Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A guided death meditation — hospital bed, funeral, gravediggers in the rain — is the centerpiece of this 127-minute session by Ven Jampa Gendun. He opens with reflections on contentment and what makes life genuinely meaningful, drawing on Lama Yeshe’s observation that we always imagine happiness to be somewhere else, then moves into the third root of the nine-part death meditation: that only karmic development, not possessions, loved ones, or the body, is of any use at the moment of death. The guided practice leads into a detailed teaching on the four powers of karmic purification — repudiation, reliance, restraint, and antidote — with most time on the first: a careful distinction between healthy regret and destructive guilt, summed up as “we are not bad people, we are people with problems.” A Q&A covers collective karma, using the Vietnam War and apartheid South Africa as concrete examples. Suited to practitioners already working with karma and death-contemplation teachings.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 11 3PA 2007 05 28.mp3
UUID: 926989bc-93f6-4768-9d52-a31d09294df9
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Three Principle Aspects of the Path 2006-2007 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 2007-05-28
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 126.9 minutes
Words: ~11,906
Yeah. So, we begin by adjusting our motivation. You know, we’ve been talking about, you know, what I would like. I don’t know if I convey it or communicate the idea or not. It’s simply, I guess, of us in our own hearts and minds have to pause and check up.
And then, we get out of touch for various reasons, either necessarily or out of necessity or just out of lack of awareness and so forth. Out of maybe what some of our more deeply held values. You know, we always had clarity of mind and a sense of caring, then we would probably not get out of touch with these values and what we like to see our life stand for in one way or another. But we don’t, do we? We aren’t always that mindful.
And so, I think it’s just simply as a practical necessity to take the time to stop distracting ourselves from ourselves, pause, and perhaps get back in touch. What would I like to see my life stand for. You know, we’re going to meditate, we’re going to continue meditating on death. And death is like kind of like the summation of our life. You know, what has it all been about?
Is it this sound and fury? A tale told by an idiot really signifying nothing? What have I accomplished? How far have I gotten in my life? And if not, why not?
So, I guess you have to be a little bit sincere about life. I don’t mean serious. I don’t think there needs to be a sense of heaviness or a sense of pressure around it. But I think we have this one precious life to lead and this individual, this jampa, whoever each of you are, isn’t going to be around at the end when it’s all over. I’m not saying that something else is not going to take its place, something is going to go on further.
But this one unique individual with his unique potentials with all these situations and circumstances about us which are never going to occur again. And are we making the best out of their situation, just taking advantage of our opportunity? And I’m not prescribing that you should act in some particular way or be some particular way or you should adopt some particular system of thought or sign on this and we’ll make you a member and everything will be okay. But I guess I would just like to feel that all of us, each of us, trying to, in some way, lead the best life we can, a successful life. However we define that, whatever makes us happy.
You know, we can go on for years and years and come to the realization that it’s as if we didn’t really live those years out, as if we were almost half asleep in one way or another. Missed the opportunities that presented themselves for one reason or another as they came along. I guess Buddhism, just, you know, maybe I think in Zen Buddhism they quite often talk about Zen Buddhism won’t make you a saint. It’ll just help you to lead a more intensified way of life. If you’re a thief, you’ll be a better thief.
Whatever. So, whatever is of use to you, whatever you feel is valuable. And we do have it’s not to suggest that any way of life can be led as meaningful as another. I’m not suggesting that. I mean, Buddhism does have some values which they hold out as the most meaningful ways that we could lead our life, the most successful story that we could possibly tell ourselves about ourselves.
We call this a Buddhist story. Somebody should make a movie, I guess. The Buddhist Story. Starring ourselves, each of us. I guess, you know, just stop and pausing and say, well, what really makes me happy?
What makes me feel a sense of fulfillment, contentment? I was reading some paragraphs from some chapters from a particular book by Lama Yeshe, and he was talking about how we are constantly thinking that happiness is somewhere else. You know that another place, another time, another situation, I’ll be happy. And we make all these plans to find this happiness, maybe we achieve our goals. And having achieved those goals, we kind of momentarily experience a satiation of our desires, and we feel a certain kind of a contentment.
But, in fact, I think most of our life, and we were studying karma, aren’t we? And one of the messages in karma is that we have present predispositions, and when these are activated, the final experience is in terms of happiness or suffering of some quality of life. And it seemed to me, I mean, the thought has occurred to me that most of us, while we’re engaged in trying to achieve these plans, that’s all that we ever look to, and we miss the little opportunities and the little happinesses that are constantly occurring all about us, at least in potential form. You know, the idea was put forth you know, we talk about happiness, Another dimension of happiness or another facet of happiness, a perspective that we can take on happiness is contentment. And contentment is finding a certain pleasure in what’s happening about us now.
You know who you are at present, in your present situation and appreciating that and valuing that. It’s not to say that we aren’t to have long term goals. That we aren’t to work towards these and put our efforts and energies. But we can’t be sure that they’re really going to bring us the happiness that we’re looking for. So, you know, on the way to achieving our goals, we miss out a lot of happiness, I think, in life.
And some of the greatest happiness is in terms of how we feel, how we find a meaningful life, a way of being in this world. And this is really hard to define, you know. It’s almost intangible. Someone just mentioned that they had a good week last week. And if you, you know, well what made that week good?
And you could try, I think, and you might not be able to point to any specific event, any dramatic happening which made you weak for you. It was just something about the way things unfold and how your mind reacted and responded to what was going on about you. So, I guess what I’m saying is this is, I think, points up to perhaps a deeper level of possibilities within our minds, a way of being in this world, over and above all our various planning and setting out our various goals, trying to find a way of being, a way of living out values, a way of expressing meaning and purpose in our life. And, you know, this becomes what we call a Buddha mind, think, or Buddhist way of life, or a Buddhist way, not a Buddhist way, a Buddhist way of life, but maybe a Buddha way of life. Kind of an awakened way of life.
We’ve been talking about these three objects of Buddhist commitment in defining what a possible alternative way of life for ourselves, you know, the Buddha. And, you know, kind of keeping this in mind orientating ourselves toward this possibility. You know, the simply most, the development of our mind in terms of wisdom, in terms of love and compassion, in terms of personal power, and these define expression in working with, in our everyday life and benefiting not only ourselves, but others. You know, this is kind of the I think Buddhism is talking about a way of life, a style of living. And we have to do something to take these ideas and make them some kind of lived reality.
