The Path to Enlightenment

Gungtang Jampai Yang, a very high lama from Amdo in Tibet, said:

The essence of Losang Gyalten (Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings) integrates listening, reflecting and meditation into one. If you attempt the collecting of merits and purification, the background support, then buddhahood is at your fingertips.

This is how to practice to achieve enlightenment and how to achieve enlightenment quickly.

My very dear, most precious, most kind, wish-fulfilling one,
Thank you very, very much for your email and your message, New Year greetings.

So that thing which is not happening—trying, but it is not happening—that is not necessarily the universe telling you it’s not good to do that. It is not necessarily that; it can be negative or positive.

For example, we can become free from samsara and after that achieve enlightenment—peerless happiness, the total cessation of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations—and then free the numberless sentient beings totally and bring them to peerless happiness, buddhahood. Of course, our mind at the moment is full of mistakes, totally obscured, like darkness, no light, no sun, and on top of that filled with fog, so it is obscured by defilements, therefore we are not yet able to do that.

The reason that we can be free from samsara—from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, the six realms of sufferings—and achieve enlightenment and bring sentient beings to enlightenment, is because the nature of our mind is not oneness with the defilements; it is not one with anger, attachment and ignorance.

If our mind was oneness with anger, attachment and ignorance then it would not possible. But we can be free from suffering in samsara. The nature of the mind is pure. You see in many other sects, like Kagyu and Nyingma, the meditators believe this—that the mind itself is already enlightened; that our mind is already enlightened and is just obscured now. But there are different ways of thinking and meditating.

According to Lama Tsongkhapa’s way of explaining the nature of the mind, the ultimate nature  is totally pure and there is no difference between sentient beings and the Buddha. There is no difference in the ultimate nature of oneself and the Buddha, but only in the conventional nature, the all-obscuring nature, the different sentient beings’ obscurations.

The Buddha is totally free from obscurations, is not obscured and has fully developed realizations, therefore every sentient being can also achieve enlightenment—every single hell being, hungry ghost, every single animal, every single ant, mosquito, slug. Everybody can achieve enlightenment and will be enlightened in the future, because the ultimate nature is pure. In the ultimate nature there is no difference between sentient beings and the Buddha, between oneself and the Buddha.

Suffering is because of being obscured temporally, therefore we have suffering, but it’s not forever; because enlightenment is possible, we can be free from samsara.

According to the present state of mind, as I have described, it is dark, foggy, so like that it is obscured. It looks impossible to achieve all those things that I said, but we can’t give up, because numberless sentient beings have become free from samsara and have achieved enlightenment. Sentient beings are the same as the Buddha. Buddha Shakyamuni was the same as us before becoming enlightened—he had problems, but he changed his mind with bodhicitta, he cherished other sentient beings and let go of the I.

We cherish the I and give up other sentient beings, so it is totally opposite to the Buddha and that’s why we haven’t become free from all the sufferings in samsara. We still have birth and death and continue to circle in samsara and have all the sufferings in between.

What I am saying is that we have to try this to be free from samsara, to achieve enlightenment, it is the most important thing. If we want happiness and don’t want suffering, this is what we have to do, with much effort, like Shakyamuni Buddha, who was the same as us but changed his mind and became enlightened. We can also do the same thing; we can change our mind and become enlightened.

This is why it is extremely worthwhile to learn Dharma and to practice Dharma. This is the most important thing, even more important than our job, money, food, etc. Actually, our job, money and food all come from Dharma, from our past life, from having practiced charity to other sentient beings in past times. With the thought of giving—through charity, not being miserly, through giving—from that came the result, which is this life’s job, money and conditions for means of living. So it all came from that cause.

Also our precious human body so that now we can practice Dharma and not be reborn in the lower realms and be able to achieve a higher rebirth, that came from the practice of morality, protecting karma, like abandoning killing, stealing, and, for example, the five precepts or four, three, two or one precepts.

So according to our own capacity, by practicing morality we get a higher rebirth. By practicing the three higher trainings, the five paths to liberation, we can become free from samsara and achieve ultimate happiness forever. By actualizing compassion for all sentient beings and bodhicitta, we enter the Mahayana path and we can achieve enlightenment for sentient beings. By practicing bodhicitta, the six paramitas, then we are able to achieve enlightenment for sentient beings.

It is possible to have rebirth as a happy transmigratory being, such as a deva or human. This is all received due to having practiced pure morality in the past. All the good things come from holy Dharma, therefore that is the most important thing.

People who have many difficulties and sufferings, this is from not having practiced Dharma. So they haven’t created the causes through charity and morality in the past.

