LTF 56: The 4th and 5th Sufferings of Samsara in General

[69] Having become an Indra, fit to be honored by the world, you fall back again upon the earth through the power of karma. Even having changed to the status of a Universal Chakravartin King, you transform into someone with the rank of a servant in samsaric states.

This type of suffering, this type of problem, is something that we can see with big government officials, for instance. Sometimes they have a very high position, but then, because of various circumstances – corruption or change of politics or failure in their policies or whatever – they fall from a high position to a very low position. Their popularity changes (you can see that with the current President in the United States: the popularity rating has gone way down), and they lose their status. Of course, in the classical texts, this refers to the position of the gods in the heavenly realms – that they enjoy such a wonderful, happy, pleasant, samsaric life; but then, when they see that it’s going to come to an end and that they are going to be reborn in much worse circumstances, their suffering is really quite terrible.

Finding Examples in Our Own Lives

I think it’s important here to try to relate this to our own personal, individual situations because to just think about presidents falling from power might not have such an emotional impact on us. The whole discussion of the renunciation of uncontrollably repeated rebirth is very, very important for developing a strong disgust with samsara, with all the uncontrollably recurring problems that happen. We need to develop disgust with that and to feel, “Enough! Enough already!”

So, how would this relate to our own, individual lives? We can think in terms of striving for a high position – for instance, wanting to become very rich or very famous or very much loved by so many different people, or wanting to get a high job and things like that. But what often happens when we achieve that? Well, look at the current economy. Companies are bought by other companies, and half of the staff are laid off. So, after we have been working at a job for ten, twenty, thirty years, all of a sudden, we are laid off. We are made redundant, and we lose our jobs. We thought that we had job security, but then, all of sudden, we are out of work. That’s quite terrible. That’s tremendous amount of suffering, isn’t it? Or we work to become very rich. We get a lot of money, and we invest it in the stock market, but then the stock market falls, and we lose the money; we lose our investment. This happens. Or it gets stolen. So, we fall from a high position to a low position. 

Sometimes people like us very much and are very friendly toward us. Then, all of a sudden, they change, and they don’t like us anymore or are not so involved with us anymore; they get involved with somebody else. So, we fall from a position of being the center of attention of people whose attention was very important to us. We fall from that. What happens? We suffer terribly, don’t we?

Then we go out and try to establish it again. We lost our great job, so we try to find another one. We go up and up on a ladder, and then we fall again. Or we have to retire. Often, when people who have been involved with very productive work lives in which they felt very necessary, very useful, are all of a sudden retired, they feel totally useless. This doesn’t need to happen only in a work situation; it can also happen in a family situation. We raise children; we feel very needed, very helpful to them. Then they grow up and leave home, and they don’t need us anymore. Again, we fall from a high position to a low position. We’re just an interference. We interfere with the way that they lead their lives. That’s very difficult to accept, isn’t it?

If We Ourselves Are Experiencing These Sufferings, We Cannot Help Others

The question is, do we want to continue to experience that? All of this is presented within the context of Mahayana path. So, ultimately, what we are aiming for is to be able to help others as much as possible to overcome these same types of problems. If we ourselves are suffering from them, how can we help anybody else to overcome them? Just to be able to lecture about it to others without having overcome the problems ourselves is not really the Buddhist way, is it? We are not just giving a university lecture about a topic. 

In order to be convincing and effective in helping somebody, we have to be examples of it ourselves. If we are suffering from this same problem or the problem that we were discussing before, the problem of never being satisfied (that because we can’t be satisfied, we go out and try to find more and more), well, how can we help somebody? For instance, if they have some sort of obsession with drugs or casual sex or whatever, how can we help them if we are obsessed with the same thing? No way. 

So, it’s very important to overcome our attachment to all these things and to renounce them, to renounce these different types of suffering and say, “Enough already. Why am I so upset about this particular incident that’s happened?” – in this case, losing our status from high to low. “Why am I so upset about that? This is part of samsara. This is the whole thing. This is disgusting. I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t want to be part of this…” what in English, we call the “rat race” in which we try to get more and more of these sorts of things.

Of course, from another point of view, if we are in a better position, people might listen to us more. So, it could be helpful in terms of helping others. But when we are obsessed with these things and think, “Ah, this is the greatest goal in life,” then, of course, we are going to be disappointed because, inevitably, we are going to fall. And there is the suffering that is involved with that. 

