My most dear, most precious, most kind, wish-fulfilling one,
Whatever you’re doing is excellent. Of course, by liberating the fish, that saves them from being killed and helps whoever has life obstacles or sickness. It helps that person get better and of course, it becomes virtue and prevents the fish from being killed. Of course, the fish have to go back in the water and there’s no [body of] water with only one kind of fish inside. I think the water is full of their enemies which will eat them, even though we liberate them from being killed.

Goats can be more expensive and you need someone to look after them, but in this way you can buy and take care of them.

In Tibet, people buy yaks and put them on the mountain and offer to the protectors, Palden Lhamo and so forth. These yaks become so big and so pompous. I saw them on the mountain, where they are offered to the Dharma protectors, not just to the suffering spirits.

Geshe Tsewang Dorje built a monastery and a big statue of Buddha in Ladakh. He invited me to Ladakh and I was supposed to come there but the lockdown due to the COVID19 virus disease happened, so I couldn’t come. If this lockdown ceases, I’m supposed to go to Ladakh, because I have big projects there.

Geshe Tsewang Dorje told me that there was a family in Ladakh with fifty cows which were old. They thought other families would help them, but no one helped them. So I said he doesn’t have to wait for me to come to Ladakh. The monks from Geshe Tsewang Dorje’s monastery can build a better place for the animals, with eight stupas for them to go around and purify their negative karma and achieve enlightenment, not only to be free from samsara. The animals can go around the stupas a few times every day. Then the monks can look after more animals. [Read more about the animal sanctuary in Ladakh here.]

I also want to help the poor people by giving them food and other things, and also by explaining Dharma, how to live their life. Not only reciting prayers, but explaining Dharma to them.

I was requested to rebuild one hundred stupas, which I think were destroyed a long time ago. They were built by Lotsawa Rinchen Zangpo, probably hundreds of years ago.

My plan is to rebuild these stupas, bigger than what was originally built there, so people can go around them and purify so much negative karma. It’s also a quick way to achieve enlightenment with bodhicitta motivation. Anyway, these are the ideas of what I want to do in Ladakh.

It’s excellent that you are reading the Golden Light Sutra. This is incredible, incredible purification, and benefits the world unbelievably, bringing peace and happiness. You can also read the sutra for all the people who have died from the COVID19 virus in China, America, India, Nepal, everywhere. Also dedicate for those who are dying or sick. You can dedicate for everybody in the whole world and for all the six-realm sentient beings to be free from samsara and to achieve enlightenment quickly. Other people who read the Golden Light Sutra can also dedicate for your father.

According to my observation, you should make tsa tsas of rig sum gon po [the Three Saviors]—Manjushri, Chenrezig, Vajrapani—these three deities on one mold. There is a big tsa tsa, maybe from Taiwan, I’m not sure. Before they built it, they made a big tsa tsa of the three long-life deities, Namgyalma, Amitayus and White Tara. It’s very beautiful. I’m not sure if there is a mold of rig sum gon po. If it’s not there, you can ask them to make a very nice one.

So you should make three tsa tsas, the same size as the tsa tsa of the three long-life deities that they have made, which is between two and three feet high. They made a very beautiful one, very nice. You should make three tsa tsas of the rig sum gon po and each of these should be about two to three feet high.

There were two girls in Ladakh that I met some years ago. I met them a few times and had some occasional correspondence with them. My question is, are you are one of those girls?

When you liberate animals who will be killed because they are bought for food and so you have to rescue them, it’s very important to take them around statues, stupas or any holy objects. If you can’t take them around the gompa or around a stupa that’s already built, you can put the holy objects outside on a table which is covered nicely with cloth, with offerings around. You can put any statues, tsa tsas and stupas there and then take the animals around the holy objects. It’s most important for them.

If there are one hundred statues, stupas, tsa tsas or pictures, whatever is on the table, then if you take an animal around one time, that animal creates the cause of enlightenment one hundred times. That means if you have a thousand crickets in a plastic bag, you can liberate them all. There are people, sometimes Chinese, who keep pets, like snakes, that eat insects and different animals. These insects are sold in the market, so you can liberate them.

One time, I was carrying Buddha’s relic and I took one thousand crickets in a plastic bag around the mountain. By taking one thousand of them around the hill, they created the cause of enlightenment. It’s unbelievably, incredibly beneficial for them, not only freeing them from samsara, but bringing them to enlightenment. You can liberate worms and insects; it doesn’t have to be only fish.

Even though we put fish in the water, other fish will kill them, but we can first take them around as many holy objects as we can, so they create some virtue and purify the cause of being born in the lower realms. They purify the cause of being reborn in samsara and they create the causes of enlightenment so many times. This is the best thing.

The second thing you can do for the animals is recite mantras, such as Medicine Buddha mantra or OM MANI PADME HUM, and then blow on the water. You can blow on a bucket of water and then sprinkle that water over the fish or any other animals. If there are birds, you can sprinkle the water on them.

The third thing is to recite mantras and if the animals hear that sound, it plants the seed of enlightenment and they go to enlightenment.

There are these three benefits, but the best one is if you can take the animals around holy objects.

In Ladakh, if there’s someone making tsa tsas for people who have died and so forth, you can get many tsa tsas from there and place them on a table in a nice way. You can buy as many as possible and place them there nicely, and then take the animals around the tsa tsas.

In this way the animals help the people to become free from samsara and become enlightened. People think they are helping the animals, but the animals are helping the people too. We have to help each other, so this is a very good practice.

We received happiness from beginningless rebirths and also in the future, up to enlightenment, from each sentient being—each hell being, each hungry ghost, each animal, each human, each sura, each asura and each intermediate state being—and from Buddha, Dharma, Sangha.

They are so precious, they have been our mother from beginningless rebirths and they have suffered unbelievably, creating so much negative karma for us, giving us happiness, a long life, education, all those things. They have suffered so much for us and created so much negative karma for us. They have been suffering from beginningless rebirths for us.

Also, they don’t know Dharma and even if they wish for happiness, with ignorance they destroy the cause of happiness, virtue, by getting angry. No matter how much they do not like suffering, they run day and night to create the cause of suffering.

When I look at mothers, I see how the children bother their parents day and night, and they don’t get any peace, because the children want this or want that. They cry, because one child wants this and another wants that. If I’m at an airport watching a family with demanding children, I get tired after five minutes of watching them and I get bored. We have been born numberless times to them and we behaved like that, therefore they have suffered so much. It’s so worthwhile to help them.

I hope you have my book, Liberating Animals. If you don’t have it, you can ask Holly, my secretary. She can help you with anything you need, books and so forth. Ask Holly and she can guide you.

Generally, when you dedicate, after reciting OM MANI PADME HUM, Vajrasattva, the King of Prayers or anything else, dedicate the merit for your father to be free from the lower realms immediately and to be reborn in a pure land where he can become enlightened, or at least to be born with a perfect human body, meet the Mahayana teachings and meet a perfectly qualified Mahayana guru revealing the unmistaken path to enlightenment. By pleasing most the holy mind of the virtuous friend, may he achieve enlightenment as quickly as possible.

OK, that’s all.

With much love and prayers ...