And this requires some kind of training of the mind, working with the dharma, the techniques. You know, we said last week that more than not perhaps the dharma is simply the truth, the way things are, and beginning to harmonize ourselves with our present experience and coming to terms with going beyond these continual set of projections that we’re continually projecting. But there’s also this third possibility in terms of a way of life. And this is the third area of commitment, and that is the Sangha. Sangha means in Tibetan, it’s gendun pa.
And gen or Gay, means virtue. Dun means to aspire. So the idea of a Sangha, or spiritual community, is someone who aspires to virtue, and the highest virtue is that of awakening. So, this becomes, for those who are part of our Sangha, we have the shared idea that we all want to wake up from this half slumber that most of us pass our life under the influence of in one way or another. And, you know, we are it’s like we’re trying to create a community, a therapeutic context, you know, like some kind of rich soil where we can come for nourishment.
And like, it’s like a greenhouse where these fragile ideas that we’re working with, the shoots of these new ways of possibilities for ourselves can be temporarily protected. They can be nurtured and developed and grow. We can experiment with alternative ways of being and thinking with each other and sharing those deeply hidden parts of ourselves which are probably to a large extent, unknown even to ourselves, let alone that we are willing to express and share with others. So, it’s a real possibility. And I guess the idea of awakening, Buddhahood, whatever you want to call it, is very much a social phenomenon.
Mental health is a social phenomenon. The world is like a hospital. It’s a place where we can come for healing. We all are very much isolated from one another, aren’t we? It’s kind of our western way of life.
That’s the way most of us lead our lives in one way or another. And we even practice our Dharma in that way and gain these realizations within our own mind as if I could come healthy and the world could remain very much as it is. I could find complete happiness and the world could be left behind in some way. I think that’s a mistaken way of thinking. I don’t think a healthy person, one could develop into a healthy person thinking in such a way, in such an extreme of individualism.
Know, Sangha can take, or a spiritual community can take many levels. There’s the ultimate Sangha, those who have direct realization of emptiness. They can help us to realize that same thing for ourselves. There’s what we call conventional level of spiritual community. Four or more nuns and monks.
And, you know, we have to respect them, don’t we? For what they are trying to do with their lives. They have made a real commitment, and their commitment is really worthy of our respect. I remember I used to be a monk. I don’t know if many of you probably know that.
And I remember after a number of years of being a monk, I went to Thailand. The very first time I was in a situation where the Thai people are generally very respectful, reverend, have a great deal of reverence for for the Sangha, for the spiritual community. This one little old lady came and she was bowing down to me. I said, No, no, don’t do that, don’t do that. And after that happened a number of times, began to realize, you know, they’re not bowing down to me, or they’re not showing respect to me as an individual personality.
It’s what I represent, you know, the Sangha. And so, I had to begin to try to live up to what respect that they and I became a representative of the Sangha, thinking myself in that way. And so, you know, one of those who those monks and nuns who have taken ordination and made this trying to commit themselves to living out a particular way of life as best they can, our deserving of our respect and our admiration, not as individual personalities, but for what they represent, the commitment, the time and energy that they’re putting into what they’re trying to achieve for themselves. And hopefully, they can share it with others, ourselves included. But at another level, and a level which is probably of even greater relevance to each of ourselves, is ourselves.
We here in this room, the people who have come before us to establish Buddha House, who worked in all the various ways to bring this situation, this kind of stop, this happening that we all are experiencing at present. It is a dependent arising. It depended on a lot of work, a lot of time and energies of a lot of people. And we owe them, and we owe each other the respect for what has gone before. Think it’s important that we acknowledge that.
And, moreover, we don’t, we can’t allow ourselves to become parasites simply to use. As if we, you know, I don’t think that’s going to work in the long run. I think there has to be some kind of exchange of value. We have to also give, we have to put in what we can into our Sangha. This is one of our refuges.
This is where we come to learn and to transform our mind. We create this situation. It’s a humanly built situation. It didn’t happen as a process of nature. It took the intentions of a lot of others besides ourselves to create this kind of situation.
And we have to participate in its development in whatever way. But at least be aware that you’re part of it, that you’re not just a visitor here. It’s like people who see themselves as a part of this planet, as opposed to I’m just stopping by in a hotel and I’m going on the next morning. This is where we live. This is where we nurture our mind.
It’s important that we take care of it, that we take care of ourself. It’s kind of the condition we’re putting our minds in, kind of the social context which fosters growth and supports awakening. Like this therapeutic culture. A way where we can nourish this innate nature of ourselves as Buddha. So, you know, Buddhism has faith in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.
It faith in the reality of awakening, that there is an alternative. Life doesn’t just have to be a bitch and then we die. There really are alternatives to what we’ve experienced very much up to now, what has been very much our story up to now. Having faith in the reality of awakening means believing in ourselves that we can change. I think, you know, I can say those words.
They’re quite easy to say. To feel them, to really, at a very depth of our being, to believe them, I think, is very much another thing altogether. But we have to begin somewhere, at least by hearing the words, and becoming accustomed to the idea of other ways of possibilities for ourselves. And we can become the best possible person that we can become. That’s what we call Buddha.
Having faith in these Three Jewels means practically entrusting ourselves to them. You know, putting into practice Buddhist Dharma with the help of the spiritual community in order to make it so, in order to really we’re trying to imagine other possible ways of life for ourselves. And it all begins in imagination. But then we try to translate that imagination what began only as an image within our mind and as some kind of lived experience. And we depend upon the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha to do that.
And this is like our refuge. This is where we can find some kind of reliable resources, some effective means for bringing this about. So, we have to have faith. We’ve talked about faith. We have to have faith in ourselves and the possibility of solving our problems.
So, the inner focus of our life becomes Buddha, which we try to actualize by means of the Dharma within this spiritual context of the Sangha and trying to, again, raise the level of motivation. I mean, that’s a practice in itself, isn’t it? Just again and again, trying to go beyond, even if only a little bit, even if only for a moment, for this moment, for the next few seconds, our exaggerated self concern, our myopic vision of what mental health is about, and what happiness is really all about. Maybe we have to try to redefine what the good life, maybe to take in one, two, three, a few other people besides ourselves, ourselves. Even just for a few moments.
You know, we can we are trying to learn together. We’re trying to train our minds. We’re trying to bring about change. And we can do that both for ourselves, ourselves, but also for a wider circle of others. And then, you know, this is a way of being a Buddha.
This is the way we are, you know, we are ignorant Buddhists at the present time, if you like. This is the way that our Buddha nature is finding expression within all the hang ups that we presently have, within that particular state of mind as best we can. You practice being a Buddha. And then finally, one day, you become that we have to practice. It’s not like you think about swimming, about becoming an Olympic swimmer, you just keep thinking about it, thinking about it.
