Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A story borrowed from Thich Nhat Hanh — a woman who chants Amitābha’s name daily for ten years yet stays sharp-tempered — opens Ven Jampa Gendun’s case that quality of practice matters more than volume. In this nearly two-hour session he reviews the eight worldly concerns covered the previous week, leads two guided meditations (mindfulness of breath, then a structured rejoicing practice moving from one’s own past actions outward to strangers and people we dislike), and turns to Tsongkhapa’s text. The main content covers the eighteen freedoms and richnesses of precious human rebirth: the eight states in which practice is virtually impossible, and the ten positive conditions we currently hold. A trapped-bird image and a passage from Thomas Merton illustrate why most people squander this window of opportunity. The session closes with the karmic causes of such a rebirth and a Q&A on karma, suicide, and the nature of Buddha.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 12 3PA 2006 11 06.mp3
UUID: c01b7249-aad2-47cb-aaff-e6cbb336ce22
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Three Principle Aspects of the Path 2006-2007 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 2006-11-06
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 123.9 minutes
Words: ~12,949
Can you hear can you hear me okay? Good. So we have to begin by adjusting our motivation. The why behind and the purpose for what we’re doing to in order to ensure that it’s going to be what we do is going to help us to solve our problems, help us to find happiness. That’s the the purpose of life is to find happiness.
So we have to ensure that the methods that we’re using to achieve that happiness are actually working. So it’s necessary that we check up. You know, last week, we were talking about the eight worldly concerns, the rules on how to be a model prisoner within cyclic existence. The way that we can ensure that we’re simply whatever we do is going to perpetuate our problems in one way or another. It’s another complication, even with the best of intentions.
Remember what these were? Eight worldly concerns? What is the first one? Pleasure pain. Pleasure and pain.
One. One, gain and loss. Fame and disrepute. Fame and disrepute. Praise disrepute.
Praise and grace. Great. You get a gold star. So, you know, I think, you know, we can check up in our everyday life. I think it’s quite useful.
That’s why we you know, one of the reasons that we go for refuge because it is a way of checking up. But, you know, it doesn’t have to be on on your cushion before teaching or before your practice and so forth. We can be checking up or be mindful of it over the course of our everyday activities, you know, whether what I’m doing, is it simply being done out of this this drug this being driven by the eight worldly concerns? Is it simply a a pursuit of pleasure, an avoidance of pain? I mean, is that our overall overall overriding motivation for doing what we’re doing?
You know, what is what we’re doing simply a matter of of our preoccupation with the pursuit of gain and avoidance of loss, the pursuit of fame, and the avoidance of disrepute, the pursuance the pursuance of of praise and the avoidance of ridicule criticism. If it is, then then whatever we do is simply going to perpetuate our our cycles of dissatisfaction. You know, so we talked about in in some complex text, the three principal aspects of the path about this reprioritizing or shifting our priorities. You know, what is the criteria that which is going which we’re going to use as a basis for the criteria in determining what we do and what we don’t do. If it’s the eight worldly dharmas and and nothing much is going to change in terms of the quality of our life.
So we try to reorientate ourselves or readjust our priorities in terms of where our where we see our happiness line, where our treasure lies in terms of, you know, going for refuge to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. You know, when we talked about Buddha is simply not simply, but essentially wisdom, trying to seeing things clearly beyond the set of set of fictions that we’re continually imposing upon our world, our reality, our relationships, ourselves, trying to see things beyond our biases, our prejudices, clearly and directly, trying to know things as they actually are. And the the quality of love and compassion, you know, we’ve described it in it’s or liking to the that of a mother for her only child, but this extended equally to all living beings. Just a sense of caring or of concern with others, and then the quality of personal power, you know, a sense of being effective that we have any inner strength that we can get things done, that we can achieve our goals. So, you know, these these are our criteria.
You know, if if what I’m doing lends itself towards that, you know, somehow supports that, supports my wisdom, supports my love and compassion, supports my personal power, and moreover in some way helps me to to translate these into, you know, beneficial activities, into skillful and fearless ways of helping others, then we can feel assured. We can have some confidence in what we’re doing is actually going to help us to solve our problems. It’s going to help us as a means to a way out of, you know, perpetual cycles of dissatisfaction. It’s going to it’s going to dismantle these eight worldly concerns. On the other hand, you know, it’s if we’re completely dominated by, you know, constant need for pleasure and the constant avoidance of of any sort of risk or painful situation, we’re never going to grow.
We’re never going to change, basically. Just the our current pleasure, what it is that we’re running after, and what it is that we’re trying to avoid. The the names of those will over time be replaced by one after another with the over call quality of what we experience as a result of even getting these pleasures and avoiding these pains will not really change to any great degree. And we don’t what do we have to show in spite of all the blood, sweat, and tears that we’ve expended over our lifetime following these eight rules, these eight ruling concerns? They really haven’t served us very well as criteria on how to live our life, how to live live a successful life.
So we might have to begin to look other places for developing and determining our goals. So in this process, the the the inner focus of our life becomes Buddha. The Buddha, you know, more than that, with inside of ourselves, something that we are the final transformation in terms of our own wisdom, our own love and compassion, and our love personal power, and how these are going to find expression in all the various daily activities of our lives and practice. And we go for refuge. You know, our priority in our life is the practice of Dharma.
You know, what essentially most, what does it mean to practice Dharma? Essentially most. One way it can be. You know, it can be can be seen from a bit different perspective. It can be put in different words for different purposes.
But I think one of the and talking about the eight worldly concerns is a very meaningful and useful practical way to begin to talk what it means to practice the Dharma, not allowing our life to be led on the basis of these eight worldly concerns. If we if we I think if we really bring it down to its essence, it is the active actively opposing negative states of mind. That’s what it comes down to. And begin being able to be aware of and identify these negative states of mind as they arise. And then by negative states of mind, I mean, types of mind which are such as, you know, attachment and anger, pride, jealousy, you know, most basically ignorance.
And as these arise, beginning to oppose them, at least don’t go along with them as best you can. Don’t prolong them or indulge them as best you can at least. And then I think, you know, things will change. There’ll be some our mind will eventually transform. And we go for refuge to, you know, these techniques which bring this about, which which, you know, act as antidotes to our attachment, act as antidotes to our anger, as antidotes to our pride, to our jealousy, to our problems, but most basically, seen in terms of these afflictive emotions, these disturbing patterns of mind.
And we go for refuge to those who help us to implement the Dharma in our everyday life, our Sangha, the spiritual community, and to who teaches, advises, share, like minded individuals, those who are trying like ourselves to apply the Dharma in our everyday life. And we try it again and again in the context of listening to a talk or giving a talk and so forth to raise the level of our motivation such that what we do is not done just out of the eight worldly dharma. It’s not just as an added matter of gaining pleasure and avoid pain, but I want to grow. I want to be a better person, not just for myself alone, but even for for one other person. Perhaps we can, you know, if we can if we can genuine genuine and get develop that sense of motivation, we can extend it to two people, maybe an entire family or three or four people.
