Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Khadro-la blessing people with a Dharma text, Bhutan, May 2016. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
“My iPad contains the Kangyur, the Tengyur, many teachings. It is the same as a Dharma text. You can’t put it on the bed or down [low]. You have to respect it and put it higher,” Rinpoche explained in a short teaching on how to show proper respect for Dharma texts, including when they are in electronic form, during a session at the 2017 Light of the Path retreat.
“You can’t put glasses or malas on top of Dharma texts. You have to respect them, treat them as Dharma, the holy body, revealing the path to liberate you from samsara and to achieve enlightenment. You have to respect them as Rare Sublime Dharma,” Rinpoche advises in a short video clip of the teaching.
Rinpoche emphasizes this point by talking about how Choden Rinpoche said that even one’s hand should go around, and not over, a Dharma text. Also objects such as a tea mug should not pass above a Dharma texts as it shows disrespect to the Rare Sublime Dharma.
Referring to the refuge part of lamrim teachings, Rinpoche stressed that it is very important to know the instructions on what is to be avoided and what to practice. If you are disrespecting Dharma texts, Rinpoche warns that it “pollutes the mind and obscures the mind. So by respecting [Dharma texts], then you create much good karma.”
Watch the teaching in this video clip “Proper Respect for Dharma Texts”:
https://youtu.be/bPDtJMaevWQ
Quoted text based on the unedited transcript for the 2017 Light for the Path retreat, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2017/
Find more video clips from Lama Zopa Rinpoche:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5F6A5E3C2873F2EA
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.
]]>Monastère Dorje Pamo is a new probationary nunnery in the South of France, situated close to FPMT centers Institut Vajra Yogini and Nalanda Monastery.
Monastère Dorje Pamo is modeled on the previous Dorje Pamo, which was founded by Lama Yeshe in the early ’80s and was the first facility for Western FPMT nuns. The original Dorje Pamo was housed in a large building belonging to Institut Vajra Yogini and was supported by a group of up to a dozen young nuns of diverse nationalities.
After a few years, the building was returned to Institut Vajra Yogini and the community of nuns dissolved. Many of the nuns were called upon to help with the management and teaching in various FPMT centers.
FPMT nuns living near the future Monastère Dorje Pamo, France, February 2017. Photo by Véronique Alber Latour.
“In 2016, we were blessed to receive the donation of a large house surrounded by six hectares [15 acres] of land, orchards, meadows, woods, and even a small lake,” shared Ven. Chantal Carrerot, coodinartor of the new Monastère Dorje Pamo. “We finally had a home for our monastery! Naturally, and following the advice of Lama Zopa Rinpoche, we have revived its original name, Monastère Dorje Pamo. The house has the potential to accommodate fifteen or more nuns.”
“Today, the project is gaining momentum,” Ven Chantal continued. “We have worked with an architect to transform the building over several years. The plans have been drawn up and the estimates for renovations have been completed.”
“We are grateful to the kind benefactors who have donated enough funds to start the first round of renovations, which will begin in March 2018. This phase involves renovating the nuns quarters and creating a temple. The first nuns are expected to move in at the end of summer. However, there is still a lot to do and we are still looking for funding to complete the gompa and the library next to it.
“Monastic communities that provide a proper environment where Buddhists nuns can live according to their vows, where they can practice together, where new nuns can be educated, and where all can be taken care of, are very rare in the world, even more so in the Western world. That a few such projects are coming forward at this time in various places in the FPMT is a source of great rejoicing!”
To learn more about Monastère Dorje Pamo, visit their website:
http://monasteredorjepamo.org/en/
Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche during a visit to the stupa at Sarnath, India, January 2017. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
By generating a bodhichitta motivation throughout each day, we can benefit ourselves and sentient beings, Lama Zopa Rinpoche explained while teaching at the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy.
Rinpoche’s advice, captured in a video clip from the October 10, 2017, teaching, emphasizes that by having a bodhichitta motivation in any number of activities, you are able to generate heaps of merit and become profoundly beneficial.
“Of course if you have an actual realization of bodhichitta, there is no question of merit,” Rinpoche says. “But even if you have an effortful motivation of bodhichitta, when you offer light—one light, even one Christmas light, whatever light, a butter lamp, one candle—you collect merits more than the sky. Wow, wow, wow!”
Rinpoche says, “If you generate a bodhichitta motivation when you circumambulate, with each step going around circumambulating, you collect merits more than the sky.”
“When you eat food, with each bite or drink, if it is done with a motivation of bodhichitta, then you are eating food for sentient beings, to serve sentient beings, to bring them to enlightenment,” Rinpoche says.
“And then also to make offering, make yourself in oneness with the guru-deity Chenrezig. Visualize Chenrezig in your heart, same as the guru. So with each bite, with each drink, you collect more than skies of merit. You collect with each spoonful, with each sip, merits more than the sky.”
“If you generate the motivation of bodhichitta for when you talk, whether you are consulting, whether you are teaching Dharma, if you generate the motivation of bodhichitta, not even the realization, but effortful bodhichitta, then with each word you collect merits more than sky,” Rinpoche advises.
Rinpoche adds, “The same thing as circumambulation, when you are going for a walk, going shopping, going for pilgrimage, whatever, if it is done with a bodhichitta motivation, then with each step you collect more than skies of merits.”
“As the Buddha said, to work for yourself and others, numberless sentient beings, the best motivation is bodhichitta. So all the buddhas, they checked, they see, it is like that,” Rinpoche says.
“Even if you don’t have a realization of bodhichitta, but you generate a bodhichitta motivation, for any activity you do—in every minute, in every second—you collect merits more than the sky! There is no time for depression. There is no space for depression. Depression, goodbye!”
If you pay attention to having a bodhichitta motivation throughout your life, your whole day, and with every activity, then it is your main practice and your main refuge.
Rinpoche explains, “When your life is so busy, your main refuge is bodhichitta. So every hour—not only every day, every hour, every minute, every second—is bodhichitta.” By doing this, you create so much merit, “more than the sky! Amazing, amazing!”
“By generating the motivation of bodhichitta, then when you do prayers all day long or for one hour, with each word you collect more than skies of merit. Can you imagine?” Rinpoche asks.
“You have to realize how you are most unbelievably fortunate! You are so fortunate. You are so fortunate this time. Next, next life not sure, but this life ….”
Rinpoche concludes, “With a bodhichitta motivation, whatever you are doing, working for the center, working for the company or the family, with bodhichitta, the merits you create, wow, wow, wow!”
To see Rinpoche giving this teaching, watch the video “Practicing Dharma Skillfully with Bodhichitta: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTcHrkEP8I8
The quotes from Rinpoche have been lightly edited and are based on the unedited transcript of the 100 Million Mani Mantra retreat in Italy, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/
Find more video clips from Lama Zopa Rinpoche:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5F6A5E3C2873F2EA
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Khadro-la at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche arrived at Kopan Monastery in early February after spending two weeks at Tso Pema in India. Khadro-la (Rangjung Neljorma Khandro Namsel Drönme) visited Rinpoche at Kopan after he returned to the monastery.
Khadro-la joined Rinpoche for lunch. They then walked around the monastery, where they met Kamal, a long-time worker at Kopan who now has cancer. Khadro-la and Rinpoche did prayers with Kamal and blessed him.
Rinpoche and Khadro-la meeting with Kamal, a long-time worker at Kopan who has cancer, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
On a tsog day, Khadro-la went with Rinpoche to Khachoe Ghakyil Ling, the Kopan nunnery, and did Vajrayogini self-initiation with the nuns. And on another day, Khadro-la and Rinpoche had lunch and then went to circumambulate the the base of Swayambhunath hill.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche celebrating the second day of Losar, giving a White Tara long life initiation, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2018. Photo courtesy of Kopan Monastery’s Facebook page.
In mid-February, Rinpoche celebrated Losar, the Tibetan New Year, at Kopan.
Phuntsok Rinpoche, Charok Lama, Rigsel Rinpoche, Losang Namgyal Rinpoche, and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi on the second day of Losar at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2018. Photo courtesy of Kopan Monastery’s Facebook page.
Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, Kopan’s current abbot; Tenzin Phuntsok Rinpoche, the reincarnation of Geshe Lama Konchog; Thubten Rigsel Rinpoche, the reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup, Kopan’s former abbot; Losang Namgyal Rinpoche, a high lama of the Tamang people; Charok Lama; and many other young lamas were also in attendance at Kopan’s Losar activities, which included pujas and a White Tara long life initiation given by Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
Kopan monks attending a White Tara long life initiation given by Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the second day of Losar, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2018. Photo courtesy of Kopan Monastery’s Facebook page.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.
]]>Practice in the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, Thubten Kunga Center, Deerfield Beach, Florida, US, February 2018. Photo by Martha Lucia Gonzalez.
On the afternoon of February 14, a mass shooting occurred at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, in Parkland, Florida, US. Fourteen students and three teachers were killed. A further fourteen people were wounded.
In the days after the shooting, Thubten Kunga Center, an FPMT center located near the tragedy, held a Medicine Buddha puja and read the “King of Prayers,” which is often recited to benefit those who have recently died.
Practitioners at the center lit a total of eighteen candles: one for each of the victims and one for the young man that carried out the shooting.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche always advises to make strong prayers to Medicine Buddha for anyone who is dying, sick, injured, or who has already died from violence such as that which occurred in Florida or elsewhere.
The short mantra of Medicine Buddha is:
TADYATHĀ / OṂ BHAIṢHAJYE BHAIṢHAJYE / MAHĀBHAIṢHAJYE [BHAIṢHAJYE] /
RĀJA SAMUDGATE SVĀHĀ
Find the long and short Medicine Buddha mantras with their common pronunciations on FPMT.org.
Read The Benefits of Medicine Buddha Mantra and Practice by Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Khyongla Rato Rinpoche at Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Keep up with Lama Zopa Rinpoche on his travels throughout the world by viewing new photo albums of Rinpoche’s journeys. The new photo album of Rinpoche’s recent trip to India contains sixty photos, covering Rinpoche’s time at Root Institute in Bodhgaya and in Tso Pema:
https://fpmt.org/teachers/zopa/gallery/india-january-2018/
Students at Maitreya School during a visit by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Bodhgaya, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
More photos from Rinpoche’s December visit to Nepal, to India in November, and to Italy, Austria, and the United States earlier in the year, plus many more, can be found on Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s photo gallery page:
https://fpmt.org/teachers/zopa/gallery/
The photo gallery display has been updated to optimize viewing on mobile phones and tablets. New features have been added; click or tap on photos to see captions and enter slideshow mode.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche circumambulating the lake at Tso Pema, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche arrived in Tso Pema, a place of pilgrimage in Himachal Pradesh, India, on January 21, coming from Bodhgaya.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche receiving oral transmissions at Zigar Monastery, Tso Pema, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Rinpoche traveled to the holy site associated with the 8th-century Indian Buddhist master Padmasambhava, or Guru Rinpoche, to receive oral transmissions from Khenpo Thinle Dorjee, the abbot of Zigar Monastery, a Kagyu monastery. The transmissions included various texts, such as Milarepa’s life story. At the conclusion of the oral transmissions, Rinpoche offered a long-life praise that he composed and other long-life items to the khenpo.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Khenpo Thinle Dorjee, Tso Pema, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
The story of Padmasambhava’s association with Tso Pema, also known as Rewalsar, is that Padmasambhava angered the king of the area by teaching Dharma to his daughter, Mandarava. The king had Padmasambhava burned alive in a pyre that created great clouds of smoke.
But after several days, a lake appeared in the same spot and Padmasambhava was sitting in the middle of the lake on a lotus and the king came to see the error of his ways. “Tso Pema” is Tibetan for “Lotus Lake.”
During his two-week visit, Rinpoche also spent time circumambulating the lake. On a tsog day, Rinpoche did Vajrayogini self-initiation until 4 a.m. And on another day, he did Trukchuma (Kalarupa) puja for several sick people and all who need it until 2 a.m.
Near the end of Rinpoche’s stay in Tso Pema, he went up to a sacred cave where Padmasambhava meditated and offered tsog.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche making tsog offerings in the Guru Rinpoche cave above Tso Pema, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
A very large 123-foot (37.5-meter) tall Padmasambhava statue, completed in 2011 and blessed by His Holiness the Dalai Lama in 2012, overlooks the lake.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.
]]>Currently a prisoner at Idaho Correctional Institution-Orofino (ICIO) in the United States, Raven Jones has been sharing his print copies of Mandala with fellow inmates. This small group of Dharma students recently offered two Losar (Tibetan new year) cards to FPMT in celebration of the year of the Earth Dog 2145. One was sent directly to Lama Zopa Rinpoche and the other to Mandala. This year, Losar takes place on February 16.