Therefore, if we want to have success, happiness, etc., we need to practice morality and charity and so forth. We need to create the cause. It is all dependent arising. Nothing is independent, it is not created by God—not having freedom, no, not at all—it is not created by God.  

In Buddhism, whether we want to be in the hell realms or free from that, it is totally in our hands. Whether we want to achieve enlightenment or not, it’s in our hands. Whether we want to be free from samsara or not, it’s in our hands. It’s up to us what we do with our mind, how we take care of our mind. In Buddhism we have total freedom in our hands. So, rejoice!

Of course, depending on what we want, even though we don’t have omniscience, if we have ordinary clairvoyance and can see something of the future or past, it is helpful. Then we know what to do, what method to use to achieve what we want, so like that.

Thank you very much.

With much love and prayers ...

The definition of a holiday is:

• The mind abiding in correctly following the virtuous friend
• The mind abiding in renunciation of samsara
• The mind abiding in bodhicitta
• The mind abiding in emptiness
• The mind abiding in the tantric path—the two stages.

The completion of your holiday is when you cease all the obscurations and complete all the realizations.

• Refuge recitations: 150,000
• Prostrations by reciting the names of the Thirty-five Buddhas: 50,000
• Mandala offerings: 100,000
• Vajrasattva mantras: 100,000
• Water bowl offerings: 50,000

If you are able to come to Nepal, there are students who come to the Kopan nunnery from Singapore and so on. They do one thousand water bowl offerings a day, so you can join them and then offer together as a group. Even if many people are doing the water bowl offerings, you can still offer them together. You can each count the total number of the bowls offered and in this way complete them faster. Also, someone can guide the practice.

Group water bowl retreats are also arranged in the West and at different centers, similar to what Kopan nunnery does, and in this way it gets them done. Otherwise you can do it alone. This may purify more because it is harder and it takes longer, therefore it purifies so many obscurations and collects so much merit. When it is very easy because it’s done with many people, maybe there’s not as much purification.

One of the benefits of offering water is that the mind becomes soft and actualizes bodhicitta—the wetness of bodhicitta—thus we generate loving kindness, compassion and bodhicitta. It is mainly for that.

• Arya Sanghata Sutra recitations: Read the Arya Sanghata Sutra each week for your whole life. This is to collect the most unbelievable, unbelievable merits, so that is to help everything.

To gain effortful lamrim experience:

What makes your life most meaningful is the lamrim. I suggest the main text for you to use is Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. If you haven’t studied this text already, then study it from beginning to end, reading through it four times. That itself is lamrim meditation if you read it slowly and relate it to your own life.

As you read, if there’s anything you don’t understand you can mark the text—not with black ink, but with orange or yellow color. Mark it respectfully, thinking this is the holy Dharma, which has two aspects—one aspect is the realizations and one aspect is the text, the letters, which explain the realizations.

Holy Dharma has two realizations, in case of realizing the absolute Dharma—the cessation of all the obscurations, the sufferings, and the true path to that, which leads to the wisdom directly perceiving emptiness. These two are ultimate Dharma.

When you mark the text, you have to think that you are offering color with respect, like offering to a statue. Otherwise if you are just marking the text with a black line on top of the letter, it creates the negative karma to be born in hell, such as the second hell, called the black line hell. Therefore, it’s important when you mark the text not to do it in a disrespectful manner.

The other thing is that you can buy a notebook and write nicely in that anything you don’t understand. Then you can meet with a geshe or elder student who has studied the lamrim well and you can ask the questions. In this way, you can learn. Or you can telephone and get the answers from someone who has studied the lamrim very well.

Study Liberation in the Palm of your Hand four times and after that go through the lamrim outline using Liberation as a basis. Cycle through the lamrim outline completely three times.

After that, try to achieve the realization of correctly following the virtuous friend with thought and action, on the basis of the outline in the lamrim. Every day, more or less meditate on that. The time depends on yourself. Do this until you achieve the effortless realization of correctly following the virtuous friend.

After that, do the meditation on the graduated path of the lower capable being, up to karma. Particularly [focus] on the perfect human rebirth. Try to get the realization that your perfect human body is much more precious than skies filled with wish-granting jewels, so you realize the importance.

Even if we have skies filled with wish-granting jewels, that alone can’t help us to be free from the lower realms. That alone can’t help us to be free from samsara, free from lower nirvana, and we can’t achieve buddhahood from wish-granting jewels. With this perfect human body, even if we don’t have a tiny piece of a wish-granting jewel, we can achieve all of this up to enlightenment.

