The Four Noble Truths: The Truth of the Cause of Suffering
Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, Australia, Sydney, 15th July 2000, Tape 2.
We have dealt briefly with the first Noble Truth, which is the truth of duhkha or the basic unsatisfactory nature of this round of birth and death, or samsara. Here we are going to deal a little with the second Noble Truth. The second Noble Truth is the truth of the cause of this unsatisfactory nature.
The truth of the cause is not the problem that we don’t get what we want, or that we do get what we don’t want. The actual problem is the whole question of wanting in the first place. So therefore, the truth of the cause of suffering is that suffering is caused by a deluded and grasping mind. It is the whole question of desire. We think that if we get everything we want, we will be happy. But as the Buddha said, that is like drinking salty water—the more we drink, the thirstier we become. So, we have to look into this question of the wanting, thirsty mind. Because our culture – the culture which we inhabit nowadays – is a culture which assures us that it is important to want more and more endlessly. Our whole culture is based on greed, and on cultivating our greed. The philosophy of the consumer society – the media of film, television, magazines, newspapers – is based on cultivating more and more wants, more and more desires. It doesn’t matter how useless the things are which we want, there is no longer even the thought of discriminating between our needs and our greed. We have long since satisfied our needs, so now we are on to our greed in a big way. And in case we are not greedy enough, the media will do everything it can to make us feel lacking. “What’s wrong with you? The real trendy person wants lots of stuff, and more and more of everything.” Our whole society is based on creating this very artificial desire once our natural needs and desires have been met with. Yet the Buddha said that the way to genuine happiness is by seeing through and learning how to drop this greedy, desiring mind. This desiring mind is a mind that continually wants more: more things, more relationships, more sensual stimulation and so on. Better sounds, brighter colours, more spicy tastes, more, more, more, more. This is what causes our problems: this mind which wants more and more and then clings to what it gets.
Let’s go into this. You see, material things, in themselves, are innocent. It is not the things which are the problem. What is the problem is our grasping, clinging mind. So it doesn’t matter what we have or what we don’t have, it is how much we hold on to what we have and don’t have. Do you understand?
There is a story about a king in ancient India. He was a very devout king and he had a Brahmin guru who was a true ascetic possessing nothing but a begging bowl made from a gourd. One time, the king and his guru were sitting in the garden under a tree and the guru was teaching Dharma to the king. While they were sitting there, a servant came running up and said, “Oh Maharaja, your Majesty, come quickly, the whole palace is ablaze and all your jewels and your silks and your gold, are all up in flames! Come immediately!” This was a rich king who had much wealth. But the king said, “Don’t disturb me, I’m with my guru learning the Dharma. You please go and deal with the palace fire yourself.” Meantime, the guru jumped up and said, “What do you mean? I left my gourd in the palace!”
You see, it’s whether we own our possessions or whether our possessions own us. It’s not the things in themselves. It’s the mind which is the problem. This clinging, grasping mind which causes us so much pain. If we consider that we are bound to the wheel of birth and death, nothing is chaining us to this wheel. We are clinging on it ourselves; it is our attachment and our clinging which keeps us bound to the wheel. We can’t let go. If one wanted to have any slogan for Buddhism, it would be “Let Go” —at all levels. Inwardly let go.
Now that doesn’t mean that we have to renounce the world and go out on the streets with a begging bowl. What it means is that inwardly there is this release from clinging. We imagine that our attachment to things and to people is what gives us happiness, is what gives us security, but that’s because of our deluded minds. We don’t understand that as long as we cling to people and to things, we are extremely insecure. Because eventually, we are going to lose these things, we are going to lose these people, and who knows when? This clinging mind causes us pain because we don’t know when we are going to lose these things. We don’t know when that person is going to leave us, or when they are going to die or when something is going to happen, so we cling. And that clinging creates so much pain and fear. So much fear. And then when we do lose them, there is so much grief.
When I first considered leaving for India, I was about 19 and I said to my mother, “I’m going to India,” and she said “Oh yes, when are you leaving?” And that’s all she said. Now, she didn’t say, “How can you leave me? Now I am going to be all by myself. Here I am, your aging mother, how can you go away?” She said, “When are you leaving?” Not because she didn’t love me, but because she did love me. Because she loved me, she wanted what was right for me. She wasn’t thinking of what would please her. That is love, that is also non-attachment.
