Comments on: the Venerable Ya-un – Admonitions to Myself

By: Advice from Me to Myself – Patrul Rinpoche « Wake Up and Laugh!

Advice from Me to Myself – Patrul Rinpoche « Wake Up and Laugh! — Mon, 02 May 2011 08:14:56 +0000

[...] encourage us to practice. Over several months I posted a translation of the Ven. Ya-un’s Admonitions to Myself. Not too long ago, I came across a link on Reddit to a text by Patrul Rinpoche (1808-1887) that [...]

By: rachael

rachael — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 16:53:02 +0000

Beautifully said Marcus!

Thank you for your words, they are most uplifting and remind us to look and perceive life positively.

I too perceive life through a lens like yours and sometimes with all these stern teachings and words, it seems that then life can be taken too seriously. And I guess, for me, I would rather be laughing and loving each moment and not be caught up in trying to be a certain way in order to be a certain religion. For I do not know any religion really and just as there are strict views with any, they do not sit well with me when it is anything but love…

By: Tanya

Tanya — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 16:44:55 +0000

Marcus, everybody is different, I am different from you, I just speak about my view, I do not say how you should think, I only say what I feel and how I see things, in many ways I am not like majority of people, I live in a ‘different world’ by many reasons (long story), my views and opinions are mine and I don’t impose them on anybody, just share my view. I don’t say “we must, or should…” – I just share my view. I do not share your and majority of people view on sex and family, why does it bother you, I do not understand, if I find it bizzare to communicate through genitals – it is my view, I prefer communication through mind, and if it makes me different from others then it is ok! actually buddhist and christian monks and nuns also prefer to live without it, so I am not alone, ok
Maybe you would find it weired, but if you would try to “have sex” with your own foundation, using your mind, then you could understand me better. I am in love with my inner Buddha – nothing wrong with that!

By: Kyōshin

Kyōshin — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 13:20:59 +0000

“if we need to reject relationships before they happen and so avoid the painful things you describe, such as “worrying sick about your child when something is not well”, then I hand in my Buddhist card right away. I’m not interested.”

Amen to that!

By: evelyn

evelyn — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 06:06:59 +0000

ha – you live and learn! i clicked!
really a great picture, taken in a fine moment with these red flowers in the background. perfect invitation to a great place…

thank you, Chong Go!

By: Marcus

Marcus — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 04:05:11 +0000

Hi Tanya,

I notice that many times in the comments here and on other posts you talk about how much you dislike the concept of sex and even how much you feel that family is a fetter. In this you are, I suppose, in good company – isn’t that exactly how the Buddha described his family?

You say “why on earth would you want to complicate your life by such things as a mate, offsprings and difficulties” – well the answer to that one is because we are human. This is what it means to be born in the human realm. And nor do we escape this realm just by avoiding these things.

In Therevada Buddhism, one indeed does escape Samsara via becoming a monk, and so people hope to be reborn as monks – with no families and no ties to the world. But the point of Mayahana is that we all have Buddha-nature and all of us, monks and lay people, householders and non-householders, can all find liberation.

So we do what we need to do in this life, and – vitally – we can enjoy this life. Sure, sex can be as you describe it, as a burdernsome “duty in marriage” or a stupid addiction – but it can also be a beautiful, and fun, loving expression of a relationship between two people that love eachother.

But perhaps you think that because I love life and love relationships and love sex too, and love this wonderful physical world even with all its suffering, my attachments are so great that I can never leave Samsara? Perhaps you are right.

And yet I refuse to believe that Samsara is just suffering. I know it contains great joy and peace and beauty. It contains all the relationships and connections that I need to work through and which bring happiness and fulfilment to my life. For some people, their karmic journey means they need to be monks, some even live as hermit monks, but for most of us that’s just not so.

If you are right, if we need to reject relationships before they happen and so avoid the painful things you describe, such as “worrying sick about your child when something is not well”, then I hand in my Buddhist card right away. I’m not interested.

But rather, I love this world, love this life, and love that through it I can learn more and more, develop myself on the Bodhisattva path, and come eventually – along with all other beings – to another realm that will be even greater.

And I do that by ‘letting go’ – letting go to my Buddha-nature or to Amida Buddha, letting go to the whole process that is carrying me where I need to go. I don’t cut off attachments, I let go. I don’t avoid relationships. I entrust.

All beings, one Buddha-nature
Praise to Amida Buddha
Praise to the Bodhisattva of Compassion

Marcus _/\_

“Life is filled with suffering, but it is also filled with many wonders, like the blue sky, the sunshine, the eyes of a baby. To suffer is not enough. We must also be in touch with the wonders of life. They are within us and around us, everywhere, any time“.
– Thich Nhat Hanh, Being Peace

By: Tanya

Tanya — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:24:44 +0000

of course you have to take care of the people in your life, but to my child I often say that married life is bondage and suffering, I tell her that it is better to be a sunim or live like a sunim, be free and study your mind. The choice is yours, it can take one lifetime to become a Buddha, or 500 life times or without any practice whatsoever, eventually you will become Buddha anyway, but that can take very, very, very long time, maybe few billion years. If you notice that samsara is suffering, you would not want to stay in it. When Buddha left his family to get enlightened, he did not really abandon his family, he went “to war with suffering”, he went to get the medicine from suffering and when he came back he was able to truly help his family, he gave them the teaching which was the medicine from suffering of samsara, birth and death. They all lived with him after he became Buddha, he personally taught his son, who became enlightened at 18, his former wife Jasodhara became enlightened too, after he returned he personally went to see he; he taught his father …
In whatever circumstances you have your mind is present, so you can practice, but if your attention always goes to outside things like attraction to someone’s body, you cannot really have “relationship” with your foundation, your inner Mind. If you are kind and helpful to others even though you do not know teachings, you would still be understanding One Mind

By: Chong Go Sunim

Chong Go Sunim — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 11:05:31 +0000

I never thought of that! There was just something about this picture that I thought might go with the post. Btw, if you click on the image, you can see it in a larger size.

The image is from behind Sudeok Temple. This is very well-known temple, and where Mangong Sunim established the first modern meditation hall for nuns. (I don’t remember the exact date, but I’m thinking in the mid 1930′s, though it could be earlier.)

By: evelyn

evelyn — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:59:37 +0000

love the picture in the text: this huge stone’s arching like a caring hand over the path, isn’t it?

By: Chong Go Sunim

Chong Go Sunim — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 08:01:40 +0000

That’s one of my favorite lines in this text, together with, “If you are ignorant and do not study, your arrogance alone will increase.”