Chapter 8Arousing Bodhicitta

Of all the teachings the Buddha ever gave, if you had to distill them down to a single essence, it would be this: bodhicitta. This luminous intention to attain awakening for the sake of all beings is the very root of the Great Vehicle, the seed from which the entire Mahayana path grows. Without it, no amount of study, meditation, or ritual can lead you to perfect Buddhahood. With it, everything you do becomes a cause for enlightenment.

Patrul Rinpoche structures this vast subject in three parts: first, training the mind in the four boundless qualities that prepare the ground; then, the actual arousing of bodhicitta itself; and finally, training in the precepts of bodhicitta through the six transcendent perfections. Together they form a complete path, one that begins with softening the heart and ends with the realization that emptiness and compassion are utterly inseparable.

Training the Mind in the Four Boundless Qualities

The four boundless qualities are love, compassion, sympathetic joy, and impartiality. While love is usually taught first, Patrul Rinpoche follows the practical tradition of beginning with impartiality. The reason is simple: without impartiality, whatever love, compassion, and joy we develop will be partial, favoring those we like and shutting out those we dislike. Our practice will be lopsided from the start.

Impartiality

Look honestly at how you relate to other people. At the moment, you are tightly bound to those you consider your own group -- parents, children, friends -- while feeling almost unbearable aversion toward those you see as enemies. But this way of sorting the world is built on a misunderstanding. It comes from taking this life's fleeting perceptions of "friend" and "enemy" as something solid and permanent, when in truth these roles have been shifting since beginningless time.

In former lives, those you now call enemies have surely been your loving parents, watching over you with tenderness, giving you everything they had. And many of those you now hold dear have been your opponents in previous existences. Patrul Rinpoche recalls the words of the sublime Katyayana, who observed a man unknowingly eating his father's reborn flesh while beating away his reborn mother, and holding on his lap his old enemy reborn as his child. Such is the absurd theater of samsara.

There is also the story of Princess Pema Sel, daughter of the Dharma King Trisong Detsen. When she died at seventeen, the king asked Guru Rinpoche how this could have happened. The Master explained that in a former life, the princess had been an insect that stung the king on the neck while he was building the great stupa of Jarung Khashor. He brushed it off and accidentally killed it. Because of that karmic debt, the insect was later reborn as his daughter.

If even Trisong Detsen's children could be born to him through such tangled karmic connections, how much more tangled are our own relationships? Why hold on to this millstone of attachment and hatred that only drags us into the lower realms?

Make the firm decision to see all beings as your own parents and children. Then train your mind step by step: first work with those who arouse anger in you, until you can regard them as you would someone neutral. Then reflect that even those neutral beings have been your father and mother in past lives, and cultivate the same warmth for them that you feel for your present parents. Finally, extend that same love equally to all beings -- friends, enemies, and everyone in between. The image given for true impartiality is the banquet of a great sage, where everyone is invited without distinction, high or low, powerful or weak, good or bad.

Love

Through training in impartiality, you come to regard all beings with equal tenderness, like parents caring for their young children. Parents ignore their children's ingratitude and all the difficulties involved, devoting every thought, word, and deed to making their little ones happy and comfortable. In just this way, devote everything you do, say, and think to the well-being and happiness of all beings.

All those beings are striving for happiness, yet they do not understand that the cause of happiness lies in positive actions. Their deepest wishes and their actual behavior are completely at odds: in their attempts to find happiness, they only bring more suffering upon themselves. Over and over again, meditate on how wonderful it would be if each of them could have all the happiness they wish for, until you want others to be happy just as intensely as you want happiness for yourself.

Loving actions of body, speech, and mind mean that everything you say and do should be straightforward and kind rather than harmful. Even when you simply look at someone, let that look be smiling and pleasant. There is a story about a powerful ruler who glared at everyone with a wrathful expression; it is said he was reborn as a hungry ghost, and eventually in hell, because he had also looked at a holy being in that way. Be especially kind to those in a lower position than yourself, and to your aging parents. As Jowo Atisha said, to be kind to those who have come from afar, to those who have been ill for a long time, or to your parents in their old age is equivalent to meditating on emptiness of which compassion is the very essence.

