Disharmony in the Family

My most dear, most kind, most precious wish-fulfilling one,
Please tell your son this:

The correct way to live your life, to practice Dharma, is to practice bodhicitta. This is because you want happiness and don’t want suffering. In that case, for that to happen, first from your side you have to stop giving harm to others with your body, speech and mind. This means to stop doing anything that others do not like or that harms others, because harming others is the cause and the result is that you receive harm back from others.

The result, the accident, is because of harming others in the past, so the accident happened. Anything in our life—happiness or suffering—depends on the negative or positive karma that we created before. Every single thing depends on that.

If you want happiness, first you have to benefit others and cause happiness to others. Then as a result you will receive happiness from others—whether it is temporary happiness or ultimate happiness; freedom from samsara or ultimate happiness, the peerless happiness, buddhahood.

Now bodhicitta—before it was just yourself, how much you have the most unbearable suffering in samsara, your own samsara. Just like that, there are numberless sentient beings—numberless hell beings, numberless hungry ghosts, numberless animals, numberless humans, numberless suras, numberless asuras and numberless intermediate state beings—who have been suffering from beginningless rebirth in samsara, in those realms. They will be suffering again without end, because those who have met the Buddhadharma are few, compared with those who haven’t met the Dharma. There are numberless beings who don’t know about karma and reincarnation—wow, wow, wow.

Therefore the most important thing in the life—every day and night, every hour, every second—is on the basis of stopping harm to others and bringing happiness and benefit to sentient beings, who are numberless in each realm, and then bringing them to the peerless happiness—the total cessation of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations. You receive all your past happiness, all your present happiness and all your future happiness, including enlightenment, from every sentient being, from everyone—from every single hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human being, sura, asura and intermediate state being.

Sentient beings are your most precious, most kind, most dear, wish-fulfilling ones, even [more precious than] Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, because by relying upon them you become free from the lower realms, free from samsara, free from abiding in lower nirvana and you are able to achieve buddhahood, the peerless happiness. Your buddhahood comes from every sentient being, therefore sentient beings are most unbelievably precious, most unbelievably precious.

Also, they have been your mother numberless times, and they have been kind in four ways from beginningless rebirth. They gave you your body, particularly the human body, which has allowed you to practice Dharma; they protected your life from hundreds of dangers every day; they bore so much hardship every day, and day and night; and the fourth kindness is they gave you education. So from beginningless rebirth every sentient being has been kind to you.

Therefore your best life is not to harm others, but only to benefit them. This is the most happy life, the most meaningful life. That’s what you should pay attention to every day, every hour, every minute. Then even reciting mantras—anything and everything you do—do it with that motivation.

So this advice is for your son and also for yourself.

To help your son, do Medicine Buddha practice if you can, not only reciting the mantra, but you also need to recite the seven Medicine Buddha’s names seven times. There is a small practice, a middle length puja and the most extensive Medicine Buddha puja, composed by the Fifth Dalai Lama. Sometimes if you can, try to do that also. Wow, that would be unbelievable. But mostly you can do the short Medicine Buddha practice (sadhana). This would be very good to practice. It takes care of your son and yourself and all sentient beings.

Thank you very much. You can pray to Medicine Buddha for your son.

Thank you very much. Please live your life with the thought of bodhicitta in everything you do. Attached is my morning motivation [The Method to Transform a Suffering Life into Happiness (Including Enlightenment)] in case you are not doing it already.

With much love and prayers...

You and your husband should both recite:

• Thirteen-wheel chakra: recite this seven times a day for some time.
• Burning Pinnacle mantra: recite this six times. This is to overcome the obstacles.

You should read theArya Sanghata Sutra once.

Zungdu text [a collection of dharani] should be read. You can ask some monks at Kopan Monastery to read and dedicate for you both. Mention that this is my suggestion.

This is my advice for now.

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Please pray to Medicine Buddha very strongly and recite the seven names of Medicine Buddha and the mantra every day, making prayers for your parents to give freedom for you to go to Dharamsala and so forth, if you still want to be a translator for the center.

Do this as a daily practice at the moment. You can do the sadhana every day and then sometimes do the middle-length puja, called The Wish-fulfilling Jewel. [Find links to these practices in the FPMT Catalogue.] Make strong prayers to Medicine Buddha that your parents will give you freedom to go to Dharamsala and so forth, to practice Dharma for the benefit of all beings.

The conclusion now is this: you have practices for many years, to make your life most meaningful. The main practice is to meditate on the lamrim and to actualize the path for every single sentient being, which also of course includes your parents.

Please make your life most meaningful with the thought of bodhicitta day and night and in every action you do.

With much love and prayers...

My most dear one,
You should recite the Verses of the Eight Noble Auspicious Ones every morning. Try that for your parents to change their minds and for them to avoid creating negative karma.

