Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Khyentse Rinpoche introduces a weekend retreat centered on heart advice from Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö, a 19th-century Tibetan master known across multiple lineages. Rather than a formal commentary, this 45-minute session blends teaching, guided mind-searching meditation, and Q&A. Rinpoche opens by establishing the structure, then explores how all phenomena arise from mind, drawing on foundational Buddhist concepts: the rarity of a precious human birth, the four common foundations for Dharma practice, and the essential role of guru devotion in recognizing Buddha-nature. He uses concrete examples—a crystal reflecting light, the futility of depending on samsaric solutions—to illustrate emptiness and clarity as dual aspects of mind. The latter half guides practitioners in direct observation: searching for where thoughts originate, realizing that past mind is memory, future mind has not arisen, and present mind remains unlocatable. Suited for established practitioners familiar with Mahāyāna concepts and vajrayana terminology.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 WR.mp3
UUID: e29bd276-7d61-4af2-b326-e794621a1496
Teacher: Khyentse Rinpoche
Collection: Weekend Retreat (Khyentse Rinpoche)
Date: 1986 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.2 minutes
Words: ~3,812
So you should in the meditate do you do meditation in the during the retreat? What is what is the definition of retreat this time? What is the retreat here? So what what should what what should I do sometimes? Every time.
And then do the meditation in between? I see. Because this is sort of a meditation now. I was thinking of talking about heart advice written by Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö. So this involve a little bit of meditation, of searching the mind.
And maybe in between our discussion, we can have some meditation, maybe five or ten minutes. And then sometimes we can have question and answer, and then sometimes I can talk. Okay. Okay. Now this text, as I said, was written by the second Khyentse Rinpoche, was one of the sort of great commentator and a leader of many different lineage.
And he was student of Jamgön Kongtrül Rinpoche, which is from Kagyü school. And he was also enthroned as one of the great Sakya Lama in Dzongsar Monastery. And during his time, he has written more than twenty four volumes about different kind of teachings on Buddhism Buddhism and Tibetan literature and like that. Now this particular heart advice, this this sort of short writing was written sort of as requested by one of the nun, his own student. And this is more like Dzogchen teaching of Nyingma school.
Well, actually, these days people consider that Dzogchen and Chagchen or Mahāmudrā, they are all sort of something different or separate. But Dzogchen is the term that is used for great completion, and Mahāmudrā is used on the aspect of bliss. And term Mahāmudrā is mostly used for the clarity. And term shunyata is used for emptiness. So it doesn’t necessarily have to be Dzogchen teaching only.
It can be typical Mādhyamika meditation or Mahāyāna meditation or it can be Mahāmudrā meditation. But here sometimes you’ll find terms like rigpa or awareness, self awareness. Now, these kind of terms are sometimes sort of particularly belong to Dzogchen tradition. Rigpa or awareness, sort of primordially pure. And these kind of terms are mostly used in Dzogchen lineage, but that doesn’t mean that this kind of term is not used within other tradition or other lineage.
Anyway, first there’s a homage to Guru Rinpoche, Padma Sambhava, the lord of oddiyana, the incomparable object of refuge. Now, as we all know, that taking refuge is one of the most important in Buddhist path because and especially in the field of Mahāyāna. As a Mahāyāna practitioner, we have sort of made a pledge and made a vow to enlighten all the sentient beings. Right now, at this moment, oneself don’t know how to liberate oneself. So one is incapable of enlightening all the sentient beings when oneself is not capable of enlightening oneself.
One has to take refuge under somebody so that one can lean on them and then enlighten all the sentient beings and accumulate merit and wisdom. So for that reason, we need taking refuge. Also in Mahāyāna practice, whatever you do, even you do meditation or a teaching or a prostration, first thing one has to start with refuge and bodhicitta or enlightenment thought. And then after doing whatever you do, prostration or teaching or meditation, then the things have to conclude with dedication. And these three, taking refuge and having the bodhicitta mind and dedication is very important while practicing the Dharma.
So first here he prostrated to the Guru Rinpoche and takes refuge under Guru Rinpoche, Padmasambhava. Now, here he specifically sort of takes refuge under Guru Rinpoche, Padma Sambhava, because Padma Sambhava is sort of a representation of the compassion of Lord Amitābha Buddha. And also in many of Nyingmapa lineages spoke, Padmasambhava is sort of a Nirmāṇakāya of Avalokiteśvara. And not only that, when we talk about vajrayana Buddhism, we talk about three types of guru: inner guru, secret guru, and outer guru. Inner guru is the essence of one’s own mind, which is the emptiness.
