Chenrezig Tibetan Buddhist Cultural Center of El Paso, Texas

This course is in Spanish.
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On the auspicious day of the Chökhor Düchen Festival, we remember the Buddha’s first teaching. Traditionally, we refer to that event with the expression of the “first turning of the Dharma Wheel”. The symbol of the wheel derives from ancient India. There, the wheel symbolized the wheel of the universal emperor who established righteous dominion. Later the wheel became one of the eight auspicious symbols of Buddhism.

Dharmachakra
Some texts say that the gods offered the Buddha the wheel after he manifested enlightenment. Additionally, the eight spokes of the Dharma wheel represent the eight-fold path.

The Buddha Travels to Teach
As followers of the Buddha, we joyfully recall the beginning of his long teaching career. Also, we take time to reflect upon these teachings and rejoice in the merit of enlightened activity. Traditional texts explain that after the Buddha realized awakening beneath the Bodhi tree at Bodh Gaya, he spent seven weeks there engaged in a series of contemplations. At first, he was reluctant to teach, fearing that people would not understand his message. But, according to the written accounts, the gods Indra and Brahmā persuaded him to share his discovery of truth. But the Buddha took the time to seek the appropriate audience for his message. He journeyed to the Deer Park at Isipatana. We now know the site as Sarnath, and it sits about 8 kilometers from Varanasi in northern India. And there he turned the wheel of the Dharma for the group of five companions with whom he had previously practiced austerities.

These days we preserve this first Dharma teaching as:

Pāli Language: Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta
Sanskrit Language: Dharmachakrapravartana Sūtra
Tibetan Language: chos kyi ‘khor lo rab tu bskor ba’i mdo
English Language: Setting in Motion the Dharma Wheel Sūtra

The Buddha declared the path to be The Middle Way because it was free from the two extremes of austerities and of over-indulgence. Additionally, this path results in seeing four truths about how things truly are. We call them truths because they accurately describe our situation. But they are truths for the noble ones because we do not all see this. Only “noble ones” who have experienced some level of awakening see things accurately.

The Four Truths of the Noble Ones [...]

The Truth of Unease or Suffering
The Truth of the Origins of Suffering
The Truth of the Cessation of Suffering
The Truth of the Path (that brings about cessation)[…]

“We experience everything through the mind. Sensory perceptions stream in and are interpreted by the mind. All our inner feelings, emotions, thoughts, memories, anticipations and fantasies are from the mind. But how much care do we take of our minds? Suppose we all had loud-speakers attached to our minds and everyone could hear exactly what we were thinking out loud. Wouldn’t everyone want to learn how to meditate and control the mind very quickly?”

- Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo (repost)

Photo: Jetsunma sitting at a table with two microphones in front of her, burying her face in her palm. At a public teaching in Paris, 2009.

“From your present state, all of the way to the enlightened state of a buddha, the distance that you have travelled on the Buddhist path is measured by the transformation of your mind.

Every moment on the path you can either move forward, stay still, or move backward.

To find out how far you have progressed on the path, just look at your ethics, concentration, and wisdom. You must be honest with yourself when you do this, as there is absolutely no point in pretending that your state of your mind is something that it is not. Every few months, just ask yourself, “Have my ethics, concentration and wisdom increased, stayed the same, or decreased?”. Be honest.

If you are staying still or moving backward on the path, do not expect progress if you continue what you are doing. Progress can only come from consistent practice. The more you practice, the faster and further you will move forward on the path. And if you do not keep up the practice, there is a real danger that you will slide back down the path. It is as simple as that.”

~ Chamtrul Rinpoche (repost)

Estamos listos para la enseñanza de esta tarde, El Fundamento de las Prácticas de Sutra y Ta**ra - Jhampa Shaneman en Laberinto del Quinto Sol
Aún hay cupo, tu donativo puede ser de $150 o $200 pesos pero a nadie le será negada la entrada por falta de dinero.
Gracias a Karuna Rivera y Luis Pegut por las facilidades para realizar este evento 🙏🏼

“Consider the fact that no matter how many planets and stars are reflected in a lake, these reflections are encompassed within the water itself. And that no matter how many universes there are, they are encompassed within a single space. And that no matter how vast and how numerous the sensory appearances of samsara and nirvana may be, they are encompassed within the single nature of mind.”

