Lama Zopa Rinpoche News and Advice

Lama Zopa Rinpoche and crew of the MV Brigitte Bardot, a trimaran belonging to the conservation organization Sea Shepherd. Rinpoche blessed marine animals from the boat’s deck, Italy, October 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsand Sherab.

When discussing global problems, Lama Zopa Rinpoche emphasizes how we must identify the mind as the source of our problems. From an article in the new issue of Mandala, Rinpoche and other Buddhist teachers explain the only way to address our collective challenges is through the transformation of our minds. 

“It’s called ‘natural disaster,’ but it’s not natural. It comes from the mind,” Rinpoche told representatives of the Foundation for Developing Compassion and Wisdom in an interview in Bodhgaya, India, in December 2011.

“It comes from the minds of people, the minds of the beings who are living in this world. Whatever they experience, good or bad, comes from their minds. Their good experiences come from their good minds, good hearts. The bad experiences come from their bad minds, bad hearts. It’s so simple. It’s not natural. In other words, it comes from lendre. ‘Le‘ is the ‘action,’ ‘dre‘ is ‘result.’ Action, effect, action, effect. Effect comes through the action. After the action, then there’s the effect. Good and bad depend on whether the action is bad or good.”

What Rinpoche and others Buddhist teachers, like His Holiness the Dalai Lama, consistently point out is that in order to address the world’s difficulties, from the Buddhist perspective, we must look first at our own individual minds. An understanding of how our minds work is critical to taking correct action to create the causes and conditions for resolving global problems. This understanding of the mind is revealed through studying and reflecting on the teachings of the Buddha and through the guidance of qualified teachers. 

You can read online the entire article “Changing the Mind, Changing the World: The Mind, Karma, and Global Change,” from Mandala January-June 2018:
https://fpmt.org/mandala/archives/mandala-for-2018/january-june/changing-the-mind-changing-the-world-the-mind-karma-and-global-change/

Watch complete teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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 charity to ants, New Mexico, 2017. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Even one small act of charity leads to happiness and success in future lives, and eventually it leads to enlightenment, Lama Zopa Rinpoche explains in a video clip from the 2016 Light of the Path retreat. “You have to know that. Keep it in your mind,” Rinpoche says. “Keep it in your heart; write it down.”

Because karma is expandable, Rinpoche explains, even if you do something small or simple, such as helping an insect or offering an old person a seat, that positive act will result in success over hundreds, thousands, of life times. Rinpoche also emphasizes how karma never gets lost. So the results of your positive actions will definitely be experienced. Rinpoche points out how necessary merit, positive karma, is for success and for achieving ultimate happiness and liberation.

Watch the video “Without Merit Nothing Works”: 
https://youtu.be/7VjbLKQG0Po

The nature of samsara is impermanence and the suffering that comes with it, Rinpoche teaches in this video clip. Relationships are changing. The best friend becomes an enemy. Because of attachment you are suffering so much. Why? Because you did not realize the Four Noble Truths in the last life. If you are actualizing the path, then you are free from the ocean of samsara. If you follow delusions and karma, if you follow attachment, then you torture yourself. Therefore, Rinpoche explains, you have to help others, who are in the same situation. This is why it’s so important to meditate on kindness and bodhichitta.

Watch more video from the 2016 Light of the Path Retreat and find links to translations, MP3s, and the complete transcript:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2016/

Watch complete teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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 arriving at the teaching venue, 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat, Italy, October 2017. Photo by Piero Sirianni.

During the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy, Lama Zopa Rinpoche addressed a question on uniting politics and Dharma. Rinpoche’s answer, captured in the video clip below from the October 28 teaching, first shares the story of two Tibetans who offered service to His Holiness translating newspaper stories. They told Rinpoche they wanted to practice Dharma. However Rinpoche saw their translation activities as Dharma, because Rinpoche recognized that they were serving the Guru and that that is Dharma. 

Rinpoche then discusses the different kinds of motivation one can have when engaging in Dharma, emphasizing the motivation of “compassion to all sentient beings. On the basis of that [motivation], free the sentient beings from oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to peerless happiness, cessation of obscurations, completion of realizations; bring them there by oneself; then oneself to achieve enlightenment for that reason, as a method; then with this bodhichitta everything becomes cause of enlightenment, not only listening to Dharma, reflecting, meditating, everything, eating, walking, sitting, sleeping, doing job, everything.”

