06. Teaching 2
02.11.2025
The root of where delusions arise from. Using Geshe-la’s transcript from 2005.
Living beings are the objects of our love and compassion and we need them to attain enlightenment. As long as we’re generating negative thoughts towards them this is blocking our path to enlightenment. They are our key. There is no exception.
Also, there are no good or bad circumstances. They are all perfect conditions to take us along the path to enlightenment.
Only wisdom and a good heart that can prevent war and complete destruction of our world. We need to develop this. Each one of us has to take responsibility. If we really want to be free from suffering we need to control our self-grasping. This is because self-grasping ignorance is the main cause of all our suffering.
Outer problem vs inner problem. Our problem is unpleasant feeling in our mind. The inner problem is what is causing the pain. Our problem is that we believe that the external situation is truly existent, not understanding that it is mere appearance, like a dream. We feel that we’re really losing something. That external situation / object that we normally see does not exist. Geshe-la’s confidence comes from his experience. He understands directly that this is a truth.
The video of our life is being projected from our own mind.
Inherently existent objects do not exist at all. We see the object but the way we see it is mistaken. Even the self we normally see does not exist. We see ourselves within our body or mind but this is a mistake. Like someone at dusk mistakenly seeing a person within a collection of stones (Shantideva).
This understanding is like a portal to enlightenment. If we get this our life completely changes. With this wisdom we’ll be of so much benefit to others.
Our self does not exist within our body or our mind. We need to spend more time identifying this object to be negated. The body has many parts and none of these are the self. The mind also has many different parts but none of these are ourself. We say ‘my body’ and ‘my mind’ - but the possessor and possessed cannot be the same. But there is no self separate from our body and mind, because if our body or mind were to disappear there would be no self. We should contemplate these points carefully. How do we exist? We exist as mere imputations. Just a thought. In the same way we can understand our body, our car, and all things we normally see do not exist.
First we need to recognise our self-grasping because it lies at our heart destroying our peace. But it is subtle. But unless we recognise it, it is impossible to control it.
Applying effort to this is the real meaning of our human life.
There are 2 types of self-grasping: self-grasping of persons and self-grasping of phenomena.
When we realise emptiness, things function, but not inherently. Like illusions created by a magician. In our life we are the magician. We’re creating our reality, but we don’t realise it.
We should meditate patiently with great effort. But joyful effort. It’s the doorway out, the answer to all our problems. Our wish to understand emptiness and our wish to apply it comes at a moment when we’ve had enough. If we’re doing this correctly, our life should be getting easier. Not our external world, but our inner experience. Geshe-la left us these words to live our life by. When you understand this clearly, it will give you immense confidence in your spiritual progress.