WSW 12: Falsely Accusations, Loss of Possessions

We are up to verse 18. The verse says in the poetic version:

When unjustly we are blamed for the misdeeds of others, and are falsely accused of flaws that we lack, and are always the object of verbal abuse, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now we’ve despised and belittled our gurus; hereafter let’s never accuse others falsely but give them full credit for virtues they have.

Particularly with this verse, we can see from the literal version a little bit more clearly what actually it’s saying. The literal version of this is: 

At times when others falsely accuse us of the wrongs of having done or not done something, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from ourselves having denigrated the hallowed ones. Now, let’s not denigrate others falsely for having done or not done something.

This whole idea here is that others accuse us, and it comes from us having done it to others. We accused people of having done something wrong which they didn’t do, or having a fault which they don’t have. Or we accuse them of the fault of not having done something when they actually did it, or of not having a quality when they actually have it. This is why it says here in the poetic version of this that we’ve unjustly blamed others. “We are blamed for the misdeeds of others” – in other words, we are blamed for, or accused of, a wrong thing that we haven’t done. Or “falsely accused of flaws that we lack” – again it’s not so clear here that. What that’s referring to is the fact that when we haven’t done something, and we’re accused of having done it. Or when we’ve done something – this is when we have done something we’re accused of not having done it. The two words here in Tibetan are “to add something that is not there” or “to take away something that is there.” 

So we’ve put down the teachers – put them down in the sense of accusing them of having faults that they don’t have – or we accuse them of not having good qualities that they do have. Sometimes teachers will act impatiently with us, for example, just as a way to push us and to shame us almost into acting, whereas in fact from their side they are not impatient at all. Or they could act crossly toward us – so here that would be an example of how we accuse them of being ill-tempered – “You really have a bad temper” – when actually they don’t. 

You see these two things of seeing that somebody has something when they don’t have it or, when they do have it, to say that they don’t have it. “Oh, you don’t know the teachings very deeply” – accusing the teacher of that when they are explaining things simply simply because they want you to be able to understand, whereas in fact they do know it very deeply. That’s what it’s referring to here. I find in this case, particularly in this verse, that looking at it more literally gives us a clearer idea of what it actually is referring to. 

Let’s think then about this issue: do we find that we are accused of faults that we don’t have? We’re blamed for things at work, or we’re blamed in our home situations, the people that we’re living with. “You didn’t do this, you didn’t do that” when we actually did it; or, “You did this” when we didn’t do it. I think that most of us have from time to time experienced that. It basically comes from doing that toward others, and the advice is very simple: “Stop doing that.” Now, how do we stop doing that?

I think there are two cases here: one in which we do this maliciously, like with trying to hide our own faults; and the other case is when we just haven’t investigated clearly enough, and we just go on superficial appearances. In that case, where it’s based on not really knowing, the solution is fairly simple: check up. Now, for that we have to be a little bit diplomatic because if we’re always asking the other person, “Did you lock the door when we left?” “Did you turn on the answering machine?” then the other person gets the impression that we don’t trust them. One has to be quite diplomatic in this type of situations.

Also, I think that we can look at this from the point of view of exaggerating what somebody does and what they don’t do. “You never call me;” sometimes they do but we say, “You never do that. “You never give me anything,” “You never do anything for me,” “You never do anything around the house,” whereas sometimes they do do something. We’re not giving them credit for something that they do; we’re taking away what they do do. Or, “You’re always upset” – well, they are not always upset. That’s adding more – adding negative qualities to things that they don’t have. This comes in there as well. We need to try to be fairly accurate in terms of positive qualities and negative qualities, and what somebody has done and what they actually haven’t done – and not exaggerate, or add things, or take things away. 

Now, what about with respect to our spiritual teacher? Here it’s says that the cause for this is having done it with the gurus. Here we’re adding faults, specifically, that they haven’t done. It’s not so much adding; they don’t talk about adding good qualities that they don’t have. Do gurus have faults or not? I think that we need to bring in here our understanding of voidness – this is very crucial here. What does the teachings on voidness say from the Prasangika point of view? It says nothing is established on the side of the object, and the existence of something is established by mental labeling. What does that mean? It means that we can look at all the behavior of the teacher, and there can be certain actions and so on that convention would agree that this is a poor quality, a negative quality. There are other aspects that convention would agree – because it has to agree with convention for it to be correct, for it to be a valid labeling – that this is a good quality – proper behavior. The other type of behavior is improper behavior. 