From a classic Buddhist point of view, when one develops this type of renunciation from samsara, one takes what are called “the vows for individual liberation.” Those are the Pratimoksha vows. Those are the vows of a monk or a nun, in which one says, “I don’t want to be involved in this type of life. I want to devote all my energy and time to gaining liberation.” That’s what monastic life is involved with. And the vows that we take are intended to help us to limit the obsessions that we have, the worldly obsessions. So, they’re guidelines to help us in the pursuit of liberation. 

What Kind of Renunciation Can We Have as Lay Practitioners?

Many of us are not ready to become monastics, not ready to devote our lives completely to the pursuit of liberation and to take the various vows, which include celibacy – giving up this whole biological aspect of life, which is so enticing that it just ties us up. We are not ready for that. Most of us. What do we do? 

What do we do? Does anybody know?

Participant: We take the lay vows?

Dr. Berzin: We take the lay vows. That’s the start. We take the lay vows. But how do we relate to our normal, everyday lives? If we don’t opt for a monastic life, we have to somehow make a living. We have to live in some social situation. Many people will find a lifetime partner, get married, perhaps have children. Then we have to pay for them. It’s expensive to have a family. We have to support them. If that’s what we choose to do, then how do we relate to renunciation? It’s not so easy, is it? Not really. Seems almost contradictory.

Having a Realistic Attitude Toward Samsara; Not Having False Expectations

I think one of the ways of dealing with it is to have a realistic attitude about samsara, not to have false expectations about it, because it is going to be filled with all these problems. So, one tries one’s best. But, of course, we are going to go from high from low. Of course, there is no certainty of how other people are going to relate to us (that’s the first suffering that we mentioned). Of course, we are never going to have enough of this or that; it’s never going to satisfy from its own side. So, we learn to have some sort of contentment from our own side. 

In other words, we learn what a realistic goal is, one that will allow us to support our family, support ourselves, and that will allow us to help others to whatever ability we can and to focus our main attention on gaining liberation rather than pursuing some super career that will take up our whole time, which in the end, we’ll get laid off from because the company is sold to another, larger company. If we can make a contribution in some sort of field of science or education or something like that – fine. But what are we running after? To get more awards? To get more titles? Some titles are useful. I got a doctorate, a PhD. It has been useful. I didn’t use it to go into university teaching, but it has been a useful thing for opening up doors. But we don’t make a big deal out of it if we do it. 

I think of a very good example. I have a very close friend who is a very intense Dharma practitioner. He has a wife and two children, but the children are grown up now. One of them is married already. He works as a grounds keeper, keeping the grounds (that’s like a gardener) of a large psychiatric hospital for criminals. He took this job because it doesn’t require thinking. It doesn’t require involving his mind because, most of time, he is sitting on a tractor mowing the lawn, trimming bushes or trees, taking care of flowers and things like that. So, it’s not a terribly involved mental activity-wise, which means that he can do mantras and various meditation practices all day long. He is by himself out there in the field, so he doesn’t have to interact very much with the other people who work at the hospital. 

Participant: He is very brave.

Dr. Berzin: Very brave. And he earns enough to be able to support his family perfectly fine, and that’s it (he still does a lot of other practice at home). No ambition to get some super position. No need. 

We have to look at ourselves and evaluate what talents we have. What can we contribute? And do that, we contribute, to whatever level we can, but without making career, money, fame and all these things the main point of life because, inevitably, we are going to go from high to low. Inevitably, it’s going to be lost.

Participant: The reality of the situation is that, for most of us as Dharma practitioners in the West, we spend ninety percent of our time pursuing samsaric stuff. 

Dr. Berzin: Right. Jorge says that we spend ninety percent of our time pursuing ordinary, worldly stuff, worldly things. That’s true. That’s very true. So, again, it comes down to prioritizing. What are our priorities in life? 

Transforming Mundane Activities into Dharma Activities

Participant: I think also that it’s sort of an art to try to transform these mundane things into Dharma practice. When you find the skill, you can make a lot of these things into a Dharma practice. 

Dr. Berzin: That’s very, very true. Mariana points out that the real art is to try to transform our ordinary, mundane things – our jobs and so on – into some sort of beneficial practice for our Dharma training. This is absolutely true. This is what lojong is all about: attitude training. 

So, if our job requires a great deal of concentration – even if it is filling out forms all day long, it requires concentration – we can look at it as an opportunity to develop concentration, which is what we need in Dharma practice anyway. Or an exercise in perseverance – that we continue working hard and doing something even if it is boring. Doing repeated Dharma practices, saying a million or ten million mantras – you better believe that that gets boring after a while. But you continue. You continue. You keep on. 

