b' The training based on the teachings of the conquerors’ child Śāntideva
1' Contemplating the benefits of exchanging self and other and the faults of not exchanging self and other
2' The ability to exchange self and other if you accustom yourself to the thought of doing so
3' The stages of meditating on how to exchange self and other
iii) The measure of producing the spirit of enlightenment
b' The training based on the teachings of the conquerors’ child Śāntideva
The training based on the teachings of the conquerors’ child Śāntideva has three parts:
1. Contemplating the benefits of exchanging self and other and the faults of not exchanging self and other
2. The ability to exchange self and other if you accustom yourself to the thought of doing so
3. The stages of meditating on how to exchange self and other
1' Contemplating the benefits of exchanging self and other and the faults of not exchanging self and other
Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:62
Whoever wishes to quickly protect
Self and other
Must exchange self for other.
Practice this excellent secret.
And:
Whatever worldly joy there is
Arises from wishing for others’ happiness.
Whatever worldly suffering there is
Arises from wishing for your own happiness.
What need is there to say more?
Look at the difference between these two:
Ordinary persons act for their own welfare;
The Sage acts for others’ welfare.
If you do not genuinely exchange
Your own happiness for others’ suffering,
You will not achieve buddhahood,
And even in cyclic existence, you will have no joy.
Consider how being self-centered is the door to all degeneration and being other-centered is the basis of all excellence.
2' The ability to exchange self and other if you accustom yourself to the thought of doing so
Take the example of your enemy becoming a friend. At first, when you heard even the name of your enemy, fear arose. Later you were reconciled and became such close friends that when this new friend was absent you were very unhappy. This reversal resulted from familiarizing your mind with a new attitude. So likewise, if you become habituated to viewing yourself as you presently view others [with an attitude of neglect] and to viewing others as you presently view yourself [with a cherishing attitude], you will exchange self and other. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:63
Do not turn away from this difficulty.
Although you were frightened upon hearing someone’s name,
Now, due to the power of conditioning,
You dislike that person’s absence.
And also:
It is not difficult to consider my body
With the perspective I have toward another’s body.
Qualm: Since someone else’s body is not your body, how can you develop the same attitude that you have toward your own?
Reply: Your body was produced from your father’s semen and your mother’s blood.64 Even though it was produced from a portion of someone else’s body, you conceive it to be your own by the influence of previous conditioning. [313] Similarly, if you become accustomed to cherishing another’s body as you presently do your own, you will view it with the same perspective that you now have toward your own body. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:65
Therefore just as you conceived “I”
With respect to the drops of semen
And blood of others, so you can be conditioned
To cherishing others as you do yourself.
Reflect thoroughly on the benefits of being other-centered and the faults of being self-centered. Thereby you will produce from the depths of your heart a great delight in meditating on the exchange of self and other. Then recognize that you can actually generate it once you have become habituated to it.
3' The stages of meditating on how to exchange self and other
The phrases “exchanging self and other” and “making oneself others and others oneself” do not indicate a training in an attitude which thinks “I am others” or “Others’ eyes, etc., are mine.” They indicate a change in the orientation of the two states of mind of cherishing yourself and neglecting others, wherein you develop the attitude of cherishing others as you presently do yourself and neglecting yourself as you presently do others.
Therefore Śāntideva’s statement above that you must “exchange your own happiness for others’ suffering” means to view cherishing yourself as the enemy and then to stop emphasizing your own happiness. In addition, you must view cherishing others as a good quality, stop neglecting others’ suffering, and instead emphasize the removal of their suffering. In brief, this statement means that you remove others’ suffering while disregarding your own happiness.
There are two obstacles to training in this attitude of exchanging self and other:
1. You make a categorical differentiation between people who are happy or suffering––yourself and others––making them as different as blue and yellow. Then, you accomplish your happiness and remove your suffering because you think of them as “mine,” and you neglect others’ happiness and suffering because you think of them as “belonging to others.”
Therefore, the remedy for this is not to make a categorical distinction between self and other as being essentially different. Rather, understand that self and other are mutually dependent such that when you are aware of self, you are aware of other; and when you are aware of other, you are aware of self. It is like being aware of near mountains and distant mountains, for example. Relative to your being here, you think of a mountain there in the distance as being a distant mountain, yet when you go to this distant mountain, you think of it as a near mountain. [314] So the awareness of self and other is not like the awareness of a color, for, regardless of what color blue is related to, you are aware of just blue and are not aware of some other color. Moreover, Śāntideva’s Compendium of Trainings states:66
By becoming accustomed to the equality of self and other,
The spirit of enlightenment becomes firm.
Self and other are interdependent.
Like this side and the other side of a river, they are false.
The other bank is not in itself “other”;
In relation to someone else it is “this bank.”
Similarly, “self” does not exist in its own right;
In relation to someone else it is “other.”
Thus Śāntideva indicates that self and other are merely posited in relation to a particular reference point and do not essentially exist.