We think that if we are non-attached, we become very cold. But that’s not so; we confuse love and attachment. We think the more we cling to something or to somebody, the more that proves we love them. But really, all it proves is how much we love ourselves. Because while we’re clinging to that person, we’re thinking, “They make me happy. I cannot lose them, because without them I will be miserable”. We are thinking about me, we’re not thinking about them. Genuine love thinks, “May you be well and happy. What is well and happy for you, I rejoice in that”. And if we have a heart which thinks like that, then it is a heart which is very free. While we have something, while we have someone, we hold them, but we hold them lightly. While they are with us, while these things are with us, we are delighted, we are happy, we appreciate and enjoy them. But if we lose them, we can accept that, because everything is impermanent. A mind like that is a mind which is open and free.
There is a story—some of you must have read it in various Buddhist books—about a trap for monkeys in Asia. There is a way of trapping monkeys where you have a coconut nailed to a tree and in the coconut, there is a little hole which is just big enough for a monkey to put his hand into. Inside this hollowed-out coconut, there is some sweet. When the monkey comes, he smells the sweet, he puts his hand inside the hole and he clutches the sweet. Now he has a fist, but he can’t get the fist out of the hole. So he is stuck there, with the greed in his mind making him unable just to open up his hand and relinquish the sweet. The hunters come and they pick him up. Nothing is holding that monkey there; the monkey just has to let go and he’s free. But the clinging, grasping mind will surmount even his fear of the hunter. He cannot let go. He wants to be free, but he wants to hold onto his sweetie too.
This is a perfect example of our predicament. Oh yes, we want to be free, we want to be enlightened, but we don’t want to let go. We want to be free and enlightened and keep everything else with us at the same time. We want our clinging mind, our greedy mind. We like it because we are deluded, and we think this clinging, greedy mind is what will give us happiness if only all our greedy wishes can be fulfilled. We don’t understand that our genuine happiness lies in letting go of that type of mindset so that when things come – nice things – we appreciate them, we enjoy them, but we hold them lightly. When they’re not there, that’s fine too. But we don’t believe it.
You know, when I go around the world, Asia, America, Europe, Australia, there are two main questions people ask. One is “How do we find a genuine spiritual master?” The second one is “How do I rid myself of anger?” Everyone asks that. Why? Because we don’t like anger. Anger makes us feel uncomfortable. People don’t like us if we’re angry. Anger causes lots of problems, so we want to be rid of anger. But nobody asks, “How can I be rid of attachment and greed?” Because we like attachment and greed; we don’t really want to be rid of them. And yet, it is our attachment and greed which are the source of duhkha. It is the source of our suffering, but no-one wants to believe that and let it go. It’s not anger which is the cause of duhkha, it’s greed, clinging, attachment; the kind of mind which holds so tight. That’s what is keeping us on the wheel of birth and death, bound and imprisoned by our hopes and our fears. The reason we are all stuck here is because we don’t let go. We can’t just let it be.
It’s a problem because it is something which masks itself. Greed masks itself as pleasure, and we don’t see that it’s the source of all our pain. Because as long as we are holding on to things so tightly, we have fear. Can you see? We fear—we fear to lose things, we fear things will change, that people will change, that feelings will change. And this is seen as something threatening and fearful, whereas it is just the way things are. Of course things change, it is the nature of things to change. But we want everything to stay as they are if they please us, only to change if we don’t like them. So, when we have relationships, we want things to be just the way they were at the beginning, never ever changing, always staying at the same intensity, everything beautiful. Things we own have to stay there, we must never lose them, we must always keep them. And this is such a weariness to the mind because it goes against the very flow of things. Nothing stays the same, even for one moment. Everything is moment to moment changing. The fact that we don’t accept that, that we don’t open ourselves to the flow, that we try to dam it up and build boundaries so that we’re safe and we’re secure—this very desire for security is what causes us this fear and grief. But we don’t see it because we are deluded. We don’t understand how to feel free. Oh, such a relief when we hold things lightly. And while things are with us, while people are with us, we delight in them, but when they go, they’ve gone. Then where is the hope? Where is the fear?
This is why, in all honesty, the Buddha started the Sangha. He started the Sangha of Buddhist monks and nuns because he saw how very difficult it is for people in an ordinary lay situation to overcome attachment. It is such a challenge to live with a mind that is open and not clinging while dealing with families and children and our responsibilities to parents and siblings, and with building up our houses, building up our businesses and being successful in the world.