So, perseverance – that’s very important. You help somebody… you try to help somebody. You try to teach them, and they don’t learn. Well, you don’t give up. Perseverance. You continue. So, this is something that you can learn at work. This is certainly something that you learn when raising a family. 

And generosity… you really have to not pay attention to your own concerns but to pay attention to the concerns, especially, of the baby; that has to take priority. One can look at that in a very possessive type of way as just taking care of one’s own precious baby. But one can also look at it as part of a larger training – that “Yes, I love my baby, and I am taking care of my baby, but it’s part of a larger training to be able to take care of everybody.” So, you expand the scope of what you are doing in a very Mahayana type of way. Or if you’re involved in medical research, like you are, Jorge, you think in terms of “May this benefit others” – so,                                                                                                      having a strong Mahayana motivation – as opposed to “May I become a famous research fellow and have my name in all the journals.”

Participant: I think that’s the point – the motivation. With motivation, one can really change a lot

Dr. Berzin: Right, with the motivation, one can change a great deal – the motivation and the attitude with which you look at what you are doing. 

For this, renunciation is very important. And I think that renunciation is very much involved with personal relationships as well. Even if you become a monk or a nun, all these sufferings will still be there. You can fall from a very high position in a monastery to a lower position or go from a lower position to a higher one. It can go up and down. You might have been a great rinpoche in Tibet, and then you are thrown into a Chinese concentration camp. Or you come to India as a refugee, and then you have to work on a road gang – as very many of the Tibetans had to do the first ten years that they came to India. They are the ones who built all these roads in the Himalayan foothills. Not easy work. So, you fall from being very high, having lots of attendants, disciples and so on, to being very low. I think that if one accepts that this is the nature of samsara, one doesn’t get so upset about it and doesn’t seek more and more. 

I think the best examples are friends, loving relationships, and so on. You have a relationship with one person, and then they find somebody else, or it doesn’t work. So, it breaks up; it ends. It gets lower. So, it goes from high to low intensity. Then, once you get over that one, you think, “OK, there are other fish in the ocean, so I’ll go out and find another one.” Then, after a period of time, the same thing happens. And then, “OK, I’ll find another one.” And again, something happens. All of sudden, you are an older person, and this up and down of intensity of relationships with people has happened four or five times in your life – falling in love, then a marriage, then a divorce, and then fall in love again and another marriage, then another divorce. It could be on that level; it could be on other levels. 

Finally, one needs to realize that this has gone on not just these four or five times in this lifetime but that this has happened millions and millions of times in previous lives. Isn’t this boring? Why am I still expecting to find Prince or Princess Charming on the white horse and that we are going to live happily ever after? As one would say in colloquial language, “Hello! This is not going to happen.” So, then you get disgusted with it. It’s not that you get angry with the person that left you because of course that’s going to happen. It’s just, “Ahh! This is ridiculous! What do I want? I would really like to get liberation from all of this.” This is the whole point of trying to get a sincere feeling of renunciation of samsara, of the futility of samsaric uncontrollably repeated problems, of things not working out.

Participant: I know a life story relating to this professor of mine. He is a very good lawyer. A woman friend of his got married, and as a present, he gave her the divorce, the next divorce. This was his present. She took it after five years. 

Dr. Berzin: Karsten has a good example of a friend who is a lawyer. A friend of this lawyer got married, and as a wedding present, the lawyer offered a free divorce in the future for that marriage. Sure enough, after five years, the woman cashed in her coupon for a free divorce. Yeah, that happens, doesn’t it?

Participant: I know another example, one I read. There is this woman who used to be in the Bundestag. She used to be a parliamentarian, and eventually, she was elected out. Then she accepted a job in the Bundestag as a cleaning lady. It doesn’t seem like she was upset about it. I don’t know the details.

Dr. Berzin: Jorge knows an example of someone who was elected to the Bundestag (that’s the legislature here in Germany), but in the next election, she lost, so she was voted out. Then she took a job as a cleaning lady in the Bundestag building. Sure, that happens. 

Participant: It’s amazing that she accepted it.

Dr. Berzin: It is amazing that she accepted it, especially seeing her old colleagues who were there. 

Participant: It’s really brave.

Dr. Berzin: That’s a very good example. 

