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CONVENTIONAL NATURE AND IMPERMANENCE
The Buddha said:

Do not commit any unwholesome actions;
Engage in perfect, wholesome actions;
Subdue one’s mind.
This is the teaching of Buddha.

One of my gurus, Kyabje Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche, said that this shows the four noble truths. These four verses show the truth of suffering, the truth of the cause of suffering, the truth of the cessation of the suffering and causes, and the truth of the path [that leads to the cessation of suffering], which means to achieve that.

In the next seven or eight verses, the Buddha explained at the end of the Vajra Cutter Sutra, the teachings on the Perfection of Wisdom, expressing nature of our life, talking about the nature of the causative phenomena, conventional nature. I don’t know the English term exactly, but it’s the truth that appears for the all-obscuring mind, the conventional nature of causative phenomena, and then the ultimate nature of causative phenomena. Basically, this is the main focus, the main object of meditation, when you recite these words, your own life and then the rest of causative phenomena.

It’s like taking medicine. We have sicknesses and then we become healthy by removing the sicknesses, so here to achieve ultimate happiness by eliminating true suffering and then the true cause of suffering, all the delusions and karma, this action, including the negative imprint of delusion, the seed.

Doing the meditation on these verses and the previous one shows the very heart of Buddhism, and then what practicing Dharma means, what meditation means.

Next, we lead our mind away from distraction by looking at causative phenomena, particular our life, the I and the aggregates and our, material possessions, the people surrounding us in our life, which are totally nature of impermanence, which are totally nature of impermanence, transitory nature, transitory, not only day-by-day, not only hour-by-hour, not only minute-by-minute, even transitory, it decays even second-by-second, and it decays, it decays even within second. That’s subtle impermanence. Things do not last, but decay even within second.

That’s conventional nature, the nature of the truth for the all-obscuring mind, ignorance, how it appears to it; it’s the truth for that. Even that nature, in Tibetan, kün-dzob dem-pa, that nature is impermanent, transitory; it doesn’t last, it decays, even second-by-second, even within a second.

Then not only that, the ultimate nature of the causative phenomena, emptiness. It brings your mind from total distraction, from seeing things appear as permanent and then believing that they are permanent, and they are always going to be like this. Even when we see a beautiful flower, we believe it’s going to be always like that. It appears permanent and we believe it; we don’t think it’s in the nature of impermanence.

While we’re looking at it, the second when you’re looking at it, it’s getting older, it’s decaying, it’s changing. It’s decaying second-by-second, even within a second, but we don’t see that, and we think it’s always going to be like this. These are concepts that we have.

When we look at it, myself as well, when we look at beautiful flower, our concept is of permanence. That is another totally wrong view, this is besides what we talked yesterday, that big hallucination, that huge hallucination, that truly-existent flower, existing from its own side, existing by nature—besides that huge, huge, huge hallucination.

Here it appears as permanent, and that’s the way we think it’s always going to be. We never think this is nature of impermanence. We never think this is. We don’t see that this is changing, that it’s nature is transitory, changing while we’re looking at it. It’s decaying, even second-by-second, even within a second, it doesn’t last.

Then, after several hours, there’s a visible change. The color changes, it gets wrinkles, it loses its brightness. After a day or many hours it gradually starts, the shape changes, the color changes, the brightness is gone, more wrinkles starts.

We start to see there’s been a change when it becomes very gross. But the change is happening every day, every hour, every minute, every second but you don’t notice it. We don’t realize it, so it appears permanent and we believe in that way.

[Noise in background] Sorry for the noise, that’s not part of the teaching. Or you can meditate on empty, [Rinpoche laughs] then it becomes a teaching.

This is our normal view, our concept of permanence and the sense that it is going to always be like that. When we meet our enemy, our enemy is always going to be like this—he’s always going to be like this or she’s always going to be like that. Or our friend, he or she is going to be our friend all the time.

We don’t think so much like this, that the thing itself is changing. While it is a friend, she is changing. I’m not talking so much about changing from a friend—that’s another thing—but while she’s a friend, she’s changing, while he’s an enemy, he’s changing. Nothing lasts.

What I’m talking about is useful. I’m describing, introducing the common view, how things appear to us ordinary beings, how we look at them, with what kind of concept, the wrong concept of permanence. Then attachment comes, grasping, Then when some obstacle happens, when somebody causes some obstacle or something, and we see the nature of change, how things are impermanent in nature—when something gets broken or old or it changes, its color changes or it decays—because there’s attachment, we get upset, we get unhappy or angry. Somebody has disturbed us and we get angry with that person.

