Bodhisattva

Awhile ago i found this sight http://www.buddhism-connect.org and signed up to receive the 'teachings' by e-mail, and well it wouldn't be hard to just check the website for new teachings, i suppose it also wouldn't be hard to forget about the site altogether, so i enjoy being able to receive it by e-mail, and im making this thread because i think maybe some of you would enjoy it aswell, here is the most recent lesson,


"Summary: Defining what it is within us that responds to the call to lead a spritual life.How we can recognise and strengthen our genuine impulse.

A student writes:

I have a question to ask about what it is within us that responds to the spiritual life. Is it ego that answers the call or is it directly Buddha Nature that is responding? Or is it both, given that from an absolute vantage point all is Buddha Nature? "

Shenpen replies:

What a wonderful question!

Well, if you mean by ego our ego-clinging mind - it wouldn’t respond if it knew what the spiritual life was all about because the spiritual life is the end of ego- clinging mind and the ego- clinging mind wouldn’t like that!

I think there has to be something else that attracts us even though our ego-clinging mind might usurp that impulse almost immediately.

For example, you could think 'wow Awakening sounds fantastic, the best thing ever - I want that!' – which is of course ego-centric. But why would it sound so good? Why would we even have the idea that to awaken would be a wonderful thing and that to be lost and misguided, blind and ignorant is miserable?

Something in us knows things could be better. And even if the ego-centric mind immediately makes it into an ego-centric project, that first impulse, however weak, must be genuine I think.

So the path to Awakening is about rooting out the ego-clinging bit and getting that genuine spark to flare up more strongly. Normally, I think what happens is that as we practice, the ego-centric part starts to get bored and wants to go off and do something else. So then you just have to sit with the practice and sit through the boredom and all the tricks of the ego-clinging mind until they have become much weaker than that genuine impulse.

Then the genuine impulse, which is our Buddha Nature, gets a bit of air to breathe and realises that this is indeed the only way to happiness and liberation, and this is when the ego-centric motivation starts to lose all its power. It still pops up from time to time - but you dont allow it to take over the practice mandala.

But even at the time of the Buddha there were disciples who were strongly motivated by ego-centric concerns - seeing the life of a monk or skill at meditation or erudition as a means to worldly advancement. In the tradition there are many stories of disciples eventually turning against the Dharma or their teachers because they were basically motivated by ego-clinging.

So it is the relative strengths of the two strands that is the key thing. Some people are strongly ego-centric but are also so strongly motivated by the genuine impulse coming from the Buddha nature, and have such faith in their teachers that they come through ok - through all the dramatic battles with their inner demons, as it were. Then another disciple who seems almost enlightened - so calm and kind, so cheerful and intelligent - but somehow, for some reason, that spark of genuineness is weak and nothing much happens. They become stuck and a bit complacent, clinging to their own self-image of themselves as nice, Dharma people. So the thing to aim for is to keep digging deep for that genuine motivation.

Thinking about death and impermanence and the sufferings of samsara is the best way to overcome that kind of complacency.

--- By Lama Shenpen Hookham"

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WolfmansBrother

hey, cool.

im going to sign up, how often to they send the teachings out?

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Bodhisattva

it varies alot, it averages about 1 every 4-5 days i suppose

you can check out the archive of old ones here
http://www.ahs.org.uk/default.asp?action=article&ID=686

WolfmansBrother

do they provide an adress to where i could send my donation, i cant electronically do it.

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Bodhisattva

i dont see one, but you could try sending her a e-mail info@ahs.org.uk