Wishing everyone onsite at KC16 and online on Zoom a good morning, Acharya Lhakpa Tshering resumed guiding our practice and continued his commentary on The 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva as taught by Ngulchu Tokmé. Looking at verse 18 and 19, the question to ask ourselves is: How to take loss and gain onto the heroic path of compassion?
The Heroic Intention of a Bodhisattva
Part of our śamatha practice is to always connect with the intention to seek enlightenment for the benefit of all sentient beings–bodhicitta. At the beginning of our session, our resident teacher stressed the heroic quality and the importance of this intention. It is heroic since we open our hearts to all sentient beings. We do so with a sense of gratitude since they have supported us in one way or another in the world of samsara, from beginningless time. The importance can be seen in the eighteenth verse:
“Even when I am made destitute, people constantly berate me,
And grave illness and evil spirits strike me,
To take on still the suffering and misdeeds of all beings for myself Without losing heart is the practice of a bodhisattva.”
Quoted from: A Guide to the Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, translated by Christopher Stagg.
“Without losing heart,” Acharya pointed out, refers to bodhicitta or heart of awakening. Why is this important? “If the intention of benefiting others is not present from the very outset, we will not be able to take hardships and suffering onto the path,” he said.
“Why me?” is Not the Question
Usually, when we face difficult situations like those pointed out in this verse, we think: “Why me? Why is this always happening to me?” Furthermore, we then typically blame others or are upset with the outside world. However, as a dharma practitioner, we should ask ourselves: “Is this going to contribute to the cause of enlightenment for myself and others?” Counter to our habits, we seek to make good use of adverse situations. The main point, therefore, is how to take suffering, hardships, and whatever discomfort in our lives, onto the path. How do we make use of them in our practice?
The Manure for Enlightenment
In the Mahāyāna sūtras, the Buddha illustrated the notion of taking any situation onto the path with cow dung. Like farmers use this to enrich their fields, bodhisattvas use all conditions, no matter what difficulty they encounter, as a way to further their practice and use it to attain the state of omniscience–buddhahood.
What if others are free from such difficulties? Rather than thinking about why they have what we are lacking, we should remember that we are engaging in the practice for their sake. We wish them to be free from any kind of hardship and discomfort. Seeking to free them from suffering, we take everything onto the path, not only our own difficulties but the difficulties of others as well. We do so “without losing heart.”
While this is surely not an easy practice, Acharya emphasized that we can always start with small steps. Slowly we will be able to take the challenges we encounter onto the path and exchange our happiness with the suffering of others.
Appreciating Wealth and Renown with Mindfulness and Mental Alertness
While the eighteenth verse speaks about taking loss onto the path, the next verse, nineteen, teaches about gain. In A Guide to the Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, translated by Christopher Stagg, it reads:
“Even if I become renowned and everyone pays me respect,
Or should I obtain wealth like that of Vaishravana,
To see the wealth of samsara as having no essence
And not have pride is the practice of a bodhisattva.”
The verse points to Vashravana, the god of wealth, according to traditional buddhist teachings. However, Acharya shared that we can simply think of rich people in our present-day world. Regardless of who we think of, and however wealthy that person may be, the same message expressed in this verse applies: It is impermanent.
The impermanent nature of things applies equally to material wealth as to other things that Ngulchu Tokmé is pointing to with this verse: being renowned, respected, and so forth. This is not difficult to understand. We can find countless examples of people who gained a lot at some point in their lives and later on lost everything again. This does not mean that such things are inherently bad. It means that they simply have no essence.
What does this mean for us as a dharma practitioner? If we gain some kind of renown and wealth, we can appreciate that. However, through the qualities of mindfulness and being mentally alert, we can remain aware of their impermanent nature and develop contentment.
Blowing Up the Balloon of Pride
The benefits of mindfulness and mental alertness, or introspection, is that it will prevent pride to arise in our mind-stream. Acharya Lhakpa taught that pride can be compared to a balloon. “The more we blow up the balloon of pride, the farther away we will be from attaining the qualities of nirvāṇa and the state of buddhahood.”
Pride contaminates, Acharya explained, the vessel or container which holds the qualities of enlightenment. Therefore, no matter whether we have a lot of wealth, are renowned, and so forth, or not, we always need mindfulness and introspection. Seeing that phenomena are impermanent, changing every second, will reduce our pride. If, he said, “we will contaminate the container of enlightenment of pride, that will neither benefit ourselves nor others.”
Does It Make Any Sense to You?
The main practice of the Mahāyāna, for all who tread the heroic path of compassion, is to always consider how to take happiness and suffering, comfort and discomfort, onto the path. More particularly, bodhisattvas take the mental afflictions like attachment, aversion, and ignorance–the three poisons–onto the path. Therefore, Acharya Lhakpa said: “We don’t have to get rid of the mental afflictions. Rather, we make use of them to move farther along the path.”
As a way to conclude our session, Acharya reminded us of something he mentioned before: Sometimes we may look at a verse and think, ‘How is this possible? It does not make any sense!’ However, instead of immediately responding in that way, we should carefully investigate and contemplate these verses, wondering: What is the point here? What does make sense to me? “If,” our resident teacher said, “you find one verse that makes sense to you, that helps you to transform your mental afflictions into path, that’s it. That’s your practice.”
Thanking everyone onsite and online for joining our practice, we dedicated the merit.
Karmapa Khyenno!
