On 27 and 28 November, H.E. Tsoknyi Rinpoche gives a teaching of The Practice of the Four Immeasurable Qualities – loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy & equanimity – is the foundation of all Buddhist teachings to give rise to the sublime qualities of bodhicitta, the heart and mind of enlightenment. It dispels all our sufferings and manifests happiness and serenity in us. 

To cultivate the Four Immeasurables requires a deep understanding of its meaning and genuine practice, time and again, in our daily life. H.E. Tsoknyi Rinpoche’s simple yet profound teaching serves to clarify these four immeasurable qualities and deeply root them in our mind. In time, with diligent practice, the heart will gradually open up and transform into boundless loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy & equanimity for ourselves and others.

This teaching is organised by Pundarika Malaysia with support from Tsoknyi Rinpoche Singapore. 

Below is content as said by Tsoknyi Rinpoche on Nov 27.

Four Immeasurable qualities – loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy & equanimity is fundamental teaching for becoming bodhisattva and eventually becoming enlightened 

door to bodhicitta

seed of bodhicitta 

relevant in modern life

we need bodhiccita more than ever in our time

in one way, our world is going forward in many sense, esp medical economical world, but at same time, we are also facing some challenges and difficulties 

we are facing subtle but pervasive suffering lack of spirituality and lack of bodhicitta

lack of true basic love

lack of connecting with our true nature suffused by love and loving kindness

we don’t really acknowledge the subtle suffering but affecting our lives and well being , mood way of thinking emotion, and we don’t really look for solution

creates a sad experience for ourselves and others, but many times pple don’t acknowledge the sadness

creates conflict between generations

to change the world starts from changing ourselves

time to time we need to change

focus of compassion traditionally is on pple who ae experiencing suffering, in times of now, we can turn the focus on the subtle

bodhicitta focus on all sentient beings, and on selfless love. But to achieve that we need to focus on ourselves first. The healthy self first, focus on making the healthy self in order to express bodhicitta selflessly to all sentient beings

keep intention selfless and for all sentient beings, to achieve that we have to start from ourselves and me

if our self is not healthy, we cannot express loving kindness to our loved ones and to all sentient beings

loving

many self is broken, tainted and becomes unhealthy 

revive essence love 

out of four immeasurable, most important is love and loving kindness

time to time we have to practice together

essence of loving kindness= essence love= express to someone abt your love care your willingness to offer protection and your wish of well being for others

pple think want to help but we don’t feel it

revive that basic wellbeing of essence love

otherwise its just a good idea, great thought but as a person are you able to do it

that hollow in you is more urgent than helping others

essence love: in subtle body language= bindu= not physical not cognition mind, in between there’s a special feeling connected to subtle body and is emerging and born or manifest out of bindu

bindu: not physical cognitive thinking, 

prana: qi

nadi: nerve, subtle nerve

bindu, energy flow in nadi carried by qi, when it flows into different channels we feel good, when there is blockage, it doesn’t flow properly, we have different moods emotions and blocks essence love

subtle body has 2 levels: subtle and very subtle

the subtle dies with death of physical body

the very subtle goes with consciousness in bardo and carries into next life

without any reason, just feel ok in the core

we have misconception: we need to feel ok because of a reason, 

pls don’t give it any reason or measure it, compare it

it is your birthright

it is part of your nature: no need reason

you have right to experience that

you experience when you are young

only thing is you didn’t know it

you didn’t know in the language of cognition but you experienced it: we lost that touch

that openness

that playfulness

that humour 

we become serious task oriented we lost beautiful innocence in ourselves 

essence love practice is to reconnect with that innocence okayness of basic beautiful love

when you nurture that you feel happy

you keep looking for why i m happy

you simply cannot accept that happiness 

we are measuring comparing , and we start looking at unfulfilled areas, smthg happened 10 years ago and we look at that area, or smthg that might happen in future and we invite fear

there’s no time to simply appreciate that beauty

why cant you simply acknowledge that essence love is that one source of happiness

