Month: December 2015

What We All Want

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An excerpt from a teaching called How Buddhism Differs from Other Religions by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

When we study Buddhism, the first thing we come to understand is the equality of all that lives.  This is a direct teaching from none other than Shakyamuni Buddha himself.  He taught that all beings are essentially equal in their nature and that they all have the same exact desires that we have.  We want to be happy.  We strive for happiness in our own way everyday.  We go here and go there to be happy.  We rest to be happy.  We wake up to be happy.  We have our weekends to be happy.  We hope the weekdays will be happy.  It’s something that’s a theme in us and whether we consciously realize that we are striving for happiness or not, it is an underlying fuel that runs the machine.  And when we are not happy, we are filled with desire.  And when we are not happy, we are suffering.

The Buddha taught us that each and every sentient being – humans, animals, and even nonphysical beings mainly wish to be happy in the simple way that we do.  I watch MSNBC news sometimes, and I watch Chris Matthews and Keith Oberman. And Chris Matthews always says in one of his commercials, “This is something uniquely American.  This is something that really shows us who we are.”  We are Americans, because in America there is the hope that this day is going to be the best day.  And that this is going to be our favorite day, and that we are going to be really happy today.  And so we wake up in America with that hope because we have the freedom to gain that happiness.  We’re not oppressed or starving or homeless or something where there is no real potential for true happiness, comfort, or ease.  I disagree with Chris Matthews even though I am a fan.  I don’t think that only in America do we wake up with that thought.  Maybe in America it seems more attainable.  But the truth of the matter is, no matter where we are, what diseases we suffer from, what poverty or hunger or disability we endure, or what oppression or warlike conditions, every single person has the wish for the freedom to be happy, and wishes for happiness.

When we realize that all sentient beings are exactly the same in that way, an understanding comes up in our minds.  It is a sense of the equality of all that lives.  Perhaps it is a sense of budding compassion or understanding.  That’s the goal anyway.

So, how does that work?  Sometimes we hear about really terrible situations, and really terrible people, such as a serial killer who has murdered like Jeffrey Dahmer.  Have you ever heard about him?  He was a serial killer that used to cannibalize people, and live with their dead bodies, and stuff like that.  Now, of course our understanding of that is that the man was extremely sick.  We can understand that, but do we understand that as strange and abhorrent and bizarre, and as ghastly his behavior was, he was striving to be happy?   But the confusion, the delusion in his mind was so thick, that in order to be happy, he had to completely dominate another life form.   Yet underlying that, even while killing, maiming and torturing people, he was striving to be happy.  That’s a bizarre thought, but it helps us to understand a little bit about the nature of suffering sentient beings.

Then we think about animals.  For those of you that don’t know, I just adore animals.  I feel very close to them, and I have a bunch.  They are my family.   Animals suffer too, and I have come to understand through my own experience, not just from the teachings, that animals also strive every day to be happy.  I see my dogs move from a hot place to a cool place, from a cool place to a warm place, and it’s about wanting to feel comfortable, to be happy.  Whenever you buy them a new toy or a new treat, they are gung-ho on it because they want to be happy.  I’ve seen for myself that desire for happiness in humans and in animals.  And so I absolutely and totally understand that what the Buddha has said is true.  While we are striving to be happy, we have absolutely no understanding as to how to go about it.  And therein lies the rub, as they say.   Therein lies the problem.

© Jetsunma Ahkön Lhamo

Astrology for 12/11/2015

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12/11/2015 Friday by Norma

Today marks a new beginning for the coming month. Make plans that outline what comes next and be aware that life now is exciting, ambitious and involves too much work! It’s a happy, productive time. A new direction is stabilizing, an adventure is possible, and something different occupies your attention. Change is here! Don’t worry if all the details aren’t in place. Rod Steiger said, “You’re not supposed to understand everything.” The big picture, setting goals for the future, is most important now. What’s good today? Intuitive understanding that brings happiness, loads of energy, drive and the willingness to charge out and do things!

The astrology post affects everyone differently, based on individual horoscopes. Check to see which
area of your life is impacted by this message!