Because there’s attachment, when there is some obstacle to the attachment, when our attachment doesn’t get what it wants, then we get angry, so it’s all built from the basic wrong concept of things appearing as permanent and then us believing this, thinking it’s always going to be like this, beautiful or whatever. So, everything is built on the wrong concept. Then we harm other sentient beings, we get unhappiness and all that, and we suffer. Our wrong concept tortures us. Basically this is how we’ve been suffering from beginningless rebirths, not only this life. It’s not only the experience of this life, the sufferings not only this life but we have been experiencing these wrong concepts, we’ve been living with these wrong concepts, under the control of these wrong concepts from beginningless rebirths. We have been suffering from beginningless rebirths with those emotions. This is the negative emotional mind tortures us all the time, that never gives us any peace and also harms others.

This concept of permanence affects the nature of our mind with these wrong concepts. Because things appear permanent other delusions arise, such as attachment and so forth, so there’s no peace. Those disturbing thoughts arise, so there’s no peace in our heart during that time.

If we recognize how it appears like this but it’s not true, that actually things are in the nature of impermanence, changing hour by hour, minute by minute, second by second, even within second, attachment doesn’t arise. This is the way we look at the conventional nature, the nature of the kun-dzob den-pa, the truth appearing to the all-obscuring mind, the impermanent nature.

Then attachment doesn’t arise. It doesn’t allow it to arise or those other wrong concepts, the negative emotional thoughts. So it brings peace, tranquility, in our mental continuum. Our mind is not stuck with that object, like glue. Attachment glues our mind to the object. Attachment is like glue; it sticks our mind on that object, making it very difficult to separate from the object. That’s the one basic suffering in our life, the suffering of attachment; it’s very difficult to separate from that.

Because of that, we can’t let go, we get stuck to that. Then we do all kinds of things—hundreds, thousands of things—to not lose that object: we kill other sentient beings, we cheat other sentient beings, we tell lies and harm other sentient beings, all kinds of things in order to not lose that object, to always have that object. We do many hundreds and thousands of things that harm other sentient beings in order to get this happiness for ourselves. We so create so many negative karma to not lose this object, for this pleasure. This is how we live, this is basically how we live life. This is another description of life for us ordinary sentient beings, living life that brings only problems and suffering.

It’s good to look deeper, to not allow ourselves to be cheated by appearances, by the concept of permanence. We shouldn’t let the concept of permanence arise, which becomes the basis for attachment and other delusions, then we cheat ourselves, we deceive ourselves all the time.

We’ve never achieved liberation from samsara so far, we’ve never achieved the fully awakened mind and full enlightenment for sentient beings. So far, from beginningless rebirths, we achieved this, even though our mind has buddha nature, all the potential to be free from oceans of suffering of hell, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, suras, asuras, intermediate state beings. We can actualize the path, have realizations, all the things, you have all the potential but until now we have not utilized it.

There will be some noise, so sorry.[ Rinpoche laughs]

It’s good to think how it is the nature of suffering. Even if we can’t think about emptiness at least if we can think about this conventional nature, the truth for the all-obscuring mind, and about impermanence it’s very helpful. We can look deeper. I’m just using the flowers as an example, what we call a “beautiful flower.”

THE HAPPINESS OF FUTURE LIVES IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE HAPPINESS OF THIS LIFE
When our mind becomes free from attachment, it has tranquility and peace, free from those negative emotional thoughts, those disturbing, afflicted emotional thoughts. We’re free. That way we’re not stuck with that, we’re free, our mind is free. It doesn’t cause delusions to arise, it helps us to achieve liberation from samsara and then to achieve enlightenment.

It’s similar with life. Sorry, I’m just going to mention this, then I’ll go back. It’s similar with life. Don’t just think one life, that in this one life we allow ourselves to be cheated, this concept thinking only one life, that happiness for this one life is the main object, the main goal, only this life. If we think that, then there’s attachment and once there’s attachment, there’s anger when somebody harms that attachment, when somebody think and speaks and acts physically, doing something our self-cherishing thought doesn’t like. Then we get angry.

If our attachment doesn’t like somebody’s way of thinking, speaking or physically acting, then we get angry, or there’s jealousy, pride—so many negative emotional thoughts arise, thinking our goal of happiness in this life has been blocked. This is what happens when our motivation, our way of thinking, is just this life.

Then, even if we accept karma and reincarnation, our next lives seem sort of unimportant. Intellectually we might believe it but it’s not important for us at this moment. Even though there might be future lives—not just this one but numberless—but this is not so close to our mind, it’s sort of like secondary. It’s not something important, so we become careless. This life’s happiness seems the most important thing.

