Lake of Lotus (6)-The Wisdom in Directing One's Dharma Practice (6)-By Vajra Master Pema...

8/13/2019 Lake of Lotus (6)-The Wisdom in Directing One's Dharma Practice (6)-By Vajra Master Pema Lhadren-Dudjom Budd

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By Vajra Acharya Pema Lhadren

Translated by Amy W. F. Chow

The Wisdom in DirectingOnes Dharma Practice (6)

complementary and interdependenteffects

2. A thorough elimination process to decide what toadopt and abandon: Irrespective of working outmajor, medium-term and small plans, there must bea process to prioritize and eliminate with regards tosome designated elements and conditions.A thoroughelimination process to determine what to adopt andabandon

Designated Elements & Conditions inDetermining What to Adopt and Abandon

(i) Importance: To what extent would the plan help inachieving the objective? To what extent would thisobjective, in which one is prepared to achieve, help inachieving the major objective?

(ii) The Price to be Paid: Life is short and limited. All theresources that you presently possess could be lost at anymoment.So, before you lose them, and when you still havethe power to control them, how are you going to make use

Excerpt of Last Issue

The Skills in the Setting-up of Plans

The primary condition for success is the setting-up of anobjective. In the setting-up of an objective with regards toones preference, capability and ideal, to be supplementedwith the skills in the setting-up of an objective, a blueprintof grandeur for the ideal of ones life has more or less beendrawn up. Then, what is the next step to proceed in order to

ensure success in achieving the objective?

The next step is to draw up a detailed and concreteplan which is also strategic and efficient in nature. Towork out a series of plans for the major, medium-termand small objectives is like the building up of a network ofinterconnected highways which would eventually lead tosuccess. In designing the numerous plans, attentionmust be paid to the following items:

1. Complementarity and the Enhancement of Effectiveness:The links between plans should have compatible,

This Lifes Combination of Resources and Its Relations with Destiny Where Did the Money Come From? History Repeating Itself Again Unexpected Attacks What Are the Reasons Behind All These? Criteria for the Transmission of the Holy Dharma The Wisdom in Saving Oneself

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of them? Most people, in general, will tend to divide theirpresent resources into two parts: one part is for the purposeof value-adding, while the other part is for the purpose ofenjoyment.

Irrespective of what purposes they are for, whether theyare for value-adding or for enjoyment, one has to paya price for it before getting the desired outcomes. Haveyou ever thought of the fact that if your resources are nothandled well, they can bring about opposite effects? Theresult could either be value-decreasing instead of value-adding, or to have suffering rather than enjoyment.

Take, for example, the case of Dharma practices, lots ofpeople would request for good fortunes and blessings fromthe Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. When they are sick, theywill ask for health; when they have problems, they wouldask for solutions. Even if they do not have any misfortunes,they will still request for wealth and success in careers tobe bestowed upon them. This is the most common waythat people will tend to engage themselves in Vajrayanapractices.

Indeed, only very few people would seriously consider thefollowing questions: Where do these blessings and fortunescome from? What kinds of changes would they bring to youthrough your requests? Do you really in need of those thingsthat you are asking for? No matter what you have asked for,

there are only two possible outcomes: either success orfailure.If the outcome is successful, it implies that a pricehas to be paid for it.On the other hand, if the outcome isa failure, it implies that one will have disappointment andfrustration. Hence, in order to obviate the situation of eitherhaving to pay for a price which is not commensurate withwhat one gets back in return as what one had hoped for, orthat the price paid is well beyond ones own capacity,thenone has to thoroughly understand and assess the greatestpossibility for the price to be paid when making thoseplans.

Once you know about the price that you have to pay for, youmust then seriously consider as to whether you still reallyneed the desired outcomes or not? Do you still continueto pray for it? Whether the final outcome will be a happyending or a sad one will be determined by the values ofeach individual. But, of course, the last thing that you wantto see happened to yourself is to be in a situation when itwill be too late to regret.

