Robina Courtin 2011 – too hard — Robina Courtin – 01 – guru Puja

Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.

About this talk. In this 127-minute teaching, Ven Robina Courtin guides practitioners through the complete Guru Puja sadhana from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s text—a tantric visualization practice in which one’s guru manifests as Tsongkhapa with Śākyamūni Buddha and Dorje Chang at the heart. She covers the merit field visualization, preliminary practices of refuge and bodhicitta, arising as a deity, and the seven limbs (prostrations, extensive offerings, confessions, rejoicing, and requests to the holy beings). She emphasizes special practices Lama Zopa added for purifying broken vows, particularly Samaya Vajra visualization, and teaches the Tsog (feast offering) in detail, stressing the tantric approach of viewing all substances as transcendental nectar rather than mundane objects. Pitched at practitioners with tantric Buddhist commitments.

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File: Robina Courtin – 01 – guru Puja.mp3

UUID: 3ce36d73-2891-4268-840b-1c38164e3f0b

Teacher: Ven Robina Courtin

Collection: z Robina Courtin 2011 – too hard (Ven Robina Courtin)

Date: 2011 (exact day not recorded)

Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide

Duration: 127.0 minutes

Words: ~15,332

Like any other sadhana it’s actually from higher yoga tantra, this particular one. And like any other sadhana, there’s a particular visualization. In this case, some of the sadhanas some of the sadhanas in where you visualize, sorry, you visualize the guru, the deity in their form, and then you think that he is oneness with your lama. But there are some guru deity practices in particular called guru deity practices where you visualize the form of your Lama, which sort of makes it more close, you know. So this is a classic example of that.

This is a you know. So if we look at this cover here, which you’ve got to cover, in the center figure in the front, what who we’re offering to, who’s the object of offering here is Lama. So that’s our Lama, whoever it might be. It could be a laywoman, you know, it doesn’t matter. But you’re visualizing in the form of Tsongkhapa with the yellow hat as a monk.

So that’s let’s say that that’s the form of the Lama. But then the next word is Lama Losang, which is Tsongkhapa. So he’s in the aspect of Tsongkhapa with that yellow hat. It’s our Lama, but looking like Tsongkhapa. Lama Lozang.

And the next one is Tubwang, and that is represent that’s Buddha, that’s represented by the imprint of the begging bowl that he’s holding. And I think there’s another imprint in there that is an imprint of the Śākyamūni Buddha. That’s represented by most I can see the begging bowl. And then in his heart, which we can’t see here, is then Dorje Chang, Vajradhāra, who’s the tantric aspect of the Buddha. So this is is like lama, our lama, in the aspect of Tsongkhapa, also in the aspect of Śākyamūni Buddha with Dorje Chang at his heart.

It’s this that’s the object of our offering here. And then surrounded, of course, by the this particular merit field. You know? So if you like one of my friends in prison who’s a Mexican gangster, he visualizes the entire merit field just naturally. I was completely mortified when I asked him, tell me about your practice, I said to him, and he proceeded to describe the entire merit field naturally.

So he must have concentration. It’s remarkable. He thinks everybody do it, does it? I didn’t say anything. Anyway, if you like that, you can visualize the entire merit field and you can have it in your mind totally crystal clear.

So what what all pudas are about, what all these sadhanas are about, the first part is the preliminary practices, and it’s assumed very often. It doesn’t actually tell you. It’s assumed that you’re offering to Śākyamūni and his particular merit field, which is this picture here, this one. That’s the refuge merit field. So the preliminary practice consists of refuge, bodhicitta, refuge bodhicitta mostly, and that’s the first part of the practice.

Where one would visualize, if one does it well, the Śākyamūni and the entire merit field. And then you dissolve them into emptiness, and then you would manifest yourself as your own deity if you’ve taken a highest yoga tantra initiation. If you haven’t, you don’t do anything. Yes. That’s just that’s okay.

And then you would then we would see the actual practice, the second part of it, which is where we then set up the visualization of Lama Losang Tubwang Dorje Chang and the merit field. And then once having then then we invite the wisdom beings to come, which is all the Buddhas from the surrounding, and they absorb into our actual visualization, making it now the actual Buddha. And then we proceed to do the seven limbs. And there are various verses for each of the seven limbs. First, prostration, then offerings, and then mainly prostration and offerings in the biggest lot.

And then the last five, rejoicing, confessing our negativity, rejoicing our virtues, delight requesting the lama to stay, requesting the lama to teach, and then dedication. There’s one verse each for those. But there are many verses for each of the prostration and many verses for the offerings. And then the next part of it is simply many, many requests to the holy beings. And then we would do when we insert there the Tsog offering, and then we would finish with the recitation of the Lamrim prayer and then dedicate.

So basically it’s a seven limb practice. Like all the Poojas, there’s seven limb practices with variations. Know, and as we go through maybe I’ll just say a couple of things. What is excellent about this, which is taken from a translation that Martin Wilson did in nineteen eighty four, it’s got all the headings, which is extremely helpful because you know what you’re doing. All the headings of each of the verses.

If you look at the heading as you’re doing it, it gives you a sense of the structure, which really helps. So what Lama Zopa has done is insert various practices in here at appropriate moments where it’s really important to do extra stuff, you know, and we’ll get to those ones. So all the things that are Lama Chopa are simply the verses numbered LC something. And we’ll skip over quite a few of the things, but there are certain ones that are really excellent to do that Lama Zopa has added. Okay.

So we go to the we turn to LC. Where is it? LC two starting for various reasons, page eleven. And we’ll sing some in Tibetan, do the chanting because the the tunes are nice, which help our minds, and we’ll do some in English. If you look at the headings, you get a sense of what you’re doing.

And because the Guru as the Buddha is the most potent object of offering, of merit for us, then practices like this are extremely beneficial. So beneficial for this center to do it, as Rinpoche says instructions to his centers is to offer Lama Chopa with the Tsog, at least the two days that are necessary, the tenth and twenty fifth of the Tibetan month. We missed out on the tenth because, know, we’d not forgot. It was on Wednesday, but we’re doing that instead here. This is one for the tenth.

Then there’s the twenty fifth of the Tibetan month. So by the centre doing it, and often it’s all that’s really auspicious for the centre, and secondly it gives us the opportunity for the students who have got that commitment to fulfil their commitment. And it also keeps our own individual commitment. So makes it very beneficial for everybody. So like I said, this first part is the preliminary practices and it’s it’s assumed that the merit that the whom we’re taking refuge in is Buddha and the merit field, even though it doesn’t say it, it’s assumed.

Sometimes in English, sometimes in Tibetan, as long as you know the part that you’re doing, that’s the main thing, which which step you’re taking. So as we recite each of these, we think that during the first half of our recitation, are purifying all the mistakes of that particular refuge, and during the second part, we’re we’re receiving all the blessings. So you think like this as we say. But we can just do three we’ll do slowly, a few of each. The first one will be the purifying.

The second is receiving the blessings. Over the page, l c four. Now bodhicitta. For the sake of all mother sentient beings, I shall become a guru deity and place all sentient beings as a supreme state of a guru deity. For the sake of all mother sentient beings, I shall become a guru deity and place all sentient beings in the supreme state of a guru deity.

Verse four. For the sake of all mother sentient beings, I shall become a guru deity and place all sentient beings in the supreme state of a guru deity. And now this generating special, this is particularly for tantra, the practice of tantra. For the sake of all mother sentient beings, I shall quickly, quickly in this very life attain the state of a primordial guru, Yidam Buddha. I shall free all mother sentient beings from suffering and place them in the great bliss of Buddhahood.

Therefore, I shall now practice the profound path of guru, Yidam Yoga. I said, now, if done the highest yoga trans initiation, we’ll do the visualization now of absorbing into the into the dharmakaya. And if you haven’t, then you just imagine that all the miracles dissolves into you and merges with your body, speech, mind. That’s what you think. You have taken initiation, we now do the the visualization.

So imagine all the merit field of Śākyamūni Buddha all dissolving into the body of Śākyamūni Buddha. And then the throne and the the lotus he’s sitting on dissolves up into him. Then he, our lama, very happily comes to sit above our crowns. And then he very happy dissolves in a golden light absorbing through our crown chakra down to our heart chakra, merging with our very subtle mind. And then we imagine all this universe, this place, Buddha house, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, the planet, the universe dissolving into empty space.

All these karmic appearances, no inherent nature. Vast empty space. Nothing. Zero, as Lama said. And now your body, bring your feet up to your crown down to the heart chakra, dissolving this body that we cling to, cherish most, that has no inherent nature, dissolving into empty space.

And this mind, all the conceptual thoughts, all this nonsense for eons that we’ve been building up out of nothing dissolve like clouds in the sky. This vast empty space. And I think this is the dharmakaya, nature of bliss, completely empty, and this isn’t me. This is my dharmakaya. Now instantly out of emptiness, out of this emptiness, out of this dharmakaya, we now manifest instantly as our deity, our Yudam, instantaneously arising.