Along with the card to Mandala came a note of gratitude, containing the mantra of Amitabha:
Thank you so very much for all you do!!! So, during this year of the Earth Dog, have a great New Year! Losar Tashi Delek! OM AMI DEWA HRI!
Raven Jones holds the unique distinction of being the only FPMT Masters Program student to complete the six-year study program entirely from prison.
Learn more about the work of the Liberation Prison Project, an FPMT project that supports Dharma students in prison, on FPMT.org.
Read a full interview with Raven Jones in “Liberation through Education,” part of the Mandala October-December 2014 issue.
Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche shopping for flower offerings, Singapore, March 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche sent this letter to a family with whom he stayed. The letter contains advice on how to make this precious human life meaningful, suggesting a dedication for the worms and insects who are harmed when growing, picking, or offering flowers, and for any calves who are harmed in the production of milk for tea. Here’s an excerpt from Rinpoche’s letter:
I wanted to mention one thing. These days I have added in my prayers for the worms and insects harmed by growing, picking, and offering flowers. So many worms die or are killed for the flowers. Often where I go there are flowers in my room, therefore after lunch, if I do purification of pollutions received, I also normally try to do dedication, especially for the calves, because I drink so much tea. I dedicate like this:
Due to all the past, present, and future merits collected by me and all the three-time merits collected by numberless sentient beings and numberless buddhas, may all the calves who suffered so much, or who have died for this milk—the mothers and babies who are separated, with so much suffering and worrying—may they never be reborn in the lower realms and may they immediately be reborn in a pure land where they can get enlightened. May they receive a perfect human body, meet the Mahayana teachings and meet a perfectly qualified Mahayana guru revealing the unmistaken path to enlightenment, and by pleasing the holy mind of the virtuous friend, may they achieve enlightenment as quickly as possible.
These days I also include the worms that have died. I guess worms died for the flowers. I should also dedicate for the people who killed the animals, so I also started to dedicate for the people.
Anyway, of course, flowers are very beautiful. Of course when people own flowers, it’s not so easy, and they have to indirectly kill worms and insects for the flowers to grow.
For this enjoyment we can also collect so many causes of happiness, all the happiness, as I have mentioned, and especially the happiness of enlightenment, by offering these beautiful flowers to the Guru, Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. All this is received by the kindness of sentient beings, the animals that died for this, the human beings who worked so hard.
What I wanted to say is this, if there are a lot of animals and worms that die, then I think it’s better not to dig for the plants in the garden. If you want flowers, you can buy them from the flower shop. You can put flowers there in pots, so you don’t have to dig.
Anyway, in case some worms get killed or something, maybe you can offer candles to the Buddha for those worms and dedicate like this:
I dedicate all the past, present and future merits collected by me, and all the three-time merits collected by numberless sentient beings and numberless buddhas, for that worm to never ever get reborn in the lower realms and to have a higher rebirth, and to generate bodhichitta and achieve enlightenment as quickly as possible.
At least do something like that, to pray for that worm, in case one gets killed.
Regarding flowers, maybe buy flowers which are in a pot from the garden shop. You can buy them and make offerings with them, and it is easy.
From the advice “How to Make This Life Most Beneficial,” given in October 2017 and published in December 2017 by Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book”:
http://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/how-make-life-most-beneficial
More information, photos, and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche blessing a small kitten before leaving Sera Je Monastery, Bylakuppe, India, November 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche traveled to Sera Je Monastic University in South India in November 2017. Ven. Gyalten Lekden, an International Mahayana Institute (IMI) monk who is in the geshe studies program at Sera Je, shared this report of Rinpoche’s visit:
After a few years’ hiatus, we were blessed to welcome Lama Zopa Rinpoche back to Sera Je in November 2017. Rinpoche had begun a series of oral transmissions some years ago, transmissions of a five-volume collection of texts and practices related to the lineage of Most Secret Hayagriva that serves as the protector of Sera Je Monastery. As is Rinpoche’s inimitable style, he tailored his teachings to meet the needs of the attendees. There was a strong emphasis on mind-training as well as the importance of distinguishing Dharma from non-Dharma through recognizing and working to abandon the eight worldly dharmas. Since the audience was composed primarily of monks, Rinpoche also wove in the benefits of properly holding the monastic vows, and how serving the monastery is just as important as traditional study.
Everyone present was overjoyed and grateful to be able to have Rinpoche pierce through the dark clouds of our habitual misconceptions, and lay bare what is most important for our lives. Then, serving as a constant paradigm for those of us who desperately need the cooling camphor of Rinpoche’s blessed instruction to quell the blazing flames of our self-grasping, self-cherishing minds, Rinpoche announced that he was donating all of the offerings he had received during the teaching to Sera Monastery’s construction of a new sewage draining system and sidewalk on the main road leading into the monastery.
Long life puja offered to Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Drati Khangtsen, Sera Je Monastery, Bylakuppe, India, December 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
As always, while at Sera Je, Rinpoche did not ever take a break. He was in constant meetings with various monastery officials, lamas, revered guests, and devotees, demonstrating for us an impeccable model of ceaseless vigilance in working to support and benefit others. Sera Je IMI House requested Rinpoche visit, and they invited me and the other foreign monks, as well as all of the out-of-town guests, to join. During his already busy schedule, he took time to not only grant us the blessing of his holy presence at IMI House, but he also stayed for quite a while and offered excellent and practical advice to those who had gathered.
As this year’s teachings concluded, while hosting the other members of the organizing committee and me for lunch, Rinpoche began to discuss teachings for future years. He is committed to completing the transmission, but he also sees the benefit of offering practical instruction to the monks. He also shared plans on how he wishes to continue combining those two aspects of instruction.
It is important to express a quick word of gratitude to Drati Khangtsen, and its tireless community of monks, without whom these teachings would not ever be possible. They did all the work of cleaning and preparing the temple, serving the tea, and helping prepare and serve meals to all of the guests, and so forth. Although this year’s schedule was quite short, everyone was ecstatic to be able to be satiated by Rinpoche’s nectar-like speech and advice. We anxiously await his return in 2018.
View a gallery of images taken during Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s visit to Sera Je Monastery in November 2017.
More information, photos, and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Ven. Tenzin Jamyang, a young Kopan monk now studying at Sera Je Monastery, at the entrance to Maitreya School and Tara Children’s Project, Bodhgaya, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche sent a letter to a student who was experiencing a lot of obstacles, as well as fear, unhappiness, and worry. Here’s an excerpt from Rinpoche’s advice given in January 2016:
My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
I heard about your difficulties. As you know, all these difficulties do not exist from their own side, even though they appear like that to our hallucinated mind. The difficulty appears to exist from its own side, to exist by itself. It appears real, using ordinary language.
Basically, what you believe is difficult is just your mind thinking, your mind merely labeling, “This is difficult.” Your mind is merely labeling that it is difficult and that’s how it came into existence. When the difficulty appeared to you, even though it is merely imputed, it appears totally opposite, as though it never came from the mind and it was never merely labeled by the mind. That is totally a hallucination.
For example, we are living our whole life in a hallucination, so like that, everything—including the I, form, sounds, smell, tangible objects; everything that appears to our senses, to our hallucinated mind—appears as real, as if something is existing from there. However, it doesn’t appear real unless our mind merely imputes it first. Everything that appears real is not true, it is a total hallucination. It is a totally hallucinated real I, a totally hallucinated real action and a totally hallucinated real object.
While everything—I, action, object—is totally empty of existing from its own side, it exists in mere name. Everything—I, action, object—exists in mere name; it is merely labeled by the valid mind, on the valid base.
What we think is difficult, in a complicated way, is all made up by our own concepts, and is to do with our own concepts.
Let me say something, what the great bodhisattva Shantideva has advised:
Whatever befalls me,
I shall not disturb my mental joy;
For having been made unhappy, I shall not accomplish what I wish,
And my virtues will decline.
— [Bodhicaryavatara, Ch. 6, v. 9]
There are so many problems in the West; also in the East, but especially in the West. If there is a way for the problem to be fixed or mended, what is there to dislike about it? If there is a method then do it, and if there is no method and no way to fix it, then why dislike it? If there is a way to fix the problem, then do it, and if there isn’t, then no need to be worried. It just makes us mentally sick and it also causes physical sickness. As it increases more, it brings more problems.
Why be unhappy about something
If it can be remedied?
And what is the use of being unhappy about something
If it cannot be remedied?
— [Bodhicaryavatara, Ch. 6, v. 10]
Please think about this. It is what Shantideva advised and this is my advice to you. When you think this way, it will bring happiness to your life. …
Read the complete advice “Remedy for Obstacles, Fear and Worry,” posted in January 2018 by Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book”:
http://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/remedy-obstacles-fear-and-worry
More information, photos, and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche turning the prayer wheel at Root Institute, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
How you see something depends on past karma as well as on how you label it, Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in a short video clip recorded during the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy in October 2017.
“Even if it is an unpleasant object, even if it is problem, in a relationship or whatever, the way you view it is the way you label it—positive label or negative label,” Rinpoche teaches. “You make a positive label by thinking of the benefits of the problem.”
“When you don’t think of the benefits,” Rinpoche continues, “then you just carry on putting on a negative label. Then you suffer like this; you torture yourself like this.”
“Therefore, you see that Dharma practice, meditation, is soooooooooooooooo important!” Rinpoche concludes. “If you know Dharma, if you practice Dharma, meditation, then you completely transform [problems] into happiness! So you enjoy your life, especially your life every day, every hour, minute. With bodhichitta, you make beneficial your life to numberless sentient beings!”
Watch “Change How You Experience Karma with Mind Training”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTPSieECQTk
Quoted text based on the unedited transcript of the 100 Million Mani Mantra retreat in Italy, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/
Find more video clips of Lama Zopa Rinpoche:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5F6A5E3C2873F2EA
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>Attendees of the Foundation Service Seminar near Madrid, Spain, December 2017. Photo courtesy of Paloma Fernandez.
In December 2017, a Foundation Service Seminar (FSS) was held near Madrid. Organized and facilitated by Spain national coordinator Paloma Fernandez and senior facilitator and center director François Lecointre, this was the first FSS to be held entirely in Spanish. Paloma shares news from the event:
Last December, we had our first Foundation Service Seminar in Spain, the first time that the seminar has been done in Spanish.
Thirty-eight people came from many different parts of Spain, and one person traveled all the way from London, to participate in the event. People arrived by all means: planes, trains, and buses. Many of them used five vacation days to attend this seminar and dedicate their time to the FPMT and Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
François Lecointre, a senior FSS registered facilitator and director of Institut Vajra Yogini, offered his time, his experience, his knowledge, his kindness, and love to all the participants. (And to me, as I was co-facilitating the seminar for the first time!)
We started every day after breakfast. Each day offered different learning activities, which typically ran until 10 p.m. each night. It was a quite intense schedule, but nobody complained. It was a great experience!
A group activity during the Foundation Service Seminar near Madrid, Spain, December 2017. Photo courtesy of Paloma Fernandez.
We all worked with great focus, analyzing different aspects of our service. We had people from nine different centers, one study group, one community project, and one from Universal Education. It was very enriching to have so many different experiences and points of view to share and to learn from.
As well as the dynamic group exercises, we also had a number of beautiful meditations, great presentations, and very stimulating discussions. We also watched very inspiring videos from Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Lama Yeshe, and Tenzin Ösel Hita.
The main highlight for most of us was, as Lama Yeshe used to say, the “family feeling” that was present during all the seminars. It was so great to be able to share five days and nights with the FPMT family and to experience what it means to be the “ambassadors” of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
One question that came from many participants was: “When is the next one?” So I have the feeling that this is the sign that the first FSS in Spain was a great success!
Foundation Service Seminar events are happening this year in Mexico in early February; at Jamyang Buddhist Centre, UK, in August; and at Milarepa Center, USA, in September. For more information on the Foundation Service Seminar and to find out how to register for future events, visit the FPMT Service Seminar webpage.
Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>His Eminence Ling Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche visiting Root Institute and its projects, Maitreya School and Shakyamuni Buddha Community Health Care Clinic, India, January 12, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
During Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s stay at Root Institute, he was joined there by many important lamas. On January 12-13, His Eminence Ling Rinpoche visited Root Institute and gave teachings, which were attended by Lama Zopa Rinpoche and many Sangha members and lay students.
While at Root, Ling Rinpoche also visited Maitreya School, where he gave a short talk. The students recited “Praises to the Twenty-One Taras” in Sanskrit as an offering. He then visited Shakyamuni Buddha Community Health Care Clinic, another project of Root Institute, and spoke to the staff and doctors there.
Ling Rinpoche at Maitreya School giving a talk with Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Principal Pema Tsering, Bodhgaya, India, January 12, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Maitreya students chanting for Ling Rinpoche, Bodhgaya, India, January 12, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
During Ling Rinpoche’s visit to Root, he praised Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s activities and spoke about how kind he was for helping the children with education and helping sick people with the health clinic. Ling Rinpoche commented on how clear the vision for Root Institute has been and on how much has been accomplished.