How it would be to go to Beijing, the next Olympic game, but you actually get in the water and you practice being a swimmer, you practice being an Olympic competitor. Competitor, maybe you even think about winning a gold medal. Anyway, we’re practicing being Buddhist. So, just for a few moments, let’s practice being Buddhist. It’s kind of our refuge, I think.
I go for refuge until I am awakened to the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Through my practice of generosity and the other perfections, may I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings. I go for refuge until I’m awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Through my practice of generosity and the other perfections, may I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings. I go for refuge until I’m awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.
Through my practice of generosity and other perfections, may I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings. May all sentient beings have happiness and the causes of happiness. May all sentient beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. May all sentient beings be inseparable from the joy that is without sorrow. May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free from attachment for some and aversion toward others.
Reverently, I prostrate with my body, speech, and mind. I present clouds of every type of offering those actually arranged and imagined. I disclose all my negative actions accumulated since beginningless time and rejoice in all the virtues of superiors and ordinary beings. Please remain until the end of cyclic existence and turn the wheel of Dharma for migrating beings. I dedicate all virtue, my own and that of others, to the Great Awakening.
So we may be meditating on death. Wow. What do people people think? Does it get too heavy? We’re going through what’s called the nine part death meditation practice where there are three routes.
We looked at the first two, and that death is inevitable. And I was trying, I guess, emphasize that we’re not particularly concerned with death. We’re with life, ensuring that we live with a quality of life. I’m trying to think of that we don’t die many times, a coward’s death, before our actual physical death, A banality, a meanness, a purpose in our lives. Thinking that the best thing you can do is find pleasure and avoid pain in the course of your life.
There is a prayer think by the Kadampa Geshe, it means whatever will help me to grow, that’s what I want. If it’s better for me to get well, that’s what I want. If it’s better for me to die, that’s what I want. If it’s better for me to experience pain, that’s what I want. If it’s better for me to experience pleasure, that’s what I want.
But my priority is to grow, to develop myself. When we die, it’s like we’ve been, whether we, a dream, whether it lasts a minute or it lasts all night, When you wake, it really doesn’t make much difference. Death is inevitable. The time of death is unpredictable. We simply don’t know when.
And we’re going to meditate on this third root, is that the time of our death, only the development, only how much we’ve grown, the karmic seeds that we’ve planted in the course of our life are going to make us, are going to be a benefit at the time of our death. And this is supported by three reasons. That are all our various enjoyments and pleasures, our various entertainments. Of what we expend our time and energies running after in one way or another in the course of our everyday life at the time of our death, they’re not going to be of any benefit to us. Even those people who love us you know, necessarily want us to be happy, and who we love and we we don’t want to leave behind at the moment or death.
They can’t help us. And even this lovely little body, you know, that we spend so much time taking care of, you know, try to get, you know, buy nice clothes for it. Lots of vitamin supplements. If you saw all the supplements I take, you’d be a minute. I think that we have to take care of our body, but even at the moment I die, it’s like of similar little help to us.
It becomes like a piece of meat in a butcher shop, doesn’t it? I don’t know, I’m getting heavy again aren’t I? So, you know, we can imagine I’ll go through this with you, then we can imagine it at the time of meditation. You won’t have to imagine. You know, you’re lying there and you’re done.
Maybe you had an accident or maybe cancer, heart attack. You had all these tubes ducting machines, nursing, doctors and you’ve got all your worldly possessions, all the goodies one way or another, symbols of them at least. All the, what do you say, the to your house? Do you say that in Australia? Okay, deed to your house.
Your car registration, there’s my computer, my prize possession, a camera, all your physical, they’re all there. And then there’s all your relatives and loved ones. There’s something in the corners. Some of them are praying for you, some are just sitting by your bed, you know, holding your hand. And then there’s your body.
You’ve taken nice lotions on, take bubble baths and wash it every day. It’s all there, everything really that has much meaning to you, that you want to hold on to. And then, you know, we’ve described process of death. There’s a bond between there’s an interface between our consciousness, our most subtle consciousness in the most subtle wind energy, and then grosser levels of wind energy, which are then associated with various elements. So, there’s an interface between the most subtle energy and grosser levels of subtle energy, grosser levels of energy.
And it begins to weaken. Just like maybe a molecular bond begins to weaken. This is a karmic bond, and the karma which is supporting the strength of that association is beginning to weaken and the mind is beginning to withdraw from the body, in other words. And at that moment, there’s this song that keeps going through my mind when I think of this. Oh yeah, what did there used to be a very popular song, maybe in the United States when I was a kid.
Have to walk that Lonesome Valley by yourself. Do remember that song? It’s like, it’s kind of a nice song, it’s true anyway, isn’t it? You go on alone. Make it down to your mind.
All these possessions are going to be left behind. Even the people who love you and who you love sincerely, and then even this body. So, you know, I guess it’s, you know, we’re always talking about priorities, don’t we? Keeping your priorities straight. I think that’s what’s important.
Keeping and being mindful of those priorities. That’s what a lot of this is all about, isn’t it? So we don’t lose sight of what is really important, what is going to be of use to us. We don’t get caught up in things which are meaningless, purposeless. I’m not saying by all means have life’s, a nice home, a car, a good flat screen, LCD, huge screen television, okay shit.
All the good things in life. But don’t trade your life for it. How much is it worth to live your life? And your relationship, they’re important. No doubt about that.
So, you know, even your body. But we’re somehow integrating these into an overall set of priorities so we don’t get lost for years at a time, maybe lifetimes at a time, ways that if we were thinking clearly and caringly, we might choose otherwise. And so, I think, this is what this is trying to do, to help us to keep coming back to what is most important to ourselves, what is really going to be of use to ourselves. What is our real refuge, I guess, in a way? Anyway, let’s try and meditate on this.
You you can imagine the bond breaks. You’re looking down on the scene of your deathbed, and they’re unplugging the tubes of your body. The doctor, he’s gone. He went a long time ago. The nurses pull the sheet up over what used to be your body.
And your relatives are beginning to, your friends are beginning to leave crying, sobbing, carrying the things from the end of your bed. Of course. They’re leaving the room. And then, finally, do call it? Orderly?
I’m still trying to learn Australian. They come in and they wheel you into the hallway. Maybe they put you on a steel gurney down the service elevator so nobody sees you. Bad advertising for a hospital. And they take you down the freight elevator, down to the morgue and they wash your body and plug up the orifices of your body and they tattoo a number on the inside of your thigh.
