Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 40-minute session, Ven Thubten Dondrub examines analytical meditation and its power to directly transform wrong views and delusions that undermine spiritual practice. He explains how analytical meditation differs from concentration practice—it is accessible to all practitioners regardless of retreat conditions, yet extraordinarily effective because it investigates the actual obstacles to faith and genuine progress. The teaching walks through the core method: taking a point from Buddhist philosophy, checking whether you agree, and crucially, hunting for the hidden doubts (“what abouts”) that lurk beneath surface acceptance, then using reasoned argument to refute them. He distinguishes this from “glance meditation”—merely reading or reciting teachings without investigation—and shows how deep analytical work on compassion or the Four Immeasurables gives authentic power to subsequent mantra recitation and practice. The session concludes with reflections on spiritual realizations, their stability and maintenance, and an extended discussion of the Tibetan tulku system—clearing misconceptions about reincarnate lamas by grounding them in actual practice and realization. The talk ends with a guided meditation on the nature of mind, continuity of consciousness across lifetimes, and the urgent importance of using this life wisely.
File metadata (for organising)
File: How to meditate Retreat 151213_PART4.mp3
UUID: f63e06c2-a22d-4811-bc05-5bad3bd39ddb
Teacher: Ven Thubten Dondrub
Collection: DB How to Meditate (Ven Thubten Dondrub)
Date: 2014 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 39.9 minutes
Words: ~3,120
So in conclusion about analytical meditation. Analytical meditation is incredibly important. As someone pointed out in the homework, developing concentration is generally speaking quite difficult and takes a lot of time and also to really fully develop it it requires very special conditions going into retreat in very super quiet places and so on. Whereas analytical meditation is something that we can all do and the effect can be incredible because the analytical meditation really is directly dealing with whether we think of it or not with aspects of our life and dealing with our delusions and wrong views and so on. And of course the more we are able to concentrate as we’re doing analytical meditation the better but even if we are far from being able to concentrate, if we apply ourselves to analytical meditation more and more it is extremely beneficial doing analytical meditation on the Buddhist teachings.
And as I try to explain so there various levels of it but the basic process is to think the teachings make a point. A is B. If there is a, you know, A plus B or one plus two equals three, the Buddha says. So then you check, well you tend to agree, oh yes, that’s true. But you it’s especially going into analytical meditation more and more it’s really trying to discover that that sneaky mind that says, no, it’s not true.
This, you know, what about? You know, what about? You have to find that mind that says, but what about? Because that is undermining our faith and therefore the energy to practice. And we may not think we’ve got any of these what abouts but actually they’re usually lurking there.
So it’s very good to discover them and once you discover one, the point is not to agree with it but to try and, you know, find some arguments to refute it. If you if you if we have some basic trust that the Buddha was on the right track. Of course, we think the Buddha was on the wrong track, then it’s different than if we think the Buddha’s on the wrong track. Why be here in the first place? We don’t wanna be following a loser.
Right? So if if we think the Buddha was on the right track and and but we think we’ve got this what about proving the Buddha’s wrong, then we should understand that our the the thing that would that after two and a half thousand years, we alone have found some some flaw in the Buddha’s arguments is pretty arrogant. So it was probably we’re wrong, so we have to try and find a way to refute those argument. Am I making sense? Yes.
Good. Right. So that’s what one’s trying to do. So there’s another thing called, which you may have come across in your reading, which you should have because it’s in the student homework, this term ‘glance meditation’. So for example, this morning we read the four immeasurable thoughts.
You know, ‘May all sentient beings have happiness, may’ So just reading that is kind of well, or just reading some of the Lamrim teachings, just reading them and sort of kind of agreeing with it is like a glance meditation. But if one hasn’t meditated on that and investigated it, it doesn’t have a great deal of benefit and impact. That’s why, you know, I mean we only did it very briefly, but we went into doing a little bit of analytical meditation of what does it mean to say may or how wonderful it is for all sentient beings to have happiness. What is all sentient beings? What is happiness?
What is meant by happiness? And then you investigate, you analyze how people don’t have that kind of happiness. They’re not even creating the causes. So by thinking about those things, one comes to a deeper understanding so that when you do these glance meditations, it has so much more power. In the same way, if one has meditated on compassion, then when you recite Om Mani Padme Hum reciting that mantra has much more power because it has much more power to affect the mind.
Am I making some sense? Yeah? I never know if I’m just talking trivial or I just can’t even Yeah. And we have to do these analytical meditations many times because we can do it properly properly, and it can have some effect on our mind. But the sad fact is that our wrong views are have been around for many lifetimes, so they have a a lot of power.
So they keep coming back. You know, they come back. So you have to, you know, try and get rid of them again. So you do the analytical meditation, you remind yourself again about this. You know, don’t stab your enemy.
Be nice to them. Oh, no. No. Stab your enemy. No.
Be nice to him. Stab. Nice. Stab. Nice.
You know? And until eventually the thought, be nice, comes more often than stab. I’m sorry. I’m putting this very grossly, but I hope you get the the what I’m trying to say in my primitive way. But even eventually, I I don’t fully understand this, and I don’t remember all the technical details of whatever.
