Recap
We’ve been going through the text by Dharmarakshita, the Indonesian teacher of Atisha, which is Wheel of Sharp Weapons. It’s an attitude training or mind training text. In it, we are looking at the first large section which deals with the various things that are befalling us – the problems that we experience – and recognizing that these problems are the results of our negative behavior in the past. As it says in the text, it’s the wheel of sharp weapons coming back to us from what we have done, and so we first of all need to recognize the causes for the various types of problems that we might be experiencing. I think it’s important to keep in mind that although the texts are specifying one particular cause for one particular result that that’s not so simple in terms of the way that cause and effect works. Whatever effects that we have come from a huge number of causes and conditions, and various things that we do have many results, not just one result. The text is speaking in terms of the major cause that could be bringing about the type of problems that we’re experiencing.
When we deal with this, what we try to do is on two levels. The first is to try stop repeating the type of destructive behavior that’s causing the problem, so that we ourselves don’t experience it in the future anymore. We don’t create more causes for the continuance of the problem. Then secondly, we also expand our attention out to everybody else who is experiencing a similar type of problems. We think to take on the problem ourselves, but as we saw we can do this on two levels of taking it on ourselves and giving the same solution to them, as we would give for ourselves. We can do this on one level in which we have this strong ego grasping that resists this, so we imagine the problems of others coming on in very strong forms of visualization to sort of smash this selfishness that doesn’t want to get involved. By actually dealing with the resistance that we would put up to having dirty substances, and frightening creatures, and so on enter into us – that helps us to fight against this strong sense of a “me” that says “I don’t want this, this is disgusting or unacceptable.”
But then on another level, what we saw was that with an understanding of voidness and mental labeling – even if our understanding is just on a very basic level – this makes the whole process much easier to do. It helps us to avoid the martyr extreme of solid “me” – “I surrender so I will now take on the problems of the world” – that is not the ultimate way of dealing with this issue. What we need to realize is, as Shantideva says, that problems have no owners, and deal with others’ problems the same as we would ourselves. In this way, we expand our scope from thinking just in terms of a little “me” that has this problem to the same problem with everybody. We deal with it on this larger, non-ego-based way, and give the same solution to others, which here is primarily dealing with changing our behavior.
Karmic Causes of Having an Unclear Mind
We’re up to verse 20. Last time I mentioned that I’ve been retranslating the text. We have the poetic version from 30 years ago, when I did this, and we also have the more literal version that I’ve been working on now. The poetical version of verse 20:
When our minds are unclear and our hearts are unhappy, we are bored doing virtue but excited by vice, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now we’ve led others to acts of non-virtue; hereafter let’s never provide the conditions that rouse them to follow their negative traits.
In the literal version it’s much simpler:
At times when our minds are unclear and our hearts are unhappy, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from having caused other people to build up negative force. Now, let’s give up (providing) conditions for others’ negative karmic force.
In the poetic version, the first line is the same. “Our minds are unclear and our hearts are unhappy” – that’s the basic situation. What the poetical version adds is an explanation of that: “We’re bored doing virtue but excited by vice.” That just expands a little bit more on that – that’s sort of the flip side of “Our minds are unclear and our hearts are unhappy.” This is usually explained in terms of when we’re trying to do positive things, then we get very sleepy. We go to a discourse or a lecture and we fall asleep; or we try to do some sort of meditation practice, and we get bored, we get restless, we’re unhappy doing that; we are thinking more in terms of other things that might be more fun – this type of thing. That’s the usual way in which it’s expanded, but I think we could understand it in a more general way as well – that we are generally depressed, the minds are dull and unclear, and our hearts are unhappy. The cause of it, just literally, is that we’ve caused other people to build up “negative karmic force.”
Here in the poetic version, it says, “We’ve led others to acts of non-virtue.” It’s the same thing: we have provided the circumstances or the causes, and we’ve sort of encouraged others to act in some sort of negative way. We ourselves experience the result of that coming upon ourselves, which the general result of acting destructively is being unhappy, experiencing suffering. The general effect of having distorted views is that the mind is very dull, and we’re stupid and unclear. In our ignorance and naivety, if we encourage others to act negatively – not only acting negatively ourselves – then it would seem quite in order that our minds would be unclear and our hearts unhappy. As I said, the explanation that’s usually given, that would refer to when we’re trying to do something positive, we feel unhappy, and our minds are unclear, and we’re bored. “Now, let’s give up (providing) conditions for others’ negative karmic force,” or in the poetic version, “let’s never provide the conditions that rouse them to follow their negative traits” – it’s the same idea.
