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Lama Zopa Rinpoche News and Advice
Lama Zopa Rinpoche meeting with senior monks and nuns after arriving at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered this advice about karma in a letter to a student, recently published on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive (LYWA). He emphasized the importance of living in pure morality and of understanding the suffering of this life.
I would just like to inform you of a most important subject. When we die, the mind continues and the body separates. The consciousness continues or migrates in two ways. There is not a third way.
If the virtue collected is strong, the result is rebirth as a human or as one of the worldly gods, or rebirth in the pure land of a buddha, which has everything that is incredible, incredible and most beautiful. There we receive teachings from the Buddha and we see the Buddha. There, it is zillions and trillions of times more beautiful than the beach that people find beautiful in the world. It’s amazing, incredible. Once we are born there, for example, in Amitabha’s pure realm, we are never again born in hell, or in the hungry ghost or animal realms. In some pure realms we become a buddha, having complete cessation and all realizations, peerless happiness. That’s the most perfect, peerless happiness. If we’re really looking for happiness and wish to cause numberless beings to achieve this peerless happiness with higher wisdom, we can achieve this.
The other way is if negative karma is stronger, we are born in the lower realms, the evil-gone realms. If there is the cause, then we are born in hell or as a hungry ghost or an animal. It is called “evil-gone” because “evil” is the cause and “gone” is the result. If we are born in the lower realms, the suffering is most unbelievable, unbelievable, unbelievable, unbelievable, unbelievable. That result and why it is such a heavy result is because of karma, which is a Sanskrit word. The cause is a heavy negative action. For example, to give an idea, even if all the human beings’ fire is put together, a tiny fire spark of hell is 66 times hotter. Compared to one fire spark of hell, all the human fire put together is like an air conditioner, or a snowflake.
What is called karma in Sanskrit, is translated as action in Tibetan. … If we practice Dharma, that is how we can purify all those past lives’ karma, thus we don’t have to experience the result. Without Dharma it is not purified. Similarly, as a human, if we have met Dharma, our negativity can be purified. If not, then we cannot purify. …
Continue to read Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s explanation “Karma and Its Results,” part of the LYWA’s “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book”:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/karma-and-its-results
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, Vajrapani Institute, California, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
“[T]he whole thing about whether (service to others) becomes a burden or whether it becomes a pleasure for you, it depends on your attitude,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche taught at a May 2003 teaching at Institut Vajra Yogini in France. “Whether it becomes a burden or becomes pleasure, joy, to do this depends on your motivation. If you have taken it as a burden, with the motivation of self-centered mind, then there is nothing to enjoy in the life. With that motivation, with that kind of attitude everything becomes a burden in your mind; your mind doesn’t feel enjoyment, everything becomes suffering. Everything becomes problem. Nothing to enjoy in the life.
“But with the other motivation ‘I am here to serve others,’ in everyday life having that attitude, ‘I’m the servant for all sentient beings, all the people at the center, wherever, in the family or office, whatever, for all the people, all the rest of sentient beings, to cause them happiness.’ The loving kindness, compassion attitude, universal responsibility – the attitude which I mentioned before, so with this positive mind cherishing others, with this bodhisattvas’ view, then so much joy, and the more responsibility you have, you can see that you are beneficial. You can see you are meaningful, you see yourself as beneficial to others, you see yourself as useful for others. You see yourself, your life as a need for others. The more you take responsibility or the more you have responsibility then you see that you’re more needed by others. So you see you are more useful to others. Then there is so much in which to rejoice. So much to rejoice in.”
Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues in “Rejoice in Your Efforts,” from the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
https://www.lamayeshe.com/article/rejoice-your-efforts
Learn more about FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche and his beneficial activities by visiting Rinpoche’s homepage, where you will find links to Rinpoche’s schedule, new advice, recent video, photos and more.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the beach to do blessing for all the sentient beings in the ocean, California, October 2015. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
In 2007, Lama Zopa Rinpoche shared what he and some FPMT students did to benefit the millions of turkeys that are killed in the U.S. for Thanksgiving Day. Rinpoche has long been a proponent of vegetarianism and thanks anyone who works to reduce the amount of meat they eat. Rinpoche suggests two practices that are beneficial for our friends the turkeys.
