Lama Zopa Rinpoche during the recording of a video teaching at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Rinpoche begins this teaching by reminding us of the reason for these teachings on refuge: a young girl in China, as well as some others, have requested Rinpoche to offer the refuge ceremony. Rinpoche is using this opportunity to offer these refuge teachings to all of us in order to remind and persuade us to create less nonvirtue and to practice virtue.

The real meaning of life is to benefit others and not harm them. It is not enough to achieve liberation from samsara for oneself alone. You need to liberate every single numberless sentient being from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to enlightenment. To do this, you need omniscience. In omniscience, you have perfect power and infinite compassion embracing all sentient beings. Therefore, you listen to the teachings for every single sentient being without even one single hell being left out. This purpose becomes like the limitless sky with no end.

By going for refuge to the Three Precious Sublime Ones (Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha) you can become free from the lower realms, from samsara, and from the lower nirvana; and you can achieve enlightenment and free numberless sentient beings from oceans of samsarmic sufferings.

Rinpoche resumes the discussion of the section “Taking Refuge and Not Asserting Another Religion” from “Day Twelve” of Phabongkha Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. Rinpoche picks up the discussion with the sentence, “In short, taking refuge is not only reciting words.” Rinpoche then offers examples of what is not taking refuge. He explains that taking refuge is not merely reciting words like a robot, which has no mind.

Rinpoche continues by considering whether what robots say can be Dharma. Only a Buddha can give advice according to people’s different levels of mind. To help sentient beings exactly without mistake, you need to achieve enlightenment. You need to understand subtle karma by dispelling the obscurations to seeing it. You need omniscience to give answers according to the level of minds of numberless sentient beings. Therefore, you can’t make a robot like a buddha, Rinpoche explains. But if a robot is filled by learned people with answers based on Dharma, then a robot can benefit people, similar to how a Dharma book benefits people.

Rinpoche takes the opportunity to remind us that taking sentient beings around holy objects is one way to benefit them—in fact, this is very easy and creates the cause for them to reach enlightenment. This is a way to repay the kindness of sentient beings, by helping them in this way. Taking insects around holy objects is so precious. Imagine all of the numberless sentient beings that you find in your bed, on your body, in your room—this is like finding a wish-granting jewel, Rinpoche says.

You can use images of deities to bless sentient beings in your home. You can also create a box with mantras on it to purify the negative karma of beings that go in the box. (Rinpoche discusses Namgyalma mantra and Lotus Pinnacle of Amoghapasha mantra  specifically.) Rinpoche also explains that if there are many insects in your house, that you find while you are cleaning, for example, you can put them in a bag and take them around holy objects.

Rinpoche discusses the kindnesses of sentient beings, who since beginningless rebirths have all been your mother:

1. The kindness of giving you a body numberless times from beginningless rebirths, particularly a human body.
2. The kindness of protecting your life from hundreds of dangers, every day.
3. The kindness of bearing hardships.
4. The kindness of giving you an education.

Rinpoche then overviews the four results of killing even one sentient being and provides commentary on each:

1. The ripened-aspect result of killing is rebirth in the lower realms.
2. The possessed result of killing is living in a place where there is fighting or disease and where food and medicine have negative side effects.
3. Experiencing the result similar to the cause of killing is being killed.
4. Creating the result similar to the cause of killing is you will kill again.

Sentient beings are also very kind to you when they are not your mother. Rinpoche discusses these kindnesses offered by others to us:

1. The kindness of giving shelter.
2. The kindness of giving clothing.
3. The kindness of giving food.

Rinpoche returns to discussing refuge. Those who don’t believe in reincarnation and karma have to practice having a good heart. They can at least do whatever they can to benefit others and make life beneficial to them. Those who do believe in reincarnation and karma have to practice Dharma. Any meditation should begin with refuge and bodhichitta. 

When you truly go for refuge, Rinpoche explains, you want to be saved because you are afraid of the lower realms and samsara. You also have total faith that the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha can guide you to safety, and you want to rely on them. From Phabongkha Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand:

Like someone who has made mistakes seeks help from an influential leader, being afraid of the evil-gone realms, samsara, and so forth and trusting that the Rare Sublime Ones have the capacity to protect you, you must develop the mental factor intention that totally relies upon these protectors. This is the criterion for having taken refuge.

Whether or not you generate refuge in your heart depends on whether or not you generate that [intention] in your heart. Therefore, don’t be like those who collect a hundred thousand words of refuge but do not generate the entity of refuge in their heart.

“[Refuge] depends on whether you have that feeling so strong that wants to rely on Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha,” Rinpoche says. Those who have a realization of refuge always have mindfulness of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha—even on the moon! They never waste time, whether or not they are in a suffering place or a happy place. They are constantly collecting virtue with actions of body, speech, and mind.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “Taking Refuge Is Not Merely Reciting Words Like a Robot”:

Rinpoche teachings on refuge will conclude with Rinpoche offering refuge in a video. Those wishing to take refuge with Rinpoche should continue to watch these teachings on refuge. Past teachings on the topic of refuge are also available to watch and rewatch.

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
• The text Lama Zopa Rinpoche is teaching on in this video comes from Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand by Pabongka Rinpoche (Wisdom Publications, 2006).
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Rinpoche meeting with the reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering, Kathmandu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

In a new touching video, Lama Zopa Rinpoche meets with the young incarnation—currently named Kunga Choyang—of Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering (1923-2014) and his family. Rinpoche shares stories in the video about this extraordinary teacher.

Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering was born in Tibet and ordained at age five. At twelve, he started his Buddhist philosophical studies. At seventeen, he joined Sera Je Monastery, then in Tibet, where he pursued rigorous philosophical studies. He served as a philosophy teacher at Sera Je for three years. In 1959, he was imprisoned by Chinese authorities for seven years and underwent extreme hardship. In 1969, he fled Tibet for India. At the rebuilt Sera Je Monastery in South India, he completed his Geshe Lharampa examination in 1978. In 1986, he was enthroned the seventieth abbot of Sera Je Monastery. He passed away in 2014 at the age of 91.

Rinpoche offering a statue of Buddha to the reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering, the former abbot of Sera Je, Kathmadu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche explains in the video that many of the best, most educated teachers nowadays, including many geshes teaching in FPMT centers, are the disciples of Khensur Rinpoche. In addition, many of his disciples are teaching the young monks at Sera Je. Rinpoche said that Geshe Lobsang, as he calls him, had a very special, very clear way of teaching—more clear than other teachers. Geshe Lobsang had received this lineage of teaching philosophy from a well known teacher in Tibet. Geshe Sopa Rinpoche and Lama Yeshe also received this lineage and were known for their clear presentation of the Dharma.

Rinpoche talks about how he and Khensur Rinpoche had been friends since the early days of Sera Je in South India. In the evenings, they would talk until 2:30 A.M. In addition to discussing Dharma, they would talk about Khensur Rinpoche’s experience in prison in Tibet. Rinpoche recalls that they would have a thermos of tea and drink and talk until it was late. Rinpoche says, “He was an excellent teacher in the world. Amazing. Really amazing.”

When Khensur Rinpoche was chosen as abbot of Sera Je in 1986, he became very busy, Rinpoche says, and they didn’t meet much during that time. Khensur Rinpoche sent monks to do religious dance in the West to raise money for Sera Je to build a gompa. In 1991, in discussion with Khensur Rinpoche, it was determined that the most beneficial offering to the monastery from Lama Zopa Rinpoche would be to create a food fund, whereby all of the monks at Sera Je Monastery could be offered quality meals for free. This offering continued for twenty-six years until a substantial endowment was offered to the monastery through FPMT International Office. This allowed the monastery to become self sufficient, using the interest generated annually from the endowment to cover the entire Sera Je Food Fund expense. Khensur Rinpoche remained the abbot of Sera Monastery until 1993.

Khensur Rinpoche passed away in Bylakkupe, India. According to Rinpoche, he told his attendants that he would be reincarnated in Amdo, Tibet, because individuals in Amdo have so much devotion and faith. Rinpoche shared that His Holiness came to Sera Je to speak to Khensur Rinpoche and asked him to reincarnate as a child who is very awakened. In the video, gesturing to the young incarnation who is sitting across from him, Rinpoche says, “This is by the development of the mind and Dharma. Not the development of anger and attachment, which is the cause to be reborn in the lower realms. But this is because of the mind of Dharma.”

Rinpoche sitting and talking with the family of the reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering, Kathmandu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

About the young incarnation’s upcoming education, Rinpoche explains that Kunga Choyang will be at Kopan Monastery for some years, then he will go to Sera Monastery. Rinpoche concludes the video by saying, “As he was an expert in his past life, he should be an expert in this life too. This life he won’t be an expert in the same way as his last life, but he will be an expert in order to benefit extensively.” 

Watch the video “Lama Zopa Rinpoche Meets with the Young Reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering”

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche recording a video teaching, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Lama Zopa Rinpoche begins by explaining that it’s very important to expand on the topic of refuge because it can take one’s whole life—even as a monk or nun studying—or many lifetimes to understand it. Rinpoche reminds us that he’s giving these teachings on refuge because a young girl and other students in China have requested for Rinpoche to offer the refuge ceremony.

The motivation for listening to the teachings, and for taking refuge, is not just for oneself or for temporary happiness. It isn’t enough to want to not be reborn in the lower realms or to obtain a deva or human rebirth in the next life. It also isn’t enough to want to be free from samsara and achieve nirvana. The real motivation is the desire to liberate the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to the total cessation of obscurations and the completion of realizations—Buddhahood—by yourself. In order to do that, you must achieve enlightenment. Therefore, for that purpose, you listen to the teachings and take refuge.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche then begins to read from, and provide commentary on, a discussion of refuge from “Day Twelve” of Phabongkha Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. Phabongkha Rinpoche teaches that when going for refuge, we make a promise to:

1. 1. Buddha, the founder of refuge;
   2. Dharma, the actual refuge; and
      
   3. Sangha, the helper for actualizing refuge.

Therefore, Phabongkha Rinpoche explains, we should rely on the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha like we rely on a doctor, medicine, and nurses when we are sick. Lama Zopa Rinpoche says that similar to how we must make sure that the doctor we chose is expert and that the medicine and nurses are correct, when taking refuge we must rely on Buddha, the founder of refuge; Dharma, the actual refuge; and Sangha, the helper for actualizing refuge ourselves.