This leads us to thinking about how we might have encouraged others to act negatively. There are many different ways in which we could have done that or provide the circumstance for them to act negatively. Of course, we could encourage them to go hunting, or fishing, or rob a store, or something like that, but probably most of us haven’t really done too much of that. But what other examples may we have? “Let’s smoke a joint,” “Let’s get drunk.” We could also encourage other people to waste a lot of time: “Oh, don’t go to the Dharma centre, let’s go to the movie, let’s go to a nightclub.” Or also get other people into idle gossip, idle chatter, by taking them away from some type of work that they might be doing which is positive – whether it’s study for school, whether it’s Dharma practice, whether they are meditating – and you just interrupt them. We not only cause an interruption to them, but then they waste their whole time talking on and on and on about nonsense – things that are not so important. But as I say, it can involve two different situations: one in which we encourage them to do something destructive or wasteful together with us; and the other is to just encourage them to do it by themselves, and we don’t do it. I think there are many examples we can think of encouraging others to cheat – not pay for this, not pay for that. The result of that is, as it says here, “Our minds are unclear and our hearts are unhappy”. What we want to do is to give up providing conditions for others to build up negative karmic potential or negative karmic force.
Let’s try to think of some sort of examples from our own experience so that it becomes a little bit more relevant, a little bit more personal. We decide to try not to repeat that, and then do this tonglen practice of thinking of everybody who has that problem of the mind being unclear, the heart being unhappy. From the commentaries, it’s primarily when we’re trying to do something positive. I know often, faced with a day of sitting at the computer and working on Dharma things, there will be times when don’t feel like doing anything: “I don’t really want to do this, this is boring.” I think that’s an example. It doesn’t have to be an overly huge depression or falling asleep; it’s just that your mind’s unclear, your heart’s unhappy, you don’t feel like doing anything positive. You surf through the internet then to find something interesting. When we think of personal examples, it’s good to think not only examples of what we were doing like this in the past, but also what we are continuing to do these days.
What about walking around with expensive clothing or jewelry in an area which is very poor, and it causes other people to be jealous and to rob us. I think that is an example. Or if you wear that and you’re walking through a very poor neighborhood where there’s a lot of crime, you’re providing circumstances for others to act negatively; it’s a good example. What about teasing a dog so that it gets really excited and really angry and then bites? Or playing very wildly with a small child so the child gets so excited when it’s time to go to bed that the child breaks something, does something really awful – we’re providing circumstances for that. Or if as parents you argue with each other in the presence of small children, and in that way, you teach them that if there is a problem you argue, and fight, and hit each other, and so on – this is, in a sense, providing circumstances where the child will learn negative type of behavior, isn’t it?
Another example I’m thinking of is, let’s say, you have a partner, and the partner meditates before going to bed, and you want to make love, and so you tell them, “Hurry up, finish your meditation already, I’m waiting here.” You do all sorts of things to encourage the person to meditate less and to come to bed. That, I think, is a classic example that fits into specifically what it’s talking about in the verse – that then our own meditations are going to be very unclear. You’ll be very unhappy and bored to meditate. Remember, when we do this tonglen practice, try to put it together with the breathing. When you breath in take the problem away from everybody; when you breath out give the discipline here to stop acting like this to everybody. We can do that in the form of light, we can do that in whatever form you want – whatever is needed. In theory, when it comes in, it comes in your right nostril; when it goes out, it goes out your left nostril.
I think we have to be a little bit careful here. I was thinking of an example of somebody I knew whose child committed suicide, and then this person felt very guilty and thought, “I wasn’t a good enough parent. I provided the conditions, the circumstances for my child to kill himself.” I think that we have to really also pay attention to the fact that just because we provide conditions for somebody to act negatively, it doesn’t mean that we’re the cause for them to act negatively. Obviously, they have to have the karmic tendencies to respond in that way; we’re just providing conditions. Although it will be best if we try to stop providing conditions, that doesn’t guarantee that the other person is not going to meet other conditions that will cause them to act negatively. And if they do act negatively, I don’t think it’s proper to feel guilty that it was my fault, and go on a heavy guilt trip. So, one has to be a little bit delicate here.
Another example I was thinking of was when somebody is on a diet, to buy them chocolate or bake them a cake. Or if somebody stops smoking, to offer them a cigarette.
Karmic Causes of Having Unfulfilled Aims
Verse 21. The poetical version is:
When our minds are disturbed, and we feel great frustration that things never happen the way that we wish, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now we have caused interfering disturbance when others were focused on virtuous acts; hereafter let’s stop causing such interruption.
The literal one:
At times when we’re frustrated from the depths of our minds that our works are never accomplished, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from having caused interference to the hallowed ones’ deeds. Now, let’s rid ourselves of all our interference-making.
