Longchenpa's 30 Pieces of Sincere Advice (Stanzas 3 & 4): On Being a Very Important Person

[Bill Gardner]

Too bad! You've built up a large following, one way or another.
You look after a large institution where all the right conditions are present.
But it's all just a basis for conflict and ideas like "This is mine."
Live alone - that's my sincere advice.

In public ceremonies you heal children or subdue demons.
You give your capabilities away to the crowd.
Because you really want food and money, your own needs cloud your judgment.
Tame your own mind - that's my sincere advice.

[Bill Gardner]

Longchenpa on being alone. This is from the end of The Jewel Ship:

Lacking the ability to lead beings to a direct experience of this reality, I remain alone in the forest. I am surrounded by many beautiful lakes, flowers, plants, fruits, and a bamboo fence with vines. With a cool house and a happy life, I have obtained the serenity of a peaceful mind. I am not seen by any humans or demons. I just live here on pure water and the food of austerities.

This is beautiful but puzzling. Is he really a forest monk, or is this metaphor? If he did not have the ability to lead beings to direct experience, does anyone? If not, what's the point of this glorious writing? And is living alone unseen the Mahayana way?

[Loren Enders]

I have always approached life as being black and white but it is not. To me living alone unseen is not the Mahayana way but my conception is my own and debatable. Lately, when I am "out in the world," I try to focus on others and not myself and I consciously say, "Blessings from the Buddhas." When homeless people come up to me, I try to listen to them and then try to visualize rays of light coming from a Buddha or vajra and permeating them, blessing them.

I don't know, the opposite side of this is the solitary yogi who is training their own mind-maybe they can actually tame or subdue demons directly just from being present in the world. Or maybe in the long run taking 5, 10, 12 years in solitary retreat to come back and do GREAT works is more beneficial.

Maybe we need to just rely on the Guru. Lacking the ability to lead beings directly we need to rely on the Guru to direct us to where we would be most beneficial until we gain that knowledge ourselves.

[Greg]

Very well said Loren.

Longchen doesn't actual say living alone unseen. If that were his intention I think he would have used different language, go into the wild mountains and retreat, for instance.

I have struggled with staying in engagement with the 'worldly dharmas' as opposed to retreating away. I have been instructed to engage the world by one of my root teachers. This probably is how he sees the work I need to do. I need a lot of hammering down.

The Mahayana path is not limited in anyway. The Diamond Cutter Sutra gives straight forward expression to that. Compassion for others has a transmundane aspect. By accomplishment through practice, compassion is not limited to helping people on the street or serving others through mundane work, but is limitless in potential.

I endorse your visualizations when encountering others. Radiating benefit in this way is very good. Maybe you do this already: Follow up with gathering back the light to your own heart. I have been doing for so many years it is almost automatic. I have also learned to offer such interpersonal contact to the mandala.

Still it can all depend if I am in a distraction of worldly dharmas whether any of that happens, alas lots of work to do.

All the best
G

[Ann Braun]

I read in a Wikipedia article that while Longchenpa was abbot of Tibet's important Samye monastery, he spent most of his life traveling or in retreat.

We humans like to idealize others, turn them into gods. isn't it wonderful that Longchenpa reminds us that a great Dzogchen adept is not a god?

Is there a cause and effect relationship between being awake and being able to lead others to direct experience? Maybe not. I've heard quite a few Tibetan stories about people whose realization was not evident until their death.

In some of his recent retreats/classes, Stephen Batchelor (who has been studying the Pali Canon) reminds us that after his experience beneath the Bodhi tree, the Buddha questioned whether he should attempt to teach.

What I take from this is that finding one's own path is an ongoing process and that a map of anyone's path is likely to look very convoluted with circuits, branchings and even dead ends.

[Jonathan Gaines]

For people interested in current teaching by a Tibetan master on Dzogchen;

Flight of the Garuda Teachings (SF/Bay Area)

Continuing on Saturday, July 4 in Berkeley and continuing at various locations around the SF Bay Area through mid-July, Wangdor Rimpoche will be teaching from the complete text of Kaden Sho Lap translated as "Flight of the Garuda," a Dzogchen heart text of the Nyingma lineage. .....(See info at the link)

http://www.customjuju.com/wangdorrimpoche/index.htm