Whatever We Say....

"Whatever we say, let us speak clearly and to the point,
in a voice that is calm and pleasant,
unaffected by attachment of hatred.
Look kindly at others, thinking,
"It is thanks to them that I shall attain Buddhahood."

Dalai Lama

The Moment

"Simply plunging directly into meditation in the moment now, 

with our whole being, free from hesitation, boredom or 

excitement, is enlightenment."

Khyentse Rinpoche 

Annoying People

"Children here refers to those of immature intelligence, that is ordinary beings with no realization. If we mix with such childish people, we risk losing our direction and will not be able to help others. So while we should avoid being influenced by them, we should not get discouraged or annoyed by them. Rather, we should feel great compassion for them, for they are in the grip of their negative emotions..."

Dalai Lama
commenting on Shantideva's marvelous "Way Of The Bodhisattva"

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

   "In order to conquer the high ground of the uncreated nature of mind, we must go to the source and recognize the origin of our thoughts. Otherwise, one thought gives rise to a second thought, the second to a third, and so on forever. We are constantly assailed by memories of the past and carried away by expectations for the future, and lose all awareness of the present.  It is our own mind that leads us astray into the cycles of existences. Blind to the mind's true nature, we hold fast to our thoughts, which are nothing but manifestations of that nature. This freezes awareness into solid concepts, such as I and other, desirable and detestable, and plenty of others. This is how we create samsara.  But if, instead of letting our thoughts solidify, we recognize their emptiness, then each thought that arises and disappears in the mind renders the realization of emptiness ever clearer.

    In the heart of winter, the chill freezes lakes and rivers; water becomes so solid that it can bear men, beasts and carts. As the spring approaches, earth and water warm up and thaw. What then remains of the hardness of the ice? Water is soft and fluid, ice hard and sharp, so we cannot say that they are identical; but neither can we say that they are different, because ice is only solidified water, and water only melted ice.

    The same applies to our perception of the world around us. To be attached to the reality of phenomena, to be tormented by by attraction and repulsion, by pleasure and pain, by gain and loss, fame and obscurity, praise and blames, creates a solidity in the mind. What we have to do, therefore, is to melt the ice of concepts into the living water of freedom within. All phenomena of samsara and nirvana arise like a rainbow, and like a rainbow they are devoid of any tangible existence. Once you have recognized the true nature of reality, which is empty and at the same time appears as the phenomenal world, your mind will cease to be under the power of delusion. If you know how to leave your thoughts free to dissolve by themselves as they arise, they will cross your mind as a bird crosses the sky - without leaving a trace.

    Maintain that state of simplicity. If you encounter happiness, success, prosperity, or other favorable conditions, consider them as dreams and illusions, and do not get attached to them. If you are stricken by illness, calumny, deprivation or other physical and mental trials, do not let yourself get discouraged, but rekindle your compassion and generate the wish that through your suffering all beings' sufferings may be exhausted. Whatever circumstances arise, do not plunge into either elation or misery, but stay free and comfortable, in unshakable serenity."

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche - November, 2000

NOTE: Youtube.com series of documentary on Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hjxHMLP6JM

In This Moment

In this moment it's possible to realize that we do not need to understand, to be understood,  to have the right idea. All we need to do is awaken to the here and now -- to stop jabbering to ourselves and be present in this moment.

There is nothing to prove, nothing to figure out, nothing to get, nothing to understand. When we finally stop explaining everything to ourselves, we may discover that in silence complete understanding was here all along.

Steve Hagen

All The Joy

All the joy the world contains

Has come through wishing happiness for others.
All the misery the world contains
Has come through wanting pleasure for oneself

Shantideva

(often quoted by the Dalai Lama)

I Love This Quote

We do not really understand what desire means. In the West,
desire seems to refer to sense gratification.
However, in the Buddhist view desire is not a craving
of the senses, but the mental concepts and projections
that we build up on an object, 

thereby bringing us problems.

Desire misrepresents and distorts the object.
We then hallucinate and drive ourselves crazy.

Lama Thubten Yeshe Rinpoche

As They Say

"Knock on the sky and listen to the sound..."

