There is a beautiful and deeply meaningful teaching on compassion called
“The Thirty-Seven Versus on the Practice of a Bodhisattva.”
It is similar to an instruction manual on how to live and practice in a way that leads to spiritual freedom while working toward relieving the suffering of all living beings. It was written by a Tibetan meditation master from the 13th century.
I will list phrases and offer descriptions that encapsulate the teachings along with an explanation of what is involved with each of the related practices.
Please remember to follow the three aspects of training that support the assimilation of the Dharma: Listening to (or reading) the teachings; Reflecting on the meaning of what you have heard to see how it is applicable to your life; and Applying the teachings through practice so that you directly realize their transformative benefits.
First, what is a Bodhisattva?
A Bodhisattva is one who lives and breathes compassion. This compassion is associated with a quality of awareness that allows one to respond appropriately to the needs of each moment.
The word bodhi means awakening and sattva means being. A Bodhisattva is someone who aspires to be awake and in that wakefulness responds to the suffering in the world.
A Bodhisattva has the capacity to experience whatever life presents without being thrown into turmoil.
To be a Bodhisattva our life does not need to change. What changes is how we live the life we have.
#1 – Give Meaning to your Human Existence
There are ten extraordinary circumstances that have come together to give you the opportunity to realize freedom:
1) You were born as a human being
2) The Dharma flourishes where you live
3) All your sense faculties are intact
4) Your lifestyle is not in conflict with the Dharma
5) You have cultivated faith in the truth of the teachings
6) The Buddha has appeared in the world
7) He taught the Dharma
8) The Dharma still exists as a true teaching
9) You are practicing the Dharma
10) You are working with a spiritual teacher
There are seven circumstances that are fortunately not present for you that tend to take individuals away from the path:
1) Being dominated by desire, anger, delusion, jealousy or pride
2) Being led astray by undesirable friends
3) Falling prey to spiritual dogma that leads nowhere
4) To be continually distracted from practice by laziness
5) Leading an unskillful life that harms yourself and others
6) To be enslaved by or controlled by others
7) To practice merely in order to gain money or fame
Consider the small number of individuals in the world who are truly practicing Dharma. Finally, remember that death comes without warning.
Given all these circumstances, neglecting the opportunity to practice consistently and intensely appears to be quite unwise.
So what is your commitment?
#2 – Abandon the Source of Attachment, Aversion and Ignorance
We all have those we care for. It is important not to simply lead our lives to accumulate wealth and happiness for those we love. We need to be careful not to have this preoccupation in our life.
We need to avoid those who are the source of hatred, arguments, feuds, and distorted beliefs that lead to suffering. Being around those who take confusion as real soon wears us out.
Once we mentally leave behind the source of these worldly concerns our minds will feel free as birds that soar in the air. This will greatly support our spiritual development.
And what is the true focus of your life?
#3 – Spend Time in Solitary Places
Taking time for retreats and having a quiet place in or around your home in order to practice undisturbed is essential for working with our afflictive emotions, for developing a calm mind and for realizing the true nature of experience. In these environments we are able to turn our mind inward, identify any unskillful qualities of mind, cultivate skillful states of mind, and attain stability in true spiritual perspectives.
The sign that we have truly internalized the Dharma is that we become peaceful by nature, free from eagerness to engage in deluded activities and are not overwhelmed by obscuring emotions.
What about you? Do you consistently spend time in solitary places?
#4 Give up the Concerns of Life by Reflecting on Impermanence
From one sutra:
Close friends who have long been together will separate,
Wealth and possessions gained with much effort will be left behind,
Consciousness, a guest, will leave the hotel of the body –
To give up the concerns of this life is the practice of a bodhisattva.
From another sutra:
Whatever is born will die,
Whatever is gathered will disperse,
Whatever is accumulated will come to exhaustion,
Whatever is high will fall.
We move from youth to old age to death. Like a frog in the mouth of a snake, we are already in death’s mouth. We know not when it will arrive and by what means. Life is like a dew drop on a blade of grass early in the morning, soon to perish.
Does it make sense to be so preoccupied with that which will inevitably come to an end? Thoughts of death with calm equanimity helps to turn the mind towards the Dharma.
Life without realizing the truth is like being aboard a sinking ship, as if we have fallen into a pit of poisonous snakes or as if we are about to be handed over to an executioner.
If these ideas disturb your mind, if you resist reflecting on them, then you have not truly realized impermanence. You are still in denial of one of the central truths spoken by the Buddha.
From another sutra:
We ought to fear death now,
And thus become fearless at the time of death;
But instead we are careless now,
And when death arrives we will beat our breast in anguish.
