Daily Practice Advice

Dear Tony,

• Three months of lamrim meditation on the graduated path of the lower being
• One month on the middle graduated path
• Six months on bodhicitta
• One month on emptiness
• Guru devotion every day
• Yamantaka
• Tara Cittamani

After finishing one round, train the mind on each topic from precious human rebirth, no matter how many months it takes, until you have actualized stable realization. Whichever realization you don’t have, do that meditation again. Continuous meditation on the lamrim is extremely important. Even if you don’t do it for many hours, you are developing your mind on the path, so each year the mind gets better and better.

If you have time, do a retreat each year. Sometimes it can be preliminary practice with lamrim or lamrim with deity retreat. Whichever feel stronger, meditate on that.

If you haven’t received a great initiation, in future try to receive initiation and commentary and do a retreat. This is the preparation to achieve the tantric path, because it plants the seed or imprint to achieve enlightenment quicker. You can do a short retreat, but later do a three-year retreat if you can.

I conclude your preliminary practice for lamrim realization and tantra, with nyung nä practice. Plan to do 300 nyung näs in your life. Without mentioning other preliminary practices, if you can do 300 nyung näs that would be excellent. Even just one nyung nä is extremely powerful and you won’t go to the lower realms.

Before you go bed, do Vajrasattva practice.

In the morning, do prostrations, reciting the Thirty-five Buddhas' names. At the end of the prostrations, do the confession prayer. This creates unbelievable merit and is the most powerful purification.

Also do Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga with lamrim meditation.

With love and prayer...

My very dear one,
I was very happy to receive your letter. I’m sorry it took many eons to reply.

Please try to practice like this:

30,000 tonglen practice by reciting the verse in Lama Chöpa or Nagarjuna’s prayer: “May whatever suffering sentient beings have, ripen on me. May whatever happiness I have, ripen on other sentient beings.” The counting is not to do with the prayer, but mainly to do with the meditation.

Regarding lamrim, please focus on these subjects for this amount of time:

• Two months: lower path
• Four months: middle path
• Four months: bodhicitta
• Two months: emptiness

Do this three times, training your mind in guru devotion every day. The length of time you do it is up to you. Also do some meditation on emptiness every day. Before you die, try to have realization of guru devotion, renunciation, bodhicitta and right view. If not all four, then three, two or one.

Train your mind on the lamrim subjects one-by-one, starting with perfect human rebirth, no matter how many months it takes, until you achieve stable realization.

I’m not sure which deity was chosen in the past, perhaps by another lama, but my suggestion is Heruka Five-Deity. Spend more time on the lamrim, until you actualize bodhicitta. First generate renunciation for this life and future lives, then you must actualize bodhicitta. Then spend more time in the generation and then completion stage tantric practice. Practice the sadhanas to train your mind in the tantric path, whatever commitments you had in the past. If you don’t have time to do the long sadhanas, do the short ones, but try to do the long sadhana of your main deity.

There’s the generation stage, then the completion stage. You might be able to do the Six Yogas of Naropa in relation to Heruka practice, but without renunciation and bodhicitta, even though you might have some experiences, you can’t complete the path. The best is to actualize bodhicitta. Do everything with a bodhicitta motivation, living your life with that, not only during meditation sessions.

It’s very good to do Vajrasattva and prostrations by reciting the Thirty-Five Buddhas’ names. Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand has more explanation on the preliminary practices.

Do guru devotion meditation on the basis of Lama Chöpa or Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga. Make offerings and do prostrations, then start the day with Lama Chöpa. Or you can do Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga in the evening.

It’s good to recite the King of Prayers at the end of the day; this is unbelievable in purifying even the heavy negative karmas that result in rebirth in hell without interruption of another life. The five uninterrupted negative karmas are: having killed one’s mother, father or an arhat, drawn blood from the Buddha or caused disunity among the Sangha, in this life and in past lives. With the King of Prayers, it’s easy to be born in the Amitabha pure land when we die.

Do good dedication at the end of the day, right after your practice.

“Due to all the three-time merits collected by me and by buddhas, bodhisattvas and all other sentient beings, may I, my family and all sentient beings generate bodhicitta, and may those who have developed it, increase it.”

“Due to the all the three-time merits collected by me, and by buddhas, bodhisattvas and all other sentient beings, which are empty, may the I, who is empty, achieve one’s deity’s enlightenment, which is empty, and lead all sentient beings, who are empty, to that deity’s enlightenment, which is empty, by myself alone, who is also empty from its own side.”