And as the Yudam, we now proceed to do Lama Chopa. From within great bliss, I from within great bliss, I arise as a guru deity. From my clear body, masses of light rays radiate into the ten directions, blessing the world and its beings, or becomes perfectly arrayed with only infinitely pure qualities. Pure clouds of outer inner and secret offerings pervade the reaches of space earth and sky spreading out inconceivably. In essence, are wisdom knowledge and the aspect in our offerings and various offering objects.

As enjoyments of the six centers, they function to generate the sacred wisdom knowledge of voidness and will. And now having taken refuge, generated bodhicitta, solved the merit field of Śākyamūni Buddha, arisen as a deity, and we now proceed to do the seven now we do the visualization of the actual practice, the actual practice generating the merit field. So as it says in the space of invisible bliss, my root guru, kind all three ways, and the aspect of Lama doesn’t talk about Dorje Chang, and then all the surrounding, all the, you know, delightful play of spontaneous bliss, radiant with countless light rays, sitting in the vajra position, skandhas of the five sugatas, the four elements, the four consorts, your sense spheres, etcetera, are the actual bodhisattvas. Your hair pores are the twenty one arhats. All worldly gods are cushions for your feet.

So it’s the emanation of all the holy beings in the universe surrounded by the merit field. We think like this. So now this next crucial piece is we’ve just set up the visualization, which is the commitment being, but you sort of think it’s only pretend. We now have to invite the actual Buddhas, is called inviting the wisdom beings by imagining light going out from the hearts of all the holy beings and inviting all the wisdom beings, from all the universe, all the holy beings who come and absorb into the merit field, kind of making it making it kind of real in a way. These next verses we invite.

There are things that totally free of inherent coming and going, still you arise to your virtuous conduct of wisdom and loving compassion according to the disposition of your varied disciples. Holy refuge savers, please come forth with your retinues. Source of goodness and well-being throughout the three times, root and lineage gurus, Yidams, Three Jewels of refuge, heroes, Dakinis, Dharma protectors, hosts of guardians. By the power of your compassion, come forth and abide steadfast. Now having taken refuge, generated bodhicitta and set up the visualization, invited the wisdom beings, now we imagine the actual all the Buddhas right in front of us.

Actual like all the beings right in front of us, actually present. Now we proceed to do the various offerings and prayers and requests to them. First, the seven limbs. These very verses is look at the verses each as what we do. Each meaning is marvelous.

And the first one is the guru is a Sambhogakāya, then the Nirmānakāya, then the Dharmakāya, then the manifestation of all the Three Jewels, then the manifestation of all the Buddhas of the three times, the ten directions. So we’re prostrating. So the next of the limbs, of course, is offering, and Rinpoche has added a few things here. So we do the very next prayer, and then we multiply the offerings infinite numbers of time with the offering cloud mantra. And then we think of how they’re all empty with this power of truth verse.

May human and divine offerings actually arrange and mentally created clouds of finest samandhabhadra offerings fill the entire space. So let us say it, imagine it. This is where the merit is in the mind, the virtue we create with our mind by thinking it. Filled with space, all the most marvelous offerings you think. And now we’re going to multiply them.

And now this power of truth Rinpoche has written a little bit extra, a newer version more recently, we can he sort of put more meaning into it for us. So we can say that one. By the power of the truth of the three rare, sublime ones, blessings of the Buddha’s body sutras and the great wealth of the community to connections inconceivable and pure, may these piles of clouds of offerings arising through Samantabhādra Samantabhādra, Mañjuśrī, unimaginable, inexhaustible, equaling the sky arise and in the eyes of the Buddhas and the bodhisattvas of the ten directions be received. So now we proceed to do the eight sense offerings. And then the next one is the five sense offerings, and the next one is a mandala or the limb of offering.

So actually there’s extra offerings here. There’s four waters in Lama Chopa. Strictly speaking, when you do Lama Chopa, you should do the the special Lama Chopa offering, which is four waters, not just two. Four waters and then all the rest. And from the left of the Buddha.

So that let’s do really the right one for Lama Chopa. Four starting from the left of the Buddha, four waters instead of two, then the rest of them. That’s Lama Chopa, as it says here. As it says here, oceans are cloud from spacious elegant vessels radiant vessels flow gently forth four streams of purifying nectars. So Lama Chopa has four.

Mhmm. K? When you do the bowl, one one sets enough for Lama Chopa, the rest can be regular. So now I use. Thank you.

That’s wonderful. Excellent. Thank you. That’s great. And now we have the five sense objects as it says over here, the five over there.

See? So we can do the short medley here, Rinpoche says. The next verse here coming, and there are special the very special requesting prayer. So the verse we’ll just do Se Gyur Pe Ki. We’ll just do the verse.

It doesn’t matter. You could do Se Gyu Pe Ki. It doesn’t matter. We’ll do the one that’s here. By the merit of having offered this to the merit field, may I and all sentient beings be able to meet the pure wisdom teachings of the victorious one, which contains the biography of those eminent ones who live in pure morality, have the brave attitude to follow extensively the Bodhisattva’s conduct and practice the yogas of the two stages, the essence of which is the transcendental wisdom of nondual bliss and voidness.

May I and all sentient beings be able to meet this pure complete teaching of Lama Tsongkhapa, the unification of Sūtra and Tantra right this Now the remainder of the offering verses from offering of practice, then the inner secret and suchness offerings, and then the offering of medicines and service. Do you have any inner offering? Do you have inner offering? You must have your offering. And also, if you’ve got highest yoga tantra initiation, you have a commitment to have a dorje and a bell.

You must have it. Sweet and alright, Tom. That’s it. That’s we can put some more alcohol here. Let’s get the where’s our new beautiful alcohol?

Well, the bottle isn’t that covered? Over there. Really brand new beautiful sorry. No. No.

She’s saying that’s all I’m just saying. Yeah. A new bottle of Grand Marnier, the best alcohol possible to offer the holy beings. Not your cheap old rubbish. Anyway, we put that in the inner offering.

So if you go to high sugar tantrum, you need to have your own inner offering. You get a special inner offering pill. You need request one. Maybe Kopan has them or maybe you ask Alama you know who might have a supply. Maybe Khensur Rinpoche has them or Geshe la.

He’ll certainly have blessed inner offering pills, you must put that in the alcohol. You need to have that personally yourself. You must have it, and you must have a dorje and bell, always on your presence. If you don’t have it, you should you have a you have a drawing. You have a commitment.

You know? If you a highest yoga tantra, you’ve got to do this, as well as offer the Tsog twice a month. These various things we need to do. It has great meaning. Perfect.

Okay. Great. Thank you, darling. So we offer that when we do that one. Okay.

And then finally, the offering and service. I think this is the wrong I’m so sorry. It’s the wrong tune. It works alright, but I think it’s the wrong tune. So Rinpoche here has added these two prayers, which if we’ve received Bodhisattva vows, and this one we must do three times a day.

And as Rinpoche says at the end, by saying this, you know, we have by thinking strongly that we have received the complete pure set every time we say it, so it renews our vows, which is so crucial. It’s like putting water on a plant every day. You have to do it. And then saying it also purifies your broken or your weakened vows, your degenerated vows. So it’s a really marvelous practice to do every day, you know?

You see it three times a day. And the next one, for those who’ve got tantric vows, is exactly the same. So we think, motivate, as Lama says. The purpose of my life is to free all my kind mother sentient beings from suffering and to lead them to enlightenment. To do this, I must receive enlightenment.

Without the bodhisattva vows, this is not possible. Therefore, I’m going to take the bodhisattva vows for the benefit of all my kind mother sentient beings. So, of course, if you don’t have it, you can think it that you’d like to have in the future, you know. I go for refuge to the Three Jewels. I confess individually all my negativities.

I rejoice in the merit of migrating beings. I take hold with my mind the perfect state for Buddha. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Supreme Sangha assembly, and I do so to attain an enlightened mind. In order to fulfill the aims of myself and others, I shall develop a supreme enlightened motive, and towards all sentient beings, my invited guests, I shall act with supreme enlightened conduct. May I become a Buddha to benefit all.

I go for refuge to the Three Jewels. I confess individually all my negativities. I rejoice in the merit of migrating beings. I take hold with my mind the perfect state of a Buddha. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma, and the supreme Sangha assembly, and I do so to attain an enlightened mind.

In order to fulfill the aims of myself and others, I shall develop a supreme enlightened motive, and toward all sentient beings, my invited guests, I shall act with supreme enlightened conduct. May I become a Buddha to benefit all. I go for refuge to the Three Jewels. I confess individually all my negativities. I rejoice in the merit of migrating beings.

I take hold with my mind the perfect state of a Buddha. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma, and the supreme Sangha assembly, and I do so to attain an enlightened mind. In order to fulfill the aims of myself and others, I shall develop a supreme enlightened motive, and toward all sentient beings, my invited guests, I shall act with supreme enlightened conduct. May I become a Buddha to benefit all. So we think strongly, as Rinpoche says, that we have received a complete pure set of bodhisattva vows, that is those that were broken are now restored and those that were kept have been increased.