Phabongkha Rinpoche then tells the story of two non-Buddhist brothers who became Buddhist when they saw Maheshvara taking refuge in Buddha. One of the brothers composed a text, which Phabongkha Rinpoche refers to, saying:

Like this text says, having taken refuge in our Teacher and being disciples of his teachings, we should hold firmly to them, unable to be converted to other [religions], and not take refuge in Bön, Mutegpa, and so forth, which are outside this Dharma.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche explains that these brothers went for refuge to the Buddha “a hundred percent, totally. Their mind is indestructible.” They will not go back to their old religion, change to following other religions, or follow Bön or Mutegpa. They firmly took refuge in Buddha.

Rinpoche describes “Mutegpa” as meaning “non-level.” He explains how the Buddhist schools—Vaibhashika, Sautrantika, Mind-Only,  Madhyamaka Svatantrika, and Madhyamaka Prasangika—are “teg pa,” or “levels,” like steps. Understanding the Vaibhashika view, helps you understand Sautrantika view, and so on. So understanding the Madhyamaka Svatantrika view is unbelievably helpful for understanding the Madhyamaka Prasangika view, Rinpoche explains. The other religions don’t help understand the most correct subtle emptiness and are therefore “Mutegpa.” Rinpoche offers the example of the Hindu tradition, where the I is permanent, exists alone, and exists with its own freedom. In contrast, Buddhism teaches that the I is impermanent, depends on causes and conditions, and does not exist with its own freedom.

Phabongkha Rinpoche continues on the topic of refuge, making two additional points: the more you think about other religions, the more you become devoted to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; and if you have two refuges, you lose your refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.

Within this context, Phabongkha Rinpoche begins a discussion of the Bön religion, which was prevalent in Tibet before Buddhism. As explained by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Phabongkha Rinpoche says that the founder of Bön cannot be said to have ceased all the gross defilements and subtle defilements and completed all the qualities; the Bön religion itself doesn’t have a method for the delusions to decrease; and the “Sangha” in Bön, those intent on virtue, do not have a lineage through vows to the founder. So the founder, the religion, and the followers do not have the qualities of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.

It is important to understand the references for Bön, “such as those found in the authentic histories in the texts of past learned [highly attained] scholars,” Phabongkha Rinpoche says, continuing from Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand:

Therefore, all three—the founder of Bön, the Bön teachings, and the Bön views—are mixed with the views and meditations of non-Buddhists. They have stolen things from the Buddhist scriptures and made them into a false Dharma and so forth. This happened a very long time ago but this widespread bad tradition has spread. Therefore, it is not worthy to be a refuge for those seeking liberation nor is it trustworthy.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues reading through this section of Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand and adding commentary. Phabongkha Rinpoche’s points here included that the Bönpo’s views are distorted views of the Mutegpa; that even if Bönpos and Mutegpa appear to have quick attainments, they eventually fall into lower realms; that Bön does not free you from samsara; that only a Buddha can liberate others from samsara; that those who are themselves bound to samsara cannot liberate others; and that Milarepa says that Bön is a wrong religion.

Phabongkha Rinpoche also debates the Bönpo’s claims that there are Bonpo buddhas and bodhisattvas, saying that “since those who say that have minds polluted by the bad imprints of wrong views, these are the great words of the highly ignorant.” Phabongka Rinpoche completes his debate making the following point:

Those who desire what is excellent should completely discard nauseating bad customs like discarding stones used to clean kaka. The refuge of Buddhists is only the Three Rare Sublime Ones. You should hold these objects of refuge as pure. It is important to totally trust in them.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche concludes this teaching with Phabongkha Rinpoche’s point that “taking refuge is not only reciting words”:

Like someone who has made mistakes seeks help from an influential leader, being afraid of the evil-gone realms, samsara, and so forth and trusting that the Rare Sublime Ones have the capacity to protect you, you must develop the mental factor intention that totally relies upon these protectors. This is the criterion for having taken refuge.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “It Is Good to Know About the Bön Religion”

Rinpoche teachings on refuge will conclude with Rinpoche offering refuge in a video. Those wishing to take refuge with Rinpoche should continue to watch these teachings on refuge. Past teachings on the topic of refuge are also available to watch and rewatch.

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
• The text Lama Zopa Rinpoche is teaching on in this video comes from Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand by Pabongka Rinpoche (Wisdom Publications, 2006) chapter “Day Twelve,” pp. 371—374, starting from the outline “Taking Refuge Owing to One’s Beliefs.” 
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche offering a talk to the Nalanda Monastery community, October 18, 2021. Photo courtesy of Nalanda Monastery’s Facebook page.

Nalanda Monastery, located in the South of France, was established in 1981 by Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche and is one of the largest Tibetan Buddhist monasteries for Westerners.

During Nalanda’s fortieth anniversary celebration, Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered the Nalanda community an encouraging and joyful talk from Kopan Monastery, urging everyone to meditate strongly on impermanence and death in order to change worldly dharma into holy Dharma. Rinpoche also praises those who are sangha in the West, explaining again that they are the “real heroes” due to the “incredible renunciation” of becoming ordained. 

All are welcome to listen to this teaching, which contains advice all students can take to heart. We also invite you to join us in rejoicing in this forty-year milestone for Nalanda Monastery! 

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching for Nalanda Monastery’s Fortieth Anniversary. 

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

You can learn more about Nalanda Monastery‘s programs, events, and how to help support this monastic institution. Find the “Nalanda Monastery 40th Anniversary, Honouring Our Former Generations” videos and more on Nalanda Monastery’s YouTube channel.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Kathmandu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Rinpoche begins this video by reminding us why he is offering these teachings on refuge. Due to a young girl and other students in China requesting refuge, Rinpoche will offer the ceremony—which all with interest are welcome to take when that video is released—after explaining the benefits of refuge.