~ Dudjom Lingpa

(Chamtrul Rinpoche’s famous monastery in Tibet was the home to Dudjom Lingpa, a great yogi and master of Dzogchen, who lived from 1835 to 1904)

“Every moment of your life provides an opportunity to practice, no matter where you are, or what is happening. Do not let practice become just something that is done in a dharma centre, or in front of a shrine, or on your meditation seat. But also let the whole world and all that you encounter within it become the training ground for your mind. The more that you do this, the faster you will move on the path to buddhahood, and the happier you will become on the way.”

~ Chamtrul Rinpoche

“Don’t expect an affliction to vanish because you successfully applied the antidote once. Until we have realized emptiness directly and nonconceptually, afflictions will continue to arise in our mind. Don’t be discouraged. Keep practicing. Making effort to transform our mind produces benefit for ourselves and others.”
- Venerable Thubten Chodron (repost)

“Like a lake unruffled by any breeze, the concentrated mind is a faithful reflector that mirrors whatever is placed before it exactly as it is.”
— Bhikkhu Bodhi (repost from Study Buddhism)

“We all know that a truly enlightened mind, a mind which is filled
with wisdom and compassion, would not discriminate. We know that a
master who embodied genuine wisdom and compassion would be totally open and accepting of everyone. How could an enlightened master say, “Yes, I accept this person but I don’t accept that person”? It’s not possible to even imagine that.

And therefore, the more we are closed to certain sections of society or religion or race, the more we close our heart and the less we are embodying of our genuine enlightened nature. The more judgmental, the more rigid, the more we are caught up in our likes and dislikes, the further we are away from an enlightened state, because an enlightened state is non-discriminating.”

- Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo (repost)

Photo: Jetsunma at a Hindu event, wrapped in a bright orange shawl, marigolds around her neck and yellow and red tilak on her forehead, Mandi, April 2024.

“Each sentient being is like a sleeping buddha who is dreaming about inherent existence of self and of all phenomena, and believing the dream to be true, which causes their nightmare of samsara - their uncontrollable recurring rebirth with all of its uncertainty, problems, and suffering.

The practice of buddhism is like the method to wake up from this nightmare, by waking up to the forever blissful reality of emptiness. In other words, waking up to the forever blissful reality of lack of inherent existence of self and of all phenomena, to become a fully awakened buddha for the benefit of all sentient beings who are still dreaming.”

~ Chamtrul Rinpoche (repost)

“The important thing is not to identify ourselves with our thoughts and feelings, but to see that thoughts and opinions are just mental factors. Even a belief system in itself is a mental artifact. The Buddha, when talking about the doctrine of the Dharma, said, “This is a raft, it’s a boat. It can take you from this shore of relative reality to the other shore of absolute reality”. Now, while we are mid-stream, we would be foolish to discard our raft, but when we get to the other shore, we would be equally foolish to then place the raft on our shoulders and carry it around out of respect. When we reach the other shore we no longer have need of the raft. The Dharma is just a device; it is the path, but it isn’t the goal.”

- Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo (repost)

Photo: Jetsunma with long-time friend Tenzin Dolma aboard a boat on the Elbe River on a sunny day in Hamburg, 2009.

“When facing death, kings and beggars are treated in the same manner. After death, every sentient being will be thrown around in samsara by their positive and negative karma. Therefore, it is very unwise to commit a negative action, while thinking solely about benefiting this present life.”

~ Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche

(Chamtrul Rinpoche was a heart son of Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche, one of the greatest masters of recent times who was responsible for reviving Buddhism in many areas of Tibet)
Repost from Chamtrul Rinpoche’s

“Compared to the ancient wisdom cultures, more and more people in today’s modern global culture are using so much of their time and energy on focusing only on the darkness of our world.

Please focus within, and shine the light of your love on to the world, and illuminate everybody that you encounter. This is the way of the bodhisattva.

Just how a candle lights another candle in times of darkness, the illuminating qualities of a loving bodhisattva will inspire others to also turn within.”

~ Chamtrul Rinpoche