Akasiagalubuha Bodhisattva

Mahamayuri

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This Lifes Combination of Resources and ItsRelations with Destiny

According to the Law of Cause and Effect, which is

recognized by both Science and Buddhism, all the goodand bad deeds that have been accumulated throughoutour numerous past lives act like a huge web/network oftractions which constitutes theCombination of Destiny for thisvery life. (Please refer to the VCD onThe Inconceivable Law of Causeand Effect, as well as the book andCD on The Freeing of Lives andCause and Effects, published bythe Dudjom Buddhist Association).

This Combination of Destiny is

extremely complicated and ever-changing. This is because thefuture tractions (as effects)of the past actions (as causes)could, at any time, become effectiveearlier than expected due to someparticular reasons. At the sametime, the present behaviours couldalso influence the ordering and itspriority of the different componentsof this combination. What you areintending to do right now, and what

you will want to do in the future, areall uncertain elements that couldfurther influence the ordering and its priority of the differentcomponents of the combination. Hence, the Combinationof Destiny for this very life comprises of elements which areever-changing and unpredictable.

If we can simplify the picture on this Combination of Destinyfor this very life, it would be easier for one to understand itscomplexity. Say, for example, the combination of resourcesfor this life is equal to 100 marks, which is then sub-dividedinto 3 components: 40 marks for ones life span, 30 marks forones wealth, and another 30 marks for ones health. If youare not satisfied with this combination, or that you would liketo make use of some of your resources to do something, youshould keep cool and do some careful planning first beforetaking any further actions. Otherwise, you will end up in aposition whereby it would be too late to regret.

Case 1

One of my Root Gurus, Ven. Guru Lau Yui-che (alias LamaSonam Chokyi Gyaltsan), had used a regrettable incident,

which he had personally witnessed, as training materials toillustrate the above-mentioned points. The Dharma practicesof Vajrayana, if used properly, can be an express shortcutfor success. Conversely,if ones mind is full of greed, hatredand ignorance, and always think of only getting advantages

without giving in return, it would most probably lead to a sadending.

The case in point happened in thecity of Shanghai. There was a Tibetanlama (Guru) who had been veryeffective in the practice of the yidamKurukulli. He was very fond of oneof his disciples, who had been verydiligent in his Dharma practices, andhe would accede to the requests ofthis disciple. However, this Tibetan

lama had held up the practice forKurukulli, and had never transmittedit to anybody. Many of his disciplesthought that the Guru was ratherselfish and would only keep themost effective Dharma practices tohimself.

Finally, one day his most favoritedisciple came to him and criedfor help because his family wasruined due to its bankruptcy. Hebegged his Guru to transmit thepractice method of Kurukulli to himin order that he could get over this

economic crisis. He had made many great aspirations, andpromised that he would practice even more diligently, andwould further help his Guru in the spreading of Buddhismin China.

The Guru had eventually yielded to the repeated requestand begging by this beloved disciple, and so agreed to givehim this special transmission. His disciple, after practicingthis special practice for a rather short period of time, wasable to pay off all his debts. It was just too quick and

effective, and that the target was too easy to achieve. Thiseffect had resulted in his giving rise to an unprecedentedgreed. After practicing for a further period of time, he askedfor more and was, indeed, landed with an unexpectedamount of money. He gave himself numerous reasons forhaving to wish for more wealth, as he would not want to losethis good opportunity. He continued to practice for a furthershort period, and again he was able to make another fortune.Unfortunately, he suddenly passed away on the same day hemade his last fortune.

Kurukulli

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The Guru, having lost his most dear disciple, wasextremely sad and felt guilty and regret for his own actions.He understood that this outcome was due to his mistakenassessments on the weaknesses of human beings, karmaand the Combination of Destinythat had played out in the

ending of his disciples life. Because of this incident, he hadpracticed confessions for the rest of his life, because heknew that it was his responsibility for this sad ending.

Where Did the Money Come From?

Where did the money come from? Did it come down from theyidam Kurukulli? Or, is it really possible to get the rewardswithout having to pay for anything? If that is the case, thenall the people in this world would not need to work, but onlyto practice the yidam Kurukulli. If one dies suddenly, wouldanyone be willing to cease practicing this wealth-creation

method, and instead spend some time to collect the corpseof the dead person?

