Lama Zopa Rinpoche News and Advice

Lama Zopa Rinpoche replied to a student who had concerns about health and having given back their ordinations vows, which led to them feeling very isolated and depressed and being unable to study or practice:

“If you can study lam-rim, that should be the main teaching – just like the wandering ascetics, the monks whose only belonging is the Lamrim Chenmo. They don’t have anything else, don’t carry anything but the lam-rim, so like that. So that is the main one to study, to meditate on – the lam-rim. You have to actualize this, otherwise we will suffer. Without realizations on guru devotion, renunciation, bodhichitta, right view and particularly tantra, you will be suffering in samsara endlessly. Do you want to do that? I don’t think so.

You should know it’s not just practice for this lifetime. The practice becomes preparation for all your lives, so eons, eons, eons, all your future lives, to go to a pure land, then enlightenment, to be free from samsara, enlightenment and then to benefit all sentient beings and enlighten them. Don’t think you are alone.” …

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Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the way to opening of renovated Jinsiu Farlin, Taipei, Taiwan, April 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

“Live the life for others. We work so hard for the (inherently existing) ‘I’ that when you search, can’t find! Strange isn’t it?”

– From Ven. Roger Kunsang’s Twitter page, posted on March 29, 2014

Ven. Roger Kunsang, Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s assistant and CEO of FPMT Inc., shares Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s recent pith sayings on Ven. Roger’s Twitter page. (You can also read them on Ven. Roger’s Facebook page.)

Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Taiwan, April 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

“Practicing patience doesn’t mean that if someone asks you to immediately kill a gigantic lady, the size of Mount Meru or the size of a louse, you do everything that the person asks. It is not like that! What it means is that in your heart you feel or think that this person is the most kind, the most precious, the most dear one. This is what guru Buddha has taught – you need to practice patience with somebody, because the person who is called ‘enemy,’ the one who has anger towards you, then if you practice patience towards that person and don’t get angry back, then that person gives you the most precious thing, enlightenment, the state of omniscient mind. With that person you can bring the numberless sentient beings to enlightenment, free them from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to full enlightenment. So this becomes the reason to practice patience.”

– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from ”Patience – Need For and Benefit Of,” published on Advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche on fpmt.org

Learn more about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche and his beneficial activities by visiting Rinpoche’s homepage, where you will find links to Rinpoche’s schedule, new advice, recent video, photos and more.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving a talk to the students of Maitreya School at Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave a teaching to the young children, teachers and parents of students at the Maitreya School, which is a project of Root Institute. Ven. Roger Kunsang, Rinpoche’s assistant, shared that Rinpoche said to the children that we don’t want suffering, we want happiness, so then, we should not give harm to others; this is the very, very basic education! This is the basic principle of the education in this school.

Maitreya School students praying before Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s talk, Root Institute, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Rinpoche also said that the Maitreya School is special because it has additional education showing how suffering and happiness do not come from outside, but from inside – from one’s own mind. After the talk, Rinpoche offered rucksacks to all of the children at the Maitreya School.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche offering a rucksack to a young Maitreya School student, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Currently, the Maitreya School is looking for teachers fluent in English and Hindi for the new school year which starts very soon. 

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), an organization dedicated to preserving Mahayana Buddhism through offering the Buddha’s authentic teachings and to facilitating reflection, meditation, practice and the opportunity to actualize and directly experience the Buddha’s teachings. Sign up to receive news and updates.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Adriana Ferranti and the staff of MAITRI Charitable Trust, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche visited MAITRI Charitable Trust, an FPMT project in Bodhgaya, India that offers a wide array of health and education programs to the very poor in the area as well as care to animals.

Children from the villages surrounding Bodhgaya lined up to greet Rinpoche upon his arrival. The children attend schools overseen by MAITRI. Rinpoche came to give a talk and advice to the children.

Children greeting Lama Zopa Rinpoche at MAITRI, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

During his visit, Rinpoche also thanked Adriana Ferranti, who founded and directs MAITRI, and the project’s skilled staff who do all the incredible good work helping poor, uneducated mothers and children, those with leprosy and tuberculosis, and animals as well as doing HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns and providing humanitarian aid to those most in need.