It’s saying that we’re frustrated; that things don’t work out the way that we would like. This is very often the case when we’re trying to do something positive – that things don’t work out. There’re always interferences; we try to do something, and it just doesn’t work. This is an interference to our own positive deeds, and so this comes from causing interference to other people’s positive deeds. It says specifically here “the hallowed one’s deeds” but I think that refers – as we have here in the poetical translation, the poetical version – to anybody who is focused on doing something positive. What we will want to do is to rid ourselves of interference-making – making interferences to others. Now, obviously, a lot of these things overlap with each other: providing circumstances for other’s negative things can also, in a sense, be in a way interfering with their meditating, disturbing them, and so on.
As I was saying at the beginning of the class, we can’t say that just one type of action is going to have just one type of effect, or one type of result is coming from just one type of action. Here we’re speaking specifically about causing interferences and hindrances to others. They are doing something positive, and the consequence of that is that we have interference, and we have obstacles, and things that we try to do don’t work out. We don’t get the job that we want, we don’t get the classes that we want – there are many examples. We want to go study in India, and it doesn’t work out – we can’t get the money or we can’t get the time off. There’re many sorts of interferences that can come and, of course, we can feel very frustrated at that.
We look on our behavior of how we might be causing interference and obstructions to other people doing positive things. It could be our teachers, it could be various lamas – constantly bothering them, for example. I think a general policy that is very good is to always ask – not only with teachers or lamas but with anybody – “Do you have time? Am I interrupting you? Is this a good time?” It’s like asking questions, especially asking questions to a teacher – it’s very important to try to answer the question first ourselves, and if we can’t answer it and we can’t figure it out, then ask. But with something very simple, then it’s best to think ourselves. I find it really very strange: I get a number of questions and email from various people around the world because of the website, and I’m always astounded when they ask a question and it’s not necessarily something that I know anything about. All I do is type it into Google and, in a few seconds, there is the answer or into Wikipedia. One wonders with these people – how could they not know about Google, in this day and age, if they are using the internet to send me an email question.
I’ll always remember, I had a professor in Princeton – Walter Kaufmann, he was very famous in those days. He was the expert on Nietzsche. He had written quite a lot of books, and I was taking a course with him on Hegel, Nietzsche, and existentialism – I was doing a bit of philosophy study. I went to his office and asked him a question and, rather than giving me the answer, he sat me down in his office with the German book of one of these philosophers in German, and said, “Look it up and figure it out yourself.” He didn’t send me home to do that; I had to do that there in his office with him there. This I thought was very helpful, actually, because I know I have the tendency to just answer other people’s questions, but you help them far better if you teach them the tools to be able to figure it out and learn it themselves. Because otherwise what happens is you encourage others to be dependent on you which, whether consciously or unconsciously, is a power trip. It’s helpful to try to figure things out yourself and not cause interruption.
Of course, it depends on each person, on each teacher. But causing interruption when somebody is actually doing something very positive – for instance, you can’t wait to ask your question, and you interrupt them while they are lecturing rather than waiting until the end – that’s causing interruption, isn’t it? I was giving that example in the last instance that our partner is meditating, and you say, “Come on, stop this. Go to bed!” That’s causing an interruption, isn’t it? It doesn’t have to be necessarily with Dharma; I think it’s doing anything which is constructive, like interrupting somebody that’s studying at school, doing their homework. As I say, it overlaps with the one before.
Let’s think about this in terms of the effect, which is that we are frustrated; our works are never accomplished; what we try to do doesn’t work out; we get lots of interference and obstacles. We then think of stopping causing interference to others, and then taking it on ourselves from others.
I should point out, that the method that is being done here, in which we start the problem in ourselves and then extend it to others, is what we find later on in the Seven Point Cleansing of Attitudes by Geshe Chekawa. In this he says, in the tonglen practice, start with yourself. I think this is where it’s coming from, since this was the earliest attitude training text.
Karmic Causes of Being Unable to Please Our Gurus
The next verse, 22, is:
When nothing we do ever pleases our gurus, this is the wheel of sharp weapons returning full circle upon us from wrongs we have done. Till now, with our gurus, we have feigned pious manners, but out of their presence we have reverted to sin. Hereafter let’s try to be less hypocritical and take all the teachings sincerely to heart.
The literal translation:
At times when no matter how we’ve acted, it never pleases our gurus, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from having acted two-facedly regarding the hallowed Dharma. Now, let’s minimize being two-faced regarding the Dharma.
