Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 46-minute talk, Kyabje Rinpoche examines what will and won’t accompany us at death, using this as a lens to show why cultivating inner mental qualities matters far more than accumulating possessions. He refutes the nihilist view that consciousness ends at death, then systematically walks through how our habitual patterns—negative or positive—determine the quality of our rebirth. The teaching unfolds through practical antidotes: ethics and kind-hearted intention restrain harmful actions; patience brings a beautiful appearance and lasting relationships; generosity ensures material security; joyous effort and meditative stability strengthen the mind; and wisdom realizing emptiness cuts ignorance, the root of all suffering. Intended for practitioners already acquainted with Buddhist karma and rebirth teachings.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1993-08-24 – Side 1 – KR.MP3
UUID: 06fb1ebd-97af-4543-8255-9ce11a89b696
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Three Principal Aspects
Date: 1993-08-24
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~2,934
So So previously, we discussed impermanence in terms of death. So in considering in considering death, we can understand that death is definite, that that all of us will die within, say, a hundred years. But we simply don’t know when we’re going to die. The time of death is uncertain, and therefore it’s necessary to reflect upon what is going to be a benefit at the time of our death. So some in considering death, hold that upon upon the death upon death, the the we are annihilated.
That is the body is either buried or burned and the consciousness, disappears, just vanishes. And this is a view held by some. So we have within us a a consciousness which involves itself in various thinking processes, discriminations, thinking this is this, that is that, has various understandings, goes through various experiences, various feelings, happiness, feelings of suffering. This is what we mean by mind. If, you know, if at the time of the, the dissolution of the body, then when it, when it, it is annihilated, if the mind were also annihilated, then we should consider, well, how many people in the world die each day?
How many people are killed? If, this was the finish of living beings, then there would be danger then the, of the world diminishing in population. So some might consider the fact well that they though they do though they are destroyed, annihilated, there are new living beings. There are beings newly being born, newly created. If if if new if living beings were newly being created, that is say these these sentient beings had not existed previously and were newly born, there would be no liberation.
There would be no achievement of of the elimination of all our various faults and the consummation of all our acts and qualities. It is because of the continuum of of of being reborn that we are able to extend this process of attaining liberation, of eliminating our various faults, and bringing the consummation of our acts and qualities over over lifetimes. Whereas if it was only in consideration of one lifetime, then these cannot be achieved. Living beings would be very much like a flower. It grows and then it withers and dies.
Because at upon death, living beings are not are not annihilated, then there is no exhaustion of living beings. Depletion. Because upon death, living beings are again reborn and then die and again are reborn in this cyclic fashion. Therefore, there’s no depletion of living beings. Living beings are newly reborn, to each life.
But this this taking of birth is not a a new in the sense that this living being has never been born before. That in fact the living being has been born for but is newly reborn to this life and this process continues on upon death. One is newly reborn into another another life. Though at the at the end, upon the death death in the course of this life, one is not annihilated but goes on to take rebirth. So in considering in consideration of this fact that we are not annihilated, then it becomes important that we consider, well, if upon my death I am going to take rebirth, what will be of benefit at the time of my death in order to ensure a fortunate rebirth?
In the course of an illness, we can make use of various methods of medicines and treatments. And these are important in bringing about a cure. So in considering our death, it’s important to consider what is going to be a benefit at the time of our death. What will be of any help to ourselves? And we if we begin to ask this question, well, it can, at the time of our death, the doctor and their various medicines, their various treatments are of no benefit at the time of our death.
And the wealth and all the various possessions that we’ve gathered together will not help us at the time of our death. And even our loved ones, our companions, our parents, they will not be of benefit at the time of our death. Even this body which we were born with, which we which was very has gone through all which had great health and vigor at one time, is not going to be of benefit at the time of our death. None of these will be of any benefit at the time of death. We’ve we can all see this for ourselves with respect to those who have died.
Did any of them were any of them able to take any possessions with them? Were any of them able to take any helpers along with them to assist them? Did any of them take their body with them? In fact, they all had to leave their possessions behind. No one could accompany them and their body was left.
The mind itself will continue on. That the continuum of mind is uninterrupted or is not The continuum of mind is not broken, but continues onward. And it is whatever faults that we may possess, whatever excellent qualities that may we may have developed, And these, to whatever extent we’ve developed those, these will accompany us accompany us in through our death and to rebirth. Whatever those attitudes that we’ve built up over the course of our life, these will accompany us. That if we’ve accustomed our mind to the kind hearted attitudes such as love and compassion, generosity and tolerance, and again and again brought brought these to mind that this kind hearted attitude that we’ve become accustomed to, this will con this will accompany us on to a future life.