But mind can be the same, as we saw with the king and the Brahman. Just because we have a big palace and lots of jewels and silks doesn’t mean that our mind is clinging. Just because we’ve renounced everything outwardly doesn’t mean our mind is still not clinging. The problem is not outside, the problem is inside. If we really want to have inner joy and contentment, then we really have to rise above hope and fear. Things are as they are. Sometimes things are nice, sometimes things are not nice. Sometimes we have, sometimes we don’t have. So? When we realise that, we have an equanimity towards the events of life, the ups and downs of life, the waves on the ocean of samsara. Samsara is like an ocean, sometimes the waves are up, sometimes the waves are down. If in all that one has equanimity, then whatever happens, one can deal with it. But one cannot deal with it if one is holding on. It’s like being on a surfboard. When we are on a surfboard, we are poised, we are balanced, we are not rigid. When the waves go up, we move with the up; when they go down, we move with the down. We are just completely balanced. If we become rigid or if we only want the high part and don’t want the low part, or vice versa, we’ll over-balance and fall right back into the ocean. Straight back into samsara.
So, when we talk about non-attachment and non-clinging, we’re not suggesting that you therefore give up your family and your friends and your house and your career. It is not to do with all that. It has to do with an inner letting go. Somebody said that the vision that came into his mind was that we’re all covered with barbs, with little hooks, and as we whirl around, everything we touch catches to us and clings to us. So we end up covered with all this stuff, which is very heavy. We are not very buoyant when we are covered with stuff which is clinging to us. So, the challenge is to pull in all those little barbs, all those little hooks, so that as we whirl around, we touch things, but they don’t catch on to us. So that when we meet people, when we meet events, when we have things, we appreciate them, we enjoy them, but we hold them lightly and if they leave, then they go.
That kind of mind is a very open, spacious mind and it is a mind that has no fear. Because, as I say, we are so caught up in our hopes and our fears, our gains and our losses. So, we need to develop this mind which clings to nought. The Buddha said develop a mind which clings to nothing. Open and let go.
Open hands allow things to flow and we cup them in our hands. If we’re trying to get water to drink and we grasp it tightly, all the water goes away and we’re left with nothing but an empty fist. If we want to drink of life, we hold it lightly, in cupped hands, then we can drink as much as we want. We appreciate things while we have them and we appreciate things when they’ve gone. No problem.
The moments when we are most deeply happy, really happy, are those moments when we have that sense of inner satisfaction and we don’t want anything. Think of it. Those rare moments when suddenly we feel everything is fine just as it is, we don’t want anything at this moment. Even if we don’t think about it, there’s no wanting. Because that wanting, greedy, grasping, desiring mind is very agitated. It’s not a peaceful mind. A peaceful, clear, quiet, spacious mind is completely settled, it doesn’t want anything. And that sense of inner contentment is genuine happiness. But we don’t really believe it. We still believe in the back of our minds that as long as we continue to get all the things we want, then that’s the way we are going to be happy. Then having gotten them, to hold on to them as tightly as we can so nobody else can get them. And so, we suffer. The suffering isn’t out there, the suffering is inside; our pain is inside us. If we have a mind which is completely at peace, which is completely at one with what is happening here and now, it doesn’t matter what’s going on outside, we can deal with it. If we have a mind which is continually agitated and restless and longing and full of desires, hopes and fears and clinging and worries and concerns, then we can be living in the most beautiful places but we’re miserable. We know this, but we don’t believe it. We don’t really believe it, because if we really believed it, we would let go. This is why we’re in samsara. We’re in samsara because we cling to the wheel.
Meditation is also a way of helping us slowly to begin to open up those tightly gripped fingers, slowly, slowly, a bit more… come on, come on. Convincing ourselves that actually opening up is a good thing. The happiest people I know are those who really are completely in the moment and who absolutely don’t want anything. They are there for others, they are not there for themselves. People who have a lot of mental problems become obsessed with themselves, their own problems, their own needs, their own desires. Everything revolves around me, me, me, and if one introduces any other subject, somehow it has to relate back to me again. And that is a very unhappy mind. It is very ironic that our society, which is so based on exalting the individual creates a society of people who feel so alienated, who feel so lonely.