Eventually, ultimately, but this is ideally speaking. What we do is done out of an altruistic motivation in order to perfectly, I think, completely awaken for the sake of all sentient beings. But somewhere along that line, somewhere at least in that direction, you know. If you point your cart north when you want to go south, how will you ever arrive? At least we can begin to orientate ourselves in that direction even if we can’t move too far in that direction itself.
Then we could feel some confidence that what we do is going to help us to solve our problems, that it’s a practice of Dharma. It’s going to help us to find happiness. I go for refuge until I’m awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and 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 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. May all sentient beings have happiness in the causes of happiness. May all sentient beings be free from the suffering of 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. Okay. Would you like to stretch and then we’ll meditate? I’ll share a little story with you. You know, the it’s about meditation.
You know, we had it’s about paying attention to the quality and not the not the quantity of our meditation. You know, we have to we have to practice intelligently. So we we have to create the kind of practice that fits fits our particular circumstance, you know, that brings the types of results that we want for ourselves. You know, there there there shouldn’t be any kind of pushing toward preconceived goals to make something happen, to attain some pre kind of preconceived state or whatever, some sort or another. If we if we simply create the proper mental and physical conditions, if we implement the instructions correctly and we we are alert, then the results will come of themselves.
We don’t have to oversee the process. We can relax into that. The results will come by themselves. That’s the nature of dependent arising. So we have we have to create the proper mental and physical conditions.
We have to implement the instructions correctly and be alert as we go along. This little story, it’s it’s from a book by Thich Nhat Hanh. Thich Nhat Hanh is a many of you or most of you know. He’s a a Vietnamese monk who has lives in France, has a center called Plum Village, and is quite a quite a great master, highly respected. It’s a story about there’s a particular practice within the within the Vietnamese Buddhism, but in what’s called the Pure Land Sect in general.
And it’s a practice centered around Buddha Amitābha. And in this practice, the the the name of Buddha Amitābha is recited over and over and over again. And it’s about a a woman, a Vietnamese woman who’s reciting during the practice of Buddha Amitābha’s name. There is a story I’d like to tell you about a woman who practices the invocation of Buddha Amitābha’s name. She is very tough, and she practiced the invocation three times daily using a wooden drum and a bell, reciting Namo Amitābha Buddha for one hour each time.
When she arrives at one thousand, she rings the bell. Although she has been doing this for ten years, her personality has not changed. She is quite mean, shouting at people all the time. A friend wanted to teach her a lesson. So one afternoon when she had just lit the incense, rang the bell three times, and was beginning to recite, he came to her door and said, Missus Nguyen, Missus Nguyen.
Missus Nguyen. She found it very annoying because this was her time of practice. But it just stood there at the front gate shouting her name. She said to herself, I have to struggle against my anger, so I will ignore that. She went on, Namo Amitābha Buddha.
Namoi Metabha Buddha. Namoi Metabha Buddha. The gentleman continued to shout her name, and her anger become became more and more oppressive. She struggled against it, wondering, should I stop my recitation and go out and give them a piece of my mind? But she continued chanting, and she struggled very hard.
Fire mounted in her, but still she tried to chant. The gentleman knew it and continued to shout her name. Missus Nguyen, Missus Nguyen. She couldn’t bear it any longer. She threw away the bell and drum.
She slammed the door, went out to the gate, and said, why why do you behave like that? Why do you call my name hundreds of times like that? The gentleman smiled at her and said, I just called your name for for minutes, and you are so angry. Have been calling the Buddha’s name for ten years. Think how angry he must be by now.
So the problem is not to do a lot, but to do it correctly. If you do it correctly, you become kinder, nicer, more understanding, and loving. When we practice sitting or walking, we should pay attention to the quality and not the quantity. If we practice only for the quantity, then we are not very different from Missus Nguyen. I think she learned her lesson.
I think she did better after that. So maybe we can do better after that. I thought we’d we’ll meditate on mindfulness of the breath. And then I thought we meditate on rejoicing. And this was, you know, rather than overlooking or dismissing all the good that we do in terms of our qualities about ourselves and our various activities, and also extending this others that we have to come constantly call them the mind and emphasize them to ourselves.
Don’t downplay them or forget about them. But, you know, our reality is very much what we pay attention to do too. And we have to begin to pay attention about what is right to ourselves. What is right about ourselves rather than most of what we do and the opposite. So we’re consciously calling to awareness, and we’re going to take different time periods, some quality about yourself, something that you did, and rejoice in it, feel good, feel pleased about yourself.
I’m happy about that quality about myself. That was a great that was a wonderful thing I did. I’m pleased with myself. I value yourself in what you do, and then we’ll do it to others as well. So take a comfortable firm posture.
So a sense of stability stability and firmness in your posture. We’ll begin to by relaxing the body at the beginning of the crown of the head, the scalp, and the forehead, and feeling the the wrinkles in the brow smoothing out the tension at the top of the head beginning to move down and out of your body into the ground. Feeling the pressure in and around the eyes beginning to dissipate. Facial muscles relaxing. The jaw relax.
And the muscles in the neck, perhaps turning your head to gently to the side a few times. Just relaxing, softening, loosening the neck, the tension. And shoulders, feeling the tension, the burden that we carry on our back, on our shoulders beginning to lessen, move down and out of your body. Keeping your back straight, rotating your shoulders a few times, letting them drop to the side, feeling the shoulder muscles beginning to relax. Your hands are relaxed.
Lower arms. Upper arms. Chest at ease. Releasing the tension that we hold in our stomach muscles, allowing your your belly to go soft. Relaxing throughout the pelvic area and the buttocks.
Relaxing throughout the upper legs. Lower legs. The feet. Become aware of your body in general and noticing any tightness, any tensions in the body. Bring your awareness to those areas and consciously relax and soften.
Feeling the attention dissipate, the tightness loosen. Body becoming relaxed, heady, comfortable. And then bring your awareness to the breath. Just the easy, gentle, in and out flow of the natural breath. If it’s helpful, using techniques of counting and noting the breath.
So now we’re going to meditate on rejoicing. Am I going to rejoice in our own actions or our own qualities? And begin by thinking of something that you did more than one month ago, that you feel pleased about yourself, that you feel good about. Bring it to mind and take joy in it. Congratulate yourself.
That was a wonderful thing I did. I’m happy that I did that. Feel good about yourself and what you did. Now we’re going to do the same, but we’ll just shift the time period. Something that you did or something about yourself more than one week ago, but less than one month ago.
