You need this:
- Chab trü puja: to be done twice by Geshe-la.
- Ven. Charles needs to read the Diamond Cutter Sutra five times for him.
Nyung Näs
Nyung Näs
Date of Advice:
March 2019
Date Posted:
August 2023
A student had to stop after doing 40 consecutive nyung näs because he felt too dizzy and could not sleep. He was planning to complete 108 nyung näs. The student asked Rinpoche for advice.
Date of Advice:
October 2021
Date Posted:
June 2023
A student had a great wish to do a three-year retreat and asked Rinpoche what practices they should do to prepare for the retreat.
My most dear, most precious, most kind, wish-fulfilling one,
Thank you for your kind letter.
My suggestion is you could do one thousand nyung näs. This would be extremely good. Then you don’t have to worry about going to the lower realms and whenever death comes, you will go to the pure land. And not only that, you develop compassion for all the sentient beings—this is special, I think with Chenrezig—and you will achieve enlightenment much quicker.
My root guru mentioned that at least you will achieve enlightenment. Just by doing nyung näs, you will achieve enlightenment within sixteen years.
When you do nyung nä practice, you are following the eight Mahayana precepts, like that, so you will have to prepare well for one thousand nyung näs. One hundred nyung näs don’t take even one year; so many people do one hundred nyung näs.
At Kopan, we have one nun who did more than two thousand nyung näs in Tsum before she came to Kopan. Some nuns come to do consultation with her. She is very inspiring, even for the Western nuns to know her, especially for the Western nuns. It’s really, really unbelievable if you can do [nyung nä practice] like that.
You are most welcome to enlightenment, without taking much time, and as well, welcome to the pure land. I will help in whatever way I can.
Yes, life is very short. It looks like we’re going to live for a long time, but actually it’s not long. It’s like one second that we have a human rebirth, in this life, and in the future when we die it will be like last night’s dream. One second, then gone, the human life is gone. We hallucinate [and tell] ourselves that we’re going to live long.
Also, by doing these nyung näs, it will make the nunnery in Mongolia so worthwhile.
With much love and prayers ...
Date of Advice:
July 2018
Date Posted:
December 2021
A student had completed 200 nyung näs and asked whether they should do another 108 nyung näs or volunteer for a project in India.
My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Thank you very much for your kind letter, I was very happy to receive it.
No, it didn’t come out beneficial for you to go to work for the project in India but then I checked and it seems there are some obstacles, both for you to go there and also for the next set of 108 nyung näs.
I checked what can be done and you should recite Amitayus Long Life Sutra (Tse dö) 500 times. You can read it and others can read it too; your friends to help you.
Also make 500 long-life tsa tsas. You can do this and also your friends can help you.
After you have done that, if you can, go to Bodhgaya and go around stupa, and do some retreat to do purification. Then after that it comes out best to go to the project in India and also best to do the nyung näs.
Thank you so much for the 200 nyung näs that you have already done. I am so happy with what you have already been able to accomplish.
In the West they talk about liberation, like women’s liberation, etc., but what you are doing is the real women’s liberation. Please tell other women that this is the real women’s liberation, so then they can achieve enlightenment, because they have generated compassion for all sentient beings in order to free them from samsara. The final women’s liberation is enlightenment, I want to say this, and you can tell others that this is the real meaning of women’s liberation.
Thank you very, very, very much. It’s incredible, incredible, incredible, I like it very much. You have become an example to other women to achieve liberation, the final liberation. You are most welcome to buddhahood, in order to free the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsara’s sufferings and bring them to enlightenment.
What makes your life most meaningful is meditation on the lamrim, then to live your life with bodhicitta motivation. This is the best.
With much love and prayers ...
Date of Advice:
September 2013
Date Posted:
November 2020
A student had completed 375 nyung näs and planned to do one thousand. The student’s letter and Rinpoche’s response are below. Rinpoche suggested sharing the student’s letter, for rejoicing.
