Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 123-minute teaching, Venerable Thubten Dondrub concludes his series on the eight worldly concerns—craving and fearing happiness and suffering, gain and loss, reputation and disgrace, praise and blame. He opens by anchoring the discussion in a core Buddhist challenge: the eight worldly concerns prevent genuine dharma practice and block the development of bodhicitta, the mind dedicated to liberating all sentient beings. Dondrub then walks through eight powerful antidotes Lama Zopa Rinpoche recommends, emphasizing meditation on impermanence and death as the most potent remedy. He explores how worldly concerns activate delusions, generate negative karma that ripens over lifetimes, and obscure the mind’s natural clarity and bliss. Central themes include the impermanence of samsaric happiness, the law of cause and effect, the rarity and value of precious human rebirth, and the mind-training practice of seeing suffering as meaningful. The teaching concludes with a brief introduction to emptiness as the ultimate antidote. Pitched at sincere practitioners engaged in the Graduated Path teachings and familiar with Tibetan Buddhist concepts. Dondrub’s approach is direct and philosophical, weaving rigorous analysis with personal anecdotes and repeated encouragement to move from intellectual understanding to lived meditation practice.
File metadata (for organising)
File: Eight Worldly Concerns Week 7 2015 02 26.mp3
UUID: efc98f12-2985-4bac-b4b7-4764f3b8e9d9
Teacher: Ven Thubten Dondrub
Collection: Eight Worldly Concerns (Ven Thubten Dondrub)
Date: 2015-02-26
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 123.5 minutes
Words: ~12,266
So I’d like to welcome everyone to our to the last class on the eight worldly concerns. So next week, we will start another little series. Day of Miracles. Oh, no. So next Thursday is the Day of Miracles. Right.
So which is the first of the four very holiest days of the the Buddhist year. So I’ll I’ll maybe talk a little bit about that at the end if you can remind me. Just to okay. So we’ll begin on page six of our prayer book. I prostrate to the gathering of dakinis in the three chakras who abide in the holy yoga of using space.
By your powers of clairvoyance and magical emanation, look after practitioners like a mother, her child. Om Akaro Mukham Sarva Dharmanam Adyanutpannatvat Om Ah Hum Phat Svāhā Gate Gate, Gate, Pāragate, Parasangate, bodhi Svāhā. By the teachings of the three supreme jewels possessing the power of truth, may inner and outer hindrances be transformed. May they be dispelled, may they be pacified, may they be completely pacified. May all negative forces opposed to dharma be completely pacified.
May the host of eighty thousand obstacles be pacified. May we be separated from problems and harmful conditions to Dharma. May all enjoyments be in accord with the Dharma and may there be auspiciousness and perfect happiness here right now. So then visualizing the Buddha in front of us as a source of refuge, inspiration and guidance, thinking of the Buddha as the embodiment of all the Three Jewels of refuge and the embodiment of all our perfect teachers of the past, present and future. Then we offer mandala of the whole universe as a way to request the teachings to be able to enter our mind.
We offer the as a way to help to free our mind of the delusions which are obstacles to understanding and practicing the Dharma. And we offer the mandalas a way to accumulate merit that is the basis for being able to completely understand the the teachings and to be able to practice them correctly and gain the realization. So as we continue to visualize the Buddha in front of us, thinking the Buddha is appearing there to remind us of our Buddha potential and to inspire us to realize it. We can particularly focus on all sentient beings surrounding us, thinking of all these beings encouraging us to follow the path to enlightenment, giving us the motivation to realize our Buddha potential. Because when we think of all sentient beings surrounding us, then we can be more and more aware of how we are totally dependent on all these beings, always have been, always will be, especially while we remain in saṃsāra, but also to get out of cyclic existence, we depend on the kindness of sentient beings directly and indirectly and also even to achieve enlightenment.
We can only do so in dependence on the kindness of mother sentient beings. And we think of all these beings as suffering in saṃsāra, experiencing more suffering than ourselves right now with far, far less freedom at the moment than ourselves to make sense of their suffering, to be able to modify it, transform it and eliminate it. So therefore, think that no matter what, must achieve enlightenment. I must use this in all future lives to achieve enlightenment for their sake, to be able to repay their kindness. So to achieve enlightenment, that involves following the path and to be able to follow the path, one first has to engage in the path and what prevents us doing that, or first, sorry, what we have to do is engage in Dharma practice and what prevents us, hinders us from doing that is our involvement with the eight worldly concerns.
And even when we try to practice Dharma, what prevents our practice becoming really powerful and perfect is our motivation to practice. It gets mixed up with the eight worldly concerns. So it’s really vital to be able to overcome these eight worldly concerns as much as possible. As Lama Rinpoche says, happiness begins when we give up the eight worldly concerns. So with that thought in mind, we can generate the thought for the sake of myself and all sentient beings, I will study this subject.
And study means not just intellectually look at them, but study in every sense of the word, of first coming to some intellectual understanding of these things for purpose applying that understanding to one’s mind in order to get rid of these worldly concerns. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Assembly by the merits I create through teaching the Dharma. May I become a Buddha in order to benefit all sentient beings. So we can imagine the Buddha in front of us is very pleased with our motivation and shows this by now coming towards the crown of our head, and when directly above our crown, we imagine the Buddha dissolving into blissful light so that that light can then pour into us, blessing our mind. So then briefly we can do some breathing meditation such as the nine round breathing exercise to let our mind become just a little bit more calm, clear, concentrated, so that we can use that more subtle level of mind to listen to and think about the Buddhist teachings tonight.
Okay. Thank you. So the most meaningful thing that we can possibly do is to dedicate our lives to sentient beings, generating the bodhicitta mind. When we are able to generate that mind, this brings the greatest protection from every kind of suffering. It brings the greatest meaning into our life, the greatest happiness.
But to be able to generate bodhicitta, which is the source of happiness for ourselves and all sentient beings, we firstly have to what that involves is overcoming the subtle self-cherishing thought, which has two aspects. There’s a subtle kind of self-cherishing and a gross form of self-cherishing. So the subtle self-cherishing is actually a virtuous mind that wishes to this is from a Mahāyāna point of view, because the whole idea of self-cherishing is a Mahāyāna concept, particularly as it’s presented in the Tibetan tradition. So the subtle self-cherishing, which is an obstacle to bodhicitta, is the virtuous mind that wishes to practice Dharma, engages in the practice of Dharma, but does so for the sake simply of oneself to achieve freedom from saṃsāra and to be able to experience the bliss of nirvana. So while one has that kind of subtle self-cherishing, one can’t generate bodhicitta because the focus is simply on oneself becoming free of suffering and doing everything, practicing the Dharma mainly for one’s own benefit.
So we have to get rid of that. And that comes mainly through reflecting on the kindness of mother sentient beings, how we’re totally dependent on them and how they are suffering. But underlying that, we first have to get rid of the gross self-cherishing and so the gross self-cherishing isn’t a virtuous mind at all. The subtle self-cherishing is a virtuous mind because it wants to practice the Dharma and so on. But the gross self-cherishing thought a completely negative mind that doesn’t allow us even to get a good rebirth because it’s only thinking about it has a completely wrong view of self and is cherishing oneself in a completely wrong way by following all the delusions, believing the lies that our delusions tell us.