Rinpoche concludes that in order to have unity of politics and Dharma, one must first know Dharma. And that having the pure mind of bodhichitta is the best way to run the government. 

“This is the best way to run the government, with bodhichitta. You are like the servant; all sentient beings are the master,” Rinpoche says. “You are the servant. You serve the sentient beings. You are there for them, not they are there for you. Like that, your motivation is so pure, so there are not the problems [that we see happening] in the world.”

Watch Rinpoche teach on politics and Dharma:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pF5EHIIDP6s

Watch more video from the 100 Million Mani Retreat 2017 in Italy and find links to translations, MP3s, and the complete transcript:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/

Watch complete teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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 with his dorje and bell, Buddha Amitabha Pure Land, Washington, US, September 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

During the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy, Lama Zopa Rinpoche talked about how to think when ringing the bell when doing Vajrasattva mantra. In this six-minute video clip from the October 20 teaching, Rinpoches notes that the vajra symbolizes method and the bell, wisdom. He explains how wisdom and method relate to each other in tantra and how the vajra and bell should be held together, not one by one. He then talks about the meaning of the bell sound.

“… So the bell sound means no phenomenon has true existence. No phenomenon has true existence, no phenomenon exists from its own side, by itself, or real. It appeared to our hallucinated mind, what is projected by ignorance, so then we from beginningless rebirths, we one hundred percent we believe, we grasp. So that is the basis of all the delusions, all the delusions, all the suffering. It is the basis of anger and attachment, all the delusions, then all suffering,” Rinpoche teaches. 

“… That means that all phenomena are empty from their own side. Like that. That is because all phenomena exist in mere name. When you recite Vajrasattva, it is not offering, it is to remind you of emptiness. In emptiness, when you ring the bell, in emptiness there is no real I. In emptiness there is no real action. In emptiness there is no real object. You ring the bell and meditate on that. So that becomes very powerful purification.”

Watch “What to think when ringing the bell and reciting Vajrasattva mantra”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fI8Eq7wD4xA

Watch more video from the 100 Million Mani Retreat 2017 in Italy and find links to translations, MP3s, and the complete transcript:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/

Watch complete teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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.

Young monks on Lama Tsongkhapa day, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, December 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

At the beginning of the 100 Million Mani Mantra Retreat in Italy in October, Lama Zopa Rinpoche talked about the need to be free from all suffering—the suffering of pain, the suffering of change, and pervasive compounding suffering—in order to achieve ultimate happiness and liberation. But, this is not enough for us, Rinpoche explained. The purpose of being born human is not to be free from suffering ourselves; the purpose of our human life is to benefit all sentient beings, to free them from all suffering and bring them to peerless happiness, total cessation of obscurations, and completion of realizations. 

In this short video clip taken from the October 6, 2017 teaching, Rinpoche talks about this main aim of human life, of the retreat, … of everything.

Watch the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAV-gvchhjw

Watch more video from the 100 Million Mani Retreat 2017 in Italy and find links to translations, MP3s, and the complete transcript:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/100-million-mani-mantra-retreat-2017/

Watch complete teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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 Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

While it may seem that there are many things we can do with our lives, Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches that there is only one thing to do that is meaningful, which is to practice Dharma. From beginningless time, Rinpoche explains, we have had numberless samsaric rebirths. We’ve been experiencing the suffering of samsara since beginningless time, and there’s nothing new that we haven’t already done or thought. When we see it like this, Rinpoche says, the decision to practice Dharma is very simple.

Rinpoche gives this powerful advice in a five-minute video clip taken from Rinpoche’s teachings at the Light of the Path retreat in 2016.

Watch “Just One Decision in Life: Practice Dharma”:
https://youtu.be/cMoyfOMLOa0

Watch more video from the 2016 Light of the Path Retreat and find links to translations, MP3s, and the complete transcript:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2016/

Watch teachings from Lama Zopa Rinpoche from around the world:
https://fpmt.org/RinpocheNow

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 at long life puja, Kopan Monastery, December 14, 2017. Photo by Bill Kane.

A long life puja was offered to Lama Zopa Rinpoche on Thursday, December 14, on behalf of the entire FPMT organization. Kopan monks, nuns, and November course students filled the main gompa at Kopan for the puja, which was also broadcast live over the internet. The long life puja came at the end of the fiftieth month-long lamrim course with teachings by Rinpoche at Kopan.

Umze Geshe Sherab leading the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, December 2017. Photo by Bill Kane.