Astrology for 12/10/2015

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12/10/2015 Thursday by Norma

A serious announcement or conversation is highlighted, where people speak carefully and thoughtfully. Reply promptly if questioned, and don’t avoid discussion. There’s a danger of missing out on something special as a result of indecision or fearfulness. “Are you in or out?” should be answered promptly, wait and you’ll find the moment has passed. Confusion and forgetfulness can be issues; have directions in hand before embarking on an endeavor. An attraction beckons, enticingly, and you really want to go there. Be careful. John Steinbeck said, “Man is the only varmint that sets his own trap, baits it, then steps in it.” What’s good today? Travel, realistic thinking, renewed adherence to your deepest beliefs, and romance!

The astrology post affects each person differently, depending on individual horoscopes. Look to see how this message affects your life!

Astrology for 12/9/2015

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12/9/2015 Wednesday by Norma

Pull inward today, to the extent that you can, and spend time in quiet thought and study. Learn something, ponder something and avoid the prevailing temptation to run around scattering your energy for no meaningful purpose. A well-considered understanding is crucial for what comes next, and you won’t gain it without contemplation. Edith Sitwell said, “My personal hobbies are reading, listening and silence.” Study all the clues like a detective, and you’ll come to an understanding of what you must do: then you can charge into action! Romance, artistic expression and work are also highlighted, if you have time. (Consider making time!)

The daily astrology post affects each person differently, depending on individual horoscopes. Look to see which area of life this message affects for you!

Practical Bodhicitta

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An excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo from the Vow of Love series

All of our suffering is brought about because we have desire in our mindstreams.  Having desire, we have attachment and aversion, hope and fear. Examine your own thoughts.  Every one of them is either a thought of hope or a thought of fear.  There isn’t one that doesn’t have as an underlying cause of hope or fear, attraction or aversion.  Every one.  That is the way the mind of duality works.  So all of the experiences that we have, according to the Buddha, are caused by the karma of desire.  Making wishing prayers to return in a form in which you can benefit beings purifies the mind of desire.  You will find that desire rules your mind less and less. Compassion is the great stabilizer of the mind.

Never stop cultivating aspirational Bodhicitta.  While you are practicing aspirational Bodhicitta your mind becomes firm and stabilized.  You are so on fire that you need to practice, in the same way that because you are determined to live, you always remember to breathe.  With that intensity, you should be absolutely determined to accomplish compassion and benefit all beings.  You always remember to practice and be mindful.   Then you begin to practice practical Bodhicitta.

Practical Bodhicitta has two divisions.  It has a lesser and greater division, or personal and a transpersonal division.  Compassion on the personal level is what we call ordinary human kindness.  It is invaluable.  There is never a time in your life that you should not practice ordinary human kindness.  I am sometimes dismayed at people who have a high-fallutin’ idea about compassion and how to practice the Vajrayana path, and they know how to do the proper instrumentation and they can chant and they can do all these wonderful things.  But they aren’t kind to one another.  How you can think of yourself as a real practitioner and not even be nice to the person next to you? How can you be arrogant?

Ordinary human kindness must be constantly practiced.  If you know of someone who is hungry, you should do your best to feed them.  If a starving child were in front of you, wouldn’t you feed him or her?  If someone that you loved really was lonely, wouldn’t you try to help them?  Of course, these are ordinary human kindnesses.  We’re not even perfect in that, are we?  I mean, we let ourselves and our families down.  We let everybody down on a regular basis.  Sometimes ordinary human kindness is impossible to achieve.

Ordinary human kindness is not lesser in its fabric or nature, but it touches less people.  For instance, let’s say you needed a friend. If I were to stay with you for some period of time, we would talk and we would share. Maybe I would teach you to meditate, if I were to discover that you’re the kind of person that would really respond to that.  But if I don’t do that, maybe I’ll have the time to teach a large group of people. Essentially I might be able to benefit many people as opposed to benefiting one person, even though you are very important and precious to me.  Yet even teaching a larger group of people is actually an intermediate level of practice. There are only so many people that can fit in this room and can be taught.