As I mentioned before, all those other negative emotional thoughts that arise, the source, the root, is attachment to this life’s pleasures. This becomes the root. All those other negative emotional thoughts are like roots spreading out. Then all the problems, all the negative emotional thoughts, so many hundreds and hundreds arise from that.

Then life has no peace and we constantly suffer. Whatever we do with that mind, we can’t find any peace, we can’t find any satisfaction, we can’t find any inner peace. Whatever we do, life is constantly suffering, dissatisfied, as I talked about yesterday.

So it’s good to regard this life as just nothing; this life is just like one minute, one hour or minute, it’s just nothing. There are so many other lives, so this one is just [one of so many.] like this second, this minute, this hour, minute, now, the present hour, the present minute, but there are so many hours, so many minutes, so many seconds continually. It’s the same with life; there is not just this life, but there are numberless future lives. As the Buddha explained, until we actualize the true path, the wisdom directly perceiving emptiness and directly cease the delusions, the disturbing thought obscurations, nyön-drip, labeled by mind and the simultaneously-born delusions—until we eliminate them, cease them completely, and then also the karma so that there’s no more reincarnation, until we achieve that level, then we have to reincarnate. When that will happen is not sure. So this emphasizes talking about achieving full enlightenment.

So we should think that this life is something like that, very short, something very short; it’s like last night’s dream, just one time dream. It happens then it’s gone; it happens and the next minute it’s gone. Like the clouds in the sky that are there now and the next minute they’re not there.

The mind, the awareness is not just this, the cause to achieve happiness is not just on this. There are numberless future lives until we achieve ultimate liberation from samsara. In the mind, instead of thinking of all those lives, even we intellectually accept them, but we see the happiness of all those numberless lives as unimportant, and just this life’s happiness as much more important, and we focus on that. Instead of that, we should think of all the future lives and the happiness of all those future lives, and see that as important, then we change our way of thinking, and focus on that.

As I mentioned, this life is something like last night’s dream, just one time, it’s happened and then it’s gone, like just one second of a day filled with minutes and hours, twenty-four hours, like that example. When our mind thinks how all the future lives are far more important, how it’s much, much, much, much more important to cause happiness, to have happiness in those lives, when you think that, then this one life seems unimportant, like one second [we are experiencing] now from all the seconds we’ve had from birth. Even from today there have been so many seconds, so the happiness of this one second is not important compared with the happiness of all those so many numberless seconds.

When we change our attitude like that, instead of placing the emphasis on the happiness of this life, thinking it’s important to achieve happiness in the numberless future lives, then our mind becomes so free, free from the problems of this life. When somebody praises us when our mind is like this, there is a total change, and even that becomes Dharma. This is the lowest Dharma, thinking that the happiness of future lives is important. Because of that, that one second [of praise] is unimportant, whatever happens is unimportant. So then when somebody praises us so much, so much, so much, so much, it’s nothing to us, it doesn’t bother us, the grasping mind, attachment doesn’t arise. Our mind is free, our mind is free, our mind is free, it cannot cheat us.

If somebody criticizes us, how we’re bad and blah, blah, blah, so selfish or whatever, it’s nothing, it is nothing to our mind. We don’t get angry. It’s nothing because this life is just like one second so the happiness of this second is unimportant; like a childish want, it doesn’t have meaning, sense.

Whether somebody says, “I don’t love you” or somebody says, “I love you,” both are nothing. [Rinpoche laughs] But then when we think of this life, when we didn’t change your mind, when our heart did not become Dharma, the very bottom Dharma, at least the very first Dharma, seeing that the happiness of future lives is more important, then those words become so important to us.

Until our mind becomes at least that very first level of Dharma, seeking the happiness of future lives, then we will always have clinging, attachment to this life and so we will be concerned about everything people say to us or behave to us. Then every single thing becomes so important, it becomes a huge issue. Whether people like us don’t like us becomes a huge issue. Even if they show their face… what’s the expression?

Student: Scowling

Rinpoche: Like scowling. You know, how the face is like this, [Rinpoche scowls], kind of stiff. No smile, scowling.

Everything becomes so important, how people and even animals behaves to us, whether the dog wags his tail or not, everything! [Rinpoche laughs] Even the elements, the trees and weather. Everything bothers us, everything becomes so important.

