Breast Cancer

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Thank you for your emails, I am sorry it took so long to reply. I checked regarding your health and it is bad this year and next year, and the third year from now it is very bad.

I checked some things for you to do:

• On the Tibetan eighth [day of the month] make a drawing of White Tara. If you know an artist you can request it. This is a practice where the whole Tara image has to be completed on the Tibetan eighth day, all in one day.
• Liberate 300 animals. This can be organized at your local center, which can help with that. It is important the center follows my book [Liberating Animals] and explanation on how to do animal liberation. This includes how to set up the altar, such as putting many tsa tsas and holy items on the table that the animals are to circumambulate. After doing that and after sprinkling mantra water on them, then liberate the birds, insects and so on—as many as possible. Before liberating the animals, take them around as many holy objects as possible; take them around those holy objects many times. This creates that many causes of enlightenment for the animals and by the way, also for the people who carry the insects and other animals.
• Gyab shi puja: three times. This should be done by the monks at the Gelug gompa, Samdeling, in Boudhanath, Nepal.
• Tara Liberating from the Eight Fears: four times 
• Three long-life deity tsa tsas: 300. The three long-life deities are in one mold, and one of these is White Tara.
• Take three ngang chu pills (inner offering pills) a day for three weeks.

This is my advice for you at this time. I am also doing prayers for you.

With much love and prayers...

My most dear, most kind, precious, wish-fulfilling one,
I am very sorry for the long delay in replying to your email. I checked and there is a small benefit in taking the medication. Don’t take Tibetan medicine with it.

Recite the prayer The Dharani Called “Possessing the Attributes of All the Buddhas". Recite this well every day, in your mind thinking of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and other holy beings—for them to not take the karma. Pray for sentient beings to be healthy—those who do good things for others, who benefit others, and even for evil beings to practice, to create good karma and not create negative karma, and to have meaningful lives.

Please make your life most meaningful with the thought of bodhicitta day and night and in every action you do.

With much love and prayers...

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
Liberate three animals if you can. This depends on what kind of animal, as some animals have to be looked after and taken care of.

Read the Vajra Cutter Sutra three times, however, your motivation should be not only for yourself, but for numberless sentient beings, to purify all their defilements and negative karma. There are numberless sentient beings who especially need to recite the Vajra Cutter Sutra precisely, so read it for them.

There are many people with cancer who need the recitation of the Vajra Cutter Sutra, therefore, when you read it, think you are purifying and healing all those people who need it. Read it specifically for those with cancer, in order to heal their cancer.

Also, you need to request Tsawa khang-tsen [monastic house] to do ten recitations of the Sutra of Golden Light for you.

I am also making prayers for you.

With much love and prayers...

My most dear, most kind, most precious, wish-fulfilling one,
It comes out very good if you start reciting this sutra regularly: The Dharani Called “Possessing the Attributes of All the Buddhas". You also need to have the Prajnaparamita read by the Kopan monks. Discuss this with the Kopan manager and if you can't afford it, then it could be combined with others who also need to have it done.

Then for you the Medicine Buddha practice is best. There is a small book that has been translated into English, if you can practice that, reciting the Medicine Buddha mantra and the seven Medicine Buddha’s names, that is extremely good for success, to achieve the peerless happiness, the state of omniscient mind and then the ultimate happiness for sentient beings—to liberate the numberless sentient beings, the numberless hell beings, numberless hungry ghosts, numberless animals, numberless human beings, numberless suras, numberless asuras and numberless intermediate state beings from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them in peerless happiness. To achieve the state of omniscient mind, to achieve the total cessation of suffering and the cause of suffering, which is not outside but inside the mind—the negative mind, wrong concepts, delusions and karma—and the actions motivated by those minds. So to achieve ultimate happiness means to achieve success forever, then you don’t fall back into suffering. The causes are removed and you have totally purified all the delusion and karma, the wrong concepts, the wrong way of thinking, the unsubdued mind.

In reality, the experience of hell is produced by the wrong mind—ignorance and the wrong concepts—and the peerless happiness, the state of omniscient mind, comes from the right concept, from realizations such as compassion towards all the sentient beings and bodhicitta derived from that—to achieve the state of omniscient mind for all sentient beings. Even ultimate happiness, the cessation of suffering, comes from the totally pure mind, the inner, happy mind, the total renunciation of samsara, the opposite of attachment, as well as from the ultimate wisdom realizing emptiness, shunyata, the emptiness of the I.

