Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Hidden Right in Front of You

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In this excerpt from a teaching called Bodhicitta, Jetsunma speaks to her students about her recognition by His Holiness Penor Rinpoche.

The person who is practicing needs to be able to distinguish between a diamond and a rhinestone. You have to know the miraculous really exists and you have to have faith in it.  Sentient beings are helpless if they’re lost in cyclic existence; they can’t make any breakthroughs.  They can’t really break out by themselves.  Somehow they have to receive a direct mind empowerment from someone that has made certain progress. One way that you can do that in the Vajrayana system is to take wangs and another way that you can do that is to have a kind of mind-to-mind relationship with your teacher.  There is a transmission that goes on, but you have to have faith for that to happen.

His Holiness said, “I could sit there and hit you with the bumpa all day long until you are flat on your head.  If you don’t have faith in the teacher, you don’t have faith in the wang, if you don’t know what’s happening, you can’t work with the wang. Your head could be flat, but nothing is going to happen.”  He said you have to have to faith.

Realizing that, he and I began to talk about that, and after a while it became necessary for the recognition [editor’s note:  Refers to Jetsunma’s recognition].  What does the recognition mean?  I don’t know.  It means nothing has changed.  What’s changed?  Michael, my husband, said he had an interesting kind of perception.  He’s married.  All of a sudden he’s married to a tulku. And I said, “All of a sudden you are married to a tulku?  What were you married to before, a bran muffin?  Dear friend, you were always married to a tulku.”  And he said, “I think about how we used to be together before,” and I said, “We’re still doing it.  I get better that now you know it?”  I don’t mean to be crass.  But you have to understand what is going on here.  In one way, nothing has changed.  The event, the real thing between us hasn’t changed.  If I was your friend before, I’m your friend now, you see?  If I was your teacher before, I’m your teacher now.  If I was the biggest pain in the neck in your life, I’m still that now.  That hasn’t changed. But now you have taken off the blinders.

What the recognition means is that you have a handle or a way to take off your blinders and to have real faith.  That’s what has got to happen.  This path doesn’t work without faith. It’s awful that I have to teach this to you. Somebody else should teach this to you, like a Khenpo.   But this is Kaliyuga and this is the West and we’re in it together so you are just going to have to put up with it.

You have to realize that all this time the miraculous has been right in front of you and it’s part of your life.  You weren’t able to realize before what an opportunity you had, but now you can realize that.  It doesn’t mean that now there is a big change in your life because your teacher has been recognized as a tulku.  You might think, “That means now I have to drop everything and do three prostrations first time I see her.”  Well, OK, that’s what they do.  That’s customary.  That’s good Guru Yoga.  But it’s not about what you do with your arms and legs.  It’s good that you practice that because it helps you to remember.  It’s not that, “Now I have to give her a cup that’s covered all the time.”  These are the stupid things that people are fearful about – forgetting to give me the right kind of cup. You think that’s what it is all about.  Or you think, “What if I walk into the room first and she walks behind me and I didn’t see her?”  Do you know how many times that’s happened me?  In India, I didn’t even know which ones were the tulkus and which ones weren’t, because I hadn’t learned them all yet.  You don’t always look where you are going. I didn’t care.   I was just right in there.

You make mistakes like that.  That’s not what it’s all about.  You shouldn’t be fearful like that.  You shouldn’t be.  The relationship hasn’t changed in that way.   The love is still there.  Everything is still the same.  Now you get to realize that the miraculous activity of Guru Rinpoche is happening in your life, that you have this precious opportunity and that this is a really good time to take advantage of it.

You have the opportunity. To paraphrase, Guru Rinpoche said, “Maybe you won’t see my body, but I will come as your teachers.” When Guru Rinpoche says something like that, I believe it out of hand.  When I see my teachers, I know that Guru Rinpoche is with me.  That same miraculous activity is right with you.  The stuff that saves is right there. What has changed is that now you have to realize and you have to practice Guru Yoga with such faith.  That’s what your job is.  All the great teachers have said it is so, therefore I believe it.  Not only that, but I’ve seen it.  That’s what it means.  I haven’t changed from a caterpillar to a butterfly.   I’m exactly the same as I was before.  Have you noticed that?

What has changed is that you have now a way to take some blinders off and you can realize for the first time that who you thought was your best friend, is still your best friend, but in a different way.  You thought you had to cling to some kind of humanity – a best friend, a sister, and comrade, somebody you could go drinking with.  That’s what you thought you had to have.  But that was only temporary.  It was a masquerade.  You still have your best friend.  But now you find out your best friend is the Three Precious Jewels and it’s always been that way, except that you didn’t know it before.  Now you know it.  So the only thing that has changed is you.  You get to take your blinders off.