We’re so glad about that. And now if we received highest yoga tantra initiation in these vows, then we think that an infinite number of my kind mother sentient beings are suffering in saṃsāra is so unbearable. I must free them from suffering and lead them to enlightenment as quickly as possible without even delaying one second. To do this, I must become enlightened. Without tantric vows, this is not possible.

Therefore, I’m going to take the tantric vows for the benefit of all my kind mother sentient beings. All Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please listen to me, whichever is the name you have that you took, the family name when you took your vows. I, from now until I reach the essence of Buddhahood, shall generate the sacred Peerless bodhicitta, just as all the Buddhas of the three times have ensured themselves of awakening by generating it. I pledge to uphold the vows of the Buddha family to rely on the triple gem, Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, and the three disciplines of observing proper behavior, gathering virtuous Dharma, and benefiting sentient beings. I pledge to uphold the vajra, Bell, and Mudra of the five vajra family, the the great vajra family, and to honor my teachers.

I pledged to practice the four types of giving six times each day, keeping in mind the delightful commitments of the great Ratna family. For the great Padma family, I pledged to uphold individually the holy dharmas that arose from great enlightenment, those of the utter secret and for the great supreme karma family, I pledge to uphold all vows well and to make as many offerings as possible. I shall generate the vows of peerless bodhicitta for the sake of all and uphold all samayas without exception. I shall uphold all the general the second and third the last one. I shall deliver those not delivered liberate those not liberated.

Give breath to those unable to breathe and place all beings in the state beyond sorrow. And as Rinpoche says, the second two, just need to do this these last two little verses here. I shall uphold all the general and specific tantric vows and commitments of the five families without exception. I shall deliver those not delivered, liberate those not liberated, give breath to those unable to breathe and place all beings in the state beyond sorrow. I shall uphold all the general and specific tantric vows and commitments of the five families without exception.

I shall deliver those not delivered, liberate those not liberated, give breath to those unable to breathe and place all beings in the state beyond sorrow. So this is also a really really special and marvelous practice to do with Rinpoche, so kindly is added to in here. Samayavajra, it’s a very it’s a very specific purification practice for from highest yoga tantra, in particular for purifying broken vows, broken commitments, broken word of honor with our gurus, you know, breaking our tantric vows, our bodhisattva vows, especially the tantric vows. So if anyone in the room has taken highest yoga tantra initiation, has taken Kriyā tantra initiation, has taken any commitments from a lama, from your lamas, and you’ve broken them. You haven’t kept your commitments.

You haven’t kept your you know, if you’ve broken your vows, then we need to do this practice. It is so so beneficial. It’s so special. And if you if you like, you know, if you’ve done that, you you can, at the end of the day, of doing Vajrasattva, it’s my suggestion, it’s my suggestion. Instead of the third step where you do Vajrasattva, you insert instead the visualization of Samaya vajra and this particular mantra and this particular visualization for the third step, which is the actual practice of purification.

You do your regret, you do reliance, but you do this one instead of just for a while to purify our broken Samaya. For you purify us for that very specific function. So you can just meditate as I say it or you can say with me. It’s very simple little practice. If you haven’t received higher yoga tantra, it’s fine to do it.

But instead of visualizing at your heart chakra, you visualize above your crown as Rinpoche says here. Not receive initiation, you recite and recite the mantras. You recite or above your crown if you haven’t received initiation. So we receive initiation, we do as the visualization says here. At the heart of myself clarified as my Guru Yidam is a multicolored lotus and a moon mandala at my heart.

Above it is a green HUM which transforms into a sword adorned with vajras, the sword is upright and the handle is a vajra And now this instantly transforms into Samaya vajra, and there’s a picture of him here. His peaceful aspect is green, and he’s got holy green, holy body with three faces, central face green, right, black, left, white, and six arms, which embrace the mother who is in similar aspect, and they’re both same and they’re holding the same things, and the is at both of their body, speech, and mind places. So their first two hands are embracing, and their second right hand holds a bhajra, the third right hand a sword. Their second left hands hold a bell, and their third carries a flower. It’s at her heart.

And at the heart, it’s again in turn at the heart of Samaya vajra is a flat multicolored vajra with in the center surrounded by the mantra. Om vajra samaya hum jah So from the vajra at the heart, nectars flow down, filling us completely and blessing our entire body and purifying all our samayas degenerated due to carelessness and all the obscurations and all the negative karmas accumulated with our three doors. So visualizing is full of this radiant nectar. And if it’s a Samaya Buddha that’s above your head, it comes down through your crown and fills you. All your regular negativity is the usual things.

Be strongly purified. The mantra, the way the lamas say the third word there, jik, they tend to say dhikka, dhikka. So it’s we now say the mantra a few times. Guru Samayavajra then says to us, all your negative karmas, obscurations, and degenerated samayas are completely purified. So strong confidence that exactly what our lama says to us has in fact happened in reality.

Our mental continuum has become completely pure. Not the slightest obscuration is left. Even the heaviest negative karmas accumulated in relationship with our lamas have been purified. So now remember as you’re initiation, you do this. If otherwise, you just imagine Guru Samayavajra dissolves into you and becomes oneness with your body, speech, and mind.

Just think that. And if you take initiation, you think Guru Samayavajra is very pleased and absorbs the indestructible seed in our heart, our own subtle mind wind. Your own body, speech, and mind become oneness with Samayavajra’s holy body, holy speech, and holy mind. And now we think about the emptiness of the three circles. I, the creator of negative karma, am completely empty of existing from my own side.

The action of creating negative karma is completely empty of existing from its own side. And the negative karma itself completely empty of existing from its own side. And that means it’s a dependent arising. For example, all the different causes and conditions that had to come about to do these various things, to create the me, to do the action, to have the actual karma itself. There’s nothing in each of these three circles, in the I, the action or the karma that is independent, that is inherent, that is intrinsic.

There’s all the dependent arising of it. Therefore, it is empty, which is why we can change it. So with the same wish, the same awareness of emptiness and dependent arising, we dedicate. Due to this virtue, may I and all sentient beings be guided by the Guru deity From now until enlightenment is achieved, may I and all others be protected by the Guru Deity and keep every Samaya of the Guru Deity. And now carry on with the rest of the seven limbs, page forty three l c thirty eight, which is the the last five verses.

Before those having great compassion, I confess with regret and vow never to commit again whatever non virtuous and evil actions I have done throughout beginningless time caused others to do or in which I have rejoiced. Though all things are like a dream lacking inherent existence, since I sincerely rejoice in the bliss and joy of all aryas and ordinary beings and in every virtue that has ever arisen. And Rinpoche says here we should meditate for a long time on this, which we never do. So let’s just rejoice, think. It’s really good for us to rejoice or delight or be glad about our own virtuous actions, our own good qualities.

We never think about this because we always criticize ourselves. So the very fact that we bothered to come today, you know, and sit here on these cushions and do actually this marvelous practice, we should be so delighted with ourselves making the effort. Just that alone. We should be delighted that we’re trying to practice Dharma, delighted that we’re living in the vows, delighted that we’re trying to, you know, run a Dharma center or support a Dharma center that helps others’ minds, delighting in the effort we make daily to practice. We really need to do this.

We never do it. We must do it. We must mean it so sincerely. Because if we can delight in our virtues, then we have the courage to see our non virtues. But if we can’t even acknowledge our virtues, of course, we don’t wanna look at our non virtues.

It’s too painful. And just how fortunate we are, delighting all the virtue we created just to be this person that I am sitting on this cushion right now. It’s inconceivable the virtue that we’ve created just to be this person. How amazing. How marvelous.

Now the most important, these next two, requesting the holy beings to continue to teach us and requesting the holy beings always to be around us. These are the main causes, the main causes of our receiving teachings and continuing to meet the holy beings from life to life. We must do this again and again. That’s why the center must invite again and again the holy beings to come. Even if they never come, we must invite.

And individually ourselves personally, requesting in our Mahat, our Lamas to guide us, to protect us, to give us teachings, not just passively waiting for it to happen. We have to proactively create the cause for it, which is the requesting, requesting and requesting. Incredible, major step. So Rinpoche says here, this first one, where as we recite the verse, we visualize ourselves as numberless Brahmas offering beautiful golden Dharma wheels to all the holy beings. Please let fall a rain of profound and extensive dharma from a hundred thousand billowing clouds of perfect wisdom and compassion to nurture, sustain, and propagate a garden of kunda flowers for the benefit and bliss of all limitless beings.

And now we visualize numberless versions of ourselves offering lion thrones adorned with double dodgy to the holy beings. Though your buddha body is subject to neither birth nor death, but as a vessel of the mighty king unification, please abide forever according to our wishes, not passing beyond sorrow until saṃsāra ends. And now the final of the seven limbs, we dedicate the merits of doing all of this. I dedicate the mass of white virtues thus created so that I may be inseparably cared for in all my lives by perfect pure gurus who are kind in three ways, and so attain the unified state of vajradhara. And now we can make a mandala offering.

