Fearless Simplicity - Drubwang Tsoknyi Rinpoche

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teaching is presented as a brain teaser and is hard to figure out but you finally get it, then you may feel satisfied. But this feeling of temporary satisfaction is not the real benefit. To really saturate yourself, your entire being, with the Dharma, you need the proper motivation. Please apply this thoroughly, all the time.

      In Vajrayana teachings, we find many instructions on how to improve our motivation. In fact, if you really learn about how this motivation should be, the whole bodhichitta teaching is contained within that. Cultivate the correct motivation within your own experience, and it turns into bodhichitta all by itself.

      I have been teaching now for fifteen years. To teach on the view, on emptiness and so forth, all of that is of course great, but when I look through the whole range of teachings, the real dividing line between whether one’s practice goes in the right direction or the wrong direction always comes down to motivation. That is the pivotal point.

      Without pure motivation, no matter how profound the method is that we apply, it still turns into spiritual materialism. To train in being a bodhisattva and cultivate bodhichitta so that “I can be happy” means something is twisted from the very beginning. Instead, embrace your practice with the genuine bodhichitta motivation.

      Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche, who is one of my root gurus, would teach on motivation over and over again. He talked about it so much that, frankly, I sometimes felt a little bored, thinking, “He talked about it yesterday, he talked about it today, and he will probably talk about it tomorrow. This is a little too much. I’ve already heard it.” This kind of resistance is actually very good proof that ego doesn’t like teachings on pure motivation. Right there, at the moment one feels resistance against the altruistic attitude, that is the precise spot to work with, touchy as it may be. To admit this and be willing to deal with it right at that point is very practical, very pragmatic. I think that the whole point of practice is using Dharma teachings at the exact point of resistance. Otherwise, we just end up practicing when we feel good, and we avoid it when we feel bored or restless. At the very moment of feeling depressed, restless, or unhappy, take these moods as a really good training opportunity, as a blessing, and put the Dharma to use right on the spot. Think, “I am so glad I have this opportunity to practice meditation. I am deeply delighted. Please come here, unhappiness, depression, every type of suffering! Please come closer, I am so happy to see you!” When we train in this type of “welcoming practice” on a daily basis, we can progress and become truly transformed. Otherwise we are just postponing the main problem until some indefinite future time, tomorrow and then again tomorrow. We postpone it again and again, until the doctor says, “Sorry, your time is up! No more tomorrows.”

      I can promise you that the Dharma works well if you use it well. I have a great deal of trust that the teachings of the awakened Buddha are extremely profound and precious. Their practice can solve our basic problem permanently and completely. All our confusion, all our emotional obscurations can be completely undone. Not only can we achieve liberation for ourselves personally, but we can expand our capacity to benefit others at a deep and true level, not just superficially. All these tools and insights are presented in the Buddha’s teachings. To use them only for temporary, shallow purposes, as is often the case with therapy—approaching practice as a bit of self-improvement—degrades the Buddha’s teachings to the level of a self-help book. There is no need for that. There are already more than enough of those—stacks of them, mountains of New Age self-help books suggesting this or that kind of therapy. If this is all we want out of Buddhism, we can turn to the easily understood self-help books that already exist. They are actually very useful. But if the future of the Buddhist tradition is no more than another self-help variation, I feel somewhat sad. Someone who simply wants a stronger ego to face the world, make more money, influence people, and become famous maybe doesn’t need Buddhism.

      This sort of Dharma talk was probably not heard in the past in Tibet. It wasn’t necessary then, because the country was full of true practitioners. You just had to look up the mountainside and somebody was sitting there practicing. You could see the dwellings of hermits from wherever you were, scattered all over the sides of mountain ranges. At any given time throughout history, the Drukpa Kagyu tradition abounded with great practitioners who had given up all material concern. These people were happy to just get by on whatever came along, happy to let whatever happened happen; they were free of all emotional baggage and worry for themselves. Maybe they did worry somewhat in the beginning, let’s say the first six months of practice, but then they went beyond petty worries. They did not spend their whole lives trying to deal with emotional issues. They dealt with them and went on to the real practice. They did not remain inside the cocoon of spiritual materialism. Wouldn’t it be sad to die like that, wrapped up in selfish worry?

      Particularly when we come to Vajrayana practice, we must also have a certain amount of courage, a certain kind of mental strength, and together with that, an openness and softness of heart. This quality does not mean we are spaced-out or preoccupied with one thought after another. Rather, we should have a willingness to understand how to practice, along with the open-mindedness. This quality of inner boldness is very important in Vajrayana: being bold not in an aggressive way, as when you’re ready to fight whoever opposes you, but rather being ready to do whatever needs to be done. That is a very important quality.

      To be a Vajrayana practitioner requires a certain degree of inner strength that grows out of confidence. This is not the aggressive strength of a fighter; it is more a preparedness that refuses to succumb to any obstacle or difficulty: “I am not going to give in, no matter how hard it is. I will just take whatever comes and use the practice to spontaneously liberate that state!” Be this way rather than timid and afraid, always shying away from difficult situations. It is very hard to be a Vajrayana practitioner with a timid, chicken-hearted attitude toward life.

      The teachings I discuss here belong to the vehicle of Vajrayana. The Sanskrit word vajra literally means “diamond,” which is the hardest of all substances. A diamond can cut any other substance, but it cannot itself be cut by anything else. The diamond’s strength and impenetrability signify that when the true view of Vajrayana has dawned within our stream of being, we develop a quality of being unmoved or unshaken by obstacles and difficulties. Whatever kind of harm may present itself, whether it be a negative emotion or a physical pain, we have a certain quality of being unassailable, instead of immediately becoming lost and being defeated by that obstacle. The true practitioner of Vajrayana is unassailable in the face of difficulty.

      We can succeed in really improving our motivation, and that would be wonderful, not only for ourselves, but also for being able to benefit others.

       SALAD DRESSING

      My style of teaching is not necessarily a style that belongs only to me personally, although it’s one I often use. I lean toward an approach that emphasizes knowledge. Equally significant is the approach that emphasizes method, or means. Please understand that means and knowledge must always go hand in hand, that we should always practice them in combination. In other words, we need to combine the two accumulations of merit and wisdom. Another way to phrase this is to emphasize the need to combine the two levels of truth, relative and ultimate. This combination of means and knowledge, merit and wisdom, relative truth and ultimate truth is like a great eagle in flight, which needs two wings to fly. The eagle unfolds its wings and soars through the sky based on these twin supports. Shantideva said: “Unfold the two wings of means and knowledge and fly to the state of enlightenment, the realm of all buddhas.” The point is that the two wings are equally important. Imagine a bird flying with one wing: it might manage to get off the ground, but it will soon plummet without having gotten very far.

      There are plenty of other analogies for this. Doesn’t a human being need two legs? When speaking, don’t we need both the upper lip and the lower lip? When eating, don’t we need both the upper and lower teeth in order to chew? And to determine a distance, don’t we need both eyes? To ring a gong, don’t we need both the mallet and the instrument to make the sound? In the same way, when practicing the Dharma, we need both means and knowledge, method and insight. This

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