Buddhism for Beginners

Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo gave this teaching Christmas eve 1995. In it she describes the hope and fear that is magnified during the holiday season, using it as a way to understand the habits of our minds. During the holiday season our minds become even more unstable than usual, according to Jetsunma. Our hopes and fears increase. "The more we grasp outwardly and try to secure what we want...the less happy we will be." Jetsunma discusses a compassionate way of life as a way to true and lasting happiness.

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Our spiritual life can be a precious living truth inside of us if we develop a deep and ultimate connection with our spiritual path. Jetsunma explains to us that this is not easy to do because our society is materialistic and removed from the natural current of life.

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Jetsunma takes us to a deeper understanding of the interdependence of the practices of Refuge and Bodhicitta. Leading us through the mental equations that will result in the cessation of suffering, she points out, "The cessation of suffering does not come about when everything external gets alright." The answer to the question, "How in the world am I going to fix this?" is: you’re not...in the world. We have to move beyond the realm of cyclic existence to get the answer. In a less than perfect world we decide to reach for something perfect that we can’t see yet. Only then can we bring comfort to others.

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The ideas of competition and materialism are taught to us as virtues during our childhood. Collecting things and going somewhere are pivotal ways of viewing our life’s progress. Jetsunma steers us away from these misconceptions: "Every moment is something that you have a sacred relationship with, because you move into the awareness that there is nothing that you can do that is separate from your own nature." We must realize that we are not doing anything or anybody a favor by living a spiritual life. We are simply expressing that which is true.

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The five senses are about distinction - the idea of self-nature being inherently real. They are extensions of our ego. Why is the understanding of our own true nature so difficult for human beings? Jetsunma answers, "Because we are practicing the mantra of separation constantly, on five different levels at once!" Ngündro, a preliminary foundational Buddhist practice, is the support for all other practices that follow. It is designed to pry our minds loose from the conceptualization, delusion and over-intellectualization that our five senses have been reporting to us for aeons.

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We are taught to never truly surrender our heart, to never risk in order to experience great passion, to always keep something aside for ourselves. Our quest for safety leads us to compartmentalize our experiences and keep everything in a neat, controlled place. Jetsunma calls us to give rise to the phenomenal flame of compassion as the only thing that will truly keep us safe. If our feeling of safety comes from having control over our experiences, we are the least safe of all.

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When Jetsunma was in her early 20’s she practiced examining all aspects of life: physical, mental, emotional. What she found in the things of samsara: "There’s no future in this." At the same time, meditating upon the natural, luminous state that is free of contrivance, she would cry, realizing that this primordial nature is free of all causes of suffering yet none of us have awakened to it. This practice, clearly outlined in detail, gives rise to a breadth and depth of compassion that makes the rest of one’s life very simple. Accomplishing this, there is no longer any decision to be made. All of one’s life becomes a vehicle to benefit all beings. Later Jetsunma learned that this practice is called Chöd in Tibet.

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There is a deep prejudice in the West that has become almost invisible to us: the idea that one’s spiritual life is somehow separate from the rest of one’s life. This results in the habit of denial about the truth of our situation and we are literally paralyzed on the Path. We are trapped by the narcotic of samsaric living, seduced into a feeling of safety. Jetsunma brings us the Buddha’s heart teaching on how to wake up to what must be done in order to prepare for our next life. If we don’t, our next life will not be what we want it to be.

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Growing up in a materialistic culture, being taught to "be all that you can be", actually produces obstacles to the path to enlightenment. The definition of neurotic is acting in a way that is inappropriate according to reality. The Buddha teaches that this "self" into whose pockets you are putting things, is an erroneous concept. Instead, Jetsunma advises how, through the practice of devotion on the Vajrayana Path, one can stop developing the ego through all this collecting. Discriminating between what is ordinary and what is precious, one can look at one’s teacher and say, "This is the face of Truth", and thereby enter the door to liberation.

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Each of us has our own "perceptual bubble", describes Jesunma Ahkon Lhamo, as she unveils for us the dynamics of how we perceive, and react to, everything around us. 

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