Lama Zopa Rinpoche News and Advice

Lama Zopa Rinpoche in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.

“… Many different conditions can cause stress: the fear of your partner dying or of losing them to someone else, failure in business, loss of a job, illness, or not getting some person or object that you want. With desires focused solely on the happiness of this life, you worry that you will not obtain the pleasures you selfishly seek. This dissatisfied, desirous mind is one of the main causes of stress,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said in a teaching in 1990 in Sydney, Australia, that has been recently published on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.

“The general method to deal with stress is to look at life in a positive rather than negative way. Looking positively at your problems is itself a meditation that transforms the mind into happiness. Reflecting on the benefits of your problems releases your squeezed, uptight mind and brings relaxation in your heart.

“Another approach is to meditate on experiencing the problem you are going through on behalf of others. Think, ‘I am experiencing this problem on behalf of all other beings. Instead of allowing countless other human beings to experience it, I alone will take all these problems upon myself, so that all others can be free of them.’ This attitude stops the problem because it purifies the cause of the problem, which is within your mind. Purifying the cause solves the problem. Experiencing your problems in this way keeps your mind happy and benefits others. And when your problem benefits others, it benefits you. …”

You can read the complete teaching, “How to Be Happy,” on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. Parts of this teaching have also been published in Wisdom Publication’s book How to Be Happy by Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

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

Lama Zopa Rinpoche blessing rescued goats at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, July 2011. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

On November 28-29, hundreds of thousands of animals will be sacrificed as part of the Gadhimai Festival, a Hindu religious festival that occurs every five years in Bariyarpur, Nepal, about 90 miles (145 km) south of Kathmandu. 

In 2009, Lama Zopa Rinpoche wrote a letter addressed to “center directors, students and friends” offering some advice on how to help stop the event and mitigate the suffering of the animals and humans involved. Then, Rinpoche suggested that reading the Sutra of Golden Light  and reciting “Prayer to Guru Rinpoche to Clear Away Obstacles on the Path” would be most useful. Recently, FPMT Education services made the oral transmission of the text publicly available in addition to a trove of other sutra-related resources.

For Thanksgiving, during which far more animals are killed than during the Gadhimai Festival, Rinpoche asks students to pray for the lives of the millions of turkeys that are killed. In 2010, Rinpoche wrote a special letter to the monks of Sera Je Monastery, asking that it be read aloud to the Sangha as a dedication after they did pujas and prayers. The letter contains advice anyone can follow to help.

For many years, Rinpoche has recommended vegetarianism as an appropriate and ideal diet for his students. 

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 with Geshe Doga and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi returning to Thubten Shedrup Ling from the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion while being mindful of the ants on the path, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive has recently published the first book in a new ebook series of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teachings: Practicing the Unmistaken Path: Lam-rim Teachings from Kopan 1991. You can read more about the book, which was edited by Gordon McDougall and Sandra Smith, by reading the Archive’s October 2014 E-letter. 

Here’s a brief excerpt from Practicing the Unmistaken Path:

“… The same mind constantly interprets because we’re not trying to change our own mind, not trying to develop our mind, to make the mind purer, more positive. Constantly the same impure mind looks at things impurely. The ordinary mind looks at everything as ordinary; the mistaken mind looks at things as mistaken. We look at others’ mistakes or we interpret things the wrong way, the negative way. The mind constantly judges the way others act in the wrong way, as harming us. We interpret the way others act to us as harmful. This ordinary mind, this impure mind, this negative thought looks at things as negative, judging or labeling and believing others’ actions as harmful to us.  

“Since there’s no mention of developing the mind, purifying the mind, transforming the mind into the positive attitude, what mind there is in life is constantly only the negative, impure, ordinary mind that looks at everything as negative, interpreting others’ actions as bad, as harmful to us. The mind projects these things. …”

You can read the complete excerpt in the Archive’s October 2014 E-letter.

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

Lama Zopa Rinpoche in the park, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

“Offering one tiny flower to a statue or picture of Buddha receives immeasurable, limitless, merit. All the paths to happiness result from that. With just one grain of rice or one tiny flower, you can enter the path and achieve total enlightenment – the completion of all good qualities,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche advised.

“After achieving enlightenment, you can liberate so many sentient beings from so much suffering and samsara and bring them to enlightenment. This is the result of offering one tiny flower. Each offering has all this benefit – like putting money in the bank. One dollar equals one billion trillion dollars in interest. This is an amazing benefit. It is important to remember this every day and offer as much as possible. If you see a beautiful flower, you visualize offering it to the guru and Buddha. The result and benefit is incredible. You can offer every single flower in a garden – the merit received is mind-blowing.

“This is how you use your precious human life, which is extremely rare and hard to find. Every time you see an object, use it to become closer to liberation and enlightenment. Many times each day, use your precious human rebirth to bring you closer and closer to liberation and enlightenment and thus to enlighten all sentient beings.”

Read more of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s on “Offering Practices” in “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” which is part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.

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. 

Animal art by Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the land around Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

During Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s stay at Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery near Bendigo in Australia, Rinpoche had several signs made to go with toy animals that had been placed along the path from the monastery to the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion. Above a small plush Tasmanian Devil, a sign in the shape of a speech bubble says:

“I the TASMANIAN DEVIL also take this great great unbelievable opportunity to achieve ultimate happiness, BUDDHAHOOD. It’s not for me, but for the sake of ALL SENTIENT BEINGS. Therefore I go around and prostrate to the stupa. Life is very short! And I don’t want to waste my life!! Ha Ha Ha.”