But a realization is the one aspect of a realization is it’s kind of it’s more or less something permanent. It stays because we can get insights, little glimpses of of, you know, these moments, but they don’t last very long. But an authentic realization is something to remain stable in your mind, but that also has limitations. Because even with an authentic realization, for example, realizing that one has a precious human rebirth or realizing that one’s gonna die or realizing that things are impermanent, one can get an authentic realization of those things. One can also gain an authentic realization of samadhi, of single pointed concentration.
But if one doesn’t maintain those realizations by reflecting on them over and again, they they go away. It’s only at a very, very, very high level of spiritual accomplishment, which I don’t know what level it is, I should know by now, but I don’t, do they actually become completely stable in the mind? But, of course, once to get a realization takes a lot of work, but once one’s got it, to maintain it only requires a little bit of effort. But one still has to to do it, and if one doesn’t, the realization will be lost. Yes.
Imprint the imprint is yes. Definitely the imprint is there. But whether whether it will actually that imprint will be able to ripen in your next lifetime that’s another big question. That’s why you know the Tibetans kind of developed the Tulku system where you catch good practitioners when they are really young whip them in a monastery where they are supposedly, hopefully, away from lots of worldly negative influences and you pump them up with the Dharma. Yes, well that’s a nice way of putting it.
Yes, yes. But also quite honestly, in those cases, some tulkus, you know, turn out well and some are duds. Just like us. Yes. Yes.
Pretty much. Yeah. Usually. Yeah. Oh, yeah.
People the kids aren’t taken screaming from their families. No. No. That doesn’t happen. Definitely not.
Because Tibetans have great faith in the dharma and it’s like Catholics in Ireland. Every Catholic family wants one of their boys in the church to be a father so and so. One of their daughters to become a nun. So same for Tibetans. You know, it was a great great thing to be ordained.
And but to be recognized as, you know, an incarnate lama, that’s very special. Yes, as I’ve said there are many levels of tulkus. Yes. Well, they don’t necessarily consciously know. That’s the point.
Because there are levels of tulkus ranging from people who just have you know, there are people who have the ability practitioners who reach a point where they can consciously choose their rebirth. So to to be able to do that, you have to be at quite a high level of spiritual accomplishment in the the light when you die to be able to consciously choose your next rebirth. But there are Tulkus who haven’t are not at that level, but they they they did practice well in a particular life. Their disciples make sure that when those those people die, they’re they’re they’re found when they’re young and get a good education, and they’re recognized as tulkus, but they’re not necessarily very spiritually advanced. They just have lots of good imprints.
Whereas there are others who are, you know, all you know, and there’s levels of you there’s you have little realizations to great ones. Because the term tulku actually means well, we’re taking up a lot of time now. I mean, the term tulku really means to be a Buddha, but in reality most tulkus are not Buddhas. Yes. Well, in the sense that everyone is a Buddha, you know, it doesn’t matter.
But here, this is something you know, don’t try and you know? You know what I’m trying to say. Yeah? Yeah? There are who well, I mean, of all, you know, of all the traditional on the planet, the main one of the main ones is his holiness, the Dalai Lama.
So he is considered to be a Buddha and not just a highly realized being. I mean, he doesn’t say so, but he is meant to be an actual Buddha, you know, a manifestation of a Buddha. But then there are other talkers who are just incarnations of good practitioners. And then there are incarnations who have some realizations. There are alarm incarnations who have high realizations from their past life and can oh, now you’ve got me going, I can’t stop.
Lama Yeshe who founded this organization, one of his gurus was, I don’t remember his name, when he was Lama’s teacher, but he passed away, and he was reborn as the son of one of Lama Yeshe’s best friends who had been a monk, who disrobed, married two sisters, which is always good, and one of the sisters had this baby, and this child was recognized as the incarnation of Lama Yeshe’s teacher, who was considered a very high lama. This little boy became a monk, was brought up at Kopan monastery, which is our monastery, our mother monastery, Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s monastery in Nepal. He was looked after as a very small boy by Lama Lhundup, who was the abbot of of Kopan monastery, who was a wonderful being, who passed away a couple of years ago. Lama Lhundrup personally told me, and he of course, he’s made it public, but I personally heard this from Lama Lhundrup himself that he because he used to have this little boy, I mean, five, six years old or something, was would sleep in his in Lama Lhundrup’s room with him. He said, at least on one occasion, he was woken up in the night by this little boy reciting in his sleep in his sleep the Abhisamayālamkāra, which was one of the five texts brought by Asaṇga back from Tuśita Pure Land, which was one of the most complicated texts on the planet, you know, about the deep meaning of the Prajñāpāramitā.
So this six year old boy was reciting it in his sleep. Yeah? So this is the real deal type tulku. Yes. Yes.
Yes. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. Some are actual bodhisattvas, some aren’t.