As always, the motivation for listening to the teachings isn’t for oneself to achieve liberation from samsara; this is not sufficient. The real purpose of human life is to not harm and only benefit sentient beings. Since beginningless rebirths, there are numberless sentient beings from whom you have received happiness. They have suffered and died for you, including small sentient beings involved in making water and food. Because of this kindness, you cannot use your precious human life to achieve happiness for yourself alone.

Rinpoche then talks about Lama Serlingpa, from whom Lama Atisha received teachings, especially on bodhicitta. Lama Atisha traveled from India to Indonesia, where he stayed for twelve years, in order to learn from Lama Serlingpa. In Leveling Out All Conceptions, Lama Serlingpa said:

That called “I,” the root of negative karma,
Is a phenomenon to immediately cast far away.

If something is poisonous, dangerous, or deadly to you, you throw it out immediately. All of your suffering from beginningless rebirths and all of your future suffering comes from your self-cherishing thought. Not only that, you have harmed numberless sentient beings since beginningless time due to this. The I is the phenomenon that is to be cast far away and others are the phenomena to immediately cherish. Also in Leveling Out All Conceptions, Lama Serlingpa said:

That called “others,” the originator of enlightenment,
Is a phenomenon to immediately cherish.

You are totally busy your whole life from birth until you die in service to the I, but it isn’t even there. Everyone functions on the basis of this “real” concept of I, but there is no such thing in reality, Rinpoche explains. The exception is those who have realized emptiness and meditate every day on seeing everything—I, action, object—as an illusion. Otherwise, what you think you see is a complete hallucination, like a dream. On the basis of this wrong concept, the six delusions—attachment, anger, pride, doubt, ignorance, wrong view—and the twenty secondary delusions arise. What appears as real, what you hold as real, it’s not there. This doesn’t mean nihilism; it doesn’t mean that nothing exists.

It is important to put effort into thinking about the shortcomings of true suffering and understanding what binds you to samsara. To do this, rely on your mind being upset with samsara.

The suffering of dissatisfaction is the suffering of pain. Even billionaires, kings, and presidents suffer from this, from not being content. Contentment is not something that is taught or emphasized in universities in the West. Even in a world full of viruses, problems, and so much suffering, you can still have contentment and satisfaction.

Coming together with people and separating is the suffering of change. Collecting material objects and losing them is the suffering of change. Rebirth ending in death is the suffering of change. Samsaric pleasures, which are the suffering of change, cheat you. You are caught over and over by samsaric pleasures, which are like honey on a blade. At the beginning there is pleasure, and then it ends with the suffering of pain. You have to meditate on the renunciation of samsara, how samsara is in the nature of suffering.

For pervasive compounded suffering, the aggregates are under the control of karma and delusion, and so they are “pervaded” by suffering, Rinpoche explains. From the seed of karma and delusion, suffering arises again. So it is “compounded.”

Form realm beings have the suffering of change. They have desire for the five external sense objects. Formless realm beings don’t have the suffering of pain or the suffering of change. They only have pervasive compounded suffering. They don’t have a physical body, just a mind, which is under the control of delusion and karma. So from this contaminated seed, suffering arises. And when their karma to be in the formless realm finishes, they get reborn in the desire realm—in a hell or as a hungry ghost, an animal, or a human being. We have been through this numberless times: born in the form realm and formless realm numberless times since beginningless rebirths. We need to be free from this.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “Rely on a Mind That Is Upset with Samsara”

Rinpoche teachings on refuge will conclude with Rinpoche offering refuge in a video. Those wishing to take refuge with Rinpoche should continue to watch these teachings on refuge. Past teachings on the topic of refuge are also available to watch and rewatch.

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Kathmandu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his explanation of Buddhist refuge.* This teaching begins with Rinpoche explaining that taking refuge is not something simple. It’s not something that you simply hear and chant. One has to understand the four noble truths extensively and also understand the qualities of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, which can take one’s whole life to do this. This is why monks study their whole lives in monasteries.

Rinpoche reminds us of the proper motivation for listening to the teachings. It is not enough to achieve liberation from samsara and then achieve nirvana and everlasting happiness for oneself alone. Instead think, “I must achieve the state of omniscience, the total cessation of obscurations and the completion of realizations. I must achieve this to free the numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to full enlightenment by myself alone! Therefore, I am going to listen to the teachings.”

Rinpoche shares a verse from Lama Tsongkhapa’s Hymn of Experience:

If you don’t attempt to think of the shortcomings of true sufferings,
Seeking liberation won’t arise exactly.
If you don’t reflect on the causes, the evolution of samsara,
You won’t know how to cut the root of samsara.
Therefore, rely on an upset mind renouncing samsara
And cherish the understanding of what ties you to samsara.

Rinpoche explains that an “upset mind renouncing samsara” is so worthwhile even though to worldly people who don’t understand Dharma, it looks totally crazy and meaningless. The “upset mind” understands how karma and delusion lead to all suffering, and how one is trapped in the endless cycle of samsara. Due to being upset by this understanding of the suffering of samsara, one is motivated to go into isolation to actualize renunciation, bodhichitta, emptiness, the whole path to enlightenment—this makes that “upsetness” so worthwhile. “Skies of worthwhile upsetness,” Rinpoche says.