This it’s auspicious. Let’s offer the long one. Go back to the long one. Page thirty three. Thirty four, is it?

Thirty three. No? Sorry. No. It’s before that.

Okay. Good. There we go. So we do it in Tibetan. If you know it, fine.

If not, just read the English. But, basically, we don’t even know if you don’t even know the visualization, it’s not complicated. All this is is imagining. This is according to Buddhist cosmology. Okay?

And, you know, it’s a bit weird view of the world. You know, we’ve got a blue sky. You didn’t know this, did you? Because it’s reflecting off lapis lazuli. Then the four continents, the eight this, sub this, the blah blah blah.

This is the Buddhist cosmology. If we don’t know this, you just sit there and daydream about all the wonderful contents of this universe. Because all this is is the contents of the universe according to Buddhist cosmology. The different beings, the different continents. All we’re doing, offering a mandala as it is, is just the abode and all the contents of that abode.

So this world we live in and the beautiful things and the shops and the stars and the moons and the food and the music, all the beautiful things. You just visualize piling them all up and making an offering of that of this abode. You know? So here, this is this one we do. If you know it, then join in.

Oh, we’ve done that already. We didn’t need to do it. Sorry. The next verse. I beg your pardon.

That was from last time, wasn’t it? So we now go on to where we are where before, which is page forty five. Sorry. Beg your pardon. It’s a nice tune anyway.

Page forty five, we go on over to the special request, the three great purposes. We go we do we do that one, the three great purposes. So we do. Now this special this special request for the three great purposes. I prostrate and go for refuge to the guru and the three precious gems.

Please bless my mind. I am requesting you to immediately pacify all the wrong conceptions from incorrect devotion to the guru up to the subtle dual view of the white, red, and dark visions that exist in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I’m requesting you to immediately generate all the right realizations from guru devotion up to enlightenment in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I’m requesting you to pacify all outer inner obstacles to actualizing the entire graduated path to enlightenment in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I prostrate and go for refuge to the guru and the three precious gems.

Please bless my mind. I am requesting you to immediately pacify all the wrong conceptions from incorrect devotion to the guru up to the subtle dual view of the white, red, and dark visions that exist in my mind and in the minds of all mother sentient beings. Now I’m requesting you to immediately generate all the right realizations from guru devotion up to enlightenment in my mind and in the minds of all mother sentient beings. I’m requesting you to pacify all outer and inner obstacles to actualizing the entire graduated path to enlightenment in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I prostrate and go for refuge to the guru and the three precious gems.

Please bless my mind. I’m requesting you to immediately pacify all the wrong conceptions from incorrect devotion to the guru up to the subtle dual view of the white, red, and dark visions that exist in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I’m requesting you to immediately generate all the right realizations from guru devotion up to enlightenment in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. I’m requesting you to pacify all outer inner obstacles to actualizing the entire graduated path to enlightenment in my mind and the minds of all mother sentient beings. So just think for a second, I think.

So imagine too removing all the obstacles to the success of the center, that all the be removed, the center receives all the resources it needs to grow, to develop a beautiful, you know, like everybody wants, a beautiful new place that can be really flourishing, can attract lots of people to have wonderful courses, a wonderful program, bringing in wonderful teachers from around the world to run the program, to teach the program, to really develop a whole new body, a great body of students who themselves will become teachers and facilitators of courses growing and growing the Dharma. May all that happen, all the obstacles, may all they be removed by this. And, of course, all the obstacles, may they be removed to our own practice, our own lives, our own success. So important. All the obstacles, completely gone.

And all the obstacles to to the projects of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s, you know, the Maitreya Project and all the other projects, they grow and flourish to benefit sentient beings unceasingly. So now skip over to LC. Next LC. Page fifty five. This is now we’ve done.

Okay. What have we done here? We first set up we’ve you know, as I said, the Śākyamūni Buddha and the refuge filled wall implied that we took refuge and generated bodhicitta. Then we dissolved them into emptiness, and we manifested as a deity. And then we did the actual practice.

We visualized the merit field, lamas, Lama Lozang Tubwang Dorje Chang, and the merit field. And then we crucially needed then to do to invited the wisdom beings to come and absorb into it to make it, like, real, you know. And then having the Buddha in front of us and all the merit field, we proceeded to do the seven limbs. Many verses of offering, many verses of confessing of prostrating and offering, and then the last five verses. Now we’ve done that and made offerings, etcetera, etcetera.

We knew that our bodies have the vows, etcetera. And now we do the final part of the Lamachopa, which is a series of requests. Because basically all these pujas, once you’ve set the merit field up, you’re doing prostrations, offerings, and requests. That’s what they consist of. Masses of offerings, masses of prostrations, then masses of requests.

Requests, requests, requests. Request is the main cause like in the seven limb practice of receiving blessings, receiving the teachings, receiving the Dharma. Requesting, requesting, requesting. So important. Source of virtue, great ocean of moral discipline, treasury brimming with jewels of much hearing, master, second Buddha, clad in saffron, elder, manaya holder, I make request to you.

You have the ten qualities suitable for one to teach the path of those gone to bliss. Lord of Dharma representing all conquerors, Mahāyāna Guru, I make request to you. You are wise, patient, honest, without pretense or guile. Your three doors well subdued. You have both sets of ten qualities, knows tantra and rituals, and are skilled in drawing and explaining.

Foremost, vajra holder, I make request to you. To those untamed by countless past Buddhas, the unruly migrators of this degenerate age who are difficult to subdue, you show unmistakenly the good way of those gone to bliss. Compassion, refuge, savior, I make request to you. At this time, when the sun like teachings of the sage is setting, you enact the deeds of a conqueror for the many beings who lack a savior, refuge. Compassion, refuge, savior, I make request to you.

Even one of your hair pores for us, a field of merit more highly praised than all the conquerors of three times and ten directions. Compassion, refuge, savior, I make request to you. Adorned with the three bodies, you manifest from an alluring net of skillful means in ordinary form to lead all beings, compassionate, refuge, savior, I make request to you. Your aggregates, elements, sense, basis, and limbs are in nature. The sugatas and consorts of the five families, bodhisattvas and wrathful protectors, supreme gurus, essence of the Three Jewels, I make request to you arising from the play of omniscient pristine awareness.

You are the essence of ten million mandala cycles, pervading lord of a hundred buddha families, foremost vajra Holder, unified primordial savior, I make request to you, unobscured, inseparable from the play of simultaneous bliss, pervading everything in motion and at rest, the nature of all things free from beginning or end, Samantabhādra, actual ultimate bodhicitta, I make request to you. And this is called the special one pointed request. And Ribur Rinpoche, one of Lama’s root gurus, when he taught us Lama Chopa one time in California, he said, when we say this verse, we visualize ourselves at the feet of our Lama holding the hem of his robe, begging him. You are my gurus. You are my yidams.

You are the dakinis and Dharma protectors. From now until enlightenment, I shall seek no other refuge than you. In this life, the Bardo and all future lives hold me with your hook of compassion. Free me from saṃsāra and nirvana’s fears. Grant all attainments.

Be my constant friend, and guard me from interferences. You are my guru. You are my yidams. You are the Dakinis and Dharma protectors. From now until enlightenment, I shall seek no other refuge than you.

In this life, the bardo and all future lives, hold me with your hook of compassion. Free me from saṃsāra and nirvana’s fears. Grant all attainments. Be my constant friend, and guard me from interferences. Now we can sing in nice little tune.

Sorry I got it wrong here. Trying to go up higher. Hang on. Just a second. No.

I’m sorry. It doesn’t matter. Sorry. I’ve got it wrong completely. Forgive me.

Such a nice tune. It’s pity to make it wrong. It’s right the way I did it now. I’ve forgotten. So silly.

I know it was, but I want to go up higher. It seemed too low, but now I missed it. That was the same. Okay. Good.

Do it again, please. You alright? And now this verse here is a mini self initiation, which is incredibly beneficial. First, we’re we’re we’re visualizing, you know, from the brow, throat, and heart of the holy beings, we we visualize white, red, and dark blue light coming, and it was sent to our hearts and dissolving into our three places one by one, and then we do them all together. We do one one at a time, and then we do the three together.

The first time we are visualizing each time each one we do it, we’re we’re removing all the obstacle, the four obstacles that purge, the four pure empowerments, the vase empowerment, the the secret empowerment, the wisdom empowerment, and the word empowerment. The first three are the first three empowerments, and then the fourth one is the fourth of the word empowerment. And then also, by doing this, we’re removing all this we’re achieving all receiving all the seeds to achieve the four kayas, the Dharma kaya, the sambhoga kaya, the nimana kaya, and the svabhava kaya. And we’re then we visualize a replica of our guru coming and dissolving into us. So it’s a super marvelous little practice.