When a person has a conversation with us you, we listen for how he says each word, and if there are some nice words, then attachment arises, but if there are some words that attachment doesn’t want to hear or our selfish mind doesn’t want to hear, then we get upset, angry, or pride arises.

Because of attachment, this life’s happiness becomes the main goal. That’s the main reason we’re living your life, that’s what we’re living our life is for—the happiness of this life, the happiness of just this one very, very short life. It’s just that, nothing else. There is nothing else other than this, no enlightenment, no happiness of future lives, no liberation from samsara, no ultimate happiness, no enlightenment, no happiness of other sentient beings, nothing, just the happiness of this very short life.

When we dedicate our most precious human rebirth, we can achieve any great meaning, any happiness whatever, all the happiness future lives. I think yesterday, you meditated on the happiness future lives, with the eight ripening aspect qualities, you meditated on that. The teacher, Steve, spoke on that.

WITH THE PERFECT HUMAN REBIRTH WE CAN ACHIEVE THE FOUR MAHAYANA DHARMA WHEELS
Seeking the happiness of future lives is one very, very, very, very, very important thing. If we have that, then Lama Tsongkhapa said that then we can make great success in realizations, these eight ripening aspects, qualities, of a human rebirth.

I don’t remember the Tibetan but there’s also the perfect human rebirth which has seven qualities, where you can practice Dharma and achieve realizations. Then there are also these four Mahayana Dharma wheels, the perfect human body which has four Mahayana Dharma wheels.

They are: in future, meeting the guru, the holy beings, being born in a [supportive] family, having the right environment and [collecting merit and making prayers]. With the place, the family we are born into, there will be no obstacle to our practice of Dharma, they are supportive of that, they support our Dharma practice.

The place where we practice is conducive and not harmful. Then we meet our virtuous friend, our guide who shows us the unmistaken path to enlightenment. Then, having done prayers, having collected merit, with these four Mahayana Dharma wheels, by practicing Dharma, we can achieve enlightenment. We can achieve these things in future lives. We can be born in a pure land, our consciousness can transmigrate to a pure land where we can practice Dharma and complete the realizations of the path to enlightenment.

There’s the deity Heruka’s pure land, Tharpa Kachö, the pure sky enjoyment, then the pure land of Vajrayogini, the female deity, Dagpa Khachö. If we get born there, we will definitely become enlightened there. If we’re born in Amitabha Buddha’s pure land, many lamas, many of my gurus say that from there we never get reborn in the lower realms, it’s impossible. After you’re born in Amitabha’s pure land, you never get reborn in the lower realms. But my root guru, His Holiness Trijang Rinpoche, His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s younger tutor, wrote from here, from Kopan said that there you can practice tantra and can achieve enlightenment.

With this perfect human rebirth, we can achieve all those things, so, so many happinesses, and another perfect human rebirth where we can not only practice Hinayana Buddhism but Mahayana Buddhism, Paramitayana Buddhism, Sutrayana Buddhism. And not only that, also Buddhist tantra, Secret Mantra, Vajrayana. We can meet and practice the Mahayana, the Paramitayana, the sutra teachings, then achieve enlightenment for sentient beings. Then we can meet the Secret Mantra Vajrayana and we can achieve enlightenment in one lifetime. Then especially highest tantra, the fourth level of tantra, and practicing that allows us to achieve enlightenment in a brief lifetime of these degenerated times, the quickest, quickest way to achieve enlightenment. By achieving the perfect human rebirth in the next life we can practice all this.

With this precious human body, by practicing the Buddhadharma, especially bodhicitta, we are able to complete the path, complete the qualities of cessation, complete the qualities of realizations, then we’re able to do perfect work towards sentient beings and liberate numberless hell beings from oceans of samsaric suffering and causes, and bring them to enlightenment, and then we liberate numberless human beings from oceans of samsaric suffering and causes, bring them to enlightenment, so like that, and numberless hungry ghosts, animals, suras, asuras, all that.

With this human body we can bring the happiness of this life to others, who are numberless, then the happiness of future lives, we can cause the happiness of all the future lives to others. You can cause ultimate happiness, liberation from samsara, to every sentient being. And with this precious human rebirth we can cause enlightenment to every being, full enlightenment to every sentient being.

This is most amazing! This human rebirth we have achieved this time is most amazing, it’s really the most unbelievable thing, most amazing, most amazing, really. We have to meditate more on this and we have to think about all these unbelievable opportunities, what we can do with this human body, especially when we think about what benefit we can offer other sentient beings, it’s like limitless skies, limitless skies of benefit to numberless sentient beings. We can offer limitless skies of benefit to every sentient being, limitless skies of benefit to all the numberless sentient beings. That’s why this human body is most unbelievable, most unbelievable, most unbelievable, so precious, how precious it is, most unbelievable.