It is like poison to think that living in isolation and practicing Dharma is crazy and meaningless. The person who thinks this way does not achieve freedom from samsara along with nirvana and everlasting happiness. But the person who is practicing Dharma, who left worldly life with renunciation to actualize the path in isolation—wow! Worldly people don’t like suffering, but they don’t understand suffering. Westerners can be so shocked when someone lives in a cave. But there is no benefit to being upset with someone who has renounced the worldly life and is practicing Dharma. In fact, it is poison. Even though there are good-hearted people in the West, Rinpoche explains that many of the concepts and actions of body, speech, and mind in the West are totally opposite of Buddhadharma, the teachings of the Buddha.

It is extremely important to understand what ties you to samsara. You are suffering and you don’t like suffering, but you don’t know why you are suffering. Nothing and nobody tied you to samsara from the outside—in fact, you tied yourself to samsara with your hallucinated mind. You must understand this. It is up to you to cut this rope.

Rinpoche shares verses from Panchen Lozang Chokyi Gyaltsen’s Melodious Song Bringing Joy to Lozang [Dragpa]: Responses to “Queries from a Sincere Heart,” which is a response to a text by Lama Tsongkhapa:

The way of reflecting on the hundreds of shortcomings of samsara:
Although there are many, through being frightened by the suffering of pain
Even animals wish to be free from it.

Even non-Buddhists renounce
Contaminated pleasant feeling.

Even animals renounce the suffering of pain, Rinpoche says. If you wield a stick toward a dog, it runs away. When they are hungry they run to look for food. They have the thought to be free from pain and the suffering of hunger and thirst. Likewise, even non-Buddhists renounce the suffering of change.

Rinpoche continues quoting Panchen Lozang Chokyi Gyaltsen:

Therefore, these contaminated aggregates taken [by delusion and karma],
Which are the nature of being compounded,
Are the container of suffering that will be actualized and [already] actualized suffering,
Such as diseases, pustules, and sharp pains.
If you meditate through thinking about this, it will help you become free.

Rinpoche explains how in Lama Tsongkhapa’s Lamrim Chenmo there are eight types of suffering, unlike how there are six types of suffering in Phabongkha Rinpoche‘s lamrim text Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. Rinpoche then goes over Tsongkhapa’s five points on the eighth type of suffering, which is the suffering of “the five aggregates taken [by karma and delusion]”:

Thinking about the meaning of what Buddha said, “In brief, the five aggregates taken [by karma and delusions] are suffering,” has five points:

1. 1. They are a vessel for suffering that will be actualized.
   2. They are a vessel for suffering that is the base on which [suffering has already] been actualized.
   3. They are a vessel for the suffering of pain.
   4. They are a vessel for the suffering of change.
   5. They are the nature of compounding suffering.

So the aggregates, due to karma and delusion, contain already actualized suffering as well as this life’s future suffering and the suffering of future lives. Lama Tsongkhapa’s way of explaining the eighth human beings’ sufferings is that it is like an ocean,” Rinpoche says. Phabongkha Rinpoche didn’t explain the aggregates as a container of the different types of suffering, but this is how Lama Tsongkhapa explained it.

From the formless realm down to Avichi Hell, the aggregates are pervaded by suffering, under the control of delusion and karma. To be free from suffering, you have to become free from the seeds of delusion and karma. Pervasive compounding suffering is the main suffering renounced by Buddhists, Rinpoche explains.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “You Tie Yourself to Samsara”

*Rinpoche teachings on refuge will conclude with Rinpoche offering refuge in a video. Those wishing to take refuge with Rinpoche should continue to watch these teachings on refuge. Past teachings on the topic of refuge are also available to watch and rewatch.

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian.
• The Foundation Store offers many resources for your practice of refuge.
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Kathmandu, Nepal, October 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

In this video, Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues a short series of teachings on refuge. These teachings will culminate with Rinpoche offering the refuge ceremony, which will be available to anyone wishing to take the life-long refuge vows from Rinpoche. This series is due to the request of a few Chinese students, including a young girl, for Rinpoche to offer refuge vows. In response, Rinpoche is explaining refuge in detail prior to offering the vows.

Rinpoche begins by warning us that we must be aware of the heavy negative karma one creates by belittling one’s guru. Rinpoche recommends writing down the following verse from the Fifth Dalai Lama, Lozang Gyatso, in our prayer books:

In the view of your own perverted mind,
Your own mistakes appear in the guru’s actions.
Your heart is totally rotten from the depths.
Recognizing that it is your own mistake, abandon it like poison.

Even if you killed your mother, your father, or an arhat, or caused blood to flow from a Buddha, or created disunity in the sangha, you can still purify those mistakes and achieve enlightenment. But the heaviest negative karma is belittling a guru with whom you have made a Dharma connection, Rinpoche explains. This verse from the Fifth Dalai Lama if very powerful for protecting you from mistakes, including breaking vows and belittling the guru. You need to recognize that seeing mistakes in your guru’s actions is your own mistake. And your own mistakes appear in the guru’s actions.

In the West, Rinpoche explains, people look for a guru, then they create the heaviest negative karma in relation to the guru. This is like finding gold and using it for a toilet or a garbage can.