You get to see that in your life right now is spontaneous, miraculous activity and that this is your time, this is your time and you can do it. Nothing’s changed except now you get to practice properly.  What’s there in front of you has always been there in front of you.  I didn’t become a tulku a month ago.  That’s the stupidest thing you ever heard of it, isn’t it?

Try to practice Guru Yoga properly.  Realize that right now, miraculous activity is in your life.  The reality of non-dual mind is in your life, and it’s your best friend.  It’s right in front of you.  The whole visualization of Kuntuzangpo and Kuntuzangmo and what it means, it’s not just a visualization.  It’s the truth.     It’s really there. You have this.  We have His Holiness and we have Gyatrul Rinpoche, and you have your root teacher.  That means it’s for real.   It’s the truth. It’s right there with you.

Sometimes I look at His Holiness and I think, “My gosh, what do I need with a visualization.  I’ve got you.”  It’s there, it’s right in front of me.  It’s nothing that I made up.  And it’s the same for you.   Now you know it.   That’s the only difference.  Don’t be scared.  You try to get it right; sure you should try to get it right.  I try to get it right.  But just try to realize that right now you have every reason and cause and expectation to deepen properly.  You have everything you need if you just do it.  What are you so distracted about?   Just do what you have to do and do it now before it’s too late.

They say a door can’t chase people around the room, but I swear, I remember chasing a lot of people around the room.  This may be the time you get that opportunity, so you better walk through the door really soon into deeper practice.

Copyright © Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo.  All rights reserved

Where There Is Love

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From a series of tweets from Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo, December 2009

I’ve recently had the great joy of seeing Dharma students return after time away. I rejoice and welcome you home with open arms and heart!

No bridge is burned, no river damned, no journey wasted, no song unsung where there is LOVE.

No obstacles, no taint, no bitterness, no blame, no darkness where there is faith.

No sorrow, no crime, no endings, no loss, no grief, no separation when one is awake.

No fear, no hate, no confusion, no winning, no losing, no past, no future, no contrivance where there is Wisdom.

No going, no coming, no abandonment, no holding, no resentment, no attachment, no loss with Bodhicitta.

©  Jetsunma Ahkön Lhamo

The Four Thoughts

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From a series of tweets by @jalpalyul on December 2, 2010

Homage to the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas! Gathering all virtue and merit from the three times, this I offer in a beautifully arranged Mandala; a splendid array of jewels, nectar, medicines, and song. Please allow me to speak in such a way as to bring benefit to all beings!

This precious human rebirth is extremely difficult to obtain. Whoever is born, must die, and all things are impermanent. If one is determined in virtuous Dharma, this is the cause for becoming Buddha – awake! When negativity is produced, it will cause endless wandering in the six realms of samsara.

Grasping, needy, lusting spirits will wander in the realm of hungry ghosts. Hate and anger cause a hellish rebirth and great suffering from heat, cold, violence, etc. Humans suffer from old age sickness and death. Those who love war and pride themselves in power, and bullying will wander in the realm of jealous gods. They suffer endless warring! Devas also suffer continually from pride and so forth. How sad!

These produce the states of non-freedom. Birth in these aforementioned realms, or with incorrect view, in a dark aeon; or in an incapacitated state, these are the essence of non-freedom! These are some faults of cyclic existence.

Birth in a land where Dharma is taught correctly and with all faculties complete, without reversed karma, with correct view and with great faith in the Three Precious Jewels, these are the endowments,which I possess.

Birth during the presence of the Buddha, and the Buddha’s teaching (Dharma), the presence of the doctrine, and pure followers, and in the presence of those who lovingly care for others from their hearts, these are the circumstantial endowments.

If one’s moral discipline is broken, even with these precious endowments, and material wealth as well, one will fall to lower realms. This is why it is so essential to use one’s life to create merit, as well as good qualities, and the purification of the five senses and perception (skandas). We must try to take this opportunity to be sure we may remain stable on the path and produce good result.

I am 61 and for me the urgency or this life is quite evident! May I and my students practice well and purely and be reborn in the realms of accomplishment! May we benefit all beings equally and always respect the Dharma just as it is.

