Transforming Pain
Tonglen for Pain in Jaw
Rinpoche gave the following advice on tonglen while in a café in New York with a geshe and some students. One of the students asked Rinpoche what she could do about the pain she had in her jaw.
Regarding the difficulties with the center, you need an open heart; there are different views, so apply the views that are more beneficial. Like a road blocked by rocks, first you have to recognize the blocks so that you can clear them away.
Regarding the pain in your jaw, it is very important to do this prayer every day. When you have happiness, think: may all sentient beings have happiness and peace. When you have suffering, problems, cancer, AIDS, relationship problems, whatever, think: may all sentient beings’ oceans of samsaric sufferings be dried out.
The idea is to do tonglen practice, from time to time, each day. Each time you do this practice of taking on the sufferings, you collect vast amounts of merit, because you are taking on the sufferings of numberless beings and purifying not only this life’s negative karma but also past lives’ negative karma. The stronger you generate compassion for animals or human beings, the greater the amount of negative karma is purified. When you do the practice of giving, you also purify today’s, this life’s, and past lives’ negative karma. It purifies many eons of negative karma.
Severe Illness
A student was suffering intense pain and was not even able to sit down comfortably. She had seen several doctors without any positive result. She thought that the pain was connected with a displacement in the vertebral column, hitting a nerve in her neck. She wrote to Rinpoche asking for advice.
My very dear one,
Thank you very much for your kind letter. I think my brother Sangye had the same problem as you, having incredible pain in his neck. I made some observations for him and the result was mainly to do purification practice. So, he did a lot of prostrations every day, reciting the Thirty-five Buddhas’ names, and Vajrasattva practice. He told me that only purification practice helped. I would like you to discuss this with my brother, and you can say that I suggested it.
Particularly, from my observations, is important is for you to recite 500,000 Samayavajra mantras. Strong purification is probably needed. If you don’t know how to apply the four opponent powers, which is included in Vajrasattva practice, please read the explanation in my book of teachings from the Vajrasattva retreat and also in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand.
Mostly, you can recite the Thirty-five Buddhas’ names as you do prostrations. From the Thirty-five Buddhas come beams of nectar, which enter your body and mind and instantly purify all the negative karma and defilements collected since beginningless rebirths. It especially purifies instantly all the negative karmas accumulated with the guru, from beginningless rebirths. Keep on reciting the Thirty-five Buddhas’ names with this visualization.
Also, Medicine Buddha puja needs to be performed for you. There are two talks that were given in the Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga retreat in Italy about how to use sickness and problems as the path to enlightenment by using them to develop bodhicitta, by experiencing them with bodhicitta. You need to practice tonglen. If you can listen to these talks it would help.
Also, you need to do the naga incense puja. You can do this yourself. You should email Kopan monastery to get the correct naga incense from them. Ask them to send it as quickly as possible. You also need to wear the mantra “Liberating from Bondage” around your neck. I will send this to you.
With much love and prayers...
Taking on Others’ Pain
A student related to Rinpoche the experience of another student who had gone to have a routine biopsy shortly after reading Rinpoche’s book Ultimate Healing. When they put the needle in, they put it in the wrong place. It hit a nerve and she experienced agonizing pain throughout her body. She remembered Rinpoche’s advice in the book about using one’s own pain to take on the suffering of others, so she thought to herself very deeply that she was experiencing this pain for all other sentient beings. She said that because she did this, she was able to endure the pain, which was so agonizing that otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to bear it. It was clear that the experience had deeply affected the student, who kept the book with her and cherished it. Rinpoche was very pleased to hear this and said the following.
It’s fantastic that she was able to do that. It’s true that the attitude of using your own suffering to take on the pain of others definitely helps you to bear pain and make it less. The more you can think that you are experiencing the suffering for others, the better and more powerful it is. Even before you perform the actual meditation, just from the arising of that intention to use the pain to take on the suffering for others, there is an effect. It changes things. Sometimes when I have pain in my eyes, I try to think that I am taking on the suffering of other beings and experiencing it for them. I noticed that it helps; the pain decreases. When you have a strong enough intention, it can not only make the pain decrease but even stop it. But, of course, that shouldn’t be the motivation. The motivation shouldn’t be to stop the pain. It should be a genuine feeling that you want to experience the pain for others. I’m not sure what my motivation was, but one should try to generate a pure motivation without any thought of wanting the pain to decrease. Then it becomes very useful. If the pain continues, then you can use it to develop the mind in compassion and bodhicitta. If you are practising thought transformation, this is the most useful thing, because you have the chance to train the mind. If the pain ceases then you lose the opportunity. You lose the benefit of having the pain.
The student had also asked a question about taking on suffering. She said that when she experienced her own pain, it was so unbearable that she couldn’t imagine how she could take on the suffering of all beings. But she also mentioned joy. The student relating this story asked Rinpoche whether a person whose mind is well-prepared experiences so much joy at being able to actually take on the suffering of other beings that the pain is no longer experienced as suffering. Rinpoche replied as follows:
Yes, it depends how much compassion is in the mind. The more compassion there is in the mind, the more pain a person is able to bear for others. For example, Shantideva mentions that normally the suffering of the hell realms is the greatest suffering that exists, so nobody wants that, but the bodhisattva who has developed great compassion is happy to bear that suffering for others. For him or her, it is great happiness and bliss to experience that for others. This is because there is so much compassion in the mind. The more compassion, the easier it is to bear the sufferings of others.
It is like a mother who is happy to take on the suffering of her child. The mother sees her beloved son or daughter as the most precious thing in the world, and that child sees his or her mother as the kindest being. Because the mother sees the child as so precious, she is very happy to take on the child’s sufferings. It is very easy for her. And the more the child sees the mother as kind, the easier it is to bear suffering for her. So, it depends on how much compassion we have and how much we are able to see others as precious and kind. The more one can see others as precious and kind, the greater one’s compassion and loving kindness, and then the more we can bear suffering for others.
So please say “Thank you” to her. Tell her I would like to thank her for having that thought. Not only did she remember to do the practice when she had pain, and it helped her to bear the pain, but even if she had died, because she had this thought in her mind of bearing the pain for other sentient beings, she would have died in the best way. So, tell her I am very happy. I will write a card for her. I will send her a card as big as this world.
Pinched Nerve
An old student had been experiencing great pain in her body, and had lost feeling in her feet due to a pinched nerve in her back. Rinpoche wrote this card for her.
My very dear one,
I am sorry about the other day. I meant to come down to speak to you, but I got distracted. Thank you very much for coming, I am very happy to have met with you again.
I am sorry about all the pain you have. As I said in the past, this is very powerful purification of negative karma that normally would be experienced in the hell realms for many years. Even this life’s pain, this little pain, is nothing compared to the suffering of what is experienced in the hell realms.
What I mentioned to you before is to use this to develop bodhicitta, loving kindness, and compassion toward others, who are so many in number. If you can do tonglen practice, the practice of taking and giving, then every time you experience pain it brings you closer to enlightenment. This is the way your sickness brings you to enlightenment. Each time you experience suffering for others, taking on the suffering of others and giving your merit and happiness to others, you are collecting so much merit. Try to think, “I am experiencing this pain on behalf of all sentient beings, so that they can have all happiness, up to enlightenment.”
Most of the time, think like this. That way, each time you will be experiencing pain for all other sentient beings, and through this you collect so much merit. So, use your pain to practice developing bodhicitta, as much as you can.
Thank you very much for making the beautiful garden, which you started. I dedicate all the merit from making offerings of all these flowers, and the results, to you. Here is a Lama Tsongkhapa statue for you, and a small Buddha.
With much love and prayer...