So, maybe one of the answers is to stop thinking so much about ourselves, to stop thinking about all my rights and think about one’s respect, honour and duty to others. Think about what we can do to help other beings. Think about others’ happiness. It is indeed paradoxical that those who are most concerned with the happiness of others end up finding themselves so happy. People who are concerned solely with their own pleasure and enjoyment and happiness end up feeling so miserable. Because while we are thinking about others’ happiness and giving delight to others, then we are not clinging. We are opening up and thinking beyond the battlements which we have built around our own heart. So many people end up having a kind of fortress inside themselves with machine guns aimed at anybody who comes near, and a secret password for just a few. And then they wonder what’s wrong.
So, when the Buddha said that we were sick, he said it was because of the sickness of our delusion, our basic ignorance from which comes the grasping. Because as long as we see ourselves as separate from others, as long as we construct this ego which is me, then everything outside is non-me. Then obviously, in order to satisfy the “me”, we have to start bringing things in. That creates the sense of desiring, of grasping, because we think that the inner emptiness, this inner lack which we feel, can be filled up by people and things. So, we try to eradicate this inner sense of hollowness, this sense of alienation and inner loneliness by filling ourselves up; filling ourselves up with relationships, or with things or with status and money. And so it goes on and on. But this is an immense black hole. It can never be filled, not that way. Never that way. However much we get, there will always be a sense of lack. We have to do something very radical. Instead of getting more and more, we have to let go. At least, let go inwardly. Each one of us is capable. Each one of us can do this. Each one of us can look into our hearts and see where this pain is. The pain derives from this incredibly deep sense of desire. This desire is very deep in our nature.
This desire, this clinging is so deep in our psyche. It is not just for superficial things like “I want a new car, I want a new dress, or I want a new partner.” This desire, this clinging, this attachment is intensely deep. You see, it is the desire which keeps us here, you do understand that. It is this desiring, clinging mind which causes all the problems. As long as we are holding on to things, then we have fear. We have fear that we will lose them. We have to get more and more and the mind is churning, churning and fearing, and that disturbed, fearful mind causes so much pain. Sometimes the more we try to fill up this big black hole, the bigger the hole seems to get. This is the problem. But the Buddha said there was a cure. Fear not.
Buddhism isn’t all about love and joy and bliss. It’s about really looking into the psyche and trying to see what is the problem here which is distorting everything we say and think and do. This understanding of the depth of our desire and the clinging mind was a large part of the Buddha’s enlightenment. He saw how this desire goes back through lifetime after lifetime and how these patterns are repeated again and again. We can’t get out. We can’t get out because we don’t really want to get out. We are all locked in this prison. We have the key, but we don’t use the key. We look at it and we study it and sometimes we hang it up on the wall and we worship it. But we don’t use it to open the door and get out. So we are all here together in a prison. Some of us are up there in the penthouse suites and some of us are down in the dungeons, but wherever we may be, we are imprisoned. The prison house of birth and death, of samsara. No one is going to come along and open the door for us. Sorry. Only we can open the door for ourselves. No one is stopping us from opening the door. There are no guards here preventing us from getting out of this prison. We can just take the key, open the door and walk out. But we don’t, because we are attached to our prison. We are attached to our prison.
Genuine happiness lies in the mind which is open and free and therefore has the fullness of genuine love and compassion for all beings everywhere. Not just the nice ones, not just the ones who are close to us, but for all beings. But to have genuine love is to have a mind which doesn’t grasp and cling. It is so sad because we are the ones who cause ourselves the pain and we give the pain to others around us. And all the time that we are trying so hard to be happy, all that time we are
Questions
Q: I was very dedicated in my practice in terms of my meditation and spiritual life before I became a mother. And now that I’ve become a mother, I find that my life is separated in a way between my desire to want to continue my meditation life and my life as a mother and my child’s life. I understand from your talk on Thursday that you were saying, you know, if people think that they are doing the Dharma by meditating half an hour a day and ten minutes at night, then they’re a bit deluded. I’m just wondering about the whole idea of having the practical application into your everyday life as an experience, because beyond the meditative state there’s this flow of life. As a mother I really want to know more about that.
JTP: On Thursday, I was trying to deal with that whole point. In the lay life, one has family, one has work, one has social responsibilities. So we cannot separate vast chunks out of every day to do formal sitting practices. Therefore, we have to incorporate our spiritual life into our daily relationships.