Student’s letter
Dear Lama Zopa Rinpoche,
I wish to share with Rinpoche the fact that I have completed 375 nyung näs. I offer Rinpoche the 375 completed nyung näs. I hope to return to the practice within the next week and believe that I shall be well into the 400s by December. I am deeply in love with the practice and hope to devote the rest of my life to doing it.
Your grateful student …
Rinpoche’s response
My most dear, most precious, most kind one,
Please enjoy, enjoy more with bodhicitta. Doing the nyung näs as I wished is incredible, thank you very much. A billion, zillion, numberless thanks, that is incredible. I have nothing much to offer you, but I want to send you some robes.
With much love and prayers …
Date of Advice:
July 2018
Date Posted:
October 2020
A student with life obstacles wrote to ask Rinpoche about doing 108 nyung näs. Rinpoche advised animal liberation and several pujas to remove the obstacles. He also emphasized the importance of meditating on lamrim and guru devotion every day.
My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
I checked and it seems you have some life obstacles if you go to nyung näs at this time, but if you do these pujas first, then it comes out best for you to do the nyung näs. All the pujas will have to be done before going to do the nyung näs.
1. Four Namgyalma long-life pujas: these can be done at Serkong Dorje Chang's monastery in Swambhunath or Drubtob Rinpoche’s monastery in Nepal. Either of these monasteries can do these pujas.
2. You need to liberate one hundred animals. This is mainly for your long life, but also for the long life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and all your gurus; for all the Sangha who preserve the Dharma and spread Dharma; for the benefactors of the Sangha and the teachings; for all those in FPMT—all the staff, all the students, all the benefactors and all the volunteers; for all evil beings to meet Dharma, to renounce negative karma and create good karma; and also for all beings.
You need to know how to do animal liberation, according to my advice. There is a book that explains how to set up the altar and how to take the animals around it, the mantras to recite and so forth. [See the FPMT ebook Liberating Animals. A short version is also available as a PDF.]
A very quick way to liberate many animals, for instance, is by getting 1,000 crickets in one bag from the shop. These are animals that are otherwise going to be killed or fed to another animal. You take the 1,000 crickets around the holy objects that you have set up (stupas, tsa tsas, relics of the Buddha) and each time it creates the cause of enlightenment for each insect, worm and so forth. [You also can liberate] worms, which are used as fishing bait. People put wire through the body of the worm, which must be unbelievably painful because the worm is not dead and is still moving.
You can also liberate bigger animals that are in danger of being killed. But please do read the book on how to liberate animals and maybe you discuss it with the center. They should know how to do it, how to follow my book, which explains the ways to benefit the animals with mantras, blessed water and going around holy objects.
3. You need the puja mamo trü kang done five times. You can request Kopan to do the puja, and if many monks attend the puja then you can count each monk that does it as one time. So if there are many monks then it is better. If many monks attend, then it gets done many times, so it’s better to do that quickly.
4. The Kopan nuns need to read zung du [Collection of Dharanis] and dedicate for you.
In terms of practice, this human life is just one time. We have this perfect human rebirth just this time, so we can use it to practice Dharma.
One practice to do every day is the daily motivation, The Method to Transform a Suffering Life into Happiness (Including Enlightenment). This also has the blessing of the speech and daily mantras.
It is very important to meditate on the lamrim every day. This is very important. You can also recite one lamrim prayer every day, reading it slowly and going over the meaning. Lamrim is what you need to actualize, no matter how long it takes, so please put your effort there.
You should do the lamrim meditation during your guru yoga practice. Stop before the guru absorbs into you and meditate on whatever section of the lamrim you are up to.
One meditation that you must try to do every day is on guru devotion. If you miss it sometimes that’s OK, but then just continue. There is no question of how much time you should take; it is up to you, what fits.