Milarepa achieved full enlightenment in this brief lifetime of degenerate times, even though he was a lay person and didn’t become a monk. This was even after he killed about thirty-seven people through black magic. He also killed many more animals that were under the house at the same time. This happened because he felt very sad and it was the advice of his mother because they were badly treated by their uncle and aunt. After he killed all those people he felt bad and went to see his guru Marpa because the lama who taught him black magic suggested he go to see Marpa.

Marpa didn’t give him any teachings for years, he just let Milarepa build a nine-storey tower three times, by himself alone. After Milarepa built the first tower, he had to tear it down and  carry all the stones back to where he found them, so his backside became bluish and hard. Also his guru Marpa, who was a buddha, always scolded him and maybe even beat him. Even when Milarepa came with other disciples to attend teachings from Marpa, when Marpa saw him, he scolded him and kicked him out. However, from Milarepa’s side, he never arose heresy or anger, he was always devotional and followed exactly what was advised by his guru Marpa.

Finally, Marpa did give Milarepa initiations and teachings and then he went to the different mountains where he was advised to meditate by Marpa. He did exactly what was advised and he achieved buddhahood—the total cessation of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations—in one brief lifetime of degenerate time. This is just a brief example of how Milarepa achieved enlightenment in a brief lifetime of degenerate time. There are many others [who also achieved enlightenment in one lifetime.] This is what you should understand; this is the essence of how to achieve enlightenment quickest in this brief lifetime of degenerate time.

Besides the perfect human rebirth, its usefulness, meditate on this longer if you can, then if you achieve realizations you can proceed to the next subject, so like that continue through the lamrim.

When you have realizations of the path of the lower capable being, you can then train the mind mainly in the path of the middle capable being. After that realization then train in bodhicitta. There are two techniques: the seven-point Mahayana cause and effect, and equalizing and exchanging oneself and others. You can do both, but whichever technique is more effective you can do that more often until you achieve effortful realization.

Then train the mind in emptiness. You should do some meditation on emptiness every day, for ten or fifteen minutes or whatever time you have. This is very important, so please study the teachings on emptiness, besides lamrim, philosophy, also take teachings, learn and read and try to understand the teachings. This is to leave imprints as much as possible on the mind.

If we have enough merit then we can have realizations even in this life; if not, then in the next life. Therefore it is very important to listen to teachings as much as possible in this life and to study and read any teachings on sutra and tantra, the Buddha’s teachings. In this way it leaves imprints on the mind and even if we don’t have realizations in this life, in the next life we will become a pandit. We can expect that. What we heard in this life, through that we can have realizations quickly.

Please use the outline of Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand or Essential Nectar for your daily meditation. This should be your pocket guide book on the lamrim. In that way, it is so simple. After becoming familiar with the lamrim then you need your personal deity of Highest Yoga Tantra, and in this way, you are practicing to achieve enlightenment in the quickest way.

Your preliminary practices are:

- Refuge: 500,000
- Generating the four immeasurable thoughts: 100,000
- Prostrations by reciting the names of the Thirty-five Buddhas: 50,000, and
- Mandala offerings: 200,000. That means you can do the long one once, twice or three times, then do the short one [Tib: Sa zhi pö kyi ... ] and count those.  You can also do the nine-line prayer to Lama Tsongkhapa [Tib: migtsema] at the end of each one, as we do in Jorchö. [Tib: Ngö drub kün jung thub wang dor je chang …. ]

All those things you are practicing are very good, but the one thing left is lamrim. You can do the lamrim prayer at the end of Lama Chöpa.

Your lamrim text is not yet translated, however, it’s called the Red Lamrim and maybe the author is Sangye Yeshe. That lamrim text is the basis for Pabongka Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. That’s the main lamrim that you should study from beginning to end.

Study this lamrim text twice from beginning to end, but that doesn’t mean you can’t read other lamrims and commentaries. You can also read them but the main lamrim for you to read is the Red Lamrim.

The things you don’t understand, mark with orange color as an offering, like painting a buddha statue or thangka, or like offering color or robes to holy objects. In other words, mark the text in a respectful way. Don’t mark the texts with black ink. Marking texts in a disrespectful way creates negative karma and is a cause to be born in the lower realms. One Western professor of Buddhism, who is one of the professors who is very good in Buddhism, said that in the past he marked many manuscripts with black color right over the letters and created the cause to be born in the lower realms many times.

Also, you can write down all the questions you have—everything you don’t know—in a book and then discuss these afterwards with the geshes or Western students who have done very good study in the Basic and Masters Programs. If there is someone who has studied well, then they can help you.