As a simple practice, you may want to place something like a pebble in one of your pockets. Every time you touch it can be a reminder of the impermanence of life and as a reinforcement to focus on the Dharma.
#5 – Avoid Unsuitable Friends
Whoever we keep company with influences the direction of our life.
Avoid friends with whom attachment, greed, hatred, delusion and unskillful actions are reinforced. An unsuitable friend is one that is fond of distractions and entices you to join him or her in the pursuit of sense pleasures. It is someone who has no interest in the Dharma. This kind of friend dampens our motivation and enthusiasm to meditate and practice.
Think about who you spend your time with!
Cultivate friendships with those who embody and inspire gentleness, love compassion and wisdom. You will be influenced by their wonderful qualities.
#6 – Rely on a Spiritual Teacher Whose Presence Creates Conditions Favorable to your Progress
Avoid teachers who act unskillfully and do not follow their own teachings. Be careful of those who have fixed views and talk about “the only way” to achieve freedom.
Choose a teacher that acts, speaks and thinks in accord with the Dharma. He will show you what needs to be done to progress on the path and what obstacles are to be avoided. He will help you give up unskillful behaviors without judgment for what you may have done in the past. We each need a teacher or spiritual guide to support us in achieving liberation.
Cultivating a relationship with a clear teacher is said to be like staying near a fire. His presence and teachings will burn away our ignorance and obscurations.
Cherish the relationship but do not worship the teacher.
The main way of fulfilling the wishes of the teacher is to put his/her instructions into practice, and to spend your life working towards attaining liberation.
#7 – Commit to the Three Jewels
People naturally seek something or someone as a refuge in life to protect them from whatever they fear. However, all forms of sanctuary based upon mundane values always fail to meet our real needs. The only true refuge can be provided by something that is free from the bonds of samsara or mundane existence. And that is the Three Jewels; the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha.
The Buddha is the one who shows us the path to enlightenment. The Dharma is the path that leads to freedom from suffering. The Sangha is composed of the companions that accompany us on this extraordinary journey.
There are actually three different levels of taking refuge. The first level is seeking refuge from our personal suffering. The next level is that of the Bodhisattva who seeks enlightenment with the motivation of helping all beings be free from suffering and to find happiness in their lives. The third level is seeking refuge in order to directly and fully realize one’s innate Buddha Nature.
Taking refuge is not merely reciting the statement that “I take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha.” Or chanting in Pali:
Buddham saranam gacchami
I go to the Buddha for refuge.
Dhammam saranam gacchami
I go to the Dhamma for refuge.
Sangham saranam gacchami
I go to the Sangha for refuge.
Dutiyampi Buddham saranam gacchami
For a second time, I go to the Buddha for refuge.
Dutiyampi Dhammam saranam gacchami
For a second time, I go to the Dhamma for refuge.
Dutiyampi Sangham saranam gacchami
For a second time, I go to the Sangha for refuge.
Tatiyampi Buddham saranam gacchami
For a third time, I go to the Buddha for refuge.
Tatiyampi Dhammam saranam gacchami
For a third time, I go to the Dhamma for refuge.
Tatiyampi Sangham saranam gacchami
For a third time, I go to the Sangha for refuge.
Taking refuge must come from the depth of your heart, from the marrow of your bones. Faith based upon one’s experience is a true requisite for taking refuge. There are four levels of faith.
Please take this opportunity right now to take refuge in the Three Jewels at whichever level you feel comfortable.
The next three sections of the verses cover teachings for those who are beginning, intermediate and advanced bodhisattva aspirants.
#8 – For Beginning Aspirants - Reject Negative and Cultivate Positive Actions
After taking refuge in the Three Jewels, it is essential to behave in accordance with the teachings of the Dharma.
Avoid:
1. Deceiving others
2. Causing doubt in someone’s mind about the value of virtuous actions
3. Criticizing others
4. Being dishonest about your faults
Cultivate:
1. Honesty
2. Praise for those who work towards ending the suffering of others
3. Benevolence for all living beings
4. Leading all beings to the Dharma and to enlightenment
As you can see, the “avoid” and “cultivate” are different than the usual list of skillful and unskillful actions.
From a sutra:
Good and evil actions
Bring their results without fail.
Do not indulge yourself in negative actions
But strive as best you can
To do good and virtuous deeds, both great and small.
The great Buddhist Meditation Master Padmasambhava said:
Although my view is higher than the sky,
My attention to actions and their effects is finer than flour.
