Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 64-minute opening session of a Lamrim retreat, Venerable Thubten Dondrub guides students through the foundational meditation on precious human rebirth. He begins with detailed posture instructions, including the seven points of Vairochana alignment, then establishes mental stability through the nine-round breathing exercise and the generation of refuge and bodhicitta motivation. The heart of the session focuses on meditating on the eight freedoms—reflecting on freedom from rebirth in hell realms, hungry ghost realms, animal realms, god realms of distraction, places hostile to the Dharma, physical handicaps, wrong views, and situations of excessive wealth. For each freedom, he instructs students to vividly imagine those sufferings, then contrast them with their current situation, cultivating genuine gratitude and determination not to waste this rebirth. The teaching is designed for retreat participants, drawing heavily on Lamrim framework and concluding with dedication of merit.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1. Day 1 Meditation Precious Human Rebirth.mp3
UUID: 907fe711-5a34-4a0b-9834-08ff2ac222e0
Teacher: Ven Thubten Dondrub
Collection: KI Retreat (Ven Thubten Dondrub)
Date: 2005 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 64.1 minutes
Words: ~4,142
So every morning we’re we’re gonna be doing some meditation on the precious human rebirth. We’ll do this each morning. And then through the day, we’ll do go through different Lamrim teachings. So we can begin by sitting in the comfort in the comfortable correct posture, especially following the seven points of the Vairochana posture as much as possible, particularly paying attention to the positioning of our upper body so that the spine is well aligned. The upper body is placed so that we’re not leaning forwards or backwards, left or right.
For the new people, if you’re not familiar, then we place our right hand on top of the left with the thumbs lightly touching, our hands resting in our lap. Our upper arms just slightly away from the sides of our body. By holding our shoulders up just a little bit, also holding our head upright, tucking in the chin just slightly, then we can ensure that the head is well placed so that the head is not tilted down or lifted up too much. And it’s best to train to meditate with your eyes just a little bit open, directing your gaze down a short distance in front of you without looking, not having an unfocused gaze. So then just for a short time just check your posture, sort of fine tune it, placing your awareness at the crown of your head moving down through your body.
Also noting any tension, seeing how that is arising or maintained by pulling in, an unconscious pulling in in all directions and holding on to that. So by noticing that we can begin to let go. So having prepared our body, we now prepare our mind to meditate, firstly by doing the nine round breathing exercise. This establishes a calm, neutral mind. If you’re not familiar with this exercise, just very briefly one observes the breath through nine rounds of breathing.
Firstly, although the breath is coming in both nostrils, you place your awareness at the right nostril, just observing the breath coming in the right nostril and going out the left for three consecutive breaths. Then for the next three consecutive breaths, observe notice the breath coming in the left nostril and then out the right nostril. And then for the final three breaths of the nine round for the nine rounds of the cycle, observe the breath coming in both nostrils and out both. So this constitutes one cycle. So one can one can do several cycles.
So now we build on that positive, that calm, clear and neutral mind by generating a strong positive virtuous mind, generating a strong refuge and aspiration motivation. So we do this by recognising right now, having that strong awareness that it is our mind that gives rise to all happiness, to all suffering, and therefore the only way to overcome all the various kinds of suffering, dissatisfaction existing in our mind, and to increase our happiness is to work with our mind in a skillful, wise, compassionate way overcoming the disturbing thoughts, cultivating the positive potentials. By ourselves we have no way to do this. This is why we take refuge in the enlightened mind of the Buddhas, having that strong trust, confidence in their perfect qualities and therefore developing a strong refuge in trust and confidence in Buddhist teachings that contain all the methods that we can use to work with our mind step by step. Developing therefore also a strong confidence, trust and refuge in those great beings who have practiced the Buddhist methods purely, consistently for a very long time and have gained deep insights into them.
So this is the Ārya Sangha. So try and develop that devotional mind of refuge in the Triple Gem to help do that. We visualise the field of refuge in front of us, if you know how to do the whole field of refuge, if not at least the central figure of Śākyamūni Buddha. Imagine the Buddha seated on a magnificent lion throne, lotus sun and moon, all in the nature of transparent light. And seated directly above the moon disc is Śākyamūni Buddha with a body of golden transparent radiating light, the very embodiment of wisdom and compassion.
At the same time, generate the bodhicitta mind, recognizing that the very essence of overcoming suffering within our mind and developing perfect happiness is to give up the self-cherishing thought which we’ve been following in all our lives, which is only brought suffering. So to give that up and to follow the Buddha’s methods of cherishing others more than self. So generate very generate very strongly right now that wish to achieve enlightenment, not only for one’s own sake, but especially so that we can repay the kindness of all sentient beings, the kindness that we’ve experienced life after life. Even our mere survival depends on sentient beings, our very existence. On top of that, every good thing that has ever happened to us, every good experience, every good quality that we have has totally depended on other sentient beings and their kindness.