Then the question is, which ones are we going to label? To label the negative aspects – if we look at the literature about the relation with the guru – that’s not helpful. It will only depress you and bring you down. The Fifth Dalai Lama says it quite clearly: you don’t deny these shortcomings, but you don’t focus on them. You have examined the guru well enough beforehand, and you’ve decided that this person has more good qualities than negative qualities, and I find him inspiring, and they can actually teach me something. Then at that point, when you accept them as your teacher, you’re no longer going to focus on and criticize their shortcomings. They have them, of course. You don’t deny them. But the point is not to dwell on them. What you are labeling and focusing on are the good qualities. This is only when you accept them as a teacher. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has said very clearly: you go to any Dharma teacher – no matter who they are – at the beginning, just like going to a lecture in the university, you check it out. 

Even when we’ve accepted the teacher, we don’t deny their shortcomings. But the point that I wanted to make is that even if conventionally they do have this fault, it’s not established from the side of the object; it’s established by what the word “fault” refers to. There’s mental labeling, but it’s not that you can just label their fault a good quality, like the people saying that this teacher’s sexual abuse, and abuse of alcohol and students, is the enlightened activity of the yidam crazy wisdom and so on. That’s labeling falsely a conventionally inappropriate type of behavior. That doesn’t conform with convention. We have to look at how we label things, and we have to look also, conventionally, how the teacher is behaving or what qualities they have. Even though those qualities are not established on the side of the teacher, still conventionally they can be called this or that.

I think we can apply this to not only the teacher but to everybody – not falsely accusing them of things that they do have or that they don’t have, or that they’ve done or that they’ve not done. I think in relations it’s often like that: “You never call,” “You don’t love me;” “You don’t this or that,” “You always do this or that.” When we’re accused of that – and that’s really not very nice – we need to see that this wheel of sharp weapons coming back from having done that to others. We decide to try to stop doing that and then also do a tonglen practice with other people who experience the same problem, because we remember this whole practice here. The text is emphasizing looking at these problems on two levels: dealing with them in terms of our own behavior and then, from a tonglen pointing of view, seeing that we’re not the only one with that problem. There are lots of others who have the same problems as well, so we expand our horizon and see this as much larger universal problem. We take on that problem of everybody ourselves – we’re not just thinking, “Poor me, I have this problem” – and give the solution to everyone. In this way we overcome our self-preoccupation, we overcome our grasping for a solid “me” – “I’m the only one who has this problem.” You see it as something which is general to lots of people.

My point is that there are many ways of practicing tonglen. We can do it with this solid “me” that still we believe in and that’s screaming and yelling, “I don’t want to have to deal with other people’s problems”. You sort of punch it in the face and say, “Aha, now take this,” experience everybody’s problem.” But I think that that is just an initial level to overcome this reticence, this hesitation that “I don’t want to get involved with other people’s problems.” But I think to really do this practice of tonglen on a long-term basis as a steady thing, it has to be combined with the understanding there’s no solid “me.” So it’s no longer an issue of  “I don’t want to experience their problems.” We take it all on and conventionally label everybody’s problem as “my problem.” Remember, Shantideva said, “Suffering has no owner”. I can label “me” onto everybody’s problems, so in that sense we take it on as my problem, and I deal with everybody’s problem as if it were just my own limited self’s problem.

Let’s think about this in terms of examples of what we might have experienced being accused ourselves and see how we might be continuing this pattern by accusing others falsely – not only our spiritual teachers but everybody in general. Then we resolve not to do that, and then do the tonglen practice in terms of taking on this suffering from everybody who has it and giving them the restraint to not continue. You want to remove from them the problem and the causes of the problem and give them happiness and the solution for getting that happiness – the cause for the happiness.

It’s taking the problem on in the sense of treating it like my own problem. Exchange of self and others: rather than thinking of it as somebody else’s problem and “I don’t care,” just as I would be really concerned about if it was my problem, now I’m equally concerned about it when it’s somebody else’s problem. I consider it the same as if it were my own problem. Then of course we try to feel the suffering that everybody has from this, not just me. As I said we can do this on two levels. The initial level is to punch in the nose the self-cherishing attitude, and for that we have all these incredible visualizations of dirty substances, and oil, and puss, and feces, and things that we’re afraid of coming into us to sort of smash the self-cherishing that doesn’t want to do it. But then, as I said, on the second level of doing this, I think it has to be done on the basis of understanding of no “true self.” The point of punching the false “me” in the face with all these visualizations is that what we’re punching is the grasping for a self. There is no false me in any case. It’s not as though we want this solid truly existent “me” to say, “Okay, now dump everything on me, I’ll be the martyr.” What we’re doing is smashing that concept of a solid “me” so that it disappears. In that sense we take it on, otherwise, so I said, this whole tonglen practice could degenerate into a martyr practice, and I don’t think it was intended for that. 