Okay, This is your body. It’s my body that I turn on it. Be careful. And then there’s your funeral and all these people gather you. People you don’t even know.
People are crying. It’s all your loved ones and friends. They’re saying wonderful things about you. What a great father, what a great mother, what a great brother, what a great sister, what a great friend you were. Telling anecdotes about what a fine person you were.
You really were probably a very fine person. And then the funeral is over and maybe they maybe they burn the body or maybe they take it to the cemetery and there’s an open grave and then the casket lowered down and threw a shovel full of dirt on top of the casket and the coffin. And I was thinking about it, you know, it’s like tonight. It’s getting dark and starting to rain. And some workmen come and shovel up the dirt.
And they put some artificial turf over it. And they look nice and green, pleasant. And it’s raining. It’s getting dark. It’s cold.
And it’s ending. It’s finished. And what has it all been about? What should you do? And what difference should that make while you still have life contemplating death?
What kind of difference could that possibly entail for you and how you lead your life? Or would it make any difference? Anyway, that’s up to you. So take a comfortable, firm posture. So we begin by relaxing the body starting at the crown, the scalp, the forehead, feeling the wrinkles in your brow beginning to smooth out.
The pressure in and around the eyes diminishing. The muscles of the face softening, relaxing. Jaws, relax. And the muscles at the back of the neck crepts gently turn your head to the sides, loosening, relaxing the muscles at the throat. The upper back, the shoulders.
Rotating your shoulders a few times. And letting them drop comfortably to the sides. And your hands are loose. Relaxing your lower arms. Your upper arms.
Chest is at ease. The heart area, the lungs, The central portion of the back. And stomach releasing the tension that we hold in our stomach muscles. Just allow your belly to go soft. Relaxing throughout the abdominal cavity.
Holding your trunk erect, relax your lower back muscles. Relaxing the buttocks throughout the upper legs and the lower legs. And your feet. Bring your awareness to your body in general. Notice any tightnesses, any tensions in the body.
Focusing upon those areas consciously, relaxing, softening, feeling the tension diminish, tightness loosen. Body becoming comfortable. Relax. And the feeling of physical pleasure pervades your body. It’s a nice place to be in your body.
And then bring your mind to the breath just to ease and gentle, in and out flow of the natural breath. If it’s helpful use the techniques of counting and noting the breaths. Now, going to meditate on death. Your imagination, creative situation, circumstance, perhaps you’re relying on a hospital bed, as we described. All your possessions in one form or another at the end of your bed and there are your loved ones, people near to you, and your own body.
It’s all there. And slowly, your senses are beginning to shut down. You no longer can understand sounds, and they’re becoming fainter, dimmer, becoming dim. Your sight can no longer see. The bond between your mind and body is weakening.
And though you want to stay, you want to hold on to this, your mind slips away. Away. And you’re looking down on this scene. Is your body, your friends and loved ones crying, walking away from the room, carrying all your various possessions? They’re gone now.
The nurse pulls the sheet over your face, what used to be your body. Then orderly comes in and wheels you down the hallway into the elevator. Down to the basement morgue. There’s your body. They wash the body.
Tattoo a number inside of the thigh. That’s your body. And that’s your funeral. You see in the first row all your loved ones, your crying, your friends, people you work with. It’s your body in the corner.
The service is over. Coffin is taken away. Perhaps it’s burnt. You can imagine taking it to the cemetery. There are your loved ones again standing around the open grave.
Coffin is being lowered. Put your body inside it, into the ground. Some dirt is thrown over the coffin. It’s sealed. There are all your loved ones walking away crying.
It’s growing dark and a few workmen come and they fill up the grave and put artificial grass over it. It’s growing dark. It’s a wet cold night. It’s all over. What should you do?
You don’t have to try to answer it, but you ask yourself the question, what should I do? Stay with the question. And then bring your mind back to the breath. And get in touch with your body. Notice the feelings and sensations within the body.
In an easy, gentle, relaxed manner, just slowly become aware of what’s going on about you, but just take your time. There’s no hurry. Okay. We’re talking about karma, and we’ve gone through various actions and the four types of results. Are coming to understand that within our mind at present, our mind is in not a blank slate.
It is conditioned in various ways. It has very much the history of all our various actions that we’ve created over lifetimes encoded in it. And we call these encodings or conditioning factors, we call them karmic seeds. It’s just a way that we can talk about these factors. And that when these factors within the mind, when they meet with the appropriate activating condition, some kind of response will arise.
And we have within our mind both positive karmic seeds and negative karmic seeds. And we mentioned last week that these are are susceptible to being weakened and destroyed. And we mentioned last week in terms of the positive karmic seeds that anger and wrong view and misguided regret among other states of mind are able to weaken and destroy the positive karmic seeds that we have within our mind. Now we’re going to begin to look at the other side of this. Not only are the positive karmic seeds susceptible to being weakened and destroyed, to being reconditioned as it were, but also the negative karmic seeds within our mind.
When we talked about the four general principles of karma, we said that karma was certain and depends upon positive actions. We will experience a positive type of result. Happiness, some form of happiness. It depends upon negative actions. We will experience a negative result, some form of suffering in one form or another.
So, we can begin to work with what are in fact these negative factors within our mind. And the Buddha taught a method of working with them in a text called the Sūtra Giving the Four Teachings. And he called these the four powers, or sometimes the four countervailing powers. By means we can consciously begin to, now we don’t want to suffer, but we have within our present minds conditioning factors which predisposes to suffering in all of its various ways. So, it seems intelligent or skillful to make use of, rather than having to wait around for the inevitable condition which is going to bring us some type of suffering, to take some kind of remedial steps to work with these methods to be able to eliminate them so we don’t have to experience the suffering.
So we’re going to go through the four powers, the means by which we can constantly weaken and destroy these negative factors, the negative karma seeds within our mind. The power of repudiation, you know, this involves developing a reasoned and deeply felt sense of regret or remorse around the past negative action that we created. The power of reliance, this involves relying upon those objects toward whom we created the negativity as a means of redirecting ourselves, relying upon those same objects as a means of picking ourselves back up. The power of restraint involves turning away from committing those actions again in the future. And then finally, the power of antidote, and this involves applying some kind of specific antidote as a counter to counteract the effects of that past negative action.
So, the power of repudiation, the power of reliance, the power of restraint, and the power of antidote. So, we’re going go through each of those four powers and how we can actually apply them in our practice. So the first of these four powers, and there’s nothing magical about this. All of what you’re describing is a process which is constrained by the law of cause and effect. So, there’s nothing magical.