Instead of seeing mistakes, we need to see whatever the guru does as positive. The Fifth Dalai Lama advises this:

With the pure appearance that sees whatever is done as positive
And the devotion that accomplishes whatever is said as advice,
Whatever you do becomes the profound vital point of accomplishing Dharma.
Understand this to be the root of the benefit and virtue that accomplish whatever you wish.

In this way, seeing whatever your guru does as positive, allows you to accomplish whatever your guru advises. Rinpoche says that this is another important verse to write down in one’s prayer book so it isn’t forgotten.

Rinpoche shares that at the time of death, Dolgyal practice harms those who do it and when a practitioner dies, terrifying visions, incredible fear, and regret appear. When the body of a Dolgyal practitioner is offered to the birds, vultures won’t even eat the bodies of those who practiced this deity. Rinpoche shares this to warn, “Be careful before taking refuge. Be careful about whom you take refuge from. Don’t cheat yourself.”

Rinpoche then offers a translation of a short sutra on going for refuge, The Mahayana Sutra Called “Going for Refuge to the Arya Three Rare Sublime Ones” (at 46:35 in the video). This sutra describes just how precious it is to take refuge. “Be careful,” Rinpoche advises. “Don’t waste your life.”

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “The Sutra ‘Going for Refuge to the Arya Three Rare Sublime Ones'”

Those wishing to take refuge with Rinpoche should continue to watch these teachings from Rinpoche. Past teachings on the topic of refuge are also available to watch and rewatch.

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian.
• The Foundation Store offers many resources for your practice of refuge.
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Image for the podcast show “Lama Zopa Rinpoche full-length teachings”

We are happy to announce a new podcast series featuring full-length teachings by Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Each episode corresponds to a new teaching in the ongoing video series of Rinpoche’s thought transformation teachings.

The podcast is currently available through a podcast app, such as Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, and most major podcast apps. Search for the show title “Lama Zopa Rinpoche full-length teachings” to find the show in the podcast app. (For those using an RSS reader app, the RSS feed link is feed:https://feeds.captivate.fm/lama-zopa-rinpoche-full-length/.) If you have questions on how to listen to podcasts through an app, a search of the internet offers many resources to help you.

This podcast is also available translated into Italian. To find it, search for “Lama Zopa Rinpoce insegnamenti completi.”

Recent podcast episode

Each new podcast episode is published at the same time as the latest video teaching and blog from Lama Zopa Rinpoche. In that way listeners will have access to transcripts and other materials associated with a specific teaching. For the podcast episodes, pauses have been shortened and background noise reduced, but otherwise the teachings are unedited. Currently we have podcast episodes for Rinpoche’s video teaching from July 2021 onward (videos 102–118).

The idea for a podcast had been discussed for several years by Ven. Roger Kunsang, CEO of FPMT, Inc. and Rinpoche’s assistant. This year FPMT International Office staff turned their attention to making the podcast happen. We will eventually produce two podcasts shows. In addition to full-length teachings, we will have a show of edited teachings by Rinpoche. We hope to launch the second podcast show featuring Essential Extracts from Rinpoche in the coming months.

Watch videos from the series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more. Read an in-depth summary of Rinpoche’s thought transformation teachings given in 2020 in the Mandala 2021 article “The Time to Practice Is Now.”

You can always find information on our podcasts on our new Podcasts page.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaching at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, September 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Rinpoche begins this teaching by reminding us that there are many ways in which we can help others. Even if you have limited Dharma understanding, limited experience of the path, there are ways you can benefit others. For example, when you build very big statues of buddhas, people come to see them, and then they purify and collect the most unbelievable merit. You can also bring Dharma books and teachings to people to help them dispel ignorance. There are many ways, according to their individual capacities, that you can help others.

Before taking ultimate refuge, you must check up. As Rinpoche has explained in his last two teachings, there are four qualities which make Buddha the ultimate refuge:

1. Buddha is free from suffering and the cause of suffering
2. Buddha is expert in the methods to free others from suffering
3. Buddha has no discriminating thought and has equal compassion and care for all
4. Buddha works to benefit every sentient being whether they benefit him or not

So why take refuge? This question is from your side only, Rinpoche explains. There are numberless buddhas and bodhisattvas who have compassion for you. So why have you been suffering from beginningless rebirths up to now? Even if all the buddhas and bodhisattvas put their power together, they can’t guide you if you don’t decide to receive their help, if you don’t take refuge.

In Buddhism, your mind is the creator. Rinpoche quotes from A Good Vase Filled with Nectar (verse 3.7):

Whatever happiness and suffering there is in samsara,
All of it comes from your karma.
Therefore, through always examining your three doors,
Make effort to abandon nonvirtue and practice virtue.

Everything comes from the mind, including enlightenment and hell, samsara and nirvana, happiness and problems. Rinpoche emphasizes that we have to work and make effort in order to achieve enlightenment. Even though the help of the buddhas and bodhisattvas is available to you, the reason you have to suffer is because you made mistakes from your side. In this context, Rinpoche shares more stories about the spirit Dogyal.

Rinpoche also talks about how the annual one-month Kopan Course began and how he was inspired by reading Kachen Yeshe Gyaltshen’s lamrim. Rinpoche also credits as inspiration Lama Yeshe’s kindness and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Rinpoche reflects that during the early Kopan Courses the already depressed Western students became even more depressed after hearing about the lower realms and eight worldly Dharmas. The accommodations at the early courses were very simple. It was great for the Western students to learn about lamrim and to see their lives, to realize what should be avoided, and what should be done for happiness in the life up to enlightenment.