but instead worry all possibilities of smthg that might happen

of course smthg might happen in future, there are so many possibilities of change, negative to positive , positive to negative, this is the natural law you cannot fight 

but we can be smart with them

what you are doing, learning, is a smart way of dealing with nature

acceptance is smart way of dealing with them

accept = when don’t accept everything, you realise you need to accept eg aging, but you can still be healthy

aging does not mean you should go down and be unhealthy

it could be that you have more money to spend, more time to practice essence love

we forget that essence love is one source of happiness

when you are happy you want to make people happy

making people happy is loving kindness= there are many different ways, simplest way is your smile, greetings, your tone of voice, your behaviour , how you move your body language, if your inner experience is cloudy moody, you only see your front road your negative mind more

when we experience essence love, we feel courage we are not bounded by chain of fear and that has tremendous power

best way of breaking chain of fear is essence love: you feel happy , less fear

not all fear are bad, there is healthy fear but there is no reference, there is no ground to judge as all is mixed up, when that happens we make a mistakes

when measurements come to you, it brings a lot of things, but your happiness is not that

of course there is many other happiness i call that extra happiness that comes and goes but but core happiness is from essence love: be confident and rest in this knowledge 

but this code happiness if you know how to connect with this, it stays with you forever, that is real home, mental home, don’t be homeless in this way.

don’t have to be bothered by others, eventually they will experience your essence love

if you have doubts of essence love, don’t believe it, doubt is temporary and impermanent, comes and goes, don’t serve tea to doubt, or you are shaking your understanding and experience of essence love

just rest and be normal and humble and relax with this, appreciate it

drop the thinking mind, invite the awareness mind and be aware of feelings

just be aware of hat is connecting with body, just be aware

just feel and be aware

let it be open

openness comes from non judgement 

the inner world manifest but we are not judging 

non judging is kindness

allowing to manifest anything 

allowing is kindness

openness is beyond like and dislike

relax with that openness

confusion might arise, its ok. arising of thoughts is ok, non arising is also ok

we have so many ways to express ourselves

let it be expressed

and that is freedom

freedom is kindness

be kind to yourself

let it come right or wrong, be open to all

okayness of essence love is bigger than clouds, turbulence, its a space

fear comes, be kind to the fear

fear is trying to protect you, be aware of fear, be okay to fear

one day fear and okayness coexist and that is essence love there

there might be fear but deep down is essence love

that okayness is essence love and there is a special feeling of well being

healthy to experience essence love when you have fear

be honest with your feelings

just say hi and not judge with open attitude in the sense of not blocking unpleasant feeling

there is another special feeling beyond pleasant and unpleasant

there is a special feeling beyond pleasant and unpleasant, and this special feeling can host pleasant and unpleasant feelings

in being okay with pleasant and unpleasant

and that is essence love

nurture that

nurture by simply being , be with that

being with it is nurturing

relaxing with that is nurturing 

honour it

honouring is nurturing

paying attention with essence love is nurturing

no comparing is nurturing 

without reason is nurturing 

if keep doing that, there is an expression of essence love and you bring a mindful immeasurable mind training 

all sentient beings wants happiness and the cause of happiness

may i be the person who can provide happiness to others

based on my essence love, i train myself to bring happiness to others to protect from unhappiness

may i become the protector of happiness, i would like to lead many pple to happiness

may i have the potential and the opportunity to use my potential in the right way

mind heart become one, connected and focussed for the well being of others

on the way of training this , sometimes it might not feel this way, be aware of this blockage, don’t need to feel sad. we all have this blockage and different issues

we all have different imprints and manifest different experiences

we have all different beautiful monsters, be aware of that

be kind to it, say hi to your blockages, its ok to have blockages, try not to suppress

be aware of these and just say hi

smile at these and feel them and practise lovingkindness with these

attitude changes, and change of attitude is kindness

the blockages is not me , is my imprint 

something happened, it is impermanent, it is emptiness also

it might open up , don’t get too excited, just be ok with openness

this blockage might come again next time, be ok with that, that okayness is kindness