Do effortful meditation by following the lamrim outline five times and then do effortless meditation.

The essence is that this life is not long but short. This perfect human rebirth is most precious. In general, a human rebirth is precious and specifically this perfect human rebirth is most precious and doesn’t last long, because death can happen at any moment. This perfect human rebirth that we have received with eight freedoms and ten richnesses is a most impossible thing to happen.

We have met with the Mahayana teachings, which is the most difficult thing to happen, and on top of that we have met perfectly qualified gurus, which is almost impossible to happen. This time we can achieve complete enlightenment in one brief lifetime of this degenerate time. Life is very short and death can happen at any time. That’s what we should have in the heart all the time.

Thank you very much. I am the same as an ant crawling around you. Anyway, your practice of guru devotion is your responsibility. Thank you very much.

Also do nyung näs every year as much as you can. That’s the quick way. Doing one nyung nä well prevents rebirth in the lower realms and you are able to go to a pure land. So doing nyung nä as much as you can each year is very good.

Sometimes recite Chanting the Names of Manjushri. Reciting that from time to time is good. Thank you.

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
In regard to practice, you should first do the morning motivation, The Method to Transform a Suffering Life into Happiness (Including Enlightenment) and also Guru Yoga practice.

The main lamrim commentary for you is Essence of Refined Gold, which you should read ten times. You should study the text and write down in a notebook or mark in the text anything that you don’t understand and ask questions to a geshe or to older students who have studied well.

Read the text ten times but read it mindfully, as an analytical meditation, until the mind is transformed, then do fixed meditation, keeping the mind in that for a while.

It’s extremely important to know the following. When a child knows that fire is hot, they won’t put their hand in the fire. If we recognize the nature of samsaric suffering we won’t follow it, although we have done that from beginningless time.

We are a servant to ignorance, a robot of samsara, following it from beginningless rebirths. We’re still in samsara and suffering, so recognize that by realizing emptiness we abandon ignorance and become free from the whole of samsara, from the three types of suffering. That’s how we can be free from the suffering of pain, from the suffering of death and old age, sickness and birth, and from the suffering of change, all the temporary samsaric pleasures. We have experienced all the pleasures—temporary samsaric pleasures—numberless times from beginningless rebirth, and because of our attitude to that we’re still in samsara, we’re still not free.

All the pleasures in the world that people have are nothing new but are old, experienced from beginningless rebirths. Compared to the devas’ very high pleasures, human beings’ billions or trillions of dollars are nothing. But compared to the devas, even the poorest human beings can have Dharma happiness, which they can continue and complete. They can be free from samsara, be liberated and become buddhas, however, samsaric happiness cannot be continued or completed.

Those two sufferings come from pervasive compounding suffering. This is very important. Buddhists need to know the sufferings of samsara, because we should realize what we need to be free from. If we can be free from pervasive compounding suffering, we can be free from samsara forever, not just temporarily. This third suffering means our five aggregates are under the control of delusion and karma, therefore the aggregates are pervaded by suffering, contaminated by the seed of delusion and karma, so suffering and delusions rise. That’s how suffering is compounded.

To realize the nature of suffering, feel that it’s like being in a fire. We can’t stand to be in a fire for even one second. We want to be out of that fire. Not just that, but hundreds, thousands of times worse than that. So it’s important, the most important meditation in our life.

Self-cherishing thought is the root of obstacles to benefit numberless sentient beings and also [it prevents us] from achieving happiness and being able to enlighten others. It’s the main obstacle. By recognizing that, give it up and develop bodhicitta, cherishing other sentient beings who are numberless. From that thought we can bring happiness to every sentient being, up to enlightenment: this life’s happiness, the happiness of future lives—not just one—and the ultimate happiness of liberation from samsara and then buddhahood, the cessation of all the mistakes of the mind and completion of all realizations. From buddhahood we can then bring that to all sentient beings.

It’s unbelievable, unbelievable. It makes life the best, most meaningful—to bring peerless happiness to all sentient beings, to bring everyone to peerless happiness by oneself. This is the best Dharma practice. If you can, put effort into this. Like churning milk to make butter, this is the essence. It’s like taking the essence of gold or jewels from the ocean sand.

Attempt to do essential daily practices. After one or two years, check and then you can do preliminary practices; there are certain meditations to do. First do effortful meditation on lamrim, then effortless meditation.

I don’t want to give all that now. Thank you very much.

Please take care of your life in this way. Bodhicitta is the best way to take care of our life, so it is most beneficial for all sentient beings, the happiest life.

Thank you very much.

With much love and prayers...