That’s why the second half of this text has all these verses of, “Trample him, trample him, dance on the head of this treacherous concept of selfish concern.” We also want to get rid not only self-cherishing – that “I don’t want to deal with anybody else’s problems” – but we want to get rid of grasping of the self. Let’s think about this and do a little bit of the tonglen practice with it. I’ll read the verse again just so that we have it clear: 

At times when others falsely accuse us of the wrongs of having done or not done something, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from ourselves having denigrated the hallow ones. Now let’s not denigrate others falsely for having done or not done something.

The poetic version is: 

When unjustly we are blamed for the misdeeds of others and are falsely accused of flaws that we lack and are always the object of verbal abuse, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now we have despised and belittled our gurus; hereafter let’s never accuse others falsely but give them full credit for virtues they have.

That’s actually adding quite a bit.

Now the next verse – verse 19. The poetical version says: 

When the things we require for daily consumption and use fall apart or are wasted or spoiled, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now we’ve been careless with others’ possessions; hereafter let’s give them whatever they need.

The literal version of that is: 

At times when our material goods of necessity fall apart, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from having considered of no value the necessities of others. Now, let’s help them acquire their necessities.

“Necessities” obviously is the things we need for daily consumption or daily use. That would be anything that we have – our clothing, our possession, our computer. These sorts of things are falling apart, or we run out of food, or the food always falls on the floor and breaks, or spills, or the dishes break, and so on. 

Participant: I have a general question about the giving of the solution. Do I give a solution that I found out for myself, which may not be the correct solution for the other person, or do I give more a general solution, like the understanding of emptiness or bodhichitta?

Dr Berzin: The question is, what do we give as a solution? That can be done in a very brief or a very elaborate type of way. What we give as a solution here is indicated in the verses, when it says, “Now let’s not denigrate others falsely for having done or not done something.” We take away their being falsely accused, and we take away from them the cause of it. (Compassion is take away the suffering and the causes of suffering.) We give to them freedom from that so that they no longer have that problem. But specifically, what we want to give to them is the cause of that, so we give them the insight and the discipline not to falsely accuse others, so that they stop building up the negative karma to continue to experience that problem. You give them that understanding, that realization, that discipline. Then you can go on from there to give them all the facilities to be able to study and practice the Dharma, and give them the insight of bodhichitta, the realization of bodhichitta, the insight of voidness; and give them liberation and enlightenment – go all the way in terms of what you give them. 

But first what we’re dealing with here, in each specific verse, is them experiencing the results of the negative karma just like we have – the same things, so the same solution here. It’s not really a personal solution because it’s indicated very much in these verses. Now, in general, when we do this, we come up with a Dharma solution. I don’t think Dharma solutions are so individual. It’s sort of general advice. If somebody is angry, take away their anger and give them patience and love – it’s not so personal or individual. Now, how do you actually visualize that? That’s a different question. The standard thing is to just visualize it as white light as you breath out. But basically, what you imagine is that they actually change and experience the result. 

Now, who do you actually visualize that for? This is another question. For a beginner’s level, there seem to be two approaches. One approach, of course, is like what we have in Theravada, and also it’s mentioned in the Seven Point Attitude Training or lojong: you start with yourself, and then you extend it gradually to more and more people that you know, and then people you like, people you dislike, etc.; and your city, the country, and so on. But His Holiness suggested another way, which is often also pointed out, which is that you want to have equanimity. You want to be able to give it to everybody. When think in terms of giving it to all beings – all humans, all animals, in all these realms – although from one point of view you could say that it becomes so vague that it doesn’t mean anything to us emotionally, from another point of view you could say that it is a practice of equanimity. If you have equanimity toward everybody – toward all humans, toward all beings – then on that basis you can deal individually with whoever you happen to meet. So, I think there are two approaches here. Both of them seem to be in there when we look at these standard sadhana practices like the Chenrezig practice that’s done in the Karma Kagyu – they are just thinking of the beings of each realm. 

If one finds that you have no feeling with that type of practice, which is very easy because it’s too vague, then I think one needs to remind oneself that the point of it is equanimity: to want to have it to all the beings of that realm equally – not just the ones we like, not just the ones that we know, and so on. That’s the point to be emphasized, and that’s not easy. But in the bodhichitta practices, the two methods for developing bodhichitta start with equanimity, and so although that’s very difficult, that seems to be the essential point for Mahayana practice. Once we’re open to everybody equally then you can build these positive attitudes of love, compassion, everybody has been my mother, and so on. The other way, where we start with ourselves and extend it out to others – the temptation, of course, is to call that a Hinayana method because it’s done like that in metta and love meditation in Theravada. 