What is the highest level of compassion?  What is the highest level of Bodhicitta?  You have to go back to the Buddha’s teaching to figure this one out.  The Buddha says that all sentient beings are suffering and that there is an end to suffering and that the end to suffering is enlightenment.  That’s the only true end to suffering.  If you fed every one that’s hungry everyday and provided them each with a companion so that they’re never lonely, gave them nice clothes, they still will experience old age, sickness and death.  There’s nothing you can do about that.  And you have no control over how they will be reborn in their next incarnation.  They could come back in a form in which they still suffer.  The only end to suffering is to eradicate the cause of suffering from the mindstream.

The root cause of all suffering is the belief in self-nature as being inherently real. It’s the mother of all-pervasive desire in the mindstream.  The children are hatred, greed and ignorance.  The mind of duality causes us to act in certain ways that create the karma so that our lives manifest in certain ways.  If we suffer from hunger or old age or sickness or death, whatever it is that we suffer from, the root cause for those sufferings is the belief that self-nature is inherently real. How can you possibly uproot all of that from your mindstream?  How can you rid the very seed of suffering from your mindstream?  According to the Buddha, that is to achieve enlightenment.  To help sentient beings remove these causes from their mindstreams, we must ourselves first achieve enlightenment.  The purpose of self, which is to achieve enlightenment, is the same as the purpose of other, which is to achieve enlightenment.  They are the same, in the same way that we are non-dual, these purposes are non-dual.

© Jetsunma Ahkön Lhamo

Astrology for 12/8/2015

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12/8/2015 Tuesday by Norma

Two factions hold opposing views and a third party is putting pressure on everyone. The open door appears in a different, more expansive direction. Look for a cheerful leader who carefully resolves the situation. Actively seek out alternative solutions to the current conundrum. Thoughtfulness, sensitivity and understanding go farther than strident rhetoric right now. Avoid repeating slogans, instead speak wholeheartedly and listen carefully to others. John Stuart Mill said, “There is always hope when people listen to both sides.” What’s good today? Love, loans, financial improvement, learning where true problems lie, and hard work that is productive.

The astrology post affects each person differently, based on individual horoscopes. Look to see where
this message affects your life!

Astrology for 12/07/2015

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12/07/2015 Monday by Norma

Love is in the air and if you’re breathing you’re happy! A reward comes today that’s unexpected and satisfying. Someone observed that you are doing a good job! Do your best to notice others- that they are working hard, upholding standards, being good people. Jetsunma said, “Attention is food.” Pay attention to others, recognize their good qualities. Likewise pay attention what’s going on around you in public, avoid congested situations and make no effort to blast your way through something that seems stuck. Push and something will push back, harder. Definitely follow your intuition, take the easy way in every instance and things go well.

The astrology post affects everyone differently, depending on individual horoscopes. Look to see which area of your life this message touches.

To What Do You Aspire?

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An excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo from the Vow of Love series

In the Vajrayana tradition one contemplates very deeply on certain thoughts before you ever go on to any deeper practice, and these thoughts are called the ‘Four Thoughts that Turn the Mind.’  The idea is that your mind becomes turned in such a way that your intention to practice is firm, like a rock.  If you were wishy-washy about why you should practice meditation, your meditation will be wishy-washy.  There’s no doubt about it.  If you were convinced that your job could bring you more eternal and natural happiness than enlightenment, you would practice your job with greater fervor than you would practice enlightenment.  Therefore you try to turn your mind so that it has a firm foundation, hard as a rock, upon which you can build your practice.

It’s that way with aspirational Bodhicitta.  You have to turn your mind in such a way that you understand the value of compassion and you have to actually ignite your mind.  You have to set it on fire, and that fire has to be stronger and hotter and fiercer than any other feeling or idea that you have.  It has to burn so strongly that you can’t put it out.