Secret guru is the nature of one’s mind, which is the clarity. Energy or unobstructed action or unobstructed compassion is outer guru, which is the form guru, such as His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Now, this inner guru and secret guru, which is the nature and essence of one’s mind, is within oneself. Sometimes we call this inner guru, many times we call this inner and secret guru, Buddha-nature. In some vajrayana teachings it is also called as vajradhara, the primordial buddha Vajradhāra.
And in the Nyingma tradition they call it Samantabhādra Buddha. This inner guru, which is the essence of one’s mind, the emptiness, is also sometimes we call it dharmakaya. And nature of the mind, clarity, is sometimes called as Sambhogakāya. And unobstructed compassion, or the display of this mind, is called as nirmanakaya. In other way, a different approach.
Usually, when we search the mind, when we try to do the meditation on mind, searching the mind, we won’t find the mind because mind is inherently nonexistent. And that is the empty aspect of the mind. And for this empty aspect of the mind we call dharmakaya or emptiness or shunyata. But then second thing, this clarity is quite difficult to understand. Clarity is now after searching the mind, you found there is no mind.
Who realizes that there is no mind? There must have someone who knows that there is no one. This realizer of nonexistence of mind is the clarity. You see, so this is not something separate. You search the mind and you find there is no mind.
But who found that there is no mind? Mind itself found that there is no mind. And that is the nature of the mind, which is clarity. Sometimes some lamas, they also use example like a lamp. Without a lamp or a light, one cannot see anything in the room.
Without a light or a lamp itself, then we won’t see the lamp itself. So without the mind one won’t realize the emptiness. But without the mind one will not see who is the knower of the emptiness. So this is the clarity and emptiness, and this is nondual, nonduality. And this is the Buddha-nature combination of dharmakaya and sambhogakaya.
And this too, the clarity and emptiness, has unobstructed action. And for this action, we call it nirmanakaya. But now there’s many different types of nirmanakaya. But most of the nirma nakaya is Buddha Śākyamūni or Guru Rinpoche Padmasambhava or like His Holiness’s nirmanakaya is a manifestation and the manifestor is dharmakaya and sambhogakaya. But actually, in the essence, there is no difference between manifestor and manifestation.
So the manifestation, nirmanakaya, is unobstructed manifestation. Unobstructed means Buddha, dharmakaya, or sambhogakaya doesn’t have any intention to manifest. They don’t have any sort of intention to send this and that manifestation and not to send any manifestation. The manifestation of Buddha dhammakaya and sambhogakaya is unobstructed, and it has no beginning and no end. But nirmanakaya, which we perceive, such as His Holiness the Dalai Lama or Buddha Śākyamūni, is the reflection or the power or sort of reflection of our faith, devotion, and karma.
For example, when we look at Buddha Buddha Śākyamūni, we have karma or we have some devotion or we have some intelligence to perceive Buddha Buddha Śākyamūni as one of human beings who has got enlightenment after rebirth in the palace and after escaping from the palace and under the Bodhi tree, and he was passed away into the parinirvāṇa. So this is our perception of nirmanakaya. Anyway, this is just a background of this. So now we go to the real text here. So this unique, free, and well favored human form is so difficult to obtain.
And since we have actually attained in this time, one must now think that one should not waste this precious human body. Just to gain a human body is quite easy, but to obtain precious human body is very difficult because the essence of precious human body is a chance or opportunity. Chance or opportunity is something difficult to obtain. Especially chance to practice the Dharma or chance to or opportunity to practice bodhicitta or this profound Dharma is so difficult to obtain. Since we have actually attained this time, one should not leave it to rot because one never knows when will this end.
Even though it is a precious human body, it doesn’t mean that it is permanent. One might die any moment. Death or dying can come unexpectedly. Almost everybody, all of us, thinks constantly that life is yet to come and we haven’t been sort of living. One of the Sakya lama, she said, We always do the preparation.
We do preparation for tomorrow, and we do preparation for next year in order to live. And all our life is preparation, and we finish our life doing preparation. Constantly we think that we have not lived properly, we haven’t sort of settled down, and the real life is yet to come without aware when the death will come. So this is if you know the essence of the precious human body, then one will think is One will immediately think or automatically think that this is a precious time, and precious time means something very difficult to gain or obtain. So, that’s why one should think first that this chance or opportunity is difficult to obtain.
Gampopa, one of the Kagyü masters, he said, In order to practice the Dharma, one should have four characteristics or four qualities. First, one should enter one’s mind into Dharma. And then second, one’s Dharma practice should be successful. And third, defilements should be apart from one’s mind. And fourth, the defilements should arise as wisdom.