But as I say, it’s much more helpful to look at some sort of example in our own lives, even if it is not exactly the same type of example. For example, you’re part of the in-crowd, and then, all of a sudden, you’re no longer part of the in-crowd; you’ve been left out. You’re one of the young people who are in and cool, and then, all of a sudden, you are considered old, a “wrinkly,” as they say in England – wrinkles on your forehead and no longer cool, interesting. So, that happens. We lose our status from high to low. 

OK. So that’s this type of suffering. Do you want to take a moment to reflect on that? Let’s do that. 

When we fall from high to low, in whatever area that might happen – being very important in somebody’s life to being not important at all, or being in a high position to being in a low position, or being active to being retired or laid off, or whatever – the point here is not to get upset or angry about it but, instead, to develop the disgust that characterizes renunciation – that “Enough already! What did I expect? This is of course what’s going to happen, and enough already! I really, really would like to get out of this syndrome that is just going to go on and on, repeating over and again in this lifetime and in future lifetimes. I’d like to get out of that. I deal with my normal, samsaric life as best as I can, but I am really aiming to get out of it.” That’s renunciation. And what we are aiming to get out of is uncontrollably recurring rebirth. When they talk about higher to lower status, they are talking more specifically about higher rebirths and lower rebirths, although we can apply it on many different levels. 

As we discussed last week, we shouldn’t trivialize renunciation. It’s a very deep, profound attitude and a very difficult attitude to develop on a sincere level. But it’s one that is certainly worthwhile to aim for and to try to approach on whatever level we can. I think that the best that we can do at our level of development, perhaps, is not to have illusions/delusions about how wonderful samsaric life is – not to fool ourselves. Does that take the joy out of life? I don’t know. There’s also the whole tantra view that sees everything as just a play of appearances of the clear light mind. Not that it makes everything into a joke, but it makes it not so heavy.

Yeah, Marianna.

Getting Rid of Our Illusions about Samsara without Becoming Bitter

Participant: I think there is a danger of becoming bitter and saying…

Dr. Berzin: This is a very important point. We have to watch out for the danger of getting bitter. What underlies getting bitter? What is getting bitter all about? It’s grasping for a solid “me.” “I wanted things to be better. Things are not like that.” We make a big, solid thing out of how terrible life is, a big, solid thing about the “poor me” who has to suffer this.  Then we feel bitter. So, renunciation has to go together with a realization that it’s the understanding of voidness that will get us out of that. Otherwise – you’re absolutely correct – you run the danger of being bitter about life. Also, there is the danger of just giving up. “Well, I’m never going to win. I’m a loser; so, why even bother?” That, also, is not the correct attitude here. That’s not a helpful attitude.

Participant: Or “I don’t want to get involved with anybody.”

Dr. Berzin: “I don’t want to get involved with anybody; I’m just going to get hurt. It’s not going to work out.” So, yes, we really have to watch out and to combine the renunciation with the understanding of voidness. 

Participant: With bitterness, also, it appears like there’s no perspective. If one doesn’t see that there’s a way out somehow, then it’s easy to get bitter. Otherwise, if one has an idea that there’s some solution, one doesn’t get bitter so easily.

Dr. Berzin: Right. Very, very good. The way that we get out of being bitter is to remember the four noble truths. The understanding of voidness is just part of the fourth noble truth, the true pathway mind. But the whole package of the four noble truths is that there is a way out. There’s the suffering of the samsara. So, we recognize the suffering and that we want to get out of it. Then we have to understand the causes of it (second noble truth) and, then, that it is possible to gain a stopping of it (otherwise, it’s hopeless). It is possible to get a true stopping of it, and voidness, the understanding of voidness, is the way out. With that, we don’t run the danger of being bitter and thinking, “I’m loser,” and so on because then, in a sense, “I’m a winner because now I know the way out, and I can do it.”

Participant: And then to ground it on the practice of mindfulness as a basis and to see how foolish, how stupid, our lives are. 

Dr. Berzin: Right. By mindfulness, I think what you mean is just paying attention to what’s going on – what in the West is sometimes called “mindfulness meditation.” The actual practice of four close placements of mindfulness is a little bit more complicated than that. But just to pay attention to what’s going on in our lives, to what our attitudes are, to what we are experiencing and the reality of it – yes, this is very important. That was what I was saying: not to have any illusions or delusions about what life is all about – but without being bitter. It’s just recognizing the first noble truth. 