And right now the vast majority of these kind sentient beings who in fact have been our mothers many times are trapped in suffering without any refuge. To think that no matter what happens I must achieve enlightenment for their sake. So think of all these kind suffering beings surrounding you, starting with your mother of this life on your left, your father on your right, the rest of your family and friends behind you, antagonists in front to make sure we include them in our compassion, And then all the other beings of the six realms of cyclic existence. We can imagine them in human form but experiencing the different sufferings that are unique to each of the realms that they’re trapped in. So then we can send prayer of refuge in bodhicitta.
We can do it twice in Tibetan, one time in English. I go for refuge until I’m enlightened to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Assembly. By my practice of giving and other perfections may I become a Buddha to benefit all sentient beings. Then the settled in prayer. Reverently, I prostrate with my body, speech, mind.
I present clouds of every type of offering, actual and imagined. I declare all my negative actions accumulated since beginningless time and rejoice in the merit of all holy and ordinary beings. Please remain until the end of cyclic existence and turn the wheel of dharma for living beings. I dedicate my own merits and those of all others to the great enlightenment. Then we offer the short mandala, thinking of offering all the beautiful things of the universe to the field of refuge so that we can overcome all our attachment, open our mind to receive the blessings of the Buddhas.
So then the foundation of all good qualities, which is in the Lamrim section, page seventeen. You just read this fairly quickly. But as we read this prayer, one can visualise that as we’re saying each verse that white light comes from the field of refuge purifying all obstacles to gaining that particular realisation. And in the section where we say, ‘Please bless me’, at that point we visualise all the light coming from the field of refuge, blessing our mind to gain that particular realization. The foundation of all good qualities is the kind and venerable guru.
Correct devotion to him is the root of the path. By clearly seeing this and applying great effort, please bless me to rely upon him with great respect, Understanding that the precious freedom of this rebirth is found only once is greatly meaningful and is difficult to find again. Please bless me to generate the mind that unceasingly day and night takes its essence. This life is as impermanent as a water bubble. Remember how quickly it decays and death comes.
After death, just like a shadow follows the body, the results of black and white karma follow. Finding firm and definite conviction in this, please bless me always to be careful to abandon even the slightest negativities and accomplish all virtuous deeds. Seeking samsaric pleasures is the door to all suffering. They are uncertain and cannot be relied upon. Recognizing these shortcomings, please bless me to generate the strong wish for the bliss of liberation.
Led by this pure thought, mindfulness, alertness, and great caution arise. The root of the teachings is keeping the Prātimokṣa vows. Please bless me to accomplish this essential practice. Just as I have fallen into the sea of saṃsāra, so have all mother migratory beings. Please bless me to see this, train in supreme bodhicitta and bear the responsibility of freeing migratory beings.
Even if I develop only bodhicitta but I don’t practice the three types of morality, I will not achieve enlightenment. With my clear recognition of this, please bless me to practice the bodhisattva vows with great energy. Once I pacify distractions to wrong objects and correctly analyse the meaning of reality, please bless me to generate quickly within my mind stream the unified path of calm abiding and especially insight. Having become a pure vessel by training in the general path, please bless me to enter the holy gateway of the fortune ones, the supreme vajra vehicle. At that time, the basis of accomplishing the two attainments is keeping pure vows and samaya.
As I have become firmly convinced of this, please bless me to protect these vows and pledges like my life. Then having realised the importance of the two stages, the essence of vajrayana, by practising with great energy, never giving up the four sessions, please bless me to realise the teachings of the holy guru. Like that, may the gurus who show the noble path and the spiritual friends who practice it and have long lives. Please bless me to pacify completely all outer and inner hindrances. In all my lives, separated from perfect gurus, may I enjoy the magnificent Dharma.
By completing the qualities of the stages and paths, may I quickly attain the state of vajradhara. So now think that the field of refuge is very pleased with our motivation to practice for the sake of all sentient beings. And really, again, strongly generate that motivation not only for doing this session this morning but for attending the whole retreat, really trying to have that very strong bodhicitta thought. So thinking that the field of refuge is very pleased with us, we imagine that now if you’re visualizing the whole field of refuge, then imagine all the holy beings dissolving into light, absorbing into the central figure of Śākyamūni Buddha. And then the lion throne of the Buddha dissolves into light, absorbing up into the lotus sun and moon.