Our view of emptiness and the true nature of life should be as high and exalted as possible, but at the same time our behavior should be grounded in an awareness of cause and effect. The absolute and relative are not mutually exclusive. The more careful we are in our actions, the easier to realize emptiness; the more profound our view of emptiness, the clearer will be our understanding of the relationship between cause and effect.
Can you truly see the truth of that? Please take time to reflect on this truth. Many erroneously believe that once emptiness is realized, the need to relate to the relative somehow disappears.
#9 – For Intermediate Aspirants – Become non-attached to sense pleasures and direct your efforts towards freedom
At a later point in this training we will discuss in detail the relationship between emptiness and the dependent arising of phenomena.
For right now, take time to consider that anything dependently arisen (such as the aggregates that many believe to encompass a self), cannot have an independent and inherent reality.
Key - Please deeply consider this.
When knowing this to be true, we lose our interest in the conditioned world like an adult who has put aside children’s games. It becomes tedious to spend time chasing after sense experiences as if they will last, and trying to outdo who we believe to be our competition in life. We become weary of the delusion of becoming lost in thoughts of the past and in projections towards the future.
Padmasambhava said:
However industrious you may be,
There is no end to worldly activities;
But if you practice the Dharma
You will swiftly conclude everything.
Another meditation master has said:
You won’t accomplish
Both the Dharma and the aims of this ordinary life –
If that’s your wish,
No doubt you’re deceiving yourself.
Please reflect on your life. Are you deceiving yourself? Are you sure?
#10 - For Advanced Aspirants – Meditate on emptiness and compassion in order to lead others to freedom
Truth is beyond any concepts such as existence and nonexistence, self and other, and happiness and suffering. Within the relative world these ideas manifest in infinite ways. Appearances are devoid of any real existence, yet beings believe them to be absolutely true.
At this stage we are interested in cultivating bodhichitta. Bodhichitta can be translated as “awakened heart.” On the relative level, it is the heartfelt yearning to free oneself from the pain of ignorance and habitual tendencies in order to help others do the same. It is the determination to attain enlightenment for the benefit of others. On the absolute level, bodhichitta is nondual wisdom, the vast, unbiased essence of mind.
As advanced aspirants we aspire to realize enlightenment for the benefit of all living beings. When we make this aspiration, we join the activities of all Bodhisattva who have lived in the past, those who are living now, and those who will emerge in the future.
Are you ready and willing to make this aspiration right now? If you are, please do so!
There are three attitudes of mind that keep us advancing towards cultivating bodhichitta:
1. Before you start any practice, whether it is listening to the Dharma, reading a book on Dharma, reflecting on the teaching, or beginning to meditate, dedicate all you are about to do to the benefit of all beings. Wish that through your own wisdom and compassion you may lead everyone out of the experience of suffering.
2. Avoid the arising of pride because of the benefits you are experiencing as a result of your practice. If you feel conceited due to your learning, generosity or insight, your practice will ultimately not lead to freedom for yourself or others. Also, on a very subtle level, be careful not to cling to whatever practices you are engaged in as if they have some intrinsic reality!
3. Finally, finish your practice by dedicating all the skillful actions you have committed and skillful thoughts you have had to others so that they may achieve enlightenment and become free from suffering.
You can end your practice session with a bodhichitta wish:
“May all beings be happy, free from suffering, and the cause of suffering. May they reach perfect happiness, remain in it, and live in equanimity. May they maintain love for all others without discrimination.”
Please make that wish now.
The next section of the verses covers ways to work with the various difficulties that may arise as we proceed along the Bodhisattva path. It is important to know how to make use of adverse circumstances as fuel for awakening. It is referred to as “the post-meditation phase of bodhichitta.”
To feel compassion for someone that is harming us in some way is an effective method for purifying our own obscurations. A Bodhisattva is willing to have difficulties come to him rather than to other beings. Of course in the beginning this is difficult to put into practice. As our attachment to the idea of self diminishes, we are able to see that all suffering is our suffering.
To cultivate this compassionate frame of mind it is helpful to consistently repeat and internalize the four boundless attitudes.
Please work with these affirmations now:
1. May all living beings have boundless happiness and love in their lives.
2. May all living beings be free from suffering in their lives.
3. May all living beings who are presently experiencing happiness retain and increase it.
4. May all living beings realize that they are equally deserving of love, compassion and joy.
#12 – Using Loss on the Bodhisattva Path
There is a story of a poor Zen monk who lived in a grass hut. His only possession was a blanket. One day a thief came and stole his blanket. When the monk returned to his hut and saw that the blanket was stolen he said, “If only I could have given him the moon and the stars as well!”
