The following is an excerpt from a teaching by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo called “Western Chod”
I tried to think to myself: So this life, what is it? What could it be like? I thought, “What is the best case scenario.” You know, this whole scene that I have right here? What’s the best way this could work out? I really played with this a little bit. (See “Best Case Scenario”)
I thought about what are the probable scenarios that will actually happen. Then I had to be more realistic and I really looked at my life. I didn’t fall out of love with it or anything. I just really examined it, in as dispassionate a way as I could. I also examined what the potential pitfalls are. I understood that you can eat health food, exercise all the time, sleep 10 hours per day, no matter what, and put yourself in a bubble where there are no chemicals in your environment,.You can do anything you want to, and no matter what, you are still going to experience the same end result and it’s still going to be samsara that we are caught in.
You cannot guarantee that even if you do all those things, the minute you step out into the street a truck’s not going to hit you. You can’t guarantee that. That’s why I understood that even though many things about this life appear stable, in fact they are not stable. So I prepared myself for that kind of understanding in that way. I would do that kind of contemplation everyday.
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