Actually, from another point of view, it’s a great joy. Look at some of the verses of Shantideva, Shantideva says, “Ah, hah! I have seen the true enemy now! You are not going to fool me anymore. Up until now, all my disturbing emotions and my confusion and so on have made a complete fool out of me and just caused me suffering. But those times are finished. Now, I will hold you in my sights and not let you rule me. I am going to overcome that. I am going to overcome you, not let you overcome me!” So, we feel joy. 

In the Wheel of Sharp Weapons, it says something like that as well. “Ah, hah! Now I have recognized the true enemy. How wonderful! I figured it out – what really is causing my problem.” So, what is really causing my problem is not you and the fact that you no longer consider me the most important person in your life. That’s not the cause of the problem because that’s just going to go on forever. If it’s not you, it’s somebody else. Nothing special about you acting like that toward me. It’s the whole structure of samsara.

Participant: Still, it’s difficult to deal with emotions

Dr. Berzin: Ooh! You are a hundred percent correct! 

Participant: But it is difficult in some situations, and the knowledge that you have does not help.

It Helps to Become Familiar with the Different Dharma Methods for Dealing with Disturbing Emotions and Compulsive Thoughts

Dr. Berzin: Right, the knowledge that we have often doesn’t help when we are overwhelmed by upsetting emotions. That’s why we do meditation practice. It’s to build up these attitudes as a deep habit, a beneficial habit, so that when these upsetting, potentially upsetting, situations occur, they don’t get out of hand because we are quickly able to apply the opponents. 

And it’s not just knowledge. You see, there is a difference between just superficial knowledge and conviction. It’s not just knowledge: we have to be convinced that it’s true. So, to have it be more deeply digested and integrated (and the only to digest and integrate it is to build up tremendous familiarity with it) – that’s the only way. The more familiar we are with it, the more that we are able to use it successfully to analyze our own experiences and those of the people that we know and the more our conviction that this is true gets deeper and deeper and deeper and, also, the easier it is to apply, to be mindful of it. This is what mindfulness means. Mindfulness means to remember. It’s the same word. We have to remember these things. 

Sure, things may be emotionally difficult, but the more experience you have in applying the understanding, the better able you are to quiet down the disturbing emotion. And you want to clean the wound early enough, before it turns into gangrene and you have to chop off your hand (if we can use an analogy). You want to try to catch it early – and not be discouraged.

This is the interesting thing when you are dealing with these types of problems. It’s that “OK, I understand I had these false expectations with my job or my relationship with this person,” or whatever it might be, and “it’s been going on and on and on. This is a pattern. This is ridiculous. What did I expect? So, don’t be so upset about it.” So, you may understand that, and it may quiet down the upset emotion, but because of the habit, the thought comes up five, six, ten times a day. The first thing you think when you wake up in the morning is, “Ah! I lost my job,” or “Oh! This person has found somebody else – not me.” Well, in that situation, the emotional upset is not so strong anymore. It’s not so strong, but the thought keeps on coming up. It’s a compulsive type of thing. So, then what you have to do is apply mahamudra and other methods – that “Well, it’s just a thought. It’s just a wave on the ocean. Big deal. So what? Don’t get caught up in it.” 

In dealing with these types of problems, you have to apply many, many different Dharma methods along the way and not expect an instant solution because, for sure, the upsetting thought is going to continue to come up. It will come up a lot. Don’t be discouraged and think, “Oh, when am I ever going to get rid of this?” It’s just a stupid thought coming up, nothing else. So, big deal. 

What sometimes is helpful is to change that mental energy, to use it to say a mantra instead. Mantras are very useful for that. What does the word “mantra” mean? It means a method to protect the mind, to protect the mind from stupid thoughts. Saying OM MANI PADME HUM is much better than saying, “Oh, I lost my job! And the people and…” blah, blah, blah. That’s not going to help anything. So, it’s important to have a whole series of methods. That’s why one needs to study various methods of Dharma. Learn them. They are all useful. You see in this situation or that situation, “What can I apply? What is going to help me?” 

Ultimately, from a Mahayana point of view, it’s that “I want to help other people, and I can’t help other people if I am obsessed with this personal problem and am upset about it. This is unacceptable.” Then, renunciation takes on a Mahayana tone, which is very important in the Mahayana context. “It is unacceptable that I am so upset because my children have to be fed and clothed and brought to school,” to use a simple, everyday example. And it’s not that you repress it either. It’s just, “Come on already! This is my samsaric mind repeating, uncontrollably repeating.” Samsara – what does the word “samsara” mean? Uncontrollably repeating and having no control; instead, it’s being under the control of karma and the disturbing emotions and habits. “So, I am not going to get upset about it. I am going to get out of it. I recognize it for what it is. It’s terrible.” 