Compassion

The meditation on compassion is to vividly imagine beings tormented by suffering and to wish them free from it. Imagine a prisoner condemned to death, being led to the place of execution. Instead of thinking of that person as someone else, imagine it is you. Ask yourself what you would do in that situation. There is nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, no refuge and no one to protect you. Feel what it would be like when all the perceptions of this life are about to cease and you must leave behind even your own dear body.

Or imagine a sheep being led to the slaughter. Do not think of it as just a sheep. Feel sincerely that this is your own old mother about to be killed. When your heart is bursting with the desire to do something right now to prevent it, reflect that although this creature is not actually your parent in this present life, it has surely been your parent in past lives and cared for you with the same tenderness. Let yourself feel such unbearable compassion that your eyes fill with tears.

Patrul Rinpoche then turns his attention -- with characteristic directness -- to the suffering of domestic animals right before our eyes, creatures we pierce, castrate, and bleed alive without a moment's consideration. He asks us to imagine ourselves in their place: cover your mouth and stop yourself breathing for a while. Experience the panic. Then think how sad it is that beings are afflicted by such suffering without a moment's respite. Extend your compassion to all beings in the three worlds -- wherever there is space there are beings, and wherever there are beings there is suffering. How wonderful it would be if every one of them could be free.

The image given for compassion is a mother with no arms whose child is being swept away by a river. How unbearable her anguish would be -- her love for her child is so intense, but she cannot catch hold of him. In exactly the same way, all beings are being carried away by the river of suffering, and however deep our compassion, we have no power on our own to save them. Meditate on this, thinking, "What can I do?" and call on your teacher and the Three Jewels from the very depth of your heart.

The story of Asanga and the Buddha Maitreya beautifully illustrates how compassion has the power to purify what nothing else can. Asanga meditated for twelve long years in retreat, practicing to have a vision of Maitreya, but saw nothing -- not even an auspicious dream. Twice he left in discouragement and twice returned, inspired by ordinary people performing seemingly impossible tasks through sheer persistence: a man rubbing an enormous iron bar with a soft cloth to make a needle, and another stroking a towering rock with a wet feather to wear it away.

After twelve fruitless years, Asanga finally gave up for good and set off down the road. There he came across a dog with crippled hind legs, its entire lower body crawling with maggots. Despite its wretched state, the dog was still full of aggression and tried to bite him. Deep, unbearable compassion swept through Asanga. He cut off a piece of his own flesh to feed the dog and then decided to remove the maggots, but feared he might crush them with his fingers. Realizing the only way was to use his tongue, he shut his eyes and reached out -- and his tongue touched the ground. The dog had vanished. In its place stood Lord Maitreya, radiant with light.

When Asanga cried out that Maitreya had been unkind not to show himself all those years, Maitreya replied that they had never been apart. It was only Asanga's own obscurations that had prevented him from seeing. His twelve years of practice had thinned those obscurations slightly -- enough to see a suffering dog. But it was his great compassion in that single moment that completely purified them.

Sympathetic Joy

The meaning of sympathetic joy is to have a mind free from jealousy. Imagine someone of noble birth, strong, prosperous, and powerful, living in comfort and surrounded by wealth. Without any jealousy or rivalry, sincerely wish that they might become even more glorious and enjoy still greater happiness. Then extend that wish to all beings.

Begin by thinking about someone who naturally arouses positive feelings in you -- a friend or loved one who is successful and content -- and feel genuinely happy for them. Gradually extend that feeling to those about whom you feel indifferent, and finally to those of whom you feel jealous or those who have harmed you. Uproot the poisonous mentality that finds it unbearable when someone else has good fortune.