Zen Saying

Ah, The Kleshas

Kleshas are thoughts, but they are a specific type of thoughts that are particularly problematic. We consider them problematic or even poisonous because they cause us suffering and indirectly they cause others suffering as well. According to the Buddha's teachings in both the sutras and the tantras, all kleshas or mental afflictions can be summed up in five categories, and those can be further reduced to three. These are usually referred to as the five poisons or the three poisons because they are poisonous if they are not remedied.

The first klesha is attachment, which can be attachment to anything such as food, wealth, pleasure and so on. This is poisonous because being attached to something causes suffering.

The second klesha is aggression. Aggression has many varieties such as hatred, holding a grudge, spitefulness, malevolence and so on. All of these are varieties of the same basic klesha.

The third klesha is apathy, which is a state that arises from ignorance or mental dullness.

The fourth klesha is pride, which in this case is holding yourself to have qualities which you don't possess.

And the fifth is jealousy, which is being unable to tolerate the good things that others enjoy. It's being bothered by the good qualities of others, being bothered by the wealth or pleasure of others and so on.

These five types of kleshas do not normally arise simultaneously. The reason we consider the kleshas problems is that they can simply ruin our lives. They can certainly ruin our practice of dharma and especially our practice of meditation.

So the first step, of course, is recognizing that a klesha has arisen. Normally we don't recognize even that. Normally when a klesha arises it takes hold of us before we are even prepared to admit that it has arisen. At this point, having learned what the kleshas are and having come to admit that they arise has prepared you to recognize and acknowledge them when they do arise.

Although you recognize the arising of the klesha, and although normally we consider kleshas poisonous and problematic, you don't try to stop or get rid of the klesha when it arises. The approach here is identical to that with thoughts in general. When the klesha arises and you recognize such-and-such klesha has arisen in my mind, you don't try to chase it out or stop it, nor do you indulge it. You don't need to stop it because the nature of the klesha is empty, the same as the nature of thought, the same as the nature of mind.

So therefore once you have recognized the arising of whatever klesha it is, then you simply look directly at its nature without altering anything, without attempting to alter your mind or the klesha. As you look at its nature you will experience and recognize its nature. In order to do this of course your mind needs to be somewhat relaxed, but also you need to have a lucid awareness.

Seeing its nature is the same as in the previous case with thoughts in general. While the klesha does not particularly disappear, because its nature is recognized it is no longer poisonous or problematic, and even while it is still present, before it has vanished it becomes an aid to meditation.

Thrangu Rinpoche

Clashing With Kleshas

In the Buddhist view the major obscurations to freedom are called kleshas. A difficult word to translate, kleshas have been called everything from passions to afflictions to conflicting emotions to disturbing conceptions. No one has been able to find quite the right word, for they are not solely emotion nor are they exclusively thought. Joseph Goldstein refers to them as afflictive emotions, while Stephen Batchelor has taken to calling them compulsions. The basic idea is that certain powerful reactions have the capacity to take hold of us and drive our behavior. We believe in these reactions more than we believe in anything else, and they become the means by which we both hide from ourselves and attempt to cope with a world of ceaseless change and unpredictability. The three poisons of greed, hatred, and ignorance are the classic Buddhist examples, but others include conceit, skeptical doubt, and so-called "speculative" views, nothing of self that bind and restrict us.

The kleshas work by grabbing hold of consciousness and taking it over. When I am enraged, I do not stop to question my reality; I am completely caught up in my anger. There is no space in my mind; I am identified one hundred percent with my feelings. The reason that kleshas is so difficult to translate is that it connotes something that underlies both state of mind and emotion.

Simultaneously thought and feeling, but more basic than either, kleshas are so intense that they propel us mindlessly into actions that cause suffering. When angry, I am gripped by my anger, and I don't care, for the moment, what the consequences of my words or actions will be. I feel totally justified. Just as the ancient languages of the Buddha have only one word for head and heart, so they also recognize the power of these primitive states to monopolize the mind, body, and behavior.

When Freud talked of instincts or drives he was trying to explain a similar concept, that there are energies that permeate us, which can grab our entire being and shape who we become. But in Buddhism these energies are not seen as essential, the way they are in conventional psychoanalysis; they are seen as self-created, springing from a fundamental fear or confusion, a reaction to things being out of our control. The great eighth-century Indian Buddhist scholar Shantideva compared the kleshas to bands of thieves lying in wait to steal the jewels inside the house of mind. His comparison is apt but suffers a little from self-estrangement. The bands of thieves are not separate from us. We steal from ourselves, having somehow learned how to rain on our own parades, and we are not passive victims in the matter. The trick, in Buddhist practice, is to uproot the kleshas through the insidious and invisible power of awareness. To become alert to how we restrict ourselves is to begin the process of liberation.

