WORDS OF WISDOM AUTHOR: KHENPO TSULTRIM LODRO

An article entitled Why It’s So Hard to be Happy listed five points to be happier: 1. do not focus on goals; 2. make time to volunteer; 3. practice moderation; 4. strive for contentment; 5. practice living in the moment. Money, designer clothes, expensive cars, etc. were not on the list. Apparently, many of our old ideas about how to be happy are wrong. 

- Quote from The Right View, "A Buddhist’s Mode of Life"

Similarly, although our feeling is very strong at the start of the practice, the feeling diminishes in time and eventually gives way to all kinds of thoughts. Thus, when the thoughts arise, we must stay vigilant and immediately return to our investigation.

The most important thing in the practice is to first abide in this state of mind, then watch our mind from the side.

- Quote from The Four Seals of Dhama, "The Practice of Realizing Emptiness"

Prior to understanding this point, we spend the entire day seeking material pleasures and placing all our hope and effort on building wealth; when we no longer see the significance in these activities, we become extremely despondent and think there is no meaning in life at all. This disappointment is not surprising since the lifestyle just mentioned is basically meaningless. There is, however, a path of liberation which gives us courage and allows us to realize: it is wrong to invest all my effort in material pursuit; my life has been totally meaningless up to now; I cannot continue to live the same way; I shall strive to attain liberation from this moment on.

- Quote from The Four Seals of Dhama, "All Contaminated Things are Unsatisfactory"

In theory, we all know the difference between the way of living and the meaning of life. However, in practice, we often behave like the uninitiated making wealth accumulation the meaning of life. We ought to know better now to separate the two and be less attached to material wealth than before. The word ‘money’ can mean a lot of things in addition to its traditional definition; in fact, it can be used to denote all worldly possessions.

- Quote from The Right View, "The Way of Living and the Meaning of Life"

As mentioned earlier, the Buddha said an instant denotes the time it takes a needle tip to pass through a very thin flower petal, but this instant can be divided into still smaller parts. If an instant can be separated into hundred thousands of time segments, we can imagine how short any one time segment is. Yet, even in this fraction of an instant, everything is in a state of flux. The Buddhist term for this is arising and ceasing, the modern term is motion.

- Quote from The Four Seals of Dhama, "The Practice of Impermanence"

How should a Buddhist live? The Buddha gave us the answer long time ago. Being his followers, we should all adopt the kind of life that he had prescribed for both the monastics and laypeople. Doing so will make for a much more meaningful life.

In the Vinaya Pitaka, the Buddha told the monastics that one should avoid duality in life. Duality mentioned in Madhyamaka is the eternalist and nihilist view, whereas in the context of the way of living, duality denotes the impoverished and self-indulgent life.

- Quote from The Right View, "A Buddhist’s Mode of Life"

If our motivation is that of the inferior practitioners, albeit some good karma may ensue, it will not lead to enlightenment. If we come to realize this might be a problem, something can still be done to transform our good karma into means for attaining enlightenment. The most effective way is to generate bodhicitta. Why? From the perspective of all things being incessantly arising and ceasing every instance, it is true that what we did before no longer exists, but the continuum of awareness of the karmic seeds has already been planted in our alaya consciousness. Once we have generated renunciation and bodhicitta, the continuum in the alaya consciousness will be transformed immediately.

“Self” and “Self-Attachment” are two different concepts. For instance, when we see a bunch of flowers, the flower is the object outside; our eye consciousness is the subject inside. Like the flower, “self” is the external object; like eye-consciousness, “self-attachment” is internal, subjective, and of the mind.

- Quote from The Four Seals of Dhama, "All Phenomena Lack Self-Existence"

Isn’t it kind of fashionable now to talk about ‘going back to the nature’? But the ‘nature’ that worldly people go back to is not the real thing. The true meaning of going back to the natural state is to give up all desires for samsara and take the path leading to ultimate liberation. So the first thing we should do now is to generate renunciation. From now on, the meaning of life for us should never be merely having money, children, family and so forth.

- Quote from The Right View, "The Way of Living and the Meaning of Life"