this blockage might not come again, be okay with that, 

that okayness grows in you

and that is first step of developing essence love into expression love

the okayness kills irrelevant unhealthy fear

blockages might happen but okayness is opening eyes

okay with all the changes

okayness is fundamental solution along with all other solutions in life, its a mental strength that will solve your ups and downs and gives courage, not only your problem, but will help with others problems

this age needs this practice

you can connect anytime

time to time connect with that equanimity

pple think that essence love will come only with suffering but that is not true

when u lose faith in love, that is expression love, that love has obj and subj, you are losing faith in that, but even so, you do not lose essence love

you lose trust of duality love, you might face broken love with duality but you cannot ignore your birthright called essence love that is always loving to you even if you hate yourself

you might have unhappy experiences in conditional love but its impossible to have unhappy experience with essence love

to heal conditional love, only way is connect with essence love

heal beautiful monster first, internally you gain strength

then u express love and not afraid of taking love from others

Teaching on 28 Nov

Nov 28

After we practise essence love, we will have less unnecessary suffering, hopefully we find ourselves at home with confidence , a little bit of joy without reason, subtle and gentle happiness without reason

because of that we become a little less busy fixing on ourselves

Its human nature when we don’t feel ok, we want to feel ok and fix not ok to be ok—–not ok in the sense of hollow, meaningless and we want to fill that hollow by any means

we have the right to feel ok, but when we don’t feel ok and want to fix that hollow

and the beginning of inner consumption happens, of course there is consumerism on the outside but it opens inner hungry and we trying to fill the gap of the hollow, could be a spiritual consumerism might happen

so now you found okayness you are home you feel happy a little bit of joy and suddenly you have time . Wow i am not fixing myself , I am ok

I am ok with not ok

I don’t need to be busy fixing myself

there is an energy, urge and inner movement

what shall i do with this energy?

it starts to express and manifest

what shall i do with that

fix others ie fixing might not be a suitable word but it means to do smthg for others, this energy will not sleep

before, it was fixing myself, now it is fixing others and that is the beginning of expression love and it comes from essence love without hollowness

when you help others with joy, helping others can be a way of fixing myself, but now not anymore because i have essence love which is part of buddha nature

seed of relative bodhicitta starts to grow without hope fear to fix myself: this energy is inside me to focus on others, lets practise loving kindness unbiased loving kindness which is the fourth immeasurable, you are helping any sentient being close and far

when you don’t have fear and hope on yourself, you don’t need to fix yourself, lets use bodhicitta energy to help others

lets train my mind and heart

loving kindness if focussing based on happiness: may i bring happiness to all sentient beings

may i bring the cause of happiness to them

happiness is individual

there is a standard happiness and individual happiness

basic common happiness is related to physical body needs, almost all sentient beings have pain and pleasure

mental happiness is more complex, hopefully we have wisdom to help them grow based on case by case basis and on a non violent approach

individual happiness always need to go with non violence-means physical emotional and mental states

ultimate happiness is nirvana liberation and buddha hood

may i bring all sentient beings ultimate happiness ie end of suffering, end of 3 types of suffering, free from duality combination of ultimate bodhicitta and relative bodhicitta, i would like to serve all sentient beings and bring a state of buddhahood to all sentient beings

i may not have capacity now but i want to do that

this can happen when i have freedom

relative help i can help along the path of buddha hood; ultimate happiness i must achieve first if not I don’t have the power to serve all sentient beings

i decide right now that I will take the bodhisattva vow to serve all sentient beings, its a big promise but i m not aiming to achieve in one lifetime

i don’t mind how long it takes i m willing to take the risk. it is good risk, why not?

if i don’t do it now, when?liberation buddhahood might take several lifetimes or 500 lifetimes or how long, i don’t mind

it is a big heart to take the commitment

to achieve that i need to practise myself : all my practice is to heal suffering of others, i should practise the paramitas

i need a team of paramitas to lead my journey successfully

this heart starts to express essence love and essence love becomes bigger and bigger, big as vast as space: as long as sentient beings are in universe, may i become a useful person

i think big but start small: start this practice from my home with my children with my parents my partner and with myself, this 6 paramitas practice