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Right Livelihood

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An excerpt from a teaching called the Eightfold Path by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Right livelihood is in the ethical conduct section of the Eightfold Path, and it means that one should earn one’s living in a righteous way. Wealth should be gained legally, and peacefully.  It sounds pretty simple, but it’s not so simple in today’s world, because you really have to look at what you do.  Lets say you own a liquor franchise.  You might want to think about selling that business and going into the Tofutti business.  You know? If you think about it, many people suffer due to what your product is.  Maybe you’re making lots of money at your liquor establishment, but then you see the poor people stumble back and forth on your street, and you have just got to ask yourself, are you doing the right thing? Upon contemplating right livelihood, one will come to understand that this is not correct.  This is not a good way to make one’s money.  Sell the franchise, and go into Dunkin Donuts or something, they make a decent coffee.  Something even better would be something that benefits sentient beings like a health food or some other product.  Right livelihood is like that.

The Buddha mentions four specific activities that harm other beings that one should avoid for this reason.  Dealing in weapons.  They hurt.  Dealing in living beings, which includes the slave trade, prostitution, and raising animals for slaughter.  That is wrong livelihood.  It is wrong to the core of the path.  No one should ever enslave another being.  No one should ever raise beings to die.  This is what the Buddha has taught, and to the degree that we go against that and harm sentient beings in this way, we ourselves will be harmed, if not in this lifetime, then in the next lifetime.  I tell you, folks.  What goes around comes around.

More wrong livelihood that should be avoided is working in meat production and butchery, as well as selling intoxicants and poisons, such as alcohol and drugs.   Furthermore, any other occupation that would violate the principals of right speech and right action should be avoided, so again there’s that blend.  Right speech, right action, they are both in that ethical category.

Ethics are so important and they are really not taught in many religions.  And in fact if you go right to Vajrayana, you may even miss these teachings.  But ethics are the foundation, the underpinning of the path.  You cannot go into highfalutin practice without good ethics.  Your whole house will fall apart.  It will be like a house of cards. We start here in the world, here in the mirror, looking at ourselves. Taking account before we go onto the fancy stuff.  You must examine your own methodologies, and to make sure that you have established good ethics and right view.

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Lead Your Mind to A Pristine Point

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From a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo (@jalpalyul)

Our minds have been under the influence of delusion since the beginning of time. The function of concentration is to gain control of our minds.  Having gained control of the mind we can then steer it in a virtuous direction. Without mind training this is not possible. Without training the mind will continue to be like “monkey mind” that drags one around in an unstable way.  This is very detrimental to one’s path. Because of that we have indulged in negative actions.  These actions lead to unwanted suffering. Therefore if we wish to succeed on the path we must learn to transform and gain control of our minds.

Like a donkey, the mind must be led in a virtuous direction and used as method as one would ride a horse. One cannot allow the mind simply to wander.  The mind’s habit is to wander wherever, and acts like a monkey, distracted and hyper, enjoying shiny things!  When you make real progress, you should be able to place the mind at a pristine point easily and well. Until one attains that point, it is necessary to progress step-by-step.  One must build a house with stable walls by building a perfect stable foundation. This is the way pure Lamas do, and we, of course must follow!

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

Who Needs Refuge?

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The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Faults of Cyclic Existence”

How is the understanding of compassion a clarifying thought as well as a motivating thought?  How is it a clarifying thought?  Now here is where the profound connection with refuge comes into play.  Not only does the compassion motivate us to take refuge, but it makes us think it through very clearly.   If we utilize it, it does.

When we enter onto the path of the Buddhadharma, we take refuge in the outer refuge of Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, the inner refuge of lama, yidam, khandro, and the secret refuge of the channels, winds and fluids.  When we actually enter into this refuge, which for our purposes now are the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, Triple Gem refuge, we must define why it must be arranged the way it is.  Why is it organized the way it is?  For instance, if it’s true that all sentient beings are suffering but they wish to be happy and they are mostly suffering due to desire and the confusion about issues concerning desire, if that’s what the Buddha said, then why don’t we just kind of sit down and have a therapeutic session of insight so that we can isolate for ourselves what it is that we actually want.And maybe then we can go and get it.  If all sentient beings are really suffering and we’re really unhappy and we’re trying to be happy, why don’t we just have an insight of some kind and go for it!? Why don’t we do that?  Well, because you’ve done that before.  You’ve done that before.  You do it all the time to greater or lesser degree, according to your capacity and your habitual tendency.  In fact, we do that all of the time.  We feel a need.  We feel desire.  We feel something.  Something is moving that locomotive down the track.  What is it?  So we sit down and we try to center ourselves or we get busy and allow thoughts to come up.  Each one of us has a characteristic way to deal with things.  Maybe we’ll do a little journaling, we’ll do a little art, we’ll do a little music, we’ll do a little whatever, take a walk and try to center ourselves, and figure out what’s going on.  Well, we’ll come up with something.  You always come up with something