In order to practice aspirational Bodhicitta, you must first of all look around you with courage.  Because we Americans, even New Age Americans, don’t like to look around and see that others are suffering.  We hate to think about that.  We think somehow it’s bad to think like that. According to the Buddha, it isn’t bad to think like that.  In fact, you must think like that in order to go on to the next level of practice.  You must look around you and be honest and be courageous. If you don’t see suffering in your life, if you don’t know that the people around you are lonely or getting old or getting sick, that they live with worry and with fear, then what you need to do is go to the library and check out books about other cultures and other forms of life, and see what the rest of the world is like.  Have you ever seen pictures of Calcutta, India?  Have you ever seen pictures of Bangladesh?  Have you ever seen pictures of Africa?  If you don’t believe that suffering exists in the world, you’ll see it there.  Have you ever studied the lives of people who continually do non-virtuous activity? Even though they might look like they’re tough and in control, they are deeply suffering. It behooves you to be courageous enough to examine that.  You should look at other life forms. You should look at animals.  You should look and see how oxen are treated in India.  I speak of India a lot, not because it’s a bad place, but because I’ve been there, and I was shocked.  I had no idea how sheltered Americans are from suffering.  I had no idea until I saw lepers in the street with no limbs and with open sores.

Having studied these things, you will come to understand that there is suffering in the world.  You should cultivate in your heart and mind a feeling of great compassion. You shouldn’t stop until you’ve come to the point that you are on fire and you cannot bear that they are suffering so much.  The Buddha says that we have had so many incarnations in so many different forms that every being you see, every one, has been your mother or your father.    Whether you believe that or not, it’s a great way to think.  Because you look at other beings and see how they are suffering helplessly, with no way to get out of it.  And that they, at one time, had given you birth.  In that way, you can come to love them in a way that you can practice for them.

You should allow yourself to become so filled with the urgency to practice loving that your heart is on fire and there’s no other subject that interests you as much.  Even if it’s uncomfortable; we Americans think we should never be uncomfortable. Sometimes discomfort is very useful.  Be uncomfortable and let yourself ache with the need to practice Bodhicitta.  Cultivate in yourself that urgency and that determination.  You might get to the point where you feel something, and you feel sort of sorry for all sentient beings.  You might think, “Okay, now I’ve got it.  I’ll go on to the next step.”  No, you haven’t got it.  You should cultivate compassion from this moment until you reach supreme enlightenment.

Unless they are supremely enlightened no one is born with the perfect mind of compassion.  I, and everyone I teach and everyone I know, including my teachers, practice aspirational Bodhicitta everyday, reminding ourselves that all sentient beings suffer unbearably and that we find it unbearable to see.  You should continue to cultivate compassion every moment of your life. It will begin to burn in your heart. It’s like love.  It’s beautiful.  You won’t want ever to be without that divine fire in your heart.  It will warm you as no other love can.  It will stabilize your mind as no other practice can.

© Jetsunma Ahkön Lhamo

Astrology for 12/06/2015

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12/6/2015 Sunday by Norma

A startling interaction kicks off the day leaving people agog, mouth open in surprise. Fear not, when it’s over, it’s over. Talking about what happened is relaxing and provides narrative for the mind. Understanding is crucial for a sense of peace and security. Ashley Montagu said, “The moments of happiness we enjoy take us by surprise. It is not that we seize them but that they seize us.” Food is a crucial component of the day. Invite friends in to dine, go out, discuss matters over a snack or meal. Stay home if the weather is unpredictable. Read, think and pay special attention to news from afar. Romance is excellent. A gift has a profound impact on the giver and the recipient and changes both lives.

The daily astrology post affects each person differently, based on individual horoscopes. Look to see which part of your life is affected by this message.

Astrology for 12/05/2015

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12/05/2015 Saturday by Norma

Listening to others is crucial today. If conversation is a pie, do you eat the whole thing or do you give everyone a slice? One person doing all the talking is a problem because the strength of the day lies in diplomacy, with equal participation for everyone. Travel is favored, provided you pay attention to your intuition. There’s a slight danger of staying in the wrong place out of politeness. If you have a sense of foreboding in an environment, grab your coat and hit the road. Albert Einstein said, “We can understand almost anything, but we can’t understand how we understand.” Love is wonderful today. Broad-ranging problems are resolved, it’s a great time to learn something new, and financial matters are improving.

the daily astrology post affects everyone differently, based on individual horoscopes. Look to see where this message impacts your life!

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