So that’s it. It’s most important to make every activity Dharma —eating, walking, sleeping and working. Make every activity not only Dharma, but also the cause of enlightenment. As much as possible, attempt to do everything with a bodhicitta motivation; not only your meditation and prayers.

Reading Lama Tsongkhapa’s Middle-Length Lamrim, Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand or other lamrim texts is very good. Reading and thinking about the Bodhicaryavatara is also very, very good, very helpful.

With much love and prayers...

Dear one,
Reading all of the Diamond Cutter Sutra every day would be very good, but if you cannot finish it, read some every day. You will collect unbelievable merit and purification and be able to realize emptiness and attain enlightenment, with the motivation to liberate and lead all sentient beings to enlightenment.

It comes out good for you to do all three—meditation, study and service—but, of course, you need to meditate on the lamrim all the time.

Concerning the lamrim meditation sections and times, work through them for months and years (not just hours or days) until you have realizations that are stable. If you do not gain the realization, practice the meditations again and again until you generate renunciation of this life and future lives, and bodhicitta. The three go together like that. However, do a little meditation on emptiness every day, even if it is only five minutes, so that before you die, you will have the realization.

Guru yoga meditation is the root of the path, and you need to gain a realization that is stable for months and years, seeing all the gurus as Buddha and all the buddhas as the guru. How much meditation you do is up to you. Then work to generate the three realizations—renunciation of this life and future lives, and bodhicitta. Depending on how much you can realize bodhicitta, you will gain lots of imprints.

Do the preliminary practices with the lamrim as your motivation. When you are doing lamrim retreat, also do the preliminary practices. In the morning do Guru Puja, refuge, bodhicitta, the four immeasurables, the seven-limb practice and the short mandala offering. Do all these practices with meditation, not just prayer. Think: “I and all sentient beings up until now are suffering because we have no realizations, and in the future it will be the same. Therefore, I will do lamrim meditation for suffering sentient beings generally, then for the beings in each of the realms. This lamrim meditation subject (that I am going to meditate on) is for gaining enlightenment, for the benefit of all my kind mother sentient beings.”

Even when doing a deity retreat, you also need to do lamrim meditation, prostrations, etc, at that time.

My very dear Lawrence,
I am very, very sorry for the many eons of delay in replying to your sincere letter. Thank you very much for your kind letter. I have cut down some of your mantras and practices (see the attached letter).

You must be a very sincere person, doing so many prayers so carefully. Now, maybe you don’t have as much energy for so many prayers because you have been doing them for such a long time and maybe you have lost some of the energy to do them.

Maybe you need more lamrim meditation. Perhaps you are doing many prayers and mantras that were not given as a commitment by a lama. If so, you can stop any of those for which you do not have a commitment. Some of your practices are specifically for success in a project or job, or whatever you wish, so you don’t need to do those all the time—just do them when you particularly need success. If you do more meditation, you can cut down on those practices that were not your guru’s advice, unless it’s something you need for success of your projects.

The most important thing is to take time to meditate on the lamrim, so, please try to do that. If you can, focus for two months on guru devotion, so this means spending a little time each day mainly focusing on guru devotion. Please follow the outline in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand. In this way, go through the whole lamrim and then start again from the beginning, over and over, until you attain realizations. For guru devotion, this means seeing one guru as all the buddhas and one buddha as all your gurus. When you have a stable realization, it is not just for one hour, or one day and then it disappears. Until you have realizations you have to keep going through the lamrim. Even when you have realizations, you still need to meditate on guru devotion a little each day, but not as much as before, to keep the realization stable.

Follow the outline in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, from the perfect human rebirth up to karma, for eight months. Try to attain any or all of the realizations by meditating step-by-step, and going back again and again, up to karma, following the outline and also reading the commentaries, such as the Lamrim Chenmo. Also do the following:

• Middle path: seven months
• Bodhicitta: eight months
• Emptiness: five months

This means for that number of months you follow the outline on that subject.

When you are focusing on emptiness use different prayers, such as the Heart Sutra, and go back again and again. After you attain a realization, then move on to the next outline.

Practicing lamrim meditation doesn’t mean just sitting down on your seat, it can be when you are outside walking around. It doesn’t have to be just when you are sitting in your room.

Try to attain some realizations. This is the best, most fulfilling, most meaningful thing. After you have bodhicitta realizations, then you can try the two stages of tantra. Whatever lamrim realization you have, then move on to the next one. If you don’t have any realizations, then keep going back, circling through. Please try practicing in this way.