And then imagine that the Buddha seated on the lotus sun and moon comes to the crown of our head, turning around facing the same direction as ourselves. So then make a strong heartfelt request to Śākyamūni Buddha who is oneness with our own root guru For one’s mind to become completely free of all obstacles, to being able to meditate on the precious human rebirth and gain a deep realization of that. Imagine Guru Śākyamūni happily responds by sending this continuous stream of white light from his heart into us. As this fills our whole body, pervades all our mind, imagine that that white light and nectar, this continuous stream of white light and nectar comes from the Buddha and washes away all those obstacles that take the aspect of a very thick black liquid that leaves from the lower part of our body, completely dissipates and becomes non existent. As you do this visualization, think of particular obstacles that you have when it comes to meditating on the precious human rebirth.
Particularly think of those. Imagine those being washed away by this light and nectar. So then imagine a continuous stream of golden light and nectar comes from the Buddha filling our whole body and mind, bringing the blessings to be able, to be able to meditate correctly without distraction on the precious human rebirth, blessing our mind to gain a deep realization of it. So for the rest of the session, we can imagine that the Buddha, the Guru Buddha, is on the crown of our head creating this very protective environment in which we can meditate and blessing our mind. We don’t have to continuously put effort to visualise the Buddha there, but just have this sense that the Buddha is on the crown of our head.
So now having prepared our mind in this way, can turn our attention to meditating on the precious human rebirth. This morning we’ll focus on meditating on the eight freedoms. So firstly, can reflect that because we have mind which is conventionally existing as being clear and knowing and ultimately is free of true existence. Because of these factors, our mind and its very nature is pure, perfect. We have this Buddha nature or Buddha potential.
It exists as the very nature of our mind, is always there, can never be harmed in any way. But throughout beginningless time has always been obscured. And because of that, we continuously suffer and cause suffering to others. It’s really only when one is born human, and not only human, but having the all the eight freedoms and the ten endowments or riches, that we have the optimum conditions to be able to look at our mind and use the Buddha’s teachings to purify our mind and discover our buddha potential and begin the path that leads to the complete realization of our Buddha nature. So it’s not enough just to have the precious human rebirth.
We have to recognize that we have it. In the teachings, it gives the simple example that if a beggar finds a diamond, a huge diamond of immense value, but the beggar doesn’t realize what it is, just thinks it’s a lump of glass, The beggar has something that could at least conventionally end all their suffering, but they don’t recognize it. So that the diamond is of no value, no benefit whatsoever to them. So we need to recognize that we have this amazing rebirth that gives us the optimum chance to be free of suffering, the optimum chance to achieve enlightenment, to repay the kindness of others. So we need to recognize very clearly that we are free, completely free of all the greatest obstacles, greatest impediments that prevent us practicing the Dharma, the liberating Dharma.
In every other realm there is nothing like that kind of freedom to practice Dharma. So we can begin by reflecting that we have the freedom of the greatest impediment of all, the greatest obstacle which is to be born in the very lowest realms of cyclic existence, the hell realms where there is continuous torment of the mind because the most extreme negative karma that our own mind has created is ripening to produce the greatest suffering where our mind is most obscured. So in those realms the suffering of body and mind is so great There there is not the slightest chance to work with the mind in a positive way. Most of you are familiar with the descriptions of the hot hells and the cold hells. Even if one finds it difficult to believe in the existence of those hell realms, One one can think of places on this earth or situations that human beings experience which is like hell.
Imagine being born in a place where there is continuous warfare and hatred and bigotry and violence. There are people, human beings, who are actually born in concentration camps in this world today. Try and put your mind in such a a hell situation where that’s all you know. You’ve been born into that. That is all you know.
That’s all you experience. Try to allow your mind to actually feel that kind of horror. And at the same time, recognize that in that situation, it would be almost impossible to practice any kind of Dharma, to control the mind, to have any peace, clarity, any virtuous thoughts whatsoever. And then recognize that right now I’m completely free of that kind of situation. I’ve been born in that situation many times before, have the potential to take rebirth in that kind of situation again but right now I’m free of it.
And what is that freedom? It’s not the freedom just to waste one’s life chasing after worldly pleasure and so on. It really is the freedom, the opportunity to practice the liberating Dharma. The freedom to work with one’s mind in a very wise and skillful way so that one never has to experience that kind of suffering again. And then we can reflect what it would be like to be born in the in the preta realms where we experience the result of our own attachment and miserliness.
In those realms, the mind experiences a state of incredible craving and dissatisfaction expressed as always craving for food and drink but never being able to experience it. Maybe in the distance one sees something, one is starving, in the distance one sees some food. With great difficulty one approaches that place but when you get there the food has disappeared. Or there’s some kind of karmically created monster that prevents one getting it. Even if one is able to obtain that food or drink, one has a karmically created body that means that when we eat that food it just causes incredible torment like drinking molten liquid, molten metal.
So the mind is constantly tormented, craving constantly without the slightest satisfaction. Such a rebirth can last for thousands and thousands of years. One has a suffering body born into an extremely ugly, dry, suffering environment. This is the rebirth that is possible according to the sutras if we find it difficult to believe that such a place exists. It’s very easy to recall on this earth places and situations very similar.
