Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. “Understanding is love itself” — a line from Thich Nhat Hanh — is the pivot around which Ven Jampa Gendun builds this 39-minute talk on exchanging self for others. He opens by diagnosing self-centeredness as a prison: the ego-worship that turns others into objects and defeats the very happiness it chases. The core of the session is a detailed tonglen (taking-and-giving) walkthrough, starting with oneself as the first compassion object — imagining dark smoke dissolving a black egg of self-cherishing at the heart, then sending brilliant white light outward as happiness. He builds through three levels of compassion and widens the practice from self to loved ones, strangers, and enemies. A nurse-to-surgeon analogy makes the point that developing oneself is itself an act of service to others. The session closes with Śāntideva’s verses on the awakening heart and a spontaneous dedication to a community member who had suffered a stroke that day.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 09 1990 08 28 Equalizing and Exchanging Self for Others.mp3
UUID: 0979c06a-bd39-4a4b-bc8d-eae68d0249b8
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Public talks 1988-2010 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 1990-08-28
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 39.3 minutes
Words: ~4,721
We’re we’re we’re we’re stuck in seeing everything from one point of view. I, me, Our own point of view. So in exchange of self for others, we become more and more able to see how the world appears out of the eyes of others, developing this flexibility, this multifaceted point of view. We begin to see how the world appears in the eyes of others from their point of view, their, you know, from their perspective, and to understand others as to love them. You know, to begin to understand another person, how does it feel to be that person?
And to actually feel that person’s experience. How does it feel imaginatively? Now I I think I quoted Thich Nhat Hanh. In terms of understanding as love. If if I understand you completely if I understand myself, I’m going to love myself.
Myself. Love in the sense of the the will to extend oneself for the purpose of nourishing oneself, one’s growth. I understand my situation and I’m willing to overcome my laziness and extend myself to make myself happy. I care that much about myself, and I take responsibility for myself. I take myself seriously because I’ve seen my potential.
I understand myself. I understand I have that potential. I take myself seriously, and I take my suffering seriously. And I understand my situation that no one else can alleviate my suffering, that I have to extend myself, and therefore I love myself. To understand, you know, this verse by Thich Nhat Hanh.
The more we see, the more we understand. The more we understand, the easier it is for us to have compassion and to love. Understanding is the source of love. Understanding is love itself. Understanding is another name for love.
Love is another name for understanding. Now generally, the the prerequisite for the development of the awakening heart is the determination to be free. determination to be free. All that is is another way of saying I love myself. That I’m willing to extend myself to grow, to solve my problems, seeing my situation, my suffering, having confronted it, having seen its where its evolution, and just as importantly, that I have the source, the potential to solve that problem, and therefore, I’m gonna make use of that.
You know, taking yourself seriously, taking responsibility for yourself, having compassion for yourself, loving yourself. So in loving others, understanding others, putting yourself in their position, taking that time, making that effort, how does it feel? What does the world look out look like out of that other person’s eyes? Understanding, you know, almost you know, it’s vicarious. It’s imaginative, but we can come close.
We can make that effort. We can try. No. It’s no. Sitting aside setting aside, I think Scott Peck talks about bracketing in setting aside your own agenda, setting aside your own issues First for the moment, emptying yourself.
How does the world look out of that person’s eyes? You know, exchanging places with your husband, your wife, your boyfriend, girlfriend, your mother, your father, you know, your children, and look back at yourself. What do you see? What do you feel? Are you as that other person, are you fulfilling their needs, their wants?
You know, when you when you when when you are them, when you you when when you are your spouse, when you are your child, what do you feel? Do you feel needed? Do you feel understood? Do you feel loved? Do you feel valued, respected, appreciated?
When you look back at your spouse, your former self, out of when you’re your you and you are your child, looking back at your mother, you as your mother, and you as your father, you as father, Do you feel understood, cared for, valued, respected? Exchange your places with someone you work with every day. How how do you how do you see yourself? How would you experience that other person putting yourself in their situation and looking back at yourself? What do you see when you look back at your former self?
You see indifference, competitiveness, exchanging places with someone who’s destitute. You become that person, and you see yourself, your former self walking along. And you walk up to your former self, and you hold out your hand to your former self, and you look into your former self’s eyes. What do you see? You see pity, compassion, fear, Contempt.
