The Workshop is in the Mind

This is such an interesting point, it sounds nice - oh yeah our minds play a role. Rinpoche said one time, and I'm quoting him exactly I promise, it's very shocking when we hear it, I've quoted it a lot, Rinpoche said - "The vast majority of all human beings on the planet have absolutely no idea that their mind plays any role at all in their lives."

Now this sounds almost impossible to believe doesn't it. I'll qualify it, we clearly know that our mind plays a big role when it comes to learning mathematics, learning music, and learning carpentry, I always say this point, we know our mind is the main player. If you don't have the right theories and think the right thoughts, you can never play the piano, you can't make a cake, and you can't make a table. So we do know it when it comes to theoretical things, intellectual things, or scientific things. We know the mind has to be trained to perfection. But Rinpoche's point is when it comes to becoming a happy person or an unhappy person, we have absolutely no idea that our mind plays any role at all, and that's the part that's shocking, and I think that's exactly right.

Even if we're good little Buddhists we all know karma, yeah, blah, blah, blah. But the moment your hubby does the wrong thing, your wife slurps her coffee, the red light is red, you don't think it's your mind that is the problem at all. I mean even the best Buddhists, because we are so addicted, totally from eons of lifetimes, Buddha says, to seeing that the outside world is the main cause of our happiness and suffering, and that's why it's so difficult, it's incredibly difficult. Even the smallest disturbance on the outside, we know this, the smallest disturbance, we don't even bother looking at our mind, we just believe in the thing out there being the problem, and we know this is true. So it's very humbling.

Karma theoretically is not complicated, it's just that it's so utterly shocking to us because it's the exact opposite of what we think. Many of us practicing for so many years, we know how tremendously hard it is, so we should not underestimate how difficult it is. But it's the essence of being a Buddhist, it's the absolute total point of all Buddha's teachings, that the mind is the main player. That the mind is the creator of everything, from the hell realms to Buddhahood, the mind is what creates it, it's as simple as that.

So all we can do is keep hearing it, keep getting the theories clear, and be able to say them in a simple way because we mostly just get very confused, we go - oh yeah it's karma! What do you mean? Oh well it's just karma. That's like saying please explain the roses in the garden. Oh it's botany! Can you explain it for me? No! What good is that? You've got to learn a bit of botany, so you know how to use the law of botany. So we have to learn to know the words so we can use the law of karma.

So let's look at how to think simply, what are the basic principles? This is part of our problem, we can't say the basic principles. But because we've heard it from the Tibetans in the same way that they would have said it in the 14th century, and talking to the choir, they don't really explain it in the way we need it to be explained. They don't stress the logic behind it, because the main point of karma in the first stages of the Lamrim is behave yourself, be nice, and don't kill, don't steal, and don't lie; and if you do you'll go to the hell realms for twenty two eons. I mean you're shaking in your shoes if you hear Lama Zopa talk.

So let's use our concepts, let's look at what would help us! Western modern people who don't have this view. How do we present it to ourselves so that it begins to be logical to us? Well there's lots of different ways, you know, let's do that. Questions include - Karma is a natural law so there's no room for guilt? Why is 'should' anger? Karma as a hypothesis? What is the correct way to act towards a teacher? What can we do to become more attuned to karma? What is the relationship between karma and loneliness? If someone is unkind to us, how do we fix it?

Question on karma and children born with disabilities. How do delusions relate to karma and how do we work with them?

Vajrayana Institute, Sydney, July 27th 2025.

Something To Think About Series #258

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Something To Think About Series #257

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Something To Think About Series #256

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Start the day with your mind pointed in positive direction.

Something To Think About Series #255

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Something To Think About Series #254

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Why is living in vows is so powerful? In order to get another decent human body, in a condition of a reasonable human life, we need many conditions for that. We are in charge of our life but we're not used to believing it, we somehow feel that someone out there will take care of us, but Buddhism doesn't talk like that. It's up to us. We have to decide what kind of rebirth we want. We have to decide, intention is - I will.

To get another decent human mother we need bucket loads of rich intentional non-killing seeds in our mind. So we need to know how to create them. We need to have plenty of those so that when we die peacefully, that one of those seeds can be triggered, and we'll get another decent human mother, and keep on moving on our spiritual path.

We've got to go through this inconvenient thing called death, and start again with a little baby body, and off we go again, it's a drag. But given that we have to do it, let's navigate it as well as possible. Let's be in charge of it! Don't just cross our fingers and hope for the best.

There are four things that need to be in place in order to have a non-killing karmic seed drop into our complete karmic action bank vault. There has to be first the object of the action, a living being, for example a mouse. The second is your mind involved, discrimination - that is the mouse I must not kill, then the thought, the intention - I must not kill the mouse, now the crucial piece, the motivation is compassion for the mouse. The compassion, the motivation is what makes the action virtuous, and obviously the stronger the compassion, the more the action is virtuous, the more rich and delicious the karmic seed is. The third thing is the action, you save the mouse. Then fourth, the result, a happy living mouse.

This is where we can turn an ordinary deluded action into a virtuous action by merely changing our motivation. This is the power of motivation.

Let's look at the action of eating. First is the object, for example a cake. Second is your mind involved in it, you intend to eat the cake, normally that intention is completely mixed with attachment, spontaneously, we're programmed with attachment. So what we've got to do before we shove it in the mouth, we offer it to the Buddha, see it as empty of existing from it's own side, and think I'm going to eat this cake so I can be fat and healthy, so I can help others. You make it bodhichitta. It's actually so simple, if we understood how easy it is to create virtue, we'd be over the moon. This is so powerful! Then the cake goes in the mouth, but you've completely altered the character of that action. You've turned it from a typical negative action of mindless attachment to a positive action. It's so simple, it's incredible!

That's why we have to remember, every action we do in the day - eating, sleeping, going to the toilet, going to bed, having sex with your lovely new boyfriend, whatever - you can put Bodhichitta in there. But we get shocked when we hear this because we think oh no that's bad, you can't do that, no no. Rubbish, of course you can! Don't go round killing people with Bodhichitta please, that's not cool. But get my point, all the ordinary things in the day that we can't imagine not doing, we can turn them into virtuous actions by being conscious and having a positive motivation. It's better than nothing, eventually when you are a Bodhisattva, it will only be a positive motivation, there won't be any taint of delusions, but we've got to start somewhere.

Just to get another human body when we die, we need one seed, but you can't just rely on one, you've got to have plenty there. You need lots of non-killing karmic seeds. This is a really important point to get, this is where vows come in now. If I didn't have a vow not to kill, when I see a creature and intentionally decide that I will not kill, because of compassion, it's only then that I will drop a non-killing karmic seed into my bank vault.

But if you don't meet many creatures, then how many times a day do you actually have the intention - I will not kill? Karma is proactive, it's intention, I will! Probably we are sitting here merely not killing, we're not killing at this moment, but we're not creating any virtuous karma of not killing.

So how are we going to create the karma of not killing and have enough karmic seeds in our mind? So how do we then create bucketloads of non-killing karma without having to not kill? By living in vows of not killing. This is such a technical simple point, that if we did understand it, we would be sad not to live in vows. We really don't understand it. Psychologically vows are incredible! This is buddha's teaching! Vows are so powerful that they are like a subtle physical energy that can be seen by clairvoyants.

Mahamudra Centre for Universal Unity, New Zealand, 19th April 2021.

Something To Think About Series #253

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin

Something To Think About Series #252

Thought of the day from Venerable Robina Courtin