Bodhisattva ethical restraints: Auxiliary vows 34-35

• Auxiliary vows 27-34 are to eliminate obstacles to the far-reaching practice of wisdom. Abandon:

• 34. Despising the spiritual mentor or the meaning of the teachings and relying instead on their mere words; that is, if a teacher does not express him/herself well, not trying to understand the meaning of what he/she says, but criticizing.

• Auxiliary vows 35-46 are to eliminate obstacles to the morality of benefiting others. Abandon:

• 35. Not helping those who are in need.

Let’s come back to our amazing fortune in having a precious human life and the opportunity to listen to the Dharma and practice it. Although we have difficulties in our life and challenges to meet, still we’re so fortunate. In going through whatever difficulties and challenges we have, it is so worthwhile just to have this opportunity and to do what we’re able to do now. We don’t get proud or arrogant because we have a precious human life but realizing that our opportunity depends on the kindness of all living beings, we feel a sense of wanting to repay that kindness through our study and practice, transforming ourselves into suitable Dharma vessels and eventually beings on the path so that we can lead others on the path as well. With that kind of perspective and the optimism that it brings, let’s listen to and discuss the teachings.

When I first met the Dharma, Lama Yeshe had us do a lot of lamrim meditation, especially on our precious human life. We did a lamrim retreat and every day we were meditating on precious human life. I thought it was such a boring meditation. It was like, “Yes, okay, I’m not a hell being, I’m not a preta, I’m not an animal, big deal.  Okay, I have my senses intact. Okay, I’m born in  . . . yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.” It’s like nothing really hit me about it, and it’s interesting how as time goes on the meaning of that meditation really comes to life and it’s like, “Oh, my goodness, how did I ever create the cause for this opportunity?” It just seems quite miraculous. Then also the opportunity itself, the capabilities and abilities we have. So it’s interesting just to see how the mind changes from, “Yeah, yeah” to “Wow, this really means something.” The meditation topic is the same, isn’t it? It’s just the mind that goes, “Oh!”

34. Scorning the Master and Relying upon the Letter

We’re starting thirty-four. Chandragomin says it’s “Scorning the master and relying upon the letter.” And here it says, “Despising the spiritual master or the meaning of the teachings and relying instead on their mere words. That is, if a teacher does not express him or herself well, not trying to understand the meaning of what he or she says but criticizing.”

Dagpo Rinpoche says:

The second misdeed that is a deterioration of the causes of wisdom is bad behavior towards the person from whom we hear the teachings.

It has two aspects to it. The first is:

It is intentionally scorning the person who teaches us the Dharma and absolutely refusing to consider him or her our spiritual guide. It may also consist of disdaining him physically by not paying our respects to him, or not serving him according to generally accepted custom. At the verbal level, it involves addressing him or her impolitely, making fun of him, speaking roughly, being critical, interrupting them, talking at the same time as them, and so on.

Let’s look just at the action itself.

Intentionally scorning the person who teaches us the Dharma and refusing to consider him or her our spiritual guide.

What’s wrong with doing that? 

Audience: No teacher, no Dharma.

Venerable Thubten Chodron (VTC): Yes, no teacher, no Dharma. 

Audience: And no Dharma, no awakening.

VTC: Yes, and no Dharma, no awakening.

The thing is if we just pick faults in the teacher and see negative qualities, we’re closing our mind to be able to learn from that person, because we say, “Who are they? They don’t know anything.” Especially if we scorn them and say, “They’re stupid,” or “they don’t teach well,” or whatever it is, we’re closing our own mind towards learning and that becomes a hindrance to us on the path. Because they may say exactly what the Buddha may say, but we don’t take it seriously. It’s not because we’re naughty little children, because we behaved impolitely, that’s not the issue. The issue is when we behave impolitely, what does that do to our mind? It’s not like the teacher is going to walk out. But what does that behavior do to our mind and how does that create an obstacle for us? 

It may also consist of disdaining him physically by not paying our respects.

So, the teacher comes in and we just ignore it, or we don’t bow before and after teachings, or we just completely ignore the teacher. Or maybe our teacher is carrying something or doing some work and we just say, “I’m on my way to do my own thing,” so we don’t offer help or anything like that.