UNDERSTANDING HOW PRECIOUS THIS LIFE IS STOPS THOUGHTS OF SUICIDE
Perhaps due to some problems our mind is very weak, and we want to commit suicide. Our mind is very weak and there’s not much to think about except committing suicide. At that time, we must remember these things, we must look at how precious this life is. Then our heart is filled with happiness. Instead of depression, we are filled with happiness and joy. Our mind is filled with happiness, and we can communicate much better with others with a happy mind. With an unhappy mind we can’t communicate, our heart’s blocked by a selfish mind. Our heart is blocked by a selfish mind and we can’t communicate with others, it prevents that and so it’s difficult to benefit others.

Sorry, so my talk went on. It went all over, like water on the ground goes all over.

So anyway here, the suicidal thought just came out. But I will just take the opportunity to mention this anyway. When a suicidal thought comes, we must think this. If we think of only one life and a suicidal thought comes, the mistake comes by thinking of just this one life. So when a suicidal thought comes, at that time we must think, we must think, there’s reincarnation, there’s karma, we must remember that, we must immediately remember reincarnation and karma.

There’s a continuation of consciousness after this life, we must remember that. When we remember that there’s a life after this, we see that what kind of life we have depends on karma. Good karma gives us a higher rebirth; negative karma beings a suffering rebirth, an evil rebirth, the lower realms.

The minute we think there’s a next life, then the suicidal thought will be stopped. If we don’t think that, if we don’t think about the next life, if we only think about this life, then a suicidal thought comes and that’s it. So it’s just a second, minute, so that.

Life doesn’t stop, consciousness doesn’t stop, the continuity of consciousness doesn’t stop. Even after we achieve enlightenment, the continuity of consciousness is always there, the continuity of consciousness is always there even after we achieve enlightenment.

Of the four schools of Buddhist philosophy, one of the lower schools, the Vaibhashika School says when we achieve nirvana, arhatship, the consciousness ceases, there is no continuation of consciousness. That’s according to the belief of that school. But however, according to the Madhyamaka School that is not the reality. I guess maybe due to karma the other schools think that way, but in reality it’s not that. The Madhyamaka School doesn’t think that way.

Not only after arhatship, even when we’ve achieved enlightenment, there’s the continuation of consciousness. There’s always the continuation of consciousness. If there were no continuation of consciousness, how could we benefit sentient beings after we achieved all those qualities, all those realizations? How are we going to benefit the numberless sentient beings from life to life until everyone achieves enlightenment, to work for them, to benefit them? There’s the continuation of consciousness.

The minute we think there’s reincarnation, there’s the continuation of consciousness, the suicidal thought will be stopped. Otherwise there’s a great risk, great risk. It’s total nonsense. This most precious human body, which is most unbelievable—nobody has harmed it but we harm it, we destroy it, this thing that we have been praying for, for many hundreds of thousands of lifetimes. We have practiced pure morality for so many lifetimes, we have dedicated the merits to achieve this. We have practiced charity, to have all this wealth and means of living, we practiced charity in the past, practiced giving, the thought of giving. We have practiced charity in the past, we dedicated the merits. That’s why we have all this means of living.

Then some problem happens and we become so depressed, something the selfish mind wanted didn’t succeed, something the attachment wants didn’t succeed, and then we commit suicide. That totally doesn’t make sense. It is totally the most ignorant thing.

But when we think about reincarnation, the continuity of consciousness, it reminds us of the lower realms, and there’s no way we can think about suicide. It naturally stops that suicidal thought, that suicidal act.

What am I saying? This is good. This is very important. This life is something like a second or like last night’s dream. It’s something very short, and then there the next life.

THE PATH OF THE LOWER SCOPE PRACTITIONER STOPS THE EIGHT WORLDLY DHARMAS
I want to finish what I started to mention before. Without our mind becoming Dharma, this very last level of Dharma, the first Dharma, at least the minimum—this thought of a mind unattached to this life, like eight worldly dharmas— if we have attachment to that happiness, then all problems come.

Then, when there’s no comfort, we experience unhappiness, we feel down. Because there’s attachment to comfort, then there’s dislike of discomfort, and so all the unhappiness and depression, all these things happen. Without this first Dharma, then there will be attachment to reputation, to become famous in the world, to want many people know us. We want to have fameness. Without this transformation of mind, developing a mind detached from this life, this will happen.