Recite the following mantras for success.¹

CHOM DÄN DE / DE ZHIN SHEG PA / DRA CHOM PA / YANG DAG PAR / DZOG PÄI SANG GYÄ / SA DZIN GYÄL PO LA / CHHAG TSHÄL LO

TADYATHA / OM DHARE DHARE / DHARANI BANDHE SVAHA

Recite a minimum of one mala each day, immediately after blessing the speech. For the visualization you can look at a statue or image of the Buddha without distraction, and visualize that beams are emitted, purifying negative karmas and defilements collected since beginningless lifetimes.

p="">

There is also a mantra from the Golden Light Sutra² that you can recite every day if you have time, otherwise just do it from time to time.

Generally you need compassion for your parents. Read the section on the mother’s kindness in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand and meditate on that. Be humble and kind to your parents, then they can change their minds and they will think Buddhism can be good. Otherwise they won’t like Buddhism and they will interfere.

Read Seven-Point Thought Transformation. Especially read the part about transforming problems into the path to enlightenment. Read that well, not just reading and trying to finish it, but trying to learn from it.

Right now there are the fifteen days of the Buddha performing miracles, when any merit increases 100 millions of times. We simply cannot grasp how much the merit becomes, it is so powerful. Especially now, it is a very good time for you to recite these mantras and the prayer because it is such a powerful time. You must take the opportunity and try to recite it as much as possible during these special days up to the Tibetan fifteenth day.

You should also read this verse from Lama Chöpa carefully and think it over:

LC 103
Should even all the beings of the three realms without exception
Become angry at me, humiliate, criticize, threaten or even kill me,
I seek your blessings not to be agitated, but to complete the perception of patience
That works for their benefit in response to their harm.

That is my advice to you.

With much love and prayers...

Notes

¹ This is the Mantra to Fulfill Wishes. [Return to text.]

² The mantra from the Golden Light Sutra is not publicly available, in accordance with Rinpoche's advice. [Return to text.]

My most dear one,
Thank you for your email, I am sorry for the delay.

You should recite the Sutra of Golden Light to pacify your family member’s anger, in order to change his mind. The recitation is so that he can generate extremely happy thoughts towards the Dharma,  thus when he sees that you are following the Dharma, he will change his mind. 

Read the Sutra of Golden Light and the Diamond Cutter Sutra five times, with that wish. Pray like that, and also for your family to be happy.

Regarding your question on what practices you can do to find a beautiful retreat place, you should pray to the Buddha and also do the extensive Medicine Buddha puja, [The Wish Granting Sovereign], written by the Fifth Dalai Lama. If you do the puja together with other students, not just by yourself, there is more power. If more people come together with the same wish, then there is more power.

You can also recite the mantra called Exalted One Extremely Pacifying All Hatred:

TADYATHA DIRI TISHTA TASKARA BADUSI MACHALA MACHALA SVAHA

Recite some of this mantra, but not much.

It is not a surprise that your family member doesn’t like you helping Buddhism. This is due to his past karma.

With much love and prayers...

For your mother

1. Recitation of OM MANI PADME HUM

Recite OM MANI PADME HUM, thinking of your mother. Listen! Each time you recite OM MANI PADME HUM, that means you are freeing all the mother sentient beings from the oceans of samsara; all the numberless sentient beings—the hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, suras, asuras and intermediate state beings—from the oceans of samsaric suffering.

Each time you say OM MANI PADME HUM [Rinpoche snaps his fingers], each time, that is all it is for, to bring the numberless hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, humans, suras and asuras to full enlightenment, to peerless happiness and to full enlightenment. So, each time you say this mantra OM MANI PADME HUM, you are freeing all sentient beings, including your mother, from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bringing each of them to the peerless happiness, to full enlightenment. Each time you say OM MANI PADME HUM, it’s for that. What it does is that.

This is what it does, so that includes your mother. You can think of your mother and visualize the Buddha Chenrezig here, and nectar comes to you. Beams come to you and to your mother and to all beings, who are in front of you.

2.  Vajrasattva purification

Then do Vajrasattva practice. At your heart are all the sentient beings, especially your mother. Then Vajrasattva sends nectar down, purifying all sentient beings, including yourself and especially your mother. With this visualization, recite the Vajrasattva mantra 21 times.

Regarding your question about the benefit of seeing your mother again, if seeing your mother benefits her in the next life, so she goes to the pure land etc, yes [it is good to see her], but if she has more attachment when she dies, then it is not good. You have to think of the benefit, not of worldly attachment. According to my divination, seeing your mother is good, not seeing your mother is good. There is no difference.

3.  Golden Light Sutra

In the Golden Light Sutra there is a chapter on compassion. This is very good. Read that chapter 80 times on your mother’s behalf. You can read it in Tibetan.