Something call bring the mind something that you did more than one week ago, but less than one month. And feel Again, we’ll do the same. And now the time period is before today, but less than one less than one week ago. Is there something that you did that you feel good about? Something positive that you did more than one day ago or less than a week ago?
Bring it to mind and rejoice in your yourself and what you did. Value what you did. And then finally, the time period is today. So it doesn’t have to be something really outstanding, but something that you simply feel good about that you did today. Bring it to mind and value it, rejoice in yourself in what you do.
Even it’s only something insignificant, you can still value it. Now we’re going to shift the focus of our rejoicing toward others. Beginning with a member of your family, someone you’re very close to. Someone in your family, thinking about some quality that they have or something that they did. It was a wonderful thing to do or something that you really admire, a quality about them and value that, rejoice that they have that quality, rejoice that they did what they did.
Be pleased for them. And I call the mind a friend, someone who’s not in your family, but still you like them. And do the same, recalling something about them that you admire, something that they did, and be be pleased for them that they did what they did, that they have this quality. Be happy for them. And I would do the same for a stranger.
Someone you don’t know, but you know of them, something about them, quality that they possess or something that they did. And be happy that they did it. Be happy that they have what they do have. Be happy for them. And then lastly, bring the mind someone that you don’t like, especially someone who you’re jealous of.
And bring the mind something that that they have, beauty, wealth, whatever, or something that they did. Setting aside your dislike or your jealousy. Be happy for them that they have this quality, that they have this material possession, that they did what they did. Be glad for them. And then bring your mind back to the breath.
And get in touch with the feelings in the body, the sensations in the body. And slowly, in easy and relaxed manner, become aware of what’s going on about you. Just take your time. So in the Tsongkhapa’s text, the three principal aspects of the path. We’re in the the main body of the text and the which looks at the explanation of the first of the three fundamental aspects, the will to awaken.
And within that, we’ve we’ve discussed the three the first of these three sections, the the reason why we need to develop this will to awaken, this determination to be free. Beginning to shift the priorities away from living a life based upon our unfounded hopes and fears, the eight worldly concerns, beginning to determine that we have to get ourselves unstuck so we simply don’t continue to perpetuate our problems in one form or another. And this was contained within freedoms and richnesses are hard to find, and life does not last long. Keeping this in mind keeping this always in mind will alter the priorities you give to this life. So we’re looking at we talked about, you know, the way that we shift our priorities that we give to this life in terms of beginning to shift take as a as our priority, the qualities of awakening, the qualities of freedom.
And tonight, we’re gonna look at the the first of these, the the way that we actually brings about what brings about this shift in fact. And it has to be something more than good intentions. We actually have to change our thinking in some ways. And we can be we we do this by appreciating our freedoms and richnesses, which are hard to find. So this is our our you know, like, I think a lot of things that the Buddha pointed out are common sense, but sometimes common sense isn’t very common.
And he he he was a great pointer. He said, take a look at this. And what what we’re going to point at or take a look at is simply our our precious human life which we all take very much for granted. You know, we don’t really value it for what it can its potential, what we can achieve by means of it. Like, our our human life is a window of opportunity for ourselves.
But if we aren’t aware of it, we won’t make use of it. And and not making use of it is as if we didn’t have it. So to to a large extent, we’ve looked at the we’ve become aware of how we have the outer basis for for awakening for in terms of the the spiritual master or the teachers. We have and we have the inner basis, our own Buddha nature, this intrinsic wakefulness about our mind and its its its its natural purity whereby the mind has the potential to be be transformed according to our efforts, according to our skills, our basic goodness. So now we have to, you know, appreciate that we have all the conditions necessary in order to bring about this transformation, to to actualize our potential, and to make use of this window of opportunity that that our human life presents to ourselves.
Often, we do not choose, but drift into those modes which eventually define us. Circumstances push and we yield. We do not choose to be what we we have become, perceptively became what we are by drifting into the doing of those things which have now which we now characteristically do. Freedom is not an objective attribute of life. Alternates without awareness yield no leeway.
And then he gives a little I think this is a nice little image that he presents. And I’m trying to relate this to ourselves and what it is in our our precious human life. I opened the door of my car and noticed in the corner of my vision an ant scurrying along the smooth, barren surface of the concrete parking lot, doomed momentarily to be crushed by one of the thousand passing wheels. There exists, however, a brilliant alternative for this gravely endangered creature. In a few moments, a woman will appear with a picnic basket, and she and I will drive into a sunny hill hilltop meadow.
This desperate ant has but to climb the wheel of my car to some sheltered ledge, and in half an hour, we’ll be in a paradise for ants. But this option this option, unknown and unknowable, yields no freedom to the ant who is doomed. And the only one irony belongs to me who observes, who reflects that options potentially as meaningful to me as this one, to this aunt, may it be at this moment be eluding my awareness so I too may be doomed. You know, it’s the the image that comes to my mind. It’s it’s if you’ve ever had a bird that has flown into your house, and the bird is flying around and around and around in complete panic and fear, and it keeps flying into the walls hurting itself.
And you you run around and you open all the windows wide and you try to shoo the bird out. But, you know, the the the still, out of its confusion, it just continues to to to, you know, hurt to hurt itself until as if by accident, maybe it finds its way out of one of the open windows. So, you know, the the the the point is that that these birds you know, you you you’re there. It’s it’s almost like a frustrating situation because this this this bird hurting itself is so pointless. It doesn’t need to continue.
There’s an open window. It’s such seems like such a simple thing for it to fly out that window and gain its freedom. But but we can see that there is a way out, but but this work this bird can’t. It take it doesn’t see that there’s an alternative possibility to its that what it’s experiencing in terms of hurting itself and suffering. So in in fear and confusion, we we we are very much like this bird.
We we keep circling around and around and around and keep hurting ourselves in one way or another. And from an awakened point of view, it’s all pointless. There’s no need there’s no need for us to continue to suffer the way that we suffer. You know, the the there is there is a way out. However, in to find that way out, we have to be aware of it.
And moreover, we have to be able to we make use of it to find that way out, to make use of that way out, this window of opportunity. And this way out is there exists an option and alternatives to most of the you know, to our way of approach to approaching to our life, which is dysfunctional, which isn’t bringing about what it what it is that we must most, which human life can bring about, which is true happiness. And moreover, we have a window of opportunity, which is what human life affords us. You know, we have this all the circumstances necessary to to to make a choice in terms of these options, which are open to ourselves. So striving for the goal, and I think I I mentioned before, is is the the essence of human life.