- Mark Epstein

Shantideva on Klesha

I am as if benumbed by sorcery, My mind reduced to total impotence
With no perception of the madness overwhelming me.
O what is it that has me in its grip?
Anger, lust -- these enemies of mine -- Are limbless and devoid of faculties.
They have no bravery, no cleverness;
How then have they reduced me to such slavery?

Shantideva
Guide To The Bodhisattva Way of Life

From Rabindranath Tagore:

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward into ever-widening thought and action -
Into that heaven of freedom, let us awake.

This I'd Post On My Wall, Alas

Do not, acting inconsiderately,
Move furniture and chairs so noisily around,
Likewise do not open doors with violence.
Take pleasure in the practice of humility.

 

Shantideva

Another From Among White Clouds

you live in the mountains a few years
and then you go into town, you sit on the bus
you look at all those people and you feel
who are you struggling for?
who are you troubled for?

people living in the mountains
practicing here one, two, four or five years
they don't think about these mundane
and trivial matters
they are quiet
if this reckless delusional mind
has not been extinguished
every day having these thoughts
good and bad, so many things

always thinking
all these things
should i shouldn't i
you can't stop it

what's this we call reckless delusional mind?
actually this is your habitual ways of thinking
it's because of these habits
that you are always bumping heads with reality
everywhere 'stubbing your toe'
this is your habits having the final say
your delusional mind taking control
so you're always banging your head

once you become aware of these mental habits
you practice
if not
then you go along with your negative habits
and it's like you're stuck in a cloth-dying vat
you'll never come clean

this is the reason for living in the mountains

Unidentified Chinese Hermit
from Among White Clouds

Teaching

When someone asks you a question, answer him or her sincerely,

and when you are not asked, do not force your teaching upon others.

-Jae Woong Kim

Four Reliances

Do not rely merely on the person, but on the words.
Do not rely merely on the words, but on their meaning.
Do not rely merely on the provisional meaning,
     but on the definitive meaning; and
Do not rely merely on intellectual understanding, but
     but on direct experience.

Four Reliances
Buddhist Tradition

If You See Through It

"If you see through this world and let go of it
this is wisdom.

 If you see through it, but don't let it go of it
that's just 'talking Zen"

Chinese Hermit
Amongst White Clouds

Ten Thousand Things

ten thousand things
all in this breath
grasping hold of emptiness
there's really nothing to say.

Unnamed Chinese Hermit
Amongst White Clouds

Don't Prolong The Past

Don’t prolong the past,
Don’t invite the future,
Don’t alter your innate wakefulness,
Don’t fear appearances.

Patrul Rinpoche

Are You A God?

One of his students asked Buddha, "Are you a god?"
"No", answered Buddha.
"Then are you a healer?"
"No", Buddha replied.
"Then are you a teacher?" the student persisted.
"No, I am not a teacher."
"Then what are you?" asked the student, exasperated.
"I am awake", Buddha replied.

Hidden

“Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.”

The Buddha

If You Propose To Speak

"If you propose to speak, always ask yourself, is it true, is it necessary, is it kind?"

The Buddha

Dharma

When Dharma works in the human world, it is called
compassion sometimes, and is called wisdom sometimes.

Dainin Katagairi

You

You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe,
deserve your love and affection.

Buddha

For As Long

"For as long as space endures, for as long as living beings remain,
until then may I too remain, to dispel the misery of the world."

Shantideva

Battle of the I

We put up protective walls made of opinions, prejudices, and strategies, banners that are build on a deep fear. These walls are further fortified by emotions of all kinds: anger, craving, indifference, jealousy and envy, arrogance and pride. But fortunately, for us, the soft spot -- our innate ability to love and to care about things -- is like a crack in these walls we erect.

Pema Chodron

Beginner's Mind

“In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities,
but in the expert's mind there are few.”

Shunryu Suzuki 

Hatred

Hatred never ceases by hatred
But by love alone is healed.
This is an ancient and eternal law.

Buddha

Everybody Loves

Everybody loves something,
even if it's only tortillas.

Trungpa Rinpoche