But it does say in the Mahayana lojong, in the Seven Point Attitude Training, start with yourself. I don’t know actually if it just goes from yourself and then everybody, or it’s first self and then gradually extended out. If we do it strictly like lam-rim, you start with yourself because compassion for everybody is based on renunciation: just as I want myself to be free from that problem then so does everybody else, so you could go from just take on your own problem first to then take on everybody’s. You wouldn’t have to go through all the steps of then my loved ones, my family, my friends, the people in my neighborhood, my city, my country, etc. I think that actually there are many styles in which it can be done. I think they all have certain validity. It depends, I think, very much on the type of person we are. If we’re somebody who is not very emotional, who doesn’t feel emotions strongly, then I think probably it’s better to start out with practicing with not only ourselves but then with people we know that we do have some feeling toward, so that on the basis of that you extend it. Because otherwise there is no feeling at all. But for those who have a great deal of feeling and emotion naturally then I don’t think that course of extending it out in steps is so necessary. The main thing is to work on having it be universal with equanimity. 

We only have a few minutes so let’s go through this fairly quickly. We’re in verse 19; it’s saying that our material goods – the things that support our lives, so this could be our possessions, the computer is always crashing and breaking, we’re always breaking dishes, everything we have breaks, our food spoils, it goes rotten, all sorts of things like that – they fall apart, are wasted or spoiled. This comes from “having considered of no value the necessities of others” – in the poetic it says that “we’ve been careless with others’ possessions.” If it’s somebody else’s house or somebody else’s room, I can trash it, I can throw garbage all around, I can waste their food, I can leave the milk out of the refrigerator, I can leave the refrigerator door open and leave their lights on. We consider of no value the necessities of others. We just download anything into their computer without really being concern about a virus etc. This is the cause for that. “We’ve considered of no value the necessities of others” – their possessions – and so, “Now, let’s help them acquire their necessities.” In the poetic version, it says give them whatever they need, but it literally just means to help them to get the things that they need for life. Rather than wasting what they have or breaking what they have, help them to build up the things that they would need. This, I think, doesn’t need terribly much discussion because I’m sure we’ve all experienced that of not valuing the possessions of others and having a lot of our own things break, or tear, or you get a hole in your shirt or your sweater the first time you wear it.

Then we practice this in the same way. We think of the syndrome that we experience. We think of how we can be perpetuating it from having this behavior of not really valuing other people’s possessions. We do this as a way to overcome that – to stop doing that; and to help others – rather than destroy, or waste, or spoil their possessions, their things – to acquire them and to get nice things. Then we think of that in terms of others as well who are always experiencing the same problem of things breaking and going bad, going rotten, spoiling, etc. and give them the same solution.

One thing I wanted to add here – it came to me while doing this – is that I think that this tonglen practice is quite similar to the inner offering practice in anuttarayoga tantra, the highest class of tantra. When we have an inner offering – inner offering of the so-called dirty substances within the body, where you have feces and urine and blood and sperm and marrow and different types of meats of different animals, and all of that is in a cup – you have four steps. You chase away interferences, then you dissolve it into voidness, and then you generate it in a pure form of nectar, and then you multiply it infinitely, to give that to everyone. It symbolizes purifying our aggregates and elements within the body and using that to help to attain enlightenment. It occurred to me that it’s really very parallel to this whole tonglen practice, because when we take on the suffering of others, what form do we take it on? We remove it from them in the form of dirty substances: oil and dirt and feces and urine, things that we are really frightened of, and so on. You first chase away interference, because you bring it into yourself, and the interference is from ego grasping: “I don’t want to deal with this.” So, you chase that interference away, then you dissolve it into voidness – because that’s the only way to deal with it; it’s not in terms of things being inherently existent – with whatever understanding of voidness we have. And then, when we do the giving, we generate it in some pure from – white light of whatever – and we multiply it infinitely and send it and give it to others. That is very much like the inner offering, isn’t it? As I said, I’ve never heard any explanation like that but, just thinking about it now, it seemed to be perfectly parallel. So, perhaps this might be of some help. 

Let’s end here with a dedication. We think whatever understanding we’ve gained, whatever positive force has built up, may this act as a cause for reaching enlightenment for the benefit of all.