Teachings with His Holiness the Dalai Lama resumed on January 14. Then on the following day, Root Institute celebrated its thirtieth anniversary after His Holiness’s teaching for the day.
Ling Rinpoche speaking during the thirtieth anniversary celebration at Root Institute, India, January 2015, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Ling Rinpoche, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Khadro-la, Dagri Rinpoche, Serkong Tsenshab Rinpoche, Ribur Rinpoche’s reincarnation, Geshe Sengye’s reincarnation, Richard Gere, and many others attended the joyous event.
Ven. Tenzin Paldron, the center director of Root, gave a short speech to the gathered crowd. Ling Rinpoche, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and others also spoke briefly about the center. Lama Zopa Rinpoche thanked everyone who had made it possible, including the sweepers and the secretary of the center. Then they all watched a seventeen-minute video of Root Institute’s history.
Hollywood actor Richard Gere speaking at Root Institute’s thirtieth anniversary celebration, India, January 15, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
On January 17, Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered the Sixteen Arhats puja for the long life of Khyongla Rato Rinpoche. Since Khyongla Rato Rinpoche is a teacher of many lamas, the offering was attended by a number of high lamas, abbots, and former abbots.
The Sixteen Arhats puja offered for the long life of Khyongla Rato Rinpoche by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Root Institute, January 17, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche offering body, speech, and mind mandala to Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, Root Institute, India, January 17, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
In between all of these activities, Lama Zopa Rinpoche had non-stop meetings with many lamas and geshes. Also during his time in Bodhgaya, Rinpoche made several visits to the Mahabodhi Stupa, which marks the site of the Buddha’s enlightenment.
At the stupa, Rinpoche would recite the mantras for circumambulation and then lead people around the stupa, explaining the mantras and what to think while circumambulating. Rinpoche also made many flower offerings to the stupa with extensive offering prayers.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.
Learn more about Root Institute at http://www.rootinstitute.ngo/.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Khadro-la (Rangjung Neljorma Khandro Namsel Drönme) at Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche arrived at Root Institute in Bodhgaya, India, on January 3, traveling from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. The day after arriving, Rinpoche invited Khadro-la (Rangjung Neljorma Khandro Namsel Drönme) to Root Institute for lunch.
When Rinpoche meets his gurus, he always makes auspicious offerings, requesting for their long lives. Rinpoche did this for Khadro-la and also recited the Sixteen Arhat prayers.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche offering a khata to Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, January 4, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
After lunch, Khyongla Rato Rinpoche arrived at Root to visit Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and Rinpoche made offerings and requests for Khyongla Rato Rinpoche’s long life. They had tea together with Khadro-la.
Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Khadro-la, and Khen Rinpoche Nicholas Vreeland having tea at Root Institute, Bodhagya, India, January 4, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Rinpoche traveled to Bodhgaya for the teachings with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, which began on January 5. More than 50,000 attended the first day of a three-day teaching intended especially for Indian Buddhists.
At the start of the first two days, students from Maitreya School, a project of Root Institute, recited the Heart Sutra from memory in Sanskrit for His Holiness and all in attendance.
Students from Maitreya School with their principal, Pema Tsering, chanting the Heart Sutra for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Bodhgaya, India, January 5, 2018. Photo by Lobsang Tsering, courtesy of DalaiLama.com.
“The students recited it with their eyes closed and their hands in the mudra of prostration, like they’re meditating on it. It’s quite moving. A lot of the students are girls,” said Ven. Holly Ansett, who was at the teachings.
“It’s amazing to think about how far they’ve come; these little Bihari girls who would normally not have an education, and here they are representing their school and reciting in front of His Holiness. And His Holiness is so affectionate towards them, and so pleased when this happens. He spent time to offer a khata to everyone, shake their hands, and take a photo.”
His Holiness the Dalai Lama explaining the text on the first day of his teachings at the Kalachakra Maidan in Bodhgaya, Bihar, India on January 5, 2018. Photo by Lobsang Tsering, courtesy DalaiLama.com.
After the Maitreya students’ recitation, His Holiness emphasized for all “that Buddhism originated in India, not in China or Tibet, and that masters of Nalanda like Nagarjuna were Indian too. Therefore, His Holiness said, it was propitious that the main disciples today were Indian. For more than 2000 years Buddhism has spread across Asia, so it would be appropriate if the Nalanda Tradition that has been kept alive in Tibet were to be re-established today in India,” DalaiLama.com reported.
On the third day of the teachings, the students recited “Praises to the Seventeen Masters of Nalanda” in Sanskrit. [See Mandala July-September 2012 for “The Seventeen Pandits of Nalanda Monastery”.]
“This prompted His Holiness to reflect what magnificent scholars [the Nalanda masters] were and how important it was that the Buddha established his teachings on the basis of reason and logic. How wonderful it is that these various masters’ writings are still available to us. We can read and study them, use them as our text books, and we can pass on what they had to say to others,” DalaiLama.com wrote.
Long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, January 11, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
On January 11, a special long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche based on White Tara was offered by Khadro-la at Root Institute. The day before the puja, some of the Kopan monks who were in Bodhgaya worked with Ven. Thupten Khadro, Root’s spiritual program coordinator, Ven. Tsenla, and many others to fill the small gompa with beautiful flower offerings, intricate decorations, and tormas.
Khadro-la offering long life nectar during the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, January 11, 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
The puja, which Khadro-la arranged and said should emphasize meditation and practice, was attended by many lamas, including Dagri Rinpoche, Serkong Tsenshab Rinpoche, Kesang Rinpoche, Oser Rinpoche, and others.
During the puja, Khadro-la made many of the offerings, including making the first mandala offering. Ven. Roger Kunsang offered the second on behalf of the whole FPMT organization. The puja began at 6 a.m. and concluded nearly five hours later.
The long life puja was described as being very strong, powerful, and precious. Afterwards, Rinpoche offered a delicious lunch on the roof of Root Institute to those who attended.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
Learn more about Root Institute at http://www.rootinstitute.ngo/.
]]>The Mahayana Children’s Programme, a program of FPMT Mongolia, is now celebrating its tenth anniversary. To mark the occasion, FPMT Mongolia director Ianzinha Bartanova shared a video of the children, recorded in Ulaanbaatar, the nation’s capital. Ianzinha writes the following about the video and the Mahayana Children’s Programme:
In the video below the youngest group of the Mahayana Children’s Programme participants, ranging in age from six to eight years, happily recite mantras in Mongolian and dedicate all merit from their practice to Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s long life.
Before they commence the mantra recitation, the children generate the correct motivation as follows: “I will do these recitations in order to be beneficial to my country, and all the six-realm sentient beings, and for my family, and myself to be happy, and to have good qualities such as perseverance, patience, responsibility, and friendliness.”
Currently practicing memorization, the children wholeheartedly enjoy the recitation of the following mantras and prayers: Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, Chenrezig, Manjushri, Vajrapani, the prostration mantra, Tara, Medicine Buddha, Vajrasattva, the mantra to bless offerings, and Migtsema.
As the children have a deep appreciation for the importance of dedication in practice, they concluded with these wishes: “Due to these merits collected, may I and my family be happy! May the most precious and kind Lama Zopa Rinpoche have a long and healthy life, and may Rinpoche lead us in all future lives!”
On behalf of all FPMT Mongolia staff and students, we would like to join with the children and dedicate all our merits accumulated during 2017 for Rinpoche’s long, healthy, and stable life. We rejoice in all meritorious actions done by the FPMT family, and from the bottom of our hearts, we wish you all a very happy and prosperous new year!
Learn more about the work of FPMT in Mongolia: http://www.fpmtmongolia.org
Learn more about the Mahayana Children’s Programme:
http://www.fpmtmongolia.org/mahayana-childrens-programme
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>The reincarnation of Trulshik Rinpoche, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi during the 100,000 tsog offerings to Guru Rinpoche, Khachoe Ghakyil Ling, Nepal, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
On December 22, Khachoe Ghakyil Ling in Nepal hosted a 100,000 tsog offerings for Guru Rinpoche in front of the gigantic Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) thangka. Lama Zopa Rinpoche attended the special puja, known as a “Guru bumtsog,” along with the young incarnation of Trulshik Rinpoche, a great master in the Nyingma tradition, who is one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s gurus.
The reincarnation of Trulshik Rinpoche, Khachoe Ghakyil Ling, Nepal, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Also in attendance were Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, the abbot of Kopan Monastery and its sister nunnery Khachoe Ghakyil Ling; Losang Namgyal Rinpoche, a Kopan monk who is also a high lama for the Tamang people of Nepal; and Rigsel Rinpoche, the young incarnation of the past Kopan abbot Khensur Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup. About a thousand ordained Sangha were there as well as many lay students.
The gigantic Guru Rinpoche thangka displayed at Khachoe Ghakyil Ling, Nepal, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
This is the third year that the enormous thangka has been displayed at the nunnery with a Guru bumstog. The thangka, which is 75 feet (23 meters) high and 87 feet (27 meters) wide, hung from a large scaffolding and depicts in stitched appliqué the Padmasambhava merit field in the center. On one side are the eight aspects of Padmasambhava and the other displays Padmasambhava’s pure land.
Through the Lama Zopa Rinpoche Bodhichitta Fund, Rinpoche commissioned the thangka in 2011. It took two years to create and was completed in 2013. His Holiness the Dalai Lama blessed the thangka in late 2013, when it was displayed at Sera Je Monastery during the Jangchub Lamrim teachings.
Khatas being offered after the Guru bumtsog in front of giant Guru Rinpoche thangka, with Rigsel Rinpoche, the reincarnation of Trulshik Rinpoche, and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Nepal, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
One of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Vast Visions for FPMT is for centers to have large thangkas and organize festival days around their display. This year’s Guru bumtsog went very well and Rinpoche was very pleased with the event.
At the end of the 100,000 tsog offering puja at Kopan Nunnery, the incarnation of Trulshik Rinpoche with Lama Zopa Rinpoche and also Rigsel Rinpoche, Ven. Sangpo and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, Nepal, January 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
See new photos from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s recent visit to Nepal:
https://fpmt.org/teachers/zopa/gallery/nepal-december-2017/
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>Buddha statue prior to offering gold-leaf at the Guru bumtsog, Hobart, Tasmania, June 2016. Photo courtesy of Stephanie Brennan.
In June 2017, FPMT in Australia (FPMTA) and Chag Tong Chen Tong Tibetan Buddhist Centre (CTCT) organized 100,000 tsog offerings to Guru Rinpoche, also known as a “Guru bumtsog.” More than 160 students from twenty or so Australian FPMT centers, projects, and services traveled to Hobart, Tasmania, to take part in the powerful and joyous multi-day event.
In a new Mandala online feature, “The Power of Guru Rinpoche: The Heart-Opening Guru Bumtsog Experience,” Stephanie Brennan, FPMTA National Education/Tour Coordinator, shares her personal account of the Guru bumtsog experience.
“… After chai and cake were served, the first puja session began. With eighteen Sangha present from all over Australia, the gompa was filled with maroon and saffron robes. Sitting in front were two geshes—Geshe Tenzin Zopa, who led the puja, and Geshe Phuntsok Tsultrim, the resident geshe at Chenrezig Institute, Queensland. Also in front was Lama Jimay from Tasmania, who ably assisted with the hook drum,” Stephanie writes.
“In the first session, we started by chanting the full verses of the ‘Prayer to Guru Rinpoche That Spontaneously Fulfills All Wishes’ to a poignant and melodic tune. This was followed by the tsog offering prayer and Guru Rinpoche mantra, which were repeated many times. These repetitions were accompanied by cymbals and drums with a very stirring beat. As the pace of these repetitions was fast, it took a little while for everyone to get their head around the Tibetan syllables, but soon everyone settled into a kind of rhythm, with Geshe Tenzin Zopa’s clear voice leading us forward.
“Sangha members played the ritual instruments, and the gompa became warm and energized. As I looked at the large thangka of Guru Rinpoche above the tsog offerings, it felt to me that evoking the spirit of Guru Rinpoche and knowing that this puja had been blessed by Lama Zopa Rinpoche beforehand, particularly to clear obstacles, made everything in the gompa seem timeless, vivid, and very clear. …”
Read Stephanie Brennan’s article “The Power of Guru Rinpoche: The Heart-Opening Australian Guru Bumtsog Experience” in its entirety:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/the-power-of-guru-rinpoche-the-heart-opening-australian-guru-bumtsog-experience
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaching at Sera Je Monastery, India, November 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
“Even when you wash, you purify not only yourself but sentient beings. Not only are your obscurations purified, but all sentient beings’ obscurations are purified. For example, the first time washing with water, the disturbing thought obscurations are purified. Then, by putting soap, then washing the subtle obscurations, shedrib, of all sentient beings, not only yours, all sentient beings are purified,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in this video clip, recorded during the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy in October 2017.