By not paying our respects to him or not serving him according to generally accepted custom.

Whatever the custom is in the place where we live, according to the culture where we live, we don’t observe that custom of showing respect and offering service to somebody who has an important role in our life. Again, the effect that has on the immediate level is that we don’t listen to the teachings very carefully because we think this person doesn’t know anything. And karmically it causes us not to meet teachers in the future or to meet teachers and have kind of rocky relationships with them because we’re having a rocky mind and rocky mouth right now. We can see all of that just creates problems for us. It’s not something that damages the teacher; they just go on. But it really impairs us.

At the verbal level, it involves addressing him impolitely.”

This might be shouting across the room or any kind of untoward behavior. We know what being impolite means. It might be making fun of somebody, teasing them, or if they have some physical attribute that’s funny, making fun of that or making fun of how they speak. It could be speaking roughly, just being generally obnoxious, being critical, pointing out faults, just seeing negativities in our teachers. It might be interrupting them: they’re trying to give us some advice and we cut in and start with what somebody was talking about today, defending ourselves. 

Teacher is trying to give us some feedback or some instruction and we say, “But I did this because of this and that and the other thing,” whatever it is so that we’re trying to preserve our reputation and not look stupid. But in doing that we actually look very stupid, don’t we? Do we really think our teacher is going to be impressed with, “Well, you know, I didn’t do this because of this this, this, this.” Clearly we’re covering up for our lack of awareness and our laziness. Interrupting him or her, they’re speaking and we cut in and take over the conversation.

Talking at the same time.

Again, teacher’s trying to speak and we just talk at the same time. You were saying your family does that. I was with some people this last week, it was interesting. The mother and daughter would both talk at the same time, so I didn’t know who to listen to. But especially when we’re with our spiritual teacher to do that just isn’t appropriate. Just generally pointing out faults and not being a very nice person. So to really take some care with that because it is not good for our own mind.

We are less likely to belittle a spiritual teacher who lives far away from us or whom we meet infrequently.

It’s true, isn’t it? With a teacher who lives far away, somebody with many titles who sits on a big throne, we think, “Oh, they’re very holy. They’re very good, this and that.” We don’t see them very often so we’re so respectful and we bow down and, “Do you want this?” and “Do you want that?” We go to the opposite extreme of just being overly pleasing, but the teacher that we’re with all the time, it’s like, “Oh, can you pass me the ketchup,” and “please do this for me,” and “please do that for me.” 

It’s much easier, we’re much less likely to belittle a spiritual teacher that we don’t see very often, and it’s much easier to respect that teacher because we don’t see them very often. And we only see them in Dharma situations, when they’re sitting on the throne and there’s a thousand people and things are like that, we don’t see them in all sorts of other human real-life situations.

On the other hand, when we see our teacher very often, perhaps even daily, we must be constantly on our guard for we can easily forget whom we are dealing with. If we are not careful, we may begin treating him or her as our peer and not as a spiritual mentor.

This is very easy, we’re together with our teachers, we see them every day, they’re just another person around here and treat them like a friend.

This would result in behavior that would be inappropriate for a student toward his or her spiritual guide. We must always try to remember whom we are addressing and make sure to be polite and respectful, rising when our teacher enters the room, for example, and speaking courteously when we have something to say. 

The idea isn’t that we’re on our best behavior when we’re with our teacher and then as soon as the teacher leaves we just go back into our old way. I’ve seen many people do this, when they’re with their teacher, they are the epitome of being so humble and, what’s the word called when you’re always asking? Pious, obsequious and like that. Then as soon as the teacher is gone, it’s like, “Do this, do that, go here, go there,” bossing everybody around. We don’t want to be like that. The idea is we practice being polite and mindful of our behavior with our teacher so that we get in the habit of being like that and then we carry that over to all the other sentient beings that we deal with. We don’t make a big line between our teacher, “I look like a goody two-shoes and everybody else I just trample on.” But as a way of training our mind and practicing. 