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 blessing dogs at Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche has given much advice on benefiting animals. Here is a suggestion for helping your pets and other animal friends:

“It’s also extremely good to bless food before you give it to animals. If you can’t do it for every meal, then you can bless all the food at the same time. Recite the five powerful mantras or OM MANI PADME HUM, Medicine Buddha, and Milarepa mantras. All of these have power and help anyone who eats this food to not be reborn in the lower realms; it blesses their mind and purifies negative karma. If you can, do it every time you feed them – recite the mantras and blow on the food. This is the biggest gift you can offer them: it causes a good rebirth, so they can escape samsara, achieve liberation, and acquire the positive imprints of the Mahayana teachings and mantras that lead to enlightenment.

“I asked the people who take care of our dogs at Tushita Centre in Dharamsala to recite the Maitreya Buddha prayer and mantra, the Lama Tsongkhapa praise to Guru Shakyamuni Buddha – ‘Having Found the Realization of Dependent Arising’ – and other prayers and mantras to the dogs, while holding a biscuit in their hand, so all the dogs wait patiently. It looks like they are respectfully listening to the teachings, with their eyes looking at the biscuit, all sitting humbly.”

Read more of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s instructions “How to Benefit Animals” on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” which is part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.

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

Lama Zopa Rinpoche after the long life puja at the CPMT 2014 meeting, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

“Lama Zopa: everything is in your hand –happiness or suffering, hell or enlightenment. Keeping your mind happy is not easy, but your business.”

– From Ven. Roger Kunsang’s Twitter page, posted on November 17, 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.)

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 practices tossing a small ball into a bucket during a picnic in Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

“People put a lot of effort into climbing Mount Everest, but it means nothing. They spend millions of dollars climbing Mount Everest just to get a reputation, just to get some dry name,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche taught to the students of the 33rd Kopan Course in 2000. “They put so many hundreds of thousands of dollars into a project which is totally meaningless. People spend so much money and effort and for their whole life they put effort into things which are totally meaningless and they only create negative karma, because their motivation is just attachment. It means nothing, and they totally waste all their money and their life, because they put so much effort for so many years into nothing.

“There are so many people in the world who have received a precious human body but are totally wasting it by doing meaningless actions. So, it is very important, while we are here, to follow the path to enlightenment. Even if we die while doing prostrations to the Buddha, we are still practicing Dharma, so if we die it is worthwhile. …”

Lama Zopa Rinpoche practices tossing a small ball into a bucket during a picnic in Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Excerpted from the teaching “Putting Effort into Dharma Practice” found at the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. 

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

Lama Zopa Rinpoche picnics with Sangha after the recent retreat, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Geshe Doga and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, Thubten Shedrup Ling, Bendigo, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

From Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s “Compassion Is of the Upmost Need”:

From the Sutra Request by Lodro Gyatso: “The thought of complete enlightenment, preserving Dharma, practicing Dharma and having love and compassion for living beings: these four dharmas have infinite qualities – the limit of their benefits is not seen by the Victorious Ones. It is said that preserving Dharma and protecting the lives of living beings has limitless benefits.”

This shows that if we have COMPASSION for sentient beings, from those we can’t see with the naked eye but only under a microscope up to creatures the size of a mountain, then the Buddha has never explained the limits of the benefits of the compassion we generate for them. It’s the same as saving the lives of human beings, animals and insects; we must understand that it has limitless benefits.

A free PDF download of “Compassion Is of the Upmost Need,” Rinpoche’s 10 quotes on compassion, is available from the Foundation Store in letter and A4 formats.

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

Lama Zopa Rinpoche practicing calligraphy in his room at Thubten Shedrup Ling, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche wrote to a young Tibetan woman, the daughter of a cousin, who was concerned about having failed her exams. Rinpoche had enrolled her in nursing school in Dharamsala and she was afraid of failing her exams again. Rinpoche advised:

“You are not losing your enlightenment, your liberation from samsara. You’re not losing a good rebirth in your next life. If that were the case, that would be something to be seriously worried about. Put whatever effort you can into studying, but in the event that you don’t succeed, look at the activities of this life as like the activities of a dream. What one gains or loses in a dream, when one wakes up, is nothing. Especially when the time of death comes, the activities of this life become like a dream, just totally empty. Especially at that time, you can see that the work you do just for this life is totally meaningless.

“Therefore, you shouldn’t worry too much. Even if you don’t succeed, you will manage to find a job. You can always be helped. You have a good heart, therefore you have some merit. You shouldn’t have a difficult life. Therefore, don’t worry too much.”

– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from “Failing Exams” on “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book”

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.

In the bush near Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, November 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

In the bush near Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, there is a representation of a charnel ground and a meditator. Lama Zopa Rinpoche recently had a sign made to sit above the somewhat ghastly scene, which says:

“I have achieved shine and insight before you! Now I am about to directly see all phenomena in emptiness, therefore I can’t stand it! I can’t wait for even a second. Before you die, before you go to bed, very soon, I am going to be enlightened. I will be illuminating Bendigo and the whole world.”

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 in the new gompa at Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery, Bendigo, Australia, November 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered this advice on the nature of the mind:

“The mind is like dough, which means you can make it into any shape: emotional, non-emotional, happy, not happy.

“Mind is like a child, so you should become the parents, like the father and mother watching and guiding the child. If you follow the child, if you become the child, it makes you crazy. Then, you always create obstacles and life becomes suffering.

“Or you become the guru and the mind is like the disciple – you watch and guide it. Or you are like a spy. You should be like a spy with your mind, always watching and blocking it when it is being negative and doing harm. It is like spying on a political person, examining what the person is thinking and planning, whether the person is performing positive actions or negative actions.

“Also, it is like you are the captain and the mind is the boat. Or you are the driver and the mind is the car, so therefore you have to always watch the car, and pay attention that you are traveling on the right road.

“If you don’t behave like this, then you are controlled by the mind.”

– Lama Zopa Rinpoche, from the page on “Meditation Practice” in “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” part of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. 

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