Using the right methods to achieve that is the way that we extract extract the essence of our human life. So the basis for taking the essence in order to take the essence of our human life, in order to extract the essence of our human life, in order to to make sure that we can find a way out and find happiness, we have to recognize three things. We have to you know, we this is all aimed at helping us to shift our priorities, to begin to appreciate what it is that we now have. We have to recognize, one, that this how special our human life is. Two, that how useful it is, how valuable it is, and then finally, how rare and how difficult it was to obtain.
You know, this is going to you know, you have something that you value, you’ll make use of it. If you see how what great worth it is, you won’t let it slip through your fingers without having gotten what you can out of it. That’s only natural. But if we don’t recognize or we don’t appreciate, then we can have something to have tremendous value, and we can go as it we read its significance is lost to us. We never take advantage of what it is that we do have.
So this is what is trying to be got at in terms of this line from our text where it says, freedoms and richnesses are hard to find. You know, the the first thing is to recognize that we what we have in fact, all of it achieved. You know, everyone in this room. That the freedom and richness of our human life, you know, that that we have that there are options open to us and how in terms of how we approach our lives, how we live our lives, and more moreover, that we have all the necessary conditions and circumstances necessary to avail ourselves, to make use, to to implement implement these methods for extracting the essence of our life. You know, we we we we you know, how we can lead an infinitely better life for ourselves.
So, essentially, appreciating our freedoms and richnesses is to is to appreciate the uniqueness of being a human being, you know, of our human life amongst all the infinite life forms and varieties of beings in the universe. And moreover, that that even amongst human beings, we are privileged. So, you know, we’re going to you know, we’re looking at something which is which is more or less obvious, but which is more than not overlooked. What do we mean by freedoms? You know, there are you know, we can we can read we can interpret these in terms of traditional interpretations, look at these in terms of the way that they have been explained, but we can also relate them in perhaps in other ways, which may be of greater even greater relevance to ourselves.
So freedoms is traditionally termed freedom from eight forms of existence in which spiritual practice is virtually impossible. And by by spiritual practice or or practice of a means by which we can extract the essence that we can find true happiness. If if happiness if life the purpose of life is happiness, to find happiness. The purpose of spiritual practice of the Dharma or whatever method is to be able to achieve that, what is in fact true happiness. We we have there are but there are eight forms of existence in which which spiritual practice or the implementing of the methods whereby to find true happiness are virtually impossible.
So the first four of these so, you know, this is taking into consideration that there are other realms of existence in ourselves, but we can interpret them in various ways to to augment that understanding, to supplement that understanding. First four of these eight forms of existence where spiritual practice is virtually impossible are are of nonhuman states. For example, you know, as a hell being, as a as a hungry ghost, as an animal. So each each each of these these these three types of existence, there are certain limitations posed by confusion, posed by pain, you know, which which which completely preclude any type spiritual practice, any type of, you know, bringing about any inner transformation, any type of spiritual concern even to be, you know, want to do it, let alone actually be able to to do it, in fact. In terms of the fourth of these nonhuman states is that of the gods, and and the gods are are continually distracted by by by sensual pleasures and by being absorbed into mindless states, like mental blankness, blissful absorption.
So those are the four nonhuman states. But the there are four forms existence even as humans in which spiritual concerns are aren’t available to ourselves. You know, during they said, for example, during an age when there are there are no Buddhists. So even though there are infinite numbers of Buddhas, and by Buddhists, I mean, these these these individuals who have awakened in terms of love, compassion, wisdom, personal power, That there are times when, in fact, there are no Buddhist teaching. You know, that we we take our teachers and and the and the teachings very much for granted, but there are there are, in fact, numerous occasions throughout the you know, and we’re talking about all the multiverses.
You know, we can’t bake them. You know, within the terms of Buddhism, we aren’t alone in the universe. This is the Earth as we know it isn’t the center of the universe, and nor is it the only inhabited planet or that there are infinite numbers of planets where being where beings exist. And there are teachings of various teachers and so forth. And but there are times when in these various situations, these times on the earth and the evolution that of you know, these planets that that there are no teachings available.
So even if one were had inclined to do, there simply wouldn’t be the methods available. So there are they’re doing an age when there are no teachings. For example, the teachings of the Buddha. There are teachings when if one were to live in a in a in a barbarous or uncivilized society, you know, where there was no practice of of spiritual path. People simply it never occurred to them that there is an alternative that they’re completely caught up in the materialism in some way or another or in in violence in one way or another.
So a barbarous or uncivilized society, as someone with mental or physical disabilities, whereby, you know, one is prevented from learning. One is prevented from from understanding the teaching. And finally, you know, in terms of human states, someone who is simply is completely closed minded or out of wrong reasons simply rejects the validity of Dharma or rejects completely the possibilities of of a spiritual path. And this this would preclude their practice. They simply wouldn’t want to become involved.
So these are said these are said to be freedoms that in a sense that we are we, you know, trying to relate this to ourselves that we have freedoms, that we are free from these eight states whereby the practice of Dharma is in virtually impossible. Four within terms of of nonhuman states, but also four in terms of human states. So this is looking at in terms of freedoms is looking at our situation from a negative point of view. We are free of these constraints. Richness is on that end are looking are looking at our situation from the positive point of view, what it is in fact we do have, the conditions needed in order to practice.
And these are, again, the traditional explanation. There are five conditions which are derived from from oneself. For example, to be a human being. Okay. Okay.
Okay. We’re all human beings. To to be born in a region where the teachings exist. So where they’re accessible, so we are all living in in a region where the teachings are accessible. We do have all the use of your faculties.
Mainly, this means that we have normal human intelligence. Okay? So we all have normal human intelligence, not to be swept away by by the tides of one’s extreme negative karma. Not to be you know, there are there’s a listing of what are called the five actions of immediate retribution. Five actions of immediate retribution.
These are said to be the the negative most negative types, heaviest types of negative karma. Yeah. Due to which it’s it’s extremely difficult for one to become involved and even having to become involved with the spiritual practice to progress and develop. Five actions of immediate retribution to to kill one’s mother, to kill one’s father, to kill an Arhat, to to draw blood with a malicious intent from a Buddha, And then the fifth is to create a a split in the Sangha, to create a split in spiritual community. These are said to be the the five heaviest types of negative karma.
So, you know, we we we we are we we have all of these qualities, you know, these richnesses in terms of derived from oneself. There’s another set of five. So the the latter half of these ten are the five conditions derived from others. Okay. A Buddha has appeared.
Okay. There there are there are great spans of time when a Buddha does not appear. There are times when a Buddha appears but does not teach the Dharma or does not complete teach a complete Dharma, means of complete liberation. The the the teachings there are times when the, you know that the Buddha Dharma as taught by Śākyamūni Buddha will eventually degenerate. You know, it’s been twenty five hundred years, and it’s said that the teachings of the Buddha Śākyamūni Buddha will last five thousand years, and then they’ll they’ll be gone.