Rinpoche thanking Adriana and MAITRI staff, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

MAITRI began its work in 1989 helping people with leprosy and working towards its eradication. Since then, the project has expanded greatly to meet the needs of the people in the Bodhgaya-area in Bihar, one of the poorest, most depressed and most populated states in India.

At present, MAITRI has 105 stray dogs they care for, most arriving with severe injuries and sickness. The staff does their best to provide them with the medical attention they need. Usually they are able to roam the entire property of MAITRI, but on the day of Rinpoche’s visit, with so many visitors, including so many children, they were tied up.

Dogs at MAITRI, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

The project also cares for rescued goats. In addition, MAITRI has a veterinarian clinic to which local people can bring their animals.

Goats at MAITRI, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s homepage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.

You can learn more about MAITRI Charitable Trust online and read Mandala’s coverage of the project’s work.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche doing korwa at the Mahabodhi Temple, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Andy Melnic.

“… On the basis of [reflecting on the lam-rim], we should generate the good heart, bodhichitta, the thought of benefiting others. This is our best refuge, especially for those of us whose lives are very busy, who don’t have much time for sitting or other traditional forms of practice. On the basis of reflecting on impermanence and death, we should make the good heart the main object of refuge in our lives. This allows all our actions to become Dharma, the cause of enlightenment and the cause of happiness for all sentient beings. Therefore, we should lead our lives with this attitude, the thought of benefiting all sentient beings.

“If you recite a Vajrasattva mantra once with bodhichitta you get the same benefit as you do from reciting 100,000 without it. If you make one light offering with bodhichitta, you get the same amount of merit as you do from making 100,000 light offerings without it. If you make charity of one dollar to a sentient being – a beggar or a homeless person – with bodhichitta, you get the same amount of merit as you do from making charity of $100,000 without it.

“It is said in the scriptures that if the sentient beings of three galaxies – the Tibetan term is tong-sum, but I’m not exactly sure how best to translate it, you should check for yourselves – all build stupas of the seven precious substances, such as gold, diamonds and so forth, and fill the whole world with these stupas, the merit of that is far less than that created by just one person offering a tiny flower to the Buddha with bodhichitta motivation. The person making this small offering with bodhichitta motivation creates far more merit than three galaxies of sentient beings covering the world with stupas made of the seven precious substances without it.

“Try to imagine this. If you build just one stupa you create unbelievable merit. It directs your life to enlightenment and is an amazing purification. So here we have three galaxies’ worth of sentient beings, each one building a stupa of the seven precious substances – not with bricks and mortar but with precious jewels – and covering the world with these. Nevertheless, the merit of one person offering a tiny flower to the Buddha with bodhichitta motivation creates far more merit than that.

“Thinking about this should inspire you to make bodhichitta your heart practice. It transforms your life like iron into gold or kaka into diamonds. Bodhichitta motivation gives your life its greatest possible meaning and makes every single action of your daily life as beneficial as it can possibly be. You should remember bodhichitta from morning to night, twenty-four hours a day. Hold it as your most precious possession, as your wish-fulfilling jewel. You should cherish your bodhichitta motivation above all else; remember it constantly and practice it at every moment. …”

– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from The Joy of Compassion, “Chapter One: Living with Compassion,” published by the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive

Learn more about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche and his beneficial activities by visiting Rinpoche’s homepage, where you will find links to Rinpoche’s schedule, new advice, recent video, photos and more.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving an oral transmission of King of Prayers at Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, February 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

“… May my pure activities be endless,
My good qualities boundless,
And through abiding in immeasurable activity,
May I actualize infinite emanations.

