Guru Padmasambhawa

"Korzyści i pozytywne właściwości płynące z powtarzania sześciosylabowej mantry Buddy Nieograniczonego Współczucia"

ENGLISH VERSION: Guru Padmasambhava on the Mani Mantra

Recognizing Innate Awareness Through Mantra

When we recite the mantra of the wisdom deity, a power arises; it is powerful. This is what it meant by "innate awareness is the form of Amitabha." One recognizes innate awareness. One recognizes that the mind itself, Buddha-nature is the Buddha, is the deity that one practises. In this context, it is Buddha Amitabha.

Why do we not appear similar to Buddhas now? It is because sentient beings grasp at the duality of subject and object; the inner mind grasps at the outer object and gives rise to many thoughts of attachment, aversion and ignorance.

The wisdom deities have trained in and accomplished bodhicitta and do not grasp at a reality.

~ Garchen Rinpoche

Appearing in the world like reflections

Just as reflections in water

Are not inside or outside,

Bodhisattvas seeking enlightenment

Know the world is not the world:

They do not dwell in or leave the world,

Because the world is inexplicable;

And they are not inside or outside,

Appearing in the world like reflections.

~ Avatamsaka Sutra - Flower Ornament Scripture

Age of Five Degenerations

The era in which we now live is known as the "Age of Five Degenerations." Our lifespan is shorter than it was in the Golden Age; this is the degeneration of life. Also, it is very rare to find someone who practices the Dharma and whose behavior really accords with it; this is the degeneration of karma, or activity.

This world of ours is constantly stricken by wars, famine, and disease, and there is but little hope of peace and happiness; this is the degeneration of the times.

All the while, the root causes of this general degeneration are the intense emotions that plague beings: hatred, desire, misjudgment, pride, and envy; this is the degeneration linked with emotions.

Finally, beings even turn their back on the Dharma; this is the degeneration of the view.

We have to wake up to the desperate and miserable conditions of this age; instead of finding it a source of fascination and pleasure, we ought to feel like a fish writhing on a hook.

We need to turn to Guru Rinpoche, the perfect buddha who vowed especially to help the beings of these decadent times, and call out to him with ardor and with longing: "There is no other hope for me but you! Unless you take me under your protection, I shall sink even deeper into samsara's ocean of suffering."

This is how the sun of Guru Rinpoche's compassion, concentrated now through the magnifying glass of our devotion, will set fire to the dry grass of our ignorance and destructive emotions.

~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Unless you cultivate Bodhicitta, you will not attain enlightenment.

Master Padma said: If you train your mind in love, compassion, and Bodhicitta, you will not take rebirth in the three lower realms. 

Moreover, from this very moment you will never fall back. This alone is my oral instruction.

Wherever you go, keep Bodhicitta in mind, never departing from its company.

Whatever action you engage in, train in doing it for the benefit of sentient beings. Train in regarding others as more important than yourself. You will attain numerous qualities as a result of this training, such as having unimpaired samayas and vows.

Unless you cultivate Bodhicitta, you will not attain enlightenment, even though you may gain mastery of mantra and be very powerful.

All the supreme and common accomplishments will result from Bodhicitta arising in your being. That alone is my oral instruction.

~ Padmasambhava

Gender identities

Our ideas about what it means to be a woman or a man - that is, our gender constructs - are given meaning and importance in our day-to-day reality. Gender identities permeate so much of our experience that it is easy to forget that they are just ideas - ideas created to categorize human beings. Nevertheless, the categories of masculine and feminine are often treated as if they were eternal truths. But they are not. They have no objective reality. Because gender is a concept, it is a product of our mind - and has no absolute existence that is separate from the mind that conceives of it. Gender categories are not inherently real in and of themselves.

~17 Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje

The meaning of the Vajra Guru mantra, the essence of Guru Rinpoche

The mantra begins by expressing the seed syllables of the diamond body, diamond speech, and diamond mind: OM AH HUNG.

VAJRA means diamond: it is never changed by the elaborations of dualistic characterizing thoughts. It is present as the essential nature that is the all-pervading indestructible essence, awareness-emptiness. It is, therefore, the absolute body.

GURU means teacher. From that state, infinite clouds of Buddha forms and Buddhafields are arrayed, loaded with special qualities and endowed with the seven branches of union.y This is the body of perfect enjoyment.

PADMA, or “lotus,” refers to the radiant awareness of discriminating wisdom — the diamond speech, great bliss—spontaneously appearing as a reflection or manifestation, miraculously born as the supreme lotus family. This is therefore the body of manifestation.

These three bodies being inseparable in the teacher, the great Diamond Bearer of Oddiyana, keep in mind his immense qualities as you pray from a state of yearning — the natural display, as devotion, of the basic nature of the mind free from all elaboration. Entreat him, “By the power of this prayer, may all the supreme and common accomplishments — SIDDHI — be now, at this very moment, bestowed in full on my mindstream — HUNG.”

Reflecting like this on its meaning, recite the mantra, as the Root Tantra of the Assembly of Knowledge Holders advises:

During the approach, visualize the teacher on the crown of your head,

Recite the mantra as a prayer.

This is an essential pith instruction.

As for the benefits of reciting the mantra, Guru Rinpoche himself said:

The essence, the mantra that embodies the Sugatas,
Is the practice that includes all the Buddhas.
By reciting the Siddhi mantra one can traverse
The fifteen levels and five paths and accomplish my level.
It is the same as reading all the sacred teachings
Of all the Buddhas of the past, present, and future.

and,

Because of it, the phenomenal world will quake.
Condensing the Buddhas of past, present, and future,
It is inseparable from all the teachers.

Because of it, haughty elemental spirits faint and tremble,
The dakinis and Dharma protectors will gather like clouds,
And all the hosts of dakas and dakinis
Will be helpless but to come in person
And bestow the supreme and common accomplishments.

If there are no signs of this happening,
I, Padma, have deceived beings.
Therefore, fortunate children of the future,
Keep it in your hearts. This is my pledge.

and,

The twelve-syllable quintessence of the Lotus-Born
Recited twelve hundred thousand times will render void the seed of cyclic existence;
Thirty-six hundred thousand times will place you in the ranks of the knowledge holders;
And ten million times will make you the equal of myself, Padma.