Many of you, those of you who were in Portland, you saw how Yangsi Rinpoche treated all the other people. He’s just as knowledgeable and is a recognized incarnate and so on, but he was so kind and really humble, genuinely humble, to all the other speakers there. There you see that kind of example. None of the other people were even his teachers, but just by developing a humble behavior towards the teacher, then carrying that over to other people. And it made such a good impression, doesn’t it? There’s a teaching just by when we observe how somebody acts. 

Je Tsong Khapa said in his short lamrim, The Foundation of All Good Qualities”—[that’s in the blue prayerbook]—‘The kind spiritual masters are the foundation of all good qualities.’ This is true for everybody. All our virtue develops with the blessings and support of our spiritual teachers. Without them it would be very difficult for us to progress on the spiritual path. The corollary of this is the person who correctly relies on a spiritual guide will easily advance.

The first part in the lamrim is setting up a good relationship with our spiritual mentor because that benefits us. We listen to the teachings better, we take things more seriously, we feel supported in our practice, we learn to overcome our critical judgmental mind. These are all good qualities we train ourselves in in relationship to our teacher. That is easier because we’ve already checked the teacher out and determined that they have some good qualities, so it becomes easier to develop our good qualities towards them because we’ve already decided they’re worthy of that kind of behavior. Then having developed those good qualities, we can take them and behave that way with other people as well—people who aren’t as nice to us or as helpful and so on. 

Even when our teacher scolds us, it’s really a practice in listening and taking to heart what they’re saying yet at the same time not taking it personally so that we feel like, “Oh, I must be a terrible person, my teacher scolded me,” or “Who does he think he’s talking to? I didn’t do that and I’m getting accused unjustly. This is just like my parents blaming me for things my siblings did.” And we just get into our old thing. One of my teachers, Khensur Rinpoche, with some of his disciples he could be so wrathful, really wrathful. I saw, especially with one monk who translated for him, he would really be quite, quite wrathful. But the monk really used it to practice and he really used it to just endure this. For a long time he had a negative mind but then he just realized, “Hey, that’s no good; this is somebody I really trust and have a lot of devotion for, so let’s not take it seriously and just keep on going.” It was quite interesting to see how this person changed.

Audience: Did you mean not take it seriously or not take it personally?

VTC: Not take it personally but seriously in the sense of, “I got criticized, this is terrible.” This kind of thing. That’s the way it is.

I remember one time I was coming to visit and the monk had picked me up at the station and taken me into the monastery and Khensur Rinpoche just said to the monk, “Bring her up here immediately. Why isn’t she up here?” And it was in Tibetan. I didn’t understand it. He told me what was being said and it was very clear he couldn’t get me there any quicker than he had. We were doing everything as fast as we could and I wanted to go up there immediately to see, but it was very interesting. He just said, “There it is, I don’t need to get disturbed by it.”

In 1954, when I was still living in Dagpo Shedrupling Monastery in Tibet, I attended teachings given by His Holiness, the Dalai Lama on The Lines of Experience—[which is a text by Je Rinpoche]—in his summer palace Norbulingka. During the lectures when His Holiness was elaborating on the correct manner of relying on a spiritual teacher, I clearly remember him saying, ‘There is not much risk in relying on great masters who sit on high thrones. The danger lies in our relationships with the spiritual teachers whom we live with or from whom we receive teachings regularly.’”

And I also have heard His Holiness say this many, many times. And it’s true, isn’t it? 

The second aspect of this misdeed is described as relying on the letter, which means attributing greater importance to the form of the teacher’s explanation than to the content. This means scrutinizing the master’s words and trying to find weak spots in the style and so on without paying attention to the meaning elucidated.

We get our critical judgmental mind revved up: “They’re explaining this, they said that, that doesn’t make sense, this is illogical and they tried to be funny but it wasn’t a very funny joke,” or “The teaching is too long or is too boring,” or “They’re not explaining it very clearly.” You know, it’s just this general critical mind that’s not really trying to understand the content of the teaching and the meaning of the teaching but just likes to pick faults. That’s easy to do, too—especially if we like to be entertained during teachings. If we go to a teacher who tells lots of jokes, we think, “This is such a good teaching.” We go to a teacher who reads out of the text and gives us the transmission, we say, “Oh, this is so boring.” But are we really getting any difference in the Dharma? Especially when we hear the text, maybe we’re getting the same words Je Rinpoche or the Buddha taught, so why are we criticizing? “Oh, they just read from the book.” Whose book is it? And what’s wrong from reading from the book written by a great master? 

