Guru Rinpoche Day
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Dear Friends Near and Far:
I
hope you have all been happy and healthy. I am in Guadalajara, Mexico
preparing for todays Guru Rinpoche Day's feast offering. I am going to
keep each and everyone of you in my mind during the feast offering.
 So
for today's Guru Rinpoche Day, I would like to share with you a key
that helps unlock the root of all hope and fear. To really understand
the dharma, to practice the dharma, and to apply the dharma, you really
need to understand this key. On a day to day basis, where does all our
hope and fear arise from? It arises from identity, feeling, belief, and
ego clinging. The root is ego, this self centered ego.
What
is hope? Hope is a positive attachment. When you don't receive that or
don't have that you feel pain. What is Fear? Fear is something that you
don't like to have or don't want to be. So most of our thoughts and
feelings are contained in hope and fear.
Now I am going to give you a short quotation:
“Without
cutting or reducing ego clinging, no matter how much you want to
practice the dharma or live a positive life it is not going to work.”
As
usual, my advice is don’t believe me but see it for your own self. So
usually I say “seeing” is the first step, “recognizing” is the second
step, “admitting” is the third step, “changing” is the fourth step and
“measuring change” is the fifth step.
From another quotation:
“Without
cutting the root of ego, meditation is just a creation of mind.
Understanding is just labeling. Thinking that you understood is just
subtle pride. When you really cut the root of ego, you don’t
differentiate between yourself and others, and then you will understand
selflessness. It is then when the realization of emptiness and
compassion is going to be inseparable.”
So
it is very important to reduce the ego. My message today may sound
complicating to some, helpful to a handful and completely gibberish to
many! But from my part, it is, has been, and will always be a joyful
pleasure to connect with each and everyone of you and be a constant
reminder of impermanence with each passing GRD one year after another.
Enclosed
is a picture of my grandfather, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche pointing his
finger inward. Thinking of you all and keeping you all in the depth of
my heart and aspiration.
Sarva Mangalam,
Phakchok Rinpoche
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