From the positive mind—which means from non-anger, non-attachment and non-ignorance — from the positive mind and actions, which is Dharma, the result is happiness. From the wrong concept, ignorance of karma—not knowing what is right mind and actions and what is wrong, negative mind and negative actions—the result is suffering. We have ignorance of this, we have attachment to this life, and we have anger. So the mind which has none of these wrong thoughts is pure Dharma, pure mind, happy mind, inner happy mind and satisfied mind. From that there is the result of temporary and ultimate happiness in this life and the next life.

Even this life's problems come from the wrong concept and wrong action. This life's happiness also comes from the right concept, the correct way of thinking, and correct actions, pure actions. From that, inner happiness comes. So even this hour’s happiness, right now, if we think in a positive way, then we have happiness, but if we think in a negative way, then we have suffering. Even the person who got angry towards us in the past, who gave us harm in the past, who we regard as an enemy, maybe first we cherished that person and now we have renounced him. Maybe in the beginning we were attached and now totally the opposite.

In the beginning we thought that person was the same as a holy being, a bodhisattva or buddha, or even just a good human being, then when he gets angry with us, provokes us, harms us, or even tries to kill us, we see him as an enemy. Actually we should see him as the most kind person; this person who is our enemy is our teacher of patience, for us to learn patience. Maybe we do meditation on patience, but here, this person is our practical teacher. We can do the action meditation of patience with him, so we have the opportunity to use him and to see him as most kind—kinder than someone who gives us a hundred thousand dollars. Just giving us a hundred thousand dollars, that alone doesn't help us to be free, to have a happy death or to stop us being reincarnated in the hell realms or as a hungry ghost or animal.

If we practice patience towards the person who is angry at us, who harms us, by thinking how extremely kind he is, then we don’t get reborn in the lower realms as a hell being, hungry ghost or animal. Also the enemy actually gives us the opportunity to create the cause for good rebirth and for our next life to be born as a deva or higher. Then also that person becomes the cause to cease all of our sufferings and to achieve ultimate happiness, full enlightenment, peerless happiness for sentient beings and to be able to free the numberless sentient beings from each realm from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to omniscience, ultimate happiness and full enlightenment.

Even for non-believers, recognizing the real enemy is a great teaching, a great learning for the mind. From this we can see that if we have much influence and power in the world, then we can destroy the whole world by our wrong way of thinking. This has happened in history, with Hitler and so forth—people with much power and influence who kill many millions of people—so we can see the incredible harm that can happen from not practicing patience. If we practice patience then it subdues the anger and the violent mind that harms us and harms the world. By practicing patience, it brings happiness to ourselves and to the world, not only to our country, society, family, husband, wife and children. It brings so much happiness, then more happiness in our relationships, so they become much better, longer lasting. If we have no anger but are patient, that itself is a happy mind.

Due to the kindness of the person we call the enemy, who is teaching us patience, then we are able to give happiness to the whole world. This is unbelievably important, unbelievably important, as everybody wants happiness and does not want suffering—even the insects, even the worms, even the smallest flies.

I would like to mention this to you as an example. In America there are often many children who kill people with guns. It happens again and again, or even a normal person suddenly goes crazy and shoots many people with a gun, though he was not at all crazy before. In reality, of course, they were crazy in their view, according to Dharma practitioners, and of course they were crazy doing something like this, which is so totally wrong. They were following the wrong concept, not Dharma wisdom.

These mass killings happen from time to time in America, but the American government still does not have a really good answer as to why it happens; they still think that everybody should have guns. This is because people have self-cherishing thought; they are thinking just about their own protection, their own life, so they think to allow everybody to have guns. This is what happens all the time and now, even more and more, because it is being reported and glorified in the news, so now it seems many people do it to become famous.

If the scientists or the government or society believed in reincarnation, if they knew what the mind is, that there is continuation, that it does not stop with the body [then they would have the answer.] The body disintegrates, but the mind continues. The nature of the mind is formless, colorless and shapeless and the nature of the body is form, color and shape. The mind continues from past life; there is continuation. Before the first second that the mind took place in the mother's womb, it came from a past life.