So, you have a child. What better place to practise giving, patience, loving kindness and being aware: being with the child in the moment, being non-judgmental and also very much practising love and non-attachment? Bringing up a child is a wonderful way to genuinely practise the Dharma—if one is awake. It is one thing to be able to sit in solitude and meditate on all these virtues like loving kindness and patience and so on, it is another thing to have a being in front of you totally dependent on you and then to see how far one’s loving kindness and patience can stretch.
So, this is a wonderful practice ground, and everything you do, every dish you wash is a practice. What better way? But we have to have the presence to do that. So don’t worry; this is a wonderful opportunity to really integrate the practice from theory into a genuine mode of being. Good luck.
Q: I find it very difficult when I’m meditating, and when I’m not meditating, to distinguish or discern between my Buddha Nature and the voice of my ego self.
JTP: When you recognise your Buddha Nature, you’ll know it! It’s not that easy to access. To really glimpse our innate awareness, beyond the coming and going of the thoughts, is a very different level of consciousness in which there is no self or other. There is no “I” there at all. It is a very open, spacious, totally different type of consciousness which when you recognise, you’ll know. Because it is nothing like the kind of meditation experiences which the ego thinks up for our entertainment while we’re sitting there.
Q: I’m still having trouble trying to come to terms with physical suffering in the world. Why people are sick, are experiencing famine and great physical pain. I can understand how we cause our own pain with our thoughts and our clinging mind but to me, it seems like a lot of people who are innocent because of their ignorance of their situation, or just because of their situation, seem to suffer. I can’t understand what is that role in our life, or in this life.
JTP: The Buddha said samsara is suffering. It is suffering: the suffering of pain, of sickness, of old age, of death, of not getting what we want and getting what we don’t want. This is what these people are suffering. That is the nature of samsara. During our many, many lives, tossing up and down on the waves of this ocean of birth and death, we have planted so many seeds and many of them are negative. At some point, they have to come to harvest. And then, of course it is terrible. But nobody said samsara is a picnic, of course it isn’t. That’s why we are trying to get out. Unless as in the Bodhisattva path we have motivation and incredible compassion so deep that we don’t want to get out, rather we aspire to raise ourselves to such a stature that we can just be here and benefit others.
The fact is that samsara is not nice. The Buddha never said it was good. And the fact is that we are continually creating more and more causes. The whole of samsara, the whole of our society, the whole of the world is created by the minds of the beings who inhabit it. Who created this? Samsara is created by the joint efforts and karma of the beings inhabiting it. That’s our tragedy. Of course, we do what we can to alleviate the suffering around us on a physical and mental level.
But as long as our minds are full of ignorance, as long as our minds are full of ill will, greed and jealousy, that is going to project itself out into society. Look at the movies—look at these movies in which people are always blowing everybody up. That is entertainment. Right? Well, why do these movies become so popular? Because people love to watch them; because that zeroes in on all the ill will and the aggression and the anger in their own minds. And either that goes into the movies or it goes into the world around us.
Nowadays, many lamas are being released from prisons in Tibet where they were in for maybe twenty or thirty years. They didn’t do anything wrong, they just happened to be lamas. Because of their position, they were put in prison, they were out in hard labour camps. Thirty years! They were beaten, they were tortured, they were interrogated, they endured hard labour. And now they’re coming out of these prisons—and so often when you met these people, although physically they’re sometimes pretty wrecked, but their eyes… their eyes are glowing. It is as if they’ve been in retreat for 30 years. They say, “I am so grateful to the Communists and to my captors, because through them I really had to practise, I had to develop genuine understanding, patience, loving kindness for those who harmed me. If I had had an easy life, I would never have developed these qualities, so I’m so grateful for having been in prison all these years, and having to really experience the teachings, not just talk about them.”
Now, they suffered, right? I mean, some of them are crippled as a result of their endurance in the prison—but their minds are not suffering.
The Buddha said there are two kinds of suffering: there is physical suffering and there is mental suffering. Physical suffering, we all have to endure at some point. But mental suffering, we don’t have to experience. If our minds are really subdued, if our minds are really full of loving kindness and understanding, then no matter what happens to us, no matter the pain, no matter the frustrations, the difficulties and the afflictions, our minds are unaffected. Our minds become more powerful, more strong. It’s like throwing oil onto a fire—the love blazes more and more. Do you understand?
