, and it’s extremely profound and vast type of motivation. And if our motivation is extremely vast, then the types of behavior or conduct which flow out of that motivation will be proportionally vast and will bring about vast results. In order to bring about vast results, we must involve ourselves in vast types of behavior or conduct.
In order to do that, we must proportionately have a vast motivation in order to involve ourselves in that type of conduct. And we can readily understand that if one has a minor type of motivation or trifling motivations, this can only lead us to involve ourselves in trifling types of behavior, bringing about trifling or insignificant types of results. We can really understand that. So this is how the term Mahāyāna or the great vehicle comes about because initially one involves oneself in this vehicle by means of the motivation of the awakened heart. Out of that awakened heart as the motivation comes extremely vast conducts or types of deeds, and one achieves great results, and therefore it is a great vehicle.
So we are seeking to practice the Dharma and within the Dharma, the Dharma of the universal vehicle. If we meditate even for five minutes on this precious awakened heart, bodhicitta, then the skillful action or the merit which accrues, if it were to have form, would not be able to fit in all of space. So the Buddha Dharma is composed of two vehicles, the great vehicle and the lesser vehicle, or the small vehicle. The small vehicle is entered into by means of the motivation by a small type of motivation, a limited motivation, a lesser type of motivation than that of the universal vehicle. Due to this limited type of motivation, the types of conduct or behavior which are engaged in are of a lesser type, bringing about a lesser type of result.
This is why it’s termed the hinayana or the lesser vehicle due to this lesser result which is achieved. So the individual who involves themselves in lesser vehicle or the smaller vehicle has a fear of cyclic existence, the suffering within cyclic existence, and has an aspiration to be liberated from this suffering of cyclic existence. Therefore, out of such a motivation they involve themselves in various practices in in order that they themselves be liberated from their suffering. This is the nature of their practice and therefore their practice, their path in which they follow to achieve this is very limited. It’s limited to their own self liberation and therefore they only achieve a limited result, their abandonment of cyclic existence.
They are not able by means of this path to achieve the ultimate welfare of both themselves and others. On the other hand, the universal vehicle is concerned with both self and others, that self are exactly like others, that all beings are equally tortured by suffering, and all beings likewise want to achieve happiness. So that in order to bring about the welfare of both self, the complete welfare of both self and others, that one aspires to achieve the state of a Buddha, that in order to bring about this end of eliminating the suffering and bringing happiness to all living beings. This is an extremely vast mind, and this mind requires this end is extremely vast, requiring a vast minded type of motivation. So this, the nature of the process that was being spoken of here, it operates equally both in the secular area and the spiritual, whether it’s dharma or worldly activities.
If we have extremely vast motivation, even in worldly activities, we will achieve a very vast type of result. So the motivation is extremely important and we all know that. If for example, we were, we had a beneficial motivation, then the type of conduct would be beneficial which arose from that, and we would achieve a beneficial result. And the opposite would be equally true if we had a harmful motivation, this would lead to harmful types of behavior bringing about harmful results. An analogy would be in the case of a plant.
If the roots of that plant were of a medicinal variety, then all that arose from those roots, the stem, the leaves, and the various fruits, would have a medicinal nature. Likewise, if the roots were of a poisonous variety, then those parts of the plant which arose from those roots, the stem, leaves, fruits, etc, would be a poisonous nature, they would be harmful. So, you know, we are always meditating. We all like to meditate. But we want to ensure that we achieve some productive results from our meditation and this is very much dependent upon our motivation for for our meditation.
We want positive results, we don’t want negative results from our meditation, and this is dependent upon the nature of our motivation and whether, even in a positive motivation, whether it’s a small or a middling or vast motivation. In the case of involving ourselves in meditation with harmful motivation, the meditation cannot become Dharma and therefore the result can only be negative. Say for example that someone in order to kill another person recited the mantra of Yamāntaka. In general, mantra of Yamāntaka is included within spiritual practices. It’s part of the Dharma.
And they recited hundreds of thousands of Yamāntaka mantra and they made prayers that this person be killed through this recitation. Though in general the mantra of Yamāntaka is a part of the Dharma, in fact, but the recitation only involves creating more and more negativity. So mantra recitation is an activity of speech, but even the activity of speech is dependent upon the mind and dependent upon the quality of the mind in terms of it being positive or negative will determine the quality of our verbal and physical actions. So therefore, it is the quality of our thinking will determine whether the various physical and verbal actions which flow from that are skillful or unskillful. If our mind is in a negative state, then whatever types of actions, whatever we may do physically or verbally will be negative in quality.