There is no such thing in this world of getting the rewardswithout having to work for them, but there is only thisLaw of Cause and Effect. No matter to whom you makeyour wishes, no matter what Dharma practices that you aredoing, no matter for whom you make the wishes and for whatreasons, you must, and have to, remember that you are nowonly crediting and over-drawing your merits in advance.In other words, you are now asking for a re-arrangement ofyour own Combination of Destiny. Everything that you have

asked for would not fall from the sky and are not cheapitems, but they are instead coming from your own limitedresources. The deities to whom you make your wishes, aswell as the Dharma practices that you are doing, are onlysome of the enabling forces in helping you to re-arrange foryour own Combination of Destiny, and in no way are theythe main characters. You, and yourself alone, are the maincharacter who is in total control of your own Combinationof Destiny.

If you just know simple arithmetic, you can do somecalculations. If the above disciple had made a wrong movein investment by using up all his 30 marks for wealth and

was at the verge of bankruptcy, what other resources couldbe at his disposal? There would be at most the 30 marks forhis health, but how much of that will still remain is somethingthat we do not know. It was quite possible that there wouldbe only 10 marks left, and so it was very likely that he hadexhausted this resource when he made his first request anddid his first round of practice. By the time when he made thesecond request and did the practice, he was probably usinghis last 40 marks for his life span, which would probably nothaving much to be left behind, and so this could be used

up in no time. If he did survive, whose merits would he beusing when he practiced and made his request for the thirdtime? Would it be possible that he might be using the meritsof his own Guru? Wise Gurus should have thought aboutthe intricacy of the web/network of karma, and that there

would be no escapes for anyone from the Law of Cause andEffect. One would only be qualified to become someonesGuru after having thought through this very clearly. The lastthing to do would be to put oneself in a position whereby itwould be too late to regret because of wrong assessmentsand calculations.

History Repeating Itself Again

Case Two

Unfortunately, the tragedies in human history that would

repeat themselves over and over again are all due to the self-uncontrollable greediness of human nature, the stupidityof ignoring historical lessons of the past, as well as thehatred for refuting to accept sincere advices of goodwill.There was one case that I had personally witnessed formyself.

1000-armed Avalokiteshvara

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A few years ago, one foreign merchant who, while doingbusiness on real estates, had encountered an economicdownturn in his far away country. The properties that he hadbuilt were not selling out and he fell short of cash flow. At

that time, he was very down, andwas just like an injured general wholost his way, but would very muchhope to re-organize his troops inorder that they could forge aheadagain. Unfortunately, as he did nothave any tactics to tackle with theproblem, and neither had he foundthe way out, and so he was verydepressed. He used to be verystubborn and would have faith onlyon himself, and would not believe inany religions. However, he had nowchanged his mind and said that hewould believe in anything as longas it could help him out.

It was rather strange that no matterwho talked to him about the Buddhistteachings, he would not listen to themin the past. Now feeling depressed,his aura of arrogance, confidenceand unreasonableness seemed tohave vanished in the air. Then, allof a sudden, there was some kind

of a sudden awakeningin him, and he began to becomereceptive to the Buddhist teachings, and particularly to theenabling force of Vajrayana Buddhism.

Thus, he was determined to practice the yidam Kurukulli,even though he was told about the story of the Tibetan Lamaand his dear disciple, as well as the simplified formula of theCombination of Destiny, and was fore-warned that therewas no such a thing as getting rewards without having to payfor them. He was also informed that if he were to practiceKurukulli in order to get over with his difficult situation, theprice that he would have to pay would be hard to assess,

because no one person could clearly and accurately knowabout ones own Combination of Destiny. Just a slightmiscalculation might lead to a situation whereby it would betoo late to regret, and death might come at anytime. Hewas so desperate to be able to get over with his presentdifficult situation that he said: if I could succeed in sellingout all the properties under construction, even if it means thatI have to die, I am willing to do that.Despite knowing all the possible consequences, he was stillvery persistent on his wish. He had the good opportunity of

receiving the initiation, transmission and practice methodsfor the yidam Kurukulli from an Authentic Guru, whohad repeatedly warned him that in order to receive moreblessings, he had to accumulate more merits and to do more

good deeds so as to ensure that therate for accumulating merits shouldbe faster than that for exhaustingmerits. Otherwise, danger wouldcome very quickly. He agreedto all those conditions and hadcompletely followed the instructionsof his Guru in the initial stage.

