I am thrilled to hear of the Lama who may grace our village with his presence and wisdom this week. I really hope that we are able to, as a community, contact and properly invite him to our village for teachings and words of wisdom. I truly believe that having such an influential individual

grace our village with their presence would highly stimulate the merit and Buddhist thought within our community. that may be lacking. I also believe that this monk could help us rehabilitate after the hailstorm. As I saw last week with the naga illness destroying our neighbouring village, there are many consequences when the balance of both the land and our bodily presence is thrown off.

I have spent my time collecting what I could find for offerings from the forest. I was able to collect sage leaves to burn for purification and cleansing, one marvelous stone with pieces of granite crystal perturbing from either side, and beautiful flowers to be arranged at an alter. To increase the likelihood of the Lama accepting our invitation, I have also collected berries from the forest that I will include in my offering package. I feel so grateful for the opportunity to present such an esteemed individual with my gifts and for the opportunity of collecting so much merit for my efforts. I think that this is an amazing opportunity for our community to grow together and to further understand our place in the realm of Buddhist studies and experience.

Throughout the Buddhist tradition it is custom for any practitioner to be influenced and guided by a teacher. In The Words of my Perfect Teacher it is said that ‘no sutra or tantra has ever spoken of any being ever attaining perfect Buddha-hood without having following a spiritual teacher’ (Rinpoche p.1). This is what makes the story of the Buddha so pivotal. Unlike Buddhist practitioners/followers, the Buddha achieved enlightenment by means of his own path. The Buddha is unlike any of being capable of attaining Buddha-hood because came to these realizations on his own. For any other practitioner, ‘it is necessary to have a spiritual teacher to guide one to liberation through examination, through the following of ones actions and finally by emulating his realizations and actions’ (Rinpoche p.1).

Mahayana Buddhism believes that in our deepest and most inner ‘selves’ we are already pure, complete and enlightened. We develop illusory images of the world because of our conceptual elaborations of reality. We see things as having full and independent nature when the true nature of all things is of equal suchness and empty of inherent existence. We may begin to understand this equal suchness that exists as the unifying factor of all creation through notions of emptiness.

As we discussed in class this week and through the identification of the twelve links of interdependent arising, we can identify ignorance to be that which allows us to form conceptual elaborations of our experience and further develop sense desire attachments to various perceived subjects and objects. We can see through Nagarjuna’s text the manner in which the twelve links of dependent origination should be considered:

59. Starting with ignorance and ending with aging,
All processes that arise from
The Twelve links of dependent origination,
We accept them to be like a dream and an illusion
60. This wheel with twelve links,
Rolls along the road of cyclic existence;
Outside this there cannot be sentient beings
Experiencing the fruits of their deeds
61. Just as dependence upon a mirror
A full image of one’s face appears
The face did not move onto the mirror
Yet without it there is no image (Nagarjuna verses 59–61)

This passage illustrates that there is relief to be offered from the knowledge and identification of the cycle of dependent origination. Wisdom of interdependent arising helps us to identify the source of our defiled state. The true nature of the mind is free from thought but we get so caught up in the illusion of appearances that we conceptualize our selves and reality to be limited, of separate own nature and independent existence. This is the essence of liberation. It is only when we are able to deconstruct our vision of reality that we are able to enter into ‘mind-only’ perception to truly realize the innate nature of our reality to be empty. The philosophy of emptiness is another aspect of Buddhist thought that, when realized, leads the practitioner to a state of mind able to perceive the true Mahayana nature of reality.

The philosophy of emptiness also gives rise to the universal existence of the tathagatagarbha (buddha-nature) innate in each individual being. This Buddha-nature (tathagatagarbha) is universal and exists at the core of each being to ensure they themselves may reach enlightenment. It is this aspect of the Buddhist tradition enforcing the divine role of the spiritual teacher in helping others reach enlightenment. It takes identification and various realizations to bring one to ultimate realization of the true nature of reality. As we are so immersed in the illusion of our mind, The buddha provides us with the path and the spiritual teacher helps us walk the way.

♡
Awakening the presence of great compassion,
Let us fill our hearts with our own compassion
Towards our selves and all living beings.
Let us display a heart of boundless love for all the world
Let us pray all living beings realize we are connected and all an equal expression of (and nourished from) the same source of life.
Let all beings everywhere be happy and free.
Adapted Buddhist prayer

♡