“I made a divination as to what would be the most beneficial thing to do for the turkeys and found that Medicine Buddha puja came out best, so the Sangha at Kachoe Dechen Ling, Fabrizio Pallotti and I did an extensive Medicine Buddha puja for them.
“Another possibility could have been for us to do prostrations to the Thirty-five Buddhas, reciting these buddhas’ names with prostrations, to purify the negative karma of the turkeys and all other sentient beings, including the people who killed the turkeys, but in this case it came out better to do Medicine Buddha puja.”
From Mandala February-March 2008.
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 Kopan Monastery, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
“One thing is guru devotion. First, you do it like this, you can do like this, tsöl je kyi nyong wa, generating or developing the experience of the lam-rim – the experience of the graduated path to enlightenment – with effort. Tsöl je kyi nyong wa, [the experience] with effort, maybe, let’s see, do it for a few months. Maybe one year… Divide one year, and do one, two, or three months – whatever, you decide – on guru devotion, on the basis of the outlines. Read the commentary and on the basis of the outlines, do meditation. During those months, you go through the outlines. Whatever is not finished today, then you do it tomorrow. So you can go back again. [This is] tsöl je kyi nyong wa, developing the experience with effort,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in the module “Advice for Realizing Lam-rim,” which is part of Living in the Path, FPMT Education Services’ essential lam-rim program as taught by Rinpoche.
“So, you can divide the year. That is tsöl je kyi nyong wa, developing the experience with effort. After that, when you think, ‘Now, if I really meditate, I can get realization,’ oh, then at that time you train your mind in tsöl me kyi nyong wa, without effort, in the effortless experience…”
To learn more about Living in the Path and to study the lam-rim more in-depth, visit the program’s page on FPMT’s Online Learning Center: http://onlinelearning.fpmt.org/course/index.php?categoryid
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 Gyalwa Gyatso (Ocean of Compassion) Buddhist Center, Campbell, California, US, November 2015. Photo by Kurty Wong.
“Even if other people don’t practice the good heart, still we should practice the good heart because we want happiness and we don’t want suffering,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche taught at Kopan Monastery in Nepal in June 2011. “Even if other sentient beings don’t practice the good heart or they try to harm us, cause us loss, kill us and so forth, if we practice only the good heart from our own side – if we are kind and only benefit others with our body, speech and mind or at the very least we don’t cause harm to other sentient beings, then we will experience happiness.
“As a result of one act of kindness, the good heart, we will experience the result, happiness, for thousands of lifetimes. From that one act of kindness, benefiting someone with our body, speech and mind or at least not harming another, the result is happiness. This is the result, even if we are looking only for our own happiness.
“Generating the good heart helps all sentient beings, and at least not harming sentient beings purifies instantly our negative karmas and defilements created from beginningless rebirth and we collect unbelievable merit.”
From the advice “The Good Heart Is the Root of Happiness” published by the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive: https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/good-heart-root-happiness/.
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 on the beach in California, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
“Lama Zopa Rinpoche has been bringing it up many, many times and feels that this is extremely important: it is inevitable an earthquake will happen in California and according to Rinpoche it seems next year is quite possible. Rinpoche has checked and below are some things that need to happen as soon as possible,” Ven. Roger Kunsang wrote in an email that went out to FPMT centers, projects and services in California in early November.
“The below needs to be completed by February 2016,” he wrote:
- 1,800,000 recitations of the long Kshitigarbha mantra done as part of a Kshitigarbha practice.
- Taking the Eight Mahayana precepts 300 times.
- Performing the extensive Medicine Buddha puja – ongoing.
- Reading of the Tengyur four times – to be done at Sera Je Monastery.
“We need to accumulate 163,099 mantras weekly – 23,300 daily – by January 31 in order to meet the goal,” said Ven. Tenzin Tsomo at Land of Medicine Buddha. By Tuesday, November 17, about 8,200 long Kshitigarbha mantras have been accumulated.
Kshitigarbha
The advice was given to Bay Area students to do these practices, but Rinpoche said that students around the world can also participate with the mantra accumulation, sending in their counts. “Basically, we need a lot of people to help contribute mantras. To give you an idea, if everyone is willing to commit 21 mantras a day, we still need over 1,000 people,” Ven. Tsomo said.