Exchange places with someone you are you are having a disagreement with. You know, try to see their side. Put yourself in their position, their side of the argument. Looking back at at yourself, former self, how are you presenting your side of the situation? What do you see when you see yourself?
You know, it’s very revealing to almost be able to see yourself out of someone else’s eyes, but also to experience what they are going through. But when you look at yourself, your former self, what do you see? Do you see hostility, defensiveness, closed mindedness, open mindedness? So Śāntideva calls this practice the sacred mystery. And now we view everything and everyone with within the framework frame of frame of reference of self centeredness.
The world is perceived and evaluated in terms of our self, our ego, which we feel deeply to be worth, worthy of our ultimate commitment. Everything and everyone is laid at the at the absolute altar of our own ego. Our entire life, all our effort, all our dreams are made at the altar of our ego. So we’ve created very much a prison for ourselves. And we continually are torturing ourselves in this way.
You know, constant dedicating ourselves to our own self centeredness, our own egos. You know, all of us struggle. You know, all of our trying to figure out the secret to happiness. We’re all trying to figure out the the next key, trying to there must be some secret. I can only discover it.
And all the time, all the struggle, blood, sweat, and tears, all this effort, we’re trying to find this secret to happiness. Never seen that it is this very struggle for our own happiness at the exclusion of others that prevents us from ever really being happy. You know, people are just made in made into objects, are devalued, exploited, manipulated as possible sources of of happiness. In the process, we devalue ourselves. We exploit ourselves.
We simply become another object. This is called internalized depression. Always competing, always comparing, always conspiring. And all this struggle, defensiveness, all these feelings of threatening, seeing other beings as threatening, as hostile. In in in all of this, there’s no love.
So in exchanging self for others, we’re shifting this psychological center of gravity, our psychological identity with others. You know, trying to immerse ourselves in others imaginatively. The other person’s qualities, the other person’s hopes, the fears, and try to see ourselves, look back at our former selves, on the other person’s perspective. So gradually, there’s a shift from the psychological center of gravity from from self to others. We understand others.
We’ve been in we’ve we’ve experienced their lives almost. How would it how could you stand that suffering? How could you bear up to that situation? How would you be able to deal with that experience? You know, it says if we begin the Dalai Lama once made a comment when he went to Europe.
He said it’s like coming home to my family. He was talking, addressing an audience. And I’m sure he had never I’m not sure. He had probably never seen more than a few people in that audience before in his life. But he knows those people.
You know, he knows he understands them. It’s like this that he’s coming home to his family. He understands them, though he met them for the first time. One of the remarkable things about meeting the Dalai Lama, his holiness, is his ability to make you feel as if you as an individual are extremely important to him, that he’s very much concerned with you as an individual, your happiness, your welfare, completely setting aside his own agenda with all his issues and exchanging himself for you and your world, your concerns, your problems, and totally giving yourself over to understanding what must be going through your mind and devoting all his skill, attention, love, and compassion, wisdom, just helping you solve your problem. So this process of awakening our hearts, opening our hearts to others is enhanced by the final meditative process of taking and giving.
This is taking, giving is a imaginative visualization technique in which we visualize taking upon ourselves the suffering of others and giving away our own happiness to others. So it’s a means of of training and actively involving ourselves. In actively a means of training ourselves and actively involving ourselves in the happiness and suffering of others. You know, in many ways, reality is imagination. You know, who we are and the reality we perceive are dependent upon our concepts within our own mind.
There is no objective reality outside of our own minds. Who we are, the way we relate with the world, and our experiences of the world is product of the images within ourselves, within ourselves, within our own mind. Our belief informs perception. Now we have a particular self image at present, and we relate with the world in the context of that self image, and that determines the way we experience the world, and that in turn reinforces that particular self image that we have, confirms that particular, our expectations in terms of the self image of what the world is like and what we are like. Whatever we can imagine has the potential reality.
If we can’t imagine it, if we cannot imagine it, we cannot be it. We train in imaginatively taking on the sufferings of others and giving away our happiness to them in order to make such a pattern of thought a more and more significant part of our self image and therefore of our reality. If you cannot imaginatively through training and the training process, extend oneself to imaginatively take upon the sufferings and give away your happiness, if you cannot incorporate that into your concept of who you are and to the possibilities of a way of relating with the world, then it can never be. You know, it’s just so in actual practice, we’d rather not deal with our own sufferings, let alone the sufferings of others. So what are we to do in such a situation as an actual practice?