Half a year later, he had met withan unexpected opportunity whichenabled him to sell all the propertieson hand. His aura of arrogance, self-

confidence and unreasonablenessgradually re-emerged again. By thistime, the warnings by his Guruhave now become unnecessarytroubles to him.

Unexpected Attacks

In fact, his wishes at that time werenot only to sell out the propertieson hand so as to get out from his

distressful situation. As he had two other pieces of land

not yet developed, he would like to ride on his presentsuccess and to build more properties so that he could makeeven bigger fortunes. His latest reasoning was: instead ofbelieving in some intangible practices, it would be better torely upon ones own ability. Since he had already got overwith the difficult times, his previous promises to his Gurudid not seem to matter any longer.

He, therefore, further built properties in the smaller pieceof land and sold them. With the money gained from theseproperties, and together with those from the previousoccasion, he totally invested all his resources into the

larger piece of land. Unfortunately, before he could make afortune from his new investment of this time, he had anotherunexpected attack which tied up all his resources. However,what really got him down this time was another major attackof his life, which was already approaching gradually withouthis knowing it.

Suddenly, he was found losing massive amount of bloodin his excretions and had to be admitted into hospital fortreatments. Physically, he had never been so weak and frail

Red Tara

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that he seemed to be at the doorstep of death. Emotionally,he was down to the polar end of depression. He struggledhard for continued survival and yet felt extremely depressedfor the outcome. He had several head-to-toe physical check-

ups within half a year, before he could eventually find outthe cause of his bleeding. For some unknown reasons,he had suffered from a very rare disease which causedulcerations in his intestines, thus resulting in the seeping ofblood. This kind of disease would normally incubate for morethan one year, and the symptoms were constant diarrhea.As the severity of the diarrhea increased progressively,more bleeding occurred in the intestines, and thus finallyled to massive bleeding. With modern medicine, the presentmedical treatment was to use poisonous medications toattack the ulcers in his intestines so as to stop the bleeding.However, the bleeding could recur at anytime. This could be

regarded as an incurable disease with an unknown cause.

What Are the Reasons Behind All These?

The merits for each individual are limited, and this isparticularly so for ones merits of the present life which iseven more limited in scope. In order to re-adjust and re-arrange the presently limited Combination of Destinywithout taking the risk of bringing harms to oneself, there areonly two possible alternatives in doing so:

1. To accumulate large amount of merits: if one does notwant to use up all your reserves, or to have wealthy butunhealthy body, one has to take the initiative to practice agreat many good deeds with a sincerity of heart, in orderto accumulate lots of merits. In this way, it will help totremendously increase the totality of resources, which canonly add up to 100 marks.

2. The rate for exhausting merits must be slower than therate for the accumulation of merits: in other words, if thewishes that one makes will exhaust a large amount of meritsin order to achieve them, and that if the wishes come true soquickly, then the phenomenon of over-drawing or advancingthe merits of either this life or of future lives would take place.

If one advances the merits for this life, one would becomeeasily sick and will have a short life. To use ones ownhealth and life span in order to exchange for ones wealthis a meaningless deal, because even though it might besuccessful, one would not have the heart and mind to enjoyit. If one advances the merits from ones future lives, onewould most probably lose the chance of reincarnating ashuman beings again in future lifetimes. Due to both itsfoolishness and the lack of merits, it would make a wrong

move in its investment, resulting in the very likely possibilityof reincarnating as some kind of foolish animalswhen onedies.

For the Case 1, the main character died because of the factsthat he did not have adequate merits but only boundlessdesires, while he was having too much success that cametoo quickly such that there was not enough time for him toaccumulate the merits.As for the Case 2, although it tookmore time for him to succeed, the main character did notcherish the critical period that he had in order to accumulatelarge amount of merits. Upon his further success, not onlydid he not treasure both the success and the resources thatwere not easy to come by, in order to make use of themin accumulating more merits, but instead he became somuch more greedy and asked for more in trying to satisfy hisendless desires.