That was all under the far-reaching wisdom, how to develop far-reaching wisdom. You can tell that this one with the teacher comes under far-reaching wisdom because if we are criticizing the teacher and being disrespectful and so on, we’re going to find it very difficult to gain any wisdom.

Now we come to a different section which is called “The twelve misdeeds contrary to the ethical conduct of helping others.” Remember there were three types of ethical conduct? Restraint from non-virtue, creating virtue and the ethical conduct of benefiting others.

This section has two parts. The first relates to general objects to be helped and the second to specific ones. In the first category there are misdeeds that involve not accomplishing what is good for others and misdeeds that consist of not eliminating what harms them.

There are two sections to this; there are general objects and specific objects. Within general objects, meaning the recipient of who we could be benefiting, it says:

It’s not accomplishing what’s good for them and then failing to eliminate what harms them.

35. Not Going to Help when it is Needed

The first section of misdeeds related to general objects to be helped and not accomplishing what is good for them.

Here is percept thirty-five, which Chandragomin says is “Not going to help when it is needed.” 

The misdeed may be associated with afflictions or dissociated from them. As before, in the first case the failure to go to help someone is motivated by either animosity or anger—

So, we don’t go help.

In the second it is due to sloth or laziness.

So, this is: “I don’t feel like it; I don’t have time.”

The eight occasions on which not providing assistance becomes a misdeed are as follows.

This is really practical material here, to see what are these eight situations in which if we don’t provide help when we’re capable of it, we commit a downfall. 

One is Deliberating an Action. Here a person has a project, is wavering between several possibilities and asks us to help make the best choice regarding what to do or not. In this case, it is a question of helping the person think about the matter thoroughly so that he or she can find the answer. It is a very practical point, as we regularly meet people who ask for our opinions about a certain course of action.

Somebody is thinking about something: “Should I do this, should I do that?” And they want to talk to us about it and ask for our advice. Instead, either out of animosity, it’s like, “Oh, this person is such a nudnik, such a pest—that’s what nudnik means, such a pest—I don’t want to help.” It’s animosity or anger or laziness, which is, “I have something more important to do, like watch TV.” So, here the person wants to talk over a situation. 

What is really skillful to do when a person asks our advice? This comes in the next section too. Do we tell them what to do? Do we ask them questions? Do we tell them our experience? There’s many ways to approach it. I think a lot of this depends on our relationship with the other person and a lot of it depends on the culture. It really sticks out in my mind, many of you saw the film about Geshe Lama Konchog’s life and his incarnation. It was made by his disciple Tenzin Zopa. Tenzin Zopa said, “Geshe-la told me to do something and I did it.” It was just very simple and that was Tenzin Zopa’s personality. Geshe Lama Konchog would tell him to do things and he didn’t question it, he just did it. That worked in that kind of situation for both of their personalities.

You meet some people and they may ask you, “What should I do?” and then if you tell them, if it doesn’t work out according to their expectations they get mad at you. Or there are some people who don’t want to really think for themselves, they want instead for somebody else to make their life decisions, which isn’t very healthy. In certain cultures, maybe in a Tibetan culture, that kind of telling somebody what to do just is part of the culture, the way people relate to each other is different, but here it’s quite different, isn’t it? And lots of times people don’t want to be told what to do, they want an opportunity to discuss the situation, so we should discuss it with them. 

Sometimes they want us to tell them what to do, but I don’t think that’s always so good. Even you can see it very clearly. Because in some ways, it’s like the other person has to reach the conclusion themselves. But with some people you have that kind of relationship; there’s that kind of trust and you can say, “Do this or don’t do that.” They really trust you and they’ll listen and it works out well. Other people ask you for advice but if you give the advice, they get mad at you because they think you’re bossing them around and controlling them, even though they were the ones who asked you for advice. So you really have to see what the situation is. 