There are so many children in the East and West, as well as old people, who through meditation, through karma, through developing the mind in the path, can remember their past lives—their own and others—and who also know future lives. It is not only Tibetan lamas who can remember their past lives.

I had one book about an American professor who went to many countries to look for people—old people and children—who could remember their past lives. He made this book of all the stories of the different people who remembered their past lives. Reincarnation is not known much at the moment, also the subject of karma—whatever we experience, good or bad, in this life is the result of past actions, past motivation, whether negative or positive.

For example, when my mother's incarnation was four years old, he was able to remember his past life family and he didn't feel shy with them, but with other people who my mother didn’t spend time with in her past life, then he felt shy. Then also the little boy, my mother's incarnation, was able to remember my mother's best friend, who was a kind person. When the little boy came to his house he was able to remember the friend’s name and he offered him wine or tea. After that, my mother's best friend grabbed the little boy, my mother's incarnation, and kept him in front of him and cried and cried and cried, because the incarnation remembered him from past life. Like that, there were also many material things the incarnation remembered from his past life, things that he looked for when he came back to Lawudo, the place where I was supposed to be in my past life, that high lamas mentioned.

Another clear story about my mother's incarnation is about a shirt my sister made for the little boy. My mother in the past had kept a small bottle of buttons, because a long time ago we regarded buttons as very precious. It was a very primitive place and in order to get buttons, also spoons, we had to get them from Kathmandu—we could not get them in the mountains, so these things were regarded as very precious. So my mother used to keep all these buttons in a jar, then my sister made a shirt using all the buttons that had been in the jar. She put them on the shirt and gave it to my mother's incarnation. The little boy immediately expressed, “These are my buttons.”

Another example was during the temple inauguration, so the incarnation offered a kata (offering scarf) to everyone who attended the inauguration, except for two people. He didn't offer to his own father or to one monk who lived at Lawudo. He didn't give the kata to his father because in the past life, my mother got very upset with him. We got water from one hermitage, a cave where an ancient great yogi had lived—that was where we got water from, only when there was not enough water at Lawudo—but the incarnation’s father had stopped the water during my mother's life. There was a pipe that went from one side of the mountain to the other, so the father put sand and rocks in the pipe and tried to block it so we couldn't get water. My mother got very upset, so that was why the incarnation didn’t give the kata to him.

The reason why he didn't give a kata to the monk who lived at Lawudo was because my mother used to tell me quietly that he was a very, very angry person. He got very heavily angry, so the little incarnation didn’t give a scarf to him either.

Then also he did exactly what my mother used to do. Whenever she went to the temple, first she would take a blessing from His Holiness the Dalai Lama's throne, then she would go to my very low throne, where I sat, then to the altar and then she would go around the temple seven times. So that is exactly what the incarnation did. He did exactly the same as my mother used to do and at the end he gave a scarf to the prayer wheel that my mother used, that I had made for my mother, then the incarnation grabbed the prayer wheel before he left.

I know there are also Western children who remember their past lives; some were great yogis in the past. There is one boy in Canada who remembers his father's reincarnation, so I know there are people who know about even other people’s reincarnations. They can remember this because of karma and through meditation. As the mind develops, we get higher and higher realizations, so there are many ways. Of course people who don't know meditation, then it is not their experience. Whatever new discovery happens, that meditators experience, we have to accept that it is possible.

For example, if people in America understood the mind, if they recognized what the mind is exactly—that it has continuation, with no beginning or end, that it can even be free from oceans of samsaric suffering and its causes, karma and delusion and wrong concepts, and can achieve the peerless happiness, the state of omniscience, and that there is no end of the mind, it always continues and also about reincarnation and karma—then they would have the answer. The answer is to practice purification of karma, which is the cause that made the little boy or the man kill many people—they appeared normal and then suddenly killed many people. So, because of reincarnation and understanding karma, there is the basis to understand the causes of the actions of body, speech and mind, whether good or bad, and then the result, happiness or suffering, and experiencing that.