Q: I have a question about clarity of mind and listening to the wisdom voice. Sometimes I get frustrated because I think that I am listening to what I believe is right, to my wisdom voice, my Buddha Nature and then I believe that it is actually true and what I should do. But that is not the case, it doesn’t turn out that way.
JTP: That’s probably because it is the ego pretending to be a wisdom voice. It is not as easy to hear your wisdom voice as people imagine. Every little flash and you think, “Ah, this is my intuition” but actually it is just a little ego flash.
I think when the wisdom voice really speaks, it speaks out loud and clear and you can’t mistake it. It doesn’t speak that often for ordinary, unenlightened beings. Every little flash and idea and intuition that comes into the mind isn’t a call from our wisdom mind.
Q: So how do you recognise that?
JTP: Personally, on the few occasions when some real intuition has spoken, it’s spoken loud and clear. It’s not a little whisper at the back of the mind. Personally, that’s how it comes. I don’t know if that’s my wisdom mind, or just the spirit guide, or whatever. I don’t know what it is, but it is male. Every time it has ever told me to do anything, however much I argue against it, it just says, “Be quiet and just do it”. It has always turned out perfect even though it seemed like impossible. So, whatever it is, it is right. But I don’t listen too much to little flashes of so-called intuition. I’m dubious about those because they usually don’t come from the wisdom mind, they just come from some other level of one’s subconscious.
The point is when one meditates, as the mind does calm down, as it becomes more clear and lucid, it does give space for deeper sources to come up. But I think when they do come up, they’re pretty clear. And if they’re telling you things which don’t pan out, then it’s probably as I say, not coming from that source at all.
Q: Ani la, I have heard and read of the word “demon” in the spiritual journey. Could you define that? Facing them in the cave, facing them in your journey. Are they internal or external?
JTP: Demons… I think demons are both inside and outside. Our internal demons of course are the subconscious drives and negative instincts which torment us continually. The external demons—indeed there are beings in this world which have taken a very dark and evil path. There’s no doubt about it. I haven’t personally encountered any demons externally. The only dark thing I ever encountered was one time when I was in my cave. I woke up in the night and there was this black thing over me: very heavy, very black, very, very evil, pressing me back and trying to suffocate me. So I thought, “How dare you! Here I am surrounded by all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas of the universe! Who do you think you are? Just go away!” I started saying a mantra and invoking the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. Then the “thing” contracted into a tiny black pinpoint and zoomed out the window. And I thought, “Cheeky little devil!” and laughed.
You know, dark cannot stand up to light. We should always remember that. Behind the darkness there is always light. Don’t ever forget the light, however dark it may seem. The darkness of a thousand years – we turn on the light, it disappears. That’s like our mind. However dark our minds may be, however full of the poisons, in the moment of illumination, where are the poisons? Gone; they’re insubstantial. It is the light of the mind which is there forever. Don’t ever forget that.
Q: When you were talking about freedom and letting go, it sounds so easy as though you could just open your hands. I am trying to really get to the crunch of it, you know. I wonder at what point in childhood do we lose that freedom? From my observation, I see kids wanting things all the time, since they are very young. If we have been tired and frightened for so many years, maybe fifty or sixty, is it that easy to open that hand, or perhaps we hear that we should open it but we don’t know how to?
JTP: I think children are very interesting. You know people romanticise children and all the innocence of childhood, the openness of childhood and so on. This is true. But anybody who has had to bring up or even witness a three-year-old or even a two-year-old—there are the three poisons, naked and undisguised. “This I want!” Crash! “And I don’t want! Waah!” You know? The fury of a child’s emotions. The joy when they get what they want, the complete frustration and anger when they are thwarted. This is our predicament. As we get older, some of us cover it over with a veneer. But these are our poisons—our poisons in a very concrete way which we carry over for lifetime after lifetime after lifetime. We are patterned.
So it isn’t easy, but it is possible. It is possible. Because just as we have these negative patterns, we can reprogram them. That is what the whole spiritual path is about; it’s about being reprogrammed. Because behind it all is the immaculate, innate awareness. That is always there; these negative emotions are just clouds, they are not the sky.