You also have to see what is appropriate when somebody asks you for advice. I remember one time I was in Malaysia, and one woman came to see me and she said, “You know, I’ve been going out with this guy for a while and should I marry him?” I said, “Well, what do you want to do?” And she said, “I don’t know. Lama so-and-so came two years ago and said it would be good to marry him, but then last year Lama this-and-that came and said maybe it wasn’t so good and so now I’m really wondering what you think. Should I marry this guy or not?” I was not going to get involved in that one! My own personal opinion was, I don’t think it’s appropriate for spiritual teachers to tell somebody who to marry. It seems like that’s their business. Maybe in a different culture, a different situation people do that, but I won’t go near it. Somebody called me actually many years ago and said, “I’m getting married to this person, but I have some doubts about it” and told me the doubts. I said, “Hum, those doubts kind of sound serious, you should really listen and think about it,” and he said, “Well, you know, the wedding is already planned” and married the person and later divorced them. So, you just have to see what the situation is. 

Sometimes what I like doing at the Abbey when I get different emails or see different situations is to bring it to the community and have us all brainstorm, because we learn a lot for our own practice about how do we help somebody address a certain problem that they’re having that they write to us about.

The second of the eight occasions is called Settling Questions. This is the follow-up of the preceding situation. The person has now reached the point where he has to make a decision and he is finding it difficult. When he asks for our assistance, if necessary, we may make the decision for him. In the first case, we help the person to reflect on the issue in the second, we help him decide upon it.

Again, see what the situation is in the culture and see what your relationship is with the person, whether you give them advice—“Do this or that”—or whether you just ask questions to them to get them to think, or whether you refer them to go see somebody else. We got an email the other day. Venerable Samten looked and I looked at it and we thought Venerable Jigme would be the best person to respond to it because she has more skill in that kind of area. So, sometimes the best way to respond is to refer the person to somebody else. 

Audience: If you were to do the second thing which was to take the decision for him, it would be helpful to set the parameter that “This is my best from what you said.” It should really be clear that this is not to hold the whole basket.

VTC: Right. And that’s why I don’t feel good making the decision for somebody else because in our culture, I think people need to learn how to think clearly and make good decisions themselves. If somebody else makes it then so often, people turn around and blame that person if things don’t go the way they want.

That’s one of the reasons for example, why monastics have a precept about not match-making and carrying messages back and forth for a liaison, because if you match-make and it’s not a good marriage, then who do they blame?

The third occasion is Traveling Back and Forth. When a traveler asks us for help, we should provide it. In ancient times, traveling in India or elsewhere was far more difficult and hazardous than it is today. There were of course, no trains or planes and people traveled mostly on foot, on horseback or in carriages. They often would have to cross dangerous and uninhabited territories.

Why is an uninhabited territory dangerous? I guess maybe animals and things like that. 

Although today conditions have vastly improved, traveling still can be a traumatic experience.

You have to sit in the airport for 24 hours with 5,000 other people trying to get on the flight because a volcano is exploding or something else happened.

And when voyagers ask us for help, we should furnish it, showing the way, giving advice as to the best route to take, accompanying them to their destination and so on.

Here, too, it really depends on the culture. I’ve heard many people say that in some cultures if you ask people for directions they will accompany you on the street and take you actually there. Americans will not. We say, “If you’re standing there, go four blocks that way turn right then at the first stop light turn left, then after another two blocks the road has a Y and you veer to the right and then you turn left by the next following building and you’ll arrive there very easily.” But we won’t take one step to go there with the other person. In India it’s hilarious, people even if they don’t know where it is say, “Oh, it’s down there,” or “go here or there.” They don’t want to disappoint you so they point you. So, you always have to keep asking. When you travel for a while you really learn how to tell who is giving you correct directions and who isn’t, no matter what country you’re in. 

Just yesterday at the airport it was confusing. I asked one person and I thought, “No, that doesn’t sound like the right direction to that terminal.” And sure enough, it wasn’t. I asked another person and it was confirmed, no, that wasn’t the right way to the terminal. Anyway, when people are traveling, this is about really trying to reach out and help them. I think especially when we see people from other countries or people who don’t know English and they’re struggling to find their way or struggling to figure out how things work in this country, we should really reach out and help. Because I’ve been a traveler in other countries many times where I haven’t known the language and people have been so kind and so helpful, I’ve been really, really grateful. I think we should definitely try and do that.