They’re finished. You know, they’re not somehow handed down from the sky. They had a they had a they arose, and eventually, they will cease. So there will be times so the teaching these teachings are lasting. There are there are times when they will not last, and they will be gone.
They will be finished. So there must be practitioners who are actually following the Dharma, the teachings, implementing the teachings, and gaining realizations. That means it’s a living tradition. It’s just not some dead words or which that were that were taught, you know, hundreds, thousands of years ago that people are actually gaining these realizations at the present time. There’s a it’s a living teaching.
And then finally, the richness of of the fact that there are people who support us in our practice, and then, like, our spiritual community, like people who who created this Buddha house, who who support the teach ings, in other words. So we the these are what are called richnesses or the situation from a that we all have from a positive point of view. So, you know, it it you know, we have to work with these ideas. You know, they sound okay. I mean, they don’t we have to appreciate this their significance and value them.
Otherwise, in that volume, we won’t take advantage of what it is that we do have. So these eighteen so there are eighteen. There are eight there are eight freedoms and ten richnesses. These eighteen qualities and conditions constitute a unique freedom and emphasize our great fortune amongst, you know, all the various beings of this universe, all the various variety. But even amongst human beings, even amongst the people we live with in Adelaide.
You know, the the there are many people who are completely completely caught up in violence and hatred, like hell beings. There there are many people who lead lead a life completely caught up in greed and consumerism just like hungry ghosts. You know, we’re talking about the people, you know, who are new to us. You know, we we don’t have to talk about something which is abstract from us. We can see this for ourselves.
There are many people who are dominated by insensitivity and stupidity just like animals. There are many people who are consumed with jealousy and aggression like demigods and who are continually seeking mindless absorptions from the gods. You know, these are talking about the characteristics of people that we have about us right now. And though many people, you know, live in in a in a in a fortunate age, what we call a fortunate age, a fortunate time when a Buddha has appeared in a place where the the teaching exists. They do they they they they they these people do not comprehend or or their value and what their teaching stand for.
And though there are people who have, you know, healthy, both physically and mentally. They don’t they don’t use their minds. They don’t use their life to its capacity for anything of real value, for anything of any, you know, for meaning or purpose in their value. And and though they might there are many people, and here we’re getting a little closer to home, who might accept the the the validity of the teachings, still they don’t practice them. So we have to appreciate our freedoms and richness, this window of opportunity, and make use of it or it’s as if we didn’t have it.
If you don’t appreciate what you have, you won’t make use of You know, we we we live in a developed country. I don’t think we appreciate that fact, you know, what it means to be living in Australia, and that we are a privileged class whether we we want to admit that or not or whether we’re aware of that or not. You know, we we, you know, we take what we take for granted is dependent upon, know, our material prosperity. They the fact that we’re able to meet here tonight. The leisure that we have, the privilege that we have is all to a large extent and perhaps perhaps to a greater extent than we would like to admit to ourselves.
It’s based upon the blood, sweat, and tears, the lives of of a great the majority of the people on this planet, the great underprivileged class, we’re living off of them to a large degree in many, many ways. The people that we share this planet with, You know, you know, our various needs are arranged in a hierarchy. Sometimes it’s the way sometimes the way that it’s explained in terms of in is it like a like a pyramid? You know? When when when when the when those needs at a lower level are satisfied, then the next level can take precedence.
For example, you know, when our when our physiological needs are satisfied, when when we have enough food, enough water, and shelter, when when those are adequate, when those are satisfied, sufficient, we can then be concerned with pursuing the next level of our needs such as, for example, safety, security. Then when we feel safe and secure, when that level of our needs is is is met, is fulfilled, is sufficient, we could be concerned with a higher level of our needs. For example, for for self esteem, for meaning, for love, for truth. And then finally, you know, when those are all we can, you know it’s like we can we can be concerned with highest of matters that is to say that was transcendence, worldly concerns altogether. We can we can concern with finding true happiness, However, when we you know, transcendental values, however we want to to think about it, conceive of it.
But it’s all but it’s a hierarchy of needs. Only when our lower levels are fulfilled can we begin to concern. You know, there’s there was a song, I think, Billie Holiday used to sing, you know, don’t preach to me when my stomach is empty. You know? First first, people’s material needs have to be taken care of.
They have to have full stomach, and then you begin to talk about other things. So likewise with ourselves, only when our our basic needs, our physical needs, our physiological needs, when our stomachs are full, when we have shelter, you know, from the cold and heat and so forth, when we have enough water, water is becoming a problem. Then we can we can be concerned with higher and higher needs. The fact that we can meet here and be concerned with ultimate needs, with very subtle needs is all indicative that we’ve that in one way or another, we have always other lesser lower needs fulfilled, satisfied to some degree or another that we can turn our mind to other concerns. So all of this, you know, all of this places a an obligation upon us.
The obligation to to live our life to its fullness. So, you know, what it means to be a human being, to fill at least some of our infinite potential, maybe in some way to live up to our potential so that we can begin to pay back all of what we’re being given, this great kindness that others are showing us, providing us this opportunity that we have. This is a quote by Thomas Merton. Thomas Merton was a an American monk, Catholic monk. Cistercian, I think.
The fullness of human life cannot be measured by anything that happens only to the body. Life is not merely a matter of physical vigor or of health or the capacity to enjoy oneself. What is life? It is something far more than the breath in our nostrils, the blood beating in our wrists, the response to physical stimulation. True.
All these things are essential for a full life, but they do not, in themselves, constitute all that life is in its fulfillment. A man can have all this and still be an idiot. And one who merely breathes, eats, sleeps, works without awareness, without purpose, and without ideas of his own is not really a man. Life is purely physical. Life in this purely physical sense is merely the absence of death.
Such people do not live. They vegetate. For a man to be alive, he must exercise not only the acts that belong to the vegetative and animal life. He must not only subsist, grow, be sentient, not only move himself around, feed himself, and the rest. He must carry on the activities proper to his own specifically human kind of life.
He must, that is to say, think intelligently. And above all, he must direct his attention his actions by free decisions made in the light of his own thinking. These decisions must tend to his own intellectual and moral and spiritual growth. They must tend to make him more aware of his capacities for knowledge and for free action. They must expand and extend his power to love others and to dedicate himself to their good.
For it is in this study he defines his own fulfillment. Man then can only fully be said to be alive when he becomes plainly conscious of the real meaning of his own existence. That is to say, when he experiences something of the fullness of intelligence, freedom, and spirituality that actualized within him. And there’s an intimate connection between fact and value and its relationship to action. You know, we have to pay attention to the facts.