On the other hand, those negative attitudes of mind that we may have developed such as, you know, hurt harmful intentions of fighting and killing and stealing, these harmful types of attitudes. These all of these negative attitudes will accompany us to into their future life. Sandy, we it is in terms of the degree of habitual whatever the degree of habituation to these various attitudes, whether then attitudes be negative or positive. By means of of of habituation to various attitudes, that attitudes which have been come been have become predominant will determine the direction of our mind upon our death. So these attitudes of mind extend in a continuity over time.
You know, that we, from our youth, we have had reoccurrence of particular attitudes which have uninterruptedly continued down to, say, last year. And then last year’s attitudes continued on to this our present age as adults down to last night. And the attitudes that last night continued on to today. And the attitudes that we presently have will in a continuous stream move on to tomorrow and the day after tomorrow and next month and next year. And these attitudes in an uninterrupted stream continue on throughout our life.
So it is those that which will determine the quality of our rebirth is the dominant dominant attitude to which we have been become habituated to, whether they are positive or negative, skillful or unskillful. If over the course of this life we have again and again accustomed our mind to positive attitudes, have become habituated such that our mind is in a very skillful state, then this will lead to a fortunate rebirth. On the other hand, if over the course of our life we have accustomed our minds to unskillful states, that we have formed the habit patterns of negative states, unskillful attitudes, then under the influence of this dominant quality of the mind being unskillful, this will lead us to unfortunate rebirths. So the mind is uncontrollably directed in terms of the factor of the dominant quality of the mind, whether it’s in terms of negative and positive. So if this is in fact the case, what are we to do?
We must begin to cultivate positive, kind hearted attitudes of the mind to habituate the mind to such states and to and to try to cease to bring to an end negative states. So it is if in the process of meditation, we we we seek to take as the observed object of mind a positive object and again taking again and again taking this object to mind such that our mind becomes familiarized with a positive object. This will habituate the mind to positive states. And with respect to negative states of mind, those which are unskillful, the various afflictive emotions, harmful attitudes of mind, we should seek to identify them, recognize them as quickly as possible upon their development. And then to apply an antidote, not to allow them to continue but applying an antidote, this will bring about their gradual decrease that they will arise fewer and fewer, less often.
So what do we mean by these various negative states? Firstly, there there’s ignorance which is an unknowing quality of the mind with respect to the nature of reality is an obscuring factor of the mind. And under the influence of ignorance, we go on to generate various negative states of such as attachment, anger, pride, jealousy, these these faulty or dysfunctional states of mind. So the root of all of these various negative states is ignorance. So we it is really best to make our effort in trying to bring about an end to ignorance.
It is very much like the in the growing of a tree, that we can cut the leaves and branches, but they will continually grow back grow back. If we were to cut the tree at its very roots, then this by by the nature of the situation eliminates will eventually eliminate the leaves and the branches which grow out of these roots. So if we can cut ignorance, which is the root of these negative states, then we will gradually they gradually attachment, pride, jealousy will be eliminated of themselves. So the the root of of these negative states is ignorance and that which acts as an antidote, that is that that which is able to bring about its elimination is the wisdom realizing emptiness. This wisdom is like an axe which cuts down the tree or maybe in Australia, ignorance can be more compared to an electric saw.
If if we realize emptiness, then we have we’ll bring an end to all negative or unfortunate rebirths. We, we, it is like It is this realization of emptiness which is the doorway closing upon suffering and entering into happiness. So it’s very necessary that we meditate well on emptiness. Listening to the subject and trying to understand it and then finally meditating on it. It is by this means that we can really begin to, cut into the root of our negativities that is ignorance.
So the the means whereby we can eliminate our suffering and find an ultimate happiness is the wisdom realizing emptiness. This is the the the real practice, of Dharma. And who would who does this wisdom realizing emptiness benefit? It benefits ourselves. In order to generate this wisdom of realizing emptiness, it’s necessary to have a kind hearted attitude.