At the end of the long life puja, Ven. Roger Kunsang, CEO of FPMT and assistant to Rinpoche, gave a special thanks to Rinpoche on behalf of all the students for teaching fifty of these courses. Ven. Roger also recognized how the courses have resulted in the establishment of FPMT Dharma centers in 39 countries. He also thanked Rinpoche for “the many, many more lamrim courses and teachings to come.” Rinpoche was then presented with a large Buddha statue and thangka.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with the statue offered to him at the end of the long life puja, Kopan Monastery, December 2017. Photo by Bill Kane.

This year, Australian nun Ven. Ailsa Cameron, a long-time Dharma editor and teacher, was appointed by Rinpoche to lead the course. Each year more than two hundred students come from around the world to attend. 

Vens. Karin Valham and Ailsa Cameron during the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, December 2017. Photo by Bill Kane.

Watch the video recording of the puja

You can find video recordings of Rinpoche’s teachings from the 2017 November course here:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/lama-zopa-rinpoche-teachings-in-kopan-2017/

Offering for Lama Zopa Rinpoche during long life puja, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, December 2017. Photo by Bill Kane.

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 seated on the throne in front of a large statue of Lama Tsongkhapa, celebrating Losar with Kopan monks, Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche described the special qualities of Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings in a 2010 letter to a student. Lama Tsongkhapa was a great Tibetan Buddhist scholar, saint, and teacher of the fourteenth century who founded the Gelug school. 

“Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings have everything to achieve full enlightenment. Especially clear are the most important points of sutra and tantra,” Rinpoche explained. “With Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings, there is clear understanding, easy, quick realizations, and one makes less mistakes. You should know that you are extremely fortunate to meet Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings and practice them. It is extremely important to practice Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga. This way you will be able to meet Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings in future lives.”

He emphasized a key feature of the teachings: “Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings have unified sutra and tantra. … It is only with tantra that you can become enlightened in one lifetime.”

And he concluded by saying that, “To meet Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings is extremely difficult.”

Statue of Lama Tsongkhapa at Buddha Amitabha Pure Land, Washington State, US, June 2015. Photo by Chris Majors.

This year Lama Tsongkhapa Day is December 12. Find resources and information about merit making while celebrating the parinirvana of Lama Tsongkhapa:
https://fpmt.org/edu-news/make-merit-on-lama-tsongkhapa-day-december-12/

Read the full letter from Rinpoche here:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/lama-tsongkhapas-teachings

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 a horse at Aquila Nera sanctuary, Italy, October 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Wherever Lama Zopa Rinpoche travels, he takes time to bless animals. Zarina Osmonalieva, a devoted student of Rinpoche, has put together a short video of Rinpoche doing animal blessings around the world, including in Russia, India, Nepal, the US, and many other places.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche blessing animals:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bY4lgj-FvZE

You can read more stories about Rinpoche blessing animals or sign up to receive FPMT News, which has frequent stories of animal blessings, in your email daily.

Benefiting animals is one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Vast Visions for FPMT. Read about it here:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/vast-vision/#animal
and: https://fpmt.org/tag/animals/

Get Liberating Animals from the Danger of Death as an e-book or in a print copy from the Foundation Store and support FPMT International Office: 
https://shop.fpmt.org/Liberating-Animals-eBook_p_2334.html.

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 Course, November 2016. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

The 2017 Kopan Course, taking place at Kopan Monastery in Nepal now through December 14, is the fiftieth lamrim course offered at the monastery. More than two hundred new and seasoned students of Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche attend the course. This is an incredible achievement and milestone for the FPMT organization to consistently offer this month-long course every year.

For the first time in the history of this course—Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s precious lamrim teachings are now being streamed on video live! All are welcome to watch these teachings, which take place at approximately 3:30 p.m. local Nepal time (GMT+5:45). Due to various factors, the start time for the teachings is flexible. Additionally, the internet connection in Nepal is not always stable. However, the media team there is doing the best they can to broadcast these incredible teachings live to students around the world. Recorded video of Rinpoche’s teachings from Kopan are also available.

On Tuesday, December 5, Rinpoche taught beautifully on why the Kopan Course is so important to attend.

“The reason to come to Kopan is to pacify the negative mind that brings all the sufferings. What you are doing, learning and meditating, is the most important thing in your life. A billion, zillion, trillion thanks to you for coming here to do the course—coming here to discover this Dharma, to discover what is unknown before, that you didn’t know how to live life. You were born a human being, but didn’t know how to live your life,” Rinpoche said.