Because attachment tells us, desire and attachment tells us, these things are wonderful and will make us happy. And our aversion tells us, and we believe our aversion that tells us, these things, these people, and these things are bad, and if we get rid of them, we’ll be okay. One of the ways our gross self-cherishing manifests is as the eight worldly concerns. One possibly could say, Oh, well, we’ll have to investigate this a bit further whether the gross self-cherishing and the eight worldly concerns are exactly the same thing. I’m not one hundred percent sure on that, but certainly the eight worldly concerns are definitely manifestations of, very active manifestations of our very gross self-cherishing thought, which is our worst enemy because it doesn’t allow us to even get a good rebirth.
And it prevents us making real use of this precious human rebirth, which is the optimum chance to free ourselves from suffering, to achieve enlightenment, the optimum chance to be of greatest benefit to all sentient beings. So what are the eight worldly concerns? Just in case you haven’t got it yet or forgotten, The eight worldly concerns are craving happiness and fearing suffering, craving gain, getting stuff and fearing losing or not gaining things, craving reputation and fearing bad reputation, craving praise and fearing blame. So in terms of craving reputation, what this is also about is craving recognition and acceptance and love and so on. And with that comes the opposite.
I think it’s really important to sort of check how if one has one aspect of the worldly concerns, the craving aspect, inevitably you have the other as well. If we crave worldly happiness, then inevitably there is the opposite of fearing suffering. If we have this craving for stuff, we inevitably have the fear of losing stuff or not getting it. If we crave reputation, inevitably it’s impossible not to have the opposite mind that fears having a bad reputation. If we crave hearing nice things, inevitably it’s inescapable that we have the mindset that fears hearing unpleasant things, especially unpleasant things about ourselves.
But in the broader context of the eight world concerns, that last set includes even just unpleasant noises like the noise of Clipsal 500, which is slightly driving me nuts at the moment. It’s getting louder by the moment. Yeah. But particularly it refers to, of course, just hearing unpleasant things about ourselves. Unpleasant sounds.
Yeah. So we crave praise, pleasant sounds about ourselves, but also pleasant sounds in general. And if we have that, inevitably, the more we have that, the more we have this fear and aversion of unpleasant sounds and criticisms and so on, and blame. Lama Zopa Rinpoche says that just like the eight worldly concerns, there are eight antidotes to these worldly concerns that we need, we can try to apply. As I was trying to say last week, of all of the eight antidotes, for us I think the most powerful one, the most effective one is understanding impermanence and death.
This is such an important topic that actually there has to be a better word than topic because topic sounds something very remote. You know, the Dharma is made up of topics, but those topics are all about our life. They’re integral aspects of our life. So one of the integral aspects of our life that the Dharma deals with is impermanence and death. The Dharma is telling us that we have to be more and more aware of impermanence and death.
And so if cultivate that awareness through meditating on impermanence and death, which we’re encouraged to do in the Lamrim teachings, the Graduated Path teachings, then that is the most accessible, powerful antidote to the worldly concerns. That everything because all the happiness we crave, that happiness arises dependent on causes and conditions, and that means it’s impermanent. Everything depending on causes and conditions, even though it may appear permanent, even though it seems to last a long time, is impermanent. It’s changing moment by moment. It’s decaying moment by moment.
It’s going to come to an end sooner or later and it can come to an end much more quickly than we ever expect. So if we had that awareness, that real understanding through meditating on it, not just knowing the words, just not being able to say, can say everything’s impermanent. Right? Anyone can say that. But we have to have some actual understanding of it, some realization of it.
The more understanding, the more realization we have of the words, the more powerful they are to change our mind. Because our delusions, remember, are extremely powerful. They’re very old. Unlike other old things which become weak with age, the delusions get stronger with age. They’ve been around since during beginningless time, so they’re incredibly powerful.
So just saying the words, This is impermanent, is not going to have much effect on something so powerful. We have to have an antidote that is as powerful, and the only way to acquire that antidote is to develop it, one self, within one’s own mind by meditating on the Lamrim, on the graduated path teachings, doing the graduated path meditations over and over again. As I’ve said many times, if you think of this as the teaching about a particular topic, such as impermanence and death, we hear it, and this is our mind, and we hear it and it touches our mind, and then as soon as the teaching stops, we forget it. We hear it again and forget it, hear it again and forget it. So we have to meditate.
Even when you meditate for a while, because the mind is so much like that, We don’t have much control of our mind. It’s still very agitated. So we meditate with a basically distracted, agitated mind. And again, the teaching touches our mind a bit and then we forget it. So we have to meditate again and again and again and and again and and and until the teaching is right in our mind in such a way it never comes out.
We have to change the analogy a bit because with a nail in a piece of wood, the nail only touches a certain part of the wood, but in this case it’s like pouring milk into water. The milk pervades all the water and stays there. So if you just mix those two analogies, you get the idea of what meditation is trying to do. Stay in the mind and pervade the mind so it affects how we experience ourself and everything through the filter of something like impermanence, experience of impermanence. So that’s really the most powerful one that counteracts all the worldly concerns, the craving for happiness, the craving for things, the craving for reputation, the craving for praise.
We can see it’s all impermanent, so why waste so much time on it, Even if we get it, because we can crave these things and work, put so much time and effort into getting these things, and it’s never sure, like in Samsāra, nothing’s definite, so we’re never sure, no matter how much effort we put into all of this, whether it will work. And the point is that even if it works and we get the reputation, we get the stuff, we get the worldly happiness, Even if we get it, even if we’re successful, it’s not going to last. Whereas if we were concerned with the Dharma, if we practise the Dharma, what we get from the Dharma, from genuine Dharma practice, pure Dharma practice, we will get that. We will succeed, because Dharma practice works. Worldly stuff doesn’t necessarily work.
Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t. But practising the Dharma works. The Buddha is the living proof of that. Our lamas are living proof of that. It works if one applies it properly.
And once one’s received the result, it doesn’t suddenly disappear. We can actually build on dharma results. And similarly, all the things that we fear, fear suffering, fear losing stuff and so on, fear having a bad reputation, criticism, again, none of it lasts. So why be so upset? Why be so bothered by it all?
If we realise that, that would have a big effect on our mind, how we lived our life. Just imagine how much time we would have if we weren’t caught up in the eight worldly concerns. The time to practice Dharma, the time to use the freedom of the precious human rebirth, this rarest freedom of all. Alright? An amazing amount of time would be available, not only in a general sense of time, but there would be that freedom in our mind.
There would be so much time in our mind, so much freedom in our mind to apply to the dharma. Because right now, the mind is so busy with the eight worldly concerns. Hard to imagine how wonderful it would be to be free. That’s what And Rinpoche says. Happiness starts when the mind is, you know, when we’re free of the eight, we give up the eight worldly concerns.