When the mind becomes Dharma, there’s no attachment. Anyway, first I’ll finish. When the mind doesn’t become this first Dharma, then there’s attachment to reputation. Because there’s attachment to reputation, to fame, there’s dislike towards not having reputation and so there is unhappiness. There’s attachment to praise, to other people praising to us, and when there’s attachment to that, then there’s dislike when other people don’t praise us.

For example, say we give a glass of water to somebody and that person doesn’t thank us, then we get upset. If we give a cup of tea or a piece of chocolate to somebody, we expect that person to say, “Oh, thank you very much. Thank you very much. I love it!” [Rinpoche laughs] If the person doesn’t say it, our mind gets upset. [Rinpoche laughs]If the person didn’t set up these words, the other person didn’t put effort to say these things, then we get upset.

This is because of attachment to these four desirable objects [of the eight worldly dharmas]. Also not receiving material things such as a birthday present, or some other present—I’m not sure—and so forth. We have attachment to receiving material things. When our mind doesn’t become Dharma, then there’s attachment to the receiving material things, and because of that, when we don’t receive things, there’s a discomfort, there’s dislike. There’s a problem.

In the reality, when our mind does not become Dharma, when our heart does not become the very basic Dharma, detachment from this life, then you can see how in life we continuously suffer, even if we have the four desirable objects. Because there’s attachment, the sicknesses of the mind, the painful mind, attachment, the “pain-sticking” mind, our mind gets stuck, it’s difficult to separate from the object, so there’s suffering, there’s mental sufferings. When we don’t receive the four desirable objects, this is suffering, and because of our dislike of not receiving thing, there’s unhappiness. So, both of these are suffering.

This is a very, very, very, very important psychology, understanding nature of life. This is a study about life, a discovery of our own life, something we haven’t discovered before.

Listen here. People are always looking for happiness. People are climbing Mt. Everest for happiness, people are jumping from airplanes for happiness. You go by airplane, then you come out of airplane, with… what do you call the bag?

Student: Parachute.

Rinpoche: Parachute? Or trekking bag. What do you call?

Student: Backpack.

Rinpoche: Backpack. So they all carry this and then everybody hold hands in the sky. [Rinpoche laughs] You hold the next person’s hand, then that person holds the next one’s, all in a circle. I see sometimes, a person fails and drops. Even if they have their parachute, sometimes the parachute doesn’t work.

So anyway, in the sky, like this, this is all trying to find happiness in this life, it’s not for enlightenment. They’re not doing this to achieve enlightenment even quicker than tantra, to save the sentient beings, to rescue the sentient beings from suffering, it’s not like that. [Rinpoche laughs] So people do all kinds of things.

I saw there was a machine, and a person is used as a bullet. [Rinpoche laughs] There’s a machine and the person, I think it’s a man, comes from machine like a bullet. It shoots very far from one mountain to another mountain, something like that. I’ve seen it on the TV. Anyway, going in the sky, going under the ocean, whatever you can do in this earth, also all kinds of ideas, whether it’s the jumping, what’s the other one, jumping off the high mountain? Huh?

Student: Bungee jumping.

Rinpoche: Bungee jumping. You go to the high mountain and then you jump. There are all kinds of things that people do for happiness, like climbing Mt. Everest the most difficult way. Normal people don’t go there, normal people go the easy way, but there are people who choose the most difficult way, the way most people don’t go normally. These people do all kinds of things to achieve happiness, to get a reputation, all kinds of way. What am I saying?

If the mind doesn’t become Dharma, life is constantly suffering with negative emotions. What was I saying?

When our mind becomes the first level of Dharma, we are free from the painful, sticking mind, the attachment to this life, then our life becomes much more profound, deeper; our way of thinking becomes deeper. Our way of living life becomes deeper than most people in the world. When our mind becomes first Dharma, free from attachment, the painful mind to this life, we don’t have attachment to those four desirable objects. That means we also don’t have dislike to these four undesirable objects, our mind feeling depressed, being unhappy due to dislike to these four undesirable objects.

As Nagarjuna said,

When you equalize the eight worldly dharmas, the four desirable objects and the four undesirable objects equalize, it doesn’t affect your mind, making it go up and down, such as when you meet undesirable objects, your mind goes down and you suffer.

This is a very important. This is the very basic Dharma, the very basic understanding of Dharma, the very basic understanding about life. When our mind becomes Dharma, these eight things, these eight worldly dharmas are equalized for us. Then whatever happens, nothing bothers us, so we always have tranquility, inner peace. We have a very content, stable life. Real peace and happiness start in our life when our mind becomes this first level of Dharma, this Dharma [seeking the happiness of future lives].

