Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 45-minute talk from 1987, Lama Lhundup explores the cardinal Buddhist principle that helping others begins with transforming your own mind. He starts by establishing the proper motivation for study—aiming toward enlightenment rather than mere worldly happiness—and identifies diminishing self-cherishing and cultivating a kind heart as the essence of practice. The core of the teaching unfolds through the twelve links of dependent origination: ignorance, karma, consciousness, name and form, faculties, contact, feeling, desire, grasping, becoming, birth, and aging-death. Lama Lhundup walks through how each link arises conditionally, explains how different motivations shape the ripening of actions into different realms of rebirth, and emphasises that meditation on the heart centre—not the head—produces stable realisation. He concludes by showing how feeling generates desire, which intensifies into grasping, and how these emotional links activate the karma needed for rebirth, using the metaphor of seed, soil, and fertiliser. Practical for serious students of the Lamrim.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 11 HY.mp3
UUID: 6053ce59-2da0-4c09-babd-6a56dac077e6
Teacher: Lama Lhundup
Collection: Helping yourself helping others (Lama Lhundup)
Date: 1987 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 44.8 minutes
Words: ~2,328
We developed a motivation for listening to the teaching which is not directed only for the happiness of this life but which is directed toward complete enlightenment. Therefore we should without the motivation I am going to listen and contemplate and think about these teaching with the motivation and intention to complete enlightenment. So our main practice should be to diminish our own self-cherishing. We should begin to increase and expand the mind which holds others dear and therefore our main practice should develop a good heart which tries to benefit others. If we can develop this kind heart, this good mind, then we will not only be happy now, we will be happy in the future.
We will be happy all the time. This is the essence of the Buddhadharma. So this is the first thing that we should rely upon. This good heart, kind heart. Not only that but if we again and again generate or meditate or habituate or cultivate this kind heart the area which we live in will be benefited and the whole world will be benefited.
In general it’s extremely important in our practice of Dharma that no matter what we understand, whatever we understand to put that into practice. So there’s a danger if we just listen to a great many teachings a great deal of listening but we don’t put it into practice then there’s a danger that it will just increase our afflictive emotions. So if we we listen to the Dharma many teachings a great deal and we don’t put what we have listened to, what we have heard into practice then there’s the danger that we’re simply going to use what we’ve heard to be a basis for developing pride. So the essence of our practice is developing this kind heart. Our main practice should be cultivating the graduated path.
So in cultivating the graduated path, we may have some difficulties. We talked about these three levels of capacities of being. If we meditate on each of your paths every day without any interruption we should make effort even though we find it difficult. Our main obstacle to our practice is the attachment to the happiness of cyclic existence. So understanding that it is this attachment to the happiness of cyclic existence which is our main obstacle to our practice of Dharma, knowing this we should seek to destroy it or reverse this attachment and this we do by coming to understand the disadvantages of cyclic existence in developing renunciation.
No matter what we see, whatever we see outside of ourselves, whatever we meet, all the marvels, the wonders of the world. We can understand them as being impermanent and they are not to be trusted or not trustworthy. We can make use of all these things but we shouldn’t be attached to them. So in order to develop renunciation we have to understand the faults of cyclic existence and therefore we have to know what are the faults of cyclic existence. So in coming to an understanding of the nature of cyclic existence, have to know how cyclic existence is created or developed.
And in understanding this, we have to trying to understand this, have to understand the twelve links of dependent origination. So first we’ll just enumerate the twelve links of dependent origination. The first of the twelve is ignorance. The second link is conditioned actions, karma, the third is consciousness, the fourth is name and form, the fifth is sources, The sixth is Contact Seventh is Feeling Eight is Desire Ninth is grasping, tenth is existence or sometimes called becoming, eleventh is birth and the twelfth is old age aging and death.
Aging and death. Those are the twelve So what is it that has caused us to enter into cyclic existence and to remain in cyclic existence from beginning this time? It is this initial ignorance, the first link of the twelve links. So in in the within the the ignorance within the which is included within the twelve links is of two types. It is the obscuration with respect to the law of cause and effect and the obscuration with respect to suchness or reality?
The motivating force which causes us to collect karma that is to engage in actions is the obscuration with respect to suchness and reality. So there are of these twelve links, the the first that is ignorance, the the eighth, which is desire, and the ninth, which is grasping. These three are afflicted emotions. The second link that is conditioned actions and the tenth existence or becoming, these are actions or karma. Due to the motivating force of ignorance engage in actions.
Whatever type of action, we create karma. Whether they are negative karma or positive karma, they are motivated by ignorance. This karma that we are talking about here the propelling karma to take rebirth. So any type of karma which acts to maintain cyclic existence is motivated by ignorance no matter whether it’s virtue or non virtue, negative or positive karma. So and we can talk and within karma, we can talk about positive or virtuous, virtuous throwing karma, and non-virtuous throwing karma, which which which maintains cyclic existence.
So non virtuous propelling karma, it has as its basis and dependent upon ignorance we generate hatred and attachment and through hatred and attachment we engage in actions which bring about negative karma in general or in this case propelling negative karma. However much anger, whether it’s little anger or great anger, however much anger, we’re always creating negative karma. Such a type of karma that this causes, the negative karma that is created, what does it propel? What is this idea of throwing or propelling? It propels rebirth as a hell being, hungry ghost or as an animal.