One of the other antidotes to the worldly concerns, which we talked about last week, was remembering the nature of samsaric suffering and that the happiness that we’re chasing after when we follow one side of the worldly concerns, craving happiness, craving gain, craving reputation, craving praise. All the happiness that we associate with that, that happiness is just the suffering of change. It’s not real happiness at all. It’s just illusory. It’s just a subtle kind of suffering.
So we need to remember that, and again, the way to do this is we have to meditate on it. Last week I went into a little bit of detail about how one can understand that what we label as happiness and all the things we associate with bringing happiness, that happiness is suffering. That happiness doesn’t change into suffering, it’s suffering from the very moment we experience it. So if one applies the mind to that, I think it’s relatively easy to understand that again, but just that understanding isn’t enough. We have to meditate on it to make it something really to develop a really strong conviction of the truth of that in our mind and for that conviction to then really affect the mind.
Someone wrote me an email about the eight worldly concerns saying that they’d read that just by knowing attachment is a problem, that is the solution to the eight worldly concerns. But as I’ve been trying to say, just knowing it isn’t enough. Just saying, Oh, this is not good, is not enough. For example, if as an ordinary person who is not addicted to heroin, has never taken heroin, it is enough to know that heroin, if you hear heroin is very bad for you, just to hear that is good enough not to get involved because there’s no addiction to it. There’s no experience of following it, taking it.
You just hear, as an intelligent person, you hear, Oh, that’s bad for me, so I won’t take it. But if one is already addicted to it’s not good enough to say, Oh, it’s bad for me. Those words don’t have any power. When one is addicted to something, it just doesn’t have the power. This is bad for me.
And the point is we’re all addicted to our delusions. We came into this world with the addiction. We didn’t start the addiction in this life. Came into this world totally addicted to every delusion. Well, actually, maybe that’s not completely right, because some of us are more addicted to some delusions than others.
Some people are more addicted to anger, some are more addicted to attachment, some are more addicted to pride or jealousy or whatever. But we were all addicted to all of them, yeah, since beginningless time. So just saying this is bad is not enough. We have to be absolutely convinced of this, and that only comes from allowing our mind to feel how bad it is to be completely convinced. And in Dharma practice, the way that is done is with some addictions in this life, there are other ways of reflecting on the harm that’s done oneself in this life, but from a Dharma point of view, we have to meditate on the teachings to see the truth of them again and again.
Meditate means not just one time, two times, three times, ten times. We need to meditate on it really until bitter end Not the bitter end, until we get the realisation, the happy end, the sweet end, when we really have that moment that lasts in our mind. That’s why we have to hear the same teachings over and over and over and over again, but we also have to meditate on them over and over and over again. So we have to remember the shortcomings of the delusions because all our worldly concerns are motivated by the delusions and by following those worldly concerns, we engage in the delusions even more. Because the more we crave worldly happiness, even though we don’t label that, we don’t think of it as worldly happiness, we chase after it thinking it’s the real thing.
The more we crave it, the more desperate we are for it, the more desperate we are for stuff, the more desperate we are for praise, the more we’re desperate for reputation, the more our desire and attachment will force us to engage in negative actions. And similarly, the more we fear the opposites, we have a fear and aversion of suffering, not getting stuff, fear of having a bad reputation, will and so on, we will do all sorts of negative actions. We will activate our anger and everything, all the delusions, and we’ll believe them. We’ll believe that that’s the way to do things. Because when the delusions take over, there’s not me having a delusion.
In a sense, I become the delusion. There’s a deluded me. Right now, hopefully, as we sit here with nice subdued minds, our delusions aren’t too active, so there’s a sort of a momentarily undiluted me. But then as soon as one of the delusions arise, that undiluted me has finished, doesn’t exist anymore. There’s a deluded me.
Remember, if you study emptiness and the nature of things, the I that does exist, the merely labelled I that does exist, that I is arising depending on the body and mind. So if the mind is free of delusion, I am free of delusion. But if the mind is under the control of anger, the I, the merely labelled I that does exist, is an angry I. Or it’s attachment, attachment takes over, then there is an attached me. There’s no other me existing.
There’s not a good one existing, an unattached one existing as well. There’s only one me. There’s no two mes. Don’t know what I would do without this bottle. I’m very attached to this bottle.
So we have to remember how disastrous the delusions are. Again, as I’ve been trying to say, it’s not enough just to tell ourselves, Oh, attachment is bad, desire is bad, being angry is bad, being proud is bad. That’s kind of a whole moralising attitude. We have to feel in a very deep way. We have to know why they’re bad, and that comes through studying the teachings and meditating on them.
It’s not just some abstract concept that attachment is bad, but we have to know what attachment is and use, as the teachings explain, what anger is, and use that to identify the way our anger and our attachment and so on manifest, and see from experience that every time I follow at it, it’s been a disaster. If we really investigate, as I’ve said quite a few times here already, Lama Zopa Rinpoche said, This this is my notes from the very first dharma course I ever received in nineteen seventy six from I rewrote them. It was this is another book, but this is the essence of what Rinpoche said in nineteen seventy six. Somewhere in there he says, did he say? That one of the best meditations you can do is to keep a diary of your self-cherishing.
And all, know, Dear Diary Today, I followed my self-cherishing thought. This was what happened. Yeah. So to read over that. Yeah.
Of course, maybe the result doesn’t come that day, but one can see that having followed this self-cherishing thought, this is what’s happened to me. And so just as one can do that for the self-cherishing in general, one can do that for any delusion that we follow. Dear diary, today, I followed my anger and screamed at the boss. This is what happened. No job.
Finished. Something like that, you know. But because our delusions are so strong, our addictions are so strong, it’s not enough to tell ourselves these things once, twice, three times. We have to do it, we have to keep doing it, and we have to understand it. Firstly, have to understand why not just say, Oh, this is bad.
Blindly believe. You know, the Buddha says this is bad. Society says this is bad. But we have to know, we have to believe this ourselves. We have to understand this ourselves completely, but then we have to remind ourselves again and again and again, because again and again and again, our delusions will come back and say, No, no, it’s fine.
It’s good. Ignore that. Rubbish. Buddha doesn’t know anything. He’s just a goody goody weird creepo guy.
Forget that. You know? Get angry. It works. Straight away.
All this Dharma stuff, you know, never seems to you know, I’ve been doing it for years. No no benefit. Forget that. Get angry. Steal.
Rob. You know? You get the result immediately. It’s good. Quick and instant result, because that’s what self-cherishing wants.
It wants things right now. It wants happiness right now, and it wants the end of suffering, the problem, to go away right now and very, very quickly and very, very easily. Yeah. And that’s what we’re habituated to. We’re addicted to that, all of us.
Sorry. I am I don’t know. A great bodhisattvas out there. Yeah? So we have to be really convinced, and then more than that, we have to be mindful of that over and over again and apply it in the situation, Because again, due to our addictions, we get the understanding, Yes, I’ve got this, but I shouldn’t do this now.