Reality is attention. Our our particular reality is what we pay attention to. Two people can see the same scene, but if they pay attention to different aspects of that scene, they’re they’re going to their realities will be very vastly different, one from the other. So to we have to we’re we’re we’re we’re trying to train ourselves to pay attention to a particular fact. Fact.
You know, we’re not making up this up at all. It’s just helping us to emphasize it to ourselves, to help us to pay attention to it. So it becomes a very great part of our reality that we value that fact, and therefore, it it causes to to to act in different way. Cause it it causes to some kind of action. So, you know, we have to value to we have to recognize the fact that there are options to open to ourselves and that we have all the abilities to achieve and to make use of those options.
That’s a fact. Based upon that fact, we will begin to value our human life. If there’s nothing more to our human life than simply the pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of pain, we’re not very much different from animals. Animals do the exact same. The criteria for the way that they lead their life is act the same.
You know, it’s not much of a life, a way to live our life, but to say of making use of its potential. But if we begin to realize that there are options and that the that we will begin to value our life because our life is the window of opportunity with the situation, the circumstances whereby we can begin to actualize those options. We can begin to pursue those options. If we don’t value our life, we will take our life for granted. You know, we may not, you know, we may not have a million dollars.
We may we may we might we might not be in a position of great power, but we have all that is necessary for for being happy. And that’s saying a lot, isn’t it? You know, to take the essence of our life. We we have that ability. We have the ability.
We have the situation, the circumstances to find true happiness. That’s more that’s better than a million dollars, a position of great power. We might get sidetracked if we had a million dollars. Probably would, actually. Or if we were in positions of great power, you know, we lose we would lose sight of what is essential to life.
You know, the greatest use that we can make of our lives is to become a Buddha. And that’s, again, it’s rather abstract, isn’t it? We can we translate that to the greatest use that we can make of our lives. It’s developing our wisdom, developing our love and compassion, and our personal power, and to express these in our everyday life and and and skillfully skillfully working with other people and helping them to solve their problems. You know, we can identify with that.
That seems to we can relate with that. So this is this is this is the best thing this is the best thing that we can do with our life, not to have a million dollars, not to have great power. You know, there’s not doesn’t preclude those, but those aren’t the those those aren’t the essential goals of life. They might be tools. They might be they might be way you know, it’s useful to be rich.
It’s useful to be power. If it’s if it’s used in in the pursuit of these goals, then they have great meaning. So this is this is the great potential of the particular particular life that we have. You know, minimally, we we have to ensure that we’re, you know, to take some kind of essence of our life so it just doesn’t pass as if in a meaningless meaningless and purposeless way to to ensure that we don’t create future suffering for ourselves. You know?
I mean, that’s minimal. And and and over and above that, create the kind of conditions so that we can continue with our practice in the future. You know? So that we will be able to continue our learning, and that we can continue our journey. We continue we we can we can use this human life as a base as a basis, and then create the conditions for the to be able to to have that again in the future and take that again.
And so life after life, you know, that we can progress till we achieve our goal. There is no there is no greater stupid self-deluded stupidity than to spend such a wonderful life so senselessly that it bears no fruitful benefit. You have experienced the sufferings of the bad migrations innumerable times. From beginning of this time, you have taken birth as an animal, hell being, hungry ghost with no freedom or opportunity to practice the Dharma. You have suffered hunger, thirst, pain, torture, and death countless times.
Now just this once, you are freed from all those miserable lives. You have obtained this precious human rebirth. Now that you have this rare opportunity in your hands, you must try not to waste it. Use the methods in this teachings to be able to go higher and further along the path in your future lives. Offer some resistance to the tendency of falling back into the endless chain of miserable lives in the lower realms.
If you knowingly let this chance slip away, you are like someone who has gone completely mad or is a mesmerized by the power of some magical incantation. So, you know, in general, the cause of a human life is pure ethical conduct. For a life of freedom, you know, that’s for that’s in general for a human life. The main cause is ethics, And we’ve created those those types of causes through our ethical conduct which bring about as a as a as a result, as a fruition, a human rebirth, the type of life that we that we have. That’s for life in general.
In addition, to have a life which has freedoms and richnesses, other causes or other contributory causes are needed as well, not just ethics. So, you know, the we we need you know, look at our look at our prosperity, you know, our affluence to create that, you know, this gives us this this, you know, this gives us an opportunity at the leisure to be able to do what it is that we want to pursue our practice if we if that’s what we wish. That has a cause. The the cause of that is that at some time in the past, we practiced generosity. We gave what we could.
You know? Subsequently, you can through practice generosity, you can easily obtain material comfort, necessities. They come to you much more readily, easily. Isn’t it strange that how in the standard of living that we have in in the west, in developed countries. And we don’t have to really I don’t know about you, but you don’t have to work very hard for it as compared to people in the third world countries.
From sun up till Sunday sundown, they get enough maybe they get enough to feed their families for that one day. That’s the reality. And how do we explain that? Is that chance? Is is that the is that is that the, you know, god is that the intervention of god, or is it simply a matter of cause and effect, karma, from the point of view of Buddhism that everything that rises in dependence upon causes.
The cause for our prosperity is generosity. So we have to create that kind of we created that kind of condition, that kind of cause in the past to have our present prosperity or condition. You know, some some people naturally find themselves surrounded by by supportive companions. You know, people who who would, you know, who these people are very attractive to others. Other people are are are kind to them, want to help them, right, are friendly towards them.
So what you know, that’s a good thing to be. What’s the cause of that? The cause of that is having practiced patience in the past. You know, tolerance. People people are naturally inclined to look upon you well to help you.
Another important cause is joyous effort. And it it some some people, when they start a task, they have this great enthusiasm initially. And then when, you know, when they find it coming, it’s a little bit difficult or it gets a little bit boring. They set aside and they move on to something else. So if if you if you in the past, if you really diligently put some effort in trying and finished whatever whatever it is that you took up, finish every skillful undertaking, you will be able to complete whatever it is that you’re undertaking in this life.
You’ll be able to finish it, bring it to some kind of positive conclusion. And some people have find it difficult to meditate. Difficult to meditate. They they have very poor concentration. The cause of that is, you know, the cause of that is a lack of meditative concentration in the past.
So the results of meditative concentration is good concentration. So, also, some people are are are able to learn very quickly. They’re able to penetrate very deeply. They understand things very quickly. And that’s the that’s the cause of that is having practice wisdom in the past.
So it’s very extremely difficult to create these causes in any other life other than a human life. So that’s you know, we talk about like, the point is that once you’ve attained a human life, we have all these opportunities to build upon that basis that we can create all of these causes. We can practice generosity. We can practice ethics. We can practice patience.