That the activities of our body and speech are not independent, somehow independent of the quality of our mind. The mind is very much the master, and the speech and body are the servants of the master. The Buddha taught the Dharma, and the Dharma was taught in order to bring about a healthy mind. That it is the Dharma is that which brings about a healthy mind and as a means to eliminate unhealthy states of mind. That if we have, by means of developing a healthy mind, then we will cease negative types of verbal and physical actions.
So what do we mean by healthy mind? There would be those states of mind which are beneficial either to oneself or others, and the contrary of that, unhealthy states of mind would be those which are harmful either to oneself or others. So what do we mean by states of mind which are beneficial to others? These are mainly the states such as love and compassion. Love is that which views others without happiness and wishes that they be brought happiness, whereas compassion sees others undergoing suffering and wishes that their suffering be eliminated.
The mind of self benefit would be the thought to, when one is without happiness, to wish to bring oneself happiness, when one is suffering the wish that one be separated or have one’s suffering be eliminated. So, and the healthiest of all minds is the supreme of all minds is the awakened heart. So, if we have not generated this precious mind, the awakened heart, then we should again and again seek to generate it and to raise it to a higher and higher level. So I’m going to explain how to proceed in meditating on the awakened heart. So with respect to the way in which to meditate on the awakened heart, There is the one method which comes firstly from the Buddhas, through the various disciples, down through Nāgārjuna and in lineage with Śāntideva.
And this method of meditating on the awakened heart is termed exchanging self for others. And then there is a second type of meditation on the awakened heart coming down again from the Buddha through his various disciples to Maitreya, then to Asaṇga. This method of meditating on the awakened heart is termed the sevenfold cause and effect precept. And these two means of meditating on the awakened heart flowed down and were joined in the person of Atisha. And Atisha continued on both of these methods to Tsongkhapa, who went on in his The Graduated Path texts, or the Lam Rim, combined these two into a single method.
This method is a very powerful means of quickly generating the awakened heart, unlike any others. So this combined method of meditation has eleven parts. The first of these eleven is that of an equanimity which is devoid of closeness or distance. So an equality in which there is no sense of distance or closeness, but a sense of equanimity. So in explaining the method of meditating on the equanimity, the avoidance of closeness or distance, we first imagine three individuals in front of ourselves, three people.
So there is one person that you have a liking for, another who you have a dislike for, and then a third person who you feel another liking or dislike, that is a neutral person. When you look at the person that you like, feel very pleased when you look upon them. It’s a very pleasant experience. When you look at the person that you dislike, you get a scowl on your face. Become Literally, you become very black faced, scowl.
And then when you look at the third person, you just feel rather indifferent toward them. So we look at these three people and at the person that we have a liking for and the other who we have a disliking for, maybe an anger, and the third who we feel indifference toward, we begin to contemplate, Well, why do I have these feelings about them? Why do I feel the way I do it? And when we begin to check up, we see that, Well, that person that you have a liking for, the reason that you have a liking for them is because they brought you some even if little benefit in the course of this life. And that person that you feel a dislike for, it’s because they brought you even a little harm over the course of this life?
And the third person, why do you feel indifferent toward them because they have neither harmed you nor helped you or benefited you over the course of this life? Okay. So when we look to the one that we like and we think about why we like them the way we do, and we realize that it’s because of the reason that in some small way over the course of this life that they’ve benefited me and that’s why I’m so pleased by them. But if we go on and examine the nature of our relationship, we can remember, we can recall that in past lives, in our previous lives, that this very same person has in fact harmed you, that in fact they’ve killed you, they’ve beat you, they’ve tortured you, they’ve done terrible things to you, and this is all that they have done in the past life to you. So thinking of this individual who this way who has harmed us in a past life, this will begin to cause us to cease the way in which we relate with them in terms of liking them presently.