I know that, but tomorrow I won’t, but well, it’s too difficult today, but tomorrow I’ll stop. I won’t do it tomorrow. We have to apply our understanding straight away. You know, there’s the great example, which you’ve probably all heard a million times, but I’ll just make it a million times in the Kadampa teachings. Know, the Lamas always give this example from the Kadampa because the Kadampa masters were renowned for practicing everything that the Buddha taught exactly as the Buddha taught right straight away.
And there’s the story of the the Kadampa master who was living in a cave way up in the mountains somewhere, and he was reading the Vinaya, which is the teachings on the monastic discipline. And he read somewhere as he he was reading this text, and he was sitting on an animal skin, you know, as his meditation mat. And he was a monk. And then he read in the Vinaya that monks should not use animal skins. So as soon as he read that, he jumped up, picked up his animal skin mat, threw it out the the cave, and sat on the ground because, you know, he couldn’t do that.
You know, it was very difficult freezing cold up in the mountains in Himalayan not the Adelaide Mountains, hills, Himalayan mountains. And then he kept reading and then he read further on in the text, but in certain situations where it’s extremely cold, it’s okay to use animal skin. So he rushed out, brought it back and sat on it. So like that, the lamas say, This is how we should practice, exactly according to what’s going on. So in the case of our delusions, we have to stop the delusion when it arises, not tomorrow when it’s arising, but when it might arise, but actually when there and we’ve recognized it’s there.
That’s what we have to do. So the third of the antidotes that Rinpoche mentions to overcome all of the worldly concerns is remembering the law of cause and effect. So this is just an extension of remembering all the harm of the delusions. Maybe I’ll just go back just to remind you. The harm of the delusions is that it becomes the motivating force for negative actions, creating negative karma, engaging in negative actions which generate negative imprints that can only ripen in suffering, including the incredible, inconceivable suffering of the lower realms.
But also, if one finds it hard to believe that, there is another very harmful aspect of the delusions, is that every time a delusion arises in our mind, it is creating an imprint of that same delusion. There are two kinds of imprints that we can generate. There are karmic imprints that ripen our suffering, but every time we follow, attachment arises in our mind, pride, jealousy, anger arise, an imprint of that delusion is generated in the mind. And that imprint will also ripen in the future. How does it ripen?
As another event of that same delusion. So every time we follow desire, we are putting imprints in our mind to follow desire even more in the future. Every time we get angry, we’re creating a habit to get angry again, or the imprint to get angry again. That’s definite, that’s guaranteed. Every time we follow pride, we are creating an imprint, an energy, a potency to follow pride, to experience pride again.
And of course, when we experience it again, we’re likely to act on it, engage in negative actions, generate negative imprints, which can only ripen as suffering. And remember, if we engage in extremely negative well, especially with throwing karmas, negative throwing karmas, one of the four results of a negative throwing karma is the habit. One has the habit to do the same kind of action again. Lama Zopa Rinpoche says this is the worst aspect of karma, of negative karmic results, because by having the habit to do the negative action again, then engage in the negative action again, create negative imprints which ripen and bring the same four results again, one of which is the habit. So we perpetuate this negative behaviour which keeps us in saṃsāra over and over and over again.
So these things we need to meditate on. Yeah? Because apart from anything else, by meditating on them, driving that imprint in our consciousness. Fortunately, this is how things just happen spontaneously, naturally. If build up these imprints through meditation in our consciousness, when negative situations arise, when delusions arise and we’re about to engage in negative actions, what tends to happen if we’ve meditated is that understanding also surfaces in our consciousness and that can act as the antidote.
So the more we’ve thought about these things and meditated on them, the more likely that will arise in our consciousness when these negative things start to arise. And the more we’ve meditated on them and so on, not only will they arise, but they will arise strongly to be able to have some effect, to counteract, to undermine that negative state that is beginning to develop. Yeah, so we have to remember karma by following the eight worldly concerns. We’re activating our delusions. We’re engaging in negative actions, and those negative actions not only have results in this life, but what we need to understand about the law of cause and effect is that the real results come later in future lives, and those results are far more profound, far longer lasting than the results in this life.
So in the case of negative actions, the suffering is far greater than any suffering that comes from following the worldly concerns in this life. The suffering is far greater and lasts far longer. And as I was saying, one of the karmic results is the habit, which encourages us to do actions again and again and again. And it’s also really important to reflect on not only when we engage in negative actions, are we creating these negative imprints that can only ripen the suffering if they’re not purified, but these negative imprints, While they’re existing and before they ripen, they are having this passive effect of obscuring our mind. Right now all of us have all these negative imprints, you know, all of us here, well every sentient being, but just let’s take this bunch here, us here, we all have Buddha potential.
The nature of our mind is to be omniscient, to know everything unmistakenly, with an unmistaken awareness that is spontaneously pervaded by great love, great compassion, etcetera, etcetera. But that mind isn’t functioning. Why? Because it’s obscured. It’s obscured by ignorance and the imprints of delusions and karmic imprints.
And by following the eight worldly concerns, trying to be happy, trying to be free of suffering, in fact, we just add more negative imprints to our mind which just obscure our mind more, And then what what is the nature of the obscured mind? It is suffering. The obscured mind is a suffering mind because what is being obscured is all the goodness of the mind, the purity of the mind, the love and compassion. When we obscure our mind, we’re not obscuring the hatred, we’re not obscuring the anger and attachment and desire. We’re obscuring all the good stuff and we’re obscuring the natural bliss of the mind.
The Buddha says that the nature of our mind, believe it or not, is blissful, utterly blissful. And that gets obscured we and we do that, nobody else, by following the eight worldly concerns, which we follow believing it’s going to do the very opposite to what it actually does. And especially from a Mahāyāna point of view, I think obscuring our mind with negative imprints and obscuring our mind with more imprints of the delusions is much worse than creating the cause of suffering for ourselves. Because with an obscured mind, the more obscured our mind becomes, the less able we are to be of benefit to sentient beings, which is the most meaningful, wonderful thing to do. This is what the Mahāyāna teachings are telling us, is that benefiting sentient beings, dedicating our life to benefiting sentient beings is the way to go.
If we want happiness, that’s the best way, is to work for the happiness of others. And what prevents us doing that, all our obscurations prevent us doing that. And even if we try to do it with an obscured mind, it’s just so much more difficult. We keep creating these obstacles to the very thing that we want to do. We are starting to understand is the best thing to do.
Next antidote. Next antidote is to remember that our belief We follow the eight worldly concerns thinking this is what they tell us, that our worldly concerns tell us that we are going to be happy as a result. We’re gonna be happy. And what what happiness do we think we’re going to get? We think we’re going to get permanent happiness.
So we have to remember that this belief of of the permanence of our happiness is just a delusion itself. It’s a wrong conception. It’s an invalid mind. We have to remind ourselves over and over again that all worldly happiness will go away. It just won’t last.
All of it comes to an end. It will definitely come to an end with our death. Whatever worldly happiness we have ends with death, but it can end long before that because it’s impermanent. It has arisen depending on causes and conditions. It depends on our unstable mind.