“Limitless is the end of space,
Likewise, limitless are living beings,
Thus, limitless are karma and afflictions.
May my aspiration’s reach be limitless as well. …”

– From “King of Prayers,” published by FPMT Education Services

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving an oral transmission of King of Prayers at Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, February 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), an organization dedicated to preserving Mahayana Buddhism through offering the Buddha’s authentic teachings and to facilitating reflection, meditation, practice and the opportunity to actualize and directly experience the Buddha’s teachings. Sign up to receive news and updates.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with the attendant of the previous Khunu Lama Rinpoche, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

While in Bodhgaya, Lama Zopa Rinpoche met with the attendant of the previous Khunu Lama Rinpoche. Known as the Ladkhi Gen-la, he has been teaching in Mumbai for the past 20 years.

Khunu Rinpoche, who passed away in 1977, was as a great teacher and scholar, called by His Holiness the Dalai Lama “the Shantideva of our time.” He authored Vast as the Heavens, Deep as the Sea: Verses in Praise of Bodhicitta, published by Wisdom Publications. 

More information, photos and updates about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche can be found on Rinpoche’s homepage. If you’d like to receive news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche via email, sign up to Lama Zopa Rinpoche News.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche circumambulating the Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

By Ven. Sarah Thresher

Lama Zopa Rinpoch making extensive prayers and dedications, Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

While Lama Zopa Rinpoche has been staying at Root Institute in Bodhgaya, India, he has been engaged in many practices during Losar and the two weeks that follow. Ven. Sarah Thresher has been participating in these virtuous activities and shared this report.

Rinpoche has gone nearly every day of the 15 miracle days to the stupa to do korwa [circumambulation], bless the light offerings and give the transmission of the Sutra of Golden Light.

On the Tibetan 15th, Chotrul Duchen, Rinpoche went to the stupa in the late morning after giving the Eight Mahayana Precepts at Root Institute. He did some circumambulation while reciting Lama Tsongkhapa’s Lekshay Nyingpo and then offered robes and bowls full of fruit and other offerings to the Buddha statue in the main shrine with extensive prayers and dedications for all the students and benefactors in the organization, for world peace, for all the centers and projects and for all sentient beings.

It’s very important to Rinpoche not to waste a moment of opportunity to purify and accumulate merit with this precious human life and to always motivate with bodhichitta and dedicate in the most extensive way for all sentient beings while remembering emptiness.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche in the market choosing the exact material to be offered to the Buddha statue inside the Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, February 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

Read more from Ven. Sarah Thresher on Rinpoche’s activities during Monlam.

Every month the Lama Zopa Rinpoche Bodhichitta Fund sponsors the offering of robes to the Buddha inside the Mahabodhi Stupa. Visit the fund’s website to learn more. 

Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving oral transmission of Sutra of Golden Light at Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

By Ven. Sarah Thresher

While Lama Zopa Rinpoche has been staying at Root Institute in Bodhgaya, India, he has been engaged in many practices during Losar and the two weeks that follow. Ven. Sarah Thresher has been participating in these virtuous activities and shared this report.

Rinpoche has been giving the oral transmission of the Sutra of Golden Light during the two weeks following Losar at the Mahabodhi Stupa in Bodhgaya.

Mahabodhi Stupa with Lama Zopa Rinpoche and students, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

The setting is stunning with a backdrop of the golden floodlit stupa and 100,000 multicolored light offerings around us.

Before the transmission Rinpoche does korwa [circumambulation] and blesses and offers the light offerings, which are part of Root Institute’s Festival of Lights and Merit. Rinpoche has commented many times how beautiful they are and also that people who are sponsoring them have so much in which to rejoice.

Then there is a motivation for the transmission, and we begin the journey through the marvelous world of the Sutra of Golden Light, with Rinpoche pausing now and then to translate some of the mind-blowing benefits of the sutra spoken by the buddhas, bodhisattvas, goddesses, deities, guardians, etc. 

On one evening, Rinpoche quoted from Chapter 10 where the Goddess Drdha explains how simply listening to the Sutra of Golden Light delights hundreds of thousands of millions of buddhas, frees beings from the lower realms and causes beings to be born in the higher realms for hundreds of thousands of rebirths. The benefits come from hearing even one chapter, one four-line verse, one word or the name of the sutra.