Rinpoche shares that he and Lama Yeshe stayed at Kachen Yeshe Gyaltshen’s monastery in Boudhanath when they first came to Nepal. From there, Lama Yeshe could see Kopan Hill, about which, Rinpoche says, Lama Yeshe was very interested.

Kachen Yeshe Gyaltshen also advised people not to practice Dolgyal. Rinpoche then shares details of some of the various lamas who have advised not to practice Dolgyal, including His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

By taking refuge in Buddha, you won’t be reborn in the lower realms. By taking strong refuge in Buddha, your heavy negative karmas get purified. And if the merit of taking refuge was materialized, Rinpoche explains, it would not fit in three-thousand-fold galaxies.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “The Merits of Taking Refuge Don’t Fit in the Three-Thousand-Fold Galaxies”:

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian.
• The Foundation Store offers many resources for your practice of refuge.
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving a video teaching at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, September 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Rinpoche continues discussing refuge in this new video. Rinpoche begins by reminding us that we must be careful about the objects in which we take refuge—for example, people take refuge in animals, nature, or spirits.

To make the point of why it is best to go for refuge to Buddha, Rinpoche again discusses the four qualities of a Buddha and shares stories and commentary after each.

1. Buddha is free from suffering and the cause of suffering
2. Buddha is expert in the methods to free others from suffering
3. Buddha has no discriminating thought and has equal compassion and care for all
4. Buddha works to benefit every sentient being whether they benefit him or not

Worldly gods and spirits don’t have the four qualities of the Buddha.

Before you take refuge in things like food, drink, medicine, and clothes, you always check up on the quality. For example, you don’t buy food that has gone bad; you check it first before buying. Like this, you also have to check the quality of the one in whom you are going to take ultimate refuge. When you are dying, in order to not be born in the lower realms, to purify negative karma, to obtain a higher rebirth, Rinpoche says emphatically, “Rely on Buddha!” To free you from samsara, to achieve nirvana, ultimate happiness forever—”Rely on Buddha!” Buddha has all the power and qualities to guide you. If you take refuge in worldly beings, samsaric beings who have discriminating thoughts, no compassion for sentient beings, attachment, anger, ignorance, self-cherishing—how can they help you?

Rinpoche then shares several stories about the dangers of trusting worldly spirits, particularly in relation to the spirit Dolgyal (Shugden).

Things appear to us according to our karma. You see things as pure or impure based on how pure or impure your own mind is. For example, one container filled with liquid appears to a preta as pus, to a human as water, and to worldly gods, suras, and asuras as nectar. To Buddha’s attendant, who served him for twenty-two years, Buddha appeared to be a liar; he didn’t see Buddha as Buddha. Rinpoche explains that was due to his karma. Likewise, some lamas have showed the aspect of practicing Dolgyal, but didn’t actually do the practice. There are many examples of enlightened beings who showed the aspect of being ordinary. What we see in others is due to our own karma.

Rinpoche shares a verse from the Fifth Dalai Lama:

In the view of your own perverted mind,
Your own mistakes appear in the guru’s actions.
Your heart is totally rotten from the depths.
Recognizing that it is your own mistake, abandon it like poison.

Rinpoche advises that this is very, very powerful, and it is so important to do mindfulness practice in relation to guru yoga. Then you never give rise to heresy and anger. If you see any mistake in the guru, it is a reflection of your ordinary mind’s mistake. Don’t think that taking refuge is something easy. Monks and nuns study refuge and the qualities of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha their whole lives so they can learn the meaning of the words and actualize them to achieve enlightenment by completing the qualities of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. This is not easy! You take refuge to be free from samsara. In order to do that, you have to know what samsara is.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “Don’t Think Taking Refuge Is Something Easy”:

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
• The Foundation Store offers many resources for your practice of refuge.
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving a video teaching at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, September 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Lama Zopa Rinpoche begins this teaching explaining that it is very wise to take refuge while we have the opportunity as human beings. We may only have our human body this one time; it’s like a stone falling up, rather than down. It’s an impossible thing, but it has happened, and we must take full advantage of it to create merit and purify negativities while we can.

People take refuge in all kinds of things—trees, animals, rocks, the sun. The most wise and important refuge to take is in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. This is the way to wake up from the deep sleep of ignorance. Not just ignorance from birth in this life, but from ignorance from beginningless samsaric rebirths. Rinpoche implores us to, “Wake up!” If you are reborn in the lower realms, it is difficult to take refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. So we have this incredible opportunity right now to do so before it is too late.

Rinpoche outlines and offers commentary on four reasons why Buddha can definitely guide you:

1. The Buddha Is Free from Suffering and the Cause of Suffering
2. Buddha Is Expert in the Methods to Free Others from Suffering
3. Buddha Has No Discriminating Thought and Has Equal Compassion for All
4. Buddha Works to Benefit All Sentient Beings Whether They Benefit Him or Not

There are many reasons to take refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. It causes you to abandon the self-cherishing thought, which harms you and all sentient beings. The self-cherishing thought causes all the sufferings, obstacles, misfortunes, and problems. If you cherish yourself, the I, then you let go of others, you give up on others. That itself harms them. The nature of that mind is to harm others, to cause suffering, not to benefit them.