Because of the inadequacy of merits within his Combinationof Destiny, he is gradually exhausting the resources for bothhis health and life span while in the process of accumulatingmore wealth. The constant seeping out of blood was alreadya sign for the draining away of his merits. The fact thathe had an incurable disease reflects that he has alreadyadvanced his merits very substantially, and this would haveadverse impacts upon the merits of his future lives.

One of the key points for the failures of the above-mentionedcases was the fact that the time for accumulation of merits

was too short and not enough, while the rate for accumulationof merits was too slow. According to the teachings fromnumerous Buddhist scriptures and Tantras, the quickestways to accumulate large amount of merits, in terms ofthe order of priority, are as follows: Priority oneis to makemany offerings to an Authentic Guru because he opensup your wisdom in the quickest and most direct way, andteaches you to practicemental concentration,power of meditation

and the teachings onliberation. However, if

you make offerings toa fake guru, it wouldquickly accumulatedemerits and lead toyour quick downfall. Thesecond prioritywould beto help the spreading of

Brahmajyotis

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Buddhism so as to thoroughly save the wisdom lives ofothers, and help to sow the seeds upon them for their futureliberations from the cycle of karmic existence (samsara).At the same time, it is also possible to open up ones ownwisdom life by having lamp offerings to all the Buddhas

and Bodhisattvas. The thirdprioritywill be to save the lives ofother people, to use medicines to help relieve their pains, tofree the lives of other living creatures, and so on. One wouldneed to practice all these activities in large quantities in orderfor them to become effective.

Criteria for the Transmission of the HolyDharma

The above-mentioned cases have illustrated one importantpoint and that is the reason why so many of the teachingsof Vajrayana Buddhism have to bekept highly confidential

and must be strictly adhered to. These teachings will onlybe transmitted to those disciples who are most sincere,have strong faith and confidence in the Buddhist teachings,will strictly follow the instructions of their Guru, with selfcultivation and discipline, full of personal integrity, are ableto control ones own desires, with wisdom and compassion,while those who do not have these qualities will be discarded.

Though there is the Authentic Guru who has all the properlineages, with realizations and great compassion, andthough the Dharma practices that has been transmittedare the most correct and effective ones, however if these

practices were to be practiced by those disciples who donot possess the above-mentioned characteristics, thereis always the danger that the correct Holy Dharma willstill either be abused, or twisted, or distorted. Hence, theguidelines for transmitting the Dharma practices mustbe strictly adhered to, and this principle should not bedisregarded due to ones own family ties, or for friendship,or for wealth and power. Otherwise, one will feel regretful ofones own decision at the end of the day.

The Wisdom in Saving Oneself

When people are in times of danger, most of them willbelieve in anything that might give them hopes of beingsaved, and will most readily agree to keep all the requiredpromises. However, deep down inside, they will only chooseto believe in those things that will meet with their own greed,hatred and ignorance.Just like the two main characters inthe above two cases,they only believed that the Dharmapractices would bring them benefits, but they did not believethat these would bring harms to them if those Dharmapractices were not handled properly.Hence, once they had

succeeded in achievingtheir wishes, they wouldimmediately break theirpromises. And so, thefirst thing that they would

do was to further indulgethemselves in their owndesires, and tried to getmore in return. They donot believe that what theywere doing at that timewere, in fact, advancingtheir own merits. They

always thought that they should not miss this goldenopportunity, or that there was no harm in giving it a try ofasking for more, or that if one does not take good care ofoneself, one would be punished.

It was likely that even up to the day when they die, they stilldo not understand the simple truth that: the source thatbrought them the blessings was, indeed, the same sourcefor their future misfortunes; that they would get hurt duringtheir endless pursuits for their countless desires; and thatifthey only think of themselves, they would be punished.

If they are willing to believe that: each individual will only hadlimited resources for this very life,that these resources wereso much interconnected that only a slight adjustment to oneof the elements would affect the whole combination, andthatthere is no exceptions to anyone, then they would not do allthe things that would lead to their doom. Hence, the truewisdom is that: we would be happy if we are content and notwanting for more; that we should not be greedy in asking formore resources which are limited; and that things can turnsour if going to extremes, and so we should cease asking formore when we already have reaped some gains..

(to be continued)

Maitreya

TilopaMilarepa

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