I have to help myself, i have to be healthy myself, i have to be strong myself, this strong person can cary the mission of helping others: i should eat proper food and sleep at the right time, i should behave properly , follow bodhisattva ‘s path and practise emptiness express my relative bodhicittas etc accumulation of merit and wisdom, the 2 wings of the bird, i should stay still , i should practise samadhi, vipassana natural mind , to go beyond duality, I should take this seriously: so this heart is opening

Unless you have essence love, not easy to open heart. You might have beautiful thoughts and concepts but thought without feeling, concept without heart, so lets open heart first, when heart starts to express , thought follows

2 ways: thought brings feeling or feeling brings thought. in modern times a lot of the heart is blocked as we overtrain too much our thoughts as we train the cognitive and conceptual mind, we neglect feelings: now is time to take care of feelings

take care of your beautiful baby heart, its ok to be baby sometimes, bring humour and spontaneity that is part of baby, the carefree part with adult mind. Mind should grow up, heart should be sometimes baby

Head don’t be baby, will mess up everything. Think properly.

Ffeel essence love warmness of bodhicitta- this combination will fix yourself and others. Feelings come from heart; understanding comes from head: if you have both you have both wings and fly to nirvana.

Bodhisattva wings are very big, just be big hearted

When you have big heart, you are ready to see sufferings and is not afraid of suffering, is willing to suffer for others, compassion is not easy but can be achieved. compassion is focussed on eliminating suffering. Loving kindness is bringing happiness. Loving kindness turn into compassion and there’s a willingness to take on difficulties, not enjoying only your practice, you almost enjoying difficulties of others on yourself—there is guts, heroic heart mind. Whenever there is conflict or difficulty, you think about getting there and doing something, even if it might affect me, but I have essence love. I can go in and go out also, there’s not a dead road but light at the end of the tunnel. I know how to manage my state of mind, I will not be broken hearted or break down. i know how to manage my internal emotions and i can come back to my home, and I m willing to take difficulties. That is not easy but easy to say. Its difficult to do, but if you do a little bit it has tremendous effect. It directly connects with your self centredness, self cherishing I is provoked.

I- i want to be relaxed have my own time, everyone should have their own time, why should I help? Everyone has ability to fix their own problems why should I be involved? There are thousands of reasons not to be involved, rights, karma etc not to fix others problems. And we miss out-hidden agenda within us, to be caught up in modern comforts. Trying to maintain comfort zone.

I will do bodhisattva activity if I m in my comfort zone, i can help when I m in my comfort zone but once I m out I m sorry. eg I have to have air purifier in my room, I must have the right temperature etc then I can conduct bodhisattva’s activity. Without that I will pray for you.

Many people have good hearts but many are locked up in their comfort zone. As a bodhisattva you need to suffer a little. High low temperature doesn’t matter, without air purifiers doesn’t matter, this comfort zone comes from the chicken hearted—-you can be easily trapped inside this

We need guts to breakout of cocoon of comfort zone, in trying to minimise pain of sentient beings, when you have that heart, it is compassion, that heart will drive your thoughts.

When you have compassionate heart, you will find the solutions, humans have the ability —- if you really want to do something, you will figure it out

If you have a heart of compassion, we will find out from our intelligent mind what to do. For me, between thoughts and feelings , feelings are more powerful. If you want to do something and you feel from your heart deep down, you will find a solution to complete that wish, you will step out of comfort zone. And you will sacrifice. If you can see great beings in this world, they all have this urge from the heart first then they look for solutions. Milarepa has this urge from the heart. Every human has a secret agenda, as a buddhist this is our secret agenda -loving kindness compassion is our hidden agenda. Normally hidden agenda others don’t know , so when you practise this bodhicitta , people don’t know, if they know its ok, if they don’t know you don’t need to say it. You don’t need anyone’s approval, confirmation or appreciation

You can be a normal person but having the heart of a bodhicitta, mind of wisdom, you can practise in any field. You maybe practicing the path of bodhissatva for 10 years but your partner does not know, but you always give surprises. He or she doesn’t need to know. You are generating inner beauty, inner beauty doesn’t age. Physical beauty might age, not mind. Your relationship with partner maintained by bodhicitta,

In order to maintain the relationship, you need to have attraction. Bodhicitta is the source of attraction. Every sentient being appreciates goodness of something, when you naturally display goodness, others are surprised . That surprise will maintain your relationship and keeps its going as you do more practice.