Rinpoche told the story that he took a bite of food in Malaysia and felt a toothache, so he just remembered the Sutra of Golden Light and the pain disappeared. 

“Whatever problem you have,” Rinpoche said, “just by thinking of the Sutra of Golden Light, your problem has gone. When you are experiencing black magic, spirit harm, sicknesses that doctors cannot cure and other problems, one very good solution is to recite the Sutra of Golden Light.” And this can also help in countries where there is a lot of fighting and problems.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving oral transmission of Sutra of Golden Light at Mahabodhi Stupa, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Sarah Thresher.

Read more from Ven. Sarah Thresher on Rinpoche’s activities during Monlam.

Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.

H. E. Tai Situ Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche on Maitreya Project land, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

His Eminence the Twelfth Tai Situ Rinpoche visited the Maitreya Project land in Bodhgaya with Lama Zopa Rinpoche to make prayers for the success of the project. 

Tai Situ Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche making prayers in front of the 24-foot (7-meter) Maitreya Project statue, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Tai Situ Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche in front of the 24-foot (7-meter) Maitreya Buddha statue, Bodhgaya, India, March 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

The Tai Situ is one of the oldest lineages in the Kagyü school and is considered to be an emanation of the bodhisattva Maitreya.

The Maitreya Project in Bodhgaya has been making progress. Currently, the project plans to build a large statue of Maitreya in his bodhisattva aspect (with legs crossed). The Maitreya Buddha Kushinagar Project is building a second very large Maitreya statue in the seated aspect.

For more, see Rinpoche’s letter on the Maitreya Projects and Mandala‘s coverage.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), an organization dedicated to preserving Mahayana Buddhism through offering the Buddha’s authentic teachings and to facilitating reflection, meditation, practice and the opportunity to actualize and directly experience the Buddha’s teachings. Sign up to receive news and updates.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche walking up to Vulture’s Peak, India, March 2014. Photo by Andy Melnic.

“If you are performing the daily actions of your life with two attitudes, you are getting close to enlightenment. The two attitudes are: 1) having a sincere heart, doing social service with compassion (working for others); and, 2) meditating on the lam-rim (the gradual path to enlightenment). This may not mean actually meditating, but living your life with lam-rim, in order to purify and collect merit, and then on top of that practicing tantra, in order to achieve enlightenment quickly, or at least to prepare the mind, by leaving positive imprints every day. Social service means doing something for others, doing it from your heart. Even if it is only a little help that you give, you still get real satisfaction, like you have done something meaningful in your life. You have done something positive. Then, every day, every moment, every second, you are getting closer to enlightenment. 

Lama Zopa Rinpoche making an offering to a beggar on the way up to Vulture’s Peak, India, March 2014. Photo by Andy Melnic.

“Otherwise, if you just live your life only thinking about your own pleasure, trying to achieve it for yourself, with attachment, then the main aim of your life is you. You are looking for pleasure for yourself, sexual pleasure and so forth, with attachment, and from this comes only pain. Everything just becomes painful.

“There is the pain of separation, where you can’t stand to be away from the person you are attached to. Then, each day, your feelings becomes stronger, until the attachment becomes unbearable. Then there comes the pain of jealousy toward others. You don’t want others to have a connection. You have so many worries and fears, and it becomes so much suffering.

“If your life does not have these two things in them (social service or lam-rim) then no matter how much you meditate, if it is not done with lam-rim, or by doing social service, doing work for others, then instead you are only doing it for yourself, and your whole life gets tied up with attachment, to sex and other things. Then there is nothing positive in your life, now or in the future. Your life will become dark, because your whole life is lived with the self-cherishing thought, with desire, attachment and clinging to this life, and all of these are non-virtues. So when you die, you don’t have any positive thoughts, and you are not able to renounce life. …”

– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from “Dealing with Attachment” on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book.”

Learn more about Lama Zopa Rinpoche, spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), and Rinpoche’s vision for a better world. Sign up to receive news and updates.