Khadro-la and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi offering a dharmachakra to Lama Zopa Rinpoche, during a long life puja for Rinpoche, Kopan Monastery, December 2020. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

In the following half-hour Essential Extract video, from a teaching Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave in December 2019 at Kopan Monastery, Rinpoche explains the difference between the appearance of our body as a base to be labeled “I,” the label itself, and the mistaken view that this I exists from its own side and that we are the aggregates. He compares this with mistaking a rope at dusk for a snake. Rinpoche emphasizes that everything is empty, but that this does not mean nothing exists. We have to bring the two truths together. For example, when we get angry, we can apply this meditation to realize that the “real I” that gets angry does not truly exist. Then the anger is gone immediately. The same goes for attachment and all delusions. And even birth and death do not exist from their own side. We think we have a “real” son or “real” daughter or “real” wealth. That is impossible, Rinpoche teaches, as there is not even a “real I.”

Watch the video “The ‘Real I’ That Gets Angry Does Not Exist”:
https://youtu.be/Bn7eHOeVU_s

Transcript: Then using the example, the body and mind in your view, the way you think, the way you believe your body and mind is like a piece of rope on the road curled like a snake, different colors and curled. Nang sel … means the way it appears to you, the body and mind are like a piece of rope, a piece of different colored rope curled. That is the appearance, then believing, then you label, because of the way it is curled and the different colors, you see, somebody who doesn’t have clear eyes, shimmering, evening time after sunset, thinks, “Oh, there is a snake.” By labeling “snake” and believing your label, snake, you get frightened. But there is no snake from the tip of the hairs, down to … The piece of the rope, every hair you look at, there is no snake there, but you label [“snake”] because in the evening time, at dusk time, the different colors and the way it is curled, it appears as a snake and then you get fear, terror.

So like that this body and mind are not I. They are not I at all. I told you yesterday or the day before yesterday. You remember I told you? But you label “I” on that and believe that is I, like you label “snake” and the fear comes, like that. It is not I, it is the base to be labeled but not the I.

You remember I mentioned M? There is the base to be labeled “M” and “M” is what is to be labeled. Tag zhi is the base to labeled, and “M” is what is labeled. They are not separate but [they are] two different things. Remember I told you the I and aggregates are two different things but not separate? You must know that, otherwise, you get caught in a hallucination, a wrong concept. You believe the body and mind are I, then all the worry-fear, everything. From that hallucination, wrong concept, hallucination, the ignorance, then all the fear, all the wrong, means all the fear comes.

Then, (Tibetan) then, “you call, you believe that is I, then suffering of pain, suffering of change, pervasive compounding suffering of samsara,” all the sufferings of samsara come in these three, you experience all that suffering. From beginningless rebirths up to now we have been suffering. [That] who made you suffer is the wrong concept, ignorance, believing your body and mind are I. You understand? You should know that. Due to that wrong concept you have suffered from beginningless rebirths. Then again if you don’t realize emptiness in this life, you will suffer again without end. Your wrong concept, ignorance, makes you suffer like by labeling “snake” on a piece of curled rope, then you get all the fear. But the snake you can’t find, it is not there. Like that, the hallucination. That is a very good meditation.

So the different examples how to meditate, there are many. There are many but some I don’t know. I received so many teachings, but due to laziness I didn’t study. I just give you some to meditate on. You understand? The easy ones. Then, that is your wrong concept, ignorance, that makes the suffering of three types—suffering of pain, suffering of change, pervasive compounding suffering—from beginningless rebirth, then again if you don’t realize emptiness, study emptiness, realize emptiness, two truths, [there is that] danger. Therefore, you need to study. You need to meditate. …

Read the complete transcript for this video extract.

Watch more videos from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching from the 2019 Kopan Course, the annual month-long lamrim course at Kopan Monastery in Nepal:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/kopan-2019/

Find more Lama Zopa Rinpoche Essential Extracts videos:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/essential-extracts/

During February 2021, Rinpoche is taking a break from offering his video series Teachings on Thought Transformation during the Time of COVID-19. Find links to the ninety published videos in this series as well as 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.