Millions of people are starving on this planet right now. Imagine what it would be like to to be reborn in such a situation. Not simply just to start having no food as we are now, but to actually be born in that situation to a starving mother, in a place where there is no food, no drink, in some vast hot desert, where everything is ugly. Just try to imagine what that would be like and how impossible it would be to do anything meaningful, virtuous with one’s mind. And then recognize that right now I’m completely free of that situation.
I have this tremendous freedom to work with my mind in a positive and meaningful way. How incredibly fortunate that is. Imagine what it would be like taking rebirth in an animal body, one’s mind trapped in an animal body. An animal experiences many of the sufferings of a human being of heat and cold and so on, but with almost no ability to protect oneself from that. In a wild situation, animals experience tremendous fear because always being the object of some other animal hunting them for food.
And even domestic animals, the ones that have a good life as pets and so on, still have the suffering of a very obscured mind. Imagine taking having such a rebirth. Again, if you find it difficult to believe, you could possibly be reborn as an animal, one can also think that among human beings right now many live a life that is very little different from animal existence. In that so many people around the world are trapped in poverty where their life is just a mere survival, working so hard just to merely exist, just eking out a living. Whatever potential they have, there is no opportunity to develop it.
Living at the most basic level. Imagine what that would be like to be born into that environment. Again, recognize what incredible freedom one has right now in contrast to that situation. Think just how amazingly fortunate I am right now. I can’t waste this freedom on meaningless things.
We can also reflect that even in the god realms, although there is incredible pleasure far greater than anything experienced in the human realm, The beings in the god realm never use that pleasure in a meaningful way. They just live a life of complete mental distraction. All that good karma being used up. And then at the end of the life, the beings in the god realms usually fall into the lower realms. Similarly, if we look at human beings who who enjoy incredible wealth and power and privilege, So often, although such people have the opportunity in theory to be of great benefit to others.
Often the life is just a life of complete distraction using that wealth just to chase after momentary pleasure. So difficult. Just imagine having been in that in that kind of situation, how difficult it would be to practice the Dharma, to develop renunciation, to even recognize that life is in its nature suffering. If one is having a lot of pleasure right now, how can you accept that life is suffering? But one doesn’t realize that that pleasure is not going to last.
So we can reflect how fortunate it is to to not be born in such situations right now. That it’s actually incredibly fortunate to to be free of such a rebirth. So even born as a human being one can be born in very unfavorable situations, born in places where there is very little religious influence whatsoever. It either never really existed or has been repressed, died out. People no longer have any belief in spiritual values, in altruism.
There’s a lot of lawlessness, violence, and so Imagine what it would be like to be born in such a situation. How difficult to practice. And then recognize that one is free of that situation right now. Imagine again what it would be like if even if one had every good situation as a human being but one is born deaf or blind or very serious physical handicaps or very strongly mentally handicapped, then in such a situation incredibly difficult to practice the Dharma. Even just being blind or deaf, imagine what that would be like, not being able to hear the teachings, not being able to read them ever again.
What an amazing freedom we have right now. We can reflect that there are millions of human beings all over the world, especially the so called first world, that enjoy every comfort, have good health, have a very affluent life, but are still subject to suffering and its causes. And yet, such people, one could be reborn in that situation, but without any views, belief in religious values, no belief in the existence of the mind, no belief in future existence, no belief in the law of cause and effect, no belief in the value of altruism or love and compassion. No belief in the the value of practicing generosity and patience. Having a very cynical mind and so on.
Imagine what it would be like to be born like that and recognize the amazing freedom from these wrong views that we have right now. What amazing opportunities that gives us. So we can bring bring this reflection, this meditation to an end by making a strong determination to be more and more mindful in our daily life of the incredible freedoms that we have, the freedom from all the greatest obstacles that hold us back from practicing the Dharma. So we can’t waste that freedom, make this determination not to waste this freedom by just chasing after the eight worldly concerns, but to really use this freedom more and more to practice the Dharma, not only for one’s own sake, but for the sake of all sentient beings. Then imagine that the Buddha on the crown of your head is very pleased and happily dissolves into light.
Imagine that golden light coming down through the crown of your head, filling your whole body, pervading all your mind, blessing your body, speech and mind, especially blessing the mind to gain a complete and abiding realization of the precious human rebirth. So then we can dedicate the merit. Page twenty seven of the morning prayers. You who uphold the subdue his moral way, who serve as the bountiful bearer of all, sustaining, preserving and spreading Mañjuśrī’s victorious doctrine, who masterfully accomplished magnificent prayers honoring the Three Jewels, protect savior myself and others, your disciples. Please, please live long.
Thank you very much. Sorry. We left out one of the the freedoms, but it’s running out of time.