Daily Practice of Taking and Giving
After His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s teachings, Lama Zopa Rinpoche went for afternoon tea with the geshe and some students from a Dharma center. Geshe-la requested that Rinpoche give some advice for the center, and they talked a little about the center’s difficulties.
We need an open heart. There are different views, so apply the views that are more beneficial. Like a road blocked by rocks, first we have to recognize the roadblocks so that we can clear them away.
A lady sitting next to me had a pain in her jaw and she asked me how to deal with it. I told her it is very important to do this prayer every day:
When we have happiness think: "May all sentient beings have happiness and peace."
When we have suffering, problems, cancer, AIDS, relationship problems, whatever, think: "May all sentient beings' oceans of samsaric sufferings run dry."
The idea is to do tong-len practice from time to time each day. When we do this practice of taking on others’ suffering, we collect limitless skies of merit each time, because we are taking on the sufferings of numberless beings and purifying not only this life’s negative karma but also our past lives’ negative karma. The stronger we generate compassion for animals or human beings, that many eons of negative karma are purified. When we do the practice of giving, we purify our negative karma from today, this life and past lives—we purify many eons of negative karma.