There’s nothing mystical. It is, given this condition, this result will arise. If you remove this condition, this result will not arise. How can we work with these conditions which already exist within our mind? They should be susceptible.
We should be able to work with them. They’re not invulnerable, but in fact we can. But it’s not a magical process. We have to actually bring about the complementary condition which will recondition these factors, these karmic seeds, such that they’re not going to be able to diminish their potential to act as a cause for future sufferings, to weaken them, and if possible, destroy them altogether. So, the first of these four powers is the power of repudiation.
This involves developing, as I just mentioned, a reasoned and deeply felt genuine sense of regret toward this negative Seeing the faults of what we did, it can’t be wishful thinking, can’t be a curiosity. We actually have to have a sense of how unskillful a mistake in that action actually was. So, in talking about the word regret, there’s a kind of a danger to, we have to be able to refine our thinking around this word regret or remorse. Because it’s easy to, perhaps we have to make a distinction, this would be a good topic for our discussion, to discriminate regret on the one hand and guilt on the other. Okay?
Sometimes maybe we don’t make a distinction between those two and it’s quite necessary. Guilt is really, in most instances, is really a destructive force in people’s lives. Guilt has, dharma has nothing to do with guilt. In the case of a guilt associated with our past actions, the focus is upon ourselves as a person, and not upon what we did. And the deeper causes of why we did that.
With guilt, there’s a sense that we, as a person, are kind of a failure. That we see our negative behavior as some kind of expression of some kind of defect in ourselves which is innate to ourselves. We have a defect in our character. You know, we would rather not do these unskillful actions. We would rather not do what we do.
We have a sense that we cannot do otherwise. Feel bad about ourselves because we’d rather not do these things. But somehow this badness, these ways of acting are kind of just simply an expression of who we are intrinsically, the nature of ourselves as a person. We don’t see, you know, we’re focusing ourselves, we’re focusing the attention is upon ourselves as a person. Rather than, you know, we don’t see our negative actions as simply being inappropriate or mistaken because it brought harm either to ourselves to others.
Rather, these mistaken actions are seen as an expression of some kind of intrinsic flaw in our character and who we are as a person. So, and we feel bad about ourselves. We don’t like ourselves because of what we do. But what can I do? That’s who I am.
I’d rather not. I’m really sorry. I’m the way I am. I don’t like myself very much about it. In some way or another, some feeling around that.
So the focus is on ourselves as a person, no matter what we did, no matter how tragic, how terrible the consequences might have been, we are not concerned with ourselves but with the action, we are not judging ourselves as not being a worthwhile person. You know, in developing a sense of regret, our focus is on what we’ve done, no matter how bad we may feel about what we did. We are not judging ourselves but the action, what we did. You know, we are not bad people. We are people with problems, but we are not the problem.
The problem is attachment or hatred or jealousy, basically ignorance. That the problem. That’s what underlies the action. So those are the problems. We aren’t the problem.
I am not attachment. I am not hatred. I take responsibility because I have those in my mind and I act it out, you know, out of a lack of mindfulness and clarity and so forth. Out of those negative ways, those negative motivations, those afflicting emotions. And I take responsibility for them.
But it’s in no way is a statement about who I am as a person. When we come under the influence of these destructive patterns of mind, we act in ways which are neither in our own or others’ best interests. That’s the nature of afflicting emotions. They only cause harm, both to ourselves and to others. The nature of afflictive emotions, they’re all wrong consciousnesses.
They either exaggerate or depreciate their object. They’re never in keeping with the reality or the actual nature of the thing, whether it’s a person or an object or whatever. There’s always an inappropriateness in the way that we relate under the influence of the afflicted emotions. We keep making these messes and we try to keep cleaning up our messes and we keep making the same mistakes. You know, it becomes a perpetual motion of cleaning up the messes that we are continually making due to these afflicted emotions in one way or another.
It seems we make mistakes. Okay, we have imperfections, we have some limitations, we have some problems, we have some habitual ways, fairly stable destructive patterns within our mind which arise from time to time, and which we, under the influence, react in ways which cause ourselves problems and other people’s problems. We cause harm to ourselves and other people’s. And we can regret that legitimately. I think that’s healthy.
That’s quite reasonable. But no matter how disastrous the consequences our mistakes might have been, we can simply and sincerely regret them. But even a tragic mistake in no way reflects upon ourselves as a person. It’s not a statement about who, in fact, we are. You know, with regret, we disclose and we acknowledge that was a mistake.
We quit trying to rationalize it or trying to hide it even from ourselves or trying to justify it. Justify it wasn’t a mistake. Acknowledge our mistakes as mistakes if only to ourselves, and we disclose it and bring it up to the light of our own day, in front of our own mental eye. And we look at it dispassionately and say, That was wrong. I harmed.
And to harm is wrong, whether it’s yourself or another. I think we can legitimately and in a very healthy manner acknowledge that fact. But there’s no self judgment. But there’s no evasion, there’s no self deception. There’s also no self judgment in all of this.
So, know, we’re not calling into question ourselves as worthwhile people, but we are confronting our past actions. And in the context of understanding our imperfections, our limitations, that we’re people with certain problems, we take responsibility for what we’ve done and the consequences. So, you know, this is where this power gets its name. We repudiate. The idea of we develop a sense of aversion, an opposition, regret about that way of acting.
We don’t want to identify with that way of acting any longer. We repudiate. We externalize and we cut ourselves and we associate that as a negative way of acting. We identify it as an unskillful way of acting, an inappropriate way of acting, not in our own or others best interests, in all these various possible ways, we hurt. You know, and above that, we can understand, having looked at karma, that the motivation and the intentionality behind that action have left some kind of imprint in our mind, these conditioning factors, these karmic seeds.
And in this case, it’s a negative seed. And moreover, when there’s negative seed, just like when it comes to a flower seed, when it comes into contact with appropriate activating conditions, the soil and the water, it’s going to, it’s going to, you know, the process of dependent arising. Something, some way of perception, some type of physical reality is going to evolve out of that for ourselves. And it’s going to be negative because of the certainty of karma. We’re going to perceive our world in a negative manner.
And by negative I mean it’s associated with displeasure and dissatisfaction and suffering. These negative conditioning factors are predisposing our mind to perceive and interpret our world in a negative manner. Some type of suffering is going to be experienced because of these negative intentions, motivations, actions of our mind. We’re conditioning our mind to interpret and perceive our reality in a negative way, let us say, a suffering way. And we don’t want to suffer.