With much love and prayers... 

My dearest Chris,
Thank you very much for all your wonderful letters, past and present. I could have put them together like the Kangyur, hundreds of Buddha’s texts, but the thought didn't come to me before. They could have been written out in gold and silver and put in the highest place.

I still remember and enjoy your company and your good knowledge of English. I wish you knew Tibetan like that. Then you could teach it to the people in America.

Every day, in the morning, when you begin the day, please remember emptiness. Everything is empty: I, action, and object. You can recite the Heart Sutra and the quotations below.

If you can, remember them in your daily life again and again. When you open the door, when the day begins, while seeing the reality of phenomena or the reality of life, recite and meditate on the meaning of these words.

These are Buddha's words from the Sutra of the King of Concentration:

As in the clear sky, the moon rises,
the reflection appears in the ocean,
but there is no transfer of the moon into the water:
All phenomena should be known to be of that nature.

The magician transforms the forms
Of various phenomena, like a horse carriage and an elephant,
but there is nothing there as it appears:
All phenomena should be known to be like that.

Exactly as when following sexual pleasure in a dream,
after the person wakes up, they cannot see it,
like an immature person who is extremely attached to sexual pleasures:
All phenomena should be known like that.

Exactly as in the dream of a young girl
Of giving birth to a son who died,
so happy to have given birth, but unhappy that he died:
All phenomena should be known like that.

Exactly like the nighttime moon
that appears in the water, calm and clear,
but the moon on the water is empty, you cannot catch it:
All phenomena should be known like that.

Exactly as at noon in autumn,
people tormented with thirst
see a mirage as water:
All phenomena should be known like this.

A mirage has no water.
Sentient beings are dying of thirst and desire to drink
but are unable to drink that water, which does not exist:
All phenomena should be known like that.

Exactly like the water tree:
even if a person wishes to take the essence from it,
a person splits that tree, there is no essence at all, no nectar inside or outside:
All phenomena should be known like that.

Also, it is good if you can recite the verses in the Thirty-Seven Practices of the Bodhisattva on emptiness, by the bodhisattva Thogme Zangpo.

Various sufferings appear in hallucinations, like a son who dies in a dream:
by holding it to be true, one suffers.
Therefore, when you encounter disharmonious conditions (that is, conditions not according to your wish, unfavorable conditions)
Looking at them as an illusion is the practice of the son of the bodhisattvas.

You are a very philosophical person. I am sure I don't need to explain this to you. I am sure your mind is always this way, but I will explain it anyway.

The way to meditate on the first stanza is this: The meaning is that ignorance leaves imprints, that are impure, on the mental continuum. Like the moon reflecting on the ocean, those imprints project hallucinated appearances, truly existent appearances. They project all the hallucinations that appear, appearing as truly existent, on the merely labeled phenomena—I, action, object, happiness, suffering, virtue, non-virtue—whatever exists.

Including the mind as well as its object—the perceiver/knower, or mind, and its object—these look or appear like they are there, but they are not there. A truly existent real knower or perceiver, the mind and object, look like they are there, but they are not there.

In reality, everything is empty. Therefore, in reality all that is appearing as real is appearances, but is totally non-existent, empty.

All that appears to be real, inherently existent, in our daily life, this inherently existent phenomenon or real phenomenon, is totally non-existent. The way phenomena appear should be understood as non-existent, totally non-existent.

Therefore, all phenomena—I, action, object—all phenomena that exist are empty. They are empty from their own side. They are empty from their own side because all these phenomena exist by being merely labeled.

For the rest of the stanzas, you can get the basic idea from this explanation. Then all day you can laugh about your own life, your own beliefs, own fears, and grasping. You can laugh even when you are alone in your room. You can laugh twenty-four hours a day about your own life. You can laugh in the kitchen making tea. You can laugh in the shop. You can laugh in your bedroom, when you’re asleep, everywhere. You can laugh when you feel depressed. You can laugh when you feel excited.

The second part is thought transformation, how to meditate on emptiness during the meditation break and to look at all phenomena during break times like a dream. That means looking at the object of the knower as empty—not true: empty. Examining the nature of unborn wisdom—that is wisdom meditating on the emptiness of that—free even of the remedy itself.

Even the remedy, even emptiness itself, has no inherent existence, it is free of that. Look at emptiness itself as empty of inherent existence. This could also be related to the self, the person, the meditator, to oneself, as also empty.

