Dharma Connection With Other Gurus

My very dear Charlotte,
Of course you know this, but I wanted to mention to you to be careful meeting other lamas (gurus) and receiving teachings and initiations. If you have taken an initiation from them, which means you have done the visualization during the initiation, then you have to devote to the lama as a guru. This means you have to obey what he says.

You often say His Holiness the Dalai Lama and myself are your gurus and no others.

Just being present with other people and hearing the teachings does not alone make a Dharma connection—a guru/disciple relationship. But if you took the teaching with a recognition of yourself as the disciple and the teacher as the guru, then even if the teacher just says a few words, even just a verse of teachings or one mantra recitation, then that person is your guru from then on. There is no changing that. After one makes that Dharma connection, of guru/disciple, then if you give up that teacher, that is the greatest negative karma and the greatest obstacle to your spiritual growth. Besides that, there are heavy obstacles and one has to experience suffering, especially at the time of death, and eons of suffering in the lower realms and the hell realms.

If you attend the teachings to make other people happy, and you just sit with the group of people while the lama gives the initiation, but you don’t visualize seeing the lama as the deity, as the lama instructs you, then you are not taking the initiation. Even if you take the substances, that doesn’t mean you are taking the initiation if you don’t do the visualization.

This is just to make sure, to make it clean-clear, so you know.

With much love and prayers,
Lama Zopa Rinpoche

PS. Please continue to pray for the Maitreya Project’s quick success, to receive all the funding and for the project to start without delay, and for the success of all of my projects and that all my wishes be fulfilled.