It’s like doing the entire initiation, which is so so auspicious. By the force of having thus requested three times nectar and light rays, white, red, and dark blue, stream forth from the places of my guru’s body, speech, and mind, and dissolve into my own three places one by one and altogether. The four obstacles are purged, the four pure empowerments, and the seeds of the four kayas are received. A replica of the guru happily dissolves into me, and I am blessed with inspiration. And now we’re gonna slide just some of his holiness’s mantra, some of Lama Zopa’s and Lama Tsongkhapa’s and Śākyamūni’s, and then the rest fillet.

Just do a couple of each. Omaguru vajradhara, vajradhara, In general, can see they’re the same. It’s Sanskrit. So Omaguru vajradhara in the beginning and then Sarwa siddhi Hong Kong at the end, and in the middle is the name in Sanskrit of the Lama. So Lama Zopa’s is Muni Sanaka Shanti.

Muni Shanti is Tubten, his name, the great Muni, the great, you know, and then Shanti is patience, Zopa. Okay. And then Śākyamūni. That will do. And then we go now to the next.

And now we offer the Tsog. This is actually a separate thing. It’s not strictly speaking part of lama chopa. Lama chopa is just a regular sadhana of the visualization, the seven limbs, and then requests and then dedication, but this lama chopa is inserted. And so the commitment you’ve got to do if you have higher yoga chant is the Lama Chopa is the Tsog part.

So if you do the Tsog, if you first generated your deity and then you do the Tsog, you’re keeping your commitment. You have to do the whole of Lama Sherpa. That’s not your commitment. Your commitment is a Tsog. We’re doing this one here.

Yeah. Yeah. I think it’s the next page, isn’t it? Forty forty three sixty three. Yeah.

You got a different book. You’ve got a different book. Sixty two. Sixty two. It’s on page sixty two and sixty three.

Lama Chopa Tsog offering. Okay. Everything we’ve got everything. So we made I offered the Tsog today, not cause I’m showing off, I’m just telling you. Not showing off.

Not nice. I didn’t mean to show off. I’m just telling you I did. So I wanted because it’s really I know that the one I just wanted to remind that somehow this was telling you was telling this to George and Lindy, but somehow, Tsog is one of the most beneficial we’re not we’ll do it. Let’s offer it first.

You don’t want to do that? Not yet. Leave it. We have to offer it yet first. Let’s bless it.

Yeah. I haven’t blessed it yet. No. We’ve got to do it now. Transforming the offerings.

And then we’ll offer. So what this this tog, I just thought, you know, to it’s really good to offer a big tog. And I remember Song Rinpoche one. We I got this back in the seventies, I tell you, at Mañjuśrī Institute. This lama, Song Rinpoche, he was so wrathful.

I couldn’t even look at him. He so scared the life out of me. He was very direct, you know, and he looked at our things. He looked at all first of all, Andy Weber, the painter was there. He was coming to see you.

Right? And he saw some of his paintings. Were you there at that meeting? Yeah. Oh, I’ll never forget it.

He looked at and his paintings, he completely criticized. No no offerings on them. There were no offerings. Talk about offerings, George. There were no offerings.

Andy Weber’s. It was the Thousand Arm Chenrezig. Peter’s painting. Well, that was Peter’s, but he was also insulting Peter’s because Peter was said he was on the floor in Unbelievable. Not not enough offerings on the tongue because offering is incredible.

And then he we had to improve, and he looked at all our tug offerings, and he said, you call those offerings? We make mountains of offerings in Tibet. And the way they say this for offerings, it’s really auspicious. So that’s why here they’re all piled up. They say you make it because it’s auspicious.

When you have a high but not like a flat plate. You know, look at all of these. They’re always pointy and always up and very auspicious and so like a mountain, you know. And it’s really good to make lots of offerings. Even if not many people come, it doesn’t matter.

So to make really high mountains of offerings. So also because I think the dakinis like sugar and not boring old wholemeal bread and everything and ugly old bananas. I think the dakinis and dakkas like light beautiful sugary blissful radiant things. So I like to like light chips and and, you know, snowballs and pink and white things. That’s my picture.

That’s what I like to offer. But I think anyway, you’re not supposed to eat it readily like regular food. You’re supposed to see it as totally transcendental. It’s the most precious stuff. You shouldn’t put it on the floor.

You should see it as a truly most special object. Know? Although we see donuts and things, we see that, but we shouldn’t think that. It’s totally transcendental. You know, it’s so sublime.

So the llamas, they just take one taste. You don’t eat it like an ordinary piece of food. You shouldn’t see it like food, you know. It’s really important. You you shouldn’t even discriminate.

And we check, oh, I like a chip. I’ll have this. It’s not a chip. It’s transcendental nectar. It’s so important because this is from tantra, you know.

And the whole thing in tantra is about seeing things not as mundane. So it’s real practice to do that because we’ve so much attachment, you know. Love the snowballs, I’m thinking, oh, the nice snowball, yes. So that’s the idea. So I thought, make mountains, it was really good.

And then Ribur Rinpoche, when he talked when he had Tsog Puja with us one time, he said, when you’re offered Tsog because it’s like a group thing, you know, you give everything away. You don’t keep anything on the offer. You even if don’t want it, you take parts, you take it home, and you offer it to people. You know? And the other thing is the center, you know, I’ve encouraged Lindy and George.

It’s the center actually. It’s like centers having a party and they’re inviting you to it. So, of course, you can also bring something. It’s good. But it’s the idea of the center offering a puja and inviting.

That’s what it is. You invite your guests, you know. You invite people to come, and then you offer them a beautiful cup of tea and a nice offering. That’s the idea, you know. That’s the thing, really.

So it’s really a wonderful action of the center to do it, to make Tsog. You know, so I thought, you know, so often we only spent seventy five dollars. Was going, oh, I’d offer us a hundred dollars. We only spent seventy five dollars. What to do next time?

So that’s the idea. That’s just and it’s not as if it’s written in the Epi empty handbook, you do it this way. But it’s what I’ve learned from the Lamas and the meaning of it’s all. It’s such a beneficial practice, such an amazing practice to do. So auspicious, you know?

And then, of course, you got the meat and alcohol there, if you haven’t done this before. The whole thing in tantrum, like I said, is to see things as see to super mundane, to lift ourselves beyond our ordinary view, to see things as sublime. You know? And so here we have in the actual really essential part of the tzog, you’ve got the substances, the ordinary mundane substances of meat and alcohol. Right?

And so we’re we’re totally we’re seeing these almost as if they’re representations of all the ordinary kind of the male and the female mundane junk. And we’re seeing them as sublime, lifting our view. So you don’t even use the word meat and alcohol. What’s the words in Sanskrit, Aleka? Mandana and mandala, what are those words?

No. Manda. Banda. What are they? Bala.

Bala and something else. I can’t even Russia wouldn’t even say meat and alcohol because once it’s blessed, it’s not meat and alcohol, you know? So this is bit shocking for vegetarians and people. We think it’s bit awful in the west. You know?

So if you don’t wanna taste, you don’t need to. But if you imagine it’s transcendental nectar, all the mundane things of this ordinary world, which we’re transcending. That’s why when you see yourself as a deity, you practice beyond your usual miserable me. You know. You see, when you got when you got highest yoga tantra commitment, you also have a commitment to see yourself as a deity, to see others as a deity, to see all sound as mantra, to see the entire world as as a mandala.

You’re trying to lift your lift your view, you know, from the mundane. This is the main way, according to tantra, why we suffer. Of course, it’s based on ignorance, but we’re trying to lift the view. That’s why seeing yourself as a deity. That’s why they talk about divine pride.

So it’s not seeing as mundane. So when you have a Tsog, when someone comes and offers, you just put your left finger and taste and think it as transcendental nectar. Don’t think it think of it as that. You know? Change your mind.

Okay. Lift bless. Pure clouds of outer inner and secret offerings and fields and with vision, so they the teachings of space, earth and sky spreading out in the sea of breeze. Essence, are wisdom, knowledge, and aspects, inner offerings, various offering objects and enjoyments of the six senses they function to generate the special wisdom, knowledge, and bliss and voidness. Now like before, we invite all the wisdom beings, all the holy beings to come.

Compassionate nature, rooted lineage gurus, assembly of yidams and deities, Three Jewels of refuge, viras, dakinis, hosts, protectors, and guardians, I request you to come to this offering site. Amidst an ocean of clouds of outer inner and secret offerings on a beautiful throne made of jewels, firmly place your radiant feet supreme sitter and grant me every desired attainment. And now we’re presenting it and then inviting each of these verses and inviting first the gurus and yidams and then the all the different beings and the sentient beings all come here, and then we then we all enjoy we offer to everybody, and then we enjoy it. Then we missed that one. That’s only when you do, like, special mother tantra.

Not this one. Next one. Oh, and you often they we take it up half a note each time sort of often when they sing the tunes, it’s auspicious to keep going higher and higher. There’s a great meaning to that as well. So go up a half a note each time.

