DHARMA IN EVERYDAY LIFE

By Nhat Quan

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Everyone has the Bodhi Mind, whether you know you have it or not, and whether you understand how to awaken it is another matter.

Speaking of the Bodhi Mind, according to the Avatamsaka Sutra, the Buddha taught:

- Good man! A Bodhisattva who develops the mind of an Unsurpassed Bodhi must develop the mind of great compassion to save all sentient beings.

- Develop the mind of making offerings to the Buddhas, serving them to the end.

- Develop the mind of seeking the true Dharma, without any regrets.

- Develop a broad mind, seeking the omniscience.

- Develop a mind of immeasurable great compassion, embracing all sentient beings.

- Develop a mind of not abandoning sentient beings, wearing the armor of steadfast vows to seek the Prajna Paramita.

- Develop a mind of practicing as the words say, to cultivate the Bodhisattva path.

- Develop a mind of not lying to the Buddhas, to uphold the great vows of all Tathagatas….

Bodhisattvas use the merits of the Bodhi mind as numerous as the dust particles of the Buddha-land, so they are born into the house of the Tathagata.

Good man! Just like a person learning to shoot, first must practice standing, then learn how to shoot. Likewise, a Bodhisattva who wants to learn the Tathagata's path of omniscience must first abide in the Bodhi mind, and then practice all the Buddha-dharma.

Good man! Just like a machine, if there is no key, the separate parts of the body cannot function. Likewise, if a Bodhisattva lacks a Bodhi mind, all practices will be scattered, and he cannot accomplish all the Buddha-dharma.

Good man! Just like a diamond, all things cannot be destroyed, on the contrary, it can destroy all things, but its nature will not be damaged. The Bodhisattva's Bodhi mind is also like that, throughout the three lives and countless eons, he teaches and transforms living beings, practices ascetic practices, and does what the Sravakas cannot do, but in the end, he does not tire or lose it.

Thus, the Bodhi mind is very important. If you put the Bodhi mind into the heart of a person who does not have an upward-looking soul, it will become a dharma-breaker. On the contrary, if you put it into the heart of a noble person, also known as a person with an upward-looking, good-looking soul, it will become pure, beneficial to humanity and society, and will never fade or become dark.

Therefore, if you only know how to devote all your time to studying the Dharma in theory, then the Dharma will not bring any benefit. Only when you know how to train your heart to help you eliminate all distracting thoughts, then you will fully inherit what the heart can bring to you. And only then will the true Dharma be preserved purely, and will spread to all places and lands, benefiting sentient beings endlessly.

In his final sermons before his death, the Buddha advised his disciples as follows:

- After my death, the Dharma will replace me as your teacher.

Knowing how to follow the Dharma is the way you show your loyalty to me. During the last forty-nine years of my life, I did not conceal anything in my teachings. There was not a single secret teaching, not a single hidden meaning. All my teachings were given honestly and transparently.

This advice shows that the Buddha did not appoint any successor, no matter how talented or extraordinary, nor did he establish any leadership authority to maintain the unity of the Dharma. Instead, he entrusted the responsibility to each individual, each person must take responsibility for himself, using his wisdom and practice to see the reality as the Buddha saw when he attained Enlightenment. That path is the way to keep the precepts, practice diligently, and help you control your body, speech, and mind to develop Wisdom to help you attain the ultimate insight that the Buddha attained while meditating under the Bodhi tree.

This particular feature of Buddhism is not only a path of practice but also opens up a wide and liberal space, leading to deeper expressions and developments of some aspects and concepts of the teachings given by the Buddha. These efforts have of course also led to appropriate and suitable methods of practice. From another perspective, it can also be said that these efforts are a way of adapting to social progress as well as different cultures. This expansion of Buddhism, especially Mahayana Buddhism, is a great advantage in bringing about a profound understanding of the levels of metaphysics, psychology, logic, and even science of the practical teachings of the Buddha.

