“About 2,550 years ago the great teacher Buddha was born in India and around the age of 29 he left the kingdom. Then, at the age of 35 he attained buddhahood, becoming a fully enlightened being. After his enlightenment, he began to share his realization and experience with his followers. His realization was absolutely based on loving kindness, compassion, and wisdom for all living beings with no discrimination.

When he gave the teachings on love, compassion, and wisdom, it’s not that he was trying to be nice or polite to the others. The Buddha saw that the very nature of every living being is love, is compassion, is wisdom; that is enlightenment. He also saw that everyone needs to discover true nature in order to remove their difficulties, challenges and suffering. There’s no other solution except to discover one’s own inherited nature. He practiced love, compassion, and wisdom and discovered our beautiful nature. He saw that it is the highest form of religion – there’s no higher Dharma than true love, true compassion, and true wisdom.

This nature is the basic nature of every living being, not just the human beings, but every single living being. Whether we see it or not, this nature is equally pervasive and inherent in all beings. And this is the nature we have to reveal if we’d like to be beautiful beings for one’s self and for others. That is why we really have to shine. This nature is also something that we have to work to reveal, because our nature is hidden within so many illusions or habitual patterns that we’ve created with our minds. They have nothing to do with our true nature. We create them and make fabrications, layer over layer like onion skins, so that our true nature is hidden underneath. We have to peel back all the skins of the onion to reveal our innate nature.

In order to reveal this beautiful nature, we have to apply the natural way not an artificial one, nor by fixations, nor by creating something completely unrealistic. We have to follow the path of the true nature to discover that nature. The artificial fabrications will not discover it, but will take us a distance from it. To follow the path of that nature as it is, is known in Buddhism as Dharma. Dharma is simply following that nature perfectly, beautifully, with balance and joy.

To follow this natural path, Buddha gave many different teachings, he laid out different techniques so that everyone can connect with it according their readiness and their connections. One of the most sophisticated and powerful ones is the Vajrayana teachings. They are considered to be a very powerful and direct way to discover our innate nature. It is following the path of that nature.

The nature of the Vajrayana teachings is very powerful in directly approaching the original nature, because, according to them, the original nature of everything is enlightened. It is very pure. There’s nothing that really needs to change from the way things are, the way we experience them. The only thing we need to change is the duality mind. We have to adjust the duality mind, because it is making a very strong blockage to realizing and connecting to this nature. It is like walls between our nature–the way things are, and the way we see things. That is the big blockage, the wall between us. And the duality mind is not something that comes from outside-it is created by our own mind. Mind creates this regimented conception of duality, and then we continue it by holding, grasping, and clinging. That is the big hindrance to realizing the true nature as it is.”

Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche
Khenpo Tsewang Dongyal Rinpoche
PBC Georgia in Carollton
February 1, 2006