So this is the four qualities that a practitioner should have. Now, in order to put one’s mind into the Dharma, we need to have another four different method, sort of a foundation. We need four common foundation to let our mind enter to the dharma. So these four common foundation is to know how precious our human body is and how impermanent it is and cause and effect about the karma and fault of saṃsāra. Now, having these four common foundations with our mind, then one will automatically enter one’s mind into the Dharma.
And then one should practice the Dharma. And while practicing the Dharma, one should have successful practice. One should not have obstacles and obscurations. So for this one needs another uncommon foundation, which is first one should take refuge because without taking refuge one is powerless to practice to enlighten oneself and to enlighten other sentient beings. So in order to have power and encouragement, one should take refuge under Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.
And then, the second thing is one should purify our bad karma, which we have gained for many lifetimes. Because without abandoning all this bad karma, one will never understand the true meaning of the dharma. Obstacles will arise. If you have not abandoned the bad karma, obstacles will arise. For this reason, one should purify the bad karma or negative actions which we have collected from last time.
To purify one’s bad karma, there are a lot of different methods, but one of the best methods in vajrayana Buddhism is doing the Vajrasattva meditation. And then one has to accumulate merit in order to be a good practitioner. If one has very limited merit, then one will always face difficulties and obstacles while you practice the Dharma. Because Dharma is very profound and deep and sort of precious, and oneself is full of bad karma and oneself doesn’t have enough merit to receive or to be a container of such precious contents. It is also said that if a wealth of a king is given to a poor beggar, then this poor beggar cannot handle with the wealth of the king because this poor beggar doesn’t have merit to keep such a wealth.
So exactly the same. If we don’t have enough merit to be a container for the dharma, then will always face the difficulties and we will never understand the profound Dharma. So for that one should call it accumulate merit. So, to accumulate merit, there are a lot of different methods, but one of the best in vajrayana Buddhism is doing the mandala offering. For example, Lama Tsongkhapa, he was one of the example in Tibet who has accumulated mandala offerings.
Even now a days we can see the mandala, the real mandala, where he did on a stone. You went to Tibet? A stone, very thick, and he did hundred so many hundred thousand times of mandala until the stone is he made a hole on that stone with his bare hand. These are the examples to collect accumulated merit. So one should accumulate merit.
And after accumulating merit, then one should have developed a devotion and faith to one’s own guru because in Buddhism, and particularly in vajrayana Buddhism, if one wants to know the nature of the mind, then one must receive the blessings from one’s own guru. Otherwise, one will never see the nature of the mind. Even though there’s inner guru and secret guru within ourselves, even though there’s a Buddha-nature within ourselves, without depending on a guru, then one will never know this inner and secret guru, or dharmakaya and sambhogakaya. Some of the dharmakaya teachings, it is explained taking an example like crystal. A crystal ball is like dharmakaya, the emptiness.
When you show this crystal in the sun, there will be rainbow or sort of a light coming from that crystal. And that is like sambhogakaya, primordially accomplished quality. Now, if you keep this crystal ball inside a box for a thousand years, there will be no You cannot say there is no potential of this rainbow or light. If you keep it for one thousand years inside a box and after one thousand year if you show out in the sun, not even one single rainbow light will be less. And if you show this crystal ball in the sun for one thousand years, not even one single rainbow light will be more.
So this rainbow light is already there, primordially accomplished within the crystal ball itself. It doesn’t come from outside source. It is within crystal ball itself. But without the sun, then there is no crystal and there is no rainbow light or there’s no quality of this crystal. So one has to depend.
If one wants to see the rainbow of the crystal or the lights of crystal, then one has to show the sun or some light, and only then one will see the primordially existent quality of one’s nature. So that’s why to depend on guru is very very important. It seems that in the West or even nowadays most of the modern world, we are taught to be independent. From a very young time, we are taught to be independent, independency. But that is also, of course, good because Buddha Buddha Śākyamūni himself said, One’s own wisdom is one’s own best teaching.
One self can only liberate oneself. No one can. Even Buddha Śākyamūni, he can only give teachings to how to get liberation, but he cannot give you the liberation itself. He cannot wipe away your defilements. He cannot take you from the saṃsāra and bring you into the nirvana.
Only one’s own practice and only one’s wisdom can show the nature of one’s mind. So independence is, of course, it is good. It is something nice to have. But right now, our ignorance is more intelligent, and our ignorance is more sort of functioning than our wisdom. So our wisdom is more ignorant right now.
So we are used to depend with the gurus. Not only to the guru, like, for example, different nations. All the different nations, they want to be independent, and then they try to accumulate lot of sources in order to be independent, not to depend with other nation. But all the time, whether it is a gross or subtle, all the time, we end up depending more and more. For example, like nuclear war, nuclear energy.