You know, we it has to be something real, something which is felt. We have to find a key to open up our mind. Otherwise, meditation, the process can be something akin to pouring oil on water where it just kind of floats on the surface. There’s no integration. There’s no mixing with the mind.
It’s difficult for us it’s difficult enough for us to confront our own problems, let alone the problems of others. So we give we we begin this imaginative process with the easiest object that we can find, and that is ourselves. So we’re going to take on our own suffering to begin with as a as a method of training. Imagining yourself in front of yourself. We can’t have compassion for ourselves.
It’s going to be difficult to arouse it sincerely toward anyone else since you know your own suffering directly and other suffering only secondhandedly, vicariously. So imagining yourself in front of yourself and thinking, this This person wants to be happy just like myself. And we’re going to use all our previous training and we’re going to combine it all in order and we’re going to use the technique of taking and giving to enhance, to integrate, to coordinate all of these previous trainings in equality of self and others, advantages of other centeredness, disadvantages of self centeredness, and equalizing and exchanging self for others, the actual exchanging self for others. We’re going to put these all together in a visualization technique. Seeing yourself in front of yourself, thinking about your suffering, your present difficulties, some present pain.
This person wants to be happy just like myself. I know that. You know, I’ve worked on that previously. And thinking about the disadvantages of self centeredness. Now you’ve you’ve you’ve already worked up on this.
This is this this self-cherishing. This is what has brought all your problems, entire life, all your difficulties, all your frustrations, all your tears, your entire life. You know, it’s destroyed all your happiness and happiness of others. It’s destroyed your ability to love others and to be able to be loved by others. It’s like it’s your greatest enemy.
It’s like self centeredness is like taking a knife and twisting it into your heart, and you just get this revolting disgust for your own self centeredness. And this we imagine that disgust in the form of a black egg at your heart. This is your self centeredness, and you just wanna destroy it because it’s destroyed all your happiness your entire life. And you put yourself in that person’s position. How could I how could I take that suffering?
Could I bear that situation? I can’t bear that. How could I bear that sit I’m gonna take that person’s suffering, and I’m gonna use it to destroy my own self centeredness. So kinda working the feelings up. That suffering of that individual who we’re using as a present object one’s own self in one’s present situation and it begins to rise up in the form of thick black smoke.
Visualization entering one’s nostrils and down into one’s heart. It begins to eat away like acid the black egg of self centeredness at your heart. It begins to eat away. Again and again, taking on that suffering till there’s a sense this person is no longer experiencing that suffering. But this person wants to be happy. I know that.
This person is just like myself. I’m sure of that. But they aren’t happy. And thinking about all the advantages of other centeredness, of caring about others more than one’s self, of going out of yourself, and the joy and the fulfillment of the idea of authenticity and meaning. I’m going to I’m going to care for this person more than myself.
I’m gonna give it give this I’m going to give this person my happiness. I’m going to exchange myself for that person. Now how wouldn’t I want to be happy if I was that person? Wouldn’t I want somebody to be giving me what I needed if I was that person, seeing the world out of that person’s eyes? Imaginatively transforming your body, your positive potential, and your wealth, objects of enjoyment into a brilliant white light.
You know, I’m going to transform every I’m gonna everything that I have and give it to that person. Transform it into a brilliant white light which rises up from your heart area and goes out to your nostril and transform into whatever that person, the counterpart of that previous suffering. If they were lonely, you give them a companion. If they if they had physical pain, you give them a healthy body. And then sympathetically sharing in their joy.
Seeing them their eyes sparkling with happiness. The feeling of bliss. Then again, future possible sufferings that this person might undergo. Feelings of, you know, maybe they have to wake up and go to work tomorrow. Not like me.
Maybe they have to go to the dentist. Future possibilities of of of death, of the general dissatisfactions, loneliness, disappointments. Disappointments. Again, no we make we we want to we’re trying to develop a sense of compassion. Compassion is the thought to separate from suffering, and there are three levels to this compassion.
So using the equality of self and others. First, knowing that this person wants to be happy. You can’t that this person doesn’t want to suffer. You can’t deny it. That’s a fact.
This person wants to be happy just like my doesn’t want to suffer just like myself. You’ve you’ve already worked on that. Knowing thinking about the disadvantages of your own self centered ness, developing the disgust for your own self centeredness, revulsion towards your own self centeredness. Exchanging yourself for that person, can how could it would I feel if I was experiencing that suffering? And then trying to develop three levels of compassion.