We consider wealth and property as desirable. However, our attachment to them is actually an obstacle to our spiritual development.
If we lose something or something is intentionally taken from us, it can actually be helpful in three ways. The first is that we can discover whether we were attached to that which we lost. The second is the feeling of gratitude that may arise that we now have less in our lives to be concerned about. The third is that someone else may be benefiting from our loss.
Look within yourself to see how needy, desperate, or confused someone must be to steal from someone else. Then use tonglen to offer those who are in this situation prosperity and at peace in their lives.
Please do that now.
Finally, ownership is an illusion, like a dream. Nothing is truly ours. The only thing we have is the experience that is before us this very moment. Everything else is an idea or a story. When we profoundly realize this truth we have great compassion for those still caught in the dream of ownership and cannot see beyond it.
Can you truly see beyond it?
#13 – Using Suffering that Stems from Relationships on the Bodhisattva Path
If someone insults or harms you in some way, think of all the suffering they are accumulating for themselves. As difficult as this may be, wish that you could take on and transform their suffering. This is the Bodhisattva way.
Drop your concerns for fairness and justice. Practice goes nowhere when we follow this line of thinking. We soon get lost in interpretation, projection, or conceptual thinking. We can only skillfully respond to a situation when we are not disturbed by our emotional reactivity and conceptual mind.
Please always remember that there is no enemy “out there” that intends on harming or causing us suffering.
The only true nemesis is our belief in self.
#14 - Using Disgrace on the Bodhisattva Path
Reputation has no objective basis and can never be controlled. There will always be some people that speak well of you and others that will speak ill of you.
Some people pursue fame and recognition their entire lives. These are no more than mirages that lead us astray and away from the Dharma.
How caught up are you with thinking about how you are perceived and whether you are being recognized for what you do?
Be honest!
There is a story about a Zen Master who was accused of fathering a child. The grandmother gave her daughter’s child to the monk who simply said, “Ah so,” and began raising the child. When the daughter confessed that it was her boyfriend’s baby the grandmother went back to the monk and said, “I was mistaken – give me back the child. The monk handed over the child and simply said, “Ah so.”
When we feel victimized or violated in some way we typically become angry and want to strike back. We want revenge, to retaliate, or to receive some sort of justice. We want people to respect who we are.
Every one of these thoughts is centered on “you.” It is all about self!
But what is there in you to be attacked, slandered or victimized? And what is there in you to be praised, respected or idolized? Whether or not these reactions arise are opportunities to see if we have truly realized no-self!
Accept the truth that we cannot control the world. Using Tonglen, take in the pain of others who are controlled by their conditioning and belief in self, and breathe out thoughts of kindness and compassion to those who suffer from those beliefs.
#15 - Using Ridicule or Criticism on the Bodhisattva Path
There are three principles of training in Buddhism that are applicable to working with ridicule and criticism:
1. If someone verbally abuses you, do not abuse that person in return.
2. If someone gets angry with you, do not get angry with that person in return.
3. If someone exposes your hidden faults, do not expose his or hers in return.
If you find that you reacted in kind towards someone who ridiculed or criticized you, look closely to discover the true source of that reactivity.
A Tibetan teacher once wrote:
Ill treatment by opponents
Is a catalyst for your meditation;
Insulting reproaches you don’t deserve
Spur your practice onward;
Those who do you harm are teachers
Challenging your attachment and aversion –
How could you ever repay their kindness?
The more you practice and are surrounded by others who are interested in the Dharma, the less likely you are to meet unpleasant and confused individuals. We can feel quite calm and centered when our lives are fully supported by others. It is actually fortunate to occasionally meet those who ridicule or criticize us. They create the opportunity to see how deeply our inner work has truly transformed our minds.
And remember that the humiliation you feel when being ridiculed or criticized is the same that others feel in similar circumstances. When that is reflected upon, the mind calms down and we are able to take in the pain of humiliation and send out the joy of humility.
Finally, as we previously worked (in an earlier Concentric Circle) with eliminating all forms of negative self-talk, the habit pattern of self-ridicule and self-criticism needs to be totally eliminated from the mind.
After all, who is criticizing who?
#16 - Using Being Unappreciated on the Bodhisattva Path
A Bodhisattva does not expect anything in return for what they do for others. Not even a thank you. In fact, many times others will act ungrateful for what you have done for them.
As a child grows up at different stages they may be at odds with their parents. As Shakespeare’s King Lear laments:
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is
To have a thankless child!
If you have ever supported someone, guided them, nurtured them with all your heart and all you received in return was ingratitude, you know something of this pain.