And now we can see these next chant these next two these verses twice more. Now one more time. Ho, blessed by Samādhi Mantra and Mudra, this notion offering the feast of uncontaminated nectar, we offer to feed you, host of Root and Lineage Gurus. Ho. Contented by a joy and abundance of everything desirable in Mahal.

Please let fall a great rain of blessings. Ho, blessed by Samādhi Mantra and Mudra, this ocean of offering feast of uncontaminated nectar, we offer to please you, host of Yidam deities, Ma Ho. Ho, my home contented by enjoying an abundance of everything desirable, m Mahal. Please let fall a great rain of attainments. Ho, blessed by Samādhi Mantra and Mudra, this ocean of offering feast of an uncontaminated nectar, we offer to please you, host of precious jewels of refuge.

Oh, mahum, contented by enjoying an abundance of everything desirable, m Maho. Please let fall a great rain of holy Dharma. Ho, blessed by Samādhi mantra and Mudra, this ocean of offering feast of an uncontaminated nectar, we offer to please you host of the Dakinis and Dharma protectors. Ma Ho, contented by enjoying an abundance of everything desirable, m mahum, please let fall a great rain of enlightened activities. Ho, blessed by Samādhi mantra and mudra, this ocean of offering, feast of uncontaminated nectar, we offer to please you, host of mother sentient beings.

O mahum, contented by enjoying an abundance of everything desirable, and my hoard please dispel the suffering arising from your side, the pure and impure. And now we offer. So now the lama is not here. Right? The holy lamb on the throne, we can imagine.

But one lama who advised me about how to do this one time, he said it’s not wrong to get up and make the offering as if he were here. It’s very auspicious. You do? So then three people, please, who’ve got initiation. Please, it’s good if George does.

George and Aleka and Lindy. George can offer the main plate, Lindy and Aleka and the meat and the alcohol, the bala and bala and manda. I can’t think what they’re called. So you two take the bala and manda, blessed, transcendental, radiant, blissful nectar. And then George can take the offering, the main plate, the one with the snowball, the pink one on the top.

Yeah. The big one. So you go first, George, and the other two behind you. Just stand there. It’s okay.

Just stand there. You should have it above your head, not above your mouth. Just note together, you two. Alcohol on the left. The liquid on the left.

Yeah. High above your mouth. That’s right. So we imagine the Guru is right there. Imagine go one step closer and imagine one step closer.

One step closer. And just imagine now the Lama’s received it and is now tasting it and he’s saying this. All go together. He’s he’s saying, I visualize myself as a Guru Dorje Chang in nature inseparable from the three vajras. Ah, this uncontaminated wisdom nectar, whom without moving from bodhicitta, I enjoy to satisfy the deities within my body.

Aho, maha sukha. Aho, great bliss. So now we put we offer up on the we can fit up there on the left. Maybe on the left, George. On the left of the pictures for the Gurus, holy beings.

Right. And then we offer now to everything to everybody. Yeah. So someone offered the merchant is at least two holy things around. And if you haven’t taken initiation, it’s fine to take if you’d like.

To have pure view, just dip your finger in and take a little piece of each and think of it as transcendental nectar purifying all your delusions. And if you don’t want to taste it, don’t worry. You don’t need to. Just a little bit of each, if you want. But have pure view is the most important thing.

Don’t have mundane view. It’s fine. Don’t worry. If you’ve got pure view, if you’re able to have pure everybody can have. I’m just telling everybody, not you.

I know you know. And if they want to it’s nectar. It’s nectar, sweetheart. Transcendental nectar. But now we should ask people to offer all of them.

You, Jack, go and help. I’ll get some of them. Then go and help. We should offer out all of these on the plates. We’ve got a fidget and we’re gonna fist to everybody.

But you make offerings to all the the nectar offered. Whoever wants to kill it. Okay. Coming eventually. Fine.

Have pure view, darling. It’s the main thing. Think transcendental nectar. There you go. Just pile up the plates with all the offering.

We’re gonna run out. We need more space, I think. We’re gonna have to get bags. Oh, we’ve paper bags here. Where are they?

What happened to them, Bill? You’ve got a paper bag here to put everything in. Good. Yeah. Jack, you’re helping.

Get the paper bags and take them around. Look, see? Paper bags somewhere. Big ones. Give everybody a paper bag to put your regular things in.

There you look at that, my god. A shopping bag, I wanna take one. And take them all and give them home. You’re not supposed to put them on the ground, you shouldn’t drop it, you should take it, it’s something very special. Transcendental nectar.

That’s the plan. That’s what you think, think. Eat away. And where’s our tea? We’ve got a blessed we’ve delicious tea coming, haven’t we?

So we’ll stop for a cup of tea and a gossip. Are we gonna do the cold thing? Yeah. And a cup of tea. We will.

Enjoy your talking. Don’t eat with attachment. That’s the whole plan. Don’t discriminate. And I always think if you you bless it with Om Ah Hum and really have pure view, even the yuckiest food will nourish you.

I don’t believe in all this healthy food rubbish. I believe in Omar hum it. I think it does everything. Is that the new diet book? What?

Is that the new diet book? That’s my new diet book. Just Om Ah Hum it and it all becomes pure. Yeah. Well, upside down.

Upside down. On the on the tables, but upside down. You can leave them, but upside down. Yeah. Yeah.

Well done. Thank you, darling. Alright. Let’s place our tea now. Put your cup of tea.

Everybody coming. Okay. Oh, yeah. My goodness. That’s Australian Thai, is it?

Is it? Is it? Chai? Is that chai? Okay.

It’s not as it’s better. Not too bad. Some of the chai have too much stuff in it. Indians never put all the things that Australians put in. It’s good.

Very tasty. Cheers, everybody. You. Two people came. Two people came.

Good start. Enjoy your tea everybody. Lots and lots of sentient beings live around from many spirits and you know, very very a lot of, yeah, a lot of just just delusional beings living around, especially in spirit form, who live around the trees and around here and around this neighborhood. They think it’s their area. So here we are having a party, we don’t invite them.

They get upset. Mhmm. So they problems, know. So you’ve got to keep placate them. So you offer your leftovers to all the local people.

Then you put the dish out there and they supposedly get the smell or the essence of it. Who knows? Probably the birds get it in the end. Because it’s a night, Kelsang Konchog, who was completely clairvoyant anyway, could see the spirits and everything. He said they get very if they if you’re walking around at night and there’s no lights, they get very upset if you bump into them.

But if they if you have a light, they’ll see you and keep out of the way. So that’s why when you put the Tsog out at night, the leftovers, you put it a stick of incense so they see it, so they know where the food is. So they’re practical. But if it’s daytime, you don’t need to do it because they see it. Yeah.

Should most of you see, the whole thing of all this because you see, because it’s this is the thing about the offerings. When you bless blessing anything, you know, even when you bless your own food, you put it on the altar. Say you you have an ordinary blessing on the altar. You put it off like your fruit, and then you can eat it after, but there’s a mantra you need to say to help you purify the the negative karma you create by eating a blessed thing because you you’re just contaminated because you’re so we’re so deluded, you know. So that’s for example.

There’s one mantra. You must have it. That one? You know that one? You should.

It’s related to eating off already blessed food. But dip That’s ordinary offers. But this is particularly offering you see, because it’s from Tog, it’s offering, it’s a tantra, it’s a much different offering. It’s a much higher offering and a more sublime and more whatever, all these things. And so because it’s offered and blessed, even the water in the bowls, should not put it on the ground.

Look like left two bits over there, but that’s that’s all all that is up there is offering. We shouldn’t live a single crumb, you know. And even the wrappers that you have, if you think of it as transcendental nectar, okay, it’s training for our minds. These wrappers, if they’ve got a bit of stuff left on them, you should not put it in the the rubbish. It’s got blessed offering.

So you’d burn that paper. You’d burn the wrapper. You know? You’ve to be really aware of this. We’re not used to it.

So we drop them on the ground. You shouldn’t. You shouldn’t even drop one crumb because it’s it’s blessed. Like, you drop the water from the bowls, say it’s blessed water. You shouldn’t walk on it.

You shouldn’t put it when you clear it outside, you shouldn’t put it in a dirty place. It should be really respected and put it into a clean place. So these offerings aren’t meant to be for the animals. He said, is their view. They say that because animals are very deluded, it’s kind of very polluting for them, not very good for them to eat with such greed, to eat such a pure thing.

Okay. I’m trying to I’ll do the whole story. That’s the attitude to have. It’s very blessed, very profound, very subtle. So it’s like not good to offer it to animals to offer it to animals because they eat with such green attachment.

I mean, we’re bad enough. But actually, they’re they’re they’re harming their minds. It’s not good for them. So therefore, you put it up high where of course you can’t help with the animals get it. So at least you’re not thinking I’m gonna offer it them.

You put it up high away from the animals so that then supposedly the spirits get it eventually then you I don’t know whatever happens to it eventually. In the end animals do get it. So it’s one of those dichotomies. You know the animals will get it what to do, but you’re not offering it to the animals. You’re putting it up high because you don’t want the animals to get it and on the ground and all dirty and yucky and then high beings, you know, the spirits and people will get it.