One day we like something, the next day we don’t. Today I’m happy because I’ve got this because my mind has decided this is what I want, I need for happiness, the next day my mind can change. I don’t like it anymore, and then I’m not happy anymore. So the things themselves can change, are changing, not that they can change, they are changing, so our happiness can fade away, but also the mind experiencing these things changes. So there’s no hope for happiness in saṃsāra, in saṃsāra.
That’s pretty depressing, isn’t it? But we can’t we can’t end on a depressing note, so I’ll try. Rinpoche once said something which when I heard it, it very amazing and impressive, but I don’t think I can really explain. Anyway, I’m trying. Rinpoche always says things so so well and anyway.
Rinpoche once made the point that, like, because we’re in Samsāra, we are suffering. We are experiencing the, you know, the truth of suffering, the true true suffering. We are experiencing true suffering simply because we’re in saṃsāra. But Rinpoche said, true suffering means everything’s unsatisfying, really. Ultimately, it’s unsatisfying.
But Rinpoche says, even when one is in saṃsāra and therefore experiencing true suffering, by practicing the Dharma practicing the Dharma is meaningful. It is a meaningful thing to do, to practice the Dharma. By practicing something which is meaningful, this is satisfying. It brings some satisfaction to know one, even if one can’t practice the Dharma purely and perfectly and continuously, but one knows is trying to, one knows one is doing something or trying to do something that is actually meaningful to do, then that brings some satisfaction in the mind. Therefore, by practicing the Dharma, even though one is still in saṃsāra, one is no longer an example of true suffering.
While in saṃsāra in general, someone who is not practising the Dharma is just an example of true suffering. One’s life without dharma is just an example of true suffering. By practising the dharma, doing something which is meaningful, that brings some satisfaction so one is no longer an example of just true suffering. Obviously that didn’t move your mind very much. I found it very helpful when I heard that, but that’s because Rinpoche said it, not anyway.
When Rinpoche says it to you, you’ll get it. Anyway, think about it. To Not allowed to? What? What are we allowed to We’re supposed to push the Dharma onto people.
Only because you can’t, we can’t. Even the Buddha can’t. It’s really difficult. But that’s why we have that’s why we have to become a Buddha. That’s the whole point.
Because, yes, people are suffering and creating the causes of suffering blindly. So just like the Buddha came and fortunately, we are starting to get the Buddha’s message. We have to become a Buddha so that some people will start to get our message when we are Buddhas, and their life can start to transform. Because no matter how much you see other people suffering, and and you can see why, if people don’t have the karmic connection, you can’t do anything. You just make worse.
That’s why one has to become incredibly skilled, incredibly patient, incredibly generous, incredibly wise, incredibly compassionate. In other words, one has to become a Buddha. But it also means since, you know, if we say, oh, I can see how terrible these other people are trapped in saṃsāra helplessly, then more than that should motivate us to give up the of concerns, right, in practice. Because continuing the eight worldly concerns isn’t helping others. It’s actually creating an obstacle for us to help them.
Yeah. Okay. Maybe I could talk about that after the break because we’re coming to that as a remedy also. Okay. Okay.
Yeah. So we’ll take a tea break. Thank you. So again, for that particular antidote to work, remembering that the happiness that we’re chasing and afraid of losing is something that actually, even if we get it, is not going to last. For that to work, again, we have to it’s not just enough to say the words, you know, worldly happiness is impermanent.
We have to have really applied our mind to thinking about that strongly to come to the conviction that that is actually true, that whatever happiness we experience, samsaric happiness, the happiness that comes from depending on a mind controlled by delusion and karma and depending on external things, that happiness is never going to last. So the more we are convinced of that, if we actually are convinced of that, that that is true, that that is the reality, why would we spend so much time chasing after it? The reason we spend so much time is because we are convinced that we’re going to get something that’s going to last. This is gonna be complete. Yeah?
Because and that’s what attachment tells us. It lies. It creates this illusion that something is much better than it is. An aspect of that illusion is that it appears to be permanent. All the delusions do that.
Know, anger makes things appear worse than they are and makes them appear to be permanently like that. And we believe that. We’re habituated to believing it. We have to you remember, what does meditation mean? Gom means to habituate the mind with something which is actually true and virtuous, whereas our mind is habituated basically the samsaric mind is habituated with what is not true and not virtuous.
So as we habituate ourselves with what is true and virtuous, what is actually happening is we are, what’s the word, de habituating and deconstructing the mind that believes in these false non virtuous things. That’s what meditation is. And our precious human rebirth is gives us it’s only with the precious human rebirth when we have the freedom to understand the harm of the worldly concerns, to undermine them, to actually meditate, to look at how our mind actually works, and even to know that we’ve got a mind. Right? Was it yesterday I was at a funeral for a man who was he was ninety four when he died, but in the last I don’t know how long, but at least five or six years of his life, became Buddhist, quite genuine in his practice and so on.
And so he wanted a Buddhist funeral, but everyone else at the funeral, except Jan who was there, everyone else, all his family and friends weren’t Buddhist at all. So I’m trying to say something about Buddhists believe in the mind and it goes on forever, but you’re thinking people don’t even know what the mind is. No idea of what the mind is. So we’ve met the Dharma, so we have a chance to have some idea. Maybe we don’t understand very well what the mind is, but we’ve got some idea.
Well, we’re beginning to get some idea of what the Buddha means by the mind. And that it’s the key, it’s the key to everything. So with a precious human rebirth, one has the freedom to understand, even to know that we’ve got a mind. That itself is pretty amazing. I mean, here I go again, my little hobby horse scientific materialism is working so hard to prove that we haven’t got a mind, that all we’ve got is a brain, this lump of grey stuff in our head, and there’s so much proof that that’s all we’ve got.
So depressing. Yeah. But there is the dharma, and then there are lamas who are showing us that there is mind. Yeah. And we’ve got the freedom to work with our mind.
Pretty amazing. So lucky. But the eight worldly concerns tell us, Don’t worry about your mind. Happiness is out there. Look, there it is in the supermarket.
So shiny, and you just get your trolley and quickly and easily get it. Pile all that happiness into the trolley and home you go. Don’t worry about your mind. Mind is, you know, even if it exists, it’s so hard to do anything with it. It takes so much time.
Don’t worry. Just get that shopping trolley out and we’ll be okay. Okay. Seventh, we’re getting towards the end. The seventh antidote, Rinpoche suggests, we work on to overcome our worldly concerns is to remember that our previous good life’s good karma is running out in this life.
This precious human rebirth, Just to have a human rebirth requires so much hard work in previous lives to create the cause, to have a good rebirth in the upper realms. And then to have a precious human rebirth with all the eight freedoms, all the ten endowments. This is incredibly rare in time and space. Remember, rarer than that tortoise sticking its tortoise turtle, either sticking its head through the golden yoke, even rarer than that. Yeah.
So many lives spent to have just this maybe hundred years or less of this life. So it’s running out day by day, every day. Our life is running out, which means the freedom to create the causes to be free of suffering is running out. Therefore, we shouldn’t waste our time on the eight worldly concerns, but recognize how precious this life is, what an amazing opportunity it is. Again, we have to meditate on that again and again to really drive it home.
