Q&A: How to Recognize Buddha Nature

✨ Q&A: How to Recognize Buddha Nature

A student asked: I would like to turn back to the topic of Buddha nature. In recent months I have gradually come to appreciate this concept, because I found that many of our desires, anxieties, and loneliness are related to seeking outer conditions to fulfill us.

If we can truly recognize, or even just have a taste of, or conviction in, our own Buddha nature, then it becomes quite easy to feel happy, fulfilled, and satisfied, and we will not be so eager to grasp at things outside. We can be very stable and calm, and we can have love and openness.

However, I do not know how to recognize this Buddha nature, or even how to develop a stronger, more solid conviction that we all possess it. So what is the way to get a little taste, a glimpse of it? I believe that could truly solve many problems.

Rinpoche: There are two different approaches, based on two aspects to be understood, which relate to the two obscurations: the afflictive obscuration and the cognitive obscuration. These we need to know, to confirm, to investigate, and to reassure ourselves about.

Regarding the cognitive obscuration, in terms of objective things: everything is pure by its nature.

When we say everything is pure by its nature, it means that our limited thoughts and limited judgments actually come from ourselves.

This is why I always give the example of the master chef versus the person without any skill.

Put one potato in front of the unskilled person, and they feel frustrated. But if I am a greatly skilled chef, I feel joyful: I can cook it in a hundred different ways, a thousand different ways.

The limit of the potato is not set by the potato itself. The potato is made small by the limits of my skill.

Everything is exactly the same.

The value of the things around us in life is not made small by the nature of the things themselves. It is we who are so limited. That is why we are unable to make use of them.

Now, what does this understanding assure us of? What does it give us?

Appreciate everything. Our negative thoughts and thinking toward outer things are cut off. This understanding truly helps us never to blame anything.

Just as in the example, the value of the potato is not limited by the potato itself; its limit depends on my skill, my capacity. It is exactly the same with all phenomena. It is not that something is limited out there. The limit is within myself.

So from today onward, what are you going to do?

If you are truly sure about what you have discovered, if you are truly a seeker bringing changes to your behavior and way of approach, then this understanding will help you never to blame the outside.

Everything is pure by its nature; the limit is within me.

From today onward, the question becomes: how do I gradually increase my skill? This is such an enlightening insight. It will truly open you up.

Then, on exactly the same basis, look at yourself. Observe again with the same principle. What is the limit of your hand? This is my hand. The Buddha also had the same kind of hand, the same fingers. He did not have six, seven, or eight fingers; he had exactly five. And he had the same feet. He utilized them.

In just the same way, you have everything in this hand. It can serve one individual, a few, or millions of individuals. It can be utilized in so many ways. So never limit yourself.

Then what is the limit?

When we look into it, it is that judging mind, the mind that says we do not have the capacity for this or that. So study the mind again.

What mind makes us so small? What is the nature of the mind itself?

Once you solve this great equation, everything becomes unblamable. You have opportunity, great opportunity, always, wherever you are.

And even before studying the mind, you already feel very joyful, optimistic, healthy, and happy, discovering that you are not limited by this body, not limited by objective things.

You already feel joy and a sense of value. And you feel grateful to have this great opportunity.

This is because this whole conversation, this whole way of reflection, only a human body, only human consciousness has this kind of access. Animals can be playful, they can be cute, but they cannot have this kind of conversation.

So through this great discovery, we are joyful, we are grateful, and at that stage much of life's stress is already gone.

Now, simply explore the mind.

You will find that right now the mind has formations of this and that, many things, because of our karmic influences and our habits. Because of these influences, and because we did not know, we have been creating many things.

But once we know, we still have a choice, an option. Then somehow we are able to put the mind to work.

Once you know how to work with the mind, once you observe it, then with every single thing your eyes engage, no matter what you see, along with that vision, mind arises.

Now you are able to purify that.

Begin from purifying. Then slowly, slowly, an effortless state comes, without any effort.

Right now, the purification of mind needs your effort: a little attention, slowing down a little, your mindfulness, your awareness. Your support is needed.

If you just look at things casually and let the mind do its usual job, that is not good. It needs your support: notice what kind of mind is arising, and find your way to change it.

Your effort is needed, your support is needed.

Then slowly, slowly, the state of effortlessness will come. At that time, you are free from your own mind.

Student: Thank you. This is very interesting.

Rinpoche: Well, this is one way. There are also many ways; you will figure them out.

Student: I feel very fortunate, because it seems very effortless when I am in the presence of someone like you. I do not need to do anything, and my mind clears up, no matter how many clouds there have been, for years, for a whole lifetime.

Rinpoche: Our consciousness, no matter what kind of pollution we put into it...

You see, no matter how much darkness has been stored in a room, perhaps for thousands, even millions of years, the moment you turn on the light, it is gone. It is something like that. That is why emptiness is the greatest cleansing.

Luminosity is like Mahamudra, and emptiness is a term we use in the Mahayana. In the Tantrayana, we use "luminosity" and "clear light" and related terms, also "Mahamudra" and so on. We have different names, but they are similar.

[Q&A with GarTul Chimi Dorjee Rinpoche during his visit to Taiwan, December 21, 2023]