That’s that’s how they talk. What can I tell you? I’m just passing on what they say. No. This is the point.

You can put it on your plants, but you’re not thinking like that. It’s the wrong way to think. You’re treating it as something ordinary. So you’re just thinking you’re putting it in a clean place where people don’t walk and where it doesn’t get polluted because it’s something blessed. That’s the attitude in your mind to have to it.

Do you see what I’m saying? Yeah. I mean, it’s difficult because all we see is you know? I mean, this is you hear all these stories, you know, about like, what about the stories about high beings manifesting as ordinary humans? There’s this wonderful story Roger told when Lama Osel was a kid, like a four year old, young four year old, and they’re all like, Lama was in car, Roger was in another car, someone all these different cars, a caravan of cars going going to Bodh Gaya.

And and Roger was with Rinpoche, and then behind in her head was Lama Osel, with someone else. He was a little boy. So, anyway, Roger they went through a village, and Rinpoche suddenly said to Roger, turn back. So Roger does what he’s told. You know, he doesn’t ask questions.

It’s Rinpoche’s business. So they stop. Rinpoche goes and buys some biscuits as an offering and gets a cutter, and then walks very respectfully into this group of young kids, young people, young four teenagers, Indians. And he walks so respectfully towards the girl in the middle. Roger said she looked like she had polio or something, but Roger was taught acting as if she were a holy being.

Right? Looks like an ordinary girl. He walks up and he tries to offer and she’s embarrassed and she’s shy and they say, come on, take it, take it. So he she takes it and he backs away like you would from a holy being, gets in the car, and all he said was, it’s not often that you see what you see in a dream. Or maybe he had a vision or something, you know, he’s asleep so he can’t dream.

Who knows? So he she Roger didn’t say anything. So they got back to to Bodh Gaya, and Osel said to Roger, where did you go? What happened? And Roger explained, and then Roger said to Lama Osel, who’s fifteen, fourteen, I wonder who that was.

Who was that Lama? He said, that was Tārā. So the point is, this is the whole point about the Bodhisattva Path. We’re speaking enough about the Bodhisattva Path this time, I’m afraid. We just didn’t do it.

Holy beings are manifesting all the time in every form imaginable. There’s dogs and ants and and and people and boring people and old maniacs. One person you think is a crazy person you don’t know? There’s a holy Rinpoche talks about some story there’s this one butcher behind a butcher, you know, who’s really heavy duty in Tibet to be a butcher, shocking, you know, behind the Potala, really like a maniac. And he said it was Yamāntaka, manifesting as butcher.

So they all say, you don’t know who anybody is, do not judge. And this is especially in relation to Tantra, especially in relation to the bodhisattva path. One wonderful story about His Holiness. Love has always said one time after the Tibetans had come out of you know, their country, they were into in India. And then with His Holiness in the government up in Dharmasala was negotiating with all the Indian government.

Okay. I wanna tell the story. Wait till we get our tea. Then we’ll tell the story. It’s a nice story.

I don’t want you to miss it. We’re having more tea. Thank you, George. You’re a good wife, George. That’s what Lama yes.

She told me I had to be. I want you to learn to be a good wife, he said. And I knew what he meant. But I was being clever and I said, who to love her? He said, all men, dear.

My god. I love a nun. Now he is he what he meant was go and be humble and serve people. You know? I love some more.

Very tasty. Then when George sits down, then I’ll tell the story. Bill’s Brew. Yeah. Thank you, darling.

Bill’s Brew. Yeah. So what I’m talking about is appearances. Everything is we see because we’ve karma, negative karma, for so many eons as ordinary sentient beings, see ordinary things. We see ordinary chips and ordinary chocolates, and then we discriminate.

You know? But the whole thing in tantra is to lift our view and see things as transcendental. So we really gotta train this way because it will it’ll never happen until we start thinking it. We’re change the mind, you know. That’s why we have to practice with have great pure view towards song, view towards the water offerings, really respect it.

But it takes time because all we see is chips, you know, chips and chocolate. We don’t see pure at all. So this story, anyway. His Holiness, they’d they’d come out of Tibet, he was negotiating with the Indian government to get this land down south, hundreds of thousands of acres, you know, for the monasteries, which the Indian government very finally eventually offered. So his Holiness sent his own minister down to in Delhi to see to see the to meet the appropriate Indian minister about all these negotiations.

It was really frustrating. He couldn’t get a meeting. Went back up to Jhansala, got all depressed, and he and he said to his Holiness, was possible I couldn’t get a meeting. And his told him, don’t worry. It’ll be okay.

Go back down. So he went down to Delhi. I wish I had told this story years ago, and he managed that he went into the office of of the minister that day, and he’s the little boy the son of the Indian minister was there, and he he made the he expressed the wish for a dog. So the Tibetan was really happy to do something, you know, to kind of grease the wheels and make make friends. So he said, oh, I’ll get you a dog.

So he went outside, and there was this sadhu, you know, this holy man holding a little dog. Oh, can I buy your dog? Yes. So he bought the dog and went into the little dog ran to the little boy, he was happy. He ran to his daddy.

His daddy was happy, and everything kind of worked. And as Lama Zopa said, the dog and the sadhu were manifestations of the Dalai Lama’s mind. This is what the holy beings are doing all the time. We shouldn’t think about Guru just sitting there with his little holy body on his bed. The lowest level body can manifest a hundred forms simultaneously.

Now forget about the tenth level, the Buddha’s. They can manifest infinite numbers, and they are doing it all the time. It’s not like another universe. You can’t think it, you know? So we shouldn’t believe in appearances.

So there’s holy appearance. We have to practice with pure view. And they talk about the tog as being such a special, the highest kind of offering. Therefore, the most purifying to do. Therefore, the most profound, So we’ve got to cultivate a pure view and not have attachment.

It’s so hard because you prefer the chocolate to a mandarin, at least I do. You know what I mean? It’s really hard to not to discriminate. So sometimes it’s best not to eat it. Just have a little taste.

That’s it. The larvae just taste it. That’s it. They leave it. You know?

Whatever, do what you can. I don’t know, somebody’s beautiful here. Thank you very much for a nice offering. Must be mine. Okay.

Well, let’s do the rest. Continue now. What are we gonna do? The Tsog queen. We’ll do the sing the song.

Spring Song of the Tsog Queen. Page seventy one. Yeah. And this is we’ll see if you we’ll see in a bit. And now we offer the leftovers to all the beings who live around, to placate them and make them our friends so they don’t disturb us because spirits and these different beings cause sickness and things.

In pure false appearances are purified in emptiness of the sublime nectar achieved by wisdom knowledge, our own becomes a vast ocean of all desired things. Blessed by Samādhi mantra mudra of this ocean of remaining Tsog. Of We offer to please you host of earth bound realm protectors from our home. Intended by all, drawing on abundance of everything desirable, May yogic activities be properly accomplished. Okay.

Alright. Remaining guests in your retinue accepted option of remaining strong with the perfect teaching, spreading this humble, the patience and helpers, and the searching we, Yogin, will gain health, long life, and power, glory, fame, good fortune, and full attainment of every desirable thing. To show on our success in activities such as sanctification, increasing so forth. O star, protectors protect us. Help us obtain all accomplishments.

Eliminate untimely death, sickness, dream and interfering first. Let there be no bad dream. No omen or calamity. Let the world be happy. Crops be good, harvest and crease, and drama flows.

Let all happiness and goodness arise, and all wishes in our minds be fulfilled. But, of course, it is valuable giving. May I become myself made Buddha for the sake of beings, and by my generosity, may I liberate the multitudes of beings not liberated by previous Buddhas. Now the last part is this lamrim prayer. This is part of the tsog.

This is part of the, Lamachopa, the lamrim prayer. We recite that as the end of Lama Chopa LC eighty four, and then we’re done. Okay. I think we do it in English. Just meditate on the meaning of each verse.

Through the power of having made offerings, in respectful request to you, a holy and perfect pure guru, supreme build of merit. I seek your blessings, saviors, and root of well-being and bliss that I may come under your joyful care. That’s the next verse. We know we can say that. We don’t need to.

Keep going down to eighty seven eighty one, page eighty one. Violently tossed amidst waves of delusion and karma, plagued by hoards and various denizens of three kinds of suffering. I seek your blessings to develop an intense longing to be free from this monstrous ocean of boundless and vicious existence. Having abandoned the mind that views this unbearable prison of cyclic existence as a pleasure grove, I seek your blessings to partake of this treasure of Ārya’s jewels by practicing the three higher trainings and thereby to uphold liberation. Banner.

Look at the headings all the way because I told you each stage of the path what we’re doing. Having considered how all these pitiful beings have been my mothers and have raised me kindness again and again, I seek your blessings to develop unaffected compassion like that of a loving mother for her precious child. There is no difference between myself and others. None of us wishes even the slightest of sufferings or is ever content with the happiness we have. Realizing this, I seek your blessings that I may enhance the bliss and joy of others.