In dependence upon this kind hearted state of or the kind hearted attitude, we will begin to cease creating negativities through our body, speech, and mind. That is to begin to cease involving ourselves in engaging in unskillful actions. Those three of killing, stealing, sexual improprieties, the four of speech, lying, divisive speech, harsh words, idle gossip, and the three of mind of covetousness, harmful intention, and wrong view. Through this, in the context of a kind heart, we will cease harming others and therefore we will be practicing ethics. And through our practice of ethics, even if we were not to, develop the realization of emptiness, we would we would take a fortunate rebirth.
So therefore ethics is Dharma. So it is through ethics that we are able to take a fortunate rebirth or let us say a happy migration. But even if we were to take rebirth in such a favorable state, still if it would not go well for ourselves if we had a repulsive appearance or our relationships were disharmonious. We had experienced disharmony in our relationships that we were quickly separated from our friends and our partners and our parents. So in order to ensure that we that we have a a handsome and beautiful appearance such that really by seeing us, others take a liking to ourselves and that we have harmonious and lasting relationship, it’s necessary to cultivate tolerance or patience.
Tolerance is the antidote to anger. And if we’ve all seen when when someone gets angry, how distorted their face becomes such that, you know, people don’t even want to look at somebody who’s angry. On the other on the other hand, those who have practiced tolerance have have a beautiful pleasing countenance, a face that people, they enjoy others enjoy looking at their face. It brings them pleasure to see their face. Those who are who are anger-prone have disharmonious relationships, you know, that people they don’t want to be around somebody who’s uptight.
Their their relationships don’t last long. On the other hand, those who have practiced tolerance have just the opposite. They have harmonious relationships which are long lasting. But it it would not be sufficient even though we might be reborn as a human being and with a beautiful appearance and have harmonious relationships if we’d if we had no supportive conditions materially. We didn’t have we had we were poor with that without material needs met.
So what are we to to do to meet that? We by means of practicing generosity, we can assure that in the future that we will we will have all of our supportive conditions, material supportive conditions. All our our we will have wealth enough our material needs will be met. But additionally to the other qualities such as being reborn as a human with a beautiful appearance and have material wealth, it is necessary that we have some enthusiastic perseverance or that we that we engage our engage in our activities in a joyous with joyous effort. You know, some people have have this quality of joyous effort in what they do, some don’t.
Some have they really take a great liking to what they’re doing. They involve themselves very enthusiastically. And this is this comes about due to the force of habituation in previous lives that they have been accustomed to to acting in this manner. Some are very enthusiastic, joyfully make effort in their Dharma practice, some involved in painting, some in very secular, other types of secular activities. And this is due to accustoming one’s mind to this this enthusiasm involved in one’s activities, making joyous effort.
And then in the the development of meditative stabilizations and meditative concentrations, we can develop a a clarity and stability of mind. Many people, when they sit down to meditate, their mind is completely all over the place. They they can’t sit for five minutes with their mind is they sit in complete distraction. Other people, they they can sit for long periods where their mind is clear, stable, and remain on the object for considerable lengths of time. This again is simply due to accustoming ourselves to the development of meditative stabilizations or meditative concentrations in previous lives, to accustom or habituating oneself to these states.
And then there is the, you know, the situation where there are some who merely upon being explained a particular subject once can understand it very quickly whether it’s whether it’s a Dharma subject or whether it’s a secular subject. They they have wisdom or or a great intelligence. And this again is something something which is developed through accustoming oneself or habituation previously. There are some that no matter how much you explain to them, they simply cannot understand, like talking to a cow or something. They have not accustomed to they are not accustomed to using their wisdom or their intelligence.
So whatever the quality of mind it might be, whether positive or negative, whether it be in terms of intelligence, whether it be in terms of the healthy states or unhealthy states, kindness or or or the like. It all come arises in dependence upon accustoming the mind, habituating the mind to these particular states. There there are some when when they look around and if we were looking around the room, they they might see the flower. Oh, what a wonderful flower. That’s really a good flower.
They they see some other artwork and think, that’s beautiful. That’s wonderful. And they quickly generate attachment, desire toward that object. This is simply arises to habituation to to these objects in in the past, in these states of mind of of attachment. There are some who’ve merely seen an object.
They they don’t even have to think about it, whether it’s a may they see their boyfriend or girlfriend or some clothing or something. And this tremendous, desire for that object arises. This comes about through accustoming the mind to such a state, habituation. So, and an example would be if yesterday we had some delicious food and then, tomorrow we we we’re merely seeing this food, our mouth begins to water. And we this is this this this reaction is comes about to, having experienced the the the delicious flavor of this food previously, having accustomed oneself to it, merely seeing it, there’s a reaction to it.