To achieve the awakening of the Bodhi mind, you need to generate the mind to escape from samsara. Because if you do not generate a pure mind to escape from samsara, you will not be able to concentrate on suppressing the desires or pleasures of the great ocean of samsara. Attachment to samsara will also bind you to possessing a body within the limits of samsara. Therefore, the first important thing is that you must be determined to escape samsara. Although it is difficult to be born into a situation where you can practice Buddhism, and even if you are born into such a situation, you must always keep in mind that:

- A human life is very short, you do not have much time to practice

Thinking like this, you can avoid desires in this world. You must always think over and over in your mind that whatever action and its consequences you create, you must bear, and all such consequences in samsara are suffering. If you can do so, you can get rid of desires in the present, and have peace in the next life.

It is by repeating and keeping in mind this that the mind that longs for happiness in the world of samsara will not arise even for a moment. Day and night, if your heart is always praying for liberation, then that is the moment when your mind is born to escape from samsara. To do so, you must generate the Bodhisattva Vow, and awaken the Bodhi Mind. Because your mind is always carried away by the flow of four violent rivers called:

- Attachment,

- Survival,

- Ignorance

- Wrong Views

And:

- Tied by the hard rope of Karma that is difficult to resist,

- Caught in the iron cage of Ego,

- Covered everywhere by the thick darkness of Ignorance

In the endless samsara, there you are tormented by the three kinds of suffering. Thus, to escape from samsara, you must develop the Bodhi Mind, because the Bodhi Mind is the enlightened mind, the mind that sees the true nature of all things. The mind believes in cause and effect and the Buddha nature of sentient beings, as well as always diligently cultivating Buddhahood. Because Bodhicitta is related in two directions:

- First is practicing according to the Buddha's teachings

Then is transforming sentient beings

According to Zen Master Suzuki in the Mahayana Buddhist Outline, he said:

- Bodhicitta is the most important characteristic of a Bodhisattva.

Therefore, when preaching about the transcendent nature of Bodhicitta in Nagarjuna's Middle Way Philosophy, he emphasized the characteristics of Bodhicitta as follows:

- Bodhicitta transcends all limitations of the Five Aggregates, the Twelve Ayatanas, and the Eighteen Realms. It is not individual but universal.

- Compassion is the nature of Bodhicitta, therefore all Bodhisattvas consider Bodhicitta as the reason for their existence.

- Bodhicitta resides in the heart of equanimity, creating the means of liberation for individuals. The Bodhicitta as mentioned above can be summarized in the Four Great Vows:

- I vow to save limitless sentient beings

- I vow to end endless afflictions

- I vow to learn limitless Dharma doors

- I vow to attain the unsurpassed Buddha Way.

I need to remind you that if you want to develop the Bodhicitta or awaken the Bodhicitta, it is not just empty words like:

- I develop the Bodhicitta, which means you have developed the mind, or every day you recite the Four Great Vows, which is called you have developed the Bodhicitta.

If you want to develop the Bodhi Mind, you must observe to establish it truly and act according to that wish in your monastic life. Some people kneel every day after chanting sutras and reciting Buddha's name to recite the dedication:

- May the three obstacles be eliminated and afflictions eliminated

May I attain true and clear wisdom

May all sins be eliminated

May I always practice the Bodhisattva Path

But then in their actions, on the contrary, today they are greedy, tomorrow they are resentful, the next day they are ignorant and lazy. One day they speak ill of or criticize others, the next day they argue, quarrel, and hate each other. In this way, the three obstacles cannot be eliminated. Most of you only practice in form, but pay little or no attention to the awakening of the mind. As a result, the fire of the three poisons still burns fiercely, unable to enjoy the refreshing taste of liberation that the Buddha taught. Therefore, here you need to ask yourself:

- How to develop the Bodhi Mind?

Or:

- How to awaken the Bodhi mind

To make the Bodhi mind arise practically, you should think and observe to develop the mind according to the following six points:

1- Enlightened Mind:

For example, you were previously ignorant, now you go to school when you have successfully studied, you know about learning. Or if you do not know America, later you can travel to America, and collect images of American cities in your mind. When you return to your native country, someone mentions America, and the scene of that city will appear in your mind. That knowledge was not there before, when the scene was absorbed, it was temporarily there, then you forgot to think about it, and gradually it will fade until it disappears completely and then return to nothingness. Your knowledge is sometimes there, sometimes not, this image disappears, and another image appears, depending on the constantly changing worldly scene, false, not real, so it is not you. The ancients said:

- The body is like foam, and the mind is like the wind.