So, it is not that in one way we have to take in anything from outside, we just have to uncover what is already innate within us, but which we have ignored. It is not by any means as impossible as it sounds. First, we have to recognise the patterns, we have to recognise what is going on in our mind. Then slowly begin to understand and to accept that and then gradually to begin to drop it, let it go and replace the negative reactions with other ways of being. It is very possible. The Buddha himself said, “If this was impossible, I would not tell you to do it, but because it is possible, therefore I urge you, please do it.” We can all do it, but it takes a bit of effort in the beginning. That’s why meditation helps and being present, learning to be mindful, so that we can watch what is happening inside ourselves and reprogram ourselves where it is not helpful, where it is not skilful. Our whole life is a learning process and a detoxifying process.
Q: I have a question about following a spiritual path and choosing which one. In this day and age there are so many different options and I’m wondering whether you have an opinion about corrupting the pure teachings by mixing them?
JTP: Yes, it is true. Nowadays, as we all know, we live in a spiritual supermarket and it’s very difficult to tell which brands are genuine products and which brands are junk food.
I would say on the whole, you are better off sticking with a product which is tried and tested, which has worked for a long time and has genuine articles which you can see and of whom you think, “Ah yes, that’s pretty good, whoever s/he is I want to be like that.”
I think also, it is important to know where we are going and to know how we are going to try to get there. In other words, to basically follow one path. But within following that one path, once we are really clear about that path, then it is also quite helpful to look at other ways of approach in order to enhance one’s chosen path and to see it from other perspectives, if we would want to. But I don’t think it’s a good idea to just take a bit from here and a bit from there, then put it together in what we hope is going to be a really satisfying meal. It’s not a buffet; we can’t just select the bits which suit us, because that’s only the ego, the ego is selecting the bits which it thinks it likes. But maybe the things which the ego really needs are exactly what it doesn’t like.
So, in our deluded state of mind it would be very difficult for us to know what we really need. Therefore, it is better to choose a whole path and just go on that path and take it as it comes. Because often, we are called to do things which we would never choose to do left to our own desires—like 100,000 prostrations—but which turn out to be exactly what we actually need. That’s one of the reasons why a qualified teacher is also very useful, because the ego is only going to choose those bits which it likes, which make the ego feel better, which isn’t the point, is it? Because we are not trying to create a bigger, better, more beautiful ego. We can’t spiritualise the ego, right? You do understand? The ego has to die. We can then resurrect it and use it, but then the ego is the servant and not the master.
Q: My question is a follow on to the last one. Having been deeply involved in a spiritual path and organisation for many years and having left it just a few years ago with disillusionment, I guess my question is getting there within the framework of an organisation versus getting there by practising on one’s own and trusting that life gives you the lessons that you need. Could you comment on that?
JTP: Basically, I don’t like organisations, so I’m not the best person to ask about this. I have always avoided them. But an organisation which is well run and has a genuine spiritual master at the head can be helpful at a certain point. I think that especially sometimes in the beginning, it could be useful to be part of a larger group. The Buddha, after he got enlightened, taught the Four Noble Truths to his companions and then what did he do? He founded a Sangha – a community – and once the Sangha began to grow, he told them, “Now you go out, not two of you together, just go out and wander around for the good and the welfare of all beings.” Nonetheless, they were part of an organisation, even though they wandered about. Later, the early Franciscans did the same.
The thing is, it is very difficult when we start out on our own to know really where we are trying to go and to select what is really useful for us. In the beginning to belong to an organisation, at least for a while, can be useful. But understand that any organisation, any set of teachings is only expedient; it is the raft, it is not the other shore. The Buddha said that his Dharma was a raft. We are in the ocean of samsara; we have to get from this shore to the other shore and we need a boat. So, while we are in the boat, we appreciate the boat, and we don’t capsize the boat. But if when we get to the other shore, we are still carrying the boat on our shoulders out of respect, that would be really stupid.
The point is to understand that any organisation, and any teaching given within that organisation, is only relative truth; it’s only a means to the end, it is not the end in itself. For as long as it is really useful and beneficial and helps us, then that is great. But at a certain point, we have to go beyond it. But we shouldn’t capsize it too soon; we should wait until we really understand what is the path, where we have to go, and what exactly is happening here; then, we can go it alone. But at the beginning, I think it’s very difficult also because when we are on a spiritual path—if we genuinely are on a spiritual path—we are swimming upstream, we are not flowing down current. Everybody else is flowing downstream; they’re flowing into the flatlands and into the swamps. We are trying to swim upstream, back to the true source of our being. And that is a very lonely swim since everybody else is passing us in the other direction. So it takes a lot of effort, it takes a lot of courage, and it does help to have other people trying to swim upstream with us.