The problem here is that no matter what we do, how we’ve acted, it never pleases our gurus. That’s an interesting question – what pleases the guru or doesn’t please the guru, and how does the guru (the teacher) manifest that and express that? But generally, this is about when we’re trying to act in a certain way, and the teacher isn’t satisfied with what we’ve done, or how we’ve done, or just everything is slightly annoying to the teacher – we always call at the wrong time, or do things at the wrong time. There are many possible ways in which what we could do never pleases our guru. The point is that we’ve acted in a two-faced manner with respect to the Dharma. In other words, when we’re with our teachers, we act so holy, and we pretend that we’re really practicing; but then when we’re away from our teacher, we act in the opposite way. It’s like saying to our teacher – this happened with one of my students – “Yes, I have given up all drugs, and I’ve given up this and that,” and then they haven’t actually. When they are away, they still are taking drugs. This is acting in a two-faced manner, pretending that we are practicing much more than we actually are with the teacher.
What the result of that would be is that the teacher is never pleased with us, the teacher chases us away, never has time for us. It’s very important with our Dharma practice to be honest with it, and not pretend to be in a higher level or more ethical level than we actually are. If we have a problem with drugs or alcohol or something like that, one can say, “I’m trying to minimize that” as opposed to saying, “I’ve given it up and not going to do it again.” We need to be honest and to report back in an honest fashion what we’ve been doing, if we’re in that type of situation with our teacher, if we have actually a personal relationship. It’s quite rare to have actual personal contact with the teachers. For most of the teachers – especially the high lamas in the Tibetan situation – there are too many disciples, and often we don’t speak their language either. But if we actually have a personal relation with the teacher, then it’s very important to be very honest and not two-faced about our Dharma practice.
This is something we can think of ourselves in terms of our personal experience. I mean, it’s an interesting topic actually, what does it mean to be two-faced? You go to India, for example, and you’re in the temple, or in Dharamsala, or you’re listening to teachings of His Holiness, and so on, and there we sit really very nicely, and we try to do more and more meditation; but when we’re back here we forget about it, and we act in a quite different way. Does that mean that when we are there in India, we shouldn’t try to act as positively as we can? I don’t think it means that, but very much to be honest with ourselves about where we’re at. Particularly I think this deals with when we are with the teacher. Obviously if we say, “Well, I’m not even going to try to stop acting in a way that is contrary to what Buddha had taught, I will continue to take drugs” or things like that – that obviously doesn’t please the teacher, because they are trying to help the student to follow the way that Buddha taught, which would help them to minimize their suffering. If they are just acting in a way that will continue making more suffering for themselves, and they don’t even care about it, and not willing to try to minimize that and stop that – obviously that would displease the teacher, and make the teacher sad. One needs to think about these things with respect to our own attitude toward Dharma, and our own attitude toward relating to a teacher and asking a teacher for guidance.
So, let’s think about this one.
At times when no matter how we’ve acted, it never pleases our gurus, this is the sharp weapon of negative karma circling back on us from having acted two-facedly regarding the hallowed Dharma. Now, let’s minimize being two-faced regarding the Dharma.
Any last comments or questions?
Participant: Are you two-faced if you are too humble?
Dr Berzin: Are we two-faced if we are too humble? Yes, I think so. Well, if you have a little bit of realization and you keep on saying, “No, I don’t know anything” – here we’re talking specifically about with the teacher, but I guess it also has to do with other people as well. On the one hand, one wants to be humble. A great deal of the style of the Kadampa Geshes, as they were called, were very noted for their humility. One doesn’t go around saying that “I know very much.” His Holiness always says, “I’m just a simple monk.” But I think there is a big difference between sincere humility and over-humility. For example, a Westerner imitating a Tibetan, and going around bent over when they are with the teachers, and sticking their tongue out, and slurping the breath inside, and doing all these gestures that very simple Tibetans would do. There is one Westerner who does that with me, and I find that unbelievably false, unbelievably phony, and I know this person is very arrogant elsewhere. The two-facedness is being overly humble with the teachers but, away from the teachers, being arrogant – this is the two-faced aspect. False humility – making a big show out of being humble – this is I think the problem. You make a show out of it: “Look at me, how humble I am, I’m the best at being humble.”
I remember there was this lama, Kunu Lama Rinpoche. He was an incredible practitioner. He the only one that everybody said was a bodhisattva, an actual bodhisattva. He’s the one that gave the teachings of Shantideva, Bodhicaryavatara, to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He would come into a temple dressed in rags, and he would just sit at the very back, with the poorest of the low monks, and they’d really have to drag him to sit upfront. That I don’t think would be considered false humility; on his own, he would just never go sit in a place of honor. There are others who come in wearing all this brocade shirts and stuff like and sit very proudly in the most prominent place. But making a show of your humility is a problem, I think, because you can tell when it’s false.
Dedication
Let’s end with a dedication then. We think whatever positive force, whatever understanding has come from this, may it go deeper and deeper and act as a cause for reaching enlightenment for the benefit of all.