Illusions appear without roots, without true nature.

If you are enlightened:

- Body and mind are like illusions, without attachment, gradually you will enter the realm of true emptiness where there is no more self-image.

- If your self is not, then the self of others is also not, so there is no human form.

- If your self and others are not, then the self of countless sentient beings is also not, so there is no sentient being form.

- If the self is not, then there is no lasting ego, no one can truly attain it until the eternal state of Nirvana is also not, so there is no life form.

You need to realize, that it is not that there is no true self of the eternal true nature, but because the Saint does not attach, that form becomes empty. If the person is not, then the dharma is also not, because the scene is always changing, arising, and passing away, without self-image. Therefore, you should realize that it is not that when the dharmas are destroyed, they become empty, but because they are illusory, their true nature is empty, and so are people. Therefore, the ancients said:

- Why wait for the flowers to fall,

Only then will you know that the form is empty.

Once you have realized that both people and dharmas are empty, then keep your mind pure and clear, without attachment, and recite the Buddha's name. Using such an enlightened mind to practice the path is called generating the Bodhi Mind.

2- Equal Mind:

In the sutras, the Buddha advised:

- All living beings have Buddha nature, they are all parents of past lives and Buddhas of future lives.

Buddhas see living beings as Buddhas, so they use a mind of great compassion and equality to save them. Living beings see Buddhas as living beings, so they give rise to afflictions, discrimination, hatred, and contempt. They have the same views but are different because of ignorance and enlightenment. As a disciple of the Buddha, you should follow the teachings of the World-Honored One, and have an equal and respectful mind towards all living beings, because they are future Buddhas, with the same Buddha nature. When you practice with an equal mind of respect and reverence, you will eliminate the karmic obstacles of discrimination and contempt, and give rise to good virtues. Only by practicing with such an equal mind can you develop the Bodhi mind.

3- Compassionate Mind:

You and all living beings are born with the virtues, good features, and wisdom of the Tathagata, but because of being deluded about your true nature, you have given rise to karma and are forced to reincarnate and endure boundless suffering. Now that this is clear, you must stop hating, loving, and discriminating, give rise to repentance, develop compassion, and find ways to save yourself and others, so that together you can be happy and free from suffering. You should recognize that compassion is different from love and view. Love and view are feelings of love that are stubbornly attached to form, so the result is being bound by the rope of love. Love and compassion are feelings of compassion and salvation, but are free from form, without discrimination and attachment. This mind manifests in all aspects, so the result is happiness and liberation, and blessings and wisdom increase. If you want your compassion to expand, you should abandon your suffering and sympathize with the sufferings of others. Naturally, you have a compassionate heart and want to save, so your Bodhi mind has not yet arisen, but now it suddenly arises. In the Avatamsaka Sutra, Samantabhadra Bodhisattva explained this. Great Bodhisattvas with great compassion have ten ways:

- Observing sentient beings without a place to rely on and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings with unfavorable natures and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who are poor and without good roots and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who are sleeping soundly in the long night of ignorance and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who do evil deeds and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who are already bound and yet like to throw themselves into bondage thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who are drowning in the sea of ​​birth and death and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who are burdened with long-term suffering and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who do not like good Dharma and thus giving rise to great compassion.

- Observing sentient beings who have lost the Buddha Dharma and thus giving rise to great compassion…

Having given rise to great compassion, of course, you may have to give rise to great Bodhicitta and vow to save them. Thus, great compassion and great Bodhicitta are mutually intertwined. Therefore, giving rise to loving-kindness and compassion is giving rise to Bodhicitta. Using great compassion and great mercy to practice the path is called generating the Bodhi Mind.

4- Joyful Mind:

If you have compassion, of course, you can express that mind through a joyful mind. A joyful mind can eliminate the karmic obstacles of petty jealousy. A joyful mind can eliminate the karmic obstacles of revenge. Because a joyful mind is not outside of enlightenment, it is the Bodhi mind. Joy has two types:

a- Rejoicing is when you see above, from Buddhas and saints to all kinds of living beings, doing any meritorious deeds, even if they are small, you are happy along with them. And when you see someone receiving blessings, prosperity, success, and stability, you also give rise to thoughts of joy and happiness for them.

b- Joyful and forgiving is when there are living beings doing evil, ungrateful, contemptuous, malicious, harmful things to others or you, you are patient and happy and ignore them. If you think deeply about this joy of patience, it turns out that there is no real patience, because the form of others, the form of self, and the form of harm are all absent. Therefore, the Diamond Sutra teaches:

- The Tathagata speaks of the Paramita of patience, which is not the Paramita of patience, that is called the Paramita of patience.

