Satisfied Buddhist - Domo Geshe Rinpoche

A boy arrives alone to a remote monastery, sent by his aunt and uncle who can no longer care for him. Shamefaced, he is brought to the abbot. "Why do you look so unhappy?" "No one wants me, my parents died and my relatives feel that I am a burden to them. I have no value in this world!"  The abbot answered from deep wisdom, "I can see that your karma is close to being exhausted for family life, my  boy. Your karma has caused it to fall away. No matter how much you try to grasp at worldly satisfaction, instead your karma for non-attainment of desire has increased.  Now do not suffer, but rejoice! The Buddha has said 'come' to you." ~ Domo Geshe Rinpoche ~~~ ***** "Ein Junge kommt alleine zu einem abgelegenen Kloster; sein Onkel und seine Tante können sich nicht länger um ihn kümmern und haben ihn dorthin geschickt. Rot vor Scham wird er zum Abt geführt. „Warum siehst Du so unglücklich aus?“ „Niemand will mich, meine Eltern sind tot u...

Free Podcast! (The search for Truth- What is possible?) Domo Geshe Rinpoche leads a discussion on the criteria we use to determine truth vs non-truth. Each individual has explicit or implicit criteria. If you do not understand the criteria you use, your search for truth will be hampered. This discussion is preliminary to discussing, "What is enlightenment?" http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/domo-geshe-rinpoche-teachings/id387058479 The four great wishes of all Tibetan Buddhist practices are really a holding space type of promise and an emerging holy bond with all living beings. These wishes are profound promises because they are made with a special state of mind called bodhicitta motivation. When I first came to America back in the early 70’s, (when I was still Tibetan), my American students would ask me dharma questions but I often felt their motivation in the discussions begin to focus more on “me and mine, or this is so bad”. While they were getting d...

Twelve people were waiting for an answer to lifes dilemma. Six left because they were not sure why they were there, having forgotten their momentary enthusiasm to know the truth. Four fell asleep. The remaining two kept each other awake, alternately using debate and encouragement toward each other. When the time came,... these two young women set aside their weapons and armor and entered a hall so brightly lit, they were engulfed by the light. ~Domo Geshe Rinpoche ~~~~~ ""Zwölf Leute warteten auf eine Antwort auf das Dilemma des Lebens. Sechs von ihnen gingen weg, weil ihnen nicht klar war, warum sie da waren und sie ihre augenblickliche Begeisterung für das Erkennen der Wahrheit vergessen hatten. Vier schliefen ein. Die verbleibenden zwei hielten sich gegenseitig wach, indem sie abwechselnd debattierten und sich gegenseitig ermutigten. Als die Zeit gekommen war, legten diese beiden jungen Frauen ihre Waffen und Rüstungen beiseite und betraten einen Saal, der so hell erleuc...

Some pseudo- spiritual/materialistic philosophies suggest that we disbelieve whatever we cannot personally prove by our own experiences. However, surely we can have some learning based on faith and reliance on others without personal experience! We can learn in school how others have discovered various truths such as the microcosmic or macrocosmic world. We call also learn from the successes and failures of others without reproducing them ourself. From a Buddhist refuge point of view, we develop trust in the Buddha as a reliable source, which ripens our capacity to spend our valuable time learning what direction we should dig to discover what we need to experience! Then, higher being becomes like our satellite GPS, showing where to go for the greatest benefit. We could spend a lifetime trying to gather useless experiences because of mistrust. Logic suggests that we maximize our remaining time in correct effort. Domo Geshe Rinpoche „Es gibt pseudo-spirituelle/materialistische Philosophi...

Everyone has their good days and their bad days. However, underlying the ups and downs of life, we may sense that something else important is missing. In addition, there are nameless anxious feelings that this is something we really should already know. It is like looking for your lucky socks that you need for an important meeting, digging through the sock drawer to no avail! This anxiety could be the signal activating the awakening desire to break free from our separation with reality. We want to know, we want to rejoice that we found and finally understand the big Truth, so we can quickly share it with others. If we cannot figure out this Truth, we might stop trying. We might even continue to experience a desire to search for personal truth from time to time, but give it up repeatedly as being too complicated. Therefore, there must be something about the way we search that needs examination to get the desired result. Rather than rushing to find “truth” immediately, why not think abou...

