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Lama Zopa Rinpoche giving an online teaching in his room at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, March 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 offering us a motivation for listening to the oral transmission of Sutra of Great Liberation. To have a good motivation one should think that one must free numberless sentient beings from oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to enlightenment, the total cessation of suffering and the completion of realizations. Rinpoche then says one should think, “Therefore, I must achieve enlightenment. Therefore, I am going to listen to the teaching and receive the lung of this sutra.”
The reality is, we could die at any time, even before this session is finished. By this time next week, we could be dead. Anything can happen. Since you were born, many friends, family—even gurus—have passed away. We ourselves are in this process too. It could happen anytime.
It is not enough to just be mindful that we are going to die. You have to practice holy Dharma! Don’t just make yourself depressed thinking you are going to die. Use your awareness of death and impermanence to not be reborn in the lower realms, to be free from samsara, to be free from lower nirvana, and to generate bodhichitta—the best Dharma practice. Don’t make yourself more depressed by squeezing your mind, thinking, “Oh no, I’m going to die!” There is already so much depression in the world.
You are receiving the oral transmission for every single human being, sura and asura being, and intermediate state being in numberless universes. You are listening for everyone, for the benefit of everyone to achieve enlightenment and to free them from samsara first. This is not just something easy and relaxed to do, no! That is the motivation! This sutra is exactly what is needed in the world.
Rinpoche continues the oral transmission of Sutra of Great Liberation at 20:47 of this video.
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 Just Squeeze Your Mind Thinking ‘I’m Going to Die'”:
https://youtu.be/VC1ONf59R74
- Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
- Find videos with Rinpoche giving the oral transmission of the Sutra of Great Liberatation
- Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
- Dedication verses for COVID-19 Crisis Teachings
Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation during the Time of COVID-19 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/
Practice advice from our teachers, Dharma study-from-home opportunities, and more can be found on the page “Resources for the Coronavirus Pandemic.”
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.