5- Mind of Repentance and Vow:

In the cycle of reincarnation, all people and all species constantly change and become relatives of each other. However, because of your ignorance and confusion, from beginningless time until now, because of your ego-clinging mind wanting to benefit yourself, you have harmed living beings, creating countless evil karma. Therefore, the Buddhas and Saints, because of their great compassion, have come into the world to preach the Dharma to save sentient beings, including you. However, towards the Three Jewels, you have given rise to an ungrateful heart of destruction. Today, when you are enlightened, you must be ashamed, repent, and sincerely repent of the three karmas. Maitreya Bodhisattva has ascended to the irreversible throne because he wants to quickly attain Buddhahood, he still worships and repents six times a day. Therefore, you must use your body karma to respectfully pay homage to the Three Jewels, your speech karma to confess your sins and pray for them to be eliminated, and your mind karma to sincerely repent and vow not to repeat them.

When you have repented, you must completely stop your evil thoughts and actions, not allowing them to continue, reaching a point where both your mind and your environment are empty, then it can be considered true repentance. In addition, you must also make a vow, vow to promote the Three Jewels, vow to save all sentient beings to atone for past mistakes, and repay the four heavy favors:

- The grace of the Three Jewels, the grace of parents, the grace of teachers, good friends and wise men, and the grace of sentient beings.

You have such a repentant and vowing mind, only then will your sins be eliminated, your merits will grow day by day, and you will reach the place of both blessings and wisdom. You use such a repentant and vowing mind to practice the path, then it is called generating the Bodhi Mind.

6- The mind that does not regress:

Even though you have repented and vowed to practice, it is not easy to eliminate the obstacles of karma or demons, and it is not easy to achieve merit, cultivate virtue, manifest the six perfections, and perform the ten thousand virtues. The Bodhi path to enlightenment is far away, full of hardships and obstacles, you have to go through countless kalpas, not just one or two lives. In his previous life, Master Sariputra attained the sixth stage and generated the Bodhi mind to practice the act of giving. But when he suffered the pain of gouging out an eye for the heretics, the heretics were thrown the eyes to the ground, spat on, and trampled on with his feet, he lost his Mahayana mind. Thus, you see that maintaining a vow is not easy! Therefore, if you want to have a non-retrogressive mind, you must make a firm vow. Vow that:

- Even if this body is subjected to countless hardships, and humiliations, or is beaten or killed, or even burned to ashes, it will not commit evil deeds or retreat from the path of cultivation.

You practice the path with an unwavering heart like this, then it is called generating the Bodhi Mind.

These are the six ways to generate the Bodhi Mind. Because of the importance and difficulty in awakening and generating the Bodhi Mind, in the Avatamsaka Sutra, the Buddha and the Bodhisattvas have extensively preached about the generating minds and the merits of the Bodhi Mind as follows:

- The important door to entering the path is to generate the mind first. The essential thing to cultivate is to first make a vow.

If you do not generate a great mind and do not make a firm vow, then even after countless lifetimes, you still cannot escape the cycle of reincarnation. Even if you cultivate, it will be difficult to be diligent and will only be a waste of effort. Therefore, you should know that if you want to learn the Buddha Way, you must first awaken the Bodhi Mind and must generate the Bodhi Mind, which cannot be delayed. In the past, the Great Master Sua-Sen in China composed the Bodhi Mind Vows to encourage the seven groups. In it, he presented the Bodhi Mind Aspiration in eight ways according to the vows: Evil, Straight, True, False, Great, Small, Indifferent, and Round. Of these eight ways, Evil, False, Indifferent, and Small should be abandoned; True, Straight, Round, and Big should be followed. Only then can it be called the Bodhi Mind aspiration in the right way.