“So you can think the same thing when you clean with soap the teeth. First purify the nyondrib, disturbing thought obscurations, yours and all sentient beings. Then second, put the toothpaste and washing, then subtle obscurations purified, not only yours and all sentient beings as well, like that. …
“There is no business in the world that can compete with bodhichitta benefits. So with the motivation of bodhichitta any action you do, then always increases and causes enlightenment. And after enlightenment what you can do is amazing, amazing, amazing. …”
Watch the entire teaching on “How to Think When Washing or Brushing Your Teeth”:
https://youtu.be/7o8_-TmHW2g
Watch complete teachings—with translations in French, Italian, and Spanish, as well as English transcripts—from the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/
Find more video clips from Lama Zopa Rinpoche:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5F6A5E3C2873F2EA
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>Mountain view from Oseling Retreat Center, October 2017. Photo courtesy of Oseling Retreat Center.
Oseling Retreat Center, in the Andalusia region of Spain, has undertaken a new project. In response to advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the center has begun work on the planning, construction, and fund-raising aspects for a new nunnery that will provide a home and learning facility for European nuns. Center director Anne Wenaas describes the project for Mandala:
Lama Zopa Rinpoche advised Oseling Retreat Center in Spain to establish a nunnery within its grounds. In keeping with Rinpoche’s vision, construction has recently commenced on a project that promises to provide a “powerhouse of Dharma practice” for European nuns.
It is of great importance for all the nuns to have a place to live, so that they can observe a monastic life and dedicate their lives to study, contemplation, and meditation. The living costs for each nun will be very low, only food and maintenance will be needed.
Oseling is situated in the Sierra Nevada, a mountain range about forty kilometers (twenty-five miles) from the coast and within traveling distance of the city of Granada. The center is quite high up the mountains, forming a large portion of the top of a mountain within the National Park.
If you are familiar with Oseling, the location of the nunnery will be just below the Tara statue, a wonderful place with a wide view of the whole valley. Construction of the nunnery has recently begun.
Architect’s drawing of the proposed nunnery at Oseling. Image courtesy of Oseling Retreat Center.
This is a very beneficial project, and practitioners at the center will all have a great and unique opportunity to help realize Rinpoche’s ambition. They encourage everyone to participate and hope to quickly raise the funds necessary to finish construction.
It is the center’s hope that Tara’s prayer will inspire the future community of nuns:
“There are many who desire Enlightenment in a man’s body, but none who works for the benefit of the sentient beings in the body of a woman. Therefore, until samsara is empty, I shall work for the benefit of sentient beings in a female body.”
Developments of the construction project will be shared via the Oseling Facebook page.
For more information or to offer support, please contact Oseling via their email: oficina@oseling.com
More information, photos, and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>Lawudo Retreat Centre, located in the Solu Khumbu district of Nepal, is where FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s previous incarnation meditated and not far from the village where Rinpoche was born. Mandala editor Laura Miller visited Lawudo in early 2017 and shared this reflection on her experience there.
Visiting Lawudo, high in the Himalayan mountains of Nepal, had been a wish of mine for nearly eight years. And on New Year’s day 2017, my tired legs trudged up the final steep path and carried me into the yard in front of the Lawudo Gompa. Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s sister, Ani Ngawang Samten, stood there as I approached. Tears formed in my eyes when I took her hands, which seemed so soft to me despite five decades of tireless work looking after the holy retreat site. All I could say to her was how happy I was to finally be there. The previous year, my sense of personal accomplishment had sunk to a difficult low. But there I was, standing just under 13,000 feet [4,000 meters], in a place surrounded by gorgeous mountains and graced by highly accomplished practitioners. Just being there, I had achieved something that felt profoundly worthwhile and a little adventurous.
Before starting my trek to Lawudo, I’d read The Lawudo Lama, an invaluable book by Ven. Jamyang Wangmo that tells the story of the inspiring lives of Lawudo Lama Kunzang Yeshe and his reincarnation Lama Zopa Rinpoche, as well as offers a detailed description of the religious and cultural history of the Mount Everest region, where Lawudo is situated. As my Sherpa guide Nursang and I walked over several days up the trail from the airstrip in Lukla to Namche Bazaar to Thame, Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s birthplace, and finally to Lawudo, the mani stones, prayer wheels, stupas, and gompas created endless opportunities for receiving blessings, rejoicing, and contemplating how generations of Sherpas, who populate the area, had made Dharma practice integral to daily life.
I can date the origin of my trip back to the time when I did a little volunteer work for Mandala magazine. While working on something for the former editor, I visited the website for Lawudo Retreat Centre. The thought “I want to go there” shot directly through my mind as I scrolled through photos of the cave where the Lawudo Lama meditated and of the Lawudo Gompa and the mountains and valley that surround them. During the past six years that I’ve worked as the editor of Mandala, I’ve read and re-read stories about Lawudo: the early years when Lama Yeshe and Rinpoche visited; the young boys who became the first Kopan monks; the experiences of Westerner students who traveled there to practice; and Ani Ngawang Samten, who still keeps it all going. When the earthquake devastated Nepal in 2015, I, along with many, many others, anxiously awaited news of what happened in Lawudo.
Fortunately, Lawudo survived and everyone there was OK. When my opportunity came to visit, like so many before me, I spent many happy hours in Ani-la’s smoky kitchen. I intently ate her nourishing food and listened to her first-hand stories of the early days and to her concerns about the always tenuous water supply and what will happen to Lawudo when she can no longer take care of it. That said, Ani-la didn’t seem to care much to talk about the earthquake. The building that contains the kitchen, dining room, and her own room, received significant damage, as did several other buildings, including the gompa and library. She lived in a tent for months while repairs were being made. During my visit, it appeared that most of the major repairs had been done thanks to generous support from the Nepal Earthquake Support Fund.
The story I enjoyed most from Ani-la recounted the fraught, weeks-long effort to bring the very large Guru Rinpoche statue up to Lawudo and into the gompa. There are no roads in the upper Solu Khumbu district. Humans and yaks carry all nature of things in this remote area; helicopters bring in larger goods and shipments. The beautiful Guru Rinpoche statue stands 13.5 feet [14 meters] tall, far too large to be carried very far. In fact, it is so tall that part of the ceiling of the gompa had to be removed in order for it to fit. My retelling of Ani-la’s story wouldn’t do it justice, but her account covered a succession of false starts, involving a very big helicopter, bad weather, drunken pilots, and the statue being stuck inside the helicopter until it wasn’t. The story ended with an auspicious rainbow surrounding the helicopter on its arrival at Mende, just below Lawudo, and the two dozen Sherpas who carried the precious holy object up the steep hill and into the gompa. The Padmasambhava Project for Peace covered the cost of inviting this impressive statue to Lawudo as well as its creation and that of nine other smaller statues of Guru Rinpoche that are now in the Lawudo Gompa.
My visit to Lawudo was short, just a taste. I had one afternoon to meditate in the Lawudo Lama’s cave. But like receiving even a short Dharma teaching from a Buddhist master, that experience had a deep and lasting effect. Thinking about it now, the dollars spent, the hard work of the hike up, the rough accommodations, and the misgivings about the elevation and the state of my body all seem so minuscule when I compare them to simply being able to be in that cave. I hope and dedicate that anyone else who wishes to go to Lawudo be able to do so and that I am able to return. I rejoice and am grateful for all who have supported the Lawudo Retreat Centre over the years and pray that it may continue on for a very long time.
The author thanks Effie Fletcher at Himalayan High Treks and Dharma Journeys Pilgrimages, and Amber Tamang at Three Jewels Adventures for their help with arrangements for the trek.
FPMT.org brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>His Holiness the Dalai Lama talking with scientists during his visit to the Université de Strasbourg, France, September 2016. Photo by Olivier Adam.
In our just published Mandala January-June 2018, we explore what Buddhism offers the world in times of global difficulties to help pacify suffering and bring about peace.
As a preview to the print edition, we have made the cover story, “Changing the Mind, Changing the World: The Mind, Karma, and Global Change,” available to read online.
Also in this issue:
Plus, teachings from Lama Yeshe, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, new photos, interviews, and much more!
Find all our exclusive online stories for Mandala January-June 2018 and information on how to receive a print copy here:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/archives/mandala-for-2018/january-june/
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable and online work of FPMT. The new issue is also available through the FPMT Foundation Store.
]]>In September of this year, Lama Zopa Rinpoche visited Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum (PLC) in Austria. This was Rinpoche’s first official visit and the first opportunity for Austrian students to attend teachings, receive an initiation, and to take refuge from Rinpoche. Center director Stefan Seidler shares a brief overview of Rinpoche’s time in Vienna:
In September, Lama Zopa Rinpoche arrived for the first time in Vienna. Many of us are still feeling the presence of our precious guru in our hearts and minds.
From the very first moments at the airport, where spiritual program coordinator Andrea Husnik, myself, and many students from Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum welcomed him, everybody felt Rinpoche‘s incredible kindness, generosity, and the warmth of heart.
After one night in a hotel, Rinpoche and his entourage moved into a wonderful old house in a quiet area in the north of Vienna, where they would stay for the next two weeks and which had been offered very generously by the parents of one of PLC’s board members.
Hard work was required to prepare the house for so many visitors, and the benefits everybody received from Rinpoche have been enormous. He was so kind to share much of his precious time with the host family, even learning how to make apple strudel. Rinpoche’s mere presence—his wisdom, his laugh, his never-ending kindness to everyone in the house—gave them all so much inspiration that every domestic task became a pure joy.
Also during the visit, all of the center’s board members and main volunteers had the opportunity to spend time with Rinpoche. As almost none of the center members in Vienna had met Rinpoche before, this visit was an amazing and rare opportunity for all of them. A very nice dinner for board members and volunteers was held in Vienna’s city center, and a wonderful, inspiring private visit to the center itself prepared us all for the big weekend to come.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaching in Vienna, Austria, September 2017. Photo courtesy of Ven. Sherab.
Almost 400 people registered and the venue, which we had rented, was fully packed for all three days. Besides people from Austria and Germany, many others traveled from all over Europe to visit Vienna. We had guests from Spain, the UK, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, France, Italy and many more countries, all eager to attend Rinpoche’s teachings.
Rinpoche’s teachings were amazing. With the help of transcriber Ven. Joan Nicell and translators Ven. Birgit Schweiberer and Ven. Paloma Alba, we were able to understand Rinpoche’s limitless wisdom.
After the teachings, Rinpoche also gave refuge. More than 50 people took refuge and, for most of them, this was also their first chance to have direct contact with Rinpoche. Later, attendees received a Medicine Buddha initiation.
For everybody from the Vienna center, everybody who attended the teachings, and of course everybody who helped plan, organize, and prepare this great visit, we’re sure the benefits and inspiration of the visit will last for a long time. PLC is very grateful that we could host our guru Lama Zopa Rinpoche and we hope he will come back very soon!
Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s September 2017 teachings in Vienna, Austria, on Rinpoche Available Now:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/lama-zopa-rinpoche-teachings-vienna-tabs/
For more information on the programs and schedule of Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum:
http://www.gelugwien.at
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Tenzin Monlam performs the deer dance at Land of Medicine Buddha, Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Building projects manager Denice Macy at Land of Medicine Buddha (LMB) in California recently shared a useful how-to list for hosting a large-scale Dharma event:
In November 2002, Sally Barraud, then director of Land of Medicine Buddha, received advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche to host a Medicine Buddha Festival at LMB at least once a year. Pearls of wisdom flowed from Rinpoche’s mouth—the advice of what to do, what to offer. With unwavering faith, Sally went to work with her team and the local community to host the first Medicine Buddha Festival. Sally reached out to Geshe Ngawang Drakpa from Tse Chen Ling in San Francisco, Ven. Donyo at Gyuto Vajrayana Center in the Bay Area, and Tam To, a local leader of the Vietnamese community in San Jose. Eight months later, the festival became a reality.
What follows is some practical advice that we have learned from hosting the Medicine Buddha Festival for the past fifteen years.
We are in service to our guru, who is at times, a hilarious comic. Have fun (Rinpoche does), laugh at mistakes (Rinpoche does), experience it all with compassion (Rinpoche does)! Buckle up and get ready for a fun and wild ride by hosting a large Dharma event to benefit others!
Wish Fulfilling Temple, Land of Medicine Buddha, Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
This will be your guide as you organize your event. For LMB, the main purpose as advised by Rinpoche was and is to give as many people as possible the opportunity to take part in the Medicine Buddha puja, to learn about the Medicine Buddha, to provide people with the opportunity to make extensive offerings to please the Buddha, and the opportunity to create imprints and merit! Easy enough!