OK. As I say, that level is easier than the really deep level, which is “I don’t want to continue taking rebirth because that is going to be the basis for all of this going on and on.” That’s much subtler, isn’t it? Much subtler. But at least we can work on the level of “I don’t want to continue all this garbage in this life,” which is a more, so-called Dharma-lite version of it. 

Then the next general type of suffering of samsara is the suffering of having no friends and so on. Here, Nagarjuna gives four verses of various things that can’t be relied on and that have no essence. The first one is delightful company (that would be friends).

(70) Having for a long time experienced the pleasure of the touch of the breasts and hips of maidens of the higher rebirth realms, once again you’ll have to entrust yourself to the unbearable touch of the implements for crushing, cutting, and subjugating in the hells.

OK, yeah! In upcoming verses, Nagarjuna will bring in more and more images from the hells. So, be prepared. 

So, here, he’s talking about experiencing the sensual pleasure of frolicking with the maidens in the heavens and so on but that then we are going to be tortured in the hells. This is used as an example for having no friends (referring to the celestial maidens) – not being able to rely on always being in nice company. 

Now, that, for many of us, is the most difficult point. We really hope to have friends and loved ones. We are social animals, and we need warm, affectionate, friendly, loving relations. That’s been shown to be the case even from a medical point of view. If we are deprived of it, we don’t thrive very well – particularly as babies or as very old persons. So, how do we relate to this? I think we have to bear in mind that friends are not forever, despite what it might say on a greeting card. 

Participant: Hallmark card.

Dr. Berzin: Hallmark greeting cards. Friends are not forever. Sorry! 

Friends Are Like Leaves that Fall Off a Tree in Autumn

Aryudeva, in Four Hundred Verses, has a very lovely image that I find very helpful to always remember, which is that friends are like the leaves that fall off a tree in autumn. The winds of karma blow the leaves together for a little while, but, eventually, the winds will cause them to part. “Friends a long time together will part their own way” – That’s in the Thirty-Seven Bodhisattva Practices (verse 4). This is not a very nice thing to accept, but it is a fact of samsara, isn’t it? And it’s terrible. It’s really terrible. One needs to try to enjoy whatever time we spend together with our friends but to expect that we are going to part – that we are not (this is the difficult thing) the only one in their lives. And we have to remember that they are not the only one in our lives either. We all have different lives with lots of different people, lots of different activities, lots of different things from the winds of karma, as it were, that are going to blow us apart. For a time, we might blow in the wind together, and we could try to continue to have close friendships. But people grow apart. 

I like to try to keep contact with old friends from long, long ago in this life. In most cases, I do. I had one friend who I was very, very close to when I was in my twenties, and recently, we got together. I was visiting the city where he lives. But we didn’t have so much in common anymore. I would have continued meeting him once every five years or whatever, exchanging telephone calls on birthdays or stuff like that. But he said to me that we really didn’t have anything in common anymore – “Bye bye. There is no reason to keep in contact anymore,” which surprised me because that was the first time that that had actually happened to me. It’s not that we parted in bad terms – not in the slightest. Still, it was a loving friendship, and we wished each other well, but we really had nothing in common anymore – except the past. And it’s pretty boring to keep on reminiscing about the past. Well, that happens. That happens.

Right. So, Renata points out that you have to… pflegen is what? Earn?

Participant: No, to care for.

Dr. Berzin: To care for, like a Pflegeheim. Right. So, you have to care for the friendship. You have to put effort into it, and so on. Yes, that’s very true. That’s very true. But the question really is, what expectations do we have of friendship? This is a difficult one because from the point of view of many Western views, friendship is pretty important in life. 

Now, the teaching, here, is not saying that we shouldn’t have friends. It’s not saying that. The point here is that friends cannot be relied upon. We can’t guarantee that we are always going to have this friendship. And what do we expect of the friendship? And when it parts, it parts. 

Renata is saying that a friend is someone who is interested in our welfare and in how we are doing. It’s someone who cares about what happens to us. And we care about what happens to them. 

Participant: Regardless of…

Dr. Berzin: Regardless of what happens. It’s not just “Oh, how interesting; I’m keeping a record of what happens.” They actually care about us. Well, yes, but… Now comes the big “but.” 