2. You must remove the obstacle of thinking, “I will not make an effort to dispel others’ suffering because others’ suffering does not harm me.” It would be like not accumulating wealth in your youth out of fear of suffering in your old age because you think that your suffering in old age does no harm to you in your youth. Or, as stated in Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds,67 it would be like not alleviating the pain in your foot with your hand, because your foot is “other.” Old age and youth (or similarly, former and future lives) are just illustrations; this principle applies also to morning and evening, former and later days, and so forth.
Qualm: But old age and youth are one continuum and the foot and hand are one collection; therefore they are not the same as self and other.
Response: “Continuum” and “collection” are designated to many moments and to many parts; they do not have a self-sufficient essence. The “self” of yourself and the “self” of others must be posited to a collection and a continuum, so self and other are not es-tablished by way of an essence that can be posited independently.
However, since beginningless time you have found your own suffering unbearable because you have been conditioned to self-cherishing. Therefore, if you become conditioned to cherishing others, you will give rise to an attitude of finding others’ suffering unbearable.
After you have eliminated the obstacles to exchanging self and other in this way, the actual way to meditate is as follows. [315] Out of attachment to self, your self-cherishing attitude has produced all sorts of undesirable things throughout the beginningless time of cyclic existence up to now. Although you wanted to make things perfect for yourself, you emphasized your own welfare and engaged in improper methods. You have spent countless eons at this, but have not at all accomplished your own or others’ aims. Not only have you not achieved these, you have been tormented only by suffering. If you had replaced concern for your own welfare with concern for others’ welfare, you would certainly have already become a buddha long ago and would have completely and perfectly accomplished your own aims as well as those of others. As you did not do this, you have spent your time uselessly and laboriously.
Make a firm determination by thinking, “Now I understand the faults of self-cherishing and the benefits of cherishing others. With great effort, relying on mindfulness and vigilance, I will discontinue the present self-cherishing, my greatest enemy, and I will not allow any potential self-cherishing to arise.” In this way frequently stop self-cherishing. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:68
Self-cherishing has harmed me in all
My myriad lifetimes in cyclic existence.
You, O mind, though you spent countless eons
Wanting to accomplish your own welfare,
Through such great hardship
You have accomplished only suffering.
And also:
If formerly you had acted for others’ welfare,
This condition which lacks
The perfect happiness of buddhahood
Could not possibly have occurred.
Thus, neither be self-centered nor support self-centered tendencies. You must train again and again in the attitude of freely giving to all beings your own body, resources, and roots of virtue, and you must work for the welfare of those to whom you give these things. It is wrong to do the opposite, so stop the attitude which sees your own body, resources, and roots of virtue as being for your own purposes. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:69
“I am controlled by others”;
You, O mind, know this for certain.
Now do not think of anything
Other than the welfare of all beings. [316]
It is wrong to achieve my own aims
With my eyes, etc. that are under others’ control.
Therefore, it is incorrect to do wrong to others
With my eyes, etc. that are for their welfare.
If you lose the thought that your body, etc. are for others’ welfare and think that they are for your own benefit, or if you see them as agents of physical, verbal, or mental harm to others, then stop this way of thinking by contemplating how this previously brought you limitless harm and how you are still mistaken with regard to its appearance of helpfulness, which is false. If you are controlled by this wrong way of thinking, it produces only unbearable suffering. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds says:70
When you [self-cherishing] ruined me before,
That was another time.
Now I recognize you; where will you go?
I will destroy all your arrogance.
Dispel the thought,
“I still have my own welfare.”
I have sold you [my mind] to others.
Do not be dispirited; offer your energy.
If I become careless
And do not give you to beings,
You will certainly give me over
To the guardians of hell.
Thus you gave me over
To long periods of suffering.
Now I remember my grudges;
I will destroy your selfish thoughts.
Similarly, when you repeatedly reflect on the benefits of cherishing others, you produce powerful enthusiasm from the depths of your heart. Discontinue your present attitude of disregarding others and keep your potential disregard of others from arising. Through affectionately viewing others as dear and beloved as much as you can, develop an attitude that cherishes others to the degree to which you previously cherished yourself—“Cherish others as you do yourself.”71
To produce the attitude that cherishes beings in this way, you must remember their kindness or recognize that they help you. For example, once farmers see that through sowing healthy seeds they will reap a good and abundant harvest, they value a fertile field. [317] Likewise, once you are certain that you will accomplish all temporary and final well-being through sowing the seeds of generosity and so forth in the field of living beings, you will cherish others. Reflect on this. Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds states:72
Living beings and conquerors are similar—
From them you achieve a buddha’s qualities.
How is it that you do not respect living beings
Just as you respect conquerors?