Attendees at the Land of Medicine Buddha festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
A successful LARGE event, Dharma or secular, needs to be planned well in advance. We look at dates as much as a year in advance. Some of the factors we consider include: the weather, dates of public holidays, seasonal events, other regularly scheduled festivals, and community events. If you fail to consider these factors, you may find that people who might benefit from your event are otherwise previously committed or that the weather is a bummer. Big party, big fun, big love!
Mani prayer wheel at the Land of Medicine Buddha in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Rinpoche helps us to identify how to please and benefit sentient beings. Consider the many different dispositions of sentient beings. Some people might attend because they love the delicious free food, others might have interest in the Tibetan culture, others want to connect with community, others have strong karmic connection to the Dharma, and some are looking for a wholesome family event—so provide varied opportunities. We have yet to provide pony rides around our stupa as Rinpoche requested, but it is in the plans! Not only would this benefit the ponies, but also the kids who would ride or lead them around the stupa.
Sun Family Meixca Dance – Medicine Buddha Festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Shine the Dharma light, spread your net wide. Let people know about your event; it is a priceless opportunity for you to connect and benefit others. We pay for advertising on the local public radio stations, in the weekly community newspaper, and sponsor adverts on Facebook. Don’t forget to take advantage of free media opportunities by sending out press releases to the local daily newspapers and online news sites, and using email messages and Facebook. We also print large posters that are placed at the center and email digital copies of them to our community connections.
Tibetan dancers at the Medicine Buddha Festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Don’t limit your audience. Rinpoche gave us the advice to invite all the area Dharma centers including Zen, mindfulness-based groups, Chinese, Vietnamese, and other Tibetan lineage centers. This is an opportunity to join with and welcome the diversity of our Dharma community. Of course, inviting other FPMT projects and centers is a must. Offer local FPMT family centers, projects, and services a table at your event to share information about their programs. Invite animal rescue groups or other non-profit organizations that align with benefiting sentient beings.
Dagri Rinpoche at the Land of Medicine Buddha Festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Duh. Of course, none of us would intentionally ignore precious advice that we have received from Rimpoche. However, it is IMPORTANT to re-read advice (again, months in advance). You will likely find it is not possible to do everything Rinpoche advises right away, or even in the first few years of holding an annual event. You may find like us, however, that it is possible to add elements each year in a practical way. It took years for us to find Mongolian acrobats in our area, but eventually we did!
Fundraising and offering donations at the Medicine Buddha Festival, Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Make meaningful and generous offerings to the people who contribute to the day: festival t-shirts for volunteers, offerings of money and special treats to the Sangha, and generous offerings to those who make music or dance offerings. Here, remember to make as extensive offerings as possible on your altars, and give people an opportunity to sponsor those offerings. People from around the world who are unable to attend your event may have the wish to participate by sponsoring various offerings.
Attendees at the Medicine Buddha Festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Even the most enthusiastic and reliable community members have obstacles that will arise. It is helpful to share information and to-do lists on Google Docs and other online methods of communication. Have a volunteer coordinator, logistics coordinator, liaison with performers, and parking coordinator. Make lists and meet in person with your team. Make plans to follow up so you can make adjustments as issues arise.
Parade at the Medicine Buddha Festival in Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
Do it now! Funny things happen when making plans for Dharma events. One year in the middle of June, a large tree fell blocking the road to our center for more than twelve hours—the day before our event! Another year someone drove a car over a cliff. It is interesting to recall how obstacles can arise and surprise. If you leave things to the final days before an event, the stress level of your team may go through the roof. Do as much as you can now. Make lists with your team that can be completed well in advance. Leave a lot of space in the last few days to be surprised by things not going exactly as planned.
Three of the Eight Great Bodhisattvas, Land of Medicine Buddha, Soquel, California, US, July 2017. Photo courtesy of Denice Macy.
The mind that sees problems is persistent (speaking for myself here). Remember you have an amazing team with Rinpoche at the head; Rinpoche inspires us to stretch ourselves, and if we trust Rinpoche’s advice, we can move ahead with faith that we have the skill, team, and karma for a successful event. Though we are limited and may learn some uncomfortable lessons along the way, we are on the right path!
Read more about the festivities, spiritual programs, and life in the community at Land of Medicine Buddha: http://landofmedicinebuddha.org/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Participants of the FPMT North America Regional Meeting during the Light of the Path retreat in Black Mountain, North Carolina, US, August 2017. Photo courtesy of Drolkar McCallum.
In August 2017, Drolkar McCallum, regional coordinator for FPMT North America and member services coordinator for the International Mahayana Institute—FPMT’s international community of nuns and monks—visited Black Mountain, North Carolina, United States, for the Light of the Path (LOP) retreat. During the retreat, which was led by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, FPMT North America held a successful and highly enjoyable regional meeting. Droklar offered her reflections:
FPMT North America held a successful and enjoyable regional meeting over August 22 and 23 during the Light of the Path (LOP) retreat in Black Mountain, North Carolina.
Twenty-two participants representing International Office and a group of twelve centers, projects, services, and study groups from all over the US and Canada came together with a few registered teachers to discuss revenue generation, live streaming, grievance procedures, and the importance of International Sangha Day.
There was an informative presentation given by Annelies van der Heijden from Maitreya Instituut in the Netherlands on the immense value of the Foundation Service Seminars. Jill Marie from Kadampa Center spoke about fundraising; Tom Truty spoke about the current projects of Education Services; and I outlined the importance of moving forward in FPMT’s regionalization strategy in order to fulfill Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s wishes for the organization.
FPMT North America Regional Meeting during the Light of the Path retreat in Black Mountain, North Carolina, US, August 2017. Photo courtesy of Drolkar McCallum.
Even though the meeting was shorter than normal, one benefit of having it at the beginning of LOP is that people were introduced to each other at the start and then had plenty of time and opportunity during the retreat to get together and discuss other issues and do some mutually beneficial brain showering!
The greatest advantage, of course, is that our most precious guru, Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, was nearby and his blessings caused great inspiration, creativity, and a willingness to get more involved.
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Ven. Roger Kunsang, and Markus Igel walking to subway in Vienna, Austria, September 2017. Photo by Lobsang Sherab.
In late September, Lama Zopa Rinpoche visited Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum in Vienna, Austria. This was Rinpoche’s first official stay in Austria and his first visit to the FPMT center that was started nearly thirty-three years ago. There Rinpoche gave teachings, refuge, and the Great Medicine Buddha initiation.
Center founder and current spiritual program coordinator Andrea Husnik and center director Stefan Seidler were in attendance for Rinpoche’s monumental visit. The teachings were supported by a team of hard-working volunteers—many of whom had taken a week off work—who forewent meals and sleep, and gave their all in order to deliver incredible hospitality to Rinpoche and all participants.
Following the Light of the Path retreat, and a long flight from North Carolina, United States, to Austria, Rinpoche rested for a number of days with the Igel family at their home in Vienna. During his stay, Rinpoche was offered an apple strudel, which the mother of the family had made. The dish was so good that Rinpoche asked if he could be shown how to make the dessert. During the filming of an instructional video (see below), Rinpoche offered advice on how to cook for the benefit of others.
Rinpoche took a number of walks in the city parks, taking every opportunity to bless the dogs that he passed. While using the subway on his way to a restaurant, Rinpoche saw a homeless man to whom he made offerings. Throughout his stay, while Rinpoche walked through the streets of Vienna, he recited OM MANI PADME HUM out loud, blessing and benefiting everyone that he encountered.
Watch “How to Cook Apple Strudel and Actualize the Path to Enlightenment” on YouTube
Rinpoche’s recorded teachings in Vienna, Austria, are available as a part of Rinpoche Available Now:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/lama-zopa-rinpoche-teachings-vienna-tabs/
View a gallery of images from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s visit to Austria:
https://fpmt.org/teachers/zopa/gallery/austria-vienna-september-october-2017/
More information, photos, and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage on FPMT.org. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
]]>His Holiness the Dalai Lama with Ven. Thubten Chodron and students at Maitripa College, May 2013. Photo by Marc Sakamoto.
In August 2017, Wisdom Publications published Approaching the Buddhist Path, the first volume of a new collaborative series—The Library of Wisdom and Compassion—between His Holiness the Dalai Lama and American Buddhist teacher, scholar, and author Ven. Thubten Chodron. Former Mandala associate editor Donna Lynn Brown spoke with Ven. Chodron in June 2017 about His Holiness’s intentions to present the lamrim to a modern audience. Ven. Chodron explains one of the challenges the projects addresses:
“… [A] challenge non-Tibetans have with the lamrim is that—as His Holiness explains—it was written for people who are already Buddhists. Lamrim texts don’t talk about why rebirth makes sense; they assume you already believe this. And the guru is Buddha? People say, ‘I just came to learn to meditate! What’s that all about?’ So in this new series we are re-ordering some topics and approaching some of them in a different way. Regarding, for example, how to relate to a spiritual mentor, His Holiness explains that in depth for a modern audience. If people start out reading Pabongka Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, they don’t know that he was teaching Tibetans who were about to take highest yoga tantra initiations. That’s not who walks into Dharma centers! People need preparatory material. In the West, what does His Holiness usually teach? Love, compassion, and secular ethics for everyone. For Westerners who are interested in the Buddha’s teachings, he starts out with the Buddhist worldview: the nature of the mind, the two truths—conventional and ultimate—the four noble truths, and the possibility of being free from the afflictions.
“Understanding these topics, people will then understand something about the basis, path, and result and will see how the lamrim meditations fit in. This project takes on the task of explaining the whole path, in some depth, to people who have a modern education. This series is not limited to Westerners. His Holiness says it’s also for young Tibetans as well as Chinese, Vietnamese, and other Asian students. …”
Read “Presenting the Path to Modern Students: An Interview with Ven. Thubten Chodron,” Mandala‘s newest online feature:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/presenting-the-path-to-modern-students-an-interview-with-ven-thubten-chodron
A group of students from Tara Institute in Victoria, Australia, took the initiative to commence study of the Yamantaka sadhana. A small but devoted number of people soon developed a regular practice, culminating in the decision to undertake retreat this past June.
The result of the group’s practice combined the energy of three centers, each bringing a component part of support to the retreat. A member of the study group, Cynthia Karena, shared some of her reflections on the process in Mandala‘s latest online feature story “Community and Commitment: A Yamantaka Study Group at Tara Institute in Australia”:
… “The study group is good to become familiar with the meditations. Having them read out so you can actually meditate on them allows you to start memorizing them. Then when you do them yourself, you meditate more than just read the words.”
The meditations are outlined in the short sadhana practice, so people know where and how they fit in, said Tara Institute student Jill Lancashire.
“It’s good to introduce the short sadhana to people who were newly initiated and either had no previous experience with the format of a sadhana or for whom Yamantaka was a new practice.
“The definite thing is that having a schedule and a dedicated group of co-practitioners makes it much easier to do the practices properly and keep them going.” …
Read Cynthia Karena’s new article “Community and Commitment: A Yamantaka Study Group at Tara Institute in Australia” in its entirety:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/community-and-commitment-a-yamantaka-study-group-at-tara-institute-in-australia/
]]>
Mandala has just published its latest ebook, Creating the Sacred, which takes an in-depth look at the making of Tibetan Buddhist thangkas, prayer wheels, and statues.
This new ebook contains fourteen articles, interviews, and stories—published by Mandala between 1982 and 2017—that explore the meaning of the sacred art found at FPMT centers and how it was created. Plus, the collection contains a teaching by Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the benefits of holy objects. While all these pieces have been previously published, many, never digitized, have until now existed only in long-forgotten print editions.
Creating the Sacred is available as a benefit to Friends of FPMT at the e-Friends level and higher and to Mandala magazine’s center packages subscribers. In becoming a Friend, you support the FPMT International Office and its wide-ranging Dharma activities.
The ebook can also be purchased through the FPMT Foundation Store, Amazon’s Kindle store, and will soon be available through Apple’s iBooks, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Aldiko, Overdrive, and other ebook outlets.
Friend of FPMT supporters join others from around the world to contribute to the success of all of FPMT International Office’s work in advancing education, charitable projects, online resources, services to FPMT communities, and more. Mandala ebooks are one of the many benefits of joining the Friends of FPMT program.
Find Creating the Sacred in the FPMT Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/Creating-the-Sacred-eBook_p_2961.html
“Finishing the whole study program [at Sera Je Monastic University] gives an opportunity to rejoice,” Geshe Tenzin Namdak told Ven. Gyalten Lekden in the just published interview “‘Something to Rejoice In’: Geshe Tenzin Namdak In His Own Words.” In the interview Geshe Namdak, who grew up in the Netherlands, talks about meeting the Dharma, studying twenty years at Sera Je in India, helping develop Choe Khor Sum Ling, the FPMT center in Bangalore, and other topics. In his characteristically humble way, he explained, “I didn’t do much, but at least there was some Dharma activity involved for the last twenty years, so that is something to rejoice in, and that makes the mind happy.”