Therefore we have to purify those negative actions, what was collected in the past—not only in this life, but in past lives—so we can purify, and by purifying in a perfect way we don’t have to experience the suffering result. Only then is there the ultimate answer, which is to cease the cause of the suffering by actualizing renunciation to samsara and realizing emptiness only, shunyata, the ultimate reality of the I and aggregates and so forth. Then we cease the cause of suffering—delusion and karma, the seed of delusion and karma—and we are free from the oceans of samsaric suffering forever. That is the ultimate happiness.

For example, the negative karma of killing one insect has four suffering results:

1) Ripening result, which means rebirth as a hell being, hungry ghost or animal, and suffering—for how long depends on how heavy the action of killing was. The other three suffering results we experience in the human realm.

2) Possessed result. This means the place where we reincarnate is very dirty or very dusty, a depressing place, not pleasant.

3) Experiencing the result similar to the cause. This means how we treat others, for example, if we kill [another sentient being], then we will experience something similar, so others will kill us. For example, similar to the stories I mentioned before, like the child killing people in America or a normal person suddenly killing many people. For example, we are walking and then somebody shoots us, a person that we didn't know, there is no connection from before that we have harmed this person. In this life we have never met that person but suddenly he shoots us and we die. Getting killed by others actually happens many times. By killing one tiny insect, if we don't purify that karma, then the result is to experience the result similar to the cause, so we will be killed by others for 500 lifetimes. That is the karmic result and it is possible it could even be for more than 500 lifetimes, even longer.

4) Creating the result similar to the cause, because there are imprints left from past lives. Past lives means it is not just from the life before this one, it could be from a billion, zillion, trillion, numberless eons ago. The negative imprints are left on the mental continuum by the past negative karma, so there is habituation, imprints left by negative karma on the mind. If we don’t purify these, then we will do it again in this life—even if we are born as a human being, we do the act of killing again, to other people and animals.

That is why, for example, in a family with two children, one child sees other people fighting and he cries. He doesn’t want to see other people suffering, he wants them to have harmony and peace, but the other child in the same family likes to kill insects and harm people. The children are from the same family, the same parents, but each child has a totally different personality. The real reason is not what scientists may say—the atoms in the body or whatever are the conditions, but the main cause is the continuation of the mind, which carries negative imprints. One child has more positive imprints and therefore more compassion. He doesn't want others to suffer and he wants to help, whereas the other child wants to kill and harm others, so that is because of the continuation of mind. Each mind has the continuation of past negative imprints, so this time their experience is this, they are born like this.

It is the same thing for earthquakes, tsunamis, typhoons, cyclones etc, also for many people who die every day from disease. There are new diseases that didn’t happen before, that are now appearing, and there are so many dangers happening—all of this is the result of past negative karma, having harmed others, so now others harm us or we experience harm. All of the harms definitely come from the mind, from our karma, but we can purify the mind, the negative karma, the obscurations.

There are many different methods of purification, but the best purification is generating compassion to even one sentient being, besides all sentient beings. The strongest compassion generates the strongest purification and it is a quick way to achieve all the realizations and a quick way to fulfill all the wishes for happiness now and in the future, and to achieve the omniscient mind, full enlightenment for sentient beings, so that is the best one.

Even non-believers know that generating compassion to all living beings is so important; even scientifically it is now mentioned. Doctors, I think at Harvard University, recently checked and said that those who think more of others than themselves in everyday life have less heart disease—they have healthier hearts. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has also been meeting with Buddhist and Western scientists for so many years and it seems that Western scientists have now discovered that it is definitely necessary to have compassion in order to be more healthy. [By generating compassion] less people will die of a heart attack, which is ultimately caused by anger, a violent mind, which disturbs the body. So we can see in reality how compassion brings not only health, but inner happiness and satisfaction. What makes a person happiest is compassion, also renunciation causes a satisfied mind, but even more is compassion. There are so many things to say, sorry this is becoming long.

For example, just recently in the Philippines, there was the situation due to the weather; there was so much suffering and so many people were dying. Definitely all these things, in the West they don’t know the cause, they don't know about mind, so they don't know what causes all these outside things. They call it natural phenomena or instinct, but this just means they don't know why it is caused, why something happens from its own side. They have no explanation. In Buddhism, the explanation is that it came from karma, from the mind. So we can purify that, everybody can. All suffering, even hell, is only temporary; it is not permanent, so everyone can become enlightened. No matter how much they are suffering now, it is only temporary, everything has an end.