It is meant for independent. You don’t have to rely on somebody. It is meant for defending so that you don’t have to take refuge under some other country. But because of this, we are more dependent. Now one nation has a fear to other nation, and one nation is under the sort of gaze of other nation.
So that’s why all what we do is depending, to depend on something samsaric. So even in Dharma practice, since we have this habit of depending, one should depend to one’s own guru who is the only one that can show you a path so that one will realize the nature of one’s mind. So that’s why developing the guru and developing the devotion towards guru is very important. So that’s why you have to practice guru yoga. And this is the two kinds of Gampopa’s teaching.
Okay. So now here, if most of you were here last night, I think you would find quite easy to stay. So I will not go on with the same explanation as last night. Now the root of all Dharma is one’s mind. Root of all this phenomena is one’s own mind.
Now, this time dharma refers to phenomena. Just briefly explaining why it’s mind. Now in in vajrayana, we always say that everything is all the appearance is mind, and mind is illusion, and illusion is inexpressible. Without the mind, there is no meditator. There is no meditation.
Without the mind there is no perceiver. Without the mind there is no perceiver, no user, no labeler or no name giver. Without the mind, there’s no Buddhist, there’s no Buddha, there’s no Buddhadharma, there’s no meditation, there’s no meditator. Why? Because without the mind there’s no perceiver of meditation, perceiver of Buddha, and perceiver of teaching of Buddha.
Not only that, without the we don’t have this house because there is no perceiver of this house. This house, this table, these human beings, these trees, all these are perception. All these perceptions are there because there is a perceiver. If there is no perceiver, there is no perception because perceptions are just a name. There’s no reality on the perception.
Or you can say there is a reality, but that reality is emptiness or shunyata, not inherently existent. The things that which you perceive is not the fact because other sentient beings perceive something different. So by that logic, one will understand the things that which you perceive, Your perception is not the fact because for somebody it is not the same perception. So that’s why all these phenomena is just one’s own mind. Now, where does this mind come from?
Now, if you don’t examine where this come from and where this mind is, Or if you don’t ask this question of what is mind, where does this come from, if you just let this mind go, then what will this mind do? If unexamined this mind, then this mind rushes after different experience. And this mind rushes after past experience, present experience, or this mind always make plans of future, or this mind is full of expectation and deception. All what we do when we don’t examine our mind, everything what we do is either rush after past experience or wander in the present experience or making the future plan. For example, after this course we will go out.
Tonight I will sleep there or here. Tonight I will have to do that and this. We make all this program. So this is all a future plan. Are programming all our mind.
That is because we don’t examine our mind. But if you look right into this mind, then this mind is free of any ground or origin. In essence, this mind is free of coming and free of staying and free of going. So shall we do some meditation about this? Five minutes or something like that.
Have my own way of conducting meditation. Can I do this? Talking. Okay. First, please relax.
Relax your mind And search your mind. One, we will we have to search this mind because this mind is the controller or the creator of all these phenomena. Without the mind, there’s no relaxation. Without the mind there’s no all these perceptions. Other than perceptions, there’s no real phenomena.
All these different phenomena, universe, water, hill, rock, house, buildings, car, one’s own five aggregates, happiness, unhappiness, beautiful, ugliness, all these different different phenomena, they are all perception of one’s own mind. Without this mind, we will never have all these perceptions. Try to reach Try to imagine the state of no mind. What will happen if there is no mind or the perceiver? You can never find even one second of space where there is no mind.
So one must examine this mind. For many lifetimes lifetimes, we have never think about this mind. We are always lost in our thoughts. So we need to concentrate on the mind. So now search the mind where it is, how it is, why this is mind, how this is mind, where it is abiding, this creator of everything.
Is your mind in in the external phenomena, or is it internal phenomena? Past mind is gone. It will never come back. All you what you have is memory that is present. Future mind is not arised.
Past mind is gone. In one second, there’s hundred in one minute, there’s hundred and thousands of past mind. So past mind is gone, future mind is not arise. Within this between this past and future mind, where is present mind? Every limit of thought is the past mind.
There isn’t anything that while you are thinking or while you are knowing. Every limit or every category of mind is past, and future is not arisen. So where is this present mind? When you concentrate on the mind, you will realize that many thoughts are disturbing your concentration. It is not something new that these thoughts are not something new.
In ordinary time, ordinary life, all these thoughts are always there, but we are not aware of these thoughts. We are always lost in the thoughts. We always wonder. We always we are too wondered that we don’t know where we are. So that’s why we don’t even care about concentration.
But this time, when you try to concentrate on one point, such as mind, then you are being aware of all these thoughts. So you call it I have no good concentration. But, in fact, you are being aware of thought.