Geshe Namdak was formally awarded his geshe degree during a three-day ceremony in May 2017, becoming the first Westerner to complete the full course of studies there and also to sit for the final geshe examination. Towards the end of the interview, Ven. Lekden asked Geshe Namdak, “Other than the actual Buddhist philosophy, what have you learned the most over the last twenty years here at Sera?”
“I don’t know. I mean, to develop the mind takes a long time, right? It’s the same with learning a language, it takes a long time. And you don’t really notice if you progress or not because it is a very slow process,” Geshe Namdak replied. “I have learned a lot from the Tibetans: to be more relaxed, to do things in a relaxed manner. Some of the monks are very relaxed, but at the same time they work very hard. Keep the mind in that relaxed state—that’s what the gurus show us all of the time. I learned quite a bit from the Tibetans to be serious, to work as hard as you can—but keep a kind of relaxed state of mind. Sometimes that’s not always easy, though!
Read the entire interview, “‘Something to Rejoice In’: Geshe Tenzin Namdak In His Own Words”:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/something-to-rejoice-in-geshe-tenzin-namdak-in-his-own-words/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
]]>Dr. José Cabezón giving a talk at Maitripa College, Portland, OR, US, September, 2016. Photo by Laura Miller.
This month’s Mandala online feature discusses an important new book: The Just King: The Tibetan Buddhist Classic on Leading an Ethical Life, recently published by Snow Lion/Shambhala.
The book presents a lengthy work on ethics by Tibetan luminary Jamgön Mipham (1846-1912) translated by distinguished scholar-practitioner and former Sera Je monk Dr. José Cabezón.
Mipham’s text is one of the most comprehensive works on Buddhist ethics ever written, and deals with ethical self-cultivation, interpersonal behavior, social justice, criminal justice, government, management, taxation, the environment, and many other topics. Although Mipham was a Nyingmapa, his text is a summary of Indian sources foundational for the Gelug and other Tibetan schools. It draws on several sutras, including the Sutra of Golden Light, a favorite of Lama Zopa Rinpoche, to which Mipham devotes an entire chapter; and several Indian ethics and advice texts, including Precious Garland, Letter to a Friend, and The Staff of Wisdom by Nagarjuna. Mipham synthesized these works with the popular “mi-chö,” or “folk” teachings of Tibet concerning proper or beneficial conduct. Thus, his book is quintessentially Tibetan Buddhist, drawing on both canonical Indian Buddhist sources and traditional Tibetan wisdom.
In the Mandala online article, The Just King is reviewed in the context of some reflections on the teaching of Buddhist ethics from FPMT-registered teacher Don Handrick.
Read the full article here:
fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/buddhist-conduct-a-new-resource-from-old-tibet
Go to the FPMT Online Learning Center’s Discovering Buddhism course to learn more about the ten non-virtues, karma, and other topics related to this article as taught by Lama Zopa Rinpoche and FPMT-registered teachers.
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable, and online work of FPMT.
]]>COVER: Kopan nuns in ritual dress awaiting Jangtse Chöje Lobsang Tenzin Rinpoche on the final day of the Monlam prayer festival, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, March 2017. Photo by Matt Lindén.
Mandala July-December 2017 is in the mail!
In the issue we share news from Kopan Monastery—where the seed of FPMT first sprouted—including a story on the enthronement of Thubten Rigsel Rinpoche, the reincarnation of Kopan Monastery’s former abbot, the beloved Khensur Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup Rigsel; a report on the two Kopan nuns receiving their geshema degrees; and a look at the state of Buddhism in the Himalayas. We also explore the transformative power of ritual with a collection of pieces: a teaching on the benefits of ritual by Lama Lhundrup, an interview with scholar José Cabezón, and personal stories from five Western monks studying at Sera Je in India. Plus, teachings from Lama Yeshe, Lama Zopa Rinpoches, new photos, interviews and much more!
While you wait for your copy, Mandala is highlighting several online pieces for you to enjoy now, including:
Enjoy Mandala July-December 2017 online content today:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/archives/mandala-for-2017/july/
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable and online work of FPMT. The new issue is also available through the FPMT Foundation Store.
]]>Freda Bedi as a nun. Photo by John Hills courtesy of Shambhala Publications.
Writer Vicki Mackenzie recently talked with Mandala about her new book The Revolutionary Life of Freda Bedi: British Feminist, Indian Nationalist, Buddhist Nun [available through the Foundation Store]. Mackenzie has been a student of Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche since 1976 and is also the author of Reincarnation: The Boy Lama and Cave in the Snow.
Photo courtesy of Shambhala Publications.
In the interview Mackenzie discussed Freda Bedi’s role in helping the Tibetan refugees who began arriving in India in 1959, including the young Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Bedi, born in 1911 in England, played a significant role in providing support to some of the first Tibetan lamas to teach Westerners, primarily through the Young Lamas Home School, which she established in 1960. Lama Zopa Rinpoche was one of the many young tulkus who attended the school, and Bedi assisted him to obtain medical care and sponsorship.
Rinpoche often speaks of how Freda Bedi helped him, and she also helped many others. She worked tremendously hard to raise money for the refugee communities, helped Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche get a scholarship to Oxford, organized European and American tours for His Holiness the Sixteenth Karmapa, and played many other roles.
Bedi, who strongly believed in the equality of women, also established the first Tibetan nunnery in the exile community. Because of her efforts, Tibetan nuns in exile got their first nunnery, Karma Drubgyu Thargay Ling, before the monks got their first monastery. Later, the Karmapa encouraged her to ordain, and she became the first gelongma in the Tibetan tradition. She developed into a serious practitioner, a translator, and a teacher of the Dharma.
As Vicki Mackenzie says, Freda Bedi “is an icon in the transmission of Buddhism to the West, an icon. And yet, she has remained fairly unknown. … Her story deserves to be told.”
Read the full interview here:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/freda-bedis-big-life-an-interview-with-vicki-mackenzie/
Purchase The Revolutionary Life of Freda Bedi through the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/The-Revolutionary-Life-of-Freda-Bedi_p_2925.html
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable and online work of FPMT.
]]>Nuns of Chenrezig Institute. Back row from left: Vens. Lozang Tsondru, Thubten Damcho, Lozang Tseten, Lozang Rigsal and Lozang Wangmo. Front row from left: Vens. Lozang Tsultrim, Gyalten Tsultrim, Tenzin Palyon, Thubten Tongnyi and Thubten Pema. Chenrezig Institute Gompa, Australia, November 2016.
Are monasteries and nunneries necessary? What are their benefits? Mandala explores this issue in a new online feature called “The Benefits of Monasteries and Nunneries,” which presents recent words of wisdom from Lama Zopa Rinpoche along with reflections by American monk Ven. Tenzin Legtsok.
To the question of whether monasteries and nunneries are needed, Rinpoche answers “Yes!” He explains that monastic communities are vital for three reasons: first, they are places where holy objects are found that allow those who visit or provide support to purify their minds, collect merit, and gain realizations; second, they offer a place for monks and nuns to live in their vows away from distractions; and third, they play an important role in preserving the Dharma.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Ven. Tenzin Legtsok, Bangalore, India, December 2016. Photo by Ven. Holly Ansett.
Ven. Legtsok, who is in the geshe studies program at Sera Je Monastic University, complements Rinpoche’s words with a discussion of the reasons why ordained people need to live together in “brick-and-mortar” communities.
Find out the details by reading the latest online feature from Mandala!
Lama Zopa Rinpoche with the young monks of Khamar Monastery, Mongolia, May 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Read “The Benefits of Monasteries and Nunneries,” Mandala‘s newest online feature:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/the-benefits-of-monasteries-and-nunneries/
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable, and online work of FPMT.
]]>The main stupa of Vikramashila monastic university, destroyed approximately 1200 C.E. India, October 2016. Photo by Annie McGhee.
“Pilgrimage needs faith. The more faith, the more happiness. Otherwise, you are just like a tourist looking at ruins. … When you go to these holy places it reminds you of impermanence. Once these places were great cities but now there are just stones. A thousand years ago these places were quite different. But even though there are just stones now these stones are so precious.”—Lama Zopa Rinpoche
In October 2016, Ladakhi Lama, a former attendant of the great Khunu Lama Rinpoche, led a few people from Root Institute in Bodhgaya, India, on a pilgrimage. The group traveled to the ruins of Vikramashila, a one-time monastic university where Lama Atisha lived and taught. For centuries, Vikramashila and Nalanda were the two most important centers of Buddhist learning in India.
In this month’s Mandala online feature, Australian Annie McGhee reports on the pilgrimage to Vikramashila. Read about her experiences, see pictures of the famous site—and perhaps decide whether you too should take a jeep ride across India’s Bihar State to take in the blessings of the precious stones and statues of Atisha’s home monastery!
Read “In the Footsteps of Atisha: A Pilgrimage to Vikramashila,” Mandala‘s newest online feature:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/in-the-footsteps-of-atisha-a-pilgrimage-to-vikramashila/
For those who are inspired, Root Institute is planning a meditative pilgrimage to Vikramashila for December 16-19, 2017. For information, please visit www.rootinstitute.ngo.
Ladakhi Lama makes a prayer at Vikramashila, India, October 2016. Photo by Inder Kaant.
Lama Atisha’s Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment is the subject of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Light of the Path teaching retreat series, hosted by Kadampa Center in North Carolina, US. Light of the Path 2017 is scheduled for August 20-September 17, 2017.
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable, and online work of FPMT.
]]>Mandala has just published a new ebook called From Warm Heart to Warm Heart: The Transmission of Dharma in the Modern World.
The ebook contains seventeen interviews about the transmission of Dharma, published by Mandala between 1982 and 2017. While all have been previously published, many, never digitized, have until now existed only in long-forgotten print editions.
Included are interviews with Lama Yeshe, Geshe Lhundub Sopa, and Yangsi Rinpoche as well as with distinguished scholars, practitioners, and teachers like Ven. Thubten Chodron, Ven. Antonio Satta, Jeffrey Hopkins, Thupten Jinpa, Georges Dreyfus, Robert Thurman, Anne Klein, John Dunne, and Roger Jackson. As a group, these thinkers provide fascinating insights into the diverse challenges of transmitting the Dharma from its traditional Tibetan setting into the modern world.
The ebook is downloadable in three formats—MOBI for Amazon’s Kindle devices, EPUB for other e-readers, iPads and tablets, and as a PDF—so that you can read it on all of your electronic devices, including your laptop or desktop computer.
The ebook is available as benefit to Friends of FPMT at the e-Friends level and higher and to Mandala magazine’s center packages subscribers. In becoming a Friend, you support the FPMT International Office and its wide-ranging Dharma activities. The ebook can also be purchased through the FPMT Foundation Store, Amazon’s Kindle store, and will soon be available through Apple’s iBooks, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Aldiko, Overdrive, and other ebook outlets.
Friend of FPMT supporters join others from around the world to contribute to the success of all of FPMT International Office’s work in advancing education, charitable projects, online resources, services to FPMT communities, and more. Mandala ebooks are one of the many benefits of joining the Friends of FPMT program.
]]>Jacob Sky Lindsley presenting his research at the November 2016 conference of the Mind and Life Institute, San Diego, California, USA. Photo by Doug Huppe.
We hear about mindfulness everywhere, it seems. Many of us practice it. But what is it doing? And how does it relate to Buddhist teachings on the emptiness of the self? If both mindfulness and Madhyamaka are methods to transform our experience of the self and reduce suffering, how do they differ in their approach?
Mandala recently interviewed Jacob Sky Lindsley, a graduate of FPMT-affiliated Maitripa College who will soon start Ph.D. studies in psychology. The conversation centered on the relationship between highly popular mindfulness therapies and Madhyamaka (Middle Way) philosophy as propounded by Lama Tsongkhapa and many other scholars—the topic of Jacob’s master’s thesis and the subject of a paper he presented at the November 2016 International Symposium of Contemplative Studies of the Mind and Life Institute, the organization associated with His Holiness the Dalai Lama that explores science and Buddhism.
Dharma students meditating at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, December 2016. Photo by Laura Miller.
Explains Jacob, “[Mindfulness] does help people. But it is far less radical than realizing the emptiness of the self … It just moves the attribution of self from the story, the narrative self, to another part of the self, the flow of experience or the awareness. But it still ascribes ‘self’ or ‘I’ to those things … Instead of saying ‘I am my story,’ we say ‘I am these sensations’ or ‘I am this awareness of the passing flow.’ But the mistake, the hallucination of ‘I,’ is still 100 percent there.”