The Voidness of Friends – of “Me” and “You”

You know this thing of (I’m sorry, but I have to bring in voidness here), “I don’t want you to love me because of my good looks or my money or my intelligence or how I can help you. I want you to love me for me, to love just me,” as though there were a little ball us inside that is separate from all these things. “I don’t want you to love me because of the good times we have together or any of that but to just love me for myself, for who I am.” It’s true that that’s what we think. We want somebody who cares for me. If that underlies the friendship, then there is a problem. 

Now, of course, love is the wish for the other to be happy and so on. So, it doesn’t necessarily have to be based on this solid view of me – not at all. It doesn’t have to be. But in most cases, it is. “You don’t care for me anymore. You don’t love me anymore. You are no longer my friend. You are not interested in me anymore. I am not interested in you anymore. You’re boring.” That’s terrible, isn’t it? 

[Participant comment cut]

Oh, yes. A good friend is somebody who doesn’t just say, “Oh, how nice you are,” but points out your faults. That’s for sure. 

[Participant comment cut]

Right. They don’t have to have the same religion. They don’t have to have the same ideology. But there’s a karmic connection. But this is the point: karmic connections aren’t forever; they change. As an aspiring bodhisattva, we aim to be interested in and care about everybody equally, which is an unbelievably high aim. Unbelievably high aim: no favorites. 

Participant: Whoa!

Dr. Berzin: “Whoa!” is right. No favorites. Bodhisattvas don’t have any favorites. 

Participant: Hard to imagine how it feels.

Dr. Berzin: Yes, although one could see examples of it from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He meets a crowd of people who are there to greet him, and he manifests absolute joy and delight in every single being that he sees. Same, same. Nobody is special. But there are very few examples of people like that. 

[Participant comment cut]

Right. So, this is a great gift, she says, that we don’t have many examples of in our society –that when the teacher looks at us, even if they are looking at everybody equally, we nevertheless have a very strong feeling (especially with someone like His Holiness) that they are sincerely interested in our welfare. Now, if we then grasp at that in terms of a truly existent me – “He’s really interested in me!” – that’s another thing. Then it could be, “I am so special,” as well, which is yet another delusion or illusion. 

Friendship is a very, very tricky thing. And to not have false expectations of friendships – that’s tough. That’s very, very tough. 

There is one example I use sometimes – which would be good if not only you but I as well could remember all time – which is the example of a wild bird that comes to our window. Very lovely example. A wild bird comes to our window, and we enjoy how beautiful it is, enjoy the company of the bird. And then the bird flies off. Maybe the bird will come back, maybe not. But if we try to catch that bird and put it in a cage, the bird will be miserable and die. And if we are constantly grabbing at it, it will be frightened and never come back. 

The people that come into our lives are like this wild bird: they are free. They come to our window. The winds of karma blow them there, carry them there. They are with us for a while, and we enjoy the beauty of being with them. And of course, the bird is going to fly off. Maybe the bird will come back; maybe it won’t. We can put out some feed for it, but not as a bribe for it to come back! Difficult. It’s very, very difficult. But that’s a nice image, I think, that can be quite helpful, even though we might not really want to apply it to our dear, dear friend. And we can apply it to our children as well. They’ve come into our lives, like the wild bird, for us to care for – for a while, and then they’ll fly off. 

Again, when we talk about renunciation, what we are renouncing is the feeling that delightful company or friends can be relied on. “I am always going to be there for you, and you are always going to be there for me.” Well, maybe not.

Participant: But I also think that if you get into this way of thinking, it doesn’t make you bitter; it makes you actually be realistic and makes you also enjoy things more. 

Being Realistic – Enjoying Friends Without Clinging and False Expectations

Dr. Berzin: Well, that’s just it. If you really can digest it, it doesn’t make you bitter: it makes you more realistic. And you can enjoy things more without the clinging and the false expectations.

Participant: If you think the friend is always going to be there – “It’s just another day with my friend” – you don’t appreciate it.

Dr. Berzin: Right. If you think that the friendship will be there forever, you take the friendship for granted and don’t really enjoy the beauty of it and the rarity of it. So, it’s the clinging that’s really the problem here, the expectation. As I say, this is quite difficult. It doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t make friends. But when we part ways, it’s not to be angry with the person, not to be upset, not to be bitter, and not to say, “Well, the next one will be better. The next one won’t let me down.” The next one will be exactly the same. Same, same. So, another wild bird.