The fourth occasion is Showing how to Undertake a Worthy Enterprise. This consists of helping others to do their job in general. For example when we have the necessary skills, we will advise farmers on how to run their farms. In particular we will show others how to fulfill the requirements of their profession in such a way that it involves the least negative activities possible. However, we will never assist people in activities that are clearly harmful, such as killing or stealing. In short, we will explain the different ways that people can accomplish what they have set out to do.

Somebody has a project, and they need advice how to do it. The computer’s broken, so they need help fixing the computer. They’re going to get a new computer. They’re trying to choose between Faswall and Rastra and they need some help in deciding. They’re trying to figure out how to do a commercial kitchen and don’t know what the requirements are. It’s any kind of project where somebody needs some advice—if we have the skills we help them and give them advice. That doesn’t mean we necessarily do everything for them. But we try and answer their questions and give them the knowledge they need. 

Of course if somebody is asking us for advice and we know that they’re going to lie on their taxes or embezzle some money or blackmail somebody, we don’t help them do that kind of thing.

Five is Protecting Possessions. The fifth way of giving assistance concerns the protection of property. This may involve giving financial advice or practical recommendations. We may propose possible ways of investing capital or refer someone to a bank or a financial counselor.

Again, I think you have to be really careful with this. Because if somebody asks you how to invest some money and you give them some advice, and then the market changes they might blame you. You have to be very careful.

On a smaller scale, knowing that people tend to keep cash in their homes, we may suggest that they put it in the bank instead. When we visit a home and we see that for lack of repairs it is getting damaged, we may advise the owner on the work that should be done on it.

But we should be tactful; otherwise they take it is criticism. And we should be sensitive whether they have the money to do the repairs or not. Because otherwise we may just make them feel bad. 

The general idea is to help others guard their belongings from theft, loss or deterioration.

If somebody is doing something that’s not so wise to protect their belongings, you give them some advice. They’re in India at the train station and they’re not holding on to their luggage; they don’t have their hand on their luggage at all time, then you say, “It’s really good to keep your hand on your luggage.” Even in American airports, I had a cousin who turned away once at the check-in counter and his computer was gone when he turned back, so you need to be careful. Or if people aren’t locking their doors when they should, giving people advice as to how to protect their possessions.

Six is Reconciling Parted Friends. Here we provide assistance to people in conflict with others. It may involve helping two friends re-establish a close relationship, serving as a mediator in a marital dispute, consoling a person who is embittered about a relationship, or anything else that helps people settle their differences.

We get many emails from people who are having difficulties in relationships and they ask us for advice. Again, depending upon the culture of the person, your relationship with them and so on, you get involved in one way or another. Regarding this, in terms of the one about marital dispute, the question came up: “In vinaya we’re not supposed to pass messages between men and women and create their liaison, so what about if they come to us when they’re not getting along, do we not get involved in that either?” Venerable Wu Yin said, there they already have the liaison, so you’re not creating it. What you’re trying to do is help them to have a happy family life, so you give them some advice that would help them to have a happy family life. 

Of course, nowadays it’s really difficult. Somebody is having marital problems, do you tell them to try and work it out with the person or do you tell them after a certain point, “You’ve tried hard enough and now it’s time to sign off and separate.” It’s really hard to know. I’m dealing with something like that right now actually. Somebody’s been writing me for a while and trying to ask questions and give the person some consolation so that they feel understood and they feel somebody’s on their side and not the whole world is against them. But at the same time, I say very often in the emails, talk to your counselor about this or talk to your counselor about that. 

Audience: These days there’s lots of divorce mediation even free in the courthouse counties. Would you refer people to those kinds of things?

VTC: Yes, they have to both go and sometimes people aren’t sure. I get emails of, “We haven’t been getting along, how can we start to get along?” But you can tell that they haven’t been getting along for a while so you’re wondering if that person wants to change enough to make the relationship work or not. It’s hard. If they’re already getting divorced it’s much easier, you just refer them to a mediator but when they’re trying to decide what to do, it can be very, very touchy, especially because the situation changes every conversation they have with their partner. They have a good conversation, then they have a bad one, then they have a good one, then they have a bad one. It’s quite difficult sometimes to know how to help them.