Actually, it’s very terrible for me to keep telling you you should meditate to get all these realizations because I haven’t got any realizations either. Or maybe you do have, but I don’t. I’ve heard that, so please don’t, anyway, just for sake of making a point, I’ve heard this story about the tortoise and the golden yoke since nineteen seventy six, know, Lama Zopa Rinpoche. It’s in his book, The Wishfulfilling Golden Sun. I think it’s in there, isn’t And Rinpoche mentioned it in his teachings, and ever since then I’ve heard many Lamas talk about the tortoise and the golden yoke.
I’ve heard it many, many times. And then, I don’t know, some years ago, I think maybe it was Rinpoche or maybe I was just reading it, and for a moment, I’m not claiming I got any realizations, not at all, but it really struck me what that meant. Because that story comes from the Buddha, told by the Buddha in one of the sutras, and the Buddha says the bit that got me is where the Buddha says that to have a precious human rebirth is rarer than that example, than that analogy, and I actually, for a moment, got that. It freaked me out, that, yeah, to have a precious human rebirth is rarer than that example. Of course, you don’t have to believe in golden yokes and tortoises and things.
That’s just an analogy, right? But the analogy shows that sticking your head through the golden yoke is very, very rare and difficult. And but we to get a precious human rebirth, far more rare and hard to get. And after hearing that story so many times, I read it once or maybe I heard it from somebody again, and I got it for a while, an illusory realisation, not a complete one, that the precious human rebirth is my precious what I’m experiencing is unbelievably rare. And then we spend it on rubbish.
This is really a disaster. But, you know, our world of concerns tell us this nonsense is fantastic. It’s so important. Me, while I’m in there, I’ll just quote from Rinpoche again. Rinpoche said something along the these are just my notes, anyway Rinpoche says, For those not following the eight worldly concerns, that is for Dharma practitioners such as Lama Zopa Rinpoche himself, or if you remember those of you who came to Khadro-la’s teachings here late last year, I’m not sure.
Anyway, I think towards the end, it was at the last teaching here, Khadro-la said that she had no realizations, nothing. She was just a very ordinary person, blah blah blah. But she said, The one thing I can say honestly is I don’t have the eight worldly concerns, which is in itself quite amazing when one realizes what that really means. Now, given up. Rinpoche said, for someone not following the Eight worldly concerns, for someone who is a genuine dharma practitioner, the rich, the powerful, the famous, in other words, all the people that we think are so wonderful and important and they themselves think they are so wonderful and important.
So for a dharma practitioner, such people look foolish like animals. How their life is only a cause of suffering, so in fact that they are objects of compassion. Is a disease of the brain, but it’s not actually a disease of the mind when you say when when there’s a distinction between the mind and the brain. So there’s still a person there. We’re taught that, you know, that so when you’re looking after them in care Mhmm.
Our relatives would say, they don’t recognize me anymore. That’s the brain that doesn’t recognize me. But I’m just trying to find an interesting distinguishing factor of what you’re saying before about science says the mind is the brain or the brain is all that there is. Then that’s fact, we’ve got a mind. In actual fact, for Buddhists.
Yeah. But scientists don’t say we have. No. That’s the point. Case of dementia where the brain gets diseased and they lose people who develop various kinds of dementia Mhmm.
Lose the capacity to to, you know, live everyday lives. So what about their mind? I’m wondering, you know, where is their mind? Their mind’s there. Their mind is there.
But there are different levels of mind. Remember, from a Buddhist point of view, especially from a tantric point of view, are three levels of mind and there is the gross mind and the gross mind of this life. So the gross mind of this life ultimately depends on the very subtle mind which goes from life to life, which is beginningless and endless. And it’s the very subtle mind that achieves enlightenment. But from that very subtle mind arises the subtle mind and from that manifests the gross mind.
When we talk about the mind now, the mind we’re using and experiencing is the gross mind. And that gross mind does depend on the brain and the nervous system in this body. It’s not the product of the brain and nervous system, but it does, in order to function, it depends on the brain and nervous system. So for someone whose brain is damaged in some way, physically or through age or disease or whatever, and you have dementia, then that gross mind cannot function the way it could because the brain is damaged. But the mind is still there.
And the very subtle mind nothing can affect the very subtle mind. Is the subtle mind like a character character? No. No. No.
No. No. Your character is, you know, you, you know, the person. This child you’re talking about is maybe serious, so he’s a serious person in this life. That seriousness, or what appears to be seriousness, is a karmic result of maybe, and it can be explained by this being is bringing into this life all these karmic imprints from a past life, so his personality is maybe more serious than others.
Yeah. It’s fascinating to me that it can be the trait can be seen at such a young age. You can’t even talk yet. Oh, sure. Yeah.
Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Back to the seventh antidote. Remember to remember that our good karma is running out.
Yeah. Took us a long time and it’s running out. And by following the eight worldly concerns, we are not creating the good karma to have good experiences in the future. That’s what we need to remember. All the good karma we’re using up, it’s okay if we continue to practice the Dharma because we’re replacing that karma we’re using up.
But if we follow the eight worldly concerns, we’re not able to replace that good karma. So then nothing in the bank account whatsoever. You’ve got money in your bank account and you spend it, it’s okay if you’re earning some money to replace it. But when we engage in the eight worldly concerns, we’re not replacing our good karma at all. And by engaging in the Eight worldly concerns, we’re using up the time where we could engage in the good actions that replace the good karma we’re using up.
So this is what we need to remember. Again, sorry. We have to meditate on it again and again. We can get the point intellectually, we can understand, Oh yeah, that makes sense. But for that understanding to really affect our mind, we have to think about it a lot, to be really convinced that that is that is the case, to really understand how karma works.
But sorry, I can’t help myself as usual. But the the law of cause and effect says that every experience we have, good or bad, suffering or happiness, That is the karmic result of an action done in the past. So to have a plate of delicious food in front of us, that is the karmic result of some good action we did in the past. Right? Some karmic imprint has ripened as the result of a plate of delicious food in front of us.
Yeah? So every time, you know, with each mouthful that we eat of this delicious food, we’re eating our good karma. Good karmic imprints in a sense. Yeah. And just eating doesn’t create any good new good karma unless one does it with the bodhicitta motivation, etcetera, etcetera.
That’s why Rinpoche encourages us to bless our food, transform everything with bodhicitta motivation. But again, that’s easy to say the words, actually do it is another thing altogether. But in following the eight worldly concerns, it’s just like we’re just eating up our good karma and not replacing it. And everything looks like it’s going well. You know?
For example, one can be rich and famous and blah blah blah and all the good things, but that’s not creating the cause for another good rebirth. I have to ask this question. So does that follow the if one has developed the what achieved in mind, is that even though one does experience the eighth world concern, but offers but offers that experience up to full full benefit of all sentient beings rather than just delivering a void, you know, because we are looking at we live in a I mean, our existence is amongst the ape world concern. It’s all around us. Oh.