This is innate to our nature. This is what we mean by sentient life. Avoidance and approach we want to happen, so we don’t want to suffer. But we have these, like a time bomb, maybe that’s exaggerating, ticking away in our mind. Just waiting for the opportunity and the conditions.
And we’re going to, due to the condition factors in the mind, in some way, in some shape, in all these various four types of results of karma, you’re going to experience our reality in a negative manner due to being predisposed to do so. And we don’t want that. So, you know, we have these negative karmic seeds in our mind. When they’re activated, we’re going to experience suffering. That’s perhaps stated most simply.
And the way that this sense of regret, the way that it’s traditionally, there’s an antidote which describes this idea. Don’t know if you’ve ever, if you’ve been in India or in a typical example is a cheap Indian restaurant. You have two friends and you go in a cheap Indian restaurant. In an Indian restaurant quite often you share dishes together. Get a dish of spinach cheese and all of these nice, I like Indian food.
And you get all the chapati’s and rice. Anyway, lots of good food. And you all share the same together. Then all three of you walk outside, yourself and these two other friends of yours. And immediately one of them drops to be dead.
And the other one, the second one, is rolling on the ground, writhing in pain, holding your stomach. And you’re kind of startled by this whole thing, you know. And you’re looking at them and see, slowly, you know, you’re looking at them and the idea begins to develop somewhere deep in your mind. You know, that one’s dead. That one’s riding on the ground in pain.
I bet you it was that meal we just ate. And we just, I ate exactly the same food that they ate. And though at this moment you’re not experiencing the slightest discomfort, this huge sense of regret begins to rise in your mind. I wish I hadn’t eaten meal. So this is the kind of, this is I guess by way of analogy, by way of what we mean by this.
You know, we’re okay right now, but our time is coming, if it were. And so, it seems legitimate and healthy, reasonable. I wish I hadn’t done that. I wish I hadn’t eaten that meal. So, in all of this, there is no one meting out punishment.
There is no one meting out, you know, is no big daddy up in the sky who’s giving us rewards for being good boys and girls. They’re spanking us for being bad boys and girls. You know, we aren’t made to suffer for our negative karma, but by our negative karma. We’re not made happy for our positive karma, but by our negative karma. These are causes.
Our negative karma is a cause of suffering. We’re not made to suffer for having done that, but by having done that. The law of cause and effect. Given this condition, this will arise. This isn’t present.
This will not arise. You know, this is one of the most basic principles that Buddhism might be. The law of dependent arising. It underpins all of Buddhism. This isn’t to say that we, again, just as we talked about guilt and regret, we have to maybe make some kind of distinction.
We have to be a little discriminating. And another way in which we can misinterpret, misunderstand, misidea of karma is that Understanding that all of our experiences arise through our own making is not to say that we aren’t able or that we should not hold responsible and others should not be stopped when they act in oppressive or abusing or harmful manner toward others. Doesn’t alleviate the necessity to act to intervene when wrong is happening. That we shouldn’t prevent hunger or poverty from happening or try to, you know, some kind of injustice is going on, to intervene, to stop. Whether it’s a government, whether it’s institutions, whether it’s individuals, they all should be held responsible.
Karmic seed for all our experiences are of our own making. Whatever we are experiencing, the main cause is the conditioning factors within our own mind. But as we try to emphasize, when we talked about distinction between various types of causes, perhaps the main cause is the karmic seeds within our mind. But that karmic seed will never ripen unless activated by a cooperative condition. You know, I gave a talk when I was here in LA previously, many years ago, and I gave a talk at Flinders.
I began, somehow the discussion came around karma. And one particular person got quite upset with me. She said, Well, yeah, then it’s okay if the South African government oppresses the blacks. That’s okay, that’s their karma, right? So, know, a little bit of truth can do a lot of harm sometimes.
It’s true that the blacks of South Africa were experiencing oppression due to having created the karma to be oppressed, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t step in and intervene. Why? Because if you tear down that regime, which acts as a cooperative condition, then that karma will never ripen. If it never comes into contact with the activating cause, then that karma will never bear any fruit. So, we can’t just say, Oh, that’s their karma, as if that’s their destiny.
It doesn’t give us any license to be apathetic, to just look on. Because we can remove the activating conditions. We can work with the cooperative causes. We can’t change their karma for them. But we can prevent the conditions which cause that to ripen.
Therefore, for them to have to undergo that particular suffering, whatever it was. You know, there are choices to be made and situations demand our compassion intervention, even within this idea of the causal chain of actions and their effects. Even from our side, we can intervene by removing the cooperative conditions. So, it’s not predestination in form, but we do have to take responsibility for what happens to ourselves. We’re not made to suffer for.
Our suffering arises from our own past actions. So we have, moreover, you know, we’re trying to develop a sense of regret, a sense of reason to regret. We don’t want to suffer in the future. We have these condition factors within our mind, oppress these negative karmas, seeds. There’s a still further reason for regret in that these negative karmic seeds within our mind obscure the development or hinder the development of our mind.
And I’d like to read a short quote from Lama Zopa Rinpoche. What is the block? Why is your mind not developing? Why are you not getting better and better? Over many years you have been listening, reflecting, and meditating on the path.
You heard and read many times the most profound secret tantric teachings, especially of Maha Anuttarayoga Tantra. You have done some retreats, but your mind is still the same as before. A rock that has been under the ocean for many eons is still hard, with only wetness on the outside, no wetness inside. There is no change. Nothing goes inside.
Your mind is like this, not having any change, any development, realizations of the path. Nothing of what is mentioned by the Buddhas in the text of Sūtra and Tantra is being actualized in your mind. This is all because of not having done powerful continual purification. Your mind is blocked by all these heavy collections of various negative karmas. We don’t want to suffer.
We want to be happy. We have within our minds at present dormant causes for suffering. These dormant causes for suffering were placed there by our previous negative actions that we created. We want to grow, we want to develop, both for ourselves and others, but not of self interest, but also interest in the welfare of others. But we want to solve our problems.
We want to be healthy people, happy, loving, sane. That’s what we all want, and this is what we’re aspiring to be, trying to be a better person, in some level, in some way Albert, each of us is conceiving of it at present. But as long as we have these obscurations, we cannot. There are some kind of hindering factors within our mind. Our mind is a terribly complex structure.
Try to simplify in a way to think about our mind. These karmic seeds themselves, aside from the future suffering consequences, hinder the present development of our mind. So I think when we begin to consider in a kind of a reasonable way, as best we can understand these, which is in fact a really subtle process, intricate process, in many ways perhaps a mysterious process, I think we can begin to have a sense, a legitimate sense, reasoned sense, and rational. I wish I hadn’t done that. That was a mistake.