This chronic disease of cherishing myself is the cause of giving rise to unsought suffering. Perceiving this, I seek your blessings to blame, begrudge, and destroy the monstrous demon of selfishness, the mind that cherishes all mother beings and would secure them in bliss as the gateway leading to infinite virtue. Seeing this, I seek your blessings to cherish these beings more than my life even should they rise up as my enemies. In brief, infantile beings labor only for their own ends while Buddhas work solely for the welfare of others, With the mind understanding the distinction between the failings of one or the advantage of the other, I seek your blessings to enable me to equalize and exchange myself with others since cherishing myself as a doorway to all torment while cherishing my mother is the foundation of all is good. I seek your blessings to make my core practice the yoga of exchanging self for others.

Eighty nine. So more more bodhicitta. And thus perfect pure compassion gurus, I seek your blessings at all karmic debts, obstacles, and sufferings of other beings. May without exception ripen upon me right now. And then I may give my happiness and virtue to others and thereby invest all beings in bliss.

And thus, perfect pure compassion gurus, I seek your blessings that all coming deaths, obstacles, and sufferings of other beings may without exception ripen upon me right now. And I may give my happiness and virtue to others and thereby invest all beings in bliss. And thus, perfect, pure, compassionate gurus, I seek your blessings in all coming deaths, obstacles, and sufferings that mother beings may accept without exception rip it upon me right now that I may give my happiness and virtue to others, and thereby invest all beings in bliss. Should even the in my environment and the beings therein be filled with the fruits of their negative actions and on wishful sufferings pour down on me like rain, I seek your blessings to take these miserable conditions as a path by seeing them as causes to exhaust the results of my negative karma. In short, no matter what appearances arise, be they good or bad, I seek your blessings to transform them into a path ever enhancing the two bodhicittas to the practice of the five forces of the essence of entire Dharma, and thus to enjoy a bliss solely a blissful mind.

Whatever I occasion to meet, I seek your blessings that I may adapt it to my meditation by the skillful means of the four four applications. I render this life of liberties and endowments infinitely meaningful by practicing the advice and commitments of thought training. In order to rescue all beings from the vast seas of existence, I seek your blessings to become adept in bodhicitta through a pure selfless wish, as well as by love and compassion conjoined with the visual technique of mounting giving and taking upon the breath. I seek your blessings that I may eagerly endeavor to put into practice the three Mahāyāna moral codes and to restrain my mind stream and pure with pure Sadi Sūtra vows, the single path journey by all victorious ones of the three times. I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of generosity through the guideline teaching of enhancing the mind that gives without attachment, namely transforming my body and collection of virtue over the three times and into the objects desired by each and every sentient being.

I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of moral discipline, working for the sake of sentient beings and acting virtuous deeds and not transgressing the vows of the body, mocks, or body cheater, and tantric vows even at the cost of my life. Should even the myriad beings of the three realms, without exception, become angry at me, humiliate, criticize, threaten, or even kill me, I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of patience, to work for their benefit in response to their harm. Even it must remain to an ocean of eons and the fiery hells of each for the sake of even just one sentient being. I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of joyous effort to restrive with compassion for supreme enlightenment and not be discouraged. Having abandoned the faults of dullness, agitation, mental wandering, I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of meditative concentration to the Samādhi of single pointed placement upon the nature of reality, which is that all things are void of true existence.

I seek your blessing to complete the perfection of wisdom through the space like yoga of single-minded placement upon ultimate truth conjoined with the tranquility and great bliss induced by the discriminating wisdom analyzing suchness. I seek your blessing to perfect the mighty on illusion by realizing how all outer and inner phenomena lack true exist, but still appear like a mirage, a dream, or the moon’s image on a still lake. Subtitles and the abundant lack even an ocean an atom of true existence while cause and effect dependent arising are infallible. I seek your blessing to discern the importance of Nāgārjuna’s thought that these two are complementary and not contradictory. And thereupon, I seek your blessings that I may cross the ocean of tantra with the kindness of my navigator, vajradhara, by holding my vows and words of honor, the roots of all powerful attainments most dear than my life.

I seek your blessing to cleanse all stains of ordinary appearance and grasping through the first stage yoga of transforming birth, death, and the bardo into the three bodies of a Buddha so that whatever appears may arise as a deity. I seek your blessings to actualize in this life the power unity of clear light on the illusory body that arises from placing your feet, my guru, on the eight petals of my heart at the very center of my central channel. Should I not have completed the points of the path at the time of death, I seek your blessings that I may be led to a pure land in either case through the instructions of applying the five forces or by the forceful means of enlightened guru’s transference of mind. In short, I seek your blessings, my savior, be cared for by you from birth and remittingly throughout all my lives and thus to become your chief disciples, holding every secret of your body, speech, and mind. Savior, please grant that all be auspicious for me to be foremost among your very first disciples wherever you manifest, so that all my temple and ultimate wishes without exception may effortlessly and spontaneously fulfill.

So now the last verse here, one one five, next page, this is where we dissolve the field of merit. We set up in the beginning. So now we imagine all the merit field dissolving from the top and bottom and sides into the heart of Lama Lozang Tubwang Dorje Chang. And then the throne dissolving up into the lotus, dissolving up into the sun disc, the mood disc, dissolving up into the body of Lama Losang Tubwang then you visualize, the body of Lama Losang Tubwang, our Lama in the form of Tsongkhapa, this pointy yellow hat in his robes, holding the begging bowl showing that he’s also Buddha, Śākyamūni. You visualize this body, top and bottom, dissolving into the heart where Dorje Chang is.

In fact, the primordial Buddha, the tantric Buddha, or the biggest Buddha, dear, as Lama answered me when I asked who he was. Dissolving into Dorje Chang at the heart. Now we visualize the lotus that Dorje Chang is sitting on at the heart of where Lama Losang Tubwang Dorje Chang were, the lotus dissolves up into a sun disc and moon disc that he’s sitting on, which dissolves into his body. And now his consort dissolves into him. And now Lama Losang Tubwang Dorje Chang, the essence of all the holy beings, comes and sits above our crown, facing the same way as we are.

And now if you haven’t taken initiation, just imagine him dissolving into you and merging with your body, speech and mind, and that’s it. And if you have taken this highest yoga tantra, you visualize it dissolves into golden blue light, enters through your crown chakra, comes down your central channel, and merges through your very subtle consciousness, your clear light mind at your heart chakra. So we think in general, you know, my body, my speech, my mind, Lama’s body, Buddha’s body, speech, Buddha’s speech, Lama’s body, Buddha’s mind. Same thing. And then we finish with you one time this mantra of my prayer.

And then we dedicate the merits. Having done all this marvelous practice, create all this merit, renewed our vows, visualized all the holy beings, made all his amazing offerings. So much, so much, so much virtuous karma exceeds creator. We should be so happy. We should have a sense of loss if we don’t do it.

So we do our best. Whatever white virtues I’ve thus created, dedicate this causes enabling me to uphold the holy Dharma scriptures and insights, and to fulfill without exception the prayers and deeds of all the Buddhas and bodhisattvas of the three times. By the force of this, I may I never be parted in all my life from Mahāyāna’s four spheres, and may I reach the end of my journey along the paths of renunciation, bodhicitta, pure view, and the two stages. Now they do the long nice single song of this. These next ones in English right here.

Due to the merits accumulated during the three times myself and all the Buddhas, which are empty from their own side, may I, who is empty from its own side, achieve the state of enlightenment which is empty from its own side, and lead all sentient beings who are empty from their own side to that state as quickly as possible by myself alone. Due to the merits of the three times created by myself and others, by the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, may I, my family members, all the students, and benefactors of the organization, all sentient beings be able to meet perfectly qualified Mahāyāna virtuous friends in all our future lives. From our side, may we always see them as enlightened and always perform only actions most pleasing to their holy minds. May we always fulfill their holy wishes instantly. Then, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, we pray and we think at the same time, as we probably don’t have the prayer here, of Lama Lhundup whose cremation is tomorrow.

We can’t think you have a long life, we think you may be reborn really soon to take another form to be a benefit to sentient beings. And we pray for the long and healthy life of Lama Zopa Rinpoche. This is his center that all his projects grow and develop, and any other holy beings we have in our heart. May they live, live long, be healthy. The world needs them.

You who uphold the vinaya moral way, who serve as the bountiful bearer of all sustaining, preserving, and spreading Mañjushri’s victorious who masterfully accomplishes magnificent prayers honoring the Three Jewels. Savior of myself and others, your disciples, please, please live long. And now for auspiciousness, just to finish our stay together. This big. Let’s do the we do the one with just the four lines.

Don’t do the one in square brackets. Sometimes they miss that one out. Why they miss out vajrapani, I don’t know, but never mind. They do. May we never develop even for a moment wrong views towards the deeds of our most precious gurus.

With faith and respect gained from seeing their goodness, may their full inspiration flow into our hearts. Okay. Thank you.