In the previous column there were discussed some of the ways people make changes to become more receptive to truth. Taking ordination vows is an extreme example as well as deciding to dedicate the rest of ones life to a hermit’s existence or perhaps living in a cave. Others will seek vows such as bodhchitta vows to energetically bind themselves to achieve the transformed state. However, there are methods we can put in to practice even today and one is to simplify. We could make things easier by giving away what is not used, needed or enjoyed anymore so that there are fewer objects that we need to control, care for, think about or even dust regularly! Even today, I took a carload of things over to Goodwill, so I feel quite happy about that. Another way to simplify is to watch how we spend our precious leisure time and make quality time management decisions to begin or sustain a regular meditation practice. Another obstacle that often confronts sincere seekers is reading about the l...

From the previous column it was said that angst can become a generalized frustration or anger about life and specifically stressful because of not being able to do what we want. That is why this energy needs to be directed or channeled carefully so that we do not move into the dysfunctional next step of blaming others. We so often hold others responsible for our lack of time or life situation, or complain that others are preventing us from being a spiritual seeker or truth seeker. We might view people at work that seem to be thwarting us or we become sorry that we have no time because we have to earn a living. It becomes all the fault of others. This can accumulate and we can forget exactly what it was that we were trying to do, namely, break free. This can lead to the uncomfortable situation and its accompanying feelings self replicating into habitual bad moods. Caught up in our feelings of blaming and the objects of that blame, we can lose sight of our actual inner process int...

The knowing method of deciding whether something is true or not is often described as having some special feeling inside. This becomes more trustworthy as we do strong purification practices to gain clarity, then when we feel inside that is true, the inner mind resonates in a special way. However, ordinary unprepared inner mind basis for resonation often comes from earlier happy or unhappy experiences. As we learn from those experiences, we use them to build a non-verbal inner structure in order to establish the reality and validity of subsequent experiences. This is very normal thinking and careful thinking in everyday life. However, there are other factors influencing us in establishing criteria for deeper inner authentic life, the nature of reality. These are the very things we wish to establish beyond any doubt and wish to know intimately. Then, criteria of feeling inside or resonating in a less clear state of being might not be the most careful criteria for establishing tru...

How you develop strategies in seeking your truth are influenced by criteria already present in your mind that you are able to use as tools for this search. However, if they remain unexamined or you are using faulty premises, you might arrive at some strange ideas about truth and falsity that bear no relationship to reality. Contrary to some pop philosophies, there are actual realities and truths that need to be penetrated in order to evolve. The reason we seek truth is not to have a fancy new way to personalize our life, feel important by creating a new truth or just wanting to be different from everybody else in a faceless world. Other criteria used for understanding truth are books of wisdom or everyday wisdom sayings. I recently read about Benjamin Franklin and some of the books that he wrote. He also himself collected sayings of his time, about crops and about the nature of people, trust, and other interesting topics gathered into regular almanacs to guide others in everyday l...

This series on seeking truth is intended to act as a way for you to meditate on your own methods. The problem continues to be separating influences that are forced on us from those we have discovered ourselves. Then we need to re validate each category to see if the outer or inner influence is valid according to logical standards. However, we do not need to be a scholar to have careful reasoning or to throw away reasoning altogether to free ourselves to think clearly. There are many voices and influences we have outside ourselves vying for our attention to make us believe according to their perceptions, some of which are valid and some are accepted without question. A saying of the Buddha often quoted about not believing him, only believe what you understand is a misunderstanding by many and is regarding this point. However, we have inner criteria and inner influence that are demanding we serve it before others. Some of these might be trauma, anger, jealousy, competitiveness, or ...

Many people sense that something important is missing, a feeling that there is something they should already know. It seems that there occurs for some an awakening desire to break free from the mental constraints that separate them from what is real. There is something that we want to know and we want to rejoice that we understand and possess the big Truth, so we can share it with others. We might experience a desire to search for personal truth from time to time but give it up as being too complicated. And so there must is something about the search itself that needs to be examined in order for us to have a quality result. Rather than trying to find the truth immediately, let us first explore how we go about our search for truth. You know, this subject can be quite romantic, isn't that so? It has feelings of extreme importance, and feelings of gripping determination, " I will not budge from this spot until I know the truth!" To begin, we look at the criteria that...