Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living
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Authors: Pema Chödrön
Tags: #Tibetan Buddhism
Start Where You Are
A GUIDE TO
COMPASSIONATE LIVING
P
EMA
C
HÖDRÖN
S
HAMBHALA
Boston
2011
SHAMBHALA PUBLICATIONS, INC.
Horticultural Hall
300 Massachusetts Avenue
Boston, Massachusetts 02115
© 1994 by Pema Chödrön
Translation of
The Root Text of the Seven Points of Training the Mind
© 1981, 1986 by Chögyam Trungpa; revised translation © 1993 by Diana J. Mukpo and the Nālānda Translation Committee.
The
Sādhana of Mahāmudrā
© 1968, 1976 by Chögyam Trungpa.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
The author’s proceeds from this book will be donated to Gampo Abbey,
Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada
B0E 2P0.
The Library of Congress catalogues the previous edition of this title as follows:
Chödrön, Pema.
Start where you are: a guide to compassionate living/Pema Chödrön.—1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
eISBN 978-0-8348-2116-3
ISBN 978-0-87773-880-0
ISBN 978-1-57062-839-9
ISBN 978-1-59030-142-5
1. Spiritual life—Buddhism. 2. Buddhism—China—Tibet—Doctrines.
I. Title.
BQ7805.C49 1994 93-39135
294.3′444—dc20 CIP
To my mother, Virginia, and my granddaughter, Alexandria
CONTENTS
Preface
Acknowledgments
4. Let the World Speak for Itself
7. Bringing All That We Meet to the Path
10. Cutting the Solidity of Thoughts
13. Teachings for Life and Death
14. Loving-Kindness and Compassion
16. Abandon Any Hope of Fruition
18. Taking Responsibility for Your Own Actions
19. Communication from the Heart
Appendix:
The Root Text of the Seven Points of Training the Mind
Bibliography
Resources
Index of Slogans
Notes
PREFACE
T
HIS BOOK
is about awakening the heart. If you have ever wondered how to awaken your genuine compassionate heart, this book will serve as a guide.
In our era, when so many people are seeking help to relate to their own feelings of woundedness and at the same time wanting to help relieve the suffering they see around them, the ancient teachings presented here are especially encouraging and to the point. When we find that we are closing down to ourselves and to others, here is instruction on how to open. When we find that we are holding back, here is instruction on how to give. That which is unwanted and rejected in ourselves and in others can be seen and felt with honesty and compassion. This is teaching on how to be there for others without withdrawing.
I first encountered these teachings in
The Great Path of Awakening
by the nineteenth-century Tibetan teacher Jamgön Kongtrül the Great. Called the
lojong
teachings, they include a very supportive meditation practice called
tonglen
and the practice of working with the seven points of mind training, which comes from an old Tibetan text called
The Root Text of the Seven Points of Training the Mind,
by Chekawa Yeshe Dorje. (See appendix.)
Lojong
means “mind training.” The lojong teachings are organized around seven points that contain fifty-nine pithy slogans that remind us how to awaken our hearts.
1
Working with the slogans constitutes the heart of this book. These teachings belong to the mahayana school of Buddhism, which emphasizes compassionate communication and compassionate relationship with others. They also emphasize that we are not as solid as we think. In truth, there is enormous space in which to live our everyday lives. They help us see that the sense of a separate, isolated self and a separate, isolated other is a painful misunderstanding that we could see through and let go.
Tonglen
means “taking in and sending out.” This meditation practice is designed to help ordinary people like ourselves connect with the openness and softness of our hearts. Instead of shielding and protecting our soft spot, with tonglen we could let ourselves feel what it is to be human. By so doing, we could widen our circle of compassion. Through this book I hope others may find such encouragement.