So people who get shot, if they had purified past negative karma then they would not get shot. If the person who does the act of shooting had purified their past karma before—if they had purified well with the four opponent powers, then they wouldn't have to do the action of killing. When someone kills another and the doctors realize they are not crazy—that this is just a normal person who suddenly changed and killed someone—they don't understand why. The reason is that all these things come from the mind; it is all to do with the concept, the mind, the way of thinking. This can be very difficult to understand, to accept. Wow, wow, wow, the wrong concept is heavier than a rock, heavier than an iron mountain—the solidity to believe that there is no reincarnation and no karma.

Each individual, however many lives he takes for however many eons, has to understand Dharma, to understand karma, to understand the mind, reincarnation, all these things, and then the second thing is to practice, to change, to abandon the cause of suffering and to practice the cause of happiness, especially ultimate happiness, the cause of enlightenment. Without that, we have to suffer on and on and on; we have to experience the problems on and on and on, with no answer, no solution and on top of that, we keep creating negative karma. From beginningless rebirth and again in this life, we keep creating continuously the cause of suffering, continuing from beginningless rebirth up to now, all day and night, all the time. We keep creating negative karma all the time, constantly, with our body, speech and mind, because of not knowing the mind, not knowing reincarnation and karma, not knowing Dharma and not practicing.

So really all the people in the world are the objects of our compassion. All the people in the world, not only animals, but all these people we can see, are unbelievable, unbelievable, most precious objects of compassion.

For animals it is so difficult to explain this, and so difficult for them to understand the cause of suffering and how to stop that, but generally speaking, for people, who have human bodies, it is easy to understand—they have so much intelligence, they can check up and they can learn. But in reality, most people do not know about this, they do not know what I have been talking about. They are almost like the many worms and ants. It’s so incredible, there’s no way to explain, no opportunity.

Thank you so much. I’m very, very, very sorry I wasted so much of your time reading my long letter. Thank you very, very, very much, thank you so much, I hope you don't get angry because of my long letter. Don't get impatient. Thank you very much. If you want to say something please write, thank you.

You have a precious human body and me too, this means we are trying to enlighten each other. We are trying to help enlighten each other. Thank you so much.

With much love and prayers,

Lama Zopa

My most dear, most kind, most precious one,
I received your message that you have a recurrence of breast cancer. If possible, please try to read the Diamond Cutter Sutra three times a day for five days. This is a very, very, very powerful teaching of the Buddha and a very quick way to purify negative karma. You will understand this by reading it.

People in the world are very scared of cancer, except for those who have a very good heart and who know that they can experience the cancer for others, for all sentient beings. In reality, consciousness continues even when the body disintegrates and separates from the continuity of consciousness. So there is reincarnation. And so much of the everyday happiness and problems that we experience in our lives is the result of our past lives’ karma, or action, which is of course physical, verbal and mental. So there is a reason why everything happens.

Even a person who looks very beautiful, so beautiful, can totally change in the later part of their life and the body can become completely different and deformed. Then nothing can be changed and they have to suffer more and more and more pain. This kind of change can happen even within one life; in the early part of our life we can be very beautiful and later in life that can totally change and it can be very upsetting and disturbing. Then we think, “What have I done? I haven’t done anything negative.” It makes us think like this. So when we experience this kind of result we think that we really haven’t done any very bad negative action, but of course that’s because of ignorance, not knowing the details of karma. Whatever happens to us in this life, much of it is the result of past karma. It could even be karma that was created a million, billion, or zillion eons ago. We can’t really say, “Oh, I haven’t done this negative karma.” It could be even longer ago than that, so many eons in the past. Karma is very frightening if it’s not purified.

So one way you are thinking now to purify, to do some practice, and that’s very wise. Even if you do purification for only one day or one hour it is still worthwhile, especially if you do the purification not for yourself but for numberless sentient beings; to free them from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to full enlightenment.

This is mentioned in the Mahayana Buddhism of Tibet, which was taught by the Buddha, practiced by the great Indian yogis who achieved enlightenment and analyzed by the great pandits, such as Nagarjuna and so forth, to check whether the Buddha’s teachings were correct or not. So many of these holy beings became enlightened.