When Milarepa's fame was spreading, a professor of logic named Tarlo became jealous and attacked him. Despite every demonstration of clairvoyance and miraculous power that Milarepa showed, Tarlo had no faith and only reacted with wrong views and criticism. He was later reborn as a demon. Even the Buddha himself could do nothing to guide a jealous person, for a mind stained with jealousy cannot see anything good in others.

To summarize all four boundless qualities, Patrul Rinpoche offers a single phrase: a kind heart. Simply train yourself to have a kind heart always and in all situations. When Atisha's hand was hurting one day, he laid it in Drom Tonpa's lap and said, "You who are so kind-hearted, bless my hand!" Atisha always placed a unique emphasis on the importance of a kind heart. Rather than asking people "How are you?" he would say, "Has your heart been kind?" And whenever he taught, he would always add, "Have a kind heart!"

Arousing Bodhicitta

The Three Degrees of Courage

Patrul Rinpoche describes three ways of arousing bodhicitta, named after three kinds of people. The first is the courage of a king: just as a king first secures his own power and then takes care of his subjects, this practitioner wishes first to attain Buddhahood and then to help all beings. The second is the courage of a boatman: just as a boatman aims to reach the far shore together with all his passengers, this practitioner wishes to achieve Buddhahood simultaneously with all beings. It is said that Lord Maitreya aroused bodhicitta in this way. The third and most courageous is the courage of a shepherd: just as shepherds drive their sheep ahead of them, making sure the flock finds grass and water and is safe from predators before thinking of themselves, this practitioner wishes to establish all beings in perfect Buddhahood before achieving it for themselves. This, it is said, is how Lord Manjushri aroused bodhicitta.

Relative and Absolute Bodhicitta

Bodhicitta has two aspects: relative and absolute. Relative bodhicitta itself has two parts -- intention and application. The intention is like forming the thought, "I am going to travel to Lhasa." It is the initial resolve: "I will do whatever is needed so that all beings attain the state of complete Buddhahood." The application is like actually preparing supplies, setting out on the road, and making the journey. It means deciding to practice generosity, discipline, patience, diligence, concentration, and wisdom in order to bring all beings to awakening -- and then actually doing it.

Absolute bodhicitta is something different entirely. Through long training in relative bodhicitta, you eventually arrive at the path of seeing, where you have a direct experience of thusness, the natural state of all things. This is the wisdom beyond all elaboration, the truth of emptiness. That is when absolute bodhicitta truly arises.

Taking the Vow

True absolute bodhicitta arises through the power of meditation and does not depend on ritual. But for relative bodhicitta, as beginners, we need a ceremony -- a ritual through which we take the vow in the presence of a spiritual teacher. We then renew that vow constantly, so that the bodhicitta we have aroused does not diminish but grows ever more powerful.

Visualize all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas in the sky before you as witnesses. Then generate this thought from the depth of your being: "Of all the countless living creatures throughout the universe, there is not one who has not been my parent. Now all these kind parents are foundering in samsara's ocean of suffering. They have no idea of the true path. They have no authentic spiritual friend to guide them, as lost as a blind person wandering alone in a deserted plain. For the sake of all beings, I shall awaken sublime bodhicitta!"

This is the quintessence of all eighty-four thousand teachings of the Buddha -- the one instruction that is enough by itself, but without which everything else is futile. When Atisha spoke of his many teachers, he would join his hands before his heart. But when he mentioned Lord Suvarnadvipa, who gave him bodhicitta, he would join his hands above his head and his eyes would fill with tears. Atisha explained that the little bit of bodhicitta he possessed came from Suvarnadvipa's kindness -- and for that he felt the greatest gratitude.

The most important thing about bodhicitta, Patrul Rinpoche insists, is not simply arousing it through recitation, but that it actually come alive within you. To take the bodhicitta vow and then not keep it would be to swindle the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas themselves. There is no worse fault than that.