Wasn’t thinking straight. I wasn’t clear. I lost I just became angry. Was so full of attachment I couldn’t help myself. I was so jealous.
It’s understandable, but I wish I hadn’t done that. I don’t want to suffer, and moreover, I want to remain stuck for the rest of my life with these reoccurring patterns of dissatisfaction. Want become a more loving person and wiser. I want to grow. I can’t undo what I did.
That’s beyond my capability. But I can, I regret that I did it. Another kind of genuine, sincere, rational way of healthy regret. This power of repudiation is the most important of these four powers. Without a genuine, if you lack this first power of repudiation, then the remaining three powers are going to be weak and ineffective at best.
So, if we don’t develop a deeply felt, sincere, genuine regret with regard to our past negative actions, there is no way that we can purify them. We created them. It is our mind which created and conditioned itself, and it is only our mind which can uncondition, which can uncreate that condition, that factor within the mind. There’s no power on earth. The Buddhists aren’t omnipotent.
There’s nothing that they can do. It is up to us. It’s our responsibility. This applies with regard to all the four powers. They’re only effective methods.
They may be effective. They may be terribly effective methods, very powerful methods, but only so if we make use of them as such. Otherwise, as if they don’t work at all. So, everything works within the restriction of the law of cause and effect. And therefore, to be effective, they cannot be applied mechanically, know, thoughtlessly.
It would be nice, but it just doesn’t work that way. If we can bring about a condition through the application of a more powerful, which is more powerful than the condition that would have activated this karma. The seed will not ripen or it will, its will be ameliorated, weakened in some fashion or another. What is being gotten out here is that it’s like if you take a seed and you scorch it, the seed remains. Potency has been destroyed.
You take a scorched seed and put it in the earth, it doesn’t matter how much soil and water you add. Its ability to bring about a result has been destroyed. Or even if we can’t destroy the seed, even if we can only weaken its potentiality, then we will experience, for example, a withered result. Result. Typically this is referred to, or this is explained as, you might take an unfavorable rebirth, but it could be experienced in a matter of short time.
Or it could be that negative karma which would have resulted in unfavorable conditions in the future, a negative rebirth and so forth, might be experienced as a slight headache in your present life. So, there’s some type of result, but that result has ameliorated. It’s withered. It’s been lessened to a great extent. The point here is that negative karma, this negative karma exceeds, is, we’re going make a parallel.
Have negative karmic seeds, and we have these antidotes, these four powers. The negative karmic seeds are like comparable to water, These four powers are comparable to heat. The more that water is exposed and comes near to heat, the more it evaporates diminishes. That is in the nature of water. It’s a matter of law of cause and effect.
As the water comes closer and is made obvious or more exposed to this source of heat, it evaporates and diminishes and finally vanishes altogether. That’s in its very nature of water. It is in the nature of these karmic seeds, these conditioning factors, that the more they are exposed and the more that we apply these in terms of application, the four powers, the more intensely they are applied and the greater the duration, the more over time that they are applied, then it is in the very nature of these karmic seeds that they will, as it were, diminish, evaporate and diminish, and then be completely gone. That’s in the comparison. It’s trying to emphasize that this is the nature.
The karmic seeds aren’t kind of inherent. Their very nature is that they are susceptible to being reconditioned in such a way that they are no longer able to bring about the result. And they are susceptible to actually being conditioned to where they bring about no result, that they can be, as it were, completely eliminated from the mind. No result arises from them. So, our individual histories predisposes us to predictable future experiences.
These are within our mind at present. But this doesn’t imply, as I mentioned before, any kind of predestination. The future is open ended. It only exists as probabilities within our mind at present. The probability exists as these conditioning factors within our mind, which have come from the past.
But the past doesn’t have to control our future. Without awareness, without intervention, it will. This is the cyclic. This is why we keep circling in cyclic existence, because our present mind is just a playing out of cause and effect. But causes exist within our present mind, and this is the only time that we can intervene in this kind of reinforcing, what would you call it, this closed system which simply perpetuates itself.
There is a possibility for intervention at this point in the present with regard to how the past is going to translate into future experiences. It’s only at the present as probabilities, not as necessities. We can intervene with regard to those probabilities through these applications of these powers. We are presently predisposed to certain experiences, but it’s only predisposed. It’s not predestined.
There’s a difference. If we make use of these four powers, it’s a way of committing ourselves to actualizing our fullest potential in terms of the future. And changing, we can’t change the past, but we have control over what we’re going to experience in the future by intervening in the present in terms of these predisposing factors, which if we don’t, will naturally play out in some predictable outcome. It’s like we have an opportunity to take control. So, by means of strong and repeated application of these four powers, not only is the karmic potency of our past negative actions weakened, but these seeds can be completely destroyed and completely eliminated from our mind.
And with regard to this first power, the power of repudiation, it’s said amongst these four types of results, you remember the four types of results? The fruition result, the result which corresponds in terms of behavior, in terms of experience, and the environmental result. This first type, this first power, the power of repudiation, is especially powerful in removing or weakening the fruition result of our past karma. Maybe we’ll go on with the remaining of these four powers. Is there anything that you’d like to talk about or questions?
I can understand karma affecting individuals with karma. Yeah. There is what’s called collective karma. Collective karma and individual karma. karma that we accumulate as a group in common with one another.
This table is, this lived realm that we experience at the present is a product of our collective karma. But within that common experience that we all share, there is how we individually experience it. So we have commonalities that we’re experiencing as a result. We all experience this room fairly similarly. That’s a product of our karma, of our collective karma.
Within that commonality of shared experience, we all have slight variations and that’s our individual karma. So, there is this notion about collective karma that we’re going to experience a result common as a group. We created the causes together. We will experience the results together. But within that context, there’s individual ways, unique ways of experiencing.
So, yeah, but it’s pretty difficult. I can see it. We can perpetrate, like, one person causing a problem and and then, like, we’ve had the the the come and we’ll go to him. But but it’s happening to a group of people. I can see Yeah, I would think that’s a good example.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, we are destroying our planet, actually. We will, a people, we will suffer the results. Yeah. And similarly, with the Germans, you know, when when the Nazis were rising in power, and there Yeah, that’s right.
For example, I remember when the Vietnam War was going, it seems as if, unless you, I mean it’s quite complicated, isn’t I don’t know if it’s a matter of paying your taxes, which go on to support war and so forth. You are supporting, There is some kind of collective karma that you’re creating along. But of course, it’s a difference in degrees according to your intention. Nonetheless, we as, and we talked about it when the Vietnam War was going on, we as a nation, we’re collecting this. America, you’re a part of that collective, you’re part of that collective karma.