For your brother

1.  His Holiness the Dalai Lama visualization and mantra recitation

Visualize His Holiness the Dalai Lama on top of your brother’s head. Then nectar purifies all the obscurations—gross obscurations [Tib: nyön-drib] and subtle obscurations [Tib: she-drib] —and the anger, attachment, ignorance and desire. These are completely purified.

Then generate for him to receive realizations, from guru devotion up to enlightenment. He receives renunciation, bodhicitta, emptiness and much compassion to all sentient beings—compassion to you and to all sentient beings.

Recite His Holiness the Dalai Lama's mantra every day. Pray to the Dalai Lama and recite his mantra. Then see what changes might happen.

2.  In the Bodhicaryavatara, there are two verses you should memorize:

I it was who in the past
Did harm to beings such as these.
And so, when others do me mischief,
It is only just that they should injure me.¹

Those who harm me come against me,
Summoned by my evil karma.
But they will be the ones who go to hell,
And so it is myself who bring their ruin.²

The essence is this. Think, “My karma is harming that person. In my past life I harmed him, and the karma persuaded him so now I receive harm from him. I have caused him to do that, by creating this karma. I caused him to be born in hell. He can be born in hell at any time, therefore I need to help him. In the past I gave such harm to sentient beings, therefore it is worthwhile that somebody is harming me.”

So, with your brother, that is the result of past karma, the result of the self-cherishing thought, holding the I as more important than others.

Memorize these two verses from the Bodhicaryavatara and the following verse from the Seven-point Mind Training, so you can recite the verses by heart.

3.  In the Seven-point Mind Training, Geshe Chekawa said,

Banish all blames to the single source.
Toward all beings contemplate their great kindness.³

Use how others treat you as a condition to develop compassion. Have great kindness towards all and do not blame any sentient being. Put all the blame on one thing, the self-cherishing thought. Towards others have no blame at all.

So, have only kindness towards your brother. Wish him all happiness in the past, present and future—temporary and ultimate happiness, the peerless happiness, future enlightenment. Think, “I receive all happiness from him, so I will have only kindness towards him.”

Do you know how all happiness comes from him? Our good karma comes from the actions of the buddhas and from sentient beings, and we also create good karma through learning from the Guru-Buddha. Therefore, these are the main reasons.

You can think that all the three times’ happiness came from the buddhas; the buddhas came from bodhisattvas; the bodhisattvas came from great compassion, and great compassion arises due to the suffering of sentient beings. If sentient beings don't have suffering through delusion and karma, there won't be compassion. So the generation of compassion is dependent on every single beings' suffering—not just some, not like that, but on every sentient being that is obscured. That includes your brother. There are three types of suffering: the suffering of change, pervasive compounded suffering and [the suffering of suffering].

Therefore, you can see that your past happiness from beginningless rebirth, as well as your present and future happiness, enlightenment, all these come from your brother. That is very clear. This is unbelievable kindness from your brother to you.

Without your brother, there is no compassion, and without compassion, there is no bodhicitta. Without bodhicitta, there are no bodhisattvas, and without bodhisattvas, there is no Buddha. Without Buddha, there is no Buddha's action. So, in this way, all the three times’ happiness comes from your brother. [All happiness] is only through the kindness of all the sentient beings, friends, enemies, strangers, including your brother's kindness.

Think, “There is no harm to me which I haven't caused.”

So, it is a very, very, very, very, very, very important subject—how every sentient being is most kind to me, more kind than the Buddha, more kind than the Dharma, more kind than the Sangha, because that came from every sentient being.

Of course, there are many other ways your brother helps you, like developing patience, etc. There are many other ways. The most important thing is the kindness of all sentient beings, including your brother.

Think, “I can't wait to free him from the ocean of samsara. I can’t wait even for a minute or a second without wishing to bring him to enlightenment. Even helping him with small problems and giving him comfort is an incredible pleasure.” Understand that all sentient beings are just like your brother. That is the real practice, the most important practice.

It is mentioned by Panchen Shakya Shri, a great pandita, that if you suffer, then take all sentient beings' suffering. “May the oceans of suffering dry out.” That means the suffering of every samsaric sentient being. That is incredible. That is tong-len.

If you are happy, dedicate the happiness to collect merit. Think, "May space be filled with happiness and peace. May each sentient being have happiness and may peace be received by each sentient being."

It means that what you experience as happiness or suffering, dedicate that to every sentient being. Like, for example,  enjoying a five-star hotel—do tong-len to all. Then you don’t waste your life. It becomes worthwhile.

Please share this advice with others.

Notes

¹ See The Way of the Bodhisattva by Shantideva, Ch. 6, v. 42. Translated by the Padmakara Translation Group, Shambhala Dragon Editions, 1997.  [Return to text]

² Ibid, Ch. 6, v. 47.  [Return to text]

³ See Mind Training: The Great Collection, Translated by Thubten Jinpa, Wisdom Publications, Boston, 2006.  [Return to text]