Training in the Precepts of Bodhicitta

Considering Others as Equal to Yourself

The reason we have been wandering in samsara from beginningless time is that we believe in an "I" where there is no self, and make that self the sole object of our affection. Instead, reflect on this: just like you, all beings of the three worlds want to be happy and to escape suffering. Even a pinprick or the tiny burn of a spark makes us cry out -- we cannot stand it. Yet all beings share this same sensitivity. Just as you work hard for your own comfort, always work hard for others' happiness too. When Padampa Sangye was asked for a complete instruction in a single sentence, he replied: "Whatever you want, others all want as much; so act on that!"

Exchanging Self and Others

This is the practice of tonglen -- giving and taking. As you breathe out, imagine that you are sending all your happiness, good fortune, and sources of merit to a person who is suffering, as if you were taking off your own clothes and dressing that person in them. As you breathe in, imagine that you are taking into yourself all their suffering and afflictions, so that they become happy and free.

Start with one individual and gradually extend the practice to include all living creatures. Whenever anything painful happens to you, generate overwhelming compassion for all the many beings in the three worlds who are right now enduring that same pain. Wish that all their suffering may ripen in you instead. Whenever you are happy, wish that your happiness might extend to bring happiness to all beings.

In a previous life, the Buddha was born in a hell realm where beings were forced to pull wagons. He was harnessed with another being called Kamarupa, but they were too weak to move their vehicle. The guards beat them with red-hot weapons. The future Buddha thought, "I will pull it alone so that Kamarupa can be relieved," and asked the guards to put the other's harness over his shoulders. The guards beat him for his insolence -- but because of that single compassionate thought, the Buddha immediately left that hell and was reborn in a celestial realm. It is said that this was how he first began to benefit others.

Geshe Chekawa's story illustrates how this practice became the heart of the Kadampa tradition. Visiting Geshe Chakshingwa, Chekawa noticed a small text on his pillow and found one line that pierced his heart: "Offer gain and victory to others. Take loss and defeat for yourself." He spent years searching for the holder of this teaching, eventually finding Sharawa, who told him: "Whether or not you like this teaching, it is one you can only dispense with if you do not want to attain Buddhahood." Chekawa studied with Sharawa for six years and was able to rid himself completely of every trace of selfishness.

Considering Others More Important Than Yourself

The final step is to genuinely take on the suffering of others. Patrul Rinpoche illustrates this with several stories. When Maitriyogi, one of Atisha's teachers, was teaching the Dharma, a man nearby threw a stone at a dog. The master yelled with pain and fell from his throne. When people saw nothing wrong with the dog, they thought he was pretending. But Maitriyogi showed them his back, where the welt of the stone was clearly visible. He had physically taken upon himself the pain meant for the dog.

The master Dharmaraksita, hearing that a sick person could only be cured by the flesh of a living human being, cut flesh from his own thigh and gave it to the patient. He suffered enormously but felt no regret. That night, a figure all in white appeared in his dream, applied nectar to the wound, and healed it completely. It was the Great Compassionate One himself. In that moment, authentic realization dawned in Dharmaraksita's mind.

The Six Transcendent Perfections

The training in the bodhicitta of application consists of putting the six transcendent perfections -- generosity, discipline, patience, diligence, concentration, and wisdom -- into actual practice.

Generosity takes three forms: material giving, giving Dharma, and giving protection from fear. Even a pinch of tea leaves given with a perfectly pure intention carries great merit. The most important thing is to overcome the grasping that clutches at possessions with a dying person's grip. As Milarepa counseled: dig out food from your own mouth and give it as alms. Otherwise, selfish attachment will grow until even all the wealth in the world would not seem enough for one person.

Discipline means avoiding all ten negative actions of body, speech, and mind, while constantly creating sources of good for the future, however small. Do not take lightly small misdeeds, believing they can do no harm -- even a tiny spark of fire can set alight a mountain of hay. And do not take lightly small good deeds, believing they can hardly help -- for drops of water, one by one, in time can fill a giant pot.