What I was saying here is that to have this is very important in our daily life. This life is something very short, something like last night’s dream, or like one session of a dream or like one second. When we think about the very short-term appearance this life, then what happens concerning this life becomes unimportant. Whether there’s happiness or no happiness, whether we face these four undesirable objects is not important, it doesn’t bother us. What am I saying?

So, by thinking about numberless future lives not just one life, our mind is extended. What happens then, with that mind, all our actions—not only doing retreat, reciting mantras or studying Dharma, even actions eating, walking, sitting, sleeping, doing jobs—all our actions become Dharma. They are all those are done for the happiness of future lives, so whatever activity we do, everything becomes Dharma, everything becomes Dharma, everything at least becomes the cause of happiness of future lives. With the motivation of seeking the happiness future lives, with the mind detached from this life but seeking the happiness of future lives, whatever we do becomes Dharma, pure Dharma, and the cause of happiness of future lives, and therefore it is not wasted.

I just want to emphasize this and how we need this attitude that sees this life as over in a second and so the happiness of this life is not the main thing, how we must focus on the happiness of all future lives.

If we think about bodhicitta, the happiness of sentient beings and to achieve enlightenment for them, of course, that’s the best. If not, then to achieve liberation, ultimate happiness, everlasting happiness, for ourselves is excellent. But even if we can’t generate that attitude of seeking liberation from oceans of samsaric suffering and its causes, then at least we should have the mind seeking the happiness of all the coming future lives.

That is one thought. Then, when our mind becomes this first level of Dharma, whatever happens, whatever problems there are, it really doesn’t bother us. It’s not important, because we don’t have much attachment, we don’t have attachment to this life. Otherwise, there are so many things, so much that becomes problems to us. Every second we find problems everywhere, as I mentioned before, even with the elements, even with the material things, we find so many problems, not only with people.

When this mind changes, once this mind becomes Dharma, all these problems, all these so many life’s problems are stopped. None of the many problems of life that now plague us exist for us anymore. Whatever happens in our life, it is no longer a problem, and because of that we
unbelievable peace and happiness. So, what am I saying?

Okay, sorry, I didn’t mean to go on about all that but just talking one, then another, then talking another one, then talking another one.

CAUSATIVE PHENOMENA ARE LIKE A STAR, A BUTTER LAMP ETC.
The Buddha said:

A star, a mirage, the flame of a lamp,
An illusion, a drop of dew, or a bubble,
A dream, a flash of lightning, a cloud—
See conditioned things as such!

These four lines are very, very, very important, the most fundamental, the most important psychology or meditation. I’ve already talked on emptiness, you have some idea. We should look at causative phenomena like a star. According to one commentary, then are no stars in the daytime. They’re there at nighttime but in the daytime we don’t see stars, so when we recite the word “star” in “look at all the causative phenomena like a star,” what we should particularly think is this is how our life is—our I, our aggregates, material possessions, belongings, family members, friends, enemies, strangers, the main object of delusions. Thinking like this make us free from negative emotional thoughts; this is the best psychology.

The I that is merely imputed by mind, on this [is placed] a hallucination of true existence, something decorated, projected, make real. And then the action, whatever we’re doing, is merely labeled by the mind, on this the hallucination of true existence is decorated, the “real” action, the object, then forms, sound, smell, taste, tangible objects. It’s merely imputed by our mind, but then all this hallucination’s projected, decorated, truly- existence, real. Everything appears real, appearing from there, from our ignorance, making our whole world false. It’s merely imputed by mind but our mind makes everything to appear real, which is not there, which is not real at all, not even the slightest atom is there. Everything’s completely, totally empty.

First you think, what should come out in your mind, the hallucination, the I, the action, the object and then your mind perceiving the object, and then naturally the meditator, the I, is naturally free from the real, true existence.

So the first thing, look at the hallucination, that which are hallucinatory, okay? Then how the arhats, the bodhisattvas and the buddhas see, how they see us and our actions, the objects, all the forms, sounds, smells, tastes, how although for us everything appears real, but how they see all this, us and all this, they see everything as totally non-existent, empty, totally empty, non-existent, not even one atom exists. So meditate on that. So I think especially the Buddha, totally empty.

So, the star in the daytime is related to the hallucination of truly-existence; it’s like a star in the daytime. If you think this, if you meditate on emptiness like this, it’s unbelievable. Emptiness is a big atomic bomb, a huge atomic bomb, destroying your root of samsara, ignorance.