Compassion. The first is like a nice friendly thought. You know, we have to begin somewhere. Wouldn’t it be nice if that person wasn’t suffering? Be nice.
You know? Okay. But then we try to intensify that, become more involved in that person’s experience. May you be separated from that suffering? A little more concern.
But then we try to develop that to its fullest most extent. I am going to separate you. I’m going to free you from that suffering. Taking on that suffering in the form of thick black smoke rising up and down, eating away at the self-cherishing of one’s heart. In the second part, we begin with taking some present difficulty.
Now we’re taking on the future difficulties, problems, pain. You can take it rather than in the form of thick black smoke, take it in the form of ferocious, terrifying beasts, animals, you know, lions and tigers. Whatever. And, you know, you’ve really you’ve built up the disgust for this self-cherishing at your heart. And these imagine taking on this suffering in form of lions and tigers, and they just kind of chew up, trample, claw the pieces, the self.
I mean, it’s really an experience. You’re trying to really get into it. It’s just mangling one’s self-cherishing at one’s heart. Again, but I’ve I’ve I’ve taken that person’s suffering, but still they don’t have the happiness that they want. You know, I know I know they want happiness because they’re equal to me.
And what if I were in that positions, person’s position? I would want happiness. I would want somebody to give me happiness, what I need. And just think of the advantages of other cherishing that if I if I do give this person happiness, it’s going to be my ultimate source of joy. I’m gonna give them that happiness.
And, again, transforming your body and your personal enjoyments, your wealth, your positive potential, and a brilliant to a brilliant white light which arises out of your heart and goes out and transforms into that counterpart of the previous suffering, whatever they need, whatever would make them happy. And then empathetically, sympathetically sharing in their joy. Again, as long as the person has ego grasping, as long as the person has self centeredness, self grasping and self centeredness, they’re going to suffer like the ultimate difficulties that we can experience. This person is not happy because this person is suffering because of this self centeredness and self grasping. I know that.
They’re just like me. And and if I were in their place, wouldn’t I want somebody to take that from me? And thinking about your own self centeredness, how it’s been the source of all your difficulty, I’m going to take on this self grasping and their self centeredness upon myself. Again, taking on that in the form of of all types of weapons, violent weapons, bombs, knives, guns, taking them on in a vivid visual form. And it just blows to smithereens, the self centeredness at your heart, self grasping, self-cherishing at your own heart.
And you’re just chopping it up with all these knives and blowing it to pieces with guns, you know, this atomic bomb just blows it apart. Just wanting to destroy it because it’s caused you pain your entire life. Again, now this person doesn’t have that self grasping. You know, how sending them whatever they need to to further themselves on the path. Transforming and first developing it through understanding the quality of that person yourself, the advantages of other cherishing, exchanging within that person’s place, exchanging self with others, and then giving your body wealth, objects of enjoyment, one’s positive potential, skillful actions in a form of brilliant white light which goes out and changes into teacher, teachings, all the supportive conditions, all the various realizations.
And then finally, the person achieves awakening in the form of a Buddha and empathetically sharing in that person’s newfound joy and their bliss, rejoicing. This is what we can do with toward ourselves. You know, once we’re able to work with that method towards and really trying and this is a training method. Method. Really trying to develop compassion for that object.
Really wanting to take on the suffering of that individual. Really wanting to love, give away your give away happiness to that individual, to extend yourself with that person’s growth, to bring them happiness. Making use of these prior meditations, bringing them all together into this visual technique. And then when you get achieve some facility with yourself as an object, taking on a loved one, someone you can naturally or quite readily feel compassion for, loved ones, even though it’s mixed with attachment. It’s still a more readily accessible object.
Loved ones, relatives, friends, if possible, begin to move into strangers, ultimately, even your enemy. Meditation. You’ve sat there and and you’ve taken on all this suffering. You’ve given away all this happiness. You’ve placed sentient beings in complete awakening.
But then you, you know, you you look around and nothing’s changed. Nothing’s it was it was only imaginative. It wasn’t done in fact. But there’s a great aspiration that I want to actually to achieve this end in fact, in reality. You know, can anyone actually bring about the welfare of others in a significant sense, in a real manner.