We can practice joyous effort. We can practice meditative concentration, and we can make use of our wisdom in in recreating, again, this basis for the future. That’s what minimally we should be doing. However far advanced we get along the path, we want to ensure that we recreated such a precious human type of rebirth again in the future, and we’re creating all the causes. That that’s that’s only possible with the type of life that we have.
You know? But in order to do that, we have to be concerned about how we use our life. And for the you know, we have to recognize how our life you know, the life that we’ve all possessed, everyone in this room, a life of freedoms and richnesses, however extremely rare and difficult it was to obtain. So, you know, this is explained in terms of its causes and in terms of what’s called classical analogy. So, like, what, you know, the we’ve talked about as we just mentioned, what are the causes of this of type of life?
We’re talking about not just human life, but within the context of all the human beings, the type of life that we now possess. You and I, everyone here in this room. We created certain causes in the path to be here, and that’s our karma. Essentially, in general, I mentioned that to be a human being, the essential cause is ethical conduct. But what does it mean to ethical conduct?
You know, it’s just like Thomas Merton, what he mentioned. And he said, the the the to carry out the activities proper to a human kind of life. Those those activities which tend toward the experience of the fullness of intelligence, freedom, and spirituality. So this this so what does that mean to practice ethics? Most basically, to practice ethics means to abandon what are called the ten non virtuous actions or the ten unskillful actions.
There are so these this this is a way of classifying all the various types of actions, and it gives us some kind of guidelines, which we can begin to to consider as criteria for how we’re going to lead an ethical life, to to train ourselves. So the in in this way, there are said to be three non virtuous actions of body, killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. There are four of speech, lying, divisive speech, harsh words, idle gossip, idle talk. Idle talk is ways of speaking which are motivated by afflictive emotions. Speaking out of attachment or anger, jealousy, so forth.
And then there there are three non virtues of mind. Covetousness, malice, harmful harmful thoughts, and then wrong view. So, you know, the by by being aware of these and then opposing them, you are practicing when, you know, when the attention that comes up to what? Kill something. So, no.
I’m not gonna kill. That restraint from committing the non virtuous action of killing is the virtuous action. You’re the opposite of that. So in this way, this is what constitutes ethics. This is the cause of a human life.
But we we’ve attained a special type of life, not just the human life. You know, we possess these these eighteen freedoms and richnesses. And so these requires to, as I mentioned before, further contributory causes, not just ethics. You know, we have to the the ethics as far as as in this manner in terms of, you know, what does it mean to practice ethics in the Mahāyāna from a Mahāyāna point of view, or the great vehicle point of view. You know, this is to as like, again, as Thomas Merton said, to to expand and extend our power to love others and to dedicate ourselves to their good.
But as well, okay, to to practice patience, to give generously, to joyously make effort toward positive goals, to to meditate, and to use our wisdom. So if we you know, this this life that we all possess, this life, you know, characterized by these eighteen freedoms and and richnesses, we’ve created the cause for them in terms of practicing these, what are called the six perfections. There has to be also some kind of it said that not this in itself is not sufficient. There has to be some sort of aspiration, you know, a prayer. One one wants to have such a way of life where you can carry on your practice.
You know, you can concern yourself spiritual matters. You know, whether this prayer was articulated or not. We that you wanted to have a situation where you could learn, that you could practice the spiritual path. So, you know, that we all have done this. We’ve all created this causes.
If you if the causes aren’t created, the result will not arise. You know, within within karma, there are four essential features. The second one of these four is without creating the cause, the result will not arise. So when you, you know, when we begin to see some type of result that we’d like to experience, we have to that motivates us to create the cause. Or moreover, if there’s some kind of result that we don’t want to experience, that motivates us to abandon the cause, which would bring that about.
That kind of if one has a sense of conviction and certainty in that. So it’s important that that that that we become aware of the fact that we’re of what we’ve created and what we’ve done in the past. You know, we don’t remember that. Maybe you didn’t remember. Maybe you remember.
I don’t know. I can only infer by the result that I must have created those past causes, that I must have been generous in the past, that I must have practiced pure ethics, that I that I I must have been patient, must have been practiced joyous effort to some degree. You know, some degree of, you know, meditative concentration, some degree, use my intelligence, my wisdom. And that and that, you know, that I must have wanted to be in this situation that I have now in the past and wish that would be so. And that’s the reason I I the reason I can accrue that is because I seem to be in this kind of situation at present.
And it didn’t come from nowhere, or it didn’t come by chance or causelessly, or it wasn’t divinely ordained. I created the causes myself, and those causes are extremely rare. And I I would have wasted all that effort in the past if I want to make use of this this opportunity that I’ve created for myself. So, also, you know, the only thing that that that is lacking is effort. You know, other than that, it’s all laid out in front of us.
That’s all there. Then there is I mentioned that in terms of recognizing the rarity and also difficulty of attaining this. There’s also a classical analogy which you use to illustrate this. I’ll throw you that classical analogy next week. Give me something to look forward to.
We’ve got a yeah. Okay? Because I, yeah. A few more things a few more ideas that we have to go through before we finish this subject. So we’ll hold that till next week.
We’ve got a few minutes. Do you do you is there anything that you’d like to discuss, the question? Any problems? That’s those are the most difficult ones. Yeah.
I don’t I I mean, it’s it’s I I don’t know. I don’t know. Killing is a is a negative action, but we have we have, like, our minds are a repository of all of the karmic seeds that that we’ve the various actions that we’ve created over lifetime, not just this lifetime. And which one of those seeds ripens at the moment of death determines the type of rebirth. So I not having clairvoyance, I couldn’t begin to guess which of those karmic seeds would have ripened at the time of this person’s death.
It it would I mean, one can you know, the state of mind is tremendously important, and the state of mind at the moment of death is tremendously important. It determines which one of these seeds will in fact be ripened. So in such a situation, it’s there’s a likelihood it would be a some type of negative seed because this person would have been well, it’s hard to know why they killed themselves. I don’t know why they killed themselves. But it’s a pretty negative state.
The the state even if it’s even if it’s killing yourself, it’s still negative action. And it’s a negative state and most generally, if you die with a negative state of mind, some type of negative karma will arrive, which I don’t know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. So that’s a good question. Think sometimes it’s not distinguished. There is so there are infinite number of Buddhists. I mean, might be Buddhists sitting in this room.
Don’t know. There there are, in in our particular world system, there are certain individuals who who have created the karma, who have created the causes to to enact what are called the twelve deeds of the Buddha. So they they are they are like Śākyamūni Buddha. So Śākyamūni Buddha was a particular type of Buddha. So it’s not to say that there’s any difference amongst Buddhas.