“So it is really of the utmost importance, you coming here to learn not just meditation but lamrim, lamrim meditation. … Only then, you can understand how to live life, how in the past how you live, and how you should live now, in a positive way to benefit not only yourself but all the numberless beings. So I want to say, your coming to Kopan to do meditation course, oh, this is the best! If you want to help the world, to bring peace, your coming here is the best. Your coming here to do the meditation course, to learn, that is the best. You have to bring peace in the world by your mind, by your good heart. You yourself have to have a good heart to bring perfect peace and happiness in the world. That is the best.”

Watch the video recording of this teaching on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tDVHE4mTwo

Livestream of these teachings can be found here when available and the livestream with transcript overlay is available here. Please read how to be notified when a live teaching starts so you don’t miss any opportunity. Italian-speaking students are also invited to enjoy the teachings translated into Italian.

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.

Watch Rinpoche teach live and information on how to be notified when a teaching starts:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/lama-zopa-rinpoche-live/

Video recordings of Lama Zopa Rinpoche teachings from around the world can be found here:
http://FPMT.org/RinpocheNow

Kopan Monastery celebrates Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s birthday, Nepal, December 3, 2017. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

All of Kopan wished Lama Zopa Rinpoche a happy birthday on Sunday, December 3. Monks, nuns, and international students attending the annual November course all celebrated the auspicious occasion in a joyous gathering outside Kopan’s main gompa.

Many offerings were made to Rinpoche: mandala offerings, young monks singing praises to Rinpoche, and a beautiful cake decorated with fresh fruit. Also, Sherpas came and offered a dance. This year marks Rinpoche’s 73rd Tibetan birthday (72nd Western birthday). Rinpoche said it was a “very hippy birthday.” 

A body, speech, and mind mandala offering for Rinpoche, Kopan Monastery, December 3, 2017. Photo courtesy of Kopan Monastery School on Facebook.

Rinpoche’s birthday was celebrated in many places around the world. Root Institute in Bodhgaya sent the message: “Celebrating Rinpoche’s birthday at the Bodhgaya Mahabodhi Stupa, dedicating the recitation of the Vajra Cutter Sutra and other prayers for His long, healthy, and stable life. We also celebrated with brownies at our community lunch!!!” Tara Children’s Project, which is a project of Root, sent a video of the children singing “Happy Birthday” and thanked Rinpoche for his kindness and compassion, and requested he come visit their school soon.

Young monks singing for Rinpoche’s birthday, Kopan Monastery, December 3, 2017. Photo courtesy of Kopan Monastery School on Facebook.

Rinpoche recently arrived at Kopan Monastery in Nepal. He will give teachings during the 50th November course, which runs through December 14 this year. The month-long Kopan lamrim course began in the early 1970s and each year is attended by more than two hundred students from around the world. There will be a long life puja offered to Rinpoche on behalf of the entire FPMT organization on December 14.

Rinpoche traveled to Kopan from India after giving a Most Secret Hayagriva transmission at Sera Je Monastery and a Golden Light Sutra transmission in Delhi. 

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 and Lama Yeshe in Geneva, Switzerland, 1983. Photo by Ueli Minder, courtesy of Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.

“The happiness we desire, the suffering we do not want, the happiness we try to get, the suffering we try to eliminate all come from the mind—not from somebody else’s mind but from our own,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche instructs in a multimedia teaching “Finding Peace in Everyday Life,” published by Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive in October.

Rinpoche continues, “For example, how does the everyday, unwanted suffering that we try to prevent come from our own mind? It arises because our mind is not under our control; we’re under the control of our mind, which in turn is under the control of our disturbing thoughts. This is the mistake we make. We allow our mind to be controlled by the inner enemy; we offer the victory to the disturbing thoughts, we always give liberation to the disturbing thoughts—ignorance, dissatisfaction, anger, and selfishness. Instead of defeating and trying to get freedom from them, we give them complete freedom and take defeat upon ourselves. That’s the whole problem. That’s it. That’s our everyday life.”

The Archive’s multimedia teachings include text, video, archive photos, and links to additional resources.

“Finding Peace in Everyday Life” is a teaching given by Lama Zopa Rinpoche in Geneva, Swizterland, in 1983 and was originally published in the Archive’s free book Life, Death and After Death. Find the entire multimedia teaching at:
http://multimedia.lamayeshe.com/finding-peace-in-everyday-life

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.