Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 23-minute teaching, Ven Jampa Ignyen explores the five powers — Pabongka Rinpoche’s framework for deepening compassion and bodhicitta in daily practice and at the time of death. He begins with how to adjust practice to your capacity, then walks through each power: determination (strong morning resolutions to overcome self-cherishing), the white seed (accumulating virtue), familiarity (continuous practice of bodhicitta), repudiation (treating self-cherishing like a thief), and prayer (dedicating merit each evening). He then applies these same five to the dying process, explaining the four stages of existence and how to sustain compassion through the intermediate state. Stories of attachment — to possessions and butter tea — illustrate the obstacles to freedom. For serious practitioners already familiar with Lamrim.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 18 LR 2001 09 13.mp3
UUID: 56ce9c52-b319-450d-987e-5300880f06fe
Teacher: Ven Jampa Ignyen
Collection: y Lam Rim 2001 Month 07-09 (Ven Jampa Ignyen)
Date: 2001-09-13
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 22.8 minutes
Words: ~2,597
Who were just in a similar situation to myself and so on. Those not sufficiently brave who are frightened by such a thought will find themselves incapable of doing this. They should do they should do the more usual things of invoking the aid of elemental beings, other beings, so forth, so as not to get sick and so on. Here, Pabongka Rinpoche is saying that we should practice within our own, within what we’re comfortable with. There are various practices within Tibetan Buddhism that are some of them are very advanced practices.
Some are medium, some are easy, and we should practice what we feel comfortable with, what appeals to us at the present, providing it’s a virtuous one, then the negative ones that appeal to us, can leave to one side. But the positive ones, then we should engage. We should mix with the mind a little bit. So then the text continues to say, immediately resort to meditation as much as you can. So we should meditate on this.
In other words, we must resort to mind training as soon as some favorable or unfavorable circumstance occurs so as to convert it to the path immediately. So here our meditation is whatever happens day or night, if it’s a favorable circumstance, good, then we should practice mind training. Unfavorable, practice mind training. So the teaching, the practice to be applied for our whole life. So here we talk about the five powers or the five strengths.
So these five powers are the power of the white seed, the power of familiarity, the power of determination or projection, the power of repudiation, and the power of prayer. Okay. We’ve got another list of five here. We probably think we’ve had enough lists. We just want the practice now.
This set of five also is of great benefit, and these are coming from the seven point mind training. Anyway, this the teachings on the seven point mind training will come up again in future, and it’s a fundamental and important text. So here, the power of determination. Here it’s called. In Tibetan, it’s penpa top.
Top means like strength or power. Penpa means projecting. Or here, it’s translated as determining. So this is explained in the following way. The power of determination is to make is the most important of these powers.
So as soon as we wake up in the morning, for the first one we practice first thing in the morning, you must make this resolution. I shall not let my life become meaningless in general. This we should think, first thing when when we the eyes open first thing in the morning, that I should not let my life become meaningless. I must especially not let this happen this year, and even more, not today. My life should be meaningful.
I shall do something meaningful. I shall I shall subdue my self-cherishing. This I will do today. And this self-cherishing is my true enemy, my only enemy. Previously, I had many enemies.
Now I realize that I only have one. I’ve reduced them all down to one. So today, I’m gonna take on a fight against this, this one enemy of self-cherishing. So this is the power of determination. So this determination initiates all our actions.
So this this idea then, today I’m gonna overcome self-cherishing. When we make that very strong resolution in the morning, then it affects our actions during the day. It has this effect that what we’re doing during the day is going to be influenced by that initial resolution. And therefore, it tends to make the actions that follow from it virtuous. Whether we practice in a great vehicle or the lesser vehicle.
When you were determined to kill a a louse or a mite or something like that, a mosquito, or we’re preparing our lunch, whatever we do, then our actions will be influenced by this initial resolution that we have that will tend to stop us from doing negative actions, in other words. By the time we’ve got up each morning and put on our belts, we have determined to make the things of this life, food, fashion, fame, etcetera, the means for our happiness. So by having this resolution to overcome our self-cherishing, whatever then we do during the day would tend to be influenced in a positive way no matter what we’re engaged in. And this we do sincerely. We make this sincere determination.