So, you know, how how how should I can I avoid experiencing this craving and how can I Well, I just mentioned all the ways? Yeah. Okay. Well Yeah. Other day.
Yes. Yeah. You mix two things together there when you said we’re surrounded by the eight world of consensus and not true. What we are we’re surrounded by, for example, beautiful things. Yeah?
And we’re surrounded by, well, you know, unpleasant things, and we’re surrounded by people who say nice things and who say bad things about us. But then there’s whether we are are we concerned about those? The worldly concerns are mental states, not things. And saying we have to give up the eight world of concerns is not saying we have to give up having nice things or eating nice food or we shouldn’t ever have anyone say nice things about us. None of those things in themselves are a problem.
The problem is the mind that has attachment to those things and craves them, you know, and becomes dependent on them. And the nature of attachment, remember, is to exact one aspect or one way of describing it is one attachment projects onto something pleasant, makes it so much more pleasant, wonderful, blah blah blah, and permanent than it is. And one way of one aspect of that or one danger of that is attachment gives an ultimate value to something that just it doesn’t have. To be rich, that is the ultimate thing, to have this piece of clothing that was designed by blah blah, you know, blah blah, mister blah blah. You know, this is the ultimate happiness to have that or to, you know, to eat at such and such a restaurant, the most expensive, that is the ultimate thing.
Some people believe that. Maybe not consciously, but be with famous people expensive places or, you know, I mean there’s levels of that, you know. This is the ultimate thing, the ultimate thing in life. Yeah. So, you know, eating expensive food is nice.
Sure. Delicious. But to give it an ultimate value and therefore, you know, and spend one’s life trying to do that, you know, or to yeah. If if I had the opportunity for experiencing nice food, then one should be grateful for that. And and Yeah.
To my earlier question, they’re offering it up. Yes. Yes. Each one has developed from bodhicitta mind. It is an opportunity.
Yeah. Well, remember, developing bodhicitta mind is a way you know, it is a major accomplishment. Even before we do that, we can try and do things with a bodhicitta. You know, it’s only a superficial thing, yeah, but even with even leave aside bodhicitta, one shouldn’t, but for the temporarily leave aside bodhicitta, it’s just a matter of putting things in perspective. Yeah.
This is nice. Nice clothes are it’s nice to have nice clothes. It’s nice to have nice cars. It’s nice to have people say nice things about you. Blah blah.
But, you know, it it’s all impermanent. It doesn’t you know, it’s okay. That’s it. And it’s gonna finish and blah blah blah. You have to we have to try and put it in perspective, but the eight worldly concerns say, if I don’t have this, you know, I’ve got to have this, and if I don’t have that, it’s a disaster.
You know? You know, you see this with with people who follow sports and things, you know, when their their team wins, they’re hysterical. And when they lose, they’re you know, with some people I I mean, really, it’s a disaster. Right? It’s a disaster.
About when they let the state. Well, people riot and kill each other in some places because it’s so important, especially these national games, you know, one country against another. But there’s so many things like that which we put We have some thing and we break it and, you know, we’re so unhappy because we’ve we’ve put so much attachment onto this thing. We’ve given it such ultimate value that, yeah, that it can’t bear. So that’s the worldly concerns, not these things, you know.
The way that we expect them. Yeah, it’s how we are concerned about them unnecessarily. This is what the the the, you know, the realized beings are telling us. We don’t have to be of course, we should be, you know, if people dislike us and blah blah blah, there’s things to do, but we developed this huge concern about it. That if people don’t like me, my life’s not worth living.
If they criticize me, that’s the end. You know? So very quickly, last one. Last antidote. Oh, I I haven’t mentioned one antidote.
Oh, there’s two more. Anyway, is to see suffering as a good thing. So this relates to Lojong, mind training, where transforming problems into happiness. So are under the control of the worldly concerns because we see suffering as such a terrible thing, and that’s why anything that will distract us, we crave it so much. We crave reputation and praise and things and worldly happiness as the antidote to suffering, and the more we have that craving, then that suffering is so unbelievably bad.
But in the mind training teachings, one can train the mind not to see suffering so bad. Because the more we focus on how bad something is, the more it appears that way. However however our mind labels something and believes that label, we experience something in that way. And the more we focus on something, the more it dominates our mind. So in Lojong teachings, the mind transformation teachings, it points out that in order to be able to see suffering as a good thing, well, there’s many ways to do that.
The simplest way is to realize our suffering is the result of our negative karma. So to experience this suffering now in this life is a good thing because in this life I have met the dharma, I understand why my suffering is occurring, that it is the result of negative actions. It’s not because I’m a helpless victim of something, I’m being punished by someone or something. It’s because this is the karmic result of creating a negative action. So why be so upset by suffering?
And also it’s good that this suffering is occurring in this life because in this life I’m able to bear it. If it was to occur in another life, in another situation, it would be unbearable. But but because my life because I have such a good life, a precious human rebirth, this suffering may be unpleasant, but it’s bearable. It’s manageable. Whereas in the other lives, when you see other people with all the suffering they’ve got, to experience something on top of that becomes unbearable.
So actually, experience some suffering now is a good thing, and it’s reminding me not to create negative karma. This suffering is good because it’s reminding me not to create negative karma. It’s reminding me, it’s a teaching telling me about the truth of the law of cause and effect. It’s just teaching, reminding me not to follow attachment, not to follow aversion. So it’s good.
But also in transforming, seeing the good side of suffering, normally, as an ordinary person, when we experience suffering, it is just natural, meaning we’re habituated to it, to only see suffering as bad, as one hundred percent bad. We focus completely on all the terrible aspects, and because we focus on that without anything modifying it, whatever suffering we’re experiencing, it is overwhelming. It’s a hundred percent bad. In mind training, what we try to do is we don’t deny that we’re experiencing a problem, we’re experiencing some suffering, but what we have to train the mind to do step by step is not to focus on all the bad things, but try and find some positive aspect of that situation. Not pretend there is a positive aspect, but find an actual positive aspect and focus on that as much as possible.
That won’t make the suffering go away. It will make the suffering meaningful, because there’s a positive aspect. And by making it meaningful, it will become bearable. And it won’t be so bad. It will be meaningful.
It’ll become a good thing. The experiencing and the suffering will be something meaningful. So if we are able to use this precious human rebirth start training the mind in Lojong, this radical ability to see the positive aspects of suffering, if we start to cultivate that mindset, then that is one of the best antidotes to the eight worldly concerns, because the eight worldly concerns are based on having this incredible fear of the slightest kind of suffering in any form. You know? Someone looks at me in a wrong way.
Can’t bear it. You know? They say the tiniest little thing against me or some something. You know? I think we’ve probably or maybe not.
Possibly, we’ll have the experience where we say something to someone which we, you know, is just from our side is just completely, what, has no bad intention. Maybe it’s just some suggestion, some advice, or it’s just a mere comment, and the person really takes it completely some other way. Or maybe we do that also. People say something to us which was just well intentioned and blah. And because we have that, we have the thing where we crave the slightest thing that anything that will distract us from all of that.