When I first read the lojong teachings I was struck by their unusual message that we can use our difficulties and problems to awaken our hearts. Rather than seeing the unwanted aspects of life as obstacles, Jamgön Kongtrül presented them as the raw material necessary for awakening genuine uncontrived compassion: we can start where we are. Whereas in Kongtrül’s commentary the emphasis is primarily on taking on the suffering of others, it is apparent that in this present age it is necessary to also emphasize that the first step is to develop compassion for our own wounds. This book stresses repeatedly that it is unconditional compassion for ourselves that leads naturally to unconditional compassion for others. If we are willing to stand fully in our own shoes and never give up on ourselves, then we will be able to put ourselves in the shoes of others and never give up on them. True compassion does not come from wanting to help out those less fortunate than ourselves but from realizing our kinship with all beings.
Later I heard these instructions presented in a more contemporary mode by my own teacher, Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche. (These have now been published in the book
Training the Mind and Cultivating Loving-Kindness.)
Trungpa Rinpoche pointed out that he had first been given these teachings when he was quite young and that it was a great relief to him to find that Buddhism could be so practical and so helpful in everyday life. He was inspired to find that we could bring everything we encounter to the path and use it to awaken our intelligence, our compassion, and our ability to take a fresh look.
In the winters of 1992 and 1993, I led one-month practice periods, called
dathuns,
completely dedicated to these lojong teachings and to the meditation practice of tonglen. Most important, those of us participating wanted to put these instructions into practice continually as the inevitable frustrations and difficulties of daily life arose. We saw the dathun as a chance to take the instructions to heart and apply them in all situations, especially those in which we usually prefer to blame or criticize or ignore. That is, we saw it as a chance to use the teachings to relate on the spot with an open heart and an open mind to the aggression, the craving, and the denial that we find in ourselves and in others.
Even for those who are unfamiliar with meditation, the lojong teachings present the possibility of an entire change of attitude: we could relate compassionately with that which we prefer to push away, and we could learn to give away and share that which we hold most dear.
For those who feel prepared to practice sitting meditation and tonglen meditation and to work with the lojong slogans in an ongoing way, doing so may be the beginning of learning what it really means to love. This is a method for allowing a lot of space, so that people can relax and open. This is the path of unconditional compassionate living. It is designed especially for people who find themselves living in times of darkness. May it be of benefit.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I
WOULD LIKE
to acknowledge the help of Pat Cousineau and Lynne Vande Bunte, who did most of the typing, and of Judith Anderson, Marilyn Hayes, Trime Lhamo, Lynne Vande Bunte, and Helen Tashima, who did the transcribing. Also thanks to Pam Gaines, who not only typed but also found people to help, and especially to Migme Chödrön, who did the first edit of the original manuscript and was a constant support to me during all the steps of preparing this book. Last but certainly not least, I want to thank Emily Hilburn Sell of Shambhala Publications. I feel extremely fortunate that she once again agreed to transform the talks into their final form.
No Escape, No Problem
W
E ALREADY HAVE
everything we need. There is no need for self-improvement. All these trips that we lay on ourselves—the heavy-duty fearing that we’re bad and hoping that we’re good, the identities that we so dearly cling to, the rage, the jealousy and the addictions of all kinds—never touch our basic wealth. They are like clouds that temporarily block the sun. But all the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one blink of an eye away from being fully awake.
Looking at ourselves this way is very different from our usual habit. From this perspective we don’t need to change: you can feel as wretched as you like, and you’re still a good candidate for enlightenment. You can feel like the world’s most hopeless basket case, but that feeling is your wealth, not something to be thrown out or improved upon. There’s a richness to all of the smelly stuff that we so dislike and so little desire. The delightful things—what we love so dearly about ourselves, the places in which we feel some sense of pride or inspiration—these also are our wealth.
With the practices presented in this book, you can start just where you are. If you’re feeling angry, poverty-stricken, or depressed, the practices described here were designed for you, because they will encourage you to use all the unwanted things in your life as the means for awakening compassion for yourself and others. These practices show us how to accept ourselves, how to relate directly with suffering, how to stop running away from the painful aspects of our lives. They show us how to work openheartedly with life just as it is.
When we hear about compassion, it naturally brings up working with others, caring for others. The reason we’re often not there for others—whether for our child or our mother or someone who is insulting us or someone who frightens us—is that we’re not there for ourselves. There are whole parts of ourselves that are so unwanted that whenever they begin to come up we run away.