It’s especially helpful when one really gets into thinking of beginningless rebirth – that this has happened countless times with this one and that one and this one and that one. It’s just going to go on and on. So, when will we learn not to get upset – the famous line, “What do I expect from samsara?” – and not to blame it on the other person? Often, when friends go their own way or develop different interests, we become very angry with the person, very upset with them. “After all that I did for you, and you act like that?! How can you want to be with somebody else and not with me?” Terrible, terrible suffering. “I don’t want to endure that suffering anymore” – this is what renunciation means. “I don’t want to do this again. I will have friendships, but without this expectation.” 

Now, the question is, does that mean I’ll never fall in love again? Sounds like a song, “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again.” That gets into a whole different level – falling in love. What in the world is that? I don’t know. There’s an awful lot of projection there and an awful lot of hormones there as well. So, that one is much more difficult. 

Participant: In the beginning, it’s really nice. 

Dr. Berzin: In the beginning it is nice, right.

Participant: You feel very good when you are in love.

Dr. Berzin: Yes, that’s true. But the person that gives you so much joy is the one that could give you the most pain and unhappiness if they ignore you or don’t do something that you would like them to do. 

There are the four types of generosity. One type is the generosity of giving equanimity, which that means that we give the guarantee of equanimity to everybody. That means that I am not going to cling to you and make demands on you. I am not going to reject you or ignore you. That’s to everybody. That’s a great gift – not cling to you, not reject you, and not ignore you, but to be open, loving, friendly, caring, etc.

Participant: You said, in the end, it all comes back down to voidness again.

Dr. Berzin: Right, it all comes down to voidness again. 

Participant: First, we conceptually project that we are totally separate entities from each other – a big solid “me” and a big solid “you” – and then we get the sincere wish to connect to each other.

Dr. Berzin: Right. She points out that we need to remember voidness because, we make a big division between you and me. Then we feel that I have to get together with you. Then there are these expectations, and it doesn’t work out, etc.

The only thing that you have to be a little careful about is that we are not all identical, like an undifferentiated stew. We are each an individual. Again, with a friend, it is very important (and with ourselves, too) to see that we are each a beginningless, endless mental continuum and that each moment is made up of so many different parts that are changing and are influenced by so many things in terms of what we see, what we hear, what we think, what feeling we have, what emotion we have. Every moment is different. And the continuum of me and the continuum of you – there is nothing solid there. Some of our individual quirks interact well with yours in terms of causal relationships; some don’t. In fact, most don’t – even if we spend twenty-four hours a day with the person, although more quirks can be interconnected than others. 

Now, within that context… not that we are all one, but within that context, we put a big solid line around the “me” and a big solid line around the “you.” We are separate: the solid “me” wants the solid “you.” And we somehow think that’s going to make the solid “me” secure, which, of course, it can never do. That goes back to our point number two – that there’s no satisfaction and that we’ll never be secure. Why? Because we’re trying to make something that doesn’t even exist – a solid “me” – secure. 

OK. It’s like, “How can I keep my unicorn in the barn?” and worrying about how to secure it so that it doesn’t run away. Well, the unicorn doesn’t even exist, so how can we make it secure? So, it’s like that. 

The only solution to insecurity is the understanding of voidness. A lot of dependent relationships, including friendships, are based on insecurity. “Somehow, when I am with you, I feel safe and secure. I feel loved.” Well, very nice. That can be what we emotionally feel, but there is a danger there. That can’t be relied on. Cannot be relied on. When it is lost, we go back to the previous suffering: we go from high to low. So, what we want to do is not to have these expectations, at least on the Dharma-lite level. Real Thing Dharma is that we don’t want to continue taking rebirth. 

Then you get into the question: do Buddhists have friends? Do arhats have friends? That’s a difficult one. Does His Holiness the Dalai Lama have friends? He calls everybody his friend. 

Participant: What about Serkong Rinoche?

Dr. Berzin: He calls everybody his friend. I traveled around with Serkong Rinpoche. Wherever we stayed, whether it was with the local geshe, the local monk, or whomever, all of a sudden, for those days, this person was his closest friend. They would laugh and joke together and the whole thing. Then they left. Like that. And that’s the only way.

For many, many years, I was closely involved with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The only way to survive in that situation is to totally acknowledge that you are not special. Nobody is special. As soon as you consider yourself special and that you should get special privileges, you are out. Everybody is equal; nobody’s special. 

So, friends cannot be relied upon. And the time for our class can’t be relied upon either. It is now nine o’clock and time to end.