Lama Tsongkhapa. Photo courtesy of FPMT Charitable Projects.
He adds, “The Gelug method [of analyzing and meditating on the emptiness of the self] seems to be able to eliminate our distorted conception of the self, not just help people create a more adaptive sense of self.”
And although Jacob respects what mindfulness therapies can do by helping people move away from identifying with their sometimes unhealthy internal narratives, he also points out that “an over-focus on mindfulness to improve well-being obscures this traditional Buddhist method for confronting our habitual relationship to self and leaves untouched its potential for ending suffering.”
He concludes that “there are reasons to consider expanding the study of meditation-based therapies, and their effects, to include the Buddhist understanding of self … After all, if attributing ‘self’ to ever-evolving experience creates suffering, doing less of it should reduce suffering. That would have to be tested, so pulling these meditations into social science research makes sense … Mindfulness came from Buddhism, after all, and is now widely used in secular therapeutic contexts. Stopping believing in a hallucinated self may also be profoundly therapeutic.”
Jacob Sky Lindsley teaching meditation as part of the public program at Maitripa College, March 2016. Photo by Marc Sakamoto.
Read “New Self / No Self: Jacob Sky Lindsley on Mindfulness and Madhyamaka,” Mandala‘s newest online feature:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/online-features/new-self-no-self-jacob-sky-lindsley-on-mindfulness-and-madhyamaka/
Mandala is offered as a benefit to supporters of the Friends of FPMT program, which provides funding for the educational, charitable, and online work of FPMT.
]]>By Miami U. Libraries – Digital Collections, via Wikimedia Commons
By Ven. Chönyi Taylor
As part of the January-June 2016 online content, Mandala is happy to share the most recent Dharma Realities column by Ven. Chönyi Taylor, who has been contributing to Mandala‘s online edition since 2010.
What better way to describe the Christmas frenzy? Wish lust. The longer the list, the greater the lust. Or perhaps the more expensive the list, the greater the lust. Whatever. The point is that our Christmas wish list is mostly a list of lusts. The Christmas we celebrate is more like the Roman Saturnalia: a celebration marked by unrestrained licentiousness. Revelry. Saturnalia was an orgy, a celebration of lust. The winter solstice marked a return to lushness after the long winter nights.
The 1st-century poet Gaius Valerius Catullus described Saturnalia as “the best of times”: dress codes were relaxed; small gifts such as dolls, candles and caged birds were exchanged. The wealthy were expected to pay the month’s rent for those who couldn’t afford it; masters and slaves swapped clothes. Family households threw dice to determine who would become the temporary Saturnalian monarch. The god Cronos (Saturn) says:
During my week the serious is barred: no business allowed. Drinking and being drunk, noise and games of dice, appointing of kings and feasting of slaves, singing naked, clapping … an occasional ducking of corked faces in icy water – such are the functions over which I preside.1
Christians took over this solstice celebration and turned it into a renewal of life through the birth of Christ. Lust has no place in the new order. Instead, it is a celebration of the new commandment: that we love one another as Christ has loved us.
These two ways of celebrating the winter solstice pull us towards two different kinds of happiness. One is the riotous happiness of relief from temporary suffering. It is a happiness that is based on external things, on having our wants and lusts met, about having a comfortable life. The other is a quieter happiness that is based within, the happiness that comes from unconditional love.
Jesus Christ, from Lama Yeshe’s “Silent Mind, Holy Mind”
Love is, according to our Buddhist teaching, the desire for others to be happy. Compassion is the desire that they be released from suffering. The happiness that comes from these desires is an inward thing, a state of mind – and especially so because it arises from an inner state of mind rather than from external things.
Lama Yeshe’s teachings on Christmas are found in a precious book Silent Mind, Holy Mind, which is unfortunately out of print. A drawing of Jesus accompanies a daily practice by Lama Yeshe for people devoted to Jesus. “Jesus” said Lama Yeshe, “had exceptionally great compassion. It is very good to check up on this fact and consider it deeply. If the thought comes to the mind ‘I must gain his realizations and becomes as compassionate as he was’ then this is the most perfect basis on which to have a celebration of his birth. With this feeling in our hearts, a Christmas festival can be very meaningful and worthwhile.”
Ven. Chönyi Taylor is a registered Foundational Buddhism FPMT teacher and an elder for the Discovering Buddhism at Home Course. She is the author of Enough! A Buddhist Approach to Working with Addictive Patterns (Snow Lion, 2010) and has been published in Mandala, Buddhadharma, Dharma Vision and Sangha Magazine. She is a founding member and member of the training committee of the Australian Association of Buddhist Counsellors and Psychotherapists and an Honorary Lecturer in the Discipline of Psychiatry at Sydney University.
1. See more at http://www.historytoday.com/matt-salusbury/did-romans-invent-christmas#sthash.Fvu3F4TM.dpuf
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Artwork by Ven. Tsapel
By Ven. Chönyi Taylor
With the launch of the new, redesigned Mandala today, we are happy to share the most recent Dharma Realities column by Ven. Chönyi Taylor, who has been contributing to Mandala‘s online edition since 2010.
Positive psychology is about dreams. Our New Millennium version is a dream of unending health, vitality and, hopefully, lots of money. Our New Millennium dreams may be different in content from other times, but not intention: we want to be happy.
There is a long history to positive psychology, dating at least back to the Greek philosophers. Epicurus had the idea that our life should be happy, tranquil, peaceful and free from fear. We should not experience pain and we should be able to manage our own lives within the company of friends. This has been updated by Martin Seligman in his description of positive psychology:
“The good life consists in deriving happiness by using your signature strengths every day in the main realms of living. The meaningful life adds one more component: using these same strengths to forward knowledge, power or goodness.”
Positive thinking as an antidote to unhappiness and dissatisfaction is not new. In 1952, Norman Vincent Peale wrote The Power of Positive Thinking. Back then, being happy meant being born into a white, middle-class, nuclear family. It was the start of a massive rise in advertising on the heels of radio, TV and films. Happiness was also defined by possessions: a car, refrigerator, washing machine and vacuum cleaner, things that became essential household items. It was an unrealistic dream. It was a 1950s version of positive psychology. You can make it work, and if you don’t, then you are a failure.
Vintage schoolbook illustration Fun with Dick and Jane, 1951. http://envisioningtheamericandream.com/2014/12/04/revisiting-thanksgiving-1960-pt-ii/
The storybook characters Jane and Dick taught me to read, and for my four-year-old self, they were the example of what children and family should be, of what my family should be. The stereotype, of course, was rarely realized. My mother tried her best to live it out, but we kids and my father’s health, constantly undermined her efforts. The stereotype was a 1950s version of what positive psychology would generate. Unfortunately, our family did not meet the criteria. My mother was a fan of Norman Vincent Peale. She was not often happy.
Trends in psychology come and go. We have had post-Freudian psychology, existential psychology, humanistic psychology, gestalt, being-psychology, transpersonal psychology, hypnosis and mindfulness in the last 50 years. Each of them promised the good life. The latest one is positive psychology.
The Buddhist version of the good life is quite different. The path to happiness is realized through the four noble truths. Suffering is not denied, it is recognized as an integral part of our ordinary lives (the first truth). Suffering arises from ignorance, grasping, clinging as described the twelve links of cyclic existence, all of which generate a mind habituated to these thoughts (karma and the second noble truth). Yes, there is an end to our suffering (the third noble truth), but it requires a lot of hard work (the fourth noble truth) and the development of the six perfections: generosity, patience, courage (enthusiasm), concentration (deep meditation) and enough wisdom to really understand how we misinterpret reality.
There is no mention of “signature strengths” or “power.” Instead, we have the six perfections of the bodhisattva. Knowledge has a much deeper meaning than Seligman’s concept of intellectual advances, since it includes the profound wisdom realizing emptiness. And “goodness” is no vague concept, but anything which does not harm others.
Kopan Monastery monks help distribute drinking water, Kathmandu, Nepal, April 2015. Photo via Facbook, Kopan Monastery School.
A positive life is represented here by the Kopan monks helping out after the Nepal earthquake. They do not seem to be concerned about signature strengths, or about power or goodness. They are not blissed out or self-centred; they are not striving for “the happy life.”
The good life can be painful.
Ven. Chönyi Taylor is a registered Foundational Buddhism FPMT teacher and an elder for the Discovering Buddhism at Home Course. She is the author of Enough! A Buddhist Approach to Working with Addictive Patterns (Snow Lion, 2010) and has been published in Mandala, Buddhadharma, Dharma Vision and Sangha Magazine. She is a founding member and member of the training committee of the Australian Association of Buddhist Counsellors and Psychotherapists and an Honorary Lecturer in the Discipline of Psychiatry at Sydney University.
]]>Lama Yeshe teaching at Olinda, Australia. On July, 26 1976, Lama Yeshe gave a public lecture in Melbourne. That same evening a weekend course for eighty commenced at Olinda in the Dandenong Ranges outside the city. Photo courtesy of Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive (lamayeshe.com).
What if your dear mother were caught in a blazing fire? You would not relax and say, “Let her burn. I don’t have time to get her out right now. I’ll do it later.” Of course you would stop whatever you were doing, no matter how seemingly important, and immediately rush to rescue her. We must regard all beings as our mother – and they are indeed trapped and burning in the fire of wrong conceptions and negativities. We must not be lazy about this! We must transform every action – eating, sleeping, working – into Dharma wisdom.
But we are lazy, aren’t we? Our impure mind lets us live life as if it were a tea party: “Let my mother burn – I’ll pull her out of the fire when I’ve finished enjoying myself.” Of course, we do not say these words, but our inner feeling, beyond words, reflects this attitude. Be careful; we often behave like this.
All the same, we don’t need to get too emotional about all this. If I pump you up too much, you’ll get overexcited and not want to do anything but run off to the mountains to meditate or run off preaching that everybody should practice Buddhism just like you do. That becomes another problem.
– Lama Yeshe, from When the Chocolate Runs Out, published by Wisdom Publications
Lama Yeshe was the founder of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>Over one weekend at Barnens O on Vaddo in September of 1983, Lama Yeshe gave a meditation course which later was published in English called “Light of Dharma,” translated into Swedish as “Lamas ljus.” Photo by Holger Hjorth, from Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive (lamayeshe.com).
If someone’s giving you a hard time and your ego starts to hurt, instead of reacting, just take a look at what’s going on. Think of how sound is simply coming out of the other person’s mouth, entering your ear, and causing pain in your heart. If you think about this in the right way, it will make you laugh; you will see how ridiculous it is to get upset by something so insubstantial.
– Lama Yeshe, from When the Chocolate Runs Out, published by Wisdom Publications
Lama Yeshe was the founder of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>“No Time to Save the World” by Vaun Raymond. Photo: http://vaunraymondblog.blogspot.com.au/2006_11_01_archive.html. Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 License.
By Ven. Chönyi Taylor
There was a time when I nearly killed myself, but for the attentiveness of the driver of the car coming towards me. I was so absorbed in a problem I was trying to solve that I was totally unaware of where I was, that is, that I was crossing the road. This was well before the days of mobile phones. Now the ubiquitous phones appear to be responsible for many more people putting themselves in danger through the same lack of awareness of surroundings. They, like me, are being intensely mindful. But, something is not quite right. It must be the technology.
New technology tends to have a bad press. Once we were warned against the act of writing, the new technology of the early Greeks. Socrates thought that writing would create forgetfulness because people would not use their memories. I doubt whether this is the earliest example of “inattention blindness,” also known as “lack of mindfulness.” How often did our Stone Age ancestors lose their prey through inattentiveness? Certainly we know that hunters need to be both patient and alert at the same time. Writing is, and was, nothing more than a different form of attentiveness. It may or may not assist our memory skills, but the world has not fallen apart because we can write.
Then we were warned about reading books. This was not a big problem before the breakthrough technology of the printing press. Now anyone could read so long as they had been taught the alphabet and phonetics. It is the cornerstone of primary education.
There is the wonderful story of the 15th-century Luddite, abbot Johannes Trithemius, who was no fan of the printing press, because he thought that the printing press would make monks lazy.1 Copying meant that you worked hard, which was better for the soul than just reading. He also thought that this newfangled printed book was not as nice as the old copied book. That reminds me of the arguments against ebooks: they just are not as nice as the old paper books and they do not smell the same.
Now it is the rise of the internet and the mobile phone which is going to make a mess of our brains, according to Nick Carr in the Wall Street Journal. The problem is division of attention, which becomes locked into our brains.2
Inattention. Also known as “lack of mindfulness.” Mindfulness, being good, implies that its opposite, inattention, is bad.
Take mobile phones, for example. They are also blamed for “inattention blindness.” People walk into cars, fall into ponds, and even kill others by texting while they are driving. We are warned about the ability of our phones to give us an illusion of connectedness while actually creating the opposite. This becomes locked into our brains.