And we turn to this person we dislike and we recall that in previous lives this very same person who we presently dislike was extremely beneficial to ourselves, previously that they were our mother, our father, our brothers and sisters, that they showed us great kindness in various activities and therefore dislike for them is completely inappropriate. Let me turn to the stranger, the person we have a sense of neutrality for or a feeling of indifference, and we recall that why is it that we feel this way? Simply because this person in the course of this life has been of no actual either positive or negative value to ourselves. But if we remember in the past, in previous lives, that this person in fact has been of great benefit to me, has been like a brother to me, but also has been extremely negative toward myself, has caused me great harm. When we look at these three individuals we can begin to gain a sense that in an overall perspective that they are very much the same, that they all have been equally negative to myself, they all have been equally positive to myself, and therefore our present feelings of attachment and hatred are quite inappropriate when looked at from this perspective, or our likings for one and our dislikes for another.
So we develop a sense of equanimity, is a feeling of sameness of attitude toward these three individuals, divorced of any sort of attachment or hatred, liking or disliking. So the analogy is that of growing a crop in a field. If the field, the place where you’re going to plant our crop is extremely rough, it’s full of boulders, it’s full of logs, it would be very difficult to cultivate such a field. We have to remove the unevenness of the place where we’re going to plant our crop. We have to level it out and make a flat place.
Having done that, then we can pliancy that crop and we’ll get an abundant harvest. Likewise, what has been analogized is that in order to cultivate the wonderful qualities of the universal vehicle, we have to develop a sense of equanimity as a foundation, equanimity where there is no attachment or aversion. So it is on this foundation of equanimity and an even minded attitude toward others divorced of any sense of attachment, aversion, or closeness or distance, that we go on to develop a sense of recognizing all sentient beings as our mothers. So we all are able to recognize our mother of this life, and that we have to understand that this mother has not only been our mother of this life, but in the previous life has been our mother and a life in various previous lives. That in fact, not only has this mother, this person been our mother, but also in all our previous lives, we also had mothers who were likewise have been our mothers many times.
We have had rebirth prior to our present birth and there was a rebirth prior to that previous rebirth and going back and back and back. In fact, the number of rebirths that we’ve taken over time is numberless. And over this numberless rebirths, we’ve had numberless mothers that not only was the mother of this life has been our mother numberless times, but in fact all living beings have been our mothers numberless times. Previous to having taken rebirth in this life to this mother, we took rebirth in a previous life and in that life had another mother. So we’ve taken many previous rebirths.
Can we come to understand this? We can understand it in terms of our various afflictive emotions, that how powerfully we are habituated to them, afflictive emotions such as anger or attachment, that they quickly arise in our mind almost all at once by themselves without any effort on our part. Again and again, attachment and anger are continually coming with our minds due to prior habituation. On the other hand, when we try to meditate, our minds aren’t clear. Have great difficulty gaining any type of understandings and realizations.
Why is this? Because it is due to having not accumulated the collection of creative potential or merit in the past lives. We haven’t accustomed ourselves to these realizations and clarities of mind in the past lives, but on the contrary, in various previous lives we have associated with these negative states and have habituated ourselves to them. So this quality is due to the latencies of karmic impressions which we’ve created in past lives. So maybe this is difficult for Westerners to accept.
We have to accept previous rebirths. So in general, Buddhists accept previous and future rebirths. If we don’t accept previous rebirths then it’s going to be difficult to recognize all living beings as your mother. Once we are able to recognize all living beings are a mother, then we begin to remember their great kindness that they have shown us, that even while we are still in the womb, how much care our mother takes, how much great concern she has for our welfare. And even after all of the great difficulty that she experiences in the course of the actual birth, She takes us lovingly into her arms and smiles upon us and she quite willingly cleans up our mess and feeds us the best of foods and handles us very tenderly.
Initially we were something like a worm, even our mother holds that worm, who we were very precious, and as we grow, tries to do the best she can for us in terms of feeding us and clothing us and giving us whatever material needs we have according to her economics, her financial situation, doing whatever she can that we might like. And it’s all dependent upon this great care that we’ve been shown over the course of our life, that we’re now able that we now have achieved what we have success in our life, and that we now are able to practice the Dharma. This is all all that we are now is a reflection of the great kindness our mothers have shown us. So on the basis of equanimity, we go on to recognize all living beings as our mothers, then go on to remember their great kindness. Once we appreciate their great kindness, we develop a gratitude which then seeks to repay their great kindness.