Okay. It’s frightening concept. Yeah, it is. Yeah, so it would be a matter of whether in your mind you actually thought otherwise. You thought, I don’t support what’s going on.
You did what you could in whatever ways to act otherwise. That’s for sure. I think it actually has to take some kind of thought in your mind as if you’re not going along with this collective mentality which is supporting all this. But yeah, just because you happen to be in that group doesn’t mean that you necessarily have to collect that karma. But it is, it was given as an example of creating collective karma.
And result of that will be experienced collectively. We all, you know, it’s how I don’t know these things, these are hard to imagine, but we have all created the karma in the past to be here tonight in this collection of people together. We all have individual karma, obviously, but we also have a shared karma. So part of that karma that we’re creating is group karma. Yeah.
Yeah. I’ve never been to confession, can you tell me what they do? It’s just a form of regrets and the way of changing themselves. Yeah. I don’t know what to leave or think.
It’s probably very skillful, actually. I have a feeling. I mean, people actually do experience a sense of regret, but of course, the nature of that regret, I don’t know. I don’t know. I’m not sure, but here we don’t necessarily, I mean there are occasions when you might disclose to another person what is negativity that you’ve done, but it can be a general sense of regret, but it’s a matter of confession or disclosure takes place within your own mind.
So there’s no intermediary with a priest or something like that who intervenes for you. It’s, I guess, acknowledging in your own mind and that you made a mistake and did something which brought harm. That acknowledgement. But I imagine the Catholic profession is probably a very skillful way also. Yeah.
And then applying penance. Most people wanna say penance. Pretty it appears that way. That’s a good example. Yeah, that’s probably a very healthy way to go about righting wrongs in the past.
What do you think? I meant to do some more research on guilt. I know it’s quite a fascinating fascinating area. You’re saying guilt is a trap because we don’t have to change. It’s very, you maintain a sense of control or power over what’s happening.
And sense of choice too. A sense of choice, that’s a good point. Yeah. So you could look at another way. Guilt could be the result of of of a bad intention.
You meant to do. And I would say the guilt could be twofold. It could be that you may be found out, you know, your facade and people discover you’re not the nice person. So there’d be guilt there. And secondly, if you’ve done it to That’s fear.
A double. Yeah, that’s right. Double maybe. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The guilt is good.
It’s very destructive, isn’t it? A lot of people Yeah. That’s right. That’s right. Within categorization of mental functions.
There’s what’s called fifty, minds and mental factors. There’s fifty one secondary mental factors, and amongst these are embarrassment and self shame. These are positive mental factors. Self shame is when you don’t feel so good about having done something. Embarrassment is, it’s from your own point of view, and embarrassment is when you did something that you feel bad because, in front of other people.
It’s Generally, we think of these are not very healthy, but I guess it requires a lot of explanation why these terms we use, maybe it’s just English terms that kind of have a lot of baggage, self shame and embarrassment are seen as healthy mental factors. It helps you bring about change and feel so good about what you do. Either for yourself or also. Did you have a comment? With the scorched seed you a a analogy, there are many are many plants here which are dependent on being scorched too.
Really? For planting purposes, you scorch them? karma bringing them to I’m just trying to work out some twists in it to make it work. I mean, scorching works both ways. Can scorch positive karma, you can get seeds, and you can scorch negative karmic seeds.
You can weaken or destroy both types of seeds, depending upon different states of mind. Yeah. It’s a necessary part of the process. I guess the analogy doesn’t correspond point by point. That’s interesting.
I don’t know how we could put that notion into the scheme of things. Maybe karma only works in the northern hemisphere. Okay, so to ensure that we don’t scorch our positive karmic seeds, even though the analogy doesn’t hold up completely, we can dedicate merit that we’ve created. May beings everywhere plagued by suffering of body and mind attain an ocean of happiness and joy by virtue of my merits. May no living creatures suffer, commit evil, or fall ill.
May no one be afraid or belittled with a mind weighed down by depression. May the blind see forms and deaf hear sounds. May those whose bodies are worn with toil be restored on finding repose. May the naked find clothing, the hungry find food, may the thirsty find water and delicious drink. May the poor find wealth, those weak with sorrow find joy.
May the forlorn find hope, constant happiness, and prosperity. May there be timely rains and bountiful harvests. May all medicines be effective and wholesome prayers bear fruit. May all who are sick and ill quickly be freed from their ailments. Whatever diseases there are in the world may never occur again.
May the frightened cease to be afraid, and those bound be freed. May the powerless find power, and may people think of benefiting each other. Through these skillful actions, may I quickly become an awakened spiritual master, and lead each and every living being to that awakened realm. 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. In the land that circles by snow mountains, you are the source of all happiness and well-being.
Powerful Chenrezig, Tenzin Gyatso, please remain to the end of cyclic existence. Maybe I can just mention a few announcements. Raj, there’s a list of notes here, if you don’t mind waiting while I go through these. There’ll be no teaching from Geshe la on Tuesday, June twelfth, due to his holiness tour. And Then perhaps some of you have seen the advertising for monks from Sera Je are doing the sacred dance and they’re going to build a mandala.
That’s going be on the sixth, seventh, and eighth of July. And there was, so we’re going to have to reschedule Geshe-la’s weekend course on Eight Verses of Thought Transformation. That’s been canceled temporarily. This Thursday, yeah that’s May twenty sixth, no, that’s May twenty-eighth. Yeah.
There’ll be a Tārā practice on Wednesday, May thirtieth, which is the last Wednesday of every month, and Chenrezig practice weekly at five p. M. On Sundays, and then I guess a special note is Thursday is Saga Dawa, so that’s the birth, enlightenment, and the passing away of Buddha Śākyamūni. And so it’s a very special day on the calendar and the karmic effects of everything that you do are said to be multiplied many, many millions of times. So it’s a good day to do something special.
And one of the special things that we do on that day is to take eight precepts, Mahāyāna precepts, are just taken for twenty four hours. And these are not killing, stealing, having any sexual activity, no intoxicants, not to eat after the noonday meal, not to sit on high thrones, high beds and so forth, not to sing, dance, wear perfume and jewelry and things like that. Anyway, Geshe-la will be giving the precepts. I think it was at five thirty on Thursday morning. Six o’clock on Thursday morning.
It’s in the newsletter, isn’t it? So anyway, you’re welcome if you’d like to do something special that day to Five thirty, This Thursday. So if you if you like to take the precepts and so forth at five thirty. Have a good week. Thank you.