You cannot abandon suffering without giving up the I. From Shantideva’s Bodhicharyavatara (chapter 8, verses 135-6):

If you don’t let go of the fire [in your hand],
The burning cannot be stopped.
Like that, if you don’t give up the I,
Suffering cannot be abandoned.

Therefore, in order to pacify
Harm to yourself and others’ suffering,
Give up yourself for others
And cherish others as yourself.

Cherish others most—this is the nature of bodhichitta. Then, you become a bodhisattva. Before that, you should have a realization of renunciation, of how your samsara is totally in the nature of suffering. A bodhisattva cherishes every single sentient being as most precious. Numberless bodhisattvas cherish the most insignificant among us like this, even a mosquito biting and buzzing. For a bodhisattva, each sentient being is most kind and more precious than wish-granting jewels filling the whole sky.

Shakyamuni Buddha cherishes each and every sentient being as most precious. In his lifetimes, he practiced morality. He practiced charity by giving away his limbs and body countless times. He practiced patience for sentient beings, even the difficult ones. He practiced with so much hardship. Numberless buddhas cherish even one mosquito or ant as most precious, Rinpoche explains. Therefore, Buddha definitely guides you, especially if you go for refuge to Buddha.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “If You Go for Refuge to Buddha, Buddha Definitely Guides You”:

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian.
• Dedication verses

Resources for your Refuge Practice

Taking Refuge and Generating Bodhicitta

The Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive shared Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s recommended meditation to do when reciting this prayer. 

Sang gyä chhö dang tshog kyi chhog nam la 
Jang chhub bar du dag ni kyab su chhi 
Dag gi jin sog gyi päi tshog nam kyi 
Dro la phän chhir sang gyä drub par shog

I take refuge until I am enlightened
In the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Supreme Assembly.
By my merits of generosity and so forth,
May I become a buddha to benefit transmigratory beings. 

From FPMT Education Services’ Daily Prayers.

Additional Resources 

• Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s advice booklet, How to Take Refuge in the Three Rare Sublime Ones as a Preliminary Practice, edited by Ven. Robina Courtin, is available as a PDF.
• A Daily Meditation on Shakyamuni Buddha by Lama Zopa Rinpoche offers an extensive explanation of the visualizations to be done while taking refuge.
• Lama Yeshe gave the teaching, Refuge is a State of Mind, at a refuge ceremony held at Chenrezig Institute, AUS, in 1979. 

• The FPMT Education program Discovering Buddhism contains a module called, “Refuge in the Three Jewels” and the Living in the Path program contains a module called, “The Refuge and Bodhicitta Verse.”

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.

Rinpoche making offerings at Boudha Stupa, Nepal, July 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

At the beginning of this video, Rinpoche talks about doing a tsog offering practice at Boudha Stupa and the benefits of making offerings to stupas. He explains how offering tsog to stupas makes you achieve all the realizations; offering medicine to stupas stops diseases; and offering grains to stupas stops famine in the world. Rinpoche also discusses how important it is to consecrate stupas, including the benefit of eliminating war.

From his room at Kopan Monastery, Rinpoche then leads an offering practice to Boudha Stupa accompanied by many senior Sangha members. You can follow along with the offering practice by watching the video (beginning at 6:43) and reading the transcript, which includes the text of the practice.

Boudha Stupa, Nepal, February 2021. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Rinpoche also provides commentary on verses from Liberation Upon Hearing: The History of the Great Jarung Kashar Stupa by Padmasambhava on the benefits of making offerings to Boudha Stupa, which include the following:

Making requests to the stupa

Whoever supplicates it will spontaneously accomplish the benefit of self and others.

The benefits of offering water

Whoever offers drinking water to it will be born free of thirst and disease.

The benefits of offering flowers

Whoever offers flowers will completely attain the freedoms and advantages.

The benefits of offering light

Whoever offers butter lamps will see the manifest faces of the buddhas and bodhisattvas of the ten directions.

Whoever offers grain oil lamps will be clarified of all obscurations of ignorance.

Whoever offers the fire for butter lamps will radiate the light rays of the Dharma throughout the ten directions.

The benefits of offering perfume

Whoever offers scented water will be freed from depression and all suffering.

The benefits of offering food and drink

Whoever offers food and drink will be sustained by the sustenance of samādhi.

The benefits of offering music

Whoever offers music will proclaim the melodious sound of Dharma throughout the ten directions.

Whoever offers cymbals will attain profound and perfect courage.

Whoever offers bells large and small will attain clear and melodious speech, and the voice of Brahmā.

The benefits of offering the five precious jewels (pearls, turquoise, lapis lazuli, gold, coral)

Whoever offers maṇḍalas of the five precious jewels will be free of poverty and attain an inexhaustible sky treasury.

Before doing the dedications, Rinpoche acknowledges that what is missing from his commentary is the benefits of offering the seven king’s objects, the eight auspicious signs, and the seven royal things.

Rinpoche concludes the teaching with the instruction that these offerings “should be done after the seven-limb practice. Do the Thirty-Five Buddhas, Vajrasattva, the seven limbs, then a short mandala, then a lamrim prayer, then after, dedication to complete the practice.”

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “Making Offerings to Boudha Stupa”:

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.
• Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian.
• Learn more about stupas and how Lama Zopa Rinpoche and the FPMT organization support the creation and preservation of stupas through the Stupa Fund.
• Dedication verses

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.