FPMT Bay Area centers have created a website with more information and ways to make pledges and report mantra recitations; contribute to the Tengyur recitations; and report the taking of the Eight Mahayana precepts. For more and to participate go to:
www.pacifyearthquakes.org
Lama Zopa Rinpoche compiled a new Kshitigarbha practice that is available as a free PDF download for people to do who want to contribute their recitations of the Kshitigarbha long mantra. There is also an MP3 of Rinpoche chanting the long Kshitigarbha mantra.
Rinpoche said that the dedication for all the above practices should be to pacify all earthquakes in California, Nepal and worldwide as well as the normal FPMT dedications.
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 and FPMT via email, sign up to FPMT News.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Rio de Janiero, Brazil, September 2015. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
“The appearances of this life [are such that] we always think, ‘Oh I’m going to live for a long time’ always, even on the same day when you are going to have an accident, the same day you are going to have an accident or going to get sick with a heart attack or whatever,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in the module “Advice for Realizing Lam-rim,” which is part of Living in the Path, FPMT Education Services’ essential lam-rim program as taught by Rinpoche
“Suddenly you are going to have a heart attack, but that same day from the morning when you get up, ‘Oh, I’m going to live for many years,’ you think like that. Even five minutes before a car accident in which you die, ‘Oh, I’m going to live for many years.’ It is cheating you, the concept of permanence.
“If you meditate on the impermanence of life, then you stop thinking you will live long and following the concept of permanence, then you see life is very short. Because of that, that makes you able to practice Dharma and complete the realizations.”
To learn more about Living in the Path and to study the lam-rim more in-depth, visit the program’s page on FPMT’s Online Learning Center: http://onlinelearning.fpmt.org/course/index.php?categoryid=5
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 in Moscow, Russia, July 2015. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
“One has to continue the meditation, analytical meditation and fixed meditation, on guru devotion until one has the stable realization that one is able to see the guru as all the buddhas and able to see one buddha as all the gurus that you have, those with whom you have a Dharma connection. So one buddha is all the gurus that you have and one guru is all the buddhas that exist, you are able to see that from your side,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches as part of Living in the Path, FPMT Education Services’ essential lam-rim program as taught by Rinpoche.
To learn more about Living in the Path and to study the lam-rim more in-depth, visit the program’s page on FPMT.org: https://fpmt.org/education/programs/living-in-the-path/.
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 during a lunch at Vajrapani Institute, California, US, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
“… Today, so many of our actions – eating, walking, and sleeping – became nonvirtue. Since birth, every week, month, year, not just in this life but during beginningless rebirths up to now – there are so many negative karmas that we don’t remember, which are not only blocks to achieving realizations and enlightenment but prevent us from being able to enlighten all sentient beings,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said in a letter to a student published as the advice “Motivation for Dharma Practice” on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
“Our negative karma is harmful to all sentient beings and it also harm us, by preventing us from achieving ultimate happiness. Because our negative karma blocks realizations, we can’t achieve a good rebirth in the next life; even this life is harmed and we receive many obstacles. We must generate a very strong thought to purify them, right now, as if we have eaten poison without knowing.
“Because of that fear, without delaying even one second, we want to purify. Even just that repentance makes the karma very small; it creates powerful, perfect purification. Especially in retreat sessions, use the extensive way of looking at negative karma. Then we will want to purify everything. …”
You can read the complete advice “Motivation for Practice” in “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book” on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/motivation-dharma-practice
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 Tse Chen Ling in San Francisco, US, October 2015. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
“The minute you cherish others relaxes your life,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said during teachings at Tse Chen Ling in San Francisco October 31-November 1, 2015. “That is the best vacation, that is the best holiday with the good heart and with bodhichitta. Even if you go to the beach, to a place that is very expensive, that costs a million dollars with a swimming pool, but mind is so much ‘my, my, my, my pleasure,’ there is no holiday; you are not giving holiday to yourself. Although externally the place is very expensive, happiness is not there; real happiness – inner happiness – is not there.”
