Student and Teacher

Together on the Path

As students on the Tibetan Bön Buddhist path, we offer our teachers a range of questions from the simple to the complex. Here is a question regarding gaining confidence in our practice and bringing it into the world.

Student:  I've been meditating every day since last October and I have been able to get into deep refuge, feeling luminous and nonbiased. I feel like anything can arise in my meditation and I don't have to go toward it and I don't have to pull back. What is the best way of bringing that out into the world, into informal practice, and how can I develop confidence in this?

Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche: First, whenever we are going inward and resting in our inner refuge, we feel protected from all the movement, being in the stillness. We feel protected from all the news and talking and noises, because we are deeply protected in the power of silence. We feel protected from all the thoughts and emotions when we are deeply protected in that indestructible sacred space. So we feel more protected being in that refuge.

The moment you come out of that, the moment you come out in the world, the moment you have interactions with someone, the moment you face your famous person, the moment you face noise, traffic, your boss, your deadlines – then the story changes a little and that protective mood is no longer there. The moment we are facing these things in our ordinary life and we feel threat or challenge, that shakes our confidence.

The number-one reason why outer circumstances shake your confidence and stability is that we do not have a right relationship with them. We see them as the enemy and destroyer. We don't see them as ourselves or our friend, as our support, as our resource; we don't see that. That's where, many times, things go wrong, when we go out and we think enemy. Right?

During a retreat, people are having a wonderful time, feeling great, and then the retreat is over. They go to the parking lot, and when they open the door, they smell their car. Just one single smell of their samsara in their car triggers the whole world of samsara out there. Right? That's a powerful smell. Why does that smell have so much power? That smell reminds us of all of samsara. It reminds us of pain, of conflict, maybe of those moments of loneliness, or of aggression in traffic. Whatever it's reminding you of, it is not reminding you of your true nature, it's reminding you of pain and samsara. But it can remind you of your nature. It can remind you.

In short then, your informal practice is that every time anything triggers your pain, don't look at it as an enemy. Look at each experience as a reminder: Thank you so much for reminding me! Thank you so much for exercising my strength. Thank you so much for testing me; I want to make sure I got it right or wrong. I want to make sure to test my confidence.

In each case, somebody is testing you. Somebody is supporting you. Somebody is opening a door for you. Somebody is showing you a way. If you look at those situations as a friend, they will not take away your confidence. Rather, they will support your confidence. So just have a little extra awareness there, all right?