1. Evil:

Some people practice without investigating their minds, only knowing how to follow the outside. Or seeking fame and profit, being immersed in present happiness, or hoping for future blessings and results, they develop the Bodhi Mind. In life, these are the kind of people who only follow the appearance and refuse to turn to the True Mind. Such aspiration is called Evil.

2. Straight:

Like you, who do not seek fame and profit, do not crave happiness and results, but only seek the Bodhi Path to escape the cycle of birth and death, to benefit yourself and others. This is the type of person who does not seek material gain above, does not like false fame below, is not interested in present life happiness, and does not think about future blessings. You only seek the Bodhi fruit for escape from the life and death of samsara. Such a mind is called straight. This is the way of developing the mind of a true practitioner, who only seeks liberation. This way of developing the mind and practicing is hard to see in this life, and only one or two people among thousands of practitioners can find this.

3. Truth:

Each thought, each thought, you seek Buddhahood above, and save sentient beings below. You see the long and distant path of Bodhi without fear, and you see sentient beings as difficult to save but you are not discouraged. Your mind is steadfast like someone climbing a mountain, determined to reach the top, like climbing a tower determined to reach the top. These people, thought after thought above, seek Buddhahood and mind after mind save sentient beings below. Hearing that becoming a Buddha is a long time away, they are not afraid and do not retreat. Such a mind is called Truth.

4. False:

Having sins but not repenting, appearing clean on the outside but dirty on the inside, being diligent at first and then lazy. Even though having a good heart but still mixed with fame and profit, having good Dharma but being polluted by sins. Having the Bodhi mind but still having these things is called False.

5. Great:

When the realm of sentient beings is exhausted, the vow is exhausted; when the Bodhi path is accomplished, the vow is accomplished. Having such a mind is called Great. This is the way of generating the mind of the Great Vehicle Dharma Body Bodhisattvas, or the Holy Sangha Bodhisattvas, who have attained the patience of non-birth, turning the wheel of Dharma without regression in the ten directions of Dharma precepts.

6. Small:

Those who see the three realms as prisons, birth, and death as enemies, only hope to be liberated quickly and do not want to save others. If you develop your mind according to this concept, it is called Small. This is the way to develop the mind of the Saints in the ranks of Sravakas and Pratyekabuddhas. Although this way of developing your mind will liberate you from the three realms and attain Nirvana, you will still be reprimanded by the Buddha for going beyond the path of Bodhisattvas and Buddhas' vows to save sentient beings.

7. Slanted:

This is the wrong way to develop your mind of those who practice but whose attainment is still within the three realms of birth and death, and have not yet been liberated. You only practice to reach a higher realm such as the realm of form or formlessness, because you have not yet understood the principle: Outside the mind, there is no dharma, outside the dharma there is no mind.

8- Perfect:

Knowing that sentient beings and the Buddha path are both self-nature, you vow to save and fulfill them. Those who practice merit but do not see themselves practicing, save sentient beings but do not see sentient beings being saved. These people use their minds as empty as space to make vows as large as space. Their practice is as vast as space, their attainments are as vast as space, and they do not see any form of emptiness. Such a mind is called perfect. This is the way of making a mind of Samyak-sambodhi bodhisattva and Eka-jati-prati-baddha. In the end, these people attain Buddhahood with all ten titles.

In short, everyone has the Bodhi Mind, it is just that you know whether you have it or not, and whether you know how to awaken it or not. If you do not want to escape from birth and death, then there is nothing to say, but if you want to escape from birth and death, you must try to awaken the Bodhi Mind, try to develop the Bodhi Mind, and follow the Buddha Dharma step by step, hoping to solve the root of birth and death. If you keep making mistakes over and over again, up to a hundred times, how can you escape from birth and death? The sutra says:

- Losing your body is as much as the soil on the ground, but gaining your body is as rare as the dust on a claw.

A body like dust on a claw is hard to get and easy to lose, so you must hold on to the body of this life, taking advantage of that hard-to-get body to practice and study Buddhism. If not, when you lose that precious body, it will be too late to regret it. Therefore, do not look down on your body, waiting until you lose it to see how precious it is. You must preserve this body carefully and always awaken the Bodhi mind. Always be aware that not only is the precious body hard to get, but also that good karma is hard to meet. Therefore, being a human being in this world, you must hold on to what you have as a means to practice until the day of liberation.

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