Now we’re going to figure out, “Oh ,  if I don’t get with the great love of my life pretty soon…, That’s what it is, I know that’s what it is.”  So now you’re on to the next adventure. Or you may ask yourself,“What is it that’s troubling me?  What is it that’s troubling me?” And you sit down and you’re reaching inside and using all this psychological technique and you’re going, “Oh it’s my mother!!!  My mother didn’t love me!!”  Each of these are valid. I’m not saying that these are not issues in your life.  I’m not saying that these are not valid things to think about, but I am saying that there is some confusion there in that you are looking at the superficial causes for discomfort, but not the deeper ones.

If we were to look more deeply,, we would discover that the underlying cause of all suffering is desire, and that we’re real, real, real confused about this whole issue.  So we examine the path and examine the teachings a little bit further. And we find that the Buddha has taught us that samsara is actually made up of the things that potentially make us suffer.  That is to say that the first step or connection with samsara, that is the wheel of death and rebirth, is based on the idea, the first gossamer thin assumption or idea, of self-nature as being inherently real.  Why does that happen?  That happens because it can. End of subject.  It’s one of the potentials in the great ground of primordial nature which contains within it all potentials.  So this has happened.  We have considered ourselves separate.

In order to consider one’s self as self nature separate, other has to be external.  In order for other to be external, it has to be determined.  In order for it to be determined, we have to react toward it.  There has to be a reaction  toward it with acceptance or rejection.  You cannot see something without registering acceptance or rejection, or the combination of the two, which is neutrality.  Neutrality is not lack of reaction.  It is a combination of reactions.  So we cannot experience anything as outside ourselves without some sort of reaction. And once that has happened, we react toward everything with hope and fear.

So everything in samsara is then built from that original structure of the idea of self nature being inherently real and at this point one’s self is determined, and other becomes external.  We split into subjective-objective reality.  Everything in samsara, every kind of perception with the senses, anything that we take in with our eyes, our ears, our tongues, anything that senses, comes from, at the root, that original construct, that original assumption of self-nature as being inherently real.  So everything in samsara is built of that.  That is to say that nothing that we experience now, nothing that we have ever experienced, is separate from the realm of desire.  So literally, everything within samsara is potentially cause for more suffering.

 Copyright © Jetsunma Ahkon Norbu Lhamo All rights reserved

The Trap of Intellectual Satisfaction

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The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Perception”

So, if you are conscious, does that lead you to the assumption that self-nature is real? Yes, it does.  Of course it leads you to the assumption that self-nature is real.  What are you doing here if you don’t think self-nature is real?  I mean, be real.  Why are you sitting here listening to this teaching so that you can attain realization in order to benefit beings?  The whole thing is built on the assumption of self being real.  I mean, you go to work every day. Would you go to work if self wasn’t real?  It doesn’t make any sense at all, does it?  Would you go through what you go through if self wasn’t real?

So, self is real.  Where we get into trouble is when we try to find self.  If you go through the process that I have described, and if you really do it diligently, if you follow that process and follow it faithfully, you will become extremely confused because then you will not know who is being confused.  It will be clear to you, very clear to you, that self is not to be found.

Well, what do you do with this, I mean, really?  What you’re supposed to do with this is meditate because if you try to do this with your brain, first of all, you’ll be crazy within a week. It simply won’t work.  You can come to some conclusions.  One thing about the Buddha’s teaching is that the philosophy is extremely appealing to the intellect.  A lot of what the Buddha taught was made for very intellectual people.  It was made to be sifted through and reasoned out intellectually. The Buddha’s instructions were that we should not practice anything that’s not reasonable to us and intelligent, so you must reason it out for yourself.  There are even some arguments that are used about reincarnation.  One can sum it up by saying that to have only one lifetime that continues into infinity is about as logical as postulating a stick with one end.  It’s not logical. It does not seem as though it could be possible, or it does not seem as though it could be realistic.

So when it comes to this kind of philosophy that we’ve been learning about, one should really think on these things.  Let’s say that we contemplate a little bit on this, and we come up with the dilemma that our experience is very real.  I am having an experience, there’s no denying it and yet, when I come to find self, I cannot find it.

So, we might, because we’re Westerners, and because this is a habitual tendency of Westerners, and also because we are confused and deluded and sentient beings, we might want to get into this meaty kind of inner dialogue with ourselves.  We might want to say to ourselves, “If I can’t find self and yet I am clearly feeling and touching and tasting and smelling and I clearly am conscious, what is happening here?”

