Some of the 2021-2022 nyung-na retreat participants at IVY. Photo by Tsanka Petkova

Institut Vajra Yogini (IVY), France, began hosting their eleventh 108 Nyung-Na Retreat in November 2021. Despite precautions taken before the start of the retreat, and adhering to local protocols once the retreat began, in January one retreatant tested positive for the coronavirus. Then each participant became sick one by one, and the virus spread to the wider IVY community as well.

The nyung-nas were paused upon learning about the spread among retreatants. After two weeks and negative tests from all participants, the retreat began again on January 31. Only eight nyung-nas were missed during this break, and some retreatants may still complete one hundred nyung-nas during this 2021-2022 series. The continuity of this seven month series of 108 nyung-nas was not broken as one of the retreatants managed to continue the practice alone during the break. Please rejoice!

Lama Zopa Rinpoche sent the IVY community advice on how to use the virus to attain enlightenment. This is timely advice for students around the world who are still dealing with the negative effects of this pandemic: 

My most dear, most precious, treasure of Vajrayogini, Geshe Loden Rinpoche, and then my most dear, all the Vajrayogini brothers and sisters, everybody who are in the Vajrayogini mandala,

So Geshe Loden explained everyone got this very precious virus.

So I want to mention what Kadampa Geshe Khamlungpa said: Even this present little suffering, it finishes the past heavy negative karmas, and in the future will turn out happiness. Therefore rejoice, be happy that you are experiencing this suffering.

Therefore, you received the virus, so be happy—happy, hippie, not hippie, happy, hippie already years ago. I am bringing back hippie life now. 

So the benefits are incredible. By experiencing this now, it finishes so many heavy negative karmas, from so many past lives. Wow! Can you imagine from beginningless rebirth, so many heavy negative karmas? It makes to finish them, so that is the benefit.

Otherwise, you have to be in the lower realm, and for eons and eons you have to suffer in the cold hells, in the hot hells, all those major and secondary hells. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow! Can you imagine?

So this experience, this virus, it makes to finish all the past heavy negative karma. So what happens in the future is that you will be like the sun shining in the world. So, everybody, people, animals, enjoy the sun rising in the whole world. Then there will be so much happiness. From life-to-life you will go to enlightenment.  

Then, there are many other benefits from experiencing suffering. There are many other benefits, but I just mention this much.

The other most important thing you have to know is that bad and good is not outside. It is up to your mind; whatever happens in your life, bad or good, is up to your mind. Like when you change the TV channel, there is fighting, then there are people having a party, people singing, dancing, trying to show enjoying—they think it is real pleasure. Then there’s fighting, people crying, wow, wow, wow, wow, more wars. So whether it’s bad or good, it is up to the mind, how one thinks, how the mind uses the virus. So, it is like that.

So, any suffering you have, relationship problems, or anything, you use that. Like the quotation I mentioned above. Then it is positive, then having the problem is positive, that is so good.

So then of course, by cherishing I, then attachment, then you suffer—wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, suffer, suffer, suffer—it’s like that.

Then I want to mention one thing: the self-cherishing thought has been harming you. You have been following the self-cherishing thought, oneself under the control of self-cherishing from beginningless lives, not just from this birth, not from this morning, not from birth, but from beginningless rebirths. So, you’ve been cheating yourself, harming yourself from beginningless rebirth, and you’ve been suffering from beginningless rebirth in samsara.

Then again you will suffer without end. Without practicing bodhicitta, but by following the self-cherishing thought, you will suffer, and you will experience the suffering in samsara without end. So, that’s the problem.

Then not only that, you see yourself as so precious, wow, but it is so harmful. So now you think of others, the numberless sentient beings—numberless hell beings, who are so precious, like yourself; numberless hungry ghosts, who are so precious, like yourself; numberless animals, like the ants, the mosquitoes, who are so precious, like yourself; and numberless human beings, who are so precious, like yourself. Then there are the numberless suras, asuras, and intermediate state beings, who are so precious, like yourself. Wow!

Then being under the control of the self-cherishing thought, because of not practicing with bodhicitta, all the sentient beings from the six realms have been harmed, and they have been suffering in samsara from beginningless rebirth, so it already happened.

So then, if you don’t practice bodhicitta, don’t actualize bodhicitta, then you don’t meet Dharma. If you don’t meet Dharma, wow, wow, wow, then not only do you suffer in samsara without end, but then you cause the sentient beings to suffer. You harm all the sentient beings, then they suffer, numberless, without end, they suffer in samsara without end, again, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow.

Even if you cause just one sentient being like this to suffer, it is an incredible thing how bad the self-cherishing thought is, how harmful, how it is the worst enemy, wow, wow, wow, wow.

So now sentient beings are numberless. So the virus is not harming, but helping you, because the virus is destroying your self-cherishing thought; the virus is harming your self-cherishing thought. That’s what you have to know. You must recognize that.

By destroying the self-cherishing thought, then it is possible to have bodhicitta and that makes to achieve enlightenment, and then to finish all the obscurations, the mistakes, then to complete all the qualities. And then after that, you liberate the numberless sentient beings from the samsara. Wow, wow, wow, wow!

And then after that, you bring them to enlightenment. Wow, wow! So that all comes from you achieving enlightenment, all that comes from bodhicitta. Wow! 

Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Kopan Monastery, January 2022. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

So you have to look at it that way: the virus is helping you. It becomes the most precious, like a treasure, the most precious wish-granting jewel, so very precious.

In Tibetan we have 424 diseases, and then 360 spirit possessions and 84,000 interferers.

So then there’s no question about this virus. So there are all those things, which are kind of harmful, but everything is transformed. If you think in this way, then everything is supportive for you to achieve enlightenment, and there are no obstacles in your life.

Therefore, the virus is so supportive for you to achieve enlightenment by destroying the self-cherishing thought. So it is like that.

Therefore, you have no obstacles in the life. All the obstacles that you have in your life, the obstacles to practice Dharma, they all become the path to enlightenment. So, there’s no obstacles in the life. 

This is how to enjoy the sufferings, or obstacles. That is lojong, the key lojong. It is a very, very, very important lojong point. So try as much as possible, try as much as possible.

So then there are mantras to recite, but you try this, lojong. We need to achieve enlightenment for sentient beings, so we use the obstacles, we utilize them in the path to enlightenment. 

So, do lojong as much as possible because our mind is not well trained in lojong. Those who have trained well in lojong, their mind is so happy. How much suffering there is, how much suffering there is wow! So the more suffering there is, the mind is more happy, blissed out.

So since many of us are beginners, try as much as possible to develop this.

Then recite Vajra Armor mantra, Geshe Loden will know it, and it is online. Then recite Black Manjushri mantra.

Thank you very much!  See you soon.

With much love and prayers,

Lama Zopa

Colophon: Advice dictated by Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Kopan Monastery, Nepal. Transcribed by Ven. Thubten Munsel, January 21, 2022. Lightly edited by Ven. Holly Ansett and Laura Miller.

Rinpoche has offered extensive valuable advice for practices to be done during the pandemic. 

You can find more blogs with short video clips from Rinpoche’s teaching as well as the complete collection of these “Essential Extracts” videos on FPMT.org.

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.