Buddha’s a Buddha. Whatever that that there are infinite numbers of Buddha. There are infinite there there isn’t there’s I’m supposing that there are numbers great number of Buddhas existing on our planet today, but they do not most of them, vast majority, only only a very few go through what is called displaying the twelve deeds of a Buddha. That is a they they they institute a entire they go through a process of instituting an entire tradition of teachings, you know, like Śākyamūni Buddha. You know, he was born in a particular place, and he grew up in a particular situation.
He went on to gain enlightenment in a particular particular Bodh Gaya, for example. And so there there is twelve, what are called the twelve deeds, twelve events, which particularly Buddha seem to display. And they they they institute a a complete tradition of teachings, which is still, you know, the the the source of our particular Dharma. Our particular teachings is Śākyamūni Buddha, you know, twenty five hundred years ago. And all of these teachings can be can be traced back to his teachings, to the teachings he actually gave twenty five hundred years ago.
That’s not to say that there aren’t lots of other Buddhas, but they haven’t instant instituted a tradition as he did. This is to him. Okay. So, again, trying to get back to your question. There are infinite there are infinite Buddhas, and they’re they’re working in all their various ways to help people people to to help them on the path, but they’re they’re only they’re said to be within this particular eon.
And eon is a huge then I take it what is it? Ten to the fifty ninth power, fifty nine zeroes after. Buddhas in this eon, there will be one thousand. Śākyamūni Buddha with the fourth in this eon of time. So that is a there’ll be one thousand Buddhas who who will go through this enactment of these twelve deeds, who will institute a complete tradition of teachings as Śākyamūni Buddha did.
The others other Buddhas are doing are acting in various ways, where where they can to lead people along the path, but they do not they do not institute a complete tradition of teachings. That’s a long that’s a long winded answer, wasn’t it? Yeah. So they’re called universal teacher. Śākyamūni was a universal teacher.
So their their abilities and understanding of wisdom and so forth are completely exactly alike. There’s no difference. The only difference is in how they go about expressing that their qualities. And the universal teachers more than, you know, essentially institute a complete tradition of teachings. Śākyamūni Buddha’s teachings have lasted twenty five hundred years.
And as I mentioned previously, they’ll last another twenty five hundred years, and then they’ll vanish. And then there’ll be a time when then these teachings aren’t available. Though there are Buddhas, they don’t they won’t institute a complete tradition of teachings. Okay. Else?
But yeah. I yeah. That’s a good that’s a good You know, it’s Hussein was yeah. Yeah. No.
That’s right. That’s right. I mean, I guess I guess the the the I there are there are you know, karma is very, a really complicated subject. Another, you know, another way of dividing up karma is into a classification of the the fruition fruitional result, the overall the overall rebirth that we take. And then there’s the the result which is similar to the cause behaviorally.
And then say, is it so one of the results of karma is habit. That’s what that’s what that comes down to. Result similar to the the cause behaviorally. We we generally do the same types of one of the we generally do the same types of behavior. Now as I mentioned, we have all of these karmic seeds within our mind.
And these given certain conditions, for example, at the at the time of death, one of these seeds will be ripened and it will it said to be through with our our mind will compulsively be attracted to a particular type of embodiment. That is they will take it to a particular type of rebirth. Within that rebirth, other karmic seeds are being are being activated. And that one of these seeds is that is is this fact of habit result, which is similar in type to the cause behaviorally. So though though we took rebirth due to pure ethics as it they would due to pure ethics, we take rebirth as a human, still within our mind are all these various karmic seeds.
And due to when one of these karmic seeds which will cause us to behave in a particular way, and they don’t necessarily have to those which are activated don’t necessarily have to be in those which are causes to to act in a human way or to act in an ethical way. So we can the those particular seeds of karma can can be which can be activated and find expression in the way that we behave, don’t necessarily have to be in terms of what brought us a human life, a frictional result. It can be a it can be another karmic seed. What is karmic seed from? Previous life.
Yeah. For sure. For sure. Yeah. So the so yeah.
It doesn’t necessarily follow that though we though we you know, the the the causes for our taking human rebirth could be have been a karma from past life or a hundred hundred thousands of lives previous to that. That was the one that that was in our previous life to this one at the moment of our death. That was the one karma that was activated, and our mind was compulsively attracted to taking a particular type of embodiment, human embodiment. But it’s not to say that we would nest that the the karma which would would then influence our type of habitual behavior would be the same. That that’s would be another karma.
Yeah. That’s a good question. I mean, I have some problems. Yeah. That’s a good question.
If you think about karma too much, it drives you crazy, I think. Anyway, it’s a good question. It’s a good Okay. So we’ll continue we’ll continue appreciating our richness, our freedoms and richnesses next week. So one of the one of the qualities about karma is it it can it it can be destroyed.
These karmic seeds. And sometimes it’s likened to taking a seed and singeing it, and it it loses its potency. Like a seed, a flower seed or something. So positive seeds can be destroyed by anger by misguided regret on the one hand, you know, like, you we’ll talk about this great day. When we come to karma, it’s it’s quite a big subject.
You know, you you you know, gave away all this stuff of your garage if you’re meaning to give away. And next day after you’ve given away, you’re like, ah, I need now I need that. I wish I hadn’t given that away. Yeah. You had good intentions when you gave it.
It always happens that the day after you gave it away, you need it. Anyway, that misguided that regret has a tendency to diminish the power the potency of that that positive seed. On the other hand, regret in general. Regretting a negative action has a tendency to diminish the potency of negative actions. Acknowledge our mistakes as mistakes and developing healthy sense of regret.
So this is the one reason one this in this thinking, this is one of the reasons that we dedicate. We dedicate to the merit and positive energy. This you know, we’re creating karma all the time. We create hopefully, you know, due to our positive motivation at the beginning, we’ve created some positive karma together. But and these are these seeds are deposited within our mind stream.
And that we can as it as it were, in some to some degree, not completely, but to some degree, we can protect these karmic seeds from being destroyed by future anger or regret. You know? I wish I wouldn’t have gone to that teaching tonight. I couldn’t watch television. It was a great show I missed.
Anyway, we can we can we can can protect those karmic seeds to some degree by dedicating that merit. And this is the reason that having having adjusted our motivation at the beginning, creating some kind of positive merit, at the conclusion, we dedicate that. We we we we direct that energy to some in some manner. And this helps to protect us from from being destroyed in the future. So this is one of the reasons behind this process of deck dedication.
May all beings everywhere plagued by sufferings 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 the deaf hear sounds by those whose bodies are worn with toil be restored upon fine 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 quickly be freed from their ailments. Whatever diseases there are in the world, may they 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 jewels of the three principal aspects of the path that have not risen arise and grow, and those that have arisen, may they never diminish but increase more and more. In the land circled by snow mountains, you are the source of all happiness and well-being. Powerful Chenrezig, Tenzin Gyatso, please remain to the end of saṃsāra. Thank you.
Have a good week.