Audience: There was a woman that wrote when I was covering Venerable Tarpa as coordinator for the teachings and stuff. She was going through this thing with her husband and it was so interesting because she was using the Dharma to justify ending the relationship. “Oh, maybe my karma has ripened and it’s finally done and for me as a practitioner maybe the best thing for is to finally say, ‘the karma has ripened, I’ve learned as much as I can from him and it’s time to go’, what do you think?” I’d be like, “I can’t really advise you,” but she used the Dharma to justify resolving something that needs more work.

VTC: You got an email where somebody was saying, “Oh, my karma with this person is done, it would be better for my practice to split up.” You’re seeing somebody use the Dharma to justify splitting up and you get the sense that they haven’t really thought about the situation well enough or really tried enough or really come to peace or clarity even in their own mind. Then you may have to correct them on their Dharma understanding. You can’t really say, “Oh, my karma with this person is done.”

Audience: [Inaudible]

VTC: Oh yes, I do that lots of times. Very often in marital situations I feel it’s much better that somebody goes to a family therapist than talk to me. But again it depends on the culture. In Asian cultures, people are used to going to the monks and nuns for help. Still there, I try and get them used to the idea of counselors but often they’re resistant to it. It’s becoming more socially acceptable now thank goodness, but some people just feel like, “Oh, I can’t do that, that’s bad; it’s shameful if I have to go to a counselor.” Whereas in our culture, people do it all the time.

But definitely, when we’re getting over our head we should refer them and definitely we should not get personally involved in this. I’m always really hesitant when they want me to talk to the spouse and then talk to them and then talk to the spouse, and it’s like, “I’m not a couples’ therapist, I really can’t do that. If your spouse is a Buddhist, I’m happy to talk to them about how they’re keeping the precepts, that I can do.” If somebody is lying or cheating on their spouse, and the person who is doing that is a Buddhist and has some faith and respect, then yes, I’m happy to talk to them about how to keep the precepts. But I don’t want to get involved in all the psychological whatevers that are going on. I’m not qualified.

Audience: I just wanted to share about divorce mediation. Something that a lot of people don’t know is well over half the couples that come don’t know if they want to get apart. In the maybe 300 I did during the time when this was my job for many years, maybe half of those ended up staying together. They would come in not sure they want to get apart because they have kids, they have finances, it’s a really big thing. Most mediators now are trained to go in the other direction and say, “What do you need to change to stay together?” Those were very satisfying kinds of mediations, not just getting apart.

VTC: You’re saying even people come in for divorce mediation now, because they’re so intertwined with each other, many mediators say, “What needs to change for you stay together?” and then people start to brainstorm what can change, they work on themselves and they often are able to stay together, which is really nice when that happens. It’s very nice. I think it’s probably easier for the kids if the parents are able to work out their differences. 

Somebody just recently told me about something called collaborative divorce. I think it might be something similar. They’re going to get divorced, but they really want to get over the anger and the hurt because they have kids and they want to learn to cooperate better for the benefit of the kids. That can be very, very helpful too. 

Audience: They get very creative when they both have that intention even though there’s anger and pain. They get very creative. One solution is the parents move out of the house and the kids stay and the parents take turns going in and out.

VTC: Oh, that’s an interesting one.

Audience: So the kids no longer have to move . . . 

VTC: To move here and there.

Audience: It’s really interesting, what people come up with.

VTC: And that’s actually more fair when the kids stay there and then the parents have to go in and out.

Audience: The parents have to deal with all that, “I forgot my clothes; I left my homework.”

VTC: Right, and then the parents really think, “Do I want to have that kind of life, where I’m going in and out and here and there?” And then they may think, “Oh, actually it’s easier to live with my spouse and try and get along with them.”