When you throw atomic bomb, there’s a huge noise, right? A huge noise. But here there’s no noise. [Rinpoche laughs] It’s unbelievable. This root of samsara has made us suffer from beginningless rebirths. So like this, if it’s possible, if there’s time, then meditate on emptiness a little. Okay? That’s the first.

Developing right view is the cause of emptiness, so next there is [the analogy] of defective view. Defective view is like if our eye organ is damaged in some way and so we see illusions, such as hairs in front of the eyes, hairs dripping down in our food while we’re eating, somehow seeing something not there because our eyesight is not clear

This is only one example of defective view. Here it means that the truly-existent I, the truly-existent action, the truly-existent forms, sounds, hell, enlightenment—everything—is false. All this appearance of true existent is like defective view. When in your heart you think that it’s empty, that all the causative phenomena are empty, that comes to the point.

The next is a butter lamp. Butter lamps are made of many causes and conditions and then exist because of them. This is the same with all the causative phenomena, which are made by so many causes and conditions coming together. It depends on many causes. Somehow it helps that it’s not independent. Okay? This is a gross way of thinking but it helps.

Then all this is like an illusion. Again the same as I told you yesterday, all these are like an illusion. Okay? So, look at your life. When you think that, it’s like an illusion, keep that a little bit, meditate on life as like an illusion. Then in your heart, what you understand, all this is empty.

Then like a drop of dew. A drop of dew sitting on electricity wires or a flower or a branch can drop at any time. Similarly, at any time these causative phenomena can be stopped, they are in the nature of impermanence. So, do a little bit of meditation on this.

Then all this is like a water bubble. Kyabje Denma Lochö Rinpoche said the water bubble is very beautiful, very nice but it can be popped at any time. All this is like a water bubble; it can be stopped at any time because it is in the nature of impermanence. Beautiful bodies, beautiful this, beautiful that, are all like water bubbles; they can be stopped at any time, they can change at any time.

Like a dream, again is the same. All this truly-existent appearance seems so real but it is like a dream. It’s merely labeled, it appears but do not exist, like a dream exactly; it does not exist at all, it’s not there. Meditate on that and then in your heart comes emptiness.

Then lightning. When there’s lightning you see things, but then it’s gone. All this appearance of this life, all these causative phenomena, it’s there for a very short time, as I mentioned before, a very short time. It happens and then the next minute it’s gone. When the death happens, it’s like that. The day when we think, “Oh, now I’m going to die,” we see this life is like a flash lightning. It happens, it’s gone, like lightning.

Then like clouds. This life changes. While you’re looking at a cloud, it’s changing, constantly changing, decaying, it’s changing, and then it’s also, next minute you look at it and then it’s not there. Like that example, our life is a causative phenomenon; it becomes like that, like clouds. So here, it is in the nature of impermanence, like clouds.

This meditation cuts the three poisonous minds, including the ignorance, the root of samsara. Each time you meditate like this, the benefits are liberation, ultimate happiness, the cessation of suffering and its causes, then also the ultimate nature is the enlightenment. Like that, you free yourself from all the oceans of samsaric suffering and the causes. And then you’re able to liberate numberless sentient beings from oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them in enlightenment.

FOOD OFFERING
I must achieve enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. Therefore I’m going to make a food offering, making charity to all sentient beings and practicing the yoga of eating.

Then, all the food in the kitchen, on the table, whatever, all the food becomes empty as it is empty, then in the jewel vase, you can do the syllable DRUM then it becomes jeweled, then there’s AH, OM inside, that becomes the tsog or the nectar. Visualize oceans of nectar, numberless oceans of nectar. Okay? Now you offer to Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, that is all the gurus, that’s all the Guru, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, all the statues, stupas, scriptures, everything; that’s everything. So you offer and generated infinite bliss in the holy mind.

[Rinpoche chants] Lama Sangye, Lama Cho…

[Rinpoche makes the offering]

Then you can do the dedication after that. And then, like I did yesterday and the day before yesterday for the tea, you can dedicate like that.

That’s it. Dedicate the merits. That’s it. Then when you take the food, it has a blessing.

Then you see yourself as a servant. All sentient beings are the master; you yourself are the servant to all sentient beings, you yourself are the servant to be used by all sentient beings for their happiness, like how the elements, water, earth, fire, wind, sky, are totally, completely used by sentient beings for their happiness. Think, “However sentient beings want to use me for their happiness, I will serve them in that way.”

That’s it.

[Rinpoche chants] Jang chub…

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