Day Two "Living the Dharma"

*These are my notes from the second day of teachings from H.H. 17th Karmapa

Day Two
-Morning Talk
His Holiness Karmapa began the day by talking a little bit about a publication he created for proper conduct regarding the protection of the environment. He stressed how important it is to protect the environment and that doing so is an extension of our vows/wishes to benefit sentient beings. The book has five major points. Point one: Trees and forests must be cultivated and not mindlessly cut down. (I should say that most of this is perhaps common knowledge and that the publication is meant to be distributed to monasteries around Asia to try and effect some change in the cultural habits in India, Tibet, China ext.) Point 2: Protecting water sources, especially in Asia because the Himalayas provide water for a very large population. Point 3: The well fare of wild life. There is a strong push for vegetarianism from His Holiness and he asked us to consider all life of the animals as well as the amount of resources that are used in raising livestock for consumption. Point 4: Waste management. He said that Buddhists should be an example of good practices. He said that in Bihar (which is quite filthy) if the Buddhists would put their trash in the bins that maybe it would catch on with the rest of the population. Point 5: Climate Change. We should pay extra attention to ways in which we can minimize our footprint.
He then said that he wasn't feel that well and that if he tried to talk on one subject that it would be too boring so he decided to just spend the rest of the time answering submitted questions. This model continued for the duration of the day. Most of which turned out to be kind of tedious like "If we watch His Holiness Karmapa on a dvd and he is doing an empowerment, does that mean we also received the empowerment?" Some of the highlights (from my point of view obviously) were:
Q: How does fear arise.
A. Fear is a by product of the skandhas or the development of the self as a permanent entity in our minds. The antidote to this is to study and contemplate the teachings of dependent arising or interdependence. So if you really look at the development of what we call ourselves then there is no one thing that exists independently from the rest and no one element that is permanent. Therefore, if there is no solid entity there then there is nothing to protect or be afraid of.
Q. You talked yesterday about desire and attachment, can you discuss working with anger.
A. Anger is a very obvious thing to recognize, so in that way it is somewhat easy to work with because you don't have to look very far to first recognize and understand when it is happening. His Holiness said that what he finds difficult is that when he gets angry it is hard to let go of the reason, or the feeling that you deserve to be angry because of such and such a thing. He said that it helps him to think of great teachers and teachings and their example inspires him to let go of his anger. He also said that it is sometimes good to start to think about all the things that bother you because then you wont fixate on one thing and soon your aggressive energy will dissipate. He told a story to illustrate the point: A sheep herder got mad at one of his sheep for something and hit it with a stick. But that started a chain reaction with all the other sheep and they were all startled and acting out. He then had to try to hit everyone of his sheep and he soon wore himself out and collapsed laughing at himself.
Q. Please explain the antidote or slogan "victory and gain to others, loss and defeat to oneself"
A. He stressed that this slogan is about trying to train one's mind to move away from always thinking about one's own benefit. He said that you don't actually take on all the suffering, and that if the Buddha would have taken all the suffering that he would have just been sick all the time and that his students would spend all their time trying to collect enough tissues. He then said that in terms of implementing this slogan that one has to use wisdom and critical intelligence. You have to understand that what you are giving away will be useful and not harmful and that you are willing to give it away so that the act of giving doesn't cause too much discord in your own life.
* I will end with a slightly more humorous one
Q. Your Holiness, I have always wondered why people look the way they do. Why some people are beautiful and others ugly. Do you have anything to say on that.
A. His Holiness said that in Tibet they say that if a person has big ears it is because when they where young they misbehaved a lot and the teacher was always pulling them around by their ear. He went on to say that what we consider beautiful is usually cultural and that those conditions play a big role. He then conceded that their is some karmic element and used the example of the bodhisattva Avolokiteshvara. He said that Avolokiteshvara was always smiling with a lovely face because of all the good deeds done and merit accomplished.

*As always forgive the spelling and grammatical errors, I went to public school in California.