But sometimes the situation isn’t a marital dispute. It’s like friends often have misunderstandings. So to help somebody look at that kind of situation, that they don’t just feel so hurt by one small comment their friend made, that they probably misunderstood to start with, that they abandon the whole friendship. It’s really trying to reconcile people as much as we can. Even if it’s not a case of people being really close and splitting up, but just when we hear one person speaking badly about another person, to try and help that person have a more positive attitude. We try and help them to not be so judgmental and to look at the situation in a variety of ways so that hopefully, they can get along with somebody. Because that is very helpful in situations where you’re working together with people, at a job or something.

Seven is Helping Organize Commemorations. In this case we participate in preparing and running celebrations or anniversaries that occur at fixed intervals, which often involve a considerable amount of work.

Like an autumn celebration at the Abbey, or organizing teachings for His Holiness—that’s not a regular anniversary. Here it’s talking more about anniversaries and things. For these we may help do various tasks, shopping or cooking, helping to welcome guests at a dinner, and so on. 

Eight is Helping in Festive Occasions. The assistance that we are to provide in this case is similar to that described in the previous section, except that the event that we help to prepare is an occasional one.

For example, hosting His Holiness.

We may assist in organizing the celebration by making appointments, contacting people and so on, as well as in the ways mentioned above.

Audience: Do those last two refer to more religious activities? Like anniversaries, you know how they celebrate?

VTC: Anniversary of different bodhisattvas and so on. It’s not specifying here whether it’s religious activities or not. It would depend if you’re a lay person or a monastic. If you’re a monastic it’s not so appropriate for you to help organize let’s say, a wedding celebration or a wedding anniversary or a birthday party, or something like that. But it would be quite appropriate to help organize a celebration for somebody getting their Geshe degree or when we have ordinations here and we invite many guests, to help organize that.

Again, you’re going to look here and see what kind of activity is it, what other things do you have on your plate, are there other people who could help instead of you helping—it doesn’t mean that every time somebody comes and says, “I want to have a birthday party” that you have to drop everything you’re doing and go off and buy balloons. 

That’s going over eight situations in which we should be really mindful and try and help if we’re capable. Next time we’ll get into things where there’s exceptions and so on.

Audience: I did have a question from last time about a different precept.

VTC: Okay, that’s fine.

Audience: And it involves the precepts about non-Buddhist topics. If you’re studying a topic that’s related to Buddhism, say non-harming, but you’re looking at non-Buddhist scriptures or non-Buddhist sources, is that considered breaking some of these precepts? Even though you’re trying to sort of deepen your understanding of the Dharma with this?

VTC: So, it’s a Buddhist topic like non-violence and non-harming but you’re reading texts by let’s say, conflict mediators or Mahatma Gandhi or other non-Buddhists on that same topic because you’re trying to deepen your understanding. Is that transgressing the precept? No, not at all. Because the transgression of the precept is if you are spending all your time reading non-Buddhist things and completely ignore Buddhism. And this is not applying so much to something like non-harming where you can really get some good information that is completely in accord with the Dharma, the precepts regarding this don’t apply to that situation. It’s more if you’re reading a non-Buddhist text let’s say, that’s talking about a creator or that says things are pre-destined or that asserts that things are truly-existent, or a scientist that says there’s only material in the universe and you’re spending much more time reading that stuff than studying the Dharma. Even if you’re reading it for a good reason, because you need to learn so that you can teach or refute those ideas, you begin to find your mind siding with those ideas. “Oh, maybe there is a cosmic consciousness, maybe there is only material in the universe.” Then that becomes a transgression.

Audience: Yes, it seems like some of those precepts when I read them, because I haven’t studied them very deeply, sometimes that you’re just not allowed to read anything besides Buddhist scriptures.

VTC: You’re saying that sometimes it sounds like you’re not allowed to read anything aside from Buddhist scriptures? That’s not true, especially if you’re a bodhisattva. I have this echoing through my mind now that I’m learning about commercial kitchens, how to get a contractor to make a bid and things like that—they say there’s nothing that a bodhisattva won’t learn to benefit sentient beings. Sometimes you may have to learn practical skills or non-Buddhist topics or whatever, and that’s fine. So much depends on your motivation and how you’re spending your time and why you’re spending your time that way and so on. But yes, of course you can read non-Buddhist things.