I appreciate people who display goodness, it makes me cry

You don’t have to say: i am a bodhisattva practitioner , you have to bring tea to my door and know that i am doing this for all

Talk or don’t talk doesn’t matter, the warmness of your heart will warm others

Long term partners don’t usually talk, scared of talking I know, but not talking does not mean you need to be frozen or cold with each other. Sometimes not talking is also co-operation. But always be warm hearted with bodhicitta.

One day both parties will be happy even if don’t talk. Warmth of sun of bodhicitta is warming things . Both very comfortable in the house.Bodhicitta needs to begin at home with your children parents partners

The world is not perfect. Bodhicitta is not about being perfect to others, bodhicitta is embracing others, not correcting others but helping others, there’s no win or lose, not right and wrong. Very hard to say what is right and wrong, due to different perspectives. Many family problems occurs because of different perspectives of claiming right and wrong.. different opinions different ways of expressing…which, is very small things, ok to lose sometimes. Bodhicitta is not asking to win all the time. Losing something is also part of the bodhicitta sometimes. Its very beautiful practise— i wish the world can do more of this lovingkindness and compassion practice.

‘Please teach my wife bodhicitta, i want her to practise more and she will follow what i say or what i want. I want to help her, she’s really suffering. I really feel compassion to her’——-if you have really this compassion its good but you might need to change something. If you really want to practise, you have to change something. Nobody is always right and nobody is always wrong.

If someone claims he is always right it means he is always wrong. Bodhisattva is willingness to take suffering difficulties sacrifice with strong heart. Compassion does not have any romantic sense-its a hard core practice . Don’t think you practice compassion and you will be happy. You will have happiness in the form of satisfaction, not happy happy but in the form of satisfaction .

Don’t aim for happy happy you will have a different kind of happiness within the suffering in the satisfaction way, its a deeper form of happiness outside of comfort zone happiness, within the difficulties. There will be joy, a different kind of joy, and you want that joy for all sentient beings. May they be free from sufferings and always be in happiness and joy, and this joy is not elimination of suffering, is joy with bodhicitta’s heart and wisdom. Bodhisattvas never wish there is no suffering, there’s always suffering, and may I go there to do something and suffer together and reduce the suffering of others.

When you practise compassion, it is the beginning of bodhicitta

——Practice——-

Sometimes when we train compassion, we get lost into our thoughts. When this happens, come back to focus on essence love, use mindfulness and awareness and reconnect with your basic well being. Or you can recognise your natural mind.Natural mind is ultimate bodhicitta. Free from duality -no subject no object you are no generating anything you just be in it. Don’t worry about the feelings, thoughts, just stay—as a mirror. You do not need to feel guilty that you are not feeling anything towards sentient beings.

Natural mind is eliminating ignorance and bringing more wisdom. On the way to help sentient beings we need wisdom. Resting in natural mind is also bodhicitta. Because I have to be free from confusion, more clear and my mission becomes more successful. If I become calm and clear and luminous, my mission becomes more effective.

I don’t feel sentient beings at this moment, but resting in natural mind is part of helping sentient beings. Because I didn’t lose my hidden agenda, resting in natural mind is fulfilling my agenda. If we are clear of our hidden agenda, no matter what you do, the practice is part of bodhicitta. Bodhicitta is not always i feel you I love you, sometimes no feeling but making yourself more capable -so you don’t need to feel guilty.

We are all tainted by our imprints, reacts to our triggers. we are not that different