If we become reactive and feel unappreciated, this is a wake-up call that we are caught in the delusion of self and other.
A true Bodhisattva never expects a reward. He or she responds to the needs of others out of natural compassion. This compassion is joined with the recognition of the emptiness of the ideas of self, other and the actions that have taken place. His only intention is to set people on the path to freedom
Watch your mind this week to see whether when you support others, in whatever form that may take, you have an expectation of appreciation.
#17 - Using Humiliation on the Bodhisattva Path
Humiliation is a wonderful opportunity to observe our pride at work. The capacity to patiently bear scorn, disrespect and even injury from those who are limited in their capacity to see the truth of Dharma is an admirable quality. It counters our tendency to want revenge and only be interested in our own happiness and welfare.
If you feel angry, take in the anger of others and send out the peace and joy you have known in your life. If you feel offended, take in the pain and insult and send out praise and gratitude.
Can you see how the repetitive and powerful practice of sending and taking (Tonglen) can transform our clinging to self?
#18 - Using Lack, Scarcity and Deprivation on the Bodhisattva Path
There are so many people in the world who have nothing or very little to sustain their life. Many are stricken with illness. Some are being mistreated by others.
Do you believe that your practice will keep this from happening to you?
How I wish that was true! There are so many karmic forces at work that at any point in time you may become ill, lose whatever you have or find yourself being mistreated by others. Difficulties and adversity are part of human existence and cannot be avoided or controlled.
Blame, resistance, or self-pity are useless. They only add fuel to the fire of deprivation. We need to become totally present with and completely open to the pain that we are experiencing. Use that pain as a way to observe the difference between adverse conditions and the suffering that comes from our identification with self and the circumstances of our lives.
On a more global scale, once again, we can use the practice of tonglen to diminish our self-cherishing attitude and to cultivate compassion. Breathe in the struggles that others are experiencing and breathe out thoughts of healing and freedom from the pains of scarcity and lack.
Why not do that now?
#19 - Using Prosperity on the Bodhisattva Path
Prosperity? Doesn’t everyone know the benefits of wealth, beauty, and influence?
The issue is not one of prosperity but the pride and conceit that may accompany it!
Someone on the bodhisattva path knows the ephemeral nature of good fortune and never feels prideful or self-important because of his or her riches or privileges.
Do you own anything that you feel proud of such as a car, a house or some other possession? Do you currently have an opportunity in life where there is even a hint of conceit? Please look carefully. And are these things truly “yours?”
#20 - Using Hatred or Anger on the Bodhisattva Path
From One Sutra:
If one does not conquer one’s own hatred,
The more one fights outer enemies, the more they will increase.
Therefore, with the armies of loving-kindness and compassion,
To tame one’s own mind is the practice of a bodhisattva.
From another sutra:
If you kill out of anger,
Your enemies will be never-ending;
If you kill anger,
That will kill your enemies once and for all.
If we have no anger or hatred within our own mind, the world we experience is one of love and peace.
There are many ways to work with anger. One way is by cultivating loving-kindness. The mind filled with loving-kindness has no room for anger and hatred to arise.
Another way is to open to that anger to see that it is only a thought in the mind that has arisen from identification with a feeling of entitlement and with having a self.
Finally, you can take in the anger, pain, rage, hatred and resentment that exists in the world and send out all the peace and contentment you have ever known or can imagine.
Why not do that now?
#21 - Using Desire on the Bodhisattva Path
It is said that indulging in sense pleasures is like drinking salt water. The more one tastes those pleasures, the more one’s thirst for them increases.
The difficulty is not the sense contact itself – that comes with the territory of being human. The difficulty is the desire for more of the pleasant feelings that accompany the sense experiences.
Going to the opposite extreme and practicing outward forms of asceticism is not the answer. That does not take care of the repressed desires that one is avoiding looking at or dealing with.
A key in working with desire is to first recognize the pleasant feelings on which they are based. Then, deeply explore these feelings to see their true nature until that realization totally permeates your consciousness – that the feelings are impermanent, unsatisfactory (because they cannot be sustained), and are not happening to a self (i.e., you!).
What is the source of the greatest prosperity in the world? Answer this question for yourself before looking at the answer below.
To be content with whatever you already have!
Verses #22 - #37 are concerned with the analysis of the empty nature of self and phenomena, meditation practices to support the realization of that emptiness, and cultivating qualities of mind such as concentration and mindfulness that enable one to meditate successfully. Since we have covered many of these teachings in the past and will be delving quite deeply into emptiness as we continue with our training, we will not be working with these final verses.