Then continue with whatever lamrim topic you are up to, doing the meditation every day and going through the subjects slowly. Whatever meditation you did in the morning, you can continue with that mind during the day, so that way your mind is in lamrim all day.
Please try to meditate on the lamrim based on guru yoga and on this basis you will get all the realizations and the most success in your life. It is important to try to achieve all the realizations in order to actualize enlightenment. This is in order to liberate numberless sentient beings and enlighten them. That’s the real project, the real goal of our life.
After you generate bodhicitta, you can practice tantra. There is generation stage—first the gross generation stage and then the subtle generation stage. You can also do some meditation on the completion stage, just to leave positive imprints for realizations.
So please practice as much as you can. Life is not long, and the nature of this life is impermanent. Death can happen at any time. This is the foundation of the Buddha’s teachings, and this was the last advice the Buddha gave before showing the aspect of passing away.
Don’t worry so much about finishing or not finishing; just do it continuously. That is the most important thing, to practice as best you can.
What makes your life most meaningful is meditation on the lamrim and to live your life with bodhicitta motivation. This is best.
After the pujas are done, it is very good to do the nyung näs. Thank you very, very much for having that wish.
You also need to recite the Golden Light Sutra once a month and continue in your life this way. You can recite a bit each day or do it all at once.
With much love and prayers ...
Date of Advice:
June 2016
Date Posted:
November 2018
In this letter, Rinpoche advised a student to do two thousand nyung näs. Rinpoche also wrote about the power of nyung näs and the importance of generating the correct motivation for the practice.
My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Not so many other preliminary practices came out [in my observation], but what came out is for you to do two thousand nyung näs. This is what Geshe Lama Konchog and many other disciples of Drupa Rinpoche did also.
Drupa Rinpoche was a great lama, who first became a lharampa geshe and then took teachings and initiations from other sects and other lamas. He then benefited so many sentient beings in the Himalayan Mountains. He organized many one hundred million OM MANI PADME HUM recitations for the people in many places, and he also started monasteries and nunneries that are still there. Now there are more nunneries.
The incarnation is in Nepal or around. He was not well, so he asked me to look after his monastery and nunnery in Tsum, which is close to Tibet. So we took care of the monastery and nunnery, and built a new monastery and developed it in many ways, with social service and education and debate and Buddhist philosophy. [See FPMT's Tsum Project.]
This lama did two thousand nyung näs himself, and I think maybe he did more than that. He had disciples who did three thousand nyung näs, many have done one thousand and now there are Western students who have finished one hundred. There is a nun who has done more than five hundred nyung näs a long time ago, and maybe she is now close to one thousand. I have been sponsoring ten people to do one hundred nyung näs each year at Institute Vajra Yogini in France.
For you, nyung nä is a great preliminary practice, so do two thousand; do as many as you can, it’s so good. This is the most powerful way to purify negative karma collected from beginningless rebirth and to collect extensive merit and in particular to develop compassion for all sentient beings. By developing compassion you will achieve enlightenment quickly, and that means you are able to free the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings quickly and bring them to buddhahood quickly, by yourself.
If you do one nyung nä well, then you will go to the pure land. So it is really important to do the nyung näs with the motivation of impermanence and strong bodhicitta. Do the nyung näs only for the sake of other sentient beings, who are numberless—the numberless hell beings, numberless hungry ghosts and numberless animals—those living in the ocean, which are the size of a mountain; those that so small you can’t see them with your eye, only with a machine; those living on the ground, the tiny flies that fly up when you walk on the grass; and those that live in the bushes and in the sky. There are not only those in this world but also in numberless worlds and numberless universes, so do it also for the numberless human beings, numberless asuras, numberless suras and numberless intermediate state beings. Do the nyung näs for all of them. This is the most exciting, greatest happiness, to do nyung näs for them. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow!
You can do that and also study Dharma always. Sometimes you can do more retreat and meditation, and sometimes do more study, or sometimes do these things together.
With much love and prayers ...