So that’s the power of determination, the power of projection, the projection of this strong wish to overcome self-cherishing. Then we have the power of the white seed. So the power of the white seed, means to accumulate the two collections, the collection of merit and the collection of wisdom. It’s the white seed. White here is referring to virtue.
So the power of the white seed is the power of virtue itself to mature our mind, mature our mind into bodhicitta and into the development of the vast positive potential we we require in order to develop on the path. So the power of the white seed, therefore, is this determination to practice virtue. Then we have the power of familiarity. The third one here means practicing, all the time no matter what we may be doing. So familiarity means here that no matter what we’re doing, walking, sitting, lying down.
Whatever we’re doing, we’re using, we’re becoming familiar with the mind of bodhicitta, with great compassion, and so on. Because generating bodhicitta really only comes about through familiarity. And as it says, as it said that nothing remains hard through familiarity. In Tibetan, says, through familiarity, if things become easier and easier. So, similarly, if we practice familiarity during the day by thinking about bodhicitta, being familiar with overcoming self-cherishing and so on, then it these practices become easier and easier.
Then we have the power of repudiation, which is as follows. At present, self-cherishing is the only thing we develop, and we should stop doing it. We’re always developing self-cherishing. It’s true. So all self-cherishing is is really this focus exclusive, exclusively upon our own situation to and excluding therefore other beings.
This we practice from morning till night. We’re always concerned about our own situation. We’re thinking about it all the time. What am I gonna do now? Should I should I do this?
Should I do that? How am I gonna do that? And so forth. Our thoughts are completely mixed with self-cherishing. It’s not as if we sit down and we start thinking about other beings, what other beings may need, what can be done in order to improve their situation.
Instead, we tend to be focused on, of course, our our own situation, Always be thinking through it, thinking around it, trying to improve it. How can I improve my situation? This type of mind is not necessarily nonvirtuous, but it’s excluding other beings, And it’s the root of all our unhappiness. But we’re so familiar with it. It seems we don’t notice it at all.
So as it says, the power of repudiation here is that we understand that at present, we’re, in the middle of this ongoing process of perfecting self-cherishing. We have to repudiate this. We have to find fault in this. So whatever way we can get at this mind of self-cherishing, we should practice. As Pabongka Rinpoche says, just like a dog that comes and steals something from us and we try and chase it and get it back from it, that’s how we should treat self-cherishing.
Whenever it arises, we should treat it like a a thief or a murderer or someone who’s committed genocide. We should have no mercy on the mind of self-cherishing because it’s, it has destroyed and continues to destroy our happiness. And the power of prayer is dedicating just before we go to sleep all the roots of virtue that we’ve accumulated during the day. So similar to the power of projection or the power of determination in the beginning, at the end of the day, we practice the power of prayer, which is dedicating any positive potential that we’ve accumulated during the day to acquiring bodhicitta. Here are two types of bodhicitta.
So these are the five powers applied in this life at present, in our current life. Then there’s the five powers. The same five powers are also applied at the time of death. So the five, again, these five at the time of death are described in the following way. Now, Pabongka Rinpoche says the mind training transference.
There is a type of practice of mind transference that occurs, that qualified Lamas and practitioners are able to transfer their consciousness to a pure land. And this practice one can, engage in in, of course, in this life. And it involves certain meditation techniques. And the recitation of mantras such as hik and phe. And if one masters this practice, then at the point of death, one when the signs of death begin to appear and the consciousnesses begin to dissolve or even prior to that point, one can do this particular type of yoga and can project one’s consciousness from one’s body, to another place.
One can direct one’s future rebirth, in other words. But Pabongka Rinpoche is saying that that type of practice is, just an ordinary practice in relation to the this particular practice of the five powers that should be practiced at the time of death. So firstly, those same five are the power of determination or projection here, which is the resolve not to become separated from bodhicitta while in the death state. So here, in fact, through one’s prior familiarity, one has this great resolution, very strong resolution, not to not to be separated from bodhicitta and great compassion as the signs as the process of death begins. So that in fact, this sense of bodhicitta, great compassion, continues through the death state into the intermediate state, into the Bardo.