Yeah? So we label that happiness. Yeah. And because we get attached to that, then anything which is not that is bad, is suffering, is terrible, unbelievably terrible, and permanently terrible, which is really bad. But if we could see the good side of suffering as a dharma practitioner, what’s to be worried about?
So there’s no time to talk about Tonglen. Tonglen. Sorry. The Tonglen comes within that where where one imagines taking on suffering from others. So I’ll second that motion.
Okay. And the final antidote to the eight world concerns, which I’ve left no time to talk about because it’s the most complicated one, emptiness. If we have some understanding of the true nature of things, how they are empty of inherent existence, Because all these things that we’re attached to, they appear out there from their own side to be like that, inherently beautiful, really like that, completely separate from their own side. And this is so bad from its own side under its own power. That’s how we relate to the world.
And of course, when we relate to the world like that, then it’s very easy to get caught up in the eight worldly concerns. But if we could start to develop some understanding that things don’t exist that way, they appear that way, but in reality they don’t exist that way, and they can’t exist that way. The only reason this beautiful flower appears beautiful is because my mind is labelling it that way. It doesn’t appear that this this you know, it it looks like that flower is really beautiful. There, the beauty is there.
But it’s not. You can’t find the beauty in there anywhere at all. That is projected. It is labelled by the mind depending on the base, which depends on causes and conditions. If we really had some understanding and especially some experience of that, we could enjoy this flower because it is beautiful.
But we wouldn’t get caught up in it. We wouldn’t get attached to it. We could enjoy it, but we wouldn’t we wouldn’t crave it. We wouldn’t be attached to it. We could see something as dangerous or harmful, unpleasant, but we wouldn’t be afraid of it because we would understand it depends on our mind.
They say I don’t know if anyone here can do lucid dreaming. I certainly can’t, but some people are able to do lucid dreaming where they dream but they’re aware that they are dreaming. So all sorts of horrendous things can happen in the dream, but it’s not a problem because they know, oh, it’s just a dream and it’s coming from my mind. So same. Like, this is when one one has realised emptiness, everything appears like being in a dream.
Nice things, scary things, good things, bad things, but one totally knows experiences, not just knowing in the sense of words, you know, but actually is experiencing, yes, this is appearing, but it’s all coming from my mind. It’s all depending on my mind. Oh, scary. Oh, yeah, it looks pretty scary, but it’s just arising. So that is the antidote, the ultimate antidote to the worldly concerns is realising emptiness.
Experiencing emptiness. But why haven’t we experienced emptiness? Because we’re under the control of the eight worldly concerns. We haven’t given ourselves time to study the teachings on emptiness because our worldly concerns tell us that’s not important. This is supermarket shopping.
That’s important. Television is important. You know, this is important. Sleeping is important. Being a couch potato is important.
Yeah. That’s what our worldly concerns tell us. But the Buddha and the Lamas, who are the emanations of the Buddha, are telling us the Dharma is what is really important. That’s what we really need, not the objects of the worldly concerns. Thank you very much.
That was it. So we can dedicate the positive imprints of tonight. May they become a cause for us to be able to see all the harm of the eight worldly concerns, renounce them, free the mind to be able to practice the Dharma, achieve enlightenment for the sake of all kind suffering mother beings. We start on page nine. 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. Page eleven. The object of refuge of myself and of all transmigratory beings in all our lifetimes is the embodiment of the Three Jewels, the all encompassing three refuges in one, the Guru, the wish granting jewel, His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, the Master Padmasambhava, the Dharma King Songtsen Gampo and Trisong Detsen, the Abbot Shāntarakshita and the numberless holy beings who preserved and spread the Buddhadharma in Tibet, and the Tibetan people who practiced and served Buddhism so faithfully for a thousand years, as well as those who along with many others died sacrificing their lives for Tibet and His Holiness. May all their positive wishes be fulfilled immediately.
Due to their limitless kindness, the son of Tibetan Buddhism has now risen in the West, which was a dark land. But now that I have met with the Dharma, I have received the perfect human body, enabling me to lead a meaningful life. Our refuge and savior, the Supreme One, His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, and the Tibetan people have been so kind to us. Remembering this, we make the following dedication prayers: May all His Holiness, the Dalai Lama’s wishes, be successful immediately. The land of Tibet achieve pure freedom and develop the Buddhadharma even more than before in Tibet.
And may all mother transmigratory beings achieve enlightenment quickly. Page thirteen. Savior of the snow land teachings and transmigratory beings who makes extremely clear the path that is unification of emptiness and compassion to the Lotus holder Tenzin Gyatso I beseech, may all your holy wishes be spontaneously fulfilled. You who uphold the subdue is moral way, who serve as the bountiful bearer of all, sustaining, preserving, spreading Mañjuśrī’s victorious doctrine, who masterfully accomplished some prayers honoring the Three Jewels, savior of myself and others, your disciples, please, please live long. Lord of Dharma, who in accordance with the various dispositions of those to be subdued, makes clear in the light of your well spoken advice, the sacred Ganden tradition, essence of Buddha’s teachings, O foremost and holy Lama, to you who are supreme, O Lama, please, please live long.
But was wasn’t there something I was supposed to say at the end? Next week, the day when it’s called Oh. Yeah. Sorry. It’s getting late, but just very briefly, next week, next Thursday, is one of the first of the four most holy days of the Buddhist year, the day of miracles.
So this is a day when the Buddha manifested many, many miracles to convert all sorts of non believers at Shravasti. So it is said on these very special days that the karmic actions that we engage in, the karmic imprints from those have far, far greater power, hundreds of thousands of times more than any karmic imprints created at other times. So it’s an important day to try to dedicate to practice avoiding negative actions and engaging in virtuous actions as much as possible. So for this reason, we have precepts at six o’clock in the morning at the Eight Mahāyāna Precepts. We do that ceremony here at the center, but it’s very good if you can do that at home also.
And then we have a lunch, eleven o’clock, eleven eleven thirty, shared lunch here. And then there is the setting up of making the altar really beautiful in the afternoon so that we do Śākyamūni Buddha puja in the evening. And two o’clock Golden Light Sūtra. Oh, two o’clock. Two o’clock.
There’s the reading of the Golden Light Sūtra here at the center. Śākyamūni Buddha Puja at seven with light offerings. So many things, virtuous things, you can come along to all or one or none. But one thing I try and encourage people to do on this super holy day and all the other holy days of the year is, since it is one of the special days as a Buddhist, to take the day off work, not work that day and dedicate it to Dharma. Good.
Yeah. But really, think about it. Plan. Yeah. If you can’t take the day off work this time, the main day is Sakadawa, which is which day?
Do you remember what date that is? June the second. June the second. June the second. So you’ve got to take work day off work.
Yeah. Have to dedicate. Right. Okay. Thank you very much.
We won’t do prostrations tonight because it’s the end of this little course, so it’s considered auspicious for the teachings to continue not to prostrate. Anyway, thank you very much. Good night. Hope to see you next week, remember those eight worldly concerns and the antidotes.