You know, as that quotation by Chogyam Trungpa, if we don’t get our own house in order, then our contribution to the world will only be further chaos. That if I develop myself, the further I develop myself it’s like the difference between being a nurse, a first aid, a nurse, and a doctor, and maybe a heart surgeon. And a first aid worker can help others. No doubt. A nurse but a nurse can help more.
A GP can help more. And if you need a heart transplant, you know, that’s what’s needed, then then you’re able to help that individual. A first aid worker, no matter how sincere they may wish to alleviate that person’s suffering to help them, can’t do it. They don’t have that ability, that potential. A nurse doesn’t have that ability, that potential.
A doctor, a GP, a general practitioner doesn’t have that ability, that potential. Only someone who is trained for that in that person’s specific needs can help them, has that potential, that capacity. What type of being has the optimum skills, abilities to help others to solve their problems? And we say a Buddha, an awakened one. If anyone, that’s our paradigm of sanity.
That’s what we’re using as our model of the optimum mode of being who has fulfilled his own welfare and is able to fulfill the welfare of others. He’s in that position or she is in that position. Developing the exceptional resolve. For the sake of others, I have to develop myself. And for the sake of the unconditional intention to free others from their suffering, I must extend myself.
I must develop myself. To gain those skills, the wisdom, the compassion, the skillful means to actually bring that about in fact, I must become a Buddha. And this is the awakening heart, the altruistic aspiration to achieve highest enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. There’s no more no more noble thought that has ever been born in the the heart of humankind. There is no more powerful method to go beyond one’s own suffering and to help others to go beyond theirs in the awakening heart.
The awakening heart is the supreme ambrosia that overcomes the sovereignty of death. It is the inexhaustible treasure that eliminates all poverty in the world. It is the supreme medicine that quells the world’s disease. It is the tree that shelters all beings, wanders, and tired upon the path of conditioned existence. It is the universal bridge that leads to freedom from unhappy states of birth.
It is the dawning of the moon of the mind that dispels the torment of afflictions. It is the great sun that finally removes this misty ignorance of the world. It is the quintessential butter from the churning of the milk of Dharma. For all those guests traveling on the path of conditioned existence who wish to experience the boundless happiness, this will satisfy them with joy and actually place them in supreme bliss. So that’s the sevenfold cause.
That is the exchange of self with others. You know, beginning with appreciating ourselves and our potential that I’ve outlined, I’ve mentioned to some degree in the development of committing ourselves, re committing ourselves to awakening in the sense of that we all have some wisdom, some basic sanity, that we all have some love and compassion, and that we all have some mental mental and physical and spiritual energy. This is the basic the basis of our of our transformation and believing in ourselves and taking ourselves seriously. And that we have all the conditions necessary to actualize our potential both the internal and external conditions. But these conditions are not going to last forever.
It’s definite that we’re going to die and the time of our death is uncertain. And what is it going to be of any benefit at the time of our death? Whether it’s the big death at the end of this life or the small deaths which are continually occurring during the course of our life. Nothing outside of our own mind can benefit at that moment. Now as John Milton said, the mind is in its own place and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.
It is the mind itself which is determinant of all things. And here we’re talking about karma, the various tendencies and patterns that we are creating within our mind. What you are now is what you have done, and what you do now is what you’re going become, and what kind of life, what kind of existence are you creating for yourself. And understanding that there’s nothing with there’s no state which is bound by ego which is satisfactory. And developing the sense of love for oneself expressed in the determination to be free out of all states bounded by ego, bounded by these neurotic compulsive patterns, coming to understand yourself, and in that understanding becoming gentle and caring for yourself.
But at the under in the same way as that we begin to understand ourselves, we begin to understand others, and and beginning to develop a gentleness and an openness toward others and our love for others. And you develop the determination to help others grow, the awakening heart. If I am not for myself, who will be? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if I if not now, when?
So we’ll stop there. We can dedicate the positive potential and skillful actions that we’ve created in listening and talking about the dharma, the awakening heart. And but especially this evening, maybe we can dedicate to all the positive potential and skillful action that we’ve created to for the benefit of Murray. Murray went to the hospital today. Yeah.
So he had a stroke today, but I think he is he is better today. He is better. So, yeah, this positive energy, this kind of intending it for his welfare, his health. May I quickly become an awakened spiritual teacher and lead each and every sentient being to the enlightened realm through these skillful actions. May the supreme jewel of the awakened heart that has not arisen arise and grow, and may that which has arisen never diminish but increase more and more.