So, we should not despise organisations, it’s just that we shouldn’t take them too seriously. Because, organisations are just made up of the people in them. The people in them are flawed, and so we shouldn’t believe everything we are told. We should also read publications of other organisations in order not to become blinkered. Sometimes organisations get so involved in themselves they don’t even realise there is anything else going on outside of themselves, and I think this is one of the big limitations. So it is good, even if one is in a group, to know what other groups are doing—maybe occasionally visit other groups or work with other groups, read the magazines of other groups. And just have a sense that there is a world beyond the confines of one’s own particular organisation.
So, on the whole, especially for those starting, it is helpful to have some structure and some Sangha, some people around of like mind to support and help us. But at a certain point, it is also fine to say, “Well, thank you very much, I am grateful for what I learned and now I am going it alone”. Because in the end, each one has to make the journey for themselves, we can’t do it en masse actually. It’s a very lonely journey, but it is the only journey which is worthwhile.
Q: I have always thought it was a bit of a conundrum that if one sees one’s own true nature, even a glimpse of it, one of course will follow a way of opening up into that nature. But if one doesn’t see it, one really has no motivation whatsoever to follow that and without the motivation, there isn’t any strength to attain anything. It seems that it takes a very long time to actually catch a glimpse of Buddha Nature or the true nature of mind. To sustain that long journey, one really needs the motivation of having seen the true nature of mind.
JTP: This is the reason why, particularly in the Nyingma and Kagyu Schools, they try to start by giving us a glimpse. Our Root Lama is the one that gives us what is called the pointing out instructions. They point out to us the nature of the mind so that once we’ve been given a glimpse, as you say, then we are really motivated to keep going and experience our own glimpses. But actually speaking, you know, it is not so difficult as it sounds, and it is not far, it’s really right here, any moment it can happen. Because it’s here, it’s inside us, it’s just that we’re looking in the wrong direction. In a moment it can happen, the mind can just open up. It’s not such a big deal.
A friend of mine, an American nun, was living also for a time in Lahaul where I was living. Once, she was sitting on the roof with some monks and nuns and they said to her, “Oh, so when did you have your first glimpse of the Nature of the Mind?” She replied, “Well, I have never seen the Nature of the Mind”. So they said, “Oh, come on, we’re all Dharma brothers and sisters, you can be honest with us. When was the first time?” And she said, “No, honestly, I am being honest here. I have never seen the nature of my mind.” Then they all looked at her astounded. These were perfectly ordinary monks and nuns—they were nothing special at all. But for them, it was nothing special.
In the West, we make it into a big deal, but it’s not a big deal. Many lamas have said it is so simple that we often miss it, we overlook it. It’s not something like the heavens open and there are trumpets and the 1812 Symphony going on there, bells ringing. It’s so simple that if we are not careful, we could almost overlook it, except that if we are aware then we recognise. It can happen any time. In the meantime, the fact that it is something so basic and so inherent to our own nature has to be its own motivation. Meanwhile, even if we don’t see the Nature of the Mind, so what? We can become quiet, we can get calm, we can develop more loving kindness, more awareness. Our lives can become simpler and more open and more free. We can do many things: it is not an all or nothing.
Meditation in itself and learning to be mindful is a great blessing for our lives. I think maybe we should stop talking so much about the Nature of the Mind and just get into being present here and now, and letting whatever is just be—if you see what I mean. That will take care of itself in its own time.
Just to practise a life of giving, ethical conduct, patience and enthusiasm and trying to be present in the moment and learning to develop some clarity and insight—that in itself is a joyful life and a meaningful life. Far better than the humdrum, ordinary, meandering lives that most of us lead. And once we start to do that, once we start to convert our everyday life into our Dharma practice, then it takes on its own momentum and it becomes easier and more fun. Dharma practice should be fun, it shouldn’t be something heavy and serious and dour. We should enjoy it – even the boring and difficult bits! That’s why when you meet great masters they’re usually laughing.
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May All Beings Benefit
Sarva Mangalam