In reference to this, killing living beings leads you to the three miserable realms. If you save others from being killed, you go to a happy realm and have a long life there. In the same way, stealing or giving away your resources, being hostile or cultivating love and compassion, will produce results such as leading you respectively to a miserable realm or to a happy realm. Contemplate especially that you need to focus on living beings as you develop the spirit of enlightenment, and that by accomplishing the bodhisattva deeds for the sake of living beings, you reach buddhahood—so these too depend on living beings. Also, reflect on bringing generosity, etc. to perfection in dependence on living beings as taught in the verses on the necessity of making living beings happy. Nāgārjuna’s Essay on the Spirit of Enlightenment (Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa) states:73
The desirable and undesirable effects—
A life in the happy or miserable realms in this world—
Arise through the benefit and harm
You do to living beings.
If you attain unexcelled buddhahood
In dependence on living beings,
Why be at all amazed that in these three realms,
The resources of deities or humans
Relied upon by Brahmā, Indra, Rudra,
And the worldly protectors
Are also brought about by
Just helping living beings?
All of the many sufferings
Living beings experience
As animals, hungry ghosts, and hell beings
Come from harming living beings.
The sufferings of hunger,
Thirst, violence, and torture,
Which are difficult to reverse and inexhaustible,
Are the results of harming living beings. [318]
The śrāvakas’ goal is inferior because they do not emphasize others’ welfare, whereas buddhas attain the final goal because they stress others’ welfare. It is said that once you have contemplated the principle here, you should not for even an instant be attached to your own welfare. The Essay on the Spirit of Enlightenment states:74
With effort eliminate as a poison
Your lack of care for living beings.
Don’t śrāvakas attain an inferior enlightenment
Because they lack caring?
By not forsaking living beings
Perfect buddhas attain enlightenment.
Once bodhisattvas ascertain the effects
Arising from helping and not helping,
How can they remain even for a moment
Attached to their own welfare?
Therefore, after conquerors’ children understand that full absorption in others’ welfare and the goal of enlightenment arise from the sprout of the spirit of enlightenment, and after they see that its root is compassion, they are very intent on cultivating compassion. They become thoroughly conditioned to it so that their compassion and spirit of enlightenment become firm. Thereupon they cannot help but engage in the deeds of the great undertaking that is most challenging. The Essay on the Spirit of Enlightenment states:75
The fruit of enlightenment solely for others’ welfare
Grows from the sprout of the spirit of enlightenment
Which has a root of firm compassion.
This is what conquerors’ children cultivate.
One who stabilizes this through conditioning,
Though initially terrified by the suffering of others,
Later gives up even the bliss of meditative stabilization
And enters the Unwavering Hell.
This is amazing! This is praiseworthy!
This is the superior way of excellent beings.
Now also develop certainty about these methods by means of the sayings of excellent beings, as follows:
Atisha said, “Tibet recognizes ‘bodhisattvas’ who do not know how to train in love and compassion.” Someone then asked, “Well then, how should bodhisattvas practice?” He replied, “They must learn in stages from the beginning.” [319]
Lang-ri-tang-ba (Glang-ri-thang-pa) said, “Sha-bo-ba (Shva-bo-pa) and I have eighteen human strategies and one horse strategy for a total of nineteen.76 Our human strategy is simply to develop the spirit of highest enlightenment and then learn to do whatever we do for the sake of living beings. Our horse strategy is this: since self-cherishing keeps that spirit of enlightenment which has not arisen from arising, and destabilizes that which has arisen and prevents its increase, train by keeping self-cherishing away and doing what you can to damage it. Cherish living beings and do whatever you can to help them.”
Nal-jor-ba-chen-bo (rNal-’byor-pa-chen-po) explained to Geshe Drom-dön-ba that he had this and that meditative concentration wherein the energy balances and absorbs, and so forth. Geshe Drom-dön-ba replied, “Even if you have a meditation undisturbed even by the beating of a large drum close to your ear, if you do not have love, compassion, and the spirit of enlightenment, you will be reborn in a place that to avoid you must now confess day and night.” Drom-dön-ba thinks that Nal-jor-ba-chen-bo is proceeding so as to cause his rebirth in a state lacking leisure, such as rebirth as an ordinary being of the formless realm or the like.
Kam-lung-ba (Kham-lung-ba) said, “Through our disinterest in living beings, who are what is most important, they will also do the same [i.e., not bring the benefit of virtues] to us.”
Whether you plant the roots of the Mahāyāna or not, or whether you have genuinely entered the Mahāyāna or not, is all founded upon this [love, compassion, cherishing others, and the like]. Therefore always consider what you should do to develop these. It is excellent if you do develop them; if you have not, do not let it remain that way. Always rely on a teacher who gives this kind of teaching. Always associate with friends who are training their minds in this way. Constantly look at the scriptures and their commentaries which describe these. Amass the collections as causes for these. Clear away the obstructions which prevent these. Moreover, if you train your mind in this way, you will definitely acquire all the seeds for developing these, so this work is not insignificant; take joy in it. The Great Elder [Atisha] said:77
One who wishes to enter the door of the Mahāyāna teachings
Should develop through effort over eons
The spirit of enlightenment, which is like the sun that clears away darkness
And the moon that quells the torment of heat. [320]
iii) The measure of producing the spirit of enlightenment 78
Understand the measure of producing the spirit of enlightenment as previously explained.79