Patience has three aspects: patience when wronged, patience to bear hardships for the Dharma, and patience in facing the profound truth without fear. A single flash of anger can destroy the merit gathered in a thousand kalpas. Whenever someone hurts or insults you, the effect -- as long as you do not lose your temper -- is to exhaust your own past negative karma. Consider all who wrong you as your teachers. If there were no one with whom to get angry, with whom could you ever cultivate patience?

As for bearing hardships, the ancient Kadampa masters lived by four principles: base your mind on the Dharma, base your Dharma on a humble life, base your humble life on the thought of death, and base your death on an empty, barren hollow. Milarepa ate nothing but nettles until his body became a skeleton covered in greenish hair. Longchenpa lived for months on mercury pills, sleeping in a rough sack. Not one of the great siddhas attained realization while enjoying the comforts of ordinary life. The idea that we can practice Dharma alongside worldly activities is like saying we can sew with a double-pointed needle or ride two horses going in opposite directions.

Diligence comes in three forms: the armor-like determination that vows to accept any hardship; the diligence that acts immediately rather than postponing practice until tomorrow; and the unstoppable diligence that never feels satisfied with a little retreat or a few prayers but vows to keep going until perfect Buddhahood. Practice like a hungry yak grazing -- while tugging at one clump of grass, its eye is already fixed on the next. The great Indian master Dipamkara used to make tsa-tsas every day with his own hands. When his followers suggested he let them do it for him, he replied, "What are you saying? Are you soon going to start eating my food for me, too?"

Concentration requires first renouncing distractions and going to a solitary place. In secluded forests, there are no worldly preoccupations. Birds and wild deer are easy companions, spring water and leaves provide good sustenance. Awareness becomes naturally clear and concentration develops by itself. The Buddha himself said that simply wishing to go to a solitary place and taking seven steps in that direction is worth more than making offerings to all the Buddhas for countless kalpas.

Wisdom comes through hearing, reflection, and meditation. Through hearing the teacher's words, you understand their meaning. Through reflection, you establish that meaning firmly through examination and analysis. Through meditation, you gain practical experience that gives rise to true realization, seeing everything as empty forms like the eight similes of illusion: a dream, a magic show, a mirage, an echo, a reflection, and a city created by magic.

Each of these six perfections contains all the others within it. Milarepa expressed their essence beautifully: to perfectly give up belief in true existence is generosity; to perfectly give up guile and deceit is discipline; to perfectly transcend all fear of the true meaning is patience; to perfectly remain inseparable from the practice is diligence; to perfectly stay in the natural flow is concentration; to perfectly realize the natural state is wisdom.

The Vital Essence: Emptiness and Compassion United

When Drom Tonpa asked Atisha what was the ultimate of all teachings, the master replied that it was emptiness of which compassion is the very essence -- a panacea that can cure every disease in the world. Drom Tonpa then asked why so many people who claim to have realized emptiness still have no less attachment and hatred. Atisha answered simply: "Because their realization is only words. Had they really grasped the true meaning of emptiness, their thoughts, words, and deeds would be as soft as stepping on cotton wool."

If you truly realize emptiness, you become free from attachment, and so you always have generosity. Free from grasping, you are never defiled by negative actions -- that is discipline. Without concepts of "I" and "mine," you have no anger -- that is patience. Your mind made joyful by realization, you always have diligence. Free from distraction, you always have concentration. And as you do not conceptualize anything in terms of subject, object, and action, you always have wisdom.

This instruction on arousing bodhicitta is the quintessence of all Dharma teachings and the essential element of all paths. It is the indispensable teaching: to have it is enough; to lack it renders everything else futile. Do not be content with merely hearing and understanding it. Put it into practice from the very depth of your heart, always on the firm basis of the love and compassion of bodhicitta. The result should be a steady and genuine increase in bodhicitta, together with a steady and genuine diminishing of ego-clinging and negative emotions. That, and nothing else, is the measure of true practice.