So the Bardo being also has this sense of compassion. And then from the intermediate state then into the next, birth existence where one is conceived. There’s in general, there’s four types of existence. At present, we’re in what’s called the prior existence. And from prior existence, we go to death existence.
From death, we go to intermediate existence, then to the birth existence, then back to prior existence. And in fact, at present, we’re in the prior, what’s called prior existence. It’s called prior existence because it’s prior to death. Then from there, we go to death, then the Bardo, intermediate existence, then the birth existence. Birth existence is only one moment.
And then back to prior existence. So we’re going around through these. Here, we should try and maintain a sense of compassion and bodhicitta through all of these stages. So this is done through familiarity. And then at the time of death, the five powers, then continues on with the power of the white seed.
So here, the white seed again is practicing virtue at the time of death, practicing as strongly as possible. So suppose you are a most you are very attached to your possessions. We must destroy this attachment to them by giving away all that we have to others. Give them as an offering to, those who are, for instance, our teachers or to the Sangha community or to those that need them and so on. So doing this is a great benefit for us during the death process, to be able to give up all that we own and especially to give it to a worthy cause.
As it said, Pabongkha says that a monk who was attached to his begging bowl died and was reborn as a snake, And the Buddha drove him into the forest, and this angered the snake. And the fires of his anger destroyed both the forest and himself, then he was reborn in hell. And his three bodies burned simultaneously. So this is an incident that occurred previously. Here, we shouldn’t be attached to our possessions, otherwise they can create obstacles for for us.
There’s also a story here that’s a little it’s similar to the one here, but there was also a story of one meditator who was very attached to butter tea. And has anyone ever tasted butter tea? It takes quite a bit of familiarity to become attached to butter tea. But especially in the cold weather, it is quite tasty. And this one meditator who was quite attached was unable to complete his meditation on this transference of consciousness because he was so strongly attached to the taste of buttered tea that he couldn’t he wasn’t able to complete the death process.
So he then prayed to his teacher, and his teacher appeared to him and said that there’s much greater, much better in the the pure realms. And on hearing that, he was able to complete the process. So similarly, at the point of death, we need to diminish, reduce our attachment to things. Otherwise, they there will be an obstacle, to our practice. Then the power of repudiation at the time of it at the time of death, is to confess all of our, broken commitments.
And this type of confession should be done very strongly, very forcefully. And that on the level of the Prātimokṣa vows, the Bodhisattva vows, and the Tantric vows. And the power of prayer at the time of death is at the time of death, we should pray to be reborn in the pure realm pure realms, but instead we should make prayers that all the sufferings of every sentient being manifest on ourselves, mature on us. So our prayer should be like that at the time of death. And then the power of familiarity, is always being familiar with the thought of bodhicitta.
Then to die at the time of death meditating on bodhicitta, meditating on great compassion. This will only be achieved through familiarity now with great compassion. Because at present, our mind of death is pretty much gonna be the mind in its current state. So if we have great compassion at present, then our our situation is is reasonably good. But if we don’t have great compassion and so on, we have work to do.
Okay. We might just stop there. But, again, these five the five powers practiced in this lifetime and the five powers at the time of death are very important. The reason they’re enumerated in five is just that if the practice is boiled down to its essential bits and pieces, then these five are important. And what where these come from is that these these are the ways that beings in the past have practiced, and they just noted that this is useful.
If you practice in this way, it’s useful. It’s easier. In fact, all of this advice here is really coming from, the experience of others and what they found to be useful in their practice. So it is good to take note, at least that there are five of these powers that we should practice as the essential practice in this life. And that’s it.
Just practicing these five is almost sufficient. If we could practice, if we could manifest these five, then our life would certainly be useful. And the pains that our mother went through to give us birth would be justified. Okay. We should stop here.
We should do a short dedication.