What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin contemplation, reflection and introspection. The web never encourages us to slow down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion.3
In other words, modern technology gives us new ways to be distracted.
Is this so?
Mindfulness necessarily creates inattention to whatever we are not being mindful of.
Inattention can also be called: concentration, distraction, inattentiveness, preoccupation, absent-mindedness, daydreaming, dreaminess, reverie, wool-gathering, abstraction, staring into space, obliviousness. Some of these synonyms are good and some are not. Where would we be without daydreaming, reverie, staring into space, brainstorming? These are also opposite to mindfulness. Studies of the creative process show that both daydreaming and attentiveness are required in the process of creation, but at different times. J. P. Guilford, the great psychologist, coined the terms “divergent thinking” and “convergent thinking.”4 We need both.
So, mindfulness which is being directed towards the phone screen is not being directed elsewhere. That does not mean we are incapable of being mindful, it only means that we have chosen to be mindful of one thing without thinking about the consequences. And having something “locked into our brains” is just current jargon for “learning.” Rather than being alarmed by these brain changes, it would be better to recognize that the neuro-circuits can also be unchanged. In other words, we create habits and we break them.
This is true, too, of our Buddhist practices. We can develop mindfulness as an aspect of meditation and as we do that we are inattentive to any problems happening around us. Meditation, wisely, can be single-pointed concentration (convergent thinking) or analytical meditation (divergent thinking). Post meditation is the time for creating merit that is to generate deeper and wiser states of mind, of wisdom and of compassion. Creating merit also requires both convergent and divergent thinking. How can I benefit this sentient being, the mouse and its decidedly unhealthy droppings? Divergent thinking. I want to do this without killing the mouse. How can I trap it without killing it? Ah, here is an idea that might work. Let me put it into practice. Convergent thinking. Both these states are necessary if the meditation or the creation of merit is to be successful.
What really matters is not attentiveness, or even short burst thinking, but the wisdom which realizes we are not paying attention to what really matters at any one time.
Then, of course, there is our motivation that turns everyday activity into Dharma practice. But that is another topic.
Ven. Chönyi Taylor is a registered Foundational Buddhism FPMT teacher and an elder for the Discovering Buddhism at Home Course. She is the author of Enough! A Buddhist Approach to Working with Addictive Patterns (Snow Lion, 2010) and has been published in Mandala, Buddhadharma, Dharma Vision and Sangha Magazine. She is a founding member and member of the training committee of the Australian Association of Buddhist Counsellors and Psychotherapists and an Honorary Lecturer in the Discipline of Psychiatry at Sydney University.
1. Mike Masnick, “A Fifteenth Century Technopanic About The Horrors Of The Printing Press,” Techdirt.com, February 25, 2011 <https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110119/05022912725/fifteenth-century-technopanic-about-horrors-printing-press.shtml>
2. Nick Carr, The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains, W.W. Norton & Co., 2011
3. Nick Carr, “Does the Internet Make You Dumber?” Wall Street Journal, June 5, 2010 <http://online.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704025304575284981644790098>
4. J. P. Guilford, The Nature of Human Intelligence, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1967
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Lama Zopa Rinpche with Garrey Foulkes in the recently completed art studio at Chenrezig Institute, Eudlo, Queensland, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
“… Every time you look at holy objects – pictures of the Buddha, statues, scriptures, stupas – they plant the seed of liberation and enlightenment in your mental continuum. So every time you look at them they purify your mind. They plant the seed of enlightenment, which includes all the causes to achieve enlightenment,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche instructs in “Why Holy Objects Are Precious and Wish-fulfilling.”
“How? When you look at them they plant a seed or positive imprint on your mental continuum so that later when you meet Buddhadharma, either in this life or in future lives, you are able to understand the words and the meaning of the teachings. From that, you are able to practice the meaning of the Dharma you have understood, which causes you to cease the gross and subtle defilements by actualizing the path and then your mental continuum becomes omniscient mind. This is what is meant when we say that by seeing holy objects it plants the seed of enlightenment on the mind – it contains the whole path from guru devotion and the three principals up to the two stages of tantra and enlightenment. Seeing holy objects makes us actualize all of this as a result. This is the effect we get from seeing them and this is how they cause us to achieve enlightenment. …”
You can read the complete advice “Why Holy Objects Are Precious and Wish-fulfilling” as a PDF found with other advice from Rinpoche on holy objects on FPMT.org.
Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche with large Chenrezig thangka at Chenrezig Institute, Eudlo, Queensland, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
“… Having a positive attitude, such as the altruistic thought to help other sentient beings and not harm them, is the cause of success in life. Even though some people might not have much education, they have no difficulties in life; they are wealthy and have harmonious relationships, and whatever they wish for happens. The reason for this is the cause created in the past. This is the actual evolution; this is where their happiness comes from. But when we do not analyze, when we are not aware, it looks as if success came from outside and does not depend on their mind,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said in a teaching from 1991 recently published on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
“It’s the opposite for people who are experiencing difficulties in their life. Their actions are motivated by ill will, jealousy, selfishness, dissatisfaction, desire, ignorance, anger and so forth, and their problems and difficulties result from that. Even though this is the actual evolution, when we do not understand or are not aware of karma, of action and result, it appears as if success and difficulties come from outside. We may have heard of karma and sometimes talk about it or meditate on it, but we are not aware of it in our everyday life.
“Happiness and success in life depends on transforming the mind, on making the mind better. Through that our actions become better; it depends on developing a positive attitude. Our mental continuum has all the potential to be completely transformed into the right path; we can completely purify all the negative imprints left on our mental continuum by our negative actions, which produce the problems in our life. Transforming our mind makes it impossible to experience the action and the resultant problems. Our mental continuum has all this potential.
“Therefore, meditation is extremely important in our life. It is the most important method for obtaining happiness in our everyday life. If we think more broadly, meditation brings not only temporary happiness but especially ultimate happiness, the peerless happiness of full enlightenment – when this mental continuum is completely pure, free of every single mistake, even the subtle imprints, the obscurations, and has completed all the qualities, all the realizations. Then we are able to bring everyone else to the peerless happiness of full enlightenment by freeing them from all their problems and obscurations, from their disturbing thoughts and even the imprints left on the mind. We have a fully knowing mind, having completed training the mind in compassion and having the perfect power to guide everyone according to the level of their mind. …”
You can read the complete teaching “Transforming the Mind in Everyday Life” on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.
]]>“… Many different conditions can cause stress: the fear of your partner dying or of losing them to someone else, failure in business, loss of a job, illness, or not getting some person or object that you want. With desires focused solely on the happiness of this life, you worry that you will not obtain the pleasures you selfishly seek. This dissatisfied, desirous mind is one of the main causes of stress,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said in a teaching in 1990 in Sydney, Australia, that has been recently published on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
“The general method to deal with stress is to look at life in a positive rather than negative way. Looking positively at your problems is itself a meditation that transforms the mind into happiness. Reflecting on the benefits of your problems releases your squeezed, uptight mind and brings relaxation in your heart.
“Another approach is to meditate on experiencing the problem you are going through on behalf of others. Think, ‘I am experiencing this problem on behalf of all other beings. Instead of allowing countless other human beings to experience it, I alone will take all these problems upon myself, so that all others can be free of them.’ This attitude stops the problem because it purifies the cause of the problem, which is within your mind. Purifying the cause solves the problem. Experiencing your problems in this way keeps your mind happy and benefits others. And when your problem benefits others, it benefits you. …”
You can read the complete teaching, “How to Be Happy,” on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. Parts of this teaching have also been published in Wisdom Publication’s book How to Be Happy by Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche in the park, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
“Offering one tiny flower to a statue or picture of Buddha receives immeasurable, limitless, merit. All the paths to happiness result from that. With just one grain of rice or one tiny flower, you can enter the path and achieve total enlightenment – the completion of all good qualities,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche advised.
“After achieving enlightenment, you can liberate so many sentient beings from so much suffering and samsara and bring them to enlightenment. This is the result of offering one tiny flower. Each offering has all this benefit – like putting money in the bank. One dollar equals one billion trillion dollars in interest. This is an amazing benefit. It is important to remember this every day and offer as much as possible. If you see a beautiful flower, you visualize offering it to the guru and Buddha. The result and benefit is incredible. You can offer every single flower in a garden – the merit received is mind-blowing.
“This is how you use your precious human life, which is extremely rare and hard to find. Every time you see an object, use it to become closer to liberation and enlightenment. Many times each day, use your precious human rebirth to bring you closer and closer to liberation and enlightenment and thus to enlighten all sentient beings.”
Read more of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s on “Offering Practices” in “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” which is part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche blessing dogs at Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche has given much advice on benefiting animals. Here is a suggestion for helping your pets and other animal friends:
“It’s also extremely good to bless food before you give it to animals. If you can’t do it for every meal, then you can bless all the food at the same time. Recite the five powerful mantras or OM MANI PADME HUM, Medicine Buddha, and Milarepa mantras. All of these have power and help anyone who eats this food to not be reborn in the lower realms; it blesses their mind and purifies negative karma. If you can, do it every time you feed them – recite the mantras and blow on the food. This is the biggest gift you can offer them: it causes a good rebirth, so they can escape samsara, achieve liberation, and acquire the positive imprints of the Mahayana teachings and mantras that lead to enlightenment.
“I asked the people who take care of our dogs at Tushita Centre in Dharamsala to recite the Maitreya Buddha prayer and mantra, the Lama Tsongkhapa praise to Guru Shakyamuni Buddha – ‘Having Found the Realization of Dependent Arising’ – and other prayers and mantras to the dogs, while holding a biscuit in their hand, so all the dogs wait patiently. It looks like they are respectfully listening to the teachings, with their eyes looking at the biscuit, all sitting humbly.”
Read more of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s instructions “How to Benefit Animals” on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” which is part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche practices tossing a small ball into a bucket during a picnic in Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
“People put a lot of effort into climbing Mount Everest, but it means nothing. They spend millions of dollars climbing Mount Everest just to get a reputation, just to get some dry name,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche taught to the students of the 33rd Kopan Course in 2000. “They put so many hundreds of thousands of dollars into a project which is totally meaningless. People spend so much money and effort and for their whole life they put effort into things which are totally meaningless and they only create negative karma, because their motivation is just attachment. It means nothing, and they totally waste all their money and their life, because they put so much effort for so many years into nothing.
“There are so many people in the world who have received a precious human body but are totally wasting it by doing meaningless actions. So, it is very important, while we are here, to follow the path to enlightenment. Even if we die while doing prostrations to the Buddha, we are still practicing Dharma, so if we die it is worthwhile. …”
Lama Zopa Rinpoche practices tossing a small ball into a bucket during a picnic in Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Excerpted from the teaching “Putting Effort into Dharma Practice” found at the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Geshe Doga and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, Thubten Shedrup Ling, Bendigo, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
From Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s “Compassion Is of the Upmost Need”:
From the Sutra Request by Lodro Gyatso: “The thought of complete enlightenment, preserving Dharma, practicing Dharma and having love and compassion for living beings: these four dharmas have infinite qualities – the limit of their benefits is not seen by the Victorious Ones. It is said that preserving Dharma and protecting the lives of living beings has limitless benefits.”
This shows that if we have COMPASSION for sentient beings, from those we can’t see with the naked eye but only under a microscope up to creatures the size of a mountain, then the Buddha has never explained the limits of the benefits of the compassion we generate for them. It’s the same as saving the lives of human beings, animals and insects; we must understand that it has limitless benefits.
A free PDF download of “Compassion Is of the Upmost Need,” Rinpoche’s 10 quotes on compassion, is available from the Foundation Store in letter and A4 formats.
More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s webpage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.
]]>Lama Zopa Rinpoche in the new gompa at Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, November 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered this advice on the nature of the mind:
“The mind is like dough, which means you can make it into any shape: emotional, non-emotional, happy, not happy.
“Mind is like a child, so you should become the parents, like the father and mother watching and guiding the child. If you follow the child, if you become the child, it makes you crazy. Then, you always create obstacles and life becomes suffering.
“Or you become the guru and the mind is like the disciple – you watch and guide it. Or you are like a spy. You should be like a spy with your mind, always watching and blocking it when it is being negative and doing harm. It is like spying on a political person, examining what the person is thinking and planning, whether the person is performing positive actions or negative actions.
“Also, it is like you are the captain and the mind is the boat. Or you are the driver and the mind is the car, so therefore you have to always watch the car, and pay attention that you are traveling on the right road.
“If you don’t behave like this, then you are controlled by the mind.”
– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from the page on “Meditation Practice” in “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
Learn more about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche and his beneficial activities by visiting Rinpoche’s webpage, where you will find links to Rinpoche’s schedule, new advice, recent video, photos and more.
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