Now if I listen to the Buddha’s teachings, and I say to myself, “Well, the Buddha teaches us that this is all a function of the assumption that self is real. Everything that I perceive seems extremely real to me, and yet it is a function, just like my fingers are a function of my body.  In that same regard and with that same directness, these experiences that I’m having are actually the extensions of perception that I’m having, and the perceptions themselves are actually a function of the assumption of self.  Yet, I can’t find the self, and the Buddha said, in fact, my nature is empty of self.” We might get into the trap of trying to figure out who made the assumption.

Don’t you love that question?  You would love to hear the answer. What if I told you that if you paid me two hundred dollars apiece I would tell you the answer to that question.  You might do it!  But actually, the Buddha did not teach, really, the answer to that question. The Buddha recommended that we don’t waste our time concentrating on our ability to compute and understand some occurrence that, perhaps or perhaps not, happened in time out of mind.  He recommended that we do not waste our time with philosophical questions. And the reason why we should not waste our time with such philosophical questions is that they do not lead to enlightenment, or in fact, to growth of any kind.

 

To have these questions answered and to be satisfied with them, one plays with them in the intellect.  One uses them as toys. They’re interesting baubles to juggle.  Every moment that you juggle these interesting baubles, you increase your awareness of consciousness, you increase the awareness of intellect, you deepen the self-cherishing, the clinging to self-nature as being inherently real.

Copyright © Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo.  All rights reserved

Buddha in the Palm of Your Hand

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From a series of tweets on October 20, 2010 by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

A few precious words taught by Kyabje His Holiness Penor Rinpoche.

The great master Buddha gave three main sermons to lead sentient beings onto the Path of Liberation from the suffering of samsara. Because beings have different levels of mind and interest, Buddha has given the teachings in nine Yanas or paths. These nine paths can be divided into the paths of Hinayana and Mahayana. Mahayana includes both Sutrayana, which emphasizes the practice of Bodhicitta and the six perfections, and Vajrayana, which utilized the techniques of deity meditation and skillful means of attaining Enlightenment.

The first eight Yanas are steps to the last and highest Yana called Atiyoga in Sanskrit. Ati means the best, top or essence. Yoga refers to the practitioner. Dzogchen, the practice of Atiyoga leads the practitioner directly to Enlightenment.

The Namcho (Space Treasure) Dzogchen preliminary practice is called “Buddha in the Palm of Your Hand.” By accomplishing this practice one can realize the nature of mind. An important and necessary foundation for higher Dzogchen practice, the preliminary practice consists of several steps.

Refuge or entering the gate of the three precious Jewels; Bodhicitta, the practice of the six perfections and the generation of the aspiration to realize Enlightenment; offering the Mandala, the accumulation of merit through skillful means; Vajrasattva, the purification of obscurations through Wisdom; and Guru Yoga, receiving the blessing through which one can attain Enlightenment in a single lifetime.

All components are necessary, as the Lama provides the maturation of the mind or there is little result. This Cycle of Revelation was revealed by Terton Migyur Dorje, who received it from Arya Avelokiteshvara and Guru Rinpoche.

This was from Kyabje Penor Rinpoche. With great longing, I bow down.

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

What Is Real?

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From a series of tweets by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

In science we have learned that objects, indeed, people are mostly space. We have atoms and molecules, and between them is empty space. So it is the case as Buddhism states. The primordial ground of being is the self-originating empty luminous state – space.

All appearances are due to the five senses, which are the five grasping skandas. We perceive by these senses all phenomena. The senses are themselves empty of self-nature.

So what is real? That empty, luminous uncompromised ground nature, and even THAT is empty if it is attached to conceptualization. It is natural vibrational attraction, magnetism so subtle that holds “view” together. We can also say that habitual tendencies, KARMA, cause and effect that rules view and condition; phenomenal display. In short we see what we are and according to habit from birth AND before. A cat is a born predator. A rabbit is born prey. Thus it is taught that every thought and action are important as they create every future, and result.

If we intentionally direct our minds toward harm, we ourselves will see the result. Cause and result. If not in this life, then soon. We are dancing in vibrationally-tuned luminosity. Every cause has result. And this is the Karma we bring into our future lives.

Try hard, indeed, accomplish virtue and view. And steer clear of harming others and causing suffering. This is what Lord Buddha taught. Eh Ma Ho.

In the end we will ALL suffer if we harm others. If we cultivate virtue (not just for show) we can benefit beings and know true bliss! Om Ah Hung Benzar Guru Pema Siddhi Hung

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

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