Watch “Take a Real Holiday” on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=St6SPcBFQ3c
You can watch more video clips of Lama Zopa Rinpoche on FPMT.org: https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/videos-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/
For longer videos of Rinpoche teaching, visit: http://bit.ly/rinpoche-available-now
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 having lunch at Vajrapani Institute with staff, members and others, California, US, November 2015. Photo by Ven. Sherab.
“People always advertise their goods as the best: ‘Mine is best!’ How do you decide what to choose? What are you going to believe? If you make the wrong choice, you will be cheated. You will obtain something of poor quality and lose out. The solution is, you should use your own wisdom, and learn to differentiate the qualities of the goods. It is similar in the case of religion,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche advised a Native American leader with some confusion about her tradition’s religious beliefs.
“Religion can be extremely dangerous. If you choose a mistaken path, you can be cheated for your whole life. Not only that, you are also cheated for many future lives, because you will make mistakes in this life, and how the future turns out depends on this life. Whether your future lives will be good or bad, right or wrong, depends on how you lead this life. It is extremely dangerous if you are wrong. If you are wrong, you can destroy so many future lives, and cause unfortunate rebirths and suffering in hell or animal realms. Even if you are born as a human being, you will have wrong beliefs, heresy, hallucinations, believe wrong things are right; like believing that there is no such thing as liberation, that poison is medicine, that medicine is poison, and that the right path is the wrong path and the wrong path is the right path. Then, that affects your next life. It is very dangerous, not only for yourself, but also if you lead others in wrong views. You bring so many sentient beings to suffering in the lower realms, in hell and as hungry ghosts.
“Everybody believes their religion is the best. However, it is extremely important to analyze with your own wisdom. Therefore, develop your wisdom. Buddhism is extremely beneficial. Buddhism is able to discriminate between right and wrong, not only in terms of religion, but for anything in life. If parents have Buddhist knowledge, they can judge what is right and wrong for their children. Otherwise, children engage in the causes of suffering. They get stuck in suffering and problems in this life, and also in future lives. So, it is very helpful to understand Buddhism. Even if you don’t practice it, it gives such a very clear view. When you look at other religions and can determine what is right and what is mistaken, even if you are not Buddhist, this knowledge can help a lot.
“Religion should be compassion. Anything that harms others is not good, for example, sacrificing animals. Don’t do things that harm others. If you harm others, then other sentient beings will harm you. Similarly, if you benefit others, then you will receive benefit from other sentient beings. This is the law of nature, like when you plant a seed and it grows up to be a tree with branches and fruit. You can practice another religion, but don’t harm others.
“You can teach your people about wisdom and the good heart. You can pass on your knowledge and wisdom to others, about compassion and positive attitudes that help you to do good for others. This way, they will experience so much happiness in this life and future lives as a result of their positive actions, which is good karma.
“Religion is for happiness, not suffering. What brings happiness and peace in one’s life and in the lives of others: these are the real religions.”
From “Dangers of Religion,” an advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche posted on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive: https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/dangers-religion
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 Ven. Gyalten Yanchen at Land of Medicine Buddha, California, October 2015. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche has given advice to many students who have cancer and are preparing for death. Here is an excerpt from a letter title, “Prepare for Death Everyday”:
… Also, if you can, chant these verses from the Guru Puja, practice this meditation and tong-len prayer:
Tong-len: Meditation on taking and giving
LC 95: And thus, venerable, compassionate gurus,
I seek your blessings that all karmic debts, obstacles, and
sufferings of mother beings
May without exception ripen upon me right now,
And that I may give my happiness and virtue to others
And, thereby, invest all beings in bliss.
Actually, this is the best Dharma gift, the best protection from delusion, the best protection from the terrifying lower realms, where there is so much unbelievable suffering. In this meditation, you take on all the sufferings of all mother sentient beings, as well as all one’s own sufferings, on oneself, then let all sentient beings have the state of no-death, enlightenment, the cessation of all sufferings. Then, one asks for all happiness, including enlightenment, all merit, to ripen on all sentient beings.
This practice should be entered into the Olympics. If you win, then at the time of death you go to the pure land, instead of being reborn in the impure world, where we are now, or the lower realms. This would be the best Olympic game. Dying with tong-len (bodhicitta) is the best Olympic game. …
Excerpted from “Prepare for Death Everyday” by Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive: https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/prepare-death-every-day
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.