In the Mahayana teaching by Kadampa Geshe Kharag Gomchung, it says,

Even this small suffering finishes past negative karma 
And there will be happiness in the future. 
Therefore be happy with the present suffering.

This is one of the ways to transform suffering and worry into happiness by looking at it as positive. Experiencing suffering now definitely finishes past negative karma. There are more things mentioned in the teaching,

Bad conditions are the virtuous friend, 
Obstacles are a means of persuading you to practice virtue. 
Disease is the broom to clean away negative karma.

Also,

Disease is a manifestation of emptiness only, ultimate reality.

And,

Sufferings, such as disease, are the blessings of the guru to purify you.

That means the guru is purifying you especially by using suffering, obstacles, bad conditions and sicknesses. Experience these for numberless sentient beings and let them be totally free and achieve the dharmakaya. Give sentient beings all your happiness—not only temporary happiness, but also liberation from samsara, the blissful state of peace, and the peerless happiness of full enlightenment; and give them all the causes of happiness—your virtues of the past, present and future. Give this to every single sentient being: every hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human, sura, asura and intermediate state being. There are numberless beings in each realm, so give to every one of them and let them become enlightened, to become a buddha.

Especially when you use suffering for tonglen, the practice of taking and giving, and bodhicitta, this is the best healing, the best purification and the way to collect skies of merit, or good karma, the cause of happiness. This is also what pleases all the buddhas and bodhisattvas most. And even if death comes while you are doing this practice, you never get reborn in the lower realms; it is fully guaranteed that you will be reborn in a pure land.

Tonglen means dedicating your life not just for your family, not just for one hundred people, but dedicating your life for numberless sentient beings. Wow, wow, wow, wow! Dedicating your life for numberless sentient beings. Wow, wow, wow, wow! For example, there are numberless ants. There are numberless creatures in the ocean; some large like whales and others so small you can only see them through a microscope. There are numberless creatures on the ground and in the sky.

Practicing this way brings the happiest inner life and the greatest satisfaction. It is the most wish-fulfilling and quickest way to achieve full enlightenment, peerless happiness, the total cessation of all the obstacles gross and subtle, the complete realization, for sentient beings, to free every one of them from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bring them to full enlightenment. Using suffering in this way is the best way to achieve full enlightenment, the fully awakened state, for others.

Now the next thing I’m going to mention is why it is important to practice even if there is only one day or one hour left. In reality, cancer is nothing. After death if our negative karma has not been purified we will have to go to the lower realms and then it’s not sure when we will be able to come back to the human and deva realms again. We may have to experience many eons of suffering and that suffering is unimaginable. Wow, wow, wow, wow, you can’t imagine that suffering. You can’t imagine it. The suffering of the lower realms is like the sky. You can’t imagine it. People in the world have no idea of reincarnation, karma, the next life and the suffering of the lower realms that results from negative karma. They have no idea.

Therefore, doing things such as reciting the Diamond Cutter Sutra is unbelievably, unbelievably, most unbelievably powerful to purify negative karma, even if the present disease doesn’t go away immediately. So it’s unbelievably, unbelievably, unbelievably, unbelievably, unbelievably fortunate to read the Diamond Cutter Sutra. Then later you can read also once or twice a day. So continue to read the sutra. While you are reading the sutra think that the Buddha is teaching you and that you are actualizing the path within you. Also think that as you recite the words of the sutra you are teaching all the numberless sentient beings and they are actualizing the path to enlightenment. That’s very good.

Thank you very much

With much love and prayer ...

My very dear Dolma,
Read the Diamond Cutter Sutra four times. This is very good, then the knot might go away.

Your main motivation is to purify gross and subtle defilements to achieve enlightenment for sentient beings—the numberless hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, suras, asuras and intermediate state beings—and to bring them to full enlightenment.

With that motivation, read the Diamond Cutter Sutra. Think the knot has gone as you are reading the Diamond Cutter Sutra. It becomes empty. You can meditate on the emptiness of that; not so much ordinary emptiness, but meditate on the tong-pa-nyi of that.

Thank you very, very, very, very much for all that you do. I know that you did so much practice even for me. Please continue to make your life most beneficial for the sentient beings with bodhicitta as much as you can.

With much love and prayers...