All of our failures, problems, illnesses, and suffering from beginningless rebirths come from cherishing ourselves, Rinpoche warns. If we want happiness, we must start cherishing others. If someone harms us, instead of blaming them, direct the anger toward the real enemy—self-cherishing. This way, there is no anger toward others, no external enemy for us to harm and kill, and we can put the blame where it belongs, our own mind. This is like shooting a long-range missile exactly on target, causing the enemy (the self-cherishing thought) to burst into a thousand pieces. Less anger means more happiness, more peace. Cherishing others is the root cause of happiness for ourselves and others, all the way up to enlightenment. The teaching for this episode was recorded on December 10, 2017, at Kopan Monastery, Nepal. 

What is the “virtuous friend?” Rinpoche explains that the virtuous friend is all the holy actions of all the buddhas. These manifest in our own guru, therefore, to disrespect our guru—with anger, heresy, complaints, negative thoughts, and so forth—is to disrespect every single buddha. There is no suffering result heavier than this. Likewise, belittling our guru causes us to suffer for eons. On the other hand, without a guru, we cannot receive the blessings of the buddhas. Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha are embodied in the guru to whom we go for refuge. By pleasing our guru, we please all the buddhas. The more we correctly follow our virtuous friend with strong devotion, the less obstacles we will encounter and the more quickly we will achieve enlightenment. The teaching for this episode was recorded on April 06, 2018, at Great Stupa Of Universal Compassion, Australia. 

What does it mean to practice Dharma? Renouncing this life, Rinpoche says. Anger, ignorance, pride, relationship issues—all of these problems come from attachment to this life. Practicing Dharma means renouncing this attachment like throwing out poison because of all the harm it can cause us. People who don’t understand might think, “I’m giving up my happiness if I give up attachment. Giving up attachment is worse than being in prison.” However, what actually happens is we are giving up the root of all our problems in order to experience much happiness. Dharma practice is not just reading texts, reciting mantras, meditating, circumambulating, doing retreat, or living in a monastery—we have to renounce our attachment to the pleasures of this life. If we don’t understand this, nothing we do will become Dharma. The teaching for this episode was recorded on October 21, 2018, at Nagarjuna C E T Madrid, Spain. 

Whatever we are doing, even while at the beach or the supermarket, we can engage in one of three mindfulness meditations on emptiness, Rinpoche suggests. For example, we can be mindful that everything we are experiencing is a total hallucination, like a dream in which things appear but are not there. Or we can be mindful that everything that appears to us as real is totally empty of existing from its own side. Or we can be mindful that everything exists in mere name and is merely labeled by the mind. In this way, there is nothing to cling to or get angry at. We suffer so much and so many delusions arise on the basis of believing that the hallucination we experience is real. By realizing that everything is empty, we destroy our delusions. The teaching for this episode was recorded on August 12, 2017, at Thubten Norbu Ling Center, United States. 

Hell, enlightenment, samsara, nirvana, what is true and false come from our mind. Whatever we see and hear, whatever we touch and smell, if someone likes us or is angry with us, whether we experience anything as good or bad from birth to death—all of this started with our mind. It came from our karma—the mental factor intention, Rinpoche says. On top of that, our mind imputes good and bad, the next second there is the appearance of good or bad, and then we believe it is real good or bad. This is why Buddha said, “The mind is the creator.” Normally people think that everything they experience came from outside, from others, and has nothing to do with the mind and so anger and attachment arise creating karma over and over. This is a total hallucination and what we experience as good or bad is our interpretation, from our mind. The teaching for this episode was recorded on May 10, 2018, at Great Stupa Of Universal Compassion, Australia. 

If we want more profit in our lives and less loss, we must see the guru as a buddha. In order to do this, the thought seeing their qualities as pure must be so powerful that it overwhelms the thought seeing their shortcomings or mistakes. When our guru seems to make mistakes, one way to view this is to think that due to our own lack of merit, we cannot be subdued by a guru showing a pure aspect so they must show an ordinary aspect having mistakes to benefit us, Rinpoche teaches. This is more precious than the whole sky filled with wish-granting jewels because it becomes a cause for not only stabilizing our devotion but for developing it further. The teaching for this episode was recorded on September 01, 2017, at Light of the Path Retreat, United States. 

We can change our minds in a positive way to mitigate problems; or we can also follow negative thoughts, our ordinary mind, to experience more problems. Using the analogy of the mind being like a television, Rinpoche says that we can change the channel of our mind to enlightenment or hell, to samsara or nirvana, to happiness or problems. Rinpoche explains how the mind and body are totally different phenomena. The mind has no beginning; it continues from life to life. „Mind“ is merely labeled on that which is clear and percieves objects; therefore, there is no real mind. The emptiness of a real mind is buddha nature. Because of this ultimate nature of the mind, the obscurations are not one with the mind and can be removed. In this way, all sentient beings can become free from suffering forever and achieve enlightenment.

The teaching for this episode was recorded on November 16, 2018, at Gendun Drupa Centre, Switzerland.