Yeah. And then of those who are actual bodhisattvas, there are those who have got some with no realization of emptiness, some who have actually realized emptiness, and there’s many levels of that. There’s many kinds of tulkus. Yeah. Well, this is what many people think that, you know, any any Tibetan Tibetan who’s got the name lama and practically any Tibetan monk somehow suddenly becomes a lama is, you know, can read your mind and fly in the sky and is a Buddha.
This is just simply not true, and it’s not I’m not trying to insult these people. I mean I mean, His Holiness has said that in public to people, you know, including with lots of tulkus. Like around him, says, you know, how many of you can do this or that? You know, not not many of us can we? Right. But most of them are all pretty cool guys anyway, that’s for sure.
So this one I was mentioning is called Yangsi Rinpoche. He now is the head of this organisation called Maitreya Institute in America. And he may come to Australia soon, actually. He’s very nice. We have, have we?
We are or will? We have. Great. Yes. When he when he he was at Monastery as a young man when I I lived at Sera Monastery for one year.
And some one of the monks told me there that he he used to this young Yangsi Rinpoche used to keep some of the that that there were hundreds of stray dogs at Sera. Because all the Indians would drop all the dogs off there and, yeah, hundreds of stray dogs. And Yangsi Rinpoche would keep some of them, and he would lick the pus off, you know, and snot off with his tongue. Not even your average Tibetan licks goo off stray dogs. He was also incredibly humble and one of the best scholars there.
Amazing young man. Anyway, so now we’ve got almost no time to meditate. In fact, nothing. Really? We could do a little.
Yeah. It was it was gonna be a very simple thing anyway to conclude. Okay. So we can begin by sitting comfortably in the correct posture. Then doing the nine round breathing.
So we can just briefly reflect that whole basis of the Buddha’s teachings is the acceptance that we have a mind, and that our mind in its nature is clear and knowing. The mind is something formless, like space. It exists, but it has no physical substance. Just like our thoughts, which are an aspect of our mind, they exist, but our thoughts are not physical. They’re not made up of any kind of particle.
They have no shape, no color, no dimension, no weight, but they exist. Love, compassion, kindness, anger, jealousy, pride, All of these things exist. But they are without any physical form. They are mind. They are all ways of knowing, ways of experiencing.
So check how one’s mind is arising moment by moment. It changes moment by moment. Its nature is the same in every moment. It’s clear. That is formless.
It has the ability to know, to experience. But then there’s another moment of mind, and then another, and then another, and another. In fact, the only way we can know is if for the mind to change. If the mind didn’t change, we would only know the one thing constantly. But because the mind changes, we can know something else, and then something else, and something else.
So there is a stream of consciousness arising moment by moment. Just check how with each moment of consciousness, with each moment of knowing, each moment of experiencing an integral part of the mind itself is feeling. With it with each moment of knowing, experiencing, there’s either a pleasant feeling, an unpleasant feeling happiness or suffering. It may be the feelings can vary from being very slight to very intense, but there is always some feeling. So just check, consider how, if what the Buddha discovered is true, that their mind does exist, but it’s completely formless, like space, then it does logically follow that my mind is something that existed before this life, but also it goes beyond this life.
If it’s formless, it’s indestructible, like space. You can’t end space. You can’t damage space. You can’t chop it up. Space doesn’t grow old.
And the mind, which is like space, can’t be damaged, can’t come to an end. It just goes on and on forever. Our body dies because it’s physical, but the mind just continues. So this life is like less than a finger snap in eternity. The suffering of this life is nothing to the suffering that we could experience in endless future lives.
Also think how there’s no way we can hide from our suffering. We can’t end it by suicide. That just ends a body. The mind continues to suffer. So the only answer is to deal with our suffering, to seize the opportunity to, step by step, overcome the causes of suffering within our mind.
And think and check up, if I don’t work skillfully with my mind now and let the causes of suffering continue, then suffering will continue. And if I don’t seize this opportunity now, when I’ve got the greatest freedom to work with my mind, How will I get the opportunity again in future? Bring the meditation to a conclusion by making that strong determination to be more and more mindful in daily life that since death is going to come to this body, but the mind is going to continue forever, it’s so important to use this life to prepare for my future lives. Instead of wasting this life chasing after the illusory pleasures of this life, seizing the opportunity to take care of the mind. Taking care of my mind now will bring happiness, some happiness, now and this life, and prepare the ground for happiness in future lives.
So I need to be mindful that the best way to take care of my mind day by day is to learn to meditate, to set some time aside each day to practice meditation. That’s the best offer I can make for myself and all sentient beings. Then recall the Buddha on one’s crown, imagine the Buddha very pleased with your practice of this meditation, today’s retreat, doing the whole course. Think that the Buddha dissolves into blissful golden light so that that blissful light can pour down into oneself, blessing one’s mind, to be able to really meditate well single pointedly on what is truly meaningful and virtuous and beneficial for oneself and all beings. Through the merits of these virtuous actions, may I quickly attain the state of a Guru Buddha and lead all living beings without exception into that enlightened state.
May the precious body mind, not yet born, arise and grow. May that born have no decline, but increase forevermore. Thank you very much, great yogis.