Place the mind in the state of the base, which is the essence of the path. In the break time, be the illusory person.

This is what you should apply when you think that women are pursuing you. You should use these things to practice Dharma, to meditate on emptiness, and to achieve realizations on emptiness. That means you are using this situation of harm and negativity to achieve liberation from samsara for yourself, and to achieve enlightenment for all sentient beings. Why? Because realizing emptiness is the only thing that can directly cut through the two defilements, gross and subtle.

The next thing is you should apply all these conditions to develop bodhicitta.

There are multiple sentient beings that are suffering, with so many problems. Think: “I will take all those sufferings on myself, as well as their causes.” Practice the visualization from time to time during the day. Every time the thought of problems comes, think, “I am experiencing these problems, this harm, on behalf of all sentient beings, to lead them to all happiness up to enlightenment.”

This way you are using unfavorable situations—sicknesses, harm, being criticized, being put down, even death—to achieve enlightenment. You are using these unfavorable situations, sickness, people trying to harm you, whatever you believe is happening, including death, to liberate countless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and to bring them to enlightenment. You are also using unfavorable situations to purify so much negative karma and collect vast amounts of merit.

Listening to teachings on emptiness collects more merit than listening to teachings on the other five paramitas (charity, morality, so forth) for ten eons. Explaining teachings on emptiness collects far greater merit than teaching the other five paramitas for ten eons. Meditating on emptiness for one second collects more merit than explaining teachings on emptiness for ten eons.

So, however much merit you collect, there is also an incredible amount of purification. There is no question about bodhicitta. The infinite merit you collect can be unbelievably powerful purification, as you know from the benefits of bodhicitta in the lamrim and in A Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life (Shantideva), in the first chapter.

So, make your life the best through unfavorable situations. This is the best protection and most useful.

Take care of your life with these two practices: meditating on emptiness and bodhicitta. These are the fundamentals of tantra.

With much love and prayer,

Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Dear one,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. I am sending you some information on which practices are best for your quickest enlightenment.

Regarding the five recitations of the Diamond Cutter Sutra each week, this reveals the heart of the 84,000 teachings of the Buddha, which are the teachings on the perfection of wisdom. The more you read this; the more it plants the seed of enlightenment and the seed of liberation. This means it plants the seed to achieve liberation from samsara. The more you read it, the more vast amounts of benefit you receive. Most importantly, each time you read it, it plants the seed to realize emptiness, then, to realize emptiness which is dependent arising. Only then can you cut the very root of samsaric suffering. The causes of samsara are karma and delusion, and the root of these are ignorance. Only then can you be free from suffering forever. Develop this wisdom with the support of bodhicitta and then develop the path of method with the support of wisdom. You will be able to eliminate the subtle negative imprints and achieve full enlightenment. Then, you will be able to do perfect work for sentient beings, to free them from all suffering and bring them to full enlightenment. This is the ultimate goal of our life, while we are living and practicing Dharma.

Generally, in daily life, make prostrations by reciting the Thirty-five Buddhas’ names and prostrate to all the buddhas, Dharma, Sangha, statues, stupas, and scriptures in the ten directions, who are manifesting as the guru. This is how you should think from your side. You can do one set, two, or three, you can do as much as you can. Finish the last part of the prayer, then do the guru yoga meditation, the most elaborate one is the Guru Puja, the short one is Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga. If you have taken a highest yoga tantra initiation, then you have to recite the Six Session Guru Yoga practice. Before the guru absorbs into you, then meditate on the lamrim. All day and night, in everything you try to do, do it with bodhicitta, as much as possible. This way, whatever activity you do becomes the cause of enlightenment, the cause of liberation and happiness in this life, and the cause in this life of happiness without expectation. This means, also, the cause of enlightenment will be the cause of happiness for all sentient beings, including their enlightenment.

In the meantime, if you have time to meditate on the lamrim, please do, and also do Vajrasattva meditation practice. You can also do Vajrasattva meditation with prostrations, and it’s very good if you begin the Thirty-five Buddhas with one round of Vajrasattva. Then, after that, recite King of Prayers. If you can do that, that’s great, because that is an extensive dedication. You are dedicating whatever good things you did today and in the past. There is a daily Shakyamuni Buddha practice, and at the end of this there are several dedications. Some you must do and some you can alternate. I hope you understand what I have said. So, please study well the advice in the pamphlet I am sending you.

With much love and prayers...