Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Have a good heart, act with kindness, nothing is more important

Patrul Rinpoche (1808-1887) Patrul Rinpoche spent most of his life wandering in the mountains, living in caves, forests, and hermitages lost in the wilderness, There he constantly meditated on love, compassion, and bodhicitta-the wish to bring all sentient beings to enlightenment. These he held as the very root of spiritual practice. To everyone, high and low, he would say, "Have a good heart, act with kindness; nothing is more important than that."

Saturday, December 24, 2005

Eeverybody thinks that compassion is important.

Everybody thinks that compassion is important, and everyone has compassion. True enough, but the Buddha gave uncommon quintessential instructions when he taught the methods for cultivating compassion, and the differences are extraordinarily important. Generally, everyone feels compassion, but the compassion is flawed. In what way? We measure it out. For instance, some feel compassion for human beings but not for animals and other types of sentient beings. Others feel compassion for animals and some other types of sentient beings but not for humans. Others, who feel compassion for human beings, feel compassion for the human beings of their own country but not for the human beings of other countries. Then, some feel compassion for their friends but not for anyone else. Thus, it seems that we draw a line somewhere. We feel compassion for those on one side of the line but not for those on the other side of the line. We feel compassion for one group but not for another. That is where our compassion is flawed. What did the Buddha say about that? It is not necessary to draw that line. Nor is it suitable. Everyone wants compassion, and we can extend our compassion to everyone. -- from Lectures on Kamalashila's 'Stages of Meditation in the Middle Way School' by Kenchen Thrangu Rinpoche, translated by Jules B. Levinson, published by Snow Lion

Friday, December 23, 2005

The Battle of Ego

THE BATTLE OF EGO

Student: The desire of ego to be fulfilled -- how does one liberate those desires of fulfillment that ego presents?

Chogyam Trungpa: It seems that trying to fulfill is another escape -- equally the same as trying to suppress. Generally there is a conflict between you and your experiences, your desires. It is a kind of game between ego and its extensions. Sometimes ego tries to overpower the projections, and sometimes the projections try to overpower ego -- that kind of battle goes on all the time. So the point is to see that battle as it is, rather than fulfill the desires or try to suppress them.

-- From TRANSCENDING MADNESS: THE EXPERIENCE OF THE SIX BARDOS edited by Judith Lief, page 141.

There are in a sense Two aspects of your mind

Dharma For Fri, Dec 23rd

There are in a sense two aspects of your mind.
There is how your mind is in it nature,
and how it appears or manifests in your experience.
From the point of view of the appearance of your mind,
you could say your mind is full of lots of suffering
and all sorts of confused or deluded projections.
But from the point of view of how your mind really is,
there is nothing in any of this confusion because all of this confusion
is secondary to the nature of mind itself.
Your mind as it is, is Buddha nature.

-- Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche, Commentary on the Essence of Creation and
Completion

Monday, December 19, 2005

Never Speak Harsh Words

Never speak harsh words for they will rebound upon you. Angry words hurt And the hurt rebounds. Like a broken gong Be still, be silent. Know the stillness of freedom Where there is no more striving. --Buddha Shakyamuni, The Dhammapada, Shambhala Pocket Classics

Saturday, December 17, 2005

Adverse conditions

Adverse conditions are spiritual friends. Devils and demons are emanations of the victorious ones. Illness is the broom for evil and obscurations. Suffering is the dance of what is.

-- Jamgon Kongtrul Lodrö Thaye, The Great Path of Awakening

Thursday, December 15, 2005

Pain in healed by empathy

Pain is healed by empathy rather than confrontation. The impulse to cooperate identifies the healer. The Sutra of the Immaculate Friend

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

merit accumulation

We cannot accumulate merit if we have a macho sense of pride and arrogance that we already have enough truth and virtue collected and now we are going to collect some more. The person who collects merit has to be humble and willing to give rather than being willing to collect. The more a person is willing to give, that much more effective, in some sense, is the accumulation of merit.

--Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Training the Mind and Cultivating Loving Kindness

Monday, December 05, 2005

Continue practice into everyday life

Continue practice into everyday life with a single meditation, always keeping in mind the intention to help others in all activities, eating, dressing, sleeping, walking, or sitting.
Jamgon Kongtrul, The Great Path of Awakening

Saturday, December 03, 2005

Desire is the source of endless problems

Desire is the source of endless problems. The more desires we have, the more we have to plan and work hard to realize them. Some time ago a businessman told me that the more he developed his company, the more he felt like making it even bigger. And the more he tried to make it bigger, the more he found he had to lie and fight mercilessly against his competitors. He had come to realize that wanting more and more made no sense, and that he only had to reduce the size of his business for competition to become less fierce so he would be able to carry out his work honestly. I found his testimony very true.

--His Holiness the Dalai Lama, from 365 Dalai Lama: Daily Advice from the Heart

Friday, December 02, 2005

Gampopa

Childish sentient beings always cherish themselves and work for their own benefit, so they suffer. The Buddhas cherished others and worked for their benefit, so they attained Buddhahood.

-- Gampopa, The Jewel Ornament of Liberation