That gratitude how is that kindness going to be repaid? By seeking to eliminate their suffering and bringing them happiness, to help them through various methods and bringing this about. So our repayment is in terms of eliminating their suffering and bringing them happiness. So, on the basis of equanimity, we recognize all living beings as our mothers, we begin to appreciate their great kindness, develop a gratitude which wishes to repay their kindness. We develop a real liking toward others.
We begin to see others as our mother how kind they have been. Just by seeing other people, we develop a sense of happiness in ourselves. We develop what is called appealing love, where others a sense of love where others look very appealing to ourselves, very attractive to us. We can appreciate how very kind mothers are in benefiting their offspring. We can even look at animals like how birds feed their young, continually bringing food to feed their chicks.
In talking about the kindness of others, we can not only appreciate the kindness when in fact they were our mothers, when perhaps the benefit is quite obvious, but even when others have not been our mothers, they are extremely kind to us. And why is that? Look at all that we have in terms of our food, our clothing, the homes that we live in. These all are dependent upon others. We aren’t able to supply all our needs ourselves, that we didn’t build the home that we live in or that we aren’t able to make our own clothing or or we aren’t able to grow our own vegetables or supply our own milk.
We depend upon all of these. We depend upon in order to get all of these necessities, we depend upon the kindness of others. If we look at the disadvantages of self centeredness, that self centeredness is concentrating only on his own happiness, where one has no sense of awareness or a sense of benefiting others. One is concerned with oneself and this is an extremely great fault. But in fact, is other cherishing where we seek, where we cherish others, we seek to benefit them, seek to bring about their welfare is in fact the root of all of our happiness.
thinking in this way, the advantages of other centers and disadvantages of self centers, we go on to practice taking and giving. Where we take upon ourselves the sufferings of all mother sentient beings and we do this in association with inhalation, inhaling. We give over all of our happiness, all of our creative potential and even our body as means of bringing others happiness associated with exhaling the outward breath. Merely the wish, may others have happiness and may they not suffer, though it’s an extremely positive state of mind, it in itself is not sufficient. We must in fact go on to do something.
We must act and moreover, we must take responsibility thinking that I myself will eliminate the sufferings of others and that I myself will bring about that happiness of others. That is to say, we develop what is called an exceptional resolve. But we have to ask ourselves, can I in fact bring about the happiness of all living beings? Can I eliminate the sufferings of all sentient beings? And seeing that in fact we can’t, we have to question, well, can anyone who could?
And we see that it is only a Buddha who is able to achieve this in. So one develops a determined resolve where that I myself, in order to bring about the welfare of not only myself but all living beings, I must attain Buddhahood. When one makes that resolve from the depths of one’s heart to attain Buddhahood to bring about the welfare of both oneself and all living beings, one develops the awakened heart. When one meditates in the manner which has been described and generates this precious mind of awakening, one becomes a practitioner of the universal vehicle. So I’ve spoken about the awakened heart rather extensively.
I think maybe for some of you it was extremely beneficial, maybe a few of you got bored. So nearly hearing the word awakened heart or bodhicitta is really a wonderful blessing. It will in the future be of tremendous benefit that one will be able to generate very quickly. So we’re going to stop there, but if you have some questions, we’ll take a few minutes for those. Yes.
So, on one hand you rejoice that you have achieved this human life, but in the meanwhile you are causing a regular suffering. So then the question is? I see. So how can I change this feeling of Taking what you said in terms of, for example, that when you’re walking around it, maybe you kill insects, and that you had no intention, you had no negative intention to kill and therefore even though having killed, there’s only a slight negativity involved? And one can, in the evening, recall various actions over the course of the day and having regret that you may have killed over the course of the day, apply the four powers, the four counteracting agents in connection with the recitation of, for example, the hundred syllable mantra of Vajrasattva or the recitation of the text Disclosure of Downfalls.
So if is an intention, then there is going to be to kill, there is negativity involved. If there is no intention to kill, then it’s not negative. So as we mentioned that the quality of the action is dependent upon motivation. Within the context of motivation, if there is no negative intention, then the action is not negative. So there’s no sentient being who is not suffering.
Whatever, we’re going to suffer and you have no intention of causing that suffering and that’s what is important. So having seen that suffering, it would be useful to cultivate compassion. Compassion. Whatever and good. I’m sorry, couldn’t hear you very well.
Is he? A hypothesis? Okay, go ahead.