In general, negative great negative actions have a propelling effect of taking your birth in hell. Limited negative actions have a propelling effect of taking your birth as a hungry ghost or animal If we take the example of killing an insect, if the motivation to kill this insect is anger, then this will create the propelling karma to take rebirth in hell. If the motivation is attachment, the karma to be reborn as a hungry ghost and if the motivation is ignorance then it’s propelling karma to be reborn as an animal Also at those times when for example we make offerings of flowers or light to the Buddha and we have a great faith. With great faith, it’s creating great virtue. But if this virtue is as its motivating force is ignorance, then we’re creating this propelling karma to be born as a as a god.
As if it’s a middling virtue, positive virtue, positive karma, then we’re creating karma that we’d be born as a human. Well, however great the degree of positive karma we create, it can only have the fruit of some type of happiness. There’s no way that creating that we can have that we can experience the effect of suffering from it. Whatever type of karma we create once we’ve collected it, it’s as if we put money in the bank. This karma is now placed in a place.
Where is it placed? It’s placed upon the consciousness. So and this this karma this impression or this this imprint, this karma will remain placed upon this consciousness. It will not be lost until it comes to a ripening. Unless it ripens, it will never be lost.
So the fourth link is name and form. This develops immediately upon conception in the womb of the mother. Immediately upon conception in the mother’s womb there is a substance similar to yogurt and this substance, this actual physical substance is what we mean when we say form. So this form has been developed and this form is in conjunction with consciousness. This is what we mean when we say name.
So there is name and consciousness. So this is in the case of of a being who’s going to take birth by womb. So as this embryo develops it increases in size and develops all the various limbs and at this time once it develops what are called the five faculties and these five faculties are the sources or the fifth link which is the sources are the five faculties. At this time there is not the eye consciousness, there is no ear consciousness. The consciousness has not developed, there are merely the faculties.
It’s like just someone staying in an empty house. But when the object, the faculty and the consciousness when these come together, There develops the ability for the aggregation or the union, the object, the faculty, and the consciousness. When these unite then there arises contact which is the sixth link. There arises contact through the union or the uniting of the object, the consciousness, and faculty. There are six faculties.
We have an eye faculty, an ear faculty, all the way up to mental faculty. So in dependence upon that, since there are six faculty there are six types of contact which are created. At the end of six weeks,. in dependence upon this union of the object of the consciousness and the faculties arises contact. We come in contact with either pleasing objects, unpleasing objects or neutral objects and dependent upon this contact arises feeling. We develop feeling.
We would have in dependence upon contact with these respective pleasing, displeasing or neutral objects there rises the feelings of suffering, happiness and equanimity. So in our case there is this serial progressive development from the sources, the contact and the feeling. But in the case of for example gods or hell beings who are born spontaneously these occur all at once. They are not serial. These three links occur simultaneously simultaneously at one time.
Also, in the formless realm, there there is only name. There’s no form. It is not exactly name. Consciousness but we don’t mean exactly name. We mean the last four of the five aggregates, the aggregates of feeling, discrimination, compositional factors and consciousness.
These four are what they mean when we say name. So in the formless realm there is only this name dependent origination there is no form. Upon taking conception in the mother’s womb, first the first consciousness which is which is established is the mental consciousness. So the place of the mental consciousness is at the heart which is the first part of the body to be developed. Which is present at the moment of conception is the mental consciousness and this resides in the heart area which is the first part of the body to develop.
In western science they say that the consciousness develops from the brain. In order to have a brain of course you have develop the head. So this is from Buddhist point of view and this doesn’t come so much later, the development of the head and the brain. But the consciousness is already present. It’s present within the heart area which is the first organ to be developed.
When we meditate we try to center our consciousness at the heart area. This is where the mental consciousness is centered or concentrated. If we meditate in our head this is where we will gain realization, but this type of understanding this type of understanding that we arrive at will not be stable the meditative feeling of the head area rather than trying to concentrate our mind in the heart center. So this this this ignorance which is the obscuration to reality that is to say the conception of the existing self is within the mental consciousness itself. The head area is not stable.
The effect of the mental consciousness residing at the heart this understanding is very stable. in dependence upon having the seventh link, feeling, depends upon feeling we generate desire which is the eighth link. So when we when the in dependence upon happy feeling we develop desire to not be separated. When we develop a feeling of suffering, we develop desire to be separated. in dependence upon this desire when it’s greatly increases then it becomes grasping and this is the ninth link.
The desire of the eighth link has been expanded greatly increased and it becomes grasping. So when we say existence, sometimes coming, sometimes called becoming, it is the actual karma. It is the karma which brings about rebirth. It’s the karma which is going to bring about rebirth. Link.
The eleventh link birth and the name and form are established simultaneously.
Rises immediately upon taking conception in the womb. Name and form and birth are simultaneous. So the twelfth link is aging and death. So it has two parts. It has the link of aging and the link of death.
The death process begins at the second moment after conception. The body is actually beginning to age even at the second moment after conception. Death link takes place when the body and mind becomes at death. Your body and mind are separated, is the death The first three, ignorance, compounded or conditioned actions and the consciousness are the propelling causes. If we use an example of a flower, that which plants the flower, that which plants the seed is the the planter of the seed is ignorance.
The seed is is the second is karma, and the and the soil where it’s planted is the consciousness. So this is a three propelling causes. So just like after merely planting the seed if we don’t add water and we don’t add fertilizer, the flower